Elections

Geoffrey S. Berman, who headed the Manhattan office, says in a book the Justice Department pushed cases, against John Kerry and others, to help Mr. Trump.A book by a former top federal prosecutor offers new details about how the Justice Department under President Donald J. Trump sought to use the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan to support Mr. Trump politically and pursue his critics — even pushing the office to open a criminal investigation of former secretary of state John Kerry.The prosecutor, Geoffrey S. Berman, was the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York for two and a half years until June 2020, when Mr. Trump fired him after he refused a request to resign by Attorney General William P. Barr, who sought to replace him with an administration ally.A copy of Mr. Berman’s book, “Holding the Line,” was obtained by The New York Times before its scheduled publication Tuesday.The book paints a picture of Justice Department officials motivated by partisan concerns in pursuing investigations or blocking them; in weighing how forthright to be in court filings; and in shopping investigations to other prosecutors’ offices when the Southern District declined to act.The book contains accounts of how department officials tried to have allusions to Mr. Trump scrubbed from charging papers for Michael D. Cohen, his former personal lawyer, and how the attorney general later tried to have his conviction reversed. It tells of pressure to pursue Mr. Kerry, who had angered Mr. Trump by attempting to preserve the nuclear deal he had negotiated with Iran.And in September 2018, Mr. Berman writes, two months before the November midterms, a senior department official called Mr. Berman’s deputy, cited the Southern District’s recent prosecutions of two prominent Trump loyalists, and bluntly asserted that the office, which had been investigating Gregory B. Craig, a powerful Democratic lawyer, should charge him — and should do so before Election Day.“It’s time for you guys to even things out,” the official said, according to Mr. Berman.The book comes as Mr. Trump and his supporters have accused the Biden administration and Attorney General Merrick Garland of using the Justice Department as a weapon after a judge authorized FBI agents to search his Florida house for missing classified records. Mr. Trump, who is a likely presidential candidate in 2024, has suggested without evidence that President Biden is playing a role in that investigation.However, Mr. Berman’s book says that during Mr. Trump’s presidency, department officials made “overtly political” demands, choosing targets that would directly further Mr. Trump’s desires for revenge and advantage. Mr. Berman wrote that the pressure was clearly inspired by the president’s openly professed wants.In the book, Mr. Berman, who as U.S. attorney did not give news interviews, offers new details about the high-profile prosecutions of defendants like Mr. Cohen; Chris Collins, a Republican congressman from New York; Michael Avenatti, the celebrity attorney and Trump antagonist; and Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier.He says there were cases his office pursued without pressure from Washington, but in others, he makes clear his greatest challenges did not always have to do with the law.“Throughout my tenure as U.S. attorney,” Mr. Berman, 62, writes, “Trump’s Justice Department kept demanding that I use my office to aid them politically, and I kept declining — in ways just tactful enough to keep me from being fired.”“I walked this tightrope for two and a half years,” writes Mr. Berman, who is now in private practice. “Eventually, the rope snapped.”Geoffrey S. Berman, fired as U.S. attorney, said he was naïve about President Trump’s fierce desire to pursue his critics. Johannes Eisele/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMr. Berman, who in the book describes himself as a Rockefeller Republican, had been a federal prosecutor in the Manhattan office from 1990 to 1994, and went on to become a co-managing partner of the New Jersey office of the law firm Greenberg Traurig.What to Know About the Trump InvestigationsCard 1 of 6What to Know About the Trump InvestigationsNumerous inquiries. More

The prime minister claims the country can’t afford to hold national elections next year. His opponents see a power grab linked to Beijing’s influence.HONIARA, Solomon Islands — When Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare bet big on China, cutting the Solomon Islands’ ties with Taiwan and signing a bundle of secretive agreements with Beijing, critics worried that the budding friendship would weaken the Pacific Island nation’s young democracy.On Thursday, his opponents say, Mr. Sogavare validated their fears: He pushed through Parliament a constitutional amendment that delayed next year’s national elections until 2024. That means he will face voters at what could be a more advantageous time for him, after the Solomon Islands hosts the Pacific Games, an international sporting event to be held in a complex that China is building.“The bill does not in any way inhibit or prohibit the right to vote,” Mr. Sogavare said as he opened debate in Parliament with a speech that portrayed the postponement as a minor issue. He added that his government continued to “uphold the principles of democracy and uphold national interests.”Mr. Sogavare, whose coalition government has a clear majority in Parliament, had been laying the groundwork for the delay for months, claiming that the country could not afford to hold both the vote and the Pacific Games in the same year.Opposition leaders argued that the Solomon Islands could and should do both. Australia’s foreign minister said this week that her government had offered to pay for the elections to be held as scheduled, expanding on similar assistance that Australia had offered in the past.“The government is saying it’s a one-off to accommodate the Games, but many of us look at that as an excuse,” Peter Kenilorea Jr., the deputy opposition leader, said in an interview. “It’s directly linked to China’s influence, and trying to keep certain people in power.”The Chinese Embassy did not respond to requests for comment. But while prolonging Mr. Sogavare’s tenure may benefit China, which has increased its focus on the Pacific and signed a security deal with his government this year, analysts and local observers believe that the main driver of the delay is the prime minister.China is building a stadium in Honiara, the Solomon Islands’ capital, that will be used for the Pacific Games next year.Matthew Abbott for The New York TimesAn emotional leader with what some describe as a streak of paranoia, Mr. Sogavare has served as prime minister three times before, never remaining popular enough to finish a term.In this case, people who have known him for years say that Mr. Sogavare sees the Games — and the new stadium on the main road in the capital, Honiara — as his crowning achievement.Delaying the election, his critics argue, is political opportunism: He hopes to win over the public with a sports spectacular, while also giving his coalition more time to line up deals with the Chinese government and Chinese companies, with all the infrastructure, resource extraction and influx of money that could entail.“He thinks he’s saving the Solomon Islands,” said Archbishop Chris Cardone, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church in the island nation, an American from Long Island who has spent 32 years in the country. But, he added, “the prime minister is really acting like a dictator in the model of Xi.”Mr. Sogavare has begun to resemble Xi Jinping, China’s leader, in other ways. He has become noticeably less tolerant of questions, and quicker to see enemies all around.In Parliament on Thursday, he said he was “extremely disappointed” by Australia’s disclosure about the offer of electoral aid, which he called “an attempt to directly interfere into our domestic affairs.”And before the session opened — in a round, gray parliamentary assembly building paid for by the United States in the 1990s — government officials told journalists outside that photos could no longer be taken in the public parking lot, because Mr. Sogavare had been angered by reporters who filmed him as he entered a few weeks earlier.Mr. Sogavare with China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, in Honiara in May. Xinhua, via Associated Press“Soga wants to hang on as long as he can; he’s not the first politician in the world to be like that,” said Graeme Smith, a Pacific Islands expert at the Australian National University.“Where the P.R.C. gets the credit,” he added, referring to the People’s Republic of China, “is they seem to have put him in a financial position to meet the needs of enough of his M.P.s to assure him of his job, no matter how erratic he gets.”Solomon Islands politics “is all about the money,” Archbishop Cardone said. When Mr. Sogavare faced a no-confidence vote last year, leaked government documents show, he distributed tens of thousands of dollars to fellow members of Parliament from a slush fund that started with money from Taiwan, only to be replenished by China.Whatever its cause, the election delay is another setback for a country of 700,000 people and nearly 1,000 islands, and a potential spark for social unrest.Since gaining independence from Britain in the wake of World War II, the Solomon Islands has been repeatedly shaken by violence, in ways that still shape the present.Ethnic and regional tensions exploded in 1998, with rebels on the main island, Guadalcanal — where the capital, Honiara, is situated — fighting to overthrow the dominant minority from the province of Malaita. As the unrest continued, a prime minister from Malaita was deposed in 2000 — and succeeded by Mr. Sogavare.Many Malaitans have never forgiven him for playing an instrumental role in toppling a prime minister they respected. And, after seeing him cozy up to Chinese Communists — who have always been eyed warily in a country that is deeply Christian, without a separation of church and state — their anger has intensified. Malaitans were among the leaders of antigovernment protests in November that led to the torching of 65 buildings, including most of Honiara’s Chinatown.The central market in Honiara last month. Matthew Abbott for The New York TimesMany islanders now worry that the postponement of the election, to no later than April 2024, will exacerbate the unresolved tensions.“Some people want change, they want new leaders,” said Phillip Subu, president of the Malaita Youth Council, a group that works with young people in the island province. “They don’t want to wait.”In Parliament on Thursday, these issues played out in tones both high-minded and accusatory, especially among Malaitan ministers on opposite sides of the debate.Matthew Wale, the opposition leader, whose mother is Malaitan, called the bill “a hijacking of the people’s right to exercise their vote.” John Dean Kuku, the leader of the independent group in Parliament, said it would “bring us injury with no cure.”Mr. Sogavare’s allies focused on the benefits they said the Pacific Games would bring, including dormitories that would later be used by local schools. Some of them attacked the news media and, echoing authoritarian governments elsewhere, accused the opposition of catering to nefarious “foreign elements,” like Australia and the United States. “Shame on you,” said Bradley Tovosia, the mining minister, who often works closely with Chinese officials, shouting at the opposition. “You talk to people you’re not representing.”In the public gallery, only a handful of people watched. A wall near the entrance celebrates the Constitution, enacted in 1978, featuring a photo of those who wrote it. They include Peter Kenilorea, the Solomon Islands’ first prime minister and the father of Mr. Kenilorea, the deputy opposition leader. In the photo, he is smiling with visible pride. Four and a half decades later, his son expressed disappointment in Thursday’s result.“It’s very much dictatorial,” Mr. Kenilorea said. “A vote delayed is a vote denied.” More

Josh Brecheen, an ardent Republican who is virtually assured of victory in November to represent an overwhelmingly red House seat in eastern Oklahoma, has a message that is geared as much toward G.O.P. leaders in Washington as it is toward his party’s voters: He’s not going to the Capitol to make friends.“Whomever is elected to this seat will be groomed for conformity into moderate positions and debt spending by the Republican establishment,” he proclaims on his campaign website. “Only a rare few won’t feast at the buffet of compromise.”Mr. Brecheen assures voters he won’t be tempted.As the general election season begins in earnest, the House Republican conference appears destined for a more conservative, fractious future no matter which party wins a majority, thanks to the candidates chosen by voters in the most solidly G.O.P. districts.Numerous Republican contenders in battleground districts have taken fringe positions or espoused conspiracy theories. Democrats have trained their sights on these candidates, hoping to block a wave of extremism. But the number of open seats in solidly Republican districts means that the G.O.P. is still favored to secure a narrow majority.That could spell trouble for Republican leaders like Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the man who would be speaker, and their ability to govern.It could also mean that the government will struggle to perform such mundane tasks as keeping itself from defaulting on its debt and plunging the global financial system into chaos. At the same time, a Republican-led stream of impeachments, as some lawmakers have promised for the attorney general, the homeland security secretary, the education secretary and the president, could serve as an endless string of distractions for the executive branch.“I will operate in kindness and love, and at the same time take hard stands,” Mr. Brecheen said in an interview, vowing, for instance, never to vote to raise the government’s borrowing limit, despite the risk of undermining the world’s faith in federal bond sales. “At some point, we have to draw a line in the sand.”Josh Brecheen, a Republican who is all but certain to win his House race in Oklahoma, has vowed never to vote to raise the government’s borrowing limit, despite the worldwide financial risks.Nate Billings, The Oklahoman, via USA Today NetworkOther candidates have emerged who could revive a corps of conservatives who bedeviled past G.O.P. speakers as they tried to raise Washington’s statutory borrowing limit, keep the government funded and operating, and approve annual military and intelligence policy bills. Such prospects seem so harrowing that one former Republican leadership aide, who insisted on anonymity, said he hoped Democratic leaders would raise the debt ceiling in the lame-duck session of Congress this winter rather than risk the first-ever default on United States government debt.“I think it’ll be very difficult,” said Jacob Rubashkin, an analyst with the nonpartisan publication Inside Elections, a political forecaster. “It’s been remarkable to see Nancy Pelosi handle a narrow majority. So it is possible to pass bills with only a couple of votes to spare.”The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries winding down, both parties are starting to shift their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.Battleground Pennsylvania: Few states feature as many high-stakes, competitive races as Pennsylvania, which has emerged as the nation’s center of political gravity.The Dobbs Decision’s Effect: Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the number of women signing up to vote has surged in some states and the once-clear signs of a Republican advantage are hard to see.How a G.O.P. Haul Vanished: Last year, the campaign arm of Senate Republicans was smashing fund-raising records. Now, most of the money is gone.Digital Pivot: At least 10 G.O.P. candidates in competitive races have updated their websites to minimize their ties to former President Donald J. Trump or to adjust their stances on abortion.But, he added, “Kevin McCarthy is not Nancy Pelosi.”Since Newt Gingrich’s “Republican Revolution” of 1994, compromise in some corners of the party has been a dirty word, and those corners have grown, first with the Tea Party movement of 2010, then with the “America First” wave of Donald J. Trump’s era.The former president’s hold on the party has added an element of uncertainty: The self-described America First Caucus, a small group of House members whose loyalty to him appears to eclipse all else, is likely to grow next year. And the group could break with the Republican House leadership at any time if Mr. Trump orders it to do so.“If Trump endorses McCarthy and stays with him, these folks will stay with him,” said Doug Heye, a Republican leadership aide during the Obama-era G.O.P. majorities. “But,” he added, “all bets are off if Trump pulls away.”It is not hard to discern where the pressure points will develop.Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene and other House Republicans loyal to former President Donald J. Trump have formed what they call the America First Caucus.Doug Mills/The New York TimesRepresentatives Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Paul Gosar of Arizona have already formed the core of a House caucus that is loyal to Mr. Trump and further to the right than the House Freedom Caucus and its predecessors, groups of conservatives who tormented the two most recent Republican speakers, John Boehner and Paul D. Ryan. The House Republicans’ right flank forced the shutdown of much of the federal government several times, and nearly prompted a default on government debt.Joe Kent, a retired Green Beret who defeated Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler in Washington State last month with Mr. Trump’s blessing, has made it clear he intends to make waves in the Capitol. On a recent appearance on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, he promised those who sympathize with the Capitol rioters, “We hear you, we’re going to go back, we’re going to look at the election of 2020.” He added, “We’re going to disclose to the American people once and for all what actually happened — release all the footage.”Andy Ogles, who is heavily favored to win a newly drawn seat in Tennessee that was designed to wipe out a Democratic district in Nashville, called for his state attorney general to join other Republican attorneys general seeking to overturn Mr. Biden’s 2020 victory in Pennsylvania..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-ok2gjs{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-ok2gjs 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.“I would hope that he’d be a thorn in the side of leadership,” said James Garrett, the chairman of the Republican Party of Davidson County, the district’s base.Max Miller, a former White House aide to Mr. Trump and the Republican nominee for a G.O.P.-leaning district in Ohio, has made loyalty to the former president his calling card.Eric Burlison, a shoo-in to represent an open district in southwestern Missouri, has pushed legislation in the Missouri State Senate that would grant blanket immunity to anyone “who uses or threatens to use physical or deadly force in self-defense” unless the violence was against a law enforcement officer. Not even the conservative state legislature would pass it. Mike Collins, who is nearly certain to win an open seat in Georgia, pressed for a “forensic audit” of Georgia’s 2020 ballots, even though they were counted, then recounted by hand to confirm Mr. Biden’s victory in the state. He has promised voters, “I am your pro-Trump, ‘Give Me Back My America First’ agenda candidate.”And Keith Self, who faces only nominal Democratic opposition before he wins a seat in Texas’ Third Congressional District, could also fortify the flank on the leadership’s right.None of the candidates besides Mr. Brecheen responded to requests for comment.For some far-right House candidates, victory is not guaranteed. Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor and Republican vice-presidential nominee, lost a special election last week to fill the remainder of the term vacated by Alaska’s longtime representative, Don Young, who died in office in March. But she will try again in November, this time for a full term and a chance to resume her role as a leading conservative scene-stealer.“It’s a real political full-circle moment to see her re-emerge on the national stage,” Mr. Rubashkin said. “Politics have moved so much in her direction since her exit, it’s kind of poetic.”J.R. Majewski, the surprise victor in an Ohio Republican primary in May, has flirted with the QAnon conspiracy theory, fulminated against what he has called “a fake pandemic organized by a fake government to hijack a fake election,” and was at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The new lines of Ohio’s Ninth District were drawn by Republican state legislators to try to end the career of Representative Marcy Kaptur, one of the Buckeye State’s last Democrats in Congress, and the race is considered a tossup.In Nevada, Sam Peters, who is locked in a close contest to unseat Representative Steven Horsford, a Democrat, has used a QAnon hashtag on social media and once declared that Mr. Trump could not have lost Wisconsin in 2020 because he had the backing of Brett Favre, the former Green Bay Packers star.Then there are the Trump-aligned candidates with tough roads ahead but clear shots at victory, like Bo Hines, a 27-year-old who is running for a swing seat in North Carolina as the state’s next brash young conservative, now that Representative Madison Cawthorn has lost his re-election bid. Sandy Smith, also in North Carolina, and Brandon Williams in upstate New York could win as well in a good Republican year. Both have strong Trump credentials.Bo Hines, a Trump-aligned House candidate, is running for a swing seat in North Carolina.Veasey Conway for The New York TimesWhen Republicans were predicting a seismic sweep in November, the influence of the far-right caucus was less worrying for leadership. A strong Republican majority would give Mr. McCarthy room to maneuver — and to lose support from some far-right Republicans on raising the debt ceiling and funding the government. Now, however, as political winds shift toward the Democrats, prognosticators like David Wasserman, a House analyst at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, see a narrow 10-to-20-seat Republican majority and trouble ahead.Even with leverage, the Trump wing would have to know how to use it. Brendan Buck, who served as a top aide to Mr. Ryan when he was speaker, said that the House Freedom Caucus had never been clear on its policy aims, but that its members understood parliamentary procedures — how to threaten the tenure of a speaker — and how to use their unity and membership totals to wreak havoc.The Greene-Boebert-Gaetz wing has never shown such acumen, Mr. Buck said, but it has something that Freedom Caucus leaders in the past and present have never had — a loyal, large following.“At this point, they are way ahead of where the Freedom Caucus was in terms of outside strength,” Mr. Buck said. “They have huge profiles. They can get people animated more than the Freedom Caucus ever could.” More

Robert Telles, the Clark County public administrator, was taken into custody in the killing of Jeff German, a reporter at The Las Vegas Review-Journal, the district attorney said.A county official in Las Vegas was arrested on a murder charge on Wednesday, hours after the police searched his home in connection with the fatal stabbing of a reporter at The Las Vegas Review-Journal, the district attorney said.The official, Robert Telles, the Clark County public administrator, was taken into custody in the killing of the reporter, Jeff German, according to the Clark County district attorney, Steven B. Wolfson.Mr. Telles was wheeled out on a stretcher and loaded into an ambulance after the police returned to his home in tactical gear, The Review-Journal reported. “The suspect in the homicide that occurred on September 2, 2022, has been taken into custody,” the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department wrote on Twitter on Wednesday night, without naming the person. The department said it planned to provide an update on the investigation at a news conference on Thursday morning.Mr. Telles, a Democrat elected in 2018, lost a June primary after he was the focus of investigative stories by Mr. German, who detailed claims that Mr. Telles had presided over a hostile work environment and had engaged in an “inappropriate relationship” with a staff member. Mr. Telles and the staff member denied the accusations.Mr. German, 69, was found fatally stabbed outside his home in Las Vegas on Saturday morning. The police believe he was killed after an altercation on Friday.“The arrest of Robert Telles is at once an enormous relief and an outrage for the Review-Journal newsroom,” Glenn Cook, The Review-Journal’s executive editor, said in a statement on Wednesday night. “We are relieved Robert Telles is in custody and outraged that a colleague appears to have been killed for reporting on an elected official,” Mr. Cook said. “Journalists can’t do the important work our communities require if they are afraid a presentation of facts could lead to violent retribution.”He thanked the Las Vegas police for responding to the killing with urgency and hard work. “Now, hopefully, The Review-Journal, the German family and Jeff’s many friends can begin the process of mourning and honoring a great man and a brave reporter,” Mr. Cook said.Mr. Telles did not respond earlier on Wednesday to phone messages, texts and emails, and it was unclear if he had a lawyer. The Review-Journal reported that after his home was searched, Mr. Telles had returned at about 2:20 p.m. local time, wearing what appeared to be a white hazmat suit. He did not respond to reporters’ questions as he entered his garage and closed the door, the newspaper reported.Earlier Wednesday, the police would not confirm that they were searching Mr. Telles’s home.In a statement, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department would confirm only that it was serving search warrants related to the investigation into Mr. German’s death. “No further information will be provided at this time,” the statement said.“They’ve been here all day, since about 7 a.m.,” David Zanella, a neighbor who lives two doors from Mr. Telles, said in a phone interview earlier on Wednesday. “They towed both of the cars from the house, and they’ve been in the house, taking things.”On Tuesday, the Police Department released a video that it said showed the person who killed Mr. German wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a reflective orange jacket. The video also showed the person’s vehicle, which appeared to be a red or maroon GMC Yukon Denali, the police said.The Review-Journal reported that a vehicle matching the description of the Yukon Denali had been towed from Mr. Telles’s property on Wednesday.The police have not said whether they believe that Mr. German was targeted because of his reporting. At a news conference on Tuesday, Capt. Dori Koren of the Police Department said that investigators were evaluating every single lead and every theory.“We are exploring all possibilities in this investigation,” Captain Koren said. “But at this time, we believe we have evidence that shows that the suspect was in the area prior to the homicide, and it appears that they were casing to commit other crimes.”He asked the public for home security video or other information that could help identify the person responsible for killing Mr. German, whose career as a columnist and a senior investigative reporter spanned more than three decades.Over that period, Mr. German broke stories on organized crime, politics, casinos and corruption for The Las Vegas Sun and then for The Review-Journal.Jeff German, an investigative reporter, on the Las Vegas Strip last year.K.M. Cannon/Las Vegas Review-Journal, via APThis year, Mr. German wrote investigative stories about Mr. Telles’s office, which secures the property of deceased people and administers estates in court. In May, Mr. German reported that the office had been “mired in turmoil and internal dissension over the past two years, with allegations of emotional stress, bullying and favoritism leading to secret videotaping of the boss and a co-worker outside the office.”The story, based on interviews with a half-dozen current and former employees, described a “hostile work environment” and accusations that Mr. Telles had engaged in an “inappropriate relationship” with a staff member.In the story, Mr. Telles blamed “a handful of old-timers” for exaggerating the relationship and for falsely claiming that he had been mistreating them. “All my new employees are super happy, and everyone’s productive and doing well,” Mr. Telles was quoted as saying.In another story in late May, Mr. German reported that Clark County managers had hired a former coroner to try to ease tensions in the office.After the June primary, Mr. Telles posted a letter online criticizing The Review-Journal and rebutting claims made in Mr. German’s reporting. Mr. Telles also wrote about Mr. German on Twitter.“Typical bully,” Mr. Telles wrote. “Can’t take a pound of critism after slinging 100 pounds of BS. Up to article #4 now. You’d think he’d have better things to do.” He included an emoji of a winking face with a tongue sticking out.After Mr. German was killed, Mr. Cook told the paper that Mr. German had not communicated any concerns for his safety or any threats made against him.“There are no words for a loss like this,” Mr. Cook wrote on Twitter on Sept. 4.Sheelagh McNeill More

President Biden has taken pains to show that he understands there is a difference between what he calls extremist “MAGA Republicans” and other members of the Republican Party.WASHINGTON — President Biden has opened many of his recent speeches with a caveat.Even as he attacks Republicans with gusto — including former President Donald J. Trump and his allies in Congress — Mr. Biden takes pains to point out that not all Republicans are plotting to destroy Social Security, oppose abortion rights and embrace political violence.Just some of them, he says.The president’s goal is to show that he understands there is a difference between what he calls extremist “MAGA Republicans,” a reference to Mr. Trump’s “Make American Great Again” campaign slogan, and other members of the Republican Party.It is a tricky message to deliver, especially for a president who vowed in his inaugural address to “end this uncivil war that pits red against blue.”But the president’s full-throated warnings about the threats to democratic institutions come just two months before the midterm elections, at a time when political violence and election denial remain rampant. Mr. Trump and many of his supporters continue to defend their lies about the 2020 election and the attacks on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. And there have been new threats of violence against federal agents investigating Mr. Trump’s handling of government documents.Despite Mr. Biden’s caveats, Republicans have seized on the president’s message to claim that he is condemning the 74 million people who voted for Mr. Trump in 2020. That has left some Democrats worried that Mr. Biden’s message could end up alienating swing voters or potential supporters in the Republican Party, even those who reject Mr. Trump’s lies.“My advice would be: Navigate with care,” said former Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, who served as the top Democrat in the Senate and the majority leader. Mr. Daschle applauded the president for calling out election lies and violence, but he cautioned that Mr. Biden’s fiery MAGA message could easily go awry.“It is critical that as Democrats, we try to draw that distinction between legitimate policy debate and what I would consider illegitimate assertions on truth involving elections and facts around elections,” Mr. Daschle said.Supporters of former President Donald J. Trump at a rally in Wisconsin in August.Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York TimesBut when it comes to policy, it is not always easy to draw such a bright line between MAGA Republicans and those Mr. Biden calls the “mainstream” Republicans he has worked with for decades. Mr. Trump’s grip on the party is strong, and his influence is evident in a range of issues, including abortion and climate change, that have lurched the party to the right.At times, Mr. Biden has conflated the two groups, saying it is MAGA Republicans who are putting forward conservative policies he opposes.The Biden PresidencyWith midterm elections approaching, here’s where President Biden stands.Defending Democracy: President Biden’s drive to buttress democracy at home and abroad has taken on more urgency by the persistent power of China, Russia and former President Donald J. Trump.On the Campaign Trail: Fresh off a series of legislative victories, Mr. Biden is back campaigning. But his low approval ratings could complicate his efforts to help Democrats in the midterm elections.‘Dark Brandon’ Rises: White House officials recently began to embrace this repackaged internet meme. Here is the story behind it and what it tells us about the administration.Questions About 2024: Mr. Biden has said he plans to run for a second term, but at 79, his age has become an uncomfortable issue.During Labor Day remarks in Milwaukee, Mr. Biden used the word “Republican” 28 times, lashing out at what he calls an extreme ideology that should be rejected when voters go to the polls in congressional elections this fall.“Every single Republican voted against lowering prescription drug prices, against lowering health care costs, against protecting your pensions, against lower energy costs, against creating good-paying jobs, against a fairer tax system,” Mr. Biden told an audience filled with labor union supporters. “Every single one in the House and Senate. Every one.”Moments later, he added, “The extreme right, the ‘Trumpies’ — they want to go to — these MAGA Republicans in Congress are coming for your Social Security as well.”.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-ok2gjs{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-ok2gjs 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.Politicians have gotten in trouble for using overly broad language to attack political opponents at the height of the campaign season.Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, was caught generalizing about Mr. Trump’s supporters during the 2016 presidential campaign, telling her donors: “You could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic — you name it.”During the 2008 campaign, Barack Obama described rural Americans as people who “get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them.” In 2012, Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee, wrote off nearly half of the country’s voters, calling 47 percent of them “entitled” and victims who would always vote for Mr. Obama.And just like those previous comments did, Mr. Biden’s speeches have generated a torrent of criticism. Nikki Haley, the ambassador to the United Nations under Mr. Trump, said that “Biden is the most condescending president of my lifetime.” Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, tweeted a picture of the president clenching his fists during a speech last week, adding the caption: “Angry man smears half of the people of the country he is supposed to lead & promised to unite.”Nikki Haley, a former ambassador to the United Nations, called Mr. Biden “the most condescending president of my lifetime.”Logan R. Cyrus for The New York TimesMr. Biden insists he is doing no such thing. At the beginning of Monday’s speech in Milwaukee, he noted that “I want to be very clear up front: Not every Republican is a MAGA Republican. Not every Republican embraces that extreme ideology.”Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said on Tuesday that the president “has been very clear that he’s talking about office holders.”“He’s talking about elected officials who have these MAGA, ultra-MAGA Republican agendas,” she said.Jason Grumet, the president of the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, said the brief caveats at the beginning of Mr. Biden’s speeches were not very effective alongside the larger broadsides that the president was delivering against Republicans, mixing criticism about anti-democratic behavior with more familiar disagreements about policy positions.“The lumping of that much more diverse group of people into this one kind of MAGA frame certainly caused a lot of people to feel like it was an undue castigation of millions of Americans,” he said. “You can have a principled, progressive debate about student debt and abortion and do that entirely within the confines of respecting core democratic principles.”Mr. Biden’s use of aggressive language during an election season is hardly new. For decades, presidents have ratcheted up attacks on their rivals in an effort to clarify the choice for voters when they go to the polls.But the president’s brand is built on a promise that he can unite America’s warring factions, drawing on a career in which he often was able to bridge political divides during a decades-long career in the Senate. He ends almost all of his speeches by saying: “We’re the United States of America. There is nothing — nothing we can’t do if we do it together.”Mr. Grumet said that Mr. Biden’s history of embracing bipartisanship raises the expectations among voters that he will seek to work with Republicans, even when they disagree strongly on many issues.“He desperately wants to be a president who can represent the entire country, and he really wants that to be true,” Mr. Grumet said. “And he is stymied by having to engage with a large group of people who argue he’s an illegitimate president. I think that fundamental struggle is playing out in real time.” More

Federal prosecutors issued a subpoena to William Russell, who served as a special assistant to the former president, and went to his home in Florida.Federal prosecutors issued a subpoena to a personal aide to former President Donald J. Trump as part of the investigation into the events leading up to the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, people familiar with the matter said.The move suggests that investigators have expanded the pool of people from whom they are seeking information in the wide-ranging criminal investigation into efforts by Mr. Trump and his allies to reverse his loss in the 2020 election and that agents are reaching into the former president’s direct orbit.This week, F.B.I. agents in Florida tried to approach William S. Russell, a 31-year-old aide to Mr. Trump who served as a special assistant and the deputy director of presidential advance operations in the White House. He continued to work for Mr. Trump as a personal aide after he left office, one of a small group of officials who did so.It was not immediately clear what the F.B.I. agents wanted from Mr. Russell; people familiar with the Justice Department’s inquiry said he has not yet been interviewed. But a person with knowledge of the F.B.I.’s interest said that it related to the grand jury investigation into events that led to the Capitol attack by Mr. Trump’s supporters.That investigation is said to have focused extensively on the attempts by some of Mr. Trump’s advisers and lawyers to create slates of fake electors from swing states. Mr. Trump and his allies wanted Vice President Mike Pence to block or delay certification of the Electoral College results during a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6 to allow consideration of Trump electors whose votes could have changed the outcome.Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsCard 1 of 9Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsMaking a case against Trump. More

Britain’s new prime minister, Liz Truss, has recruited cabinet members from diverse backgrounds, though her inner circle retains a hard Conservative edge.LONDON — One attended Britain’s most famous private high-school, Eton College, another is a top-drawer lawyer, and the third holds a senior rank as an Army reservist. The résumés of those handed the three top cabinet posts by Britain’s new prime minister, Liz Truss, are typical of generations of high-achievers in her ruling Conservative Party.What is different is that none of the three are white.In choosing her top team, Ms. Truss has created a strikingly diverse cabinet. The country also has its first female deputy prime minister.“What is extraordinary is the pace of change, how this is already normal, and this isn’t contentious,” said Sunder Katwala, the director of British Future, a research institute that focuses on immigration, integration, race and identity. “There aren’t people going around saying ‘give us our country back.’”Still, Ms. Truss’s inner circle, while progressive in its ethnic makeup, also has a hard ideological edge, which critics say makes it unlikely to pursue policy friendlier to Britain’s minority population, or for refugees arriving on the country’s shores.Indeed, some argue that the diversity among cabinet ministers gives Ms. Truss the cover to pursue even more radical approaches, such as a plan to send some asylum seekers to Rwanda — a policy now the responsibility of Suella Braverman, the new home secretary, whose father came to Britain from Kenya in 1968.Suella Braverman, the new home secretary, leaving the first cabinet meeting.Tolga Akmen/EPA, via Shutterstock“There’s a difference that makes no difference, and a change that leads to no change,” said Kehinde Andrews, a professor of Black studies at Birmingham City University, citing as one example the Conservatives’ immigration policy and the Rwanda plan.“The fact is that you should judge it on the policy,” he said, “and the government’s track record is horrendous.”Ms. Braverman’s legal background — she is a barrister — is relevant to her new position because the government is fighting a battle in court with opponents who have stalled the Rwanda flights. She has already established herself as a hard-liner and has called for Britain to limit the influence of the European convention on human rights, which protects basic human rights and which was written into domestic British law in 1998.The chancellor of the Exchequer, Kwasi Kwarteng, shares Ms. Truss’s faith in free markets, desire to cut taxes and approach to deregulation. His parents, an economist and a lawyer, came to Britain from Ghana as students in the 1960s. Cerebral and self-confident, Mr. Kwarteng attended Eton College and then won a place at Cambridge University, where he excelled academically.The new foreign secretary is James Cleverly, whose mother came to the Britain from Sierra Leone, and who rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel as an Army reservist. He is perhaps the least ideological of the three, though like the other two, he was a strong proponent of Brexit.The new foreign secretary, James Cleverly, on Wednesday. Ms. Truss held the position before she became the prime minister.Tolga Akmen/EPA, via ShutterstockCritics point out that, unlike the overwhelming majority of Britons, Mr. Kwarteng, Ms. Braverman and Mr. Cleverly were all educated at private schools (albeit sometimes with financial aid, as in Mr. Kwarteng’s case) — proof that social class, rather than race or gender, is perhaps the more telling dividing line in British politics.For all that, Ms. Truss’s appointments put Britain indisputably ahead of many other European countries in the diversity of its political elite. On Wednesday, Ms. Truss used her first appearance in Parliament to point out that she is the third female Conservative prime minister, while the opposition Labour Party has never elected a woman as leader.“It is quite extraordinary, is it not” Ms. Truss said, “that there does not seem to be the ability in the Labour party to find a female leader, or indeed a leader who does not come from north London?” — a reference to Keir Starmer, the party leader, and his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn, both of whom represent parliamentary constituencies in same part of the capital.In fact, the diversity of the cabinet can be traced to a former prime minister, David Cameron, who, after becoming party leader in 2005, altered the selection process for potential Conservative lawmakers. That effectively forced local parties to choose parliamentary candidates from lists with a bigger proportion of female, Black and minority ethnic backgrounds.“Look what’s happened to the Conservative Party,” Mr. Cameron said in an interview with The New York Times in 2019. “It used to be people like me: white, posh, male, rural southerners. It has now got a gender balance. It’s every people from every Black and minority ethnic group in the country.”David Cameron, the former prime minister of Britain, in 2019.Mary Turner for The New York TimesMr. Cameron rejected the contention that the ethnic and racial diversity masked a lack of class diversity. Among those he named to his cabinet, he noted in the interview, was Sajid Javid, whose Pakistani immigrant father drove a bus.“The fact that the old fusty Conservative Party is managing to produce people like that says a lot,” he said.Britain’s first Black cabinet minister, Paul Boateng, was appointed in 2002, but until recently there was little change at the highest reaches of government. When in 2010 a member of the House of Lords, Sayeeda Warsi, was appointed to the cabinet she was the first British politician of South Asian heritage to take up such a position. It was another four years before an elected lawmaker of South Asian heritage, Mr. Javid, joined the cabinet.In part, the gains in government by people of color reflect social change and advances through education. On average, ethnic minority pupils have outperformed white Britons at school in recent years. In every year from 2007 to 2021, white pupils had the lowest entry rate into higher education.“Cameron’s effective intervention catalyzed and sped up some that was happening in Britain,” said Mr. Katwala of British Future. He added, “In Britain we are a generation ahead of most other western European countries.”Yet critics note that the greater ethnic and gender diversity has not changed the policies of successive Conservative governments, which have grown increasingly hard-line on immigration and often embraced tax cuts and other economic policies that tend to favor wealthy people.Ms. Truss has acknowledged that her most notable tax cut proposal — a reversal of last April’s increase in national insurance rates — would disproportionately benefit those with higher incomes, since they pay the most taxes.“To look at everything through the lens of redistribution, I believe, is wrong,” Ms. Truss said to the BBC last Sunday, in what some noted was a full-throated defense of “trickle-down” economics. “What I’m about is about growing the economy and growing the economy benefits everybody.”Ms. Truss facing questions on Wednesday in a photograph released by Parliament.Jessica Taylor/UK Parliament/EPA, via ShutterstockProfessor Andrews, from Birmingham City University, said the Conservatives were practicing a particularly cynical form of identity politics by promoting the diversity among its senior leaders, while also advancing retrograde policies.Mr. Katwala argued that diversity at the top of politics doesn’t do anything automatically, but can shift attitudes by providing role models and “makes a difference in what your expectations are at a societal level.” The example he cited was that of Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, who came to power in 1979.“I don’t think she had a policy agenda that was good for women or any ambition to promote women,” Mr. Katwala said. “Yet when Liz Truss was at school she saw that there was a woman in Downing Street.” More

We’re getting Senate serious, people. And it’s all about you. The candidates need you, even if your home state doesn’t have a real nail-biter. (Chuck Schumer is going to be re-elected in New York. You heard it here first.)No matter where you’ve been over the summer, I bet you spent some of your time plowing through emails from Senate hopefuls asking you for money.It can get a tad … dispiriting. You wake up and take a look at your inbox. When you see there are over 50 new messages waiting, you have to assume that a few are actually from people you know.Nah. The one titled “Dinner Plans” isn’t about date night. Catherine Cortez Masto, the senator from Nevada, wants you to know that she and her husband just finished eating, and that while he’s doing the dishes, she’s got time to share a quick fund-raising request.(Let’s at least rejoice that no male Democratic senator will dare write you saying he’s reaching out while his wife cleans up the kitchen.)Last weekend, John Fetterman, the Democratic Senate candidate in Pennsylvania, was so engrossed in the meaning of Labor Day that he announced he’d decided to celebrate by not emailing anybody on Monday. (“… and that means we need today’s fund-raising to make up the difference.”)And when Labor Day did arrive, Fetterman …A. Took the day off and spent it watching “Sopranos” reruns.B. Challenged his staff to a Wordle competition.C. Wrote “I know I said I wasn’t going to email you today, but I want to share some thoughts.”Yeah, I know you know it’s “I know….”Val Demings, who’s running for Senate in Florida, sent me way more letters in August than anyone in my family did, all about her desperate need for funds to win what sounded like a very, very, very hard-fought primary — which, it turned out, she won with 84 percent of the vote. Demings piled up more than $47 million, some of which she still has on hand for her race against Marco Rubio.This is not a bad thing. I’ll bet her primary donors won’t mind having their money used to knock off Senator Rubio, a raving foe of abortion rights who recently called the Mar-a-Lago document scandal a “storage” issue.Of course, despite her big haul, Demings is right back blowing the emergency whistle. “I’m sorry to crowd your inbox, friend,” she wrote on Wednesday, warning that her campaign was “still short of our upcoming midnight fund-raising goal.”Cynics might presume that no candidate has ever, in history, actually reached a fund-raising goal. Really, do you ever remember getting a note saying: “Thanks, guys! We’ve got all the money we need now! Give to your pet shelter.”You do have to feel some sympathy — Senate campaigns are wicked expensive. The question is whether you should respond to this barrage of email requests for donations. The downside, as you probably suspect, is that it will make you an even more popular target.But do you want to tell all these candidates that if they need money, they’d better go to the PACs and corporate sponsors? Come on.“This is right now a kind of necessary evil,” Daniel Weiner of the Brennan Center said.“It’s the choice between a couple of wealthy donors or grass-roots fund-raising.”So if you’re reading all the stories about the critical Senate races in places like Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, it’s hard to tell yourself they’re none of your business. We’re talking about who controls the Senate — not to mention whether the nation will be spending another two years obsessing over the mind and mood of Joe Manchin.But it’s also hard to make a donation and keep your name from being given to — or purchased by — other campaigns. As it stands, this information is just another commodity. Sure, the Federal Election Commission could limit the sale of email lists. “But that’s going to be a bit of an uphill battle,” said Weiner, who spends a large part of his parental visits cleaning out his mother’s backed-up inbox.You can get yourself off any individual candidate’s list — there should be an “unsubscribe” option somewhere at the bottom of every plea. Or, if you’re not obsessive about keeping your inbox tidy, you can just ignore the emails and let them stack up — my husband is closing in on 85,000.I’m a deleter but also a kind of collector. Some of these campaigns do have particular … personalities.For instance, Tim Ryan, the Democrats’ Senate candidate in Ohio, is a mega-mailer who appears to be in a serious funk. “This is BAD,” began one of his recent missives, along with another announcing “A HUGE setback.” And, perhaps most distressing from the readers’ side, one that promised, “This is the longest email I’ll ever send you.”Don’t over-worry, Ryan fans — he’s doing better than expected in a state that’s become very tough for his party. And remember, this is the season when candidates try to sound as desperate as possible.Anyhow, it’s a good week for getting involved. We’re coming to the big finale. Look around and see who you’d like to help. Doesn’t have to be the Senate. Although, unless you have a deep personal connection, it’s probably OK to ignore all those requests from candidates for lieutenant governor.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