Elections

New Mexico voters will weigh in on some key contests today. Here’s what to know if you’re heading to the polls.How to voteThe deadline to apply for absentee ballots was on Thursday. You can track the status of your ballot on this site. Not sure if you’re registered to vote? That same site will tell you if you are. The deadline to register for voting in person on Election Day was Saturday.Where to voteTo find a polling place near you, enter your full name, date of birth and county into this site. Ballots must be returned to the county clerk, or your voting precinct, by 7 p.m. local time on Election Day (which is also when polls close) to be counted.What’s on the ballotRepublicans will vote on candidates for governor and lieutenant governor. (Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and Lt. Gov. Howie Morales, both Democrats, do not face challenges for their party’s nomination.) Democrats will pick candidates for attorney general, state treasurer and auditor.Depending on where you live, other local races may be on your ballot. Use this site to find out what is on your ballot. More

Primary voters in seven states, including California and New Jersey, go to the polls on Tuesday to select their party’s candidates for statewide offices, like the governors of New Mexico and South Dakota; for mayor of Los Angeles, the nation’s second largest city, and for dozens of House seats.Crime is very much on the minds of Californians: San Franciscans are deciding whether to remove their district attorney, and Angelenos are weighing whether to elect as their next mayor a longtime Democratic insider or a billionaire former Republican who promises to crack down on crime and homelessness and clean up the city.Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, is not expected to have much opposition as he seeks an eighth term this November at age 89. Other races offer more drama.Here’s what to watch for in Tuesday’s contests in New Jersey, Mississippi, Iowa, South Dakota, New Mexico, Montana and California:A true battleground map comes into viewIn most of the country, congressional redistricting shored up incumbency for both parties. Tuesday will showcase much of the battleground that remains. Of the 53 House seats that the nonpartisan Cook Political Report sees in play, nine are in California, New Mexico and Iowa.And for once, Democrats will be watching districts where they can play offense: four Republican House seats in California, now held by Representatives David Valadao, Mike Garcia, Michelle Steel and Young Kim, and one in New Mexico, held by Yvette Herrell.If those races do not add a little suspense to the vote Tuesday, California’s unusual primary system could give political obsessives a very late night. Under the system, established under former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the top two vote-getters on primary night face off in November, regardless of party.Invariably, a few races end up with a Republican facing off with a Republican or a Democrat meeting a Democrat, leaving one party iced out. Some seats could be guaranteed to change hands based on Tuesday’s results.Democratic miscalculations and lost opportunitiesIn New Mexico, Democrats in full control of the state capital in Santa Fe took a chance, making a safe seat in the state’s picturesque north less safe by dipping the district’s boundaries south, in hopes of taking southern New Mexico’s Republican seat.But in a bad Democratic year, they may have overplayed their hand: Rather than hoping for a sweep of the state’s three House seats, Democrats now are worrying that Republicans could hold that seat and grab another.Redistricting in California was in the hands of a nonpartisan commission, which put Democrats into position to take some Republican seats and elect the first Hispanic representatives in the Central Valley.But Democrats could also lose some House seats, including the one held by Katie Porter, one of the party’s rising stars. Besides Ms. Porter, Representative Mike Levin on the Southern California coast is sweating his re-election, and a new seat in central California, the 13th District, should be Democratic in an ordinary year, but this is not that.Democrats had also hoped to make a play for the Iowa Senate seat held by Mr. Grassley. But Mr. Grassley opted to run for re-election, though he would be 95 by the end of his next term. And the Democrats’ favored candidate, Abby Finkenauer, 33, who served one term in the House, has struggled even to get on the ballot.Ethics lapses can be costly. Except when they aren’t.Representative Tom Malinowski, a New Jersey Democrat, had the makings of a foreign policy heavyweight in his party. He was the Washington director of Human Rights Watch before becoming a top human rights official in the Obama administration’s State Department.Mr. Malinowski turned his attention to electoral politics in 2018, beating a moderate Republican, Leonard Lance, in that year’s Democratic wave. In 2020, he edged out Thomas Kean Jr., the son and namesake of a popular former New Jersey governor, by 5,311 votes.Stock trades by Representative Tom Malinowski were the subject of an investigation by the House Ethics Committee.Pool photo by Graeme JenningsOn Tuesday, Mr. Kean is the odds-on favorite to win his party’s nomination to challenge Mr. Malinowski again, but this time, the Democrat is one of the most endangered incumbents in the House, thanks to three factors. Redistricting made his narrowly Democratic seat narrowly Republican.Despite Mr. Kean’s loss in 2020, the governor’s son is a strong opponent in a state where surnames matter (Robert J. Menendez, Senator Bob Menendez’s son, is the heavy favorite in the Democratic primary for another House seat). And Mr. Malinowski admitted he had failed to properly disclose thousands of dollars in stock trades, the subject of an investigation by the House Ethics Committee.On the other hand, another House candidate with a checkered ethics record, Ryan Zinke, is expected to win his G.O.P. primary and return to the House from Montana’s First District. Mr. Zinke left Washington in 2018 as Mr. Trump’s first Interior secretary under a cloud of conflict-of-interest investigations and questionable taxpayer expenditures.Trump’s swing and miss in South DakotaFormer President Donald J. Trump vowed to punish Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, for not sufficiently promoting the lie that Mr. Trump had won re-election in 2020. “South Dakota doesn’t like weakness. He will be primaried in 2022, political career over!” the former president declared on Twitter in December 2020, before he was barred from the platform.Senator John Thune at the Capitol in May.Shuran Huang for The New York TimesBut South Dakota’s governor, Kristi Noem, opted to run for re-election instead of for the Senate, and no serious challenger heeded Mr. Trump’s call to take on Mr. Thune. Consequently, Republican voters in South Dakota are likely to easily nominate Mr. Thune — dismissed by Mr. Trump as a “Republican in name only” and “Mitch’s boy” — for re-election, lifting him up as the heir apparent to Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate Republican leader.They will also put Ms. Noem in position to run for president or, if Mr. Trump runs, to make a play for vice president.Understand the 2022 Midterm ElectionsCard 1 of 6Why are these midterms so important? More

Gov. Kathy Hochul will be a target for Rep. Tom Suozzi and Jumaane Williams in the first of two debates featuring the three leading Democrats.ALBANY, N.Y. — The first official debate in the Democratic primary for governor of New York took place last week with little attention or fanfare, and perhaps for good reason: The favorite in the race, Gov. Kathy Hochul, was not in attendance.That will change on Tuesday, with the first of two debates scheduled among Ms. Hochul and her two main party rivals, Representative Thomas R. Suozzi of Long Island and Jumaane D. Williams, New York City’s public advocate.The one-hour debate, which will be hosted and broadcast by WCBS-TV, will provide the candidates a chance to introduce themselves to voters and to road-test their arguments against Ms. Hochul, who, with the June 28 primary only three weeks away, carries a commanding lead in the polls.But the same polls show areas of concern among voters — including fears about crime and disapproval of the hefty government subsidy going to a new Buffalo Bills stadium — that could hint at potential weak spots in the governor’s armor.The two-man debate last week was more of a shared opportunity for Mr. Williams and Mr. Suozzi to lace into Ms. Hochul, offering a glimpse at the attack lines they are likely to use in the debate on Tuesday and on the campaign trail.How will Ms. Hochul fend off the attacks she has now seen previewed? Will the nonaggression pact between Mr. Suozzi and Mr. Williams on display last week hold? Is there still time for a breakthrough moment that could change the shape of the race?Here’s a look at the candidates, and some of the main issues they will grapple over.A focus on crimeEven before the mass shootings in Buffalo, Tulsa and Uvalde, Texas,, addressing gun violence was a priority for New York politicians, and it has now taken on even greater urgency.Mr. Suozzi has placed fighting crime at the center of his platform, releasing a 15-point plan and repeatedly demanding rollbacks to changes made in recent years to New York’s bail laws that were meant to reduce the number of people incarcerated over a lack of bail money. One feature of Mr. Suozzi’s plan involves giving judges discretion in assessing a defendant’s “dangerousness” when setting bail.Ms. Hochul made similar proposals during the most recent legislative session, securing a few changes but finding opposition to others in the left-leaning Legislature. She is likely to trumpet these modifications, as well as the package of gun-safety bills she recently signed into law, as evidence that her administration has made progress in containing gun violence.On the other side of the issue is Mr. Williams, who has argued against rolling back the bail reforms and has said state agencies and community groups can “co-create” public safety, if provided with the appropriate funding.Suozzi will cast himself as the experienced executiveFor much of the campaign, Mr. Suozzi has rarely missed an opportunity to question Ms. Hochul’s capability, and to imply that New Yorkers are unsafe under her leadership.This tactic has the potential to both help and hurt Mr. Suozzi, political observers say. On one hand, he is well positioned to point out Ms. Hochul’s inconsistencies, such as criticizing Washington for doing little on gun safety when she was hardly a gun-reform advocate during her time in Congress, even earning an N.R.A. endorsement at one point.But by striking too hard, Mr. Suozzi could risk coming across as bullying or dismissive, analysts said — particularly dangerous given the makeup of New York’s Democratic primary electorate.“Look, 58 to 60 percent of the primary voters in this election are going to be female,” said Bruce Gyory, a Democratic political consultant, adding that “an awful lot of them are highly educated, professional women who really bristle at the mansplaining.”Mr. Suozzi has emphasized his background as Nassau County executive and mayor of Glen Cove, suggesting that he is best equipped to lead the state as an experienced executive.In addition to his focus on making changes to the bail laws, Mr. Suozzi has said he would push to lower property taxes and to make state government to do what it can to make New York more attractive to business.Those stances place him in ideological territory that is very similar to Ms. Hochul’s. Perhaps that is why Mr. Suozzi has struggled to make headway in polls or in fund-raising thus far, raising $3.5 million in the latest reporting period, compared with Ms. Hochul’s more than $10 million.Williams has the progressive lane to himselfAs the only far-left candidate in an increasingly progressive state, Mr. Williams has a clear path before him. He also has experience running against Ms. Hochul: In 2018, he lost to her in a competitive race for lieutenant governor.Yet his campaign for governor has failed thus far to build momentum, raising just $250,000 in the last filing period.At last week’s debate, Mr. Williams refrained from taking swipes at Mr. Suozzi, saving his barbs for the governor. He repeatedly suggested that Ms. Hochul’s six years as lieutenant governor to Andrew M. Cuomo, who resigned last year amid allegations of sexual misconduct, had made her complicit in some of his more unpopular policies.Mr. Williams has also said Ms. Hochul should have more to show from her time in office, citing the lack of access to food and transit options in the mostly Black Buffalo neighborhood where last month’s mass shooting took place as proof that she had done little for constituents in her hometown.In the debate on Tuesday, political analysts suggested, Mr. Williams will need to attack without overreaching. But more than that, he will be hoping for a breakthrough moment that could put his candidacy and ideas — like public power, free public college and an approach to public safety that is based on community building, rather than policing — into the conversation.But that is easier said than done, said Steve Israel, a former congressman from Long Island who once ran the House Democrats’ campaign arm and has endorsed Ms. Hochul.“Unless you have a grenade with a pin pulled halfway out, it’s hard to break through,” he said.Hochul will practice risk managementThe calculus for Ms. Hochul is the opposite. Armed with the power of incumbency, a slate of endorsements from powerful unions and an $18.6 million campaign war chest, she will be doing all she can to maintain the race’s current dynamics.Ms. Hochul is likely to seek to highlight the wins she earned in the most recent legislative session, including gun-safety and abortion rights legislation and a gas tax holiday, while trying to steer the debate away from controversy.It will not be easy. Her first lieutenant governor, Brian Benjamin, resigned after being indicted on federal bribery charges; the Bills stadium deal was heavily criticized; and the fund-raising records she has set in her first year in office have raised questions about her relationship with big donors.The debate will provide her opponents a chance to press for answers to difficult questions on live television. Still, if she is able to fend off attacks from the left and right, strategists said, she will be well positioned to claim a middle ground.“Her best-case scenario is status quo,” said Evan Stavisky, the president of the Parkside Group, a political consulting firm.“She needs to forcefully defend herself because she’s likely to be the focus of contrast from her opponents,” he said. “She needs to talk about her successes, and to get out of there without changing the fundamental dynamics of the race.”Bolstering New York’s economyAnother crucial question for candidates is how to breathe life into the state’s economy, especially as New York continues to recover from the worst effects of the coronavirus pandemic and some residents leave for other states.Each candidate has different explanations for why people have flowed out. Mr. Suozzi blames crime and taxes. Mr. Williams points to an overall rise in prices and to employers that force workers back to offices. He suggests the state should embrace a “new normal.”Ms. Hochul has tried to thread the needle, pledging to make New York the most “business-friendly and worker-friendly state in the nation.” How successful she has been will no doubt be a subject of much debate. More

The Supreme Court is poised to rule on a law that gives local officials discretion over who can carry a handgun in the state.Good morning. It’s Tuesday. We’ll look at why gun restrictions in New York could be loosened if the Supreme Court strikes down a state law that gives officials discretion over permits for handguns. We’ll also look at tonight’s debate in the Democratic race for governor.Dakota Santiago for The New York TimesYesterday we looked at a state gun law that allows the authorities to remove weapons from the home of someone who has made a threat.Today our focus is on a different gun law in New York State, one that gives local officials discretion over who can carry a handgun. Officials are bracing for the U. S. Supreme Court to strike it down — and for the consequences in cities like New York, where a jump in gun crimes accompanied the pandemic.My colleague Jonah E. Bromwich writes that if the court invalidates the New York law, obtaining a handgun legally could become far easier.“A lot more people are going to now want to go out and get guns — and for all the wrong reasons,” Richard Aborn, the president of the nonprofit Citizens Crime Commission, told Jonah. “I have people telling me they decided to get a gun that I never dreamed would go out and get a gun. They’re not going to use it illegally, but they’re feeling this need to arm themselves in a way that I’ve not seen before.”Aborn also warned that minor confrontations could turn deadly if more New Yorkers arm themselves.The case before the court was brought by the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, the state affiliate of the National Rifle Association. The case involves two men from upstate New York who sought unrestricted licenses to carry handguns.They were given restricted licenses, allowing them to carry guns for hunting and target shooting; one of them was also allowed to carry a gun to and from work. But they were denied unrestricted licenses because they did not show “proper cause” as defined by the law, which says that someone seeking such a permit must demonstrate a heightened need to carry a gun.Lawyers for the rifle and pistol association challenged the process, arguing that the denial was unconstitutional under recent decisions by the court involving the Second Amendment.Aidan Johnston, the director of federal affairs for Gun Owners of America, a pro-gun lobbying group, echoed the argument that the law gives local officials too much latitude last week as he told Jonah, “New York’s concerns are unfounded and violate our rights and leave New Yorkers disarmed in the face of evil.”The court could rule that New York’s current standard is too strict or too vague. Either way, New York officials would probably respond by drafting a new law that met the ruling’s specifications. Gov. Kathy Hochul has already said she would consider calling a special session of the State Legislature if the court were to invalidate the statute.WeatherThe day will start out mostly sunny with temperatures near the high 70s. Then expect a chance of showers and thunderstorms late at night, with temps dropping to the high 60s.ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKINGIn effect until June 20 (Juneteenth).Three Democratic candidates, one debateTonight’s one-hour debate, originating from WCBS-TV (Channel 2 in New York), will give Gov. Kathy Hochul and her two main party rivals — Representative Thomas Suozzi of Long Island and Jumaane Williams, New York City’s public advocate — an opportunity to introduce themselves. It will also give Suozzi and Williams a chance to try out their arguments against Hochul.With the June 28 primary only three weeks away, she has a commanding lead in the polls.[What to Watch for as Hochul Faces Rivals in N.Y. Governor’s Debate]My colleague Grace Ashford says one issue that’s sure to come up is crime. Even before the recent mass shootings in Buffalo and elsewhere, dealing with gun violence was a priority for New York politicians. Suozzi has demanded a rollback of recent changes to New York’s bail laws. His 15-point plan for fighting crime includes giving judges discretion in assessing a defendant’s “dangerousness” when setting bail.Hochul made similar proposals during the most recent legislative session, winning some changes but encountering opposition to others in the left-leaning Legislature.Williams has argued for keeping the changes to the bail law, saying that state agencies and community groups can “co-create” public safety if provided with the appropriate funding.The latest New York storiesJingyu Lin for The New York TimesThe Tony AwardsPortraits of the nominees: As Broadway embarked on its road to recovery, these 45 theater artists helped pave the way.The decades-long journey of a musical: Vulture traces the “countless loop the loops” of the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical, “A Strange Loop.”More Arts & CultureA life in rock ’n’ roll: The “Lou Reed: Caught Between the Twisted Stars” exhibit offers glimpses of a life in rock ’n’ roll and tracks the evolution of one of music’s polarizing legends.100 tips on eating in the city: Grub Street’s diner-at-large, Tammie Teclemariam, aims to visit as many restaurants as possible within a year. Five months in and 200 food spots down, she shares 100 things she’s learned, Grub Street reports.Making “Fire Island”: The writer and star of “Fire Island,” Joel Kim Booster, reflects on making the rare romantic comedy that puts gay Asian American men at its center.Miles walked: 7,024. Bagel shops reviewed: 202.via Mike VarleyMike Varley’s plan was to walk 7,000 miles in New York City — 26.2 miles a day, five days a week, for a year. Rating bagel shops along the way was an afterthought.Off he went in June 2020 with Jessi Highet, a clothing designer who dyes her own textiles. More about her later.They trudged. They strutted. They tiptoed.“Pretty early on, I recognized that we were going to be in every neighborhood in New York City,” he said, “and I was going to have to eat.”He figured that every neighborhood had a bagel store and that he could work off the calories.“The only way it’s appropriate for somebody to be eating three bagels a week is if you’re walking five marathons a week,” he said.They tramped. They traipsed. They strolled.The idea to do five marathon walks a week in New York came up while they were on vacation, walking from the Pacific Ocean to Olympia, Wash. He proposed the idea.“She said, predictably, ‘You’re crazy,’” he recalled. This was not what she said when he proposed something else. More about that later, too.Back home in Bushwick, they spent 18 months mapping out a year’s worth of walks. He quit his job as a producer at a video-game company in February 2020, expecting to start looping around the city in March. The pandemic shutdown postponed the first step 90 days.They ambled. They rambled. They shambled.He developed his own system for rating bagels. “My credentials as a food person are limited to an enthusiasm for bagels, really,” he said. “I have no culinary diplomas or anything like that.”After 7,024 miles, he had reviews in on 155 bagel stores — not enough, he decided. “It wasn’t that we didn’t hit the neighborhoods,” he said, “it was that we didn’t necessarily hit the bagel stores.” He set out on a second marathon that he called “a gorge-fest,” visiting 55 more bagel shops. The highest score went to P & C Bagels in Middle Village, Queens. Here is how Varley described the bagel he had there: “The outside was crusty. The inside was doughy. The topping coverage was dense. The salt ratio was excellent.”But he acknowledged that it might not necessarily be everybody’s favorite. “Bagels are so good in New York City that anything above a 4 in my system has a possibility of being the best for you if it’s the place where they know your name,” he said.They plodded. They pranced. And, on the last day of their walkathon, they got married, in Marine Park in Brooklyn, after going the usual distance on foot. They planned stops along the way where guests could join them — including one at a bar in Bushwick where bagels were catered from P & C.METROPOLITAN diaryEmpty seatDear Diary:Rushing wearily onto a packed 6 train after a long day, I spotted an empty seat across from the door. I beelined toward it, hoping no one else would get there first.Feeling smug, I sat down and began to look around. Glancing at the man sitting next to me, I saw that he had what appeared to be an albino snake wrapped around his neck. Its head was resting on one of the man’s arms and facing me.I stared in disbelief, wondering if it was a real snake because it wasn’t moving.Just then, it flicked its tongue out at me.You have never seen anyone jump up so fast and move as far as possible.No wonder no one had taken the seat.— Anna SanidadIllustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.Glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B.P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.Melissa Guerrero More

SITKA, Alaska — As the only Republican senator fighting for her seat less than two years after voting to convict Donald Trump, Lisa Murkowski could be one of the crowning casualties in his war to rid the party of dissenters. Mr. Trump has insisted that voters here in Alaska won’t forgive Ms. Murkowski for her recent transgressions, and that Kelly Tshibaka, the Republican challenger whom he endorsed, “stands for Alaska values.”What I imagine he meant was that Ms. Tshibaka has the courage to confront bullies, the willingness to put state before political party, and a general resilience that comes from years of living in “Alyeska,” the Aleut word for “the great land.” The only problem with his argument is that, over the past 20 years, it’s Ms. Murkowski who has demonstrated all three. And it might be just enough to save her political career.As the state with the highest percentage of voters refusing to declare a party affiliation (more than half of voters here identify as independent), Alaska has a rich tradition of rewarding candidates who stand up to powerful figures like Mr. Trump. In the early 20th century, James Wickersham, Alaska’s congressional delegate, battled to give the territory the right to govern itself, insisting on its difference from the “Outside.” As recently as the 1990s, Gov. Wally Hickel was saying that Alaska deserved to be called its own “unique country.” And Alaska’s longtime congressman, Don Young, was so willing to stand up to the powers that be that he once held a 10-inch knife to John Boehner’s neck. (The two later became friends, and Mr. Boehner served as Mr. Young’s best man.)The daughter of an Alaska governor, Ms. Murkowski understands this tradition better than most. She infuriated her Republican colleagues in 2017 with her vote against repealing the Affordable Care Act and rejected Mr. Trump’s nominees, voting against both Betsy DeVos as secretary of education and Brett Kavanaugh for Supreme Court justice. In that sense, she represents ideals all but lost in American political life: She may not wield a knife on the House floor, but her independent thinking and ability to consider each issue individually are relics of a time when party loyalty mattered less than your relationship with your constituents.That approach has hurt her standing in the Republican Party. After she voted to convict Mr. Trump, he declared that she represented “her state badly and her country even worse.” He even threatened to come to Alaska to campaign against her — now that would be a reality show I’d watch. While such saber-rattling would have been enough to send most moderate Republicans scurrying into their holes, Ms. Murkowski held fast.To understand her resilience and resolve, you need only to look at her wrist. There, you’ll find a bracelet engraved with her last name, along with the words “Fill it in. Write it in.” This was a gift from her husband, who modeled it on the silicone wristbands her campaign issued in 2010 after she lost her primary to a Republican challenger blessed by the national party. Ms. Murkowski won the general election as a write-in candidate thanks to a motley crew of centrists, Democrats and Alaska’s Native community. (Ms. Murkowski’s vote against the health care repeal was largely seen in the state as a “thank you” card to the villages that allowed her to pull this off.)Kelly Tshibaka, meanwhile, returned to the state of her birth just three years ago — about as long as we keep salmon in the freezer before putting it into our Dungeness traps. In an attempt to shake the carpetbagger label, her campaign released a video showing her at work on a set-net operation in Cook Inlet. The move backfired when the Alaska Department of Fish and Game fined her $270 for not having a crew license. (I was also fined by that agency, for working on a sea cucumber dive boat without a license. I did not issue a news release afterward blaming my political opponents for the fine.)If the tribes, sportfishermen, A.T.V.ers, commercial fishermen and conservationists in Alaska agree on one thing, it’s the responsibility of the state to control its fisheries and maintain a “sustainable yield” through strict regulations, a duty written into the Alaska Constitution. The footage of Ms. Tshibaka illegally handling a salmon showed someone desperate for authenticity — but also a candidate either ignorant of, or just willing to break, Alaska’s fish laws.Ms. Tshibaka has also been taken to task for her unsteady relationship to the truth. In 1975, her parents moved to the state for the pipeline boom and spent time in a tent at Russian Jack Springs Park for their honeymoon. A photo from this period has become Exhibit A of the “homeless to Harvard” story arc Ms. Tshibaka has promoted to describe her Alaska upbringing. As the veteran Alaska newspaper columnist Dermot Cole recently pointed out, her parents weren’t homeless. They were camping.After finishing high school, Ms. Tshibaka left to attend college in Texas, then Harvard Law, before spending 17 years in Washington. She wrote an article praising an organization that advocated gay conversion therapy (she later apologized to anyone she might have offended), described the “Twilight” books and movies as “evil,” and warned against the “addictive” qualities of witchcraft — positions not exactly in line with Alaska voters’ distaste for people telling them how to live their lives.Both she and Ms. Murkowski have presented themselves as lifelong Alaskans running against the political “establishment” in the rest of the country. But it’s Ms. Tshibaka who salutes the flag at Mar-a-Lago, telling high school students in Nome that Mr. Trump’s policies were “super great for our state.” In February, Mr. Trump hosted a fund-raiser for Ms. Tshibaka at his Florida club, though he then turned around and charged her $14,477 for use of the facilities. She moved back to Alaska only in 2019, when she was hired by the Republican governor, with the state paying $81,000 in moving expenses to bring her and her family north.Preening for a national audience at CPAC and on conservative talk shows, as Ms. Tshibaka has been doing, could hurt her chances in the August primary. The Democrat who went up against the Republican incumbent senator Dan Sullivan in 2020, Dr. Al Gross, discovered this to his grief. Hosting Zoom calls from his Airstream, courting donors across the country, he raised $19 million, the highest take of any Alaska Senate candidate ever. But come election time, the national exposure seemed to hinder more than help; Dr. Gross lost to Mr. Sullivan by 13 percentage points.Ms. Murkowski plays a different game.If history is any guide, soon she’ll arrive at the small airport here in Sitka dressed in fleece and denim, ready to wolf down wilted iceberg lettuce at the Chamber of Commerce luncheon, pumping hands with the “cut, kill, dig, drill” flannel-wearing good old boys at Orion Sporting Goods, dancing at Native celebrations.While I don’t always agree with her, when I watch her work a room, it’s difficult to take seriously Mr. Trump’s prediction that Alaska voters won’t forgive her. The more relevant question seems to be whether Ms. Murkowski will forgive him. “I will tell you, if the Republican Party has become nothing more than the party of Trump, I sincerely question whether this is the party for me,” she said shortly after the Capitol riot.The idea that Mr. Trump could fly up to Alaska and take her down, as he has so many others, could actually win Ms. Murkowski votes. One thing he might discover in the attempt: He doesn’t have the first idea of the values of this state he has visited only during refueling stops on Air Force One — the closeness to the land, to blood, to the sound ice shards make on a pane of glass at 40 below. All this might play as curiosity or nostalgia in the Lower 48. But it’s real up here.We don’t need more greatness in Alaska — just someone who understands what we already have, and is courageous enough to defend it against those who do not.Brendan Jones (@BrendanIJones), a writer and commercial fisherman, is the author, most recently, of the novel “Whispering Alaska.”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

Jessica Cisneros, the progressive South Texas immigration lawyer, said on Monday that she would formally demand a recount in her razor-thin runoff against Representative Henry Cuellar, the nine-term incumbent and moderate Democrat she has been trying to unseat for years.“I owe it to our community to see this through to the end,” Ms. Cisneros said in a statement.The May 24 election has not been called by The Associated Press. As of Friday, Mr. Cuellar was ahead of Ms. Cisneros by 187 votes.The Cisneros campaign said the Texas Democratic Party canvassed and certified the results of the runoff on Monday, and the review showed Mr. Cuellar ahead of Ms. Cisneros by 281 votes. Mr. Cuellar’s campaign had already declared victory the day after the runoff, saying that the margin of victory at that time “will hold.”In a statement on Monday, Mr. Cuellar said, “Every vote has been counted and our margin not only held but increased.” He added, “As Democrats, it is now time to come together and win the general election in November.”Mr. Cuellar said Ms. Cisneros had “every legal right” to demand a recount, but he said that she “has no path to victory and will not gain 281 votes.”Ms. Cisneros has until 5 p.m. Wednesday to formally submit a recount request to the Texas Democratic Party, which in turn has 48 hours to review the matter, according to a spokeswoman for the party. The spokeswoman, Rose Clouston, said that once the request was received and deemed eligible, the process of recounting the ballots could begin immediately.The race has drawn national attention as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressive leaders have backed Ms. Cisneros’s attempt to unseat one of the most conservative Democrats left in the House. Mr. Cuellar campaigned alongside Representative James E. Clyburn, the House majority whip, and faced scrutiny over a federal investigation. The F.B.I. raided Mr. Cuellar’s Laredo home earlier this year as part of an investigation that appears to be linked to an inquiry into the political influence of Azerbaijan, the former Soviet republic.Ms. Cisneros’s demand for a recount on Monday was the latest chapter in her efforts to defeat Mr. Cuellar, for whom she had once worked as an intern. In 2020, Ms. Cisneros came within 2,700 votes of victory. This year, she challenged him again, holding him just below the 50 percent threshold in the March primary to avoid a runoff.In Texas primaries, any candidate who finishes below 50 percent faces the No. 2 vote-getter in a runoff. In the Democratic primary in March, Mr. Cuellar won 48.4 percent of the vote, Ms. Cisneros got 46.9 percent and another liberal candidate, Tannya Benavides, had 4.7 percent. More

Proud Boys leaders charged with seditious conspiracy in 6 January riotEnrique Tarrio and four other members accused of plotting to attack the US Capitol Top leaders of the far-right Proud Boys group, including its national chairman, Enrique Tarrio, have been charged with seditious conspiracy for plotting to storm the US Capitol to obstruct the certification of Joe Biden’s election win over Donald Trump on 6 January 2021.Capitol attack panel to unveil new evidence against Trump at public hearingsRead moreThe move by federal prosecutors to charge Tarrio and four other Proud Boys leaders with seditious conspiracy – in addition to previous charges of obstructing a congressional proceeding – marks a major development in the criminal investigation into the Capitol attack.In the 33-page indictment unsealed in Washington DC on Monday, the justice department said Tarrio and his co-defendants Joseph Biggs, Ethan Nordean, Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola for months used encrypted messaging apps to stop Biden’s certification by force.The new charges against the proud Boys leadership come days before the parallel congressional inquiry into the Capitol attack is scheduled to start televised hearings that are expected to examine, in part, Trump’s personal culpability in the events of January 6.Seditious conspiracy, which is challenging to prove, requires federal prosecutors to show beyond a reasonable doubt that at least two people agreed to use force to overthrow the government or to interfere with the execution of a US law.The new indictment is the latest involving seditious conspiracy, after the justice department filed identical charges earlier this year against top members of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group, including its founder Stewart Rhodes, over the Capitol attack.A bipartisan US Senate report linked seven deaths to the attack on the Capitol, which failed to stop certification of Biden’s win. Trump was impeached for inciting an insurrection but acquitted when enough Senate Republicans stayed loyal.In adding on the seditious conspiracy charges, the justice department appeared to indicate that it has learned new information in recent weeks about the Proud Boys’ plans ahead of 6 January as a result of several significant developments.One of the Proud Boys, who was originally charged with Tarrio and the other co-defendants for obstructing a congressional proceeding, Charles Donoghue pleaded guilty in April and accepted a plea deal to cooperate with the criminal investigation into the group.Meanwhile, though the indictment also identified unindicted co-conspirators – “Person 1” is understood to be Jeremy Bertino and “Person 2” is likely Aaron Whallon Wolkind – neither of those men have been charged. A third top Proud Boy leader, John Stewart, also remains uncharged.The government said in the indictment that on 20 December 2020, Tarrio created a chat called “MOSD Leaders Group” – described by Tarrio as a “national rally planning committee” – that included Nordean, Biggs, Rehl and other individuals who were not identified.Through the rest of December, the government said, Proud Boys leaders used additional MOSD group chats to plan a “DC trip” and communicate to group members that they should go to the capital not wearing their familiar black and yellow colours but travel “incognito” instead.The government said in the indictment that on 30 and 31 December 2020, Tarrio communicated with an individual – whose identity is known only to a grand jury – who sent him a nine-page document, called “1776 returns” in reference to the year of American independence from Britain. It laid out a plan to occupy “crucial buildings” on 6 January.The document broadly outlined a plan to reconnoiter and storm crucial government buildings in Washington DC on 6 January, though not the Capitol itself, the New York Times earlier reported.Tarrio is said to have received the “1776 returns” document from one of his girlfriends, who compared the plan to storming the Winter palace in St Petersburg that sparked the Russian Revolution in 1917, the New York Times reported.The indictment cited a reference to that moment in the new indictment, drawing upon what appeared to be newly-uncovered text messages. After the Capitol attack ended, Bertino messaged Tarrio, “1776,” to which Tarrio responded: “The Winter Palace.”Three days before the Capitol attack, a Proud Boy referred to only as “Person-3” posted a voice message in the MOSD Leaders Group that stated the “main operating theater should be out in front of the House of Representatives”, according to the indictment.“That’s where the vote is taking place with all of the objections,” the person said, according to the indictment. “Plan the operations based around the front entrance to the Capitol building. I strongly recommend you use the National Mall and not Pennsylvania Avenue.”The new pieces of evidence in the latest indictment were messages Bertino sent to Tarrio after the attack. “You know we made this happen,” Bertino said. Referring to the implications of obstructing Biden’s win, Bertino added: “They HAVE to certify today. Or it’s invalid.”Tarrio was not in Washington DC on 6 January 2021, having been ordered to leave the capital by a judge after being arrested the day before for burning a Black Lives Matter banner at a church during a pro-Trump rally in December.But the justice department has said that even though Tarrio was not accused of “physically taking part in the breach of the Capitol”, he “led the advance planning and remained in contact with other members of the Proud Boys during” the attack.Eleven members of the Oath Keepers militia are also charged with seditious conspiracy.Lawyers for Tarrio and the other four Proud Boys leaders have said there is no evidence they conspired to storm the Capitol, and that the MOSD group chats and the acquisition of tactical gear before 6 January were measures to protect themselves in case of potential altercations.TopicsUS Capitol attackThe far rightnewsReuse this content More

ATLANTA — A gas-money giveaway in support of Herschel Walker, the Republican candidate for Senate in Georgia, drew the ire of Democrats and voting rights groups in the state, who said the move was both hypocritical and possibly illegal.The event, organized by the pro-Walker PAC 34N22, aimed to highlight rising gas prices and tie the issue to Senator Raphael Warnock, a Democrat who will run for re-election against Mr. Walker in November. The group handed out $25 fuel vouchers and Walker campaign flyers to motorists in line at a gas station in downtown Atlanta on Saturday as volunteers held signs saying, “Warnock isn’t working.”Several Democrats and leaders of voting rights groups criticized the event, pointing to a provision of the state’s voting law that bans volunteers from handing out water or snacks to voters while they are waiting in line. Handing out gas vouchers on behalf of a political candidate to motorists who are in line at the pump, they argued, should be considered just as unlawful.In an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, State Representative Bee Nguyen, a Democrat who is running for Secretary of State in Georgia, cited a 2020 incident in which she said a state investigator had demanded that volunteers at a polling place in Metro Atlanta remove all snacks and water.“Giving away gas vouchers and Herschel Walker flyers at the same time isn’t legal,” she said. “Are they going to do something about it?”A memo from Mr. Walker’s lawyers shared after the event denied any wrongdoing, saying the gas vouchers were distributed “without condition” and that no voters who received the vouchers were required to vote, register to vote or support any political candidate.“Warnock’s campaign is upset about 34N22’s community outreach program, not because of any earnest legal concerns, but because they don’t want the public to know Warnock has contributed to record gas prices and the pain Georgians are feeling at the pump,” the memo reads.Mr. Warnock’s campaign did not comment on the event.Mr. Walker’s campaign denied any involvement with Saturday’s voucher giveaway after a video surfaced showing Angela Stanton-King, a Walker campaign volunteer, crediting Mr. Walker for the gas voucher event. Campaign laws bar candidates from directly influencing or cooperating with PACs that support them.“Herschel Walker decided, ‘You know what, we’re going to do this free gas giveaway for the community. I want them to know that I care,’” said Ms. Stanton-King, a former U.S. House candidate who was pardoned in 2020 by former President Donald J. Trump for her role in a car-theft ring, in the video.The Saturday event — and ensuing backlash — provide the latest look at what is likely to be a bitter and expensive fight for the Senate seat.Two days before the event, Mr. Warnock released a television advertisement attacking Mr. Walker for his embrace of an aerosol product he claimed could remove Covid-19 from one’s body upon entry to a building. The last few seconds of the ad, entitled “Snake Oil,” flash the words: “Is Herschel Walker really ready to represent Georgia?” as footage plays of Mr. Walker explaining the treatment in an interview. More