Elections

MANAGUA — Los procesos electorales en América Latina se dan de manera más o menos imperfecta, pero se dan; y, salvo pocas excepciones, los votos de los ciudadanos se cuentan de manera transparente. Son sistemas democráticos que aún no logran resolver problemas de fondo en nuestras sociedades, y en algunos países la credibilidad de las instituciones se ha deteriorado, pero los electores pueden corregir el rumbo. No es el caso de Nicaragua.En noviembre de este año se celebran elecciones para presidente y vicepresidente, y para renovar el total de los asientos de la Asamblea Nacional. La decisión cerrada de Daniel Ortega, quien llegó por segunda vez a la presidencia en 2007, es reelegirse una vez más, junto con su esposa, la vicepresidenta Rosario Murillo. Así alcanzaría veinte años consecutivos de mando, sin contar los diez que gobernó en el periodo de la revolución en los años ochenta, con lo que superaría con creces a cualquier miembro de la familia Somoza, que gobernó el país directa o indirectamente entre 1937 y 1979.En las últimas semanas, el plan maestro fraguado para impedir unas elecciones democráticas se ha echado a andar, y sus resultados empiezan a ser palpables.¿Se puede hablar de elecciones justas, libres y transparentes en Nicaragua? Los hechos lo niegan.La rebelión cívica iniciada en abril de 2018, con un saldo de al menos 328 asesinados, principalmente jóvenes, fue dominada por medio de la represión violenta, de acuerdo con la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos. Ahora toca el turno de actuar a la maquinaria política. Estas elecciones están orquestadas para anular la participación de las fuerzas que representen un riesgo real de cambio político, apartar a los candidatos que verdaderamente sean un desafío a la continuidad de Ortega e impedir el derecho de la ciudadanía al voto libre y secreto.La Asamblea Nacional, dominada por la aplanadora orteguista, aprobó en enero una reforma a la Constitución que impone la cadena perpetua por “delitos de odio”. Pero no busca castigar el odio racial o contra las minorías, sino a quienes adversan al régimen. También una ley de ciberdelitos, destinada a mantener bajo control a las redes sociales, y otra que impide presentarse como candidatos a cargos públicos a quienes caigan bajo la calificación de “agentes extranjeros”. Las causales son tantas, que resulta imposible librarse de algunas de ellas.La Ley de Defensa de los Derechos del Pueblo a la Independencia, la Soberanía y Autodeterminación para la Paz, pena con cárcel y despoja del derecho de ejercer cargos públicos a quienes, entre otros delitos antipatrióticos, “exalten y aplaudan sanciones contra el Estado de Nicaragua”. Es la única ley en el mundo que castiga los aplausos.Una de las protestas de 2018, en ManaguaEsteban Biba/Epa-Efe vía RexEn diciembre de 2018, la policía allanó las oficinas de El ConfidencialMeridith Kohut para The New York TimesEn octubre del año pasado, una resolución votada por la Asamblea General de la Organización de los Estados Americanos advierte que deben darse negociaciones “incluyentes y oportunas” entre el gobierno y la oposición para acordar reformas electorales “significativas y coherentes con las normas internacionales”; modernización y reestructuración del Consejo Supremo Electoral para garantizar que funcione de manera “totalmente independiente, transparente y responsable”; actualización del registro de votantes; y, entre otras medidas, observación electoral nacional e internacional.Hace pocas semanas, al abrirse formalmente el periodo electoral, Ortega hizo todo lo contrario: copó la totalidad de los cargos de magistrados del Consejo Supremo Electoral con leales partidarios suyos; e introdujo una serie de reformas a la Ley Electoral que establecen aún mayores restricciones a los partidos. En estas decisiones no hubo ninguna clase de negociación con las fuerzas de la oposición.Muy recientemente, fue despojado de su personería jurídica el Partido de Restauración Democrática, bajo cuya bandera participaría una amplia gama de organizaciones de oposición agrupadas en la Coalición Nacional, varias de ellas formadas a raíz de los sucesos de abril de 2018. Igual pasó con el Partido Conservador.Ahora mismo, el Ministerio Público, obediente también, levanta cargos de lavado de dinero, bienes y activos en contra de Cristiana Chamorro Barrios, hasta hace poco presidenta de la Fundación Violeta Barrios, que lleva el nombre de su madre, expresidenta de Nicaragua. A la cabeza de las encuestas entre los candidatos presidenciales, la acusación contra Chamorro Barrios busca inhabilitarla.Al mismo tiempo, esta semana los estudios de grabación de los programas de televisión de su hermano, el periodista Carlos Fernando Chamorro, que se transmiten a través de las redes sociales, fueron allanados por segunda vez por la policía, y sus equipos y archivos confiscados. Nada parece indicar que la persecución contra los medios independientes de comunicación vaya a detenerse.En medio de estas condiciones adversas, que tienden a empeorar, permanece en la contienda la Alianza Ciudadanos por la Libertad, hasta ahora con su personería en regla. Aún debe escoger a sus candidatos, pero Ortega se ha arrogado, mediante diversos mecanismos y estratagemas, una especie de derecho de veto sobre quienes pueden competir contra él, y quienes no.El aparato electoral es fiel a Ortega en sus distintos niveles, y en las mesas de votación, las papeletas y las actas estarán bajo el control mayoritario de sus partidarios. No existe a la fecha ningún organismo independiente, nacional o internacional, involucrado en la observación electoral.En una protesta de 2018, una manifestante llevó una pancarta con los rostros de Daniel Ortega y Anastasio Somoza.ReutersBajo un estado policial como el presente, no es posible imaginar ninguna actividad proselitista electoral en plazas o calles. El régimen no las permitirá, porque teme un desborde popular como el de hace tres años. Y la policía impide a los candidatos, de manera arbitraria, salir de sus domicilios. Se tratará entonces de unas elecciones donde, por lo visto, la campaña electoral se haría desde la cárcel, o con la casa por cárcel.Una resolución del Consejo de Derechos Humanos de las Naciones Unidas en marzo manda que se deje de acosar y asediar a los opositores y disidentes políticos en Nicaragua, y que cesen las detenciones arbitrarias, las amenazas y otras formas de intimidación como método para reprimir la crítica; y pide, además, “liberar a todos aquellos arrestados ilegal o arbitrariamente”. Pero todas las demandas y censuras de los organismos internaciones son papel mojado para Ortega. Más de cien prisioneros políticos permanecen en las cárceles.Mientras algún partido esté dispuesto a apañar el fraude, aceptando los escaños que le asignen como segunda fuerza en la Asamblea Nacional; y mientras su reelección sea reconocida diplomáticamente por los países occidentales una vez consumada, considerará que tiene la legitimidad que necesita.Y como en las viejas historias de los dictadores latinoamericanos, algún subalterno le preguntará antes de abrir las urnas: ¿Con cuántos votos quiere ganar, Su Excelencia?Sergio Ramírez es novelista y ensayista. Fue vicepresidente de Nicaragua entre 1985 y 1990. En 2017 fue galardonado con el premio Cervantes. More

A Wyoming state senator who is challenging Representative Liz Cheney in the 2022 Republican primary acknowledged this week that when he was 18, he had sex with a 14-year-old girl — which is statutory rape in many states — and that she became pregnant.The state senator, Anthony Bouchard, made the disclosure in a Facebook Live video posted on Thursday and in a subsequent interview with The Casper Star-Tribune, saying that the girl gave birth to a son “more than 40 years ago” in Florida and that he married the girl after she turned 15.She died by suicide a few years later, after they had divorced and she had entered another relationship, Mr. Bouchard said.Mr. Bouchard sought to downplay his actions, saying in his video, “She was a little younger than me, so it’s like the Romeo and Juliet story.” But under current Florida law, his actions would be illegal.Because he did not specify the year he impregnated the girl, it is not clear what Florida’s laws were at the time.Mr. Bouchard said he went public with the story after a newspaper reached out to him. In the Star-Tribune interview, he blamed a “political opposition research company” for spreading it.He used his video to highlight his stance against abortion, saying he and the girl had resisted pressure to terminate the pregnancy.There was “a lot of pressure, pressure to abort a baby, I got to tell you,” he said in the 13-minute video. “I wasn’t going to do it, and neither was she. And there was pressure to have her banished from their family. Just pressure. Pressure to go hide somewhere. And the only thing I could see as the right thing to do was to get married and take care of him.”Mr. Bouchard is one of several Republicans who have said they will challenge Ms. Cheney, who was kicked out of her House leadership position this month for criticizing former President Donald J. Trump and saying she would do everything possible to ensure he was not the Republican Party’s presidential nominee in 2024.Mr. Bouchard was first elected to the State Senate in 2017 to represent the Laramie County area. He is a gun-rights activist who owns a septic system cleaning business with his wife, according to his official biography. More

A dead-heat election was followed by uncertainty and intrigue. But barring further surprises, Fiame Naomi Mata’afa will become prime minister on Monday.While its island neighbors in the Pacific weathered military coups and internal volatility, Samoa long followed a predictable political course, keeping the same leader in power for more than two decades.But as the country is set to usher in its first female prime minister, that status quo has been dramatically upended. The incoming leader, Fiame Naomi Mata’afa, represents a sharp break from what she describes as a worrying slide away from the rule of law, and she has vowed to scrap a major infrastructure project backed by China, her country’s largest creditor.And her ascension itself, after a dizzying seven-week period of uncertainty and intrigue that followed the April 9 election, has sent a rare charge through Samoan politics.First, there was a dead heat at the polls. Ms. Mata’afa’s upstart party won as many seats in Parliament as the one led by the swaggering prime minister, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi. An independent candidate took the remaining seat, making him a kingmaker.That set off feverish courting of that candidate by both parties. But the election commission intervened — paradoxically, blocking the rise of Ms. Mata’afa with the use of a law meant to ensure that more women served in Parliament.Under that law, women must hold at least 10 percent of the seats. The April election produced a count of 9.8 percent, which the electoral commission deemed insufficient. So it appointed another female member of Parliament — one representing Mr. Tuilaepa’s party. That handed him a majority, and a path to remaining in office.It didn’t last long. The independent candidate soon threw his weight behind Ms. Mata’afa’s party, and Samoa’s judiciary later tossed the additional female member out of Parliament, putting Ms. Mata’afa’s party in the majority. Although Mr. Tuilaepa has yet to concede, Ms. Mata’afa is scheduled to be sworn in as prime minister on Monday.Perhaps Samoa can then catch its breath.Apia, the capital of Samoa. Under Samoan law, women must hold at least 10 percent of the seats in Parliament. Matthew Abbott for The New York TimesMs. Mata’afa’s climb to the top job in Samoa — a country that was called Western Samoa until 1997 to distinguish it from American Samoa — is more than four decades in the making. Ms. Mata’afa, 64, a high chief who holds the title fiame, was propelled into political leadership after her father, the country’s first prime minister, died when she was 18. Not long after, she became the matai, or head of her family — an unusually early rise.“As an 18-year-old, I was looking forward to going to university, getting a degree, getting a job, maybe getting married,” she said by telephone on Friday. Always interested in politics, she had expected to move into the field over time. “But things were sped up unexpectedly. Sometimes life doesn’t work out necessarily how you thought it might.”She had long been expected to become prime minister one day — but as Mr. Tuilaepa’s successor, not his opponent, said Iati Iati, a political scientist at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand.Ms. Mata’afa spent three decades in Mr. Tuilaepa’s party, the Human Rights Protection Party, eventually becoming its deputy leader. But she left it in November over what she saw as a slide toward autocracy, including legislation that threatened to change the structure of the Samoan judiciary.“It wasn’t a difficult decision to make,” Ms. Mata’afa said. “What really led me to make the decision to step away was the dismantling of essentially the rule of law.”“Because of that huge majority that the H.R.P.P. had,” she added, “it became a lot more rampant, even the internal checks weren’t there — I was getting to feel a bit like the lone voice. If you can’t do it from the inside, you have to step outside.”She became the leader of a new opposition party, known as FAST, which drew a number of other H.R.P.P. defectors.Ballots from Samoa’s April 9 election, which ended in a dead heat. Samoa Electoral Commission, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“She’s such a strong, powerful, well-respected political leader, and she’s really probably the only politician in Samoa at the moment who can counter Tuilaepa,” said Kerryn Baker, a researcher at the Australian National University who is an expert on parliamentary gender quotas in the region.Ms. Mata’afa has already pledged to take one significant step away from Mr. Tuilaepa, 76, the second-longest-serving prime minister in the world.On Thursday, she announced that she would cancel a $100 million wharf development backed by China, saying that her small country of 200,000 people did not need such a large infrastructure project. China is Samoa’s largest creditor, accounting for about 40 percent, or some $160 million, of its external debts.Mr. Tuilaepa has been a staunch ally of Beijing for decades. While Ms. Mata’afa said she wanted to preserve relations with China, her pledge to shelve the wharf project has raised questions about the future of those ties, Dr. Iati said.“What is Samoa’s position in relation to China, what is the Pacific’s position in relation to China?” he said. “It’s got people examining China’s role in the country and in the region as a whole.”Ms. Mata’afa has also promised to focus on sustainable development as Pacific nations suffer from the effects of climate change, and to work to ensure women’s continued participation in politics.One of Samoa’s first female members of Parliament, Ms. Mata’afa has been a fierce defender of the parliamentary gender quota. She characterizes it not as a way to increase women’s participation, but as “legislation to ensure that it does not fall below this level.”Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi had yet to concede as of Friday.Brittainy Newman/The New York TimesSamoa’s welfare system, unlike those of more developed nations, is still largely family-based, “and therefore women still carry a lot of that responsibility and burden,” Ms. Mata’afa added. “Women have to see politics as an area where they’ve seen other women be able to achieve in it, so it’s not something that is insurmountable.”“My goal for women is that they fulfill their potential, that we remove any barriers that might be there for women, to enable them to make that contribution,” she said. But with more than 20 legal challenges to her election still pending, some worry that Ms. Mata’afa may yet be barred from assuming the top office.“The H.R.P.P. and Prime Minister Tuilaepa — they’re not done,” said Patricia O’Brien, an expert on the region at the Australian National University. “They’re going to cast doubt on the results, they’re going to cast doubt on the court cases, they’re trying to do things to muddy the waters and to disrupt an orderly transition of power.”Mr. Tuilaepa offered a hint of how he saw his place in Samoa this month as he responded to a protest of about 100 people calling on him to concede.“I am appointed by God,” he told local news media. “They should go to a church and pray instead of protesting in front of the courthouse.”Ms. Mata’afa, for her part, said she just wanted to get on with the job.“It’s a free world; he can talk about anything he likes,” she said. “I just like to spend my energy talking about things that need to be addressed.” More

A slew of influential ultra-Orthodox Jewish leaders endorsed Mr. Yang, motivated by one overriding issue: “Yeshivas, yeshivas, yeshivas.”The campaign material began appearing in Yiddish earlier than usual this year, declaring that the best defense that ultra-Orthodox Jews in New York City could have against a hostile world would be to elect Andrew Yang as mayor.One ad, invoking a passage from the Babylonian Talmud, told voters that Mr. Yang was the sort of honest man who is loved by God, not someone “who says one thing with his mouth but means another in his heart.”Another ad cast the choice in existential terms, urging people to vote for Mr. Yang because he alone supports “our right to educate our children according to our fundamentals” and “values our way of life.”With the June 22 Democratic mayoral primary roughly a month away, Mr. Yang, a former 2020 presidential candidate, has been able to push to the top of the contest through a potent mix of celebrity, optimism and tireless outreach, both in person and on social media.As he did in his presidential candidacy, which had support from a broad spectrum of disaffected voters, Mr. Yang has been able to widen his appeal in New York, attracting a significant following from influential ultra-Orthodox Jewish leaders.There are at least 500,000 Orthodox Jews in the New York area, by some estimates, and the endorsement of ultra-Orthodox leaders is highly coveted because the community is seen as a formidable voting bloc, especially in a race that has so far not energized the electorate.The endorsement of ultra-Orthodox leaders is highly coveted because the community is seen as a formidable voting bloc.James Estrin/The New York TimesThe key for Mr. Yang was his early declaration that he intended to take a laissez-faire attitude toward Hasidic yeshivas, the private schools to which almost all ultra-Orthodox families send their sons, as well as toward the schools where they educate their daughters.The yeshiva system has faced intense criticism over the failure of some schools to provide a basic secular education. Some also operated secretly during the pandemic, in violation of public health rules.“We shouldn’t interfere with their religious and parental choice as long as the outcomes are good,” he told The Forward, a Jewish publication, in February.That approach has helped him undercut rivals, particularly the Brooklyn borough president, Eric Adams, a former state senator who has a long working relationship with the Orthodox community.In the 2013 Democratic mayoral primary, Hasidic groups in Borough Park, Brooklyn, backed Bill de Blasio, who had once represented the area in the City Council.But in the last two presidential elections, neighborhoods with large ultra-Orthodox populations were islands of deep red in overwhelmingly blue Brooklyn. Some precincts in Borough Park voted for President Donald J. Trump by more than 90 percent in 2020.It remains to be seen how much influence Hasidic leaders will have in the Democratic primary; most ultra-Orthodox Jews support the Republican Party, according to a study published last week by the Pew Research Center, and the 2020 presidential election results in Orthodox Brooklyn seem to bear that out.Nonetheless, for Hasidic leaders, the decision to endorse a newcomer like Mr. Yang over a known quantity like Mr. Adams highlights their anxiety after a yearslong series of calamitous events: a devastating pandemic, a rise in anti-Semitic hate crimes and a long history of clashes with secular authorities over issues like social distancing, measles outbreaks and high school curriculums.Mr. Yang comes to city politics without the baggage of those past clashes. Capitalizing on that blank slate, he has won over allies with well-honed rhetoric on religious freedom, a sophisticated messaging campaign in Yiddish media and a willingness to adopt the hands-off approach favored by Hasidic leaders.“The most burning issue is yeshivas,” said Alexander Rapaport, a community leader who has organized voter registration drives in Borough Park in the run-up to the primary. “It’s not like something else is issue No. 2. Everything else is issue No. 25. The first 24 issues are yeshivas, yeshivas, yeshivas.”Alexander Rapaport, a community leader in Borough Park, said that for many voters, where candidates stood on yeshivas was a defining issue. Kevin Hagen for The New York TimesIn past elections, debates over yeshivas often centered on the allocation of public funds to the religious schools, which receive millions of federal, state and city dollars through education and child care programs.But the political conversation changed after a 2015 legal complaint filed by yeshiva graduates who said they had been given little secular education. That complaint led the city to open an inquiry that found that 26 of 28 yeshivas that were investigated were not meeting a legal requirement to provide education “substantially equivalent” to that provided in city public schools.No action was taken, but it prompted a citywide dialogue that cut to the heart of the yeshiva’s role in Hasidic society and profoundly insulted many in the community. There are more than 50,000 students in Hasidic schools in New York City, according to a 2017 report by Young Advocates for Fair Education, an ultra-Orthodox advocacy group.“The perceived threat to the autonomy of the yeshivas is greater now than it ever has been in part because there are critics from within the community publicizing what they see as the problems with the yeshiva system in a way that hasn’t happened before,” said Nathaniel Deutsch, a professor at University of California, Santa Cruz.Mr. Yang’s approach to the community was on full display at a recent event in Midwood, Brooklyn, where he received the endorsement of two local politicians, Assemblyman Simcha Eichenstein and Councilman Kalman Yeger.Standing before a crowd of reporters, Mr. Yang vowed to fight anti-Semitism and told Hasidic voters they were part of the “beautiful mosaic” of New York City.But when asked by The New York Times about yeshivas, Mr. Yang stood quietly behind Mr. Eichenstein and Mr. Yeger as they heatedly defended the schools, attacked “so-called advocates” for reform and decried the city investigation.Mr. Yang appeared bewildered by their anger — at one point, Mr. Yeger accused members of the City Council of being “OK with our kids getting blown up” — and sought to calm tensions with a joke about the “high-value add” they made to his campaign.He then took the microphone and criticized the city for allowing investigators “to check for infractions of various kinds” in yeshivas. He said he would take a different approach as mayor..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-9s9ecg{margin-bottom:15px;}.css-1jiwgt1{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;margin-bottom:1.25rem;}.css-8o2i8v{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-8o2i8v p{margin-bottom:0;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-1rh1sk1{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-1rh1sk1 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-1rh1sk1 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1rh1sk1 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccc;text-decoration-color:#ccc;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}“To the extent that there are issues in individual schools, I think we have to come together with the community and say ‘Look, like, is there something we can do to help?’” Mr. Yang said.“When there are issues, the approach should be one of correction and collegiality rather than contentiousness and adversarialness,” he added. “Which, unfortunately I think, has been the dynamic that the city has engendered for far too long.”Mr. Yang has expressed a willingness to adopt a hands-off approach to yeshivas, winning over many Hasidic leaders.Dave Sanders for The New York TimesMr. Adams has also praised yeshivas, saying he was “genuinely impressed” by one of the schools investigated by the city when he visited in March. But he has stressed that they must meet city standards and seemed to favor intervention when they do not.“We have to ensure that these yeshivas — those that are failing, which is not all the yeshivas, but those that are failing — we have to ensure that they meet the minimum standards,” he recently told The New York Times.The endorsements for Mr. Yang have been notable for how early they arrived. Hasidic leaders tend to wait until polls have established a favorite so they can try to back the winner, said David M. Pollock, the public policy director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York.But the fact that ultra-Orthodox voters have voted as a bloc in the past does not mean they are a monolith, Mr. Pollock said.That has been especially clear at the local level. Even in 2013, when Mr. de Blasio won the Borough Park neighborhood, he did so only by a slight margin over William C. Thompson Jr., who beat him in other neighborhoods with large ultra-Orthodox populations.“The dynamic is not that there is one bloc vote, but that there are multiple political players who can deliver votes wholesale,” Mr. Pollock said. That can be especially potent in an election with ranked-choice voting, which this mayoral race is using for the first time.“If you’re not going to endorse someone as your No. 1, you can say, ‘You’ll be our No. 2,’” Mr. Pollock said. “That’s not bad if you can sway 6,000 votes.”Mr. Yang has sought to appeal to Hasidic voters on issues besides education, including support for the right of parents to choose a circumcision ritual, metzitzah b’peh, which is used by a minority of Hasidic mohels and has transmitted herpes to babies, and support for Israel in its conflict with Hamas.But yeshivas have become the dominant issue in part because they play a larger role in Hasidic society than schools do in the secular world, Professor Deutsch said.They employ many Hasidic people, act as a social network that connects people with jobs and marriage prospects and are a primary medium through which the community’s history, values and Yiddish language are passed on to new generations, he said.They are also an important lever of power for community leaders, who can threaten to bar a child from yeshiva to enforce standards of behavior on their parents, such as a prohibition on renting property to gentrifiers, Dr. Deutch said.Indeed, Yoel Greenfeld, a young man leaving prayers at a 24-hour synagogue in Borough Park, said he would vote for Mr. Yang in the general election because Hasidic leaders endorsed him. But he cannot vote in the primary because he is a registered Republican.“I’ll vote for Yang because the community here wants Yang, and when people say that they mean the leaders want Yang,” Mr. Greenfeld said. “My opinion is nothing compared to theirs. But personally, I want a Republican.” More

The Democratic secretary of state said she had “grave concerns regarding the security and integrity” of the machines that were examined to appease ardent backers of Donald J. Trump.Arizona’s top elections official on Thursday urged the state’s most populous county to replace hundreds of voting machines that have been examined as part of a Republican-backed review of the state’s November election.The request added fuel to charges by impartial election observers and voting rights advocates that the review, ordered in December by the Republicans who control the State Senate, had become a political sham.In a letter to officials of Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix, the elections official, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, said it was unclear whether companies hired to conduct the review had sufficiently safeguarded the equipment from tampering during their review of votes.Ms. Hobbs, a Democrat, recommended that the county replace its 385 voting machines and nine vote tabulators because “the lack of physical security and transparency means we cannot be certain who accessed the voting equipment and what might have been done to them.”The advisory, in a letter to the county’s board of supervisors, did not contend that the machines had been breached. But Ms. Hobbs wrote that she had “grave concerns regarding the security and integrity of these machines, given that the chain of custody, a critical security tenet, has been compromised.”She added that she had first consulted experts at the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the national authority for election security issues.A spokeswoman for the county elections department said county officials “will not use any of the returned tabulation equipment unless the county, state and vendor are confident that there is no malicious hardware or software installed on the devices.”If the county decides to scrap the machines, it is unclear who would be responsible for paying to replace them. The State Senate agreed to indemnify the county against financial losses resulting from the audit.Republicans in the State Senate who ordered the review of the election said they wanted to reassure ardent backers of former President Donald J. Trump who refused to accept his narrow loss in Arizona. The review focused on Maricopa County, which produced two-thirds of the vote statewide.Mr. Trump has asserted that the audit would confirm his claims that his election loss was because of fraud, a charge that virtually every election expert rejects. With no formal electoral authority, the review could not change the results in Arizona.The audit was bombarded with charges of partisan bias after the State Senate hired a firm to manage the review whose top executive had spread baseless charges that Mr. Trump’s loss in the state was a result of fraud. The criticism has only mounted after nonpartisan election observers and journalists documented repeated lapses in the review’s process for recounting ballots. More

Timothy Granison’s arrest was the latest crisis for the re-election campaign of Mayor Lovely Warren of Rochester, N.Y., who suggested the investigation was part of a conspiracy against her.The husband of the mayor of Rochester, N.Y., was arrested on Wednesday after the police said they discovered drugs and guns in searches of his car and home, the latest crisis for the mayor in a year continually whipsawed by scandal.Mayor Lovely Warren’s husband, Timothy Granison, 42, was accused of being part of a midlevel cocaine trafficking ring and charged on Thursday with drug and gun possession in what prosecutors said was the culmination of a seven-month-long investigation.Six other people were charged in connection to the case, and additional charges are expected, according to the Monroe County district attorney.Ms. Warren was not charged with a crime, and prosecutors have not suggested she was a target of the investigation. A lawyer for Mr. Granison said Ms. Warren had no involvement with anything of which he is accused.But Mr. Granison’s arrest, and the discovery of 31 grams of powder in his possession that the police believe is cocaine — as well as a semiautomatic rifle and an unregistered handgun in Ms. Warren’s home — threatened to once again upend Ms. Warren’s re-election campaign.The episode was the latest in a series of scandals linked to Ms. Warren, who is seeking her third term as the mayor of Rochester, a small city just south of Lake Ontario.Last summer, the city was rocked by revelations of an apparent cover-up of the death of Daniel Prude, a Black man who died in police custody, which led to the firing of its police chief and censure of top officials. In the fall, Ms. Warren was indicted by county prosecutors on campaign finance charges for financial fraud during her 2017 re-election campaign. She has pleaded not guilty.In an address from City Hall on Thursday, Ms. Warren said she was the victim of a vast conspiracy to discredit her just a month before the city’s Democratic primary election. She accused the New York State Board of Elections of manipulating the evidence in its case against her, and suggested that the district attorney was framing her because she was angry the mayor had supported her opponent. And Ms. Warren intimated that the timing of Mr. Granison’s arrest and next court date — June 21, the day before the primary — had been designed to prevent her re-election.“People will try anything to break me,” Ms. Warren said.Ms. Warren is seeking a third term, and facing a primary challenge next month. Adrian Kraus/Associated PressShe described the recent events biblically, as her “Job year,” and denied any involvement in Mr. Granison’s troubles; the mayor and her husband had long ago signed a separation agreement, she said, but continued to co-parent their 10-year-old daughter.At a news conference on Thursday, Sandra Doorley, the Monroe County district attorney, repudiated Ms. Warren’s accusations.“I’m sure there are going to be people out there who think this was politically motivated,” Ms. Doorley said. “It was not.”Ms. Doorley described Mr. Granison as a player in a “narcotics ring,” adding that the investigation was ongoing and more arrests and searches were expected. More than two kilograms of crack cocaine and powder, worth about $60,000, as well as more than $100,000 in cash, was recovered across searches of the homes and other property of the seven people arrested..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-9s9ecg{margin-bottom:15px;}.css-1jiwgt1{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;margin-bottom:1.25rem;}.css-8o2i8v{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-8o2i8v p{margin-bottom:0;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-1rh1sk1{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-1rh1sk1 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-1rh1sk1 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1rh1sk1 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccc;text-decoration-color:#ccc;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}“We believe this whole organization was a midlevel drug organization that was affecting the city of Rochester,” Ms. Doorley said at the conference, adding that the quantity of drugs recovered was considered “significant.”Mr. Granison has had past run-ins with the law: When he was 17, he pleaded guilty to second-degree robbery after serving as a getaway driver in a jewelry store robbery. He was sentenced to five years probation.On Thursday, he pleaded not guilty to one count of criminal possession of a firearm, and two counts of criminal possession of a controlled substance, and was released on his own recognizance. Ms. Doorley said that investigators were also assessing whether the semiautomatic rifle was legal, and said he could face charges related to that weapon if it was not.In an interview, John L. DeMarco, Mr. Granison’s lawyer, said that his client also wanted to stress that his wife had not been involved. “The mayor has played no role in any of this,” Mr. DeMarco said. “Other than merely being a resident of the home, there is no involvement.”Officials declined to specify what sparked the initial investigation, but Ms. Doorley said that Mr. Granison was not one of the original targets. About three months ago, conversations captured on police wiretaps revealed he played a role, she said.Police are seeking to interview Ms. Warren but have not yet done so, according to Maj. Barry C. Chase, a troop commander with the State Police.Officials declined to comment on whether the mayor was heard on the wiretap. More

Republicans see an independent inquiry into the attack on the Capitol as a threat to their push to regain control of the Senate and the House.WASHINGTON — Leading congressional Republicans offer multiple justifications for why they oppose an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob, but there is really one overriding reason: They fear it will hurt their party’s image and hinder their attempts to regain power in next year’s midterm elections.Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the No. 2 Republican, was unusually candid about his party’s predicament, which he said was “weighing on people’s minds” as they contemplated the prospect of an inquiry into the deadliest attack on the Capitol in two centuries.Republicans, he said, wondered “whether or not this can be, in the end, a fair process that fully examines the facts around Jan. 6 in an objective way, and doesn’t become a political weapon in the hands of the Democrats.”Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, as is his style, was much more circumspect. But in a closed-door luncheon this week, Mr. McConnell, the minority leader, warned fellow Republican senators that the proposed panel — the product of a deal between a top Democrat and a top Republican in the House — was not as bipartisan as it appeared. He said he believed that Democrats had partisan motives in moving to set up the commission and would try to extend the investigation into 2022 and the midterm election season, tarnishing Republicans and complicating Mr. McConnell’s drive to return as majority leader.A day later, Mr. McConnell joined Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House Republican leader, in flat-out opposing the creation of the 10-member commission. Four months after the deadly assault that targeted them and their institution, the two minority leaders in Congress had united against a bipartisan inquiry that would provide a full accounting for the riot.Like Mr. McConnell, Mr. McCarthy is determined to put Republicans in the House majority next year and himself in the speakership, and he regards an investigation into what happened on Jan. 6 as an obstacle in his path.Given that the commission would be likely to delve into the details of Donald J. Trump’s role in stoking the riot with lies about a stolen election — and that of his party in spreading those false claims and seeking to invalidate President Biden’s victory — it stands to reason that any investigation could be damaging to Republicans. The testimony of Mr. McCarthy, who was in contact with Mr. Trump by phone on Jan. 6, would undoubtedly be sought.Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 House Democrat, archly referred to potential Republican culpability during a House debate on Wednesday, saying the inquiry was needed to get to the bottom of what took place.“Why did that happen?” he asked. “How did it happen? How can we stop it from happening again? What are the resources that we need? And yes, who was responsible? Some, perhaps, are going to vote against this because that’s what they fear.”Capitol Police officers aiming their guns at a barricaded door as rioters tried to enter the House chamber on Jan. 6.Andrew Harnik/Associated PressThe political dynamic was a stark difference from the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, when lawmakers, despite months of disagreement and negotiation, finally came together around the idea of forming an outside inquiry. The independent commission they created has become the gold standard for such efforts, and was heralded for its work in unraveling the origins of the terrorist attacks and making recommendations to prevent a recurrence. Just three House members opposed the formation of that commission on the final vote in November 2002, and the proposal was approved on a voice vote in the Senate.But there was no hope for a similar consensus outcome in the House on Wednesday — and most likely none in the Senate in the future — at a time when many Republicans have been working to deflect any close examination of the riot, and some have tried to downplay or deny its crucial facts.Republican leaders have dug in against the commission even though one of their own members negotiated its details with Democrats, who acceded to their initial demands about its structure. The Jan. 6 proposal was modeled very closely on the Sept. 11 commission. But times have changed, and the Capitol riot has become just another partisan dividing line in a divided capital.Political risks were a very real consideration in 2002 as well. The Bush administration, and particularly Vice President Dick Cheney, quietly hindered the drive to set up the bipartisan commission even as the White House professed to be fully supportive of the effort. President George W. Bush and members of his administration knew that the disclosure of intelligence lapses leading up to Sept. 11 and other aspects of the investigation could be severely damaging, and they were in no rush to back an inquiry that could haunt the president’s re-election in 2004. But the pressure built to the point where Congress was finally able to proceed.Many of the objections being raised now were also aired during the debate surrounding the Sept. 11 commission. Mr. McConnell and others have said that congressional committee inquiries can get the job done while the Justice Department is deep into its own criminal investigations.“It’s not at all clear what new facts or additional investigation yet another commission could lay on top of the existing efforts by law enforcement and Congress,” Mr. McConnell said.But to Democrats and others supporting the commission, that is the point: A bipartisan inquiry could find facts and developments that other, more narrowly focused investigations might miss, and then be able to deliver a more comprehensive picture of what happened on Jan. 6. The Sept. 11 commission went to work after numerous congressional inquiries, including an in-depth, joint House and Senate Intelligence Committee investigation, and there was still plenty of room for the panel to expand on that and other work.Republicans have also raised concerns that the inquiry could complicate the criminal prosecution of those being charged in the assault — a common critique of congressional investigations that parallel criminal inquiries. And they objected that Democrats would appoint the chair of the panel and control the hiring of staff members, suggesting that even with Republicans able to appoint half of the commission members, Democrats would really be in control.“It will be up to the commission to decide how far they want to go,” said Representative John Katko, Republican of New York, who helped negotiate the bipartisan committee agreement.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesRepresentative John Katko of New York, the top Republican on the Homeland Security Committee, who negotiated the agreement with Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi and the chairman of the committee, sought to dispel those concerns and others, calling them unwarranted.“The commission creates the rules as a team,” Mr. Katko said. He also dismissed complaints from Republicans that the scope of the panel was too narrow given civil unrest around the nation, including by left-leaning activists, saying there was no reason the commission could not examine such episodes.“It will be up to the commission to decide how far they want to go,” he said.Such assurances are unlikely to move Mr. McConnell and Mr. McCarthy, who have other reasons for opposing the commission. They believe that Democrats have a vested interest in calling attention to the horrors of Jan. 6, and saw the efforts by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to maintain fencing around the Capitol and keep National Guard troops present as ways to remind Americans of the assault by pro-Trump forces. Given all of that, it is not clear whether the proposal can draw the 10 Republicans whose votes would be needed to advance the bill creating the inquiry past a filibuster in the Senate.But 35 Republicans in the House broke from the leadership and supported the commission. They said it was time for others in their party to do the same in the pursuit of truth.“We need the answers, not political rhetoric,” said Representative Fred Upton of Michigan, one of the 35. “That’s what this bipartisan commission can provide for all of us, for our country. Let the truth shine in.” More

Our politics are stalled. Our democracy is in tatters. Blame it on the occupation.TEL AVIV — For a few days in early May, Israel appeared close to establishing a new government. After four elections in two years that failed to produce a decisive result, the country was poised for a surprising partnership of ideologically diverse parties including, for the first time, an independent Arab party — Raam. Such a government would have been fraught, even shaky, but it would have ended the two years of political chaos and replaced Israel’s right-wing prime minister, a man currently standing trial for corruption.What happened instead followed a grim pattern: The Israeli-Palestinian conflict flared yet again. Within days of the start of the military escalation between Hamas and the government of Benjamin Netanyahu that was sparked in Jerusalem and compounded by Jewish and Palestinian violence in Israeli cities, the crisis had put political change on hold.Although many Israelis scoff at the left-wing tendency to blame the occupation for the country’s problems, and Mr. Netanyahu has insisted for years that the conflict doesn’t control our lives, reality says otherwise. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict dominates Israeli politics, muscling out sound policymaking in other critical areas of life. The conflict is suffocating liberal values, eroding Israel’s democratic institutions. Israeli leadership at large is collapsing under its weight.It is time to accept that it’s not just that Israel controls Palestinians in the conflict. Palestine also controls Israel. The occupation and the festering political conflict since 1948 have permeated every part of our society, political and social institutions, and well-being. If Israel and its supporters can view the situation in this light, they might reach different conclusions about what’s best for the country.The political system is a key starting point. In Israel, left, center or right-wing ideology is grounded in attitudes toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: support for or opposition to a two-state solution; support for expanding or dismantling settlements and/or land concessions. These attitudes and levels of (Jewish) religious observance strongly predict which ideological camp a voter will choose.In Israeli elections, it is nearly impossible to woo a significant number of voters across the main ideological political camps with shared problems such as economic concerns, investment in education, L.G.B.T.Q. rights or even the highly emotional question of disentangling religion and state. While the elections in March demonstrated that some centrists voted for the right-wing parties, right-wing voters in particular almost never move to the left.There is nothing wrong with voting for parties that reflect one’s ideology. But right-wing parties, especially under Mr. Netanyahu, have a longstanding pact with religious parties that share their ideology regarding the conflict. The religious parties block other urgently needed changes in Israeli society, such as laws proposing an end to the longstanding exemption of ultra-Orthodox Jews from conscription, which is required for all other citizens; civil marriage, which is not available in Israel (sending many Israelis abroad to tie the knot); and widespread access to public transportation on the Sabbath. Ordinary Israelis have been angry for decades about inequality of army service, about Sabbath privileges for those who own cars and about religious authority over family law, which is a bitter source of gender inequality.At times, Israel has appeared to lay the groundwork for a more a liberal democratic society, which would advance broader progressive values. In the early 1990s, Israel passed two new Basic Laws, guaranteeing a series of basic individual rights and protections. These became a stand-in for a Bill of Rights since Israel has no formal one. An increasingly activist Supreme Court advanced some human rights protections and individual freedoms.For example, in 1993 Israel repealed its restriction on gay men serving openly in certain defense forces positions, and the next year the Supreme Court issued its first ruling against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. In 1998, Israel passed its first dedicated law against sexual harassment.Yitzhak Rabin’s government sought to redress discrimination against Palestinian citizens and signed the Oslo Accords in 1993. When Mr. Rabin was assassinated in 1995 for his nascent efforts to end the conflict, progressive change on certain social issues continued, but liberal interpretations of the law and the Supreme Court itself would eventually come under intense attacks from the Israeli right wing.The failure of another peace process in 2000 gave way to a violent second intifada, pushing Israeli society farther to the right and paving the road for Mr. Netanyahu’s return to power in 2009. Mr. Netanyahu has worked assiduously to undermine a two-state solution. And he and other right-wing nationalists and populist leaders set about undermining the institutions of Israeli democracy itself.Since 2009, Mr. Netanyahu’s governments have passed discriminatory legislation against Palestinian citizens, laws targeting left-wing political activities and laws constraining civil society. These laws have roots in the conflict over national identity or occupation. They elevate the status of Jews over Palestinians, or they are tailored to constrain criticism of the occupation.The motive for this effort is no mystery: It is aimed at ensuring that Israel remains a Jewish-dominated state, with minimal political opposition. Both would be essential if Israel were to advance West Bank annexation, which would alter the state’s demographic makeup and spark challenges to the character of the state and its undemocratic governance of Palestinians.The Israeli right’s most ambitious campaign for about a decade has been a sustained attack on the judiciary. Right-wing leaders speak of correcting the balance of power among the branches of government and restoring sovereignty to “the people,” rather than the elites, referring to judges — especially Supreme Court justices. The chief proponents of this cause are overwhelmingly committed to settlements and annexation. Naftali Bennett, leader of the right-wing Yamina party and a former defense and education minister, once served as head of the Yesha settlers’ council. Ayelet Shaked, justice minister from 2015 to 2019, is outspoken in favor of both aims. Simcha Rothman, a firebrand anti-Supreme Court crusader and a settler from deep inside the West Bank, entered the Knesset in 2021 with the Jewish-ultranationalist Religious Zionist party.Undermining the judiciary has nothing to do with repairing institutions; it will assist what right-wing leaders call “governability” — a word that also appears in the name of the organization Mr. Rothman founded. The term is a euphemism, and a mantra, for government power unrestrained by courts, which enables both continuing rule over the Palestinian territories and an increasingly undemocratic Israel.Last, the conflict is directly tied to Israel’s chaos of leadership. Mr. Netanyahu retains stable support from nearly one-quarter of voters, largely because of his image as the man who won’t make concessions to “Arabs” (many right-wing Israelis avoid the word “Palestinian”). He used the most recent escalation with Hamas to burnish his image as the master of security. The crisis also persuaded Mr. Bennett of the Yamina party to withdraw from negotiations to join the would-be alternative government and revive the option of yet another Netanyahu coalition.Once again, with help from the conflict, Israel has normalized a leader standing trial for corruption charges in three cases, who refuses to resign. (He has pleaded not guilty). Since a sufficient number of parties over the past two years have refused to join a government led by Mr. Netanyahu, his recalcitrance is the reason Israel has had no permanent government despite four elections. He has also opportunistically joined the attacks on Israel’s judiciary in an effort to undermine the court cases against him.Decades of Palestinian suffering should have brought Israel’s occupation to an end by now. But the folly of territorial conquest and international realpolitik has been stronger.Perhaps a cleareyed view of how the conflict is suffocating Israel can add urgency. There is certainly no easy or ideal solution. But the “stand back” approach, or any “not now” complacency, is definitely the wrong one.Dahlia Scheindlin is a political strategist and a public opinion expert who has advised eight national campaigns in Israel and worked in 15 other countries. She is also a policy fellow at the Century Foundation.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