Elections

Vice President Kamala Harris rolled into Arizona on Friday evening with the same political momentum that has infused her first swing across the country this week, drawing a crowd that her campaign estimated at more than 15,000 — her largest yet — in a Western state that not long ago appeared to be falling off the battleground map.Along with her newly minted running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, Ms. Harris delivered a stump speech that is barely a week old, and yet familiar enough to an impassioned new following that some shouted her lines before she did.The rally was her fourth in four days with an arena-filling crowd that demonstrated the degree to which her candidacy replacing President Biden’s had remade the 2024 race.Mr. Walz relished the crowd that filed into the Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, Ariz., in 100-degree heat as he poked fun at Mr. Trump’s obsession with rally crowds.“It’s not as if anybody cares about crowd sizes or anything,” Mr. Walz said to knowing cheers.Despite her momentum, Ms. Harris faces an uphill battle in Arizona, a longtime Republican stronghold that flipped to Mr. Biden in 2020 but, according to polling, had been drifting back to former President Donald J. Trump this year.To win, she will need to reunite the diverse coalition of voters who delivered the state four years ago, and she made an explicit appeal to one part of that group on Friday: Native American voters.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Choose Your Own Medal Table Number of Events Won (the Standard Count) United States 33 39 39 111 China 33 27 23 83 Britain 14 20 23 57 France 14 20 22 56 Australia 18 16 14 48 Japan 16 8 13 37 Italy 11 12 13 36 Netherlands 13 6 10 29 Germany 12 9 8 29 South Korea 13 8 7 28 More

On New Year’s Day, a Telegram user in Portugal posted an ominous message that the wait was over. This was the year to stop the “Population Replacement” — a conspiracy theory that immigrants of color are taking over. In the days and weeks that followed, thousands more posts like it appeared on Telegram, X, YouTube […] More

Jack Campbell, the sheriff of Sangamon County, was criticized for hiring the deputy, who has now been charged with murdering Sonya Massey in her home last month.Jack Campbell, the Illinois sheriff whose deputy was charged with murder after fatally shooting a Black woman in her home last month, said Friday that he would leave his position by the end of the month amid calls from the public and the governor that he do so.The sheriff said in a statement obtained by WAND, a local television news station, that the “current political climate” made it impossible for him to continue in his role leading the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office and that he would retire no later than Aug. 31.Sheriff Campbell had previously said he would not resign as he faced criticism for having hired Sean Grayson, the white deputy who shot Sonya Massey, 36, despite knowing that Mr. Grayson, 30, had two convictions for driving under the influence on his record, including one that had led to Mr. Grayson’s premature discharge from the Army in February 2016.Mr. Grayson fatally shot Ms. Massey at her home in Springfield, Ill., on July 6 after she had called the emergency services because she believed an intruder was in her home.The day before, Ms. Massey’s mother, Donna Massey, had called 911 to alert the authorities that her daughter had been having a mental breakdown and was in a vulnerable state.“I don’t want you guys to hurt her, please,” she told a dispatcher on the morning of July 5.Sheriff Campbell, who was elected in 2018, fired Mr. Grayson on July 17 after an investigation into the deputy’s shooting of Ms. Massey by the state police resulted in a murder charge. On July 22, his department released footage of the shooting from Mr. Grayson’s body-worn camera.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

The agency said there was insufficient data to allow the use of a treatment for PTSD that involves the drug known as Ecstasy.The Food and Drug Administration on Friday declined to approve MDMA-assisted therapy for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder, dealing a serious blow to the nascent field of psychedelic medicine and dashing the hopes of many Americans who are desperate for new treatments.The F.D.A. said there was insufficient data to allow its use, and it asked the company seeking approval for the treatment, Lykos Therapeutics, to conduct an additional clinical trial to assess whether the drug, commonly known as Ecstasy or molly, would be safe and effective.An additional clinical trial could add years, and millions of dollars, to the approval process.If approved, MDMA would have become the first psychedelic compound to be regulated by federal health authorities. Supporters of psychedelic medicine were deeply disappointed, and some said they were stunned, having assumed the therapy’s promising data would overcome flaws in the company’s clinical trials, which had been designed in consultation with F.D.A. scientists.“This is an earthquake for those in the field who thought F.D.A. approval would be a cinch,” said Michael Pollan, the best-selling author and co-founder of the UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics. His book, “How to Change Your Mind,” helped catalyze public interest in the therapeutic potential of psychoactive compounds, demonized during the nation’s long war on drugs.But the agency’s decision had not been entirely unexpected, after a group of independent experts convened by the F.D.A. to evaluate Lykos’s data met in June and did not recommend the treatment. On two central questions, the experts voted overwhelmingly that the company had not proven the treatment was effective, and that the drug therapy’s benefits did not outweigh the risks.The agency generally follows the recommendations of its outside panels. Critics, however, have questioned the panel’s expertise, noting that only one of its 11 members had experience in psychedelic medicine.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

The United States, Egypt and Qatar are trying to restart peace talks between Hamas and Israel, while Israel carries on its operation in Gaza and braces for attacks by Iran and Hezbollah.An Israeli ground assault in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday forced tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes and shelters, many for a third time or more, even as the United States and some Arab allies pressed both Israel and Hamas to restart peace talks.Between 60,000 and 70,000 people had fled by Thursday evening after the Israeli military ordered people in the city of Khan Younis to leave, according to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. More continued to flee into the night and into Friday.The Israeli military said its troops were “engaged in combat both above and below-ground” in the Khan Younis area, in an attack involving ground troops, fighter jets, helicopter gunships and paratroopers, and that the air force had struck more than 30 targets. The assault, the military said, was “part of the effort to degrade” Hamas’ capabilities “as they attempt to regroup.”Under a blazing sun, women carrying babies and blankets, men pushing carts and wheelchairs over sandy roads and young children carrying suitcases and backpacks have walked away from homes and shelters and toward unknown destinations. Some were in tears.“People are sleeping in the streets. Children and women are on the ground without mattresses,” Yafa Abu Aker, a resident of Khan Younis and an independent journalist, told The New York Times in a text message.“Death is better,” an older woman said on Thursday, in video from the Reuters news agency. “We’re fed up. We’ve already died. We’re dead.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Former President Donald J. Trump on Friday afternoon vehemently maintained that he had once been in a dangerous helicopter landing with Willie Brown, the former mayor of San Francisco, and insisted he had records to prove it, despite Mr. Brown’s denial.In an angry phone call to a New York Times reporter as he landed several hours away from his planned rally in Bozeman, Mont., because of a mechanical issue on his plane, Mr. Trump excoriated The Times for its coverage of his meandering news conference on Thursday at Mar-a-Lago, his private club and home, during which he told of an emergency landing during a helicopter trip that he said both he and Mr. Brown had made together. Mr. Trump was expected to keep his rally schedule on Friday as planned, boarding a smaller plane to complete the journey.Mr. Brown denied on Thursday that he had ever flown in a helicopter with Mr. Trump. It appeared Mr. Trump may have confused Willie Brown with Jerry Brown, the former governor of California, with whom Mr. Trump traveled by helicopter in 2018 while surveying wildfire damage in the state. But Jerry Brown, who left office in January 2019, said through a spokesman, “There was no emergency landing and no discussion of Kamala Harris.”Willie Brown, who was a boyfriend of Vice President Kamala Harris during the 1990s, knew Mr. Trump as a potential business associate during those years, when Mr. Trump, then a New York developer, was working on new projects. A biography of Ms. Harris, “Kamala’s Way: An American Life,” reported that Mr. Trump had sent his private plane for Mr. Brown and Ms. Harris in 1994 to fly them from Boston to New York City. “We have the flight records of the helicopter,” Mr. Trump insisted Friday, saying the helicopter had landed “in a field,” and indicating that he intended to release the flight records, before shouting that he was “probably going to sue” over the Times article. When asked to produce the flight records, Mr. Trump responded mockingly, repeating the request in a sing-song voice. As of early Friday evening, he had not provided them.Mr. Trump has a history of claiming he will provide evidence to back up his claims but ultimately not doing so.He has also told the helicopter story before, in his 2023 book, “Letters to Trump,” in which he published letters to him from a number of people, including Mr. Brown. In the book, Mr. Trump wrote, “We actually had an emergency landing in a helicopter together. It was a little scary for both of us, but thankfully we made it.” More

Fresh challenges in the offing could determine how long the vice president’s honeymoon will last.If you are Vice President Kamala Harris, another Democrat or any other person who happens to want Harris to become president, the last two weeks and five days have probably felt like a dream.There is a tougher reality for Harris, though, belied by the euphoric haze.The contest between Harris and former President Donald Trump remains remarkably close, and she is tied with him in must-win states like Wisconsin and Michigan, according to The New York Times’s polling averages. Trump’s allies are sharpening their attacks. And in a candidacy measured in days not months, she has yet to face the scrutiny of an interview or release a detailed vision for her potential presidency.Every presidential campaign is a series of tests. Can you excite voters? Can you raise money? For Harris, the answer to both of those questions so far is yes. Her party coalesced around her instantly. She has smashed fund-raising records and held overflowing rallies, and she seems to be tugging key swing states her way.But as Harris wraps up a battleground campaign tour with her brand-new running mate this weekend and turns her attention toward the Democratic National Convention this month, fresh challenges are in the offing. And the short campaign leaves a candidate who is still introducing herself to voters with little time for do-overs.“She will be tested,” Neil Newhouse, a Republican pollster, said. “She’ll be tested by the Trump campaign. She’ll be tested by the press, and just by everyday events.”That may be why Harris has been careful to sound a note of caution to supporters who might prefer to luxuriate in the optimism.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More