Elections

The top election official in Arizona’s Maricopa county, who became nationally known for defending the 2020 election results from false claims by Donald Trump and others of fraud, has lost his seat in the Republican primary to a challenger who questioned those 2020 results.In his campaign, Stephen Richer reaffirmed in a primary debate with his Republican opponents that neither the 2020 nor 2022 elections were stolen. His opponents continued questioned the results, with one partly blaming Mark Zuckerberg, claiming the Facebook founder “dropped in illegal drop boxes” to sway the elections.State representative Justin Heap, another challenger, claimed election rules were not followed, though he avoided taking a direct stance on whether he thought the elections were stolen.On Wednesday it was announced that Heap had won the election with more than 40% of the vote, after 81% of ballots had been counted. Richer trailed by 6.5%.Heap is a first-term state representative who sought the votes of Maga supporters, despite deleting 2023 posts on social media claiming he is not one himself. He has, however, claimed he proudly voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020 and would do so again. His candidacy was supported by the far-right Freedom caucus.He has also aligned himself with the Senate candidate Kari Lake, a favorite of Trump who has also repeatedly claimed election fraud despite no evidence, and falsely accused Richer of having a role in it. Richer has sued Lake for defamation.Richer took office in 2021 after defeating a Democrat incumbent.“Nobody stole Maricopa county’s election. Elections in Maricopa county aren’t rigged,” Richer wrote in a 2021 open letter to Arizona Republicans. “The truth is that the case isn’t there. I spent November and December willing to wait for a meritorious lawsuit, a scientific claim or convincing data. But it never came because it didn’t exist.”He received death threats for denying the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and that the 2022 election was stolen from Lake. One county party official stated that he would “lynch” Richer, and a Missouri man faced federal charges for threatening to kill him in 2022.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAs recorder of Maricopa county, the most populous county in Arizona, Richer ran voter registration and early voting efforts.Heap will now run against Democrat Tim Stringham, an attorney, in the 5 November general election. More

Sean Patrick Cirillo called Ms. Greene’s office and told staff members about his plans to kill the politician, the F.B.I. said. He faces a maximum of five years in prison.An Atlanta man pleaded guilty on Tuesday to making death threats against Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.The man, Sean Patrick Cirillo, 34, made two threatening phone calls on Nov. 8, 2023, to Ms. Greene’s Washington, D.C., office, spoke to staff members and said that he planned to shoot the politician in the head, an F.B.I. agent said in court documents.“I’m gonna kill her next week,” Mr. Cirillo said, according to recordings of the phone call that were reviewed by the F.B.I. “I’m gonna murder her.”Mr. Cirillo pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Atlanta to one count of transmitting interstate threats. He will face a maximum possible penalty of five years in prison when he is sentenced on Nov. 7.“Threatening to kill a public official is reprehensible,” Ryan K. Buchanan, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, said in a statement. “Our office will not tolerate any form of violence, threats or intimidation against public officials.”In a statement, Mr. Cirillo’s lawyer, Allison Dawson, said that Mr. Cirillo had struggled with mental health issues and was not on his prescribed medication at the time of the incident.Ms. Greene’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.After Mr. Cirillo was arrested, Ms. Greene said in a statement to Atlanta News First: “Threats to murder elected officials should never be tolerated.”During his phone calls to Ms. Greene’s office, the F.B.I. said, Mr. Cirillo said that he was focusing on Ms. Greene through the sight of a sniper rifle. He also threatened to kill her staff members who picked up the two calls, which he made on Nov. 8 at 1:33 p.m. and 5:36 p.m., the F.B.I. said.The next day, when the F.B.I. showed up at Mr. Cirillo’s home by tracking his phone number, Mr. Cirillo admitted to making the calls, said he had made them to “get attention” and added that he had called “multiple other people as well including other members of Congress,” court records state. It is not clear who else received Mr. Cirillo’s calls.Mr. Cirillo’s guilty plea is the latest event in a recent pattern of threats toward political figures. Last week, a man was charged with threatening to assault and kill federal officials, judges and state employees across several states, including people involved in the prosecution of former President Donald J. Trump.In California, some elected officials said they were rethinking public office in light of increasing harassment.Kirsten Noyes More

The announcement came less than a week after Boar’s Head recalled more than 200,000 pounds of meat during an outbreak that has killed two and sickened more than two dozen.Boar’s Head recalled seven million additional pounds of deli meat on Tuesday, expanding a recall of more than 200,000 pounds after its product was linked on Monday to a listeria outbreak that has left two people dead and sickened nearly three dozen.The expanded recall includes all meats and poultry processed at a Boar’s Head facility in Jarratt, Va. The decision to broaden the recall came after the company learned from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that a sample of its liverwurst from a Maryland store that had tested positive for listeria bacteria had matched the strain in the nationwide outbreak.“Based on this new information, we took steps to ensure we are doing everything possible to protect public health,” Boar’s Head said in a statement on its website on Tuesday. The company added that it had suspended operations involving ready-to-eat meats at the Jarratt facility until further notice.The company announced its initial recall on July 25, calling back all products that had been processed on the same production line and on the same day, June 27, as the contaminated liverwurst. That recall amounted to 207, 528 pounds of meat comprising 10 different products sliced at deli counters and sold in retail stores.Now, the recall covers every item produced at the Virginia facility, a sweeping list of 71 products bearing the Boar’s Head and Old Country brand names produced from May 10 through July 29, the U.S.D.A.’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said.The list of products includes multipound loaves of “Strassburger Brand Liverwurst MADE IN VIRGINIA” with sell-by dates ranging from July 25 to Aug. 30 and meats made for slicing at delis with an Aug. 10 sell-by date. Some of those meats include: Virginia ham, Italian Cappy Ham, Extra Hot Italian Cappy Ham, Pork & Beef Bologna, Beef Salami, Beef Bologna and Garlic Bologna.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 strike was in retaliation for a deadly rocket attack this weekend in the Golan Heights. At least three civilians were killed and 74 others wounded on Tuesday, Lebanese officials said.Israel launched a deadly strike in a densely populated Beirut suburb on Tuesday in retaliation for a rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that it blamed Hezbollah for and that killed 12 children and teenagers on a soccer field.The target of the Israeli strike in a southern suburb of Lebanon’s capital was Fuad Shukr, a senior official who serves as a close adviser to Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, according to three Israeli security officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.The Israel Defense Forces later said in a statement that its fighter jets had “eliminated” Mr. Shukr, but there was no confirmation from Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed group, and the claim could not be independently verified.Hezbollah has denied carrying out the attack in the Golan Heights on Saturday. The latest strikes were likely to fuel concerns that Israel’s long-running conflict with the group could escalate into a full-blown war even as Israel wages a military offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after that group led a deadly assault in Israel on Oct. 7.The attack on Tuesday is believed to be the first time since the war with Hamas began that Israel has targeted Hezbollah in Beirut. In January, an Israeli airstrike in a Beirut suburb killed Saleh al-Arouri, a senior leader of Hamas, which is also backed by Iran.The strike on Tuesday killed at least three other people — a woman and two children — and wounded at least 74 others, five critically, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Health. Officials were still searching the rubble for other victims, the ministry said. More

An investigative report, which also documents widespread sexual and physical abuse in a program of forced assimilation, calls on the federal government to apologize and “chart a road to healing.”Nearly 1,000 American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian children died while attending boarding schools that were set up by the U.S. government for the purpose of erasing their tribal ties and cultural practices, according to a report released on Tuesday by the Interior Department.“For the first time in the history of the country, the U.S. government is accounting for its role in operating Indian boarding schools to forcibly assimilate Indian children, and working to set us on a path to heal from the wounds inflicted by those schools,” Bryan Newland, the department’s assistant secretary for Indian affairs, wrote this month in a letter to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland that was included in the report.The report calls on the federal government to apologize and “chart a road to healing.” Its recommendations include creating a national memorial to commemorate the children’s deaths and educate the public; investing in research and helping Native communities heal from intergenerational stress and trauma; and revitalizing Native languages.From the early 1800s to the late 1960s, the U.S. government removed Native children from their families and homes and sent them to boarding schools, where they were forcibly assimilated.It spent nearly $25 billion in today’s dollars on the comprehensive effort, according to the investigative report released on Tuesday, including operating 417 schools across 37 states and territories where children were physically and sexually abused. They were also forcibly converted to Christianity and punished for speaking their Native languages.The report identified by name almost 19,000 children who attended a federal school between 1819 and 1969, though the Interior Department acknowledges there were more.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

Jackson and Ben Matz make their collaborative debut.Jump to: Today’s Theme | Tricky CluesWEDNESDAY PUZZLE — Jackson Matz’s first crossword for The New York Times, which was published in March, featured three 15-letter spanners: I COULD EAT A HORSE, CARE TO ELABORATE and SELF-DRIVING CARS. That’s a tough act to follow, even if you set the bar yourself. It seems Mr. Matz decided he wasn’t taking any chances, because this time he brought along his big brother Ben.The Matz brothers — or the brothers Matz, for a flourish — have combined forces to bring us a rollicking Wednesday grid, whose theme can be identified only by the revealer at the appointed hour (59-Across). Let’s take a look under the hood, shall we?Today’s ThemeThe [Song from “The Little Mermaid” that’s a phonetic hint to interpreting the answers to the starred clues] (59A) is UNDER THE SEA. In other words, removing the letter C from the beginning of each themed entry gives us the correct answer to the clue.Here’s one example: To [Rip off] (25D) your customers is to OVERCHARGE them, not to “cover charge” them — though I stand by the opinion that cover charges are generally a rip-off. Another example, at 11-Down: If you’re [Not moving fast enough], you are LOSING TIME.This is the third puzzle with a theme that plays on the homophony between the word “sea” and the letter C to come across my desk in recent months, but I’m tickled every time. Just a few weeks ago, Tarun Krishnamurthy’s debut puzzle for The Times featured the grammagram “sea anemone” (C-N-M-N-E). Last fall, Ella Dershowitz brought us a grid filled with “C creatures,” with words like “sponge” and “urchin” appearing on the grid in C-like curves.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