Elections

Scroll down to reveal a hint for each category of today’s Connections, or head to the comments for community hints and conversation.Good morning, dear connectors. Welcome to today’s Connections forum, where you can give and receive puzzle — and emotional — support.Be warned: This article includes hints and comments that may contain spoilers for today’s puzzle. Solve Connections first, or scroll at your own risk.Connections is released at midnight in your time zone. In order to accommodate all time zones, there will be two Connections Companions live every day, dated based on Eastern Standard Time.If you find yourself on the wrong companion, check the number of your puzzle, and go to this page to find the corresponding companion.Post your solve grid in the comments and see how your score compares with the editor’s rating, and one another’s.Today’s difficultyThe difficulty of each puzzle is determined by averaging the ratings provided by a panel of testers who are paid to solve each puzzle in advance to help us catch bugs, inconsistencies and other issues. A higher rating means the puzzle is more difficult.Today’s difficulty is 3 out of 5.Need a hint?In Connections, each category has a different difficulty level. Yellow is the simplest, and purple is the most difficult. Click or tap each level to reveal one of the words in that category. 🟨 StraightforwardDELICATE🟩 ⬇️DESSERT🟦 ⬇️BARE🟪 TrickyCARPETFurther ReadingWant to give us feedback? Email us: [email protected] to go back to Connections?Want to learn more about how the game is made?Leave any thoughts you have in the comments! Please follow community guidelines:Be kind. Comments are moderated for civility.Having a technical issue? Use the Help button in the Settings menu of the Games app.Want to talk about Wordle or Spelling Bee? Check out Wordle Review and the Spelling Bee Forum.See our Tips and Tricks for more useful information on Connections.Join us here to solve Crosswords, The Mini, and other games by The New York Times. More

Parts of the Upper Midwest remained under flood warnings on Sunday morning, after days of heavy rain pushed some rivers to record levels.More than a million people in the Upper Midwest were under flood warnings early Sunday morning, after days of heavy rain caused major flooding, forced evacuations and led to rescues in Iowa and South Dakota.The flood warnings were in place for rivers in parts of Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, Nebraska, South Dakota and Wisconsin. Some of the warnings were scheduled to end later on Sunday; others were in effect until further notice. A flood warning means that flooding is imminent or already occurring.In Iowa, several rivers have been peaking above levels reported during a 1993 flood that left 50 dead across the Midwest, according to that state’s governor, Kim Reynolds. She declared a disaster for 21 counties on Saturday, calling the flooding “catastrophic” on social media.In South Dakota, torrential rain has fallen across the central and eastern parts of the state for three days, and some areas have received up to 18 inches.Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota told reporters on Saturday that the worst flooding was expected to occur in the state on Monday and Tuesday as water coursed downstream and into rivers. She added that the Big Sioux River, one of the state’s major waterways, was expected to reach record levels.Other parts of the United States are grappling with a heat wave that has coincided with a spike in heat-related illnesses over the past week in some regions. Dulles, Va., and Baltimore are among the cities that have broken temperature records. Dangerously hot conditions were forecast for parts of Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania until Sunday evening, the National Weather Service said.The flooding in the Midwest has caused devastation in Rock Valley, Iowa, where the Rock River rose to a record level early Saturday. That led city officials to issue emergency evacuation orders for many of the city’s 4,000 residents. The city was without clean water because its wells had been contaminated by floodwaters, the local authorities said on social media.Sioux City Fire Rescue, which helped to evacuate people from Rock Valley, said on social media that many people and animals stranded in floodwaters in the city had been rescued by emergency teams with boats. In neighboring Nebraska, Gov. Jim Pillen said in a statement that he had authorized a military helicopter to help with search and rescue operations.Volunteers stacking sandbags in Hawarden, Iowa, a town of about 2,000 where some residents were evacuated.Tim Hynds/Sioux City Journal, via Associated PressAbout 15 miles southwest of Rock Valley, parts of Hawarden, Iowa, were also evacuated, city officials said on social media. Hawarden has a population of about 2,000.In Sioux Falls, S.D., emergency services rescued nine people from floodwaters, Regan Smith, the city’s emergency manager, said at a news conference on Saturday. Emergency services responded to five stranded drivers, 30 stalled vehicles in water, 10 calls about water problems and 75 traffic accidents, he added. More

The small town of Fordyce, Ark., was beginning to absorb the impact of the bloodshed, as a few details began to emerge. A fourth victim died on Saturday. Thomas and Sharon Brazil were sitting in their car late Friday morning in front of the only grocery store in Fordyce, Ark., discussing what they wanted to buy to put on the grill that night. Then they noticed a man with a gun approaching them.He looked at them, Mr. Brazil said, “and he shot.” Mr. Brazil, a 65-year-old minister, was shot in the forehead above his right eye. Ms. Brazil suffered cuts from broken glass. They went to the hospital but both survived. They were among the lucky ones.All told, the police said that the gunman killed four people and injured nine after he opened fire at the Mad Butcher grocery store. On Saturday, this town of 3,400 people, about 70 miles south of Little Rock, was only beginning to absorb the impact of the bloodshed, as a few details began to emerge, including a fourth victim who died in the evening.“I just don’t have the words,” said Kasey Langley, whose daughter owns a flower shop a few doors down from the Mad Butcher. “I woke up this morning thinking it was all a dream. This didn’t happen, but it did.”Late Saturday, the Arkansas State Police identified those killed as Shirley Taylor, 62; Callie Weems, 23; Roy Sturgis, 50; and Ellen Shrum, 81. Ms. Taylor’s daughter, Angela Atchley, said her mother was killed standing at the checkout of the Mad Butcher, while she was doing her usual grocery shopping. 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 said in an address to an evangelical group that he had suggested starting a sports league for migrants to fight one another.Appearing at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s conference in Washington on Saturday, Mr. Trump described migrants with the dehumanizing terms he often uses to refer to them, saying they were “tough,” “come from prisons” and are “nasty, mean.”Mr. Trump then said that he had suggested to Dana White, an ally of the former president’s who is the chief executive of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, “Why don’t you set up a migrant league of fighters?”He continued, referring to the U.F.C.: “And then you have the champion of your league — these are the greatest fighters in the world — fight the champion of the migrants? I think the migrant guy might win! That’s how tough they are.”Mr. Trump said that Mr. White “didn’t like the idea too much.” But, he added, “It’s not the worst idea I’ve ever had. These are tough people.”Mr. White, asked about Mr. Trump’s comment at a U.F.C. event on Saturday, confirmed that the former president had made the proposal, but said, “It was a joke, it was a joke. I saw everybody going crazy online. But yeah, he did say it.”The Biden campaign denounced Mr. Trump’s comments, attacking what it called “a rambling, confused tirade,” at what it said was intended to be “a conference for Christian values.”“Trump’s incoherent, unhinged tirade showed voters in his own words that he is a threat to our freedoms and is too dangerous to be let anywhere near the White House again,” Sarafina Chitika, a spokeswoman for the Biden campaign, said in a statement.Mr. Trump has made immigration a central part of his platform in the 2024 presidential election, as it was in his two previous campaigns. He has pledged to carry out sweeping raids and to use military funds to erect camps to hold undocumented detainees. He has also escalated his rhetoric against migrants, at times using language that invokes the racial hatred of Hitler by describing migrants as “poisoning the blood of our country.”“Fantasies about cage matches are a distraction from the very real plans Trump and his team are making to deport millions of people who have lived here for decades and the resulting inflation, joblessness and economic devastation,” said Doug G. Rivlin, a spokesman for America’s Voice, an immigrant-rights advocacy group that has been tracking the escalation of Republican rhetoric on the issue. “Republican politicians are going to find that hard to defend while campaigning this year.”Jazmine Ulloa More

The incident came months after another tourist was killed in Zambia when an elephant charged her group. One wildlife expert said the attacks were most likely “freak accidents.”A tourist from New Mexico was killed in Zambia when an elephant charged her, according to the police commissioner who investigated the incident. She is the second tourist to be fatally attacked by an elephant in the southern African country this year.The woman who was killed, Juliana G. Letourneau, 64, of Albuquerque, had just visited Victoria Falls, a 350-foot waterfall that straddles the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe, and was heading back to her hotel on Wednesday when the group that she was traveling with encountered a herd of elephants on the road.She and others stepped out of their vehicle to observe the animals, said Auxensio Daka, the police commissioner for the southern province of Zambia, in a telephone interview on Saturday.“They stopped to watch the elephants, and unfortunately one of them charged towards them as they were standing there watching,” Mr. Daka said.Mr. Daka said that Ms. Letourneau was taken to a clinic in Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park near Livingstone, Zambia, where she was declared dead on arrival. Her injuries included deep wounds on the right shoulder blade and forehead, a fractured left ankle and a slightly depressed chest, according to a police statement.No other injuries were reported from the encounter with the elephant.Ms. Letourneau’s brother said on Saturday that he had no details about the incident, and declined to be interviewed. Other relatives could not be reached.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

Donald J. Trump’s campaign is billing it as a must-have fashion accessory for his supporters: an American flag lapel pin with the former president’s name scrawled in gold block letters across it — in all caps.The pins were available starting Thursday for a $50 donation to the Trump campaign, the latest merchandising gambit from a candidate who has hawked a plethora of products over the decades, most recently Bibles and Trump sneakers.A donation page for the pins declared that Mr. Trump’s political opponents had rendered him a convicted felon and asked supporters if he could count on their support.His latest marketing pitch is further testing the norms of flag etiquette and drawing fresh scrutiny from critics.It’s not only the flag flap surrounding Mr. Trump, whose birthday, June 14, happens to fall on Flag Day. Some election deniers have flown the flag upside-down, a historical symbol of distress, to protest Mr. Trump’s 2020 election defeat. An inverted flag appeared at the home of Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., a display that he attributed to his wife.Alterations to the flag are forbidden under the U.S. Flag Code, which was created in the 1920s by a group of patriotic and civic groups that included the American Legion and adopted as law by Congress in 1942.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

Dolly McDermott and her mother, Patricia McDermott, were making their way along Surf Avenue on Coney Island shortly after noon on Saturday. They were trying to get to the registration table for Brooklyn’s annual Mermaid Parade, but it was slow going — spectators kept asking them to pose for pictures.The daughter was wearing light-rimmed sunglasses, peach-colored frills, necklaces, bangles, and a foam seashell anchored to her back. Her mother struck a gothic contrast in black and white, with face paint and a full mermaid skeleton running the length of her outfit.“One more! One more!” a photographer pleaded with them.“It’s taken us half an hour to walk this far,” the younger Ms. McDermott, an artist and a self-styled “professional eccentric,” said. “Only because we look as good as we do,” her mother added.Marchers lined up in the shade before the start of the parade.Graham Dickie/The New York TimesThe pair said they had been marching in Coney Island’s pageantry of aquatic weirdness for several years, and that they had not been deterred by a citywide heat advisory. The temperature was already 86 and climbing as costumed marchers and spectators assembled under a cloudless blue sky.But the mood was upbeat as DJs on floats tested their speakers and marching bands tuned up near the staging area at Surf Avenue and West 21st Street.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

Meet Wild Thang, an 8-year-old Pekingese from Oregon who had sought the title of “World’s Ugliest” for years. Now, it’s finally his.Maybe it’s the way his lolling pink tongue juts out, or how his glittering wide eyes bejewel a tiny head under a mop of long, frizzy, brown-and-white fur, but there’s just something about Wild Thang — and a panel of judges agreed.The 8-year-old Pekingese from Oregon was crowned the World’s Ugliest Dog on Friday, confirming that when the looks are, well, lacking, there’s something to be said for persistence. It was his fifth try for the top prize at the competition.“His victory is a testament to his undeniable charm and resilience,” said a statement released by the competition following Wild Thang’s big win.Born and raised in Los Angeles, Wild Thang’s life got off to a difficult start, according to his biography (yes, he has one). As a puppy, he contracted distemper, an infectious disease caused by a virus that attacks dogs’ respiratory, gastrointestinal and nervous systems. He barely survived, and his biography notes that Wild Thang was left permanently affected by the disease: “His teeth did not grow in, causing his tongue to stay out and his right front leg paddles 24/7.”Nevertheless, Wild Thang is “a healthy, happy Glugly (glamorous/ugly) guy” who “loves people, other dogs and especially his toys.”Like other beauty pageant winners, Wild Thang champions causes dear to him, according to his biography. He has helped raise money to get his fellow Pekingese doggies in Ukraine to safety — and has already saved seven of them from the war zone.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