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      Kevin McCarthy Surprised Us All

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      Gail Collins: I didn’t think I’d be saying this, Bret, but we’ve dodged a shutdown. It’s a stupendous moment for Kevin McCarthy. Now if he gets tossed out as House speaker by the right wing, he’ll go down in history as the guy who sacrificed his career for the common good. As opposed to the best-possible previous scenario: the boring career pol who was too scared to keep the government running.What’s your reaction?Bret Stephens: Cutting billions in funding for Ukraine was a shame, but I’m guessing the aid will be restored to Kyiv pretty soon. Otherwise, it’s a vast relief that the government will stay open. And, of course, watching someone like Matt Gaetz get politically humiliated is always pleasing.Gail: And there was Gaetz, on cue, announcing Sunday that he would try to remove McCarthy from the speakership. Lord knows it’s been a long trek, listening to the Republicans’ constant yelping about deficit spending. Is it fair to point out that the national debt rose $7.8 trillion during the Trump administration?Bret Stephens: Not fair at all, Gail. Everything that happened when Trump was president was so perfect, so beautiful.OK, I’m kidding. One of my many laments about Trump is that he spent like a sailor on land and governed like a drunk at sea. I wish this would count against him with G.O.P. primary voters, but the truth is that the average Republican isn’t all that eager to really slash government spending, even if they say they don’t like the government. I think Trump intuitively understood this, which is why attacks from Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley aren’t making a dent in Trump’s poll numbers.Which reminds me: Your thoughts on last week’s Republican presidential debate? Whom did you dislike the least?Gail: I suspect this is a setup to get me to praise your fave, Nikki Haley.Bret: Not a setup. An … invitation.Gail: And hey, I can’t argue that she wasn’t the sanest of the group. Along with Chris Christie, the Republican Republicans love to hate.Haley lightly criticized Trump’s performance as president, and after the debate was over, he called her a “birdbrain.”You know, I have this tiny hope that the New Hampshire Republican voters will exercise a little independence and give her the top primary vote and an early lift. But kinda worried Christie will be in there too, dividing the sanity caucus.Bret: A great point. Christie should get out now and throw his support behind Haley. The only reason he got in the race in the first place was to chuck spears at Trump. It hit the wrong Donald — Duck, not Trump — and now all Christie is doing is dividing the anti-Trump field. I also wish Mike Pence would recognize reality and tuck back into bed with his wife of 38 years. That would give Haley a fighting chance to further destroy Vivek Ramaswamy and replace DeSantis as the most plausible Republican alternative to Trump. But I have to admit, my hopes of Trump not being the nominee are dwindling fast.Gail: OK, New Hampshire Republicans, are you listening? Counting on you for a primary miracle.Bret: Speaking of Trump crushing his opponents, I nearly jumped out of my skin when I saw that Washington Post-ABC News poll last week, giving Trump a 10-point lead over Joe Biden in a head-to-head matchup. I realize it might be an outlier, but I don’t understand why no serious Democrat is willing to challenge Biden for the nomination. Help me out here.Gail: The poll, if accurate, is a cry of crankiness from middle-of-the-roaders who wanted a more exciting candidate. Still, the only reason for a loyal Democrat to oppose Biden’s nomination is that he’s too old. I think he’s been a darned good president. And while I do wish he had stepped aside, I’m certainly not going to have any trouble whatsoever arguing he’s the better option.This is when I get to point out that Trump is 77 and in worse physical condition than Biden. And has been saying some very weird things lately — even for him.Bret: Biden’s main problem isn’t that he’s too old. There are plenty of sharp, fit and healthy 80-year-olds. His problem is that he looks and sounds feeble. Trump may be awful and insane and nearly as old as Biden, but one thing he isn’t is low energy. And even if you think Biden is the best president since F.D.R., or Abe Lincoln for that matter, he’s got a 41.5 percent approval rating, a vice president who’s even more unpopular than he is and major political liabilities on immigration, crime and inflation. Also now Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is hinting that he’ll run as a third-party candidate in the general election, which would be on top of Biden’s Cornel West problem.Gail: Thank you for giving me a chance to howl about third-party candidates, who have no possibility of winning but every possibility of screwing up the majority’s right to choose.Bret: I suppose that, in theory, Kennedy could subtract a lot of votes from Trump, since both of them draw from the same well of looney-tune conspiracy theories. But my guess is that, as a Democrat, Biden would be the bigger loser from an independent Kennedy campaign. And if West persists in running, drawing progressive and Black voters away from Biden, then the chances of a Trump victory grow even larger.Gail: But we were talking about President Joe …Bret: If you see Biden jumping out of the political hole he’s in, please tell me how.Gail: Just being sane, not under multitudinous indictments or facing a stupendous financial collapse is … going to help. This is not going to be one of those sunny remember-when election victories like Barack Obama’s or I guess for Republicans, Ronald Reagan’s. But given the Donald’s multiple upcoming trials, I think it’ll be a wow-what-a-crazy-year episode that ends with the majority rationally rejecting the worst possible option.Bret: If a second Trump administration is the national nightmare you and I think it will be, then Democrats need a better political strategy than getting angry at third-party candidates while hoping that Trump goes to jail before he returns to the White House. The passing of California’s Dianne Feinstein is a sad event, and there’s a lot to celebrate in her long and distinguished career, but it was hubris on her part to run for re-election in 2018, just like it was hubris for Ruth Bader Ginsburg not to step down while Obama was still president. Although, in Feinstein’s defense, at least she could be reasonably sure that a Democratic governor would choose her successor.Gail: Yeah, when you’ve got a great job in the spotlight, it’s hard to just let it go.Bret: Which maybe explains the guy in the White House. Sorry, go on.Gail: I thought Feinstein should have resigned when she became incapacitated. And Ginsburg diminished a great legacy by hanging onto her job when she was sick and close to death, thereby paving the way for Trump to complete his takeover of the Supreme Court.We have to celebrate the people who surrender the spotlight voluntarily, like Nancy Pelosi, who is still serving the country as a member of Congress, but gave up her party’s House leadership to let the next generation be in the center of attention.Hey — a positive thought! Any good news you want to share?Bret: I don’t know if this is good news per se, but I was delighted to hear Mark Milley, the retiring chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, dismiss Trump as a “wannabe dictator” after his former boss suggested the general’s actions with regard to China would have once been punishable by death. Milley emphasized the military’s fidelity to the Constitution, which is yet another reminder that Democrats should put aside their 50 years of misgivings about the Defense Department and embrace its vital role in defending democracy at home and abroad.Hoping for agreement …Gail: Total agreement about the Defense Department having a vital role. Not so much about the Defense Department having an efficient operation. Way too much waste, which mostly comes from members of Congress lobbying to keep job-creating military facilities in their districts, and pressure to pick up wasteful contracts because they’re supported by, um, members of Congress.Bret: I’ll make a modest bet that, in another few years, Democrats will be the strong-on-defense party, just as they were in the days of Jack Kennedy. It’s part of the great ideological switcheroo taking place right now between the parties: Republicans sound a lot like Democrats of yesteryear — working-class values, quasi-isolationist in their foreign policy, indifferent to the moral character of their leaders — while Democrats have become the party of college-educated managerial types who want to stand up to Russia and uphold moral integrity in political leadership.Gail: Well, we’ll see. At least we’re ending on a consensus of sorts: that Trump is going to be doing something awful soon. Granted, that’s not the toughest prediction to make. So before we go, give me one of your great quotes to celebrate the arrival of October.Bret: Not really a celebration, but a Gerard Manley Hopkins poem I love:Márgarét, áre you gríevingOver Goldengrove unleaving?Leáves like the things of man, youWith your fresh thoughts care for, can you?Ah! ás the heart grows olderIt will come to such sights colderBy and by, nor spare a sighThough worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;And yet you wíll weep and know why.Now no matter, child, the name:Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same.Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressedWhat heart heard of, ghost guessed:It ís the blight man was born for,It is Margaret you mourn for.I memorized it many years ago, thanks to my teacher and friend, Dr. Peter Bach. He, better than anyone, knows its meaning.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: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Power of Older Women? Extinct G.O.P. Moderates? It’s Time for the Mailbag.

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      We’re answering reader questions on polling and elections, including the underexplored area of longevity.Women live longer than men on average, meaning they can vote more often on average. Arin Yoon for The New York TimesWatch out: Women outlive menI’m 79, and women my age remember when abortion was illegal. Many of us either had a back-alley abortion, or had friends who had one. We are determined that neither our daughters nor our granddaughters have to experience this. Many of the elderly men I know still vote for Republicans. But watch out: We outlive you! — Mary LeonhardtYou may be partly joking, Mary, but this is probably a minor reason Democrats do a bit better among older voters than people might guess!Why? American women, who tend to support Democrats, live almost six years longer on average than men. Women make up 55 percent of registered voters over age 65 — including 58 percent of those over age 80 — according to data from L2, a political data firm. In comparison, women are 52 percent of registered voters under 65.I know all of this is a little morbid, but longevity strikes me as an underexplored dimension of electoral trends nowadays. We know higher life expectancy is correlated with socioeconomic status and tends to be higher in Democratic-leaning areas. Could this be a factor in why Democrats are performing better among older voters than usually thought? I think so.Are you sure these people exist?“You refer to ‘relatively moderate, highly educated Republicans.’ You could have listed all of them … it wouldn’t have been a long list. — Jeff DavisIt would be a longer list than you might think. More than 20 million people with a college degree voted for Donald J. Trump in 2020. In our last New York Times/Siena College poll, 13 percent of likely Republican primary voters were self-identified moderates or liberals with a college degree.There’s a bigger lesson here: A small percentage of a huge group can still yield a large number of people. To take another example: There are more Republicans in California than in any other state. There are more Republicans in Brooklyn than in Wyoming, the state where Mr. Trump fared best.If not Biden, who?Pundits keep saying people don’t want Biden. Who do they want? — R. GribbonWell, they’re not sure. In an open-ended survey question, no alternative candidate earns any meaningful amount of support from Democratic voters. And I don’t think that’s entirely unreasonable, given there aren’t any mainstream Democrats running against President Biden.To me, the interesting question is whether many of these voters would wind up preferring Mr. Biden if alternatives like Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan or Gov. Gavin Newsom of California actually ran. It seems quite possible.Just forget about national polling?I find national polling to be particularly misleading. Please focus on state-by-state polling. I’ll be watching PA, WI, MN, GA, AZ, VA, and NV. — Tim OliverI’m sympathetic to the general sentiment here, Tim. Over the years, we’ve done many more Times/Siena polls in the battleground states than nationwide.But I wouldn’t go so far as to say that national polling is misleading. The difference between the national vote and the battleground states isn’t that large — and might even be shrinking.There are advantages to national polling as well. There are more historical questions for comparison. It’s much less expensive than battleground polling: It might take six state polls to get a decent picture. And there are plenty of cases — say, a Republican presidential primary or a battle for control of the House — where the national picture is much more relevant than the core battlegrounds.Polling and nonbinary peopleI was wondering about the inclusivity of the demographic charts. I noticed that the gender category was very binary, with someone only being able to select male or female. Were there any nonbinary people interviewed in this poll, or did someone have to select male or female? As a nonbinary person, I would love to advocate for queer folx to be able to fully participate in these polls. Thank you so much. — Melissa DaileyIt’s worth adding some historical context. First, most pollsters typically asked whether someone was male or female — which is to say someone’s “sex,” not gender. That’s what the Census Bureau does as well, and pollsters generally find it advantageous to have their questions align with the census for comparison or even statistical adjustment. And as someone who loves historical data, I’m also always loath to lose a consistent measurement of something over time.Second, you might be surprised to learn that many telephone pollsters haven’t actually been asking about the sex or gender of respondents. Instead, many have relied on the interviewer to record the respondent’s sex or gender based on voice. That might seem strange, but many respondents find it strange or even offensive to be asked if they’re a man or a woman.Nonetheless, this is an area where survey research is evolving. In the last decade or so, many pollsters have started asking about gender. A smaller number of pollsters have offered respondents options beyond “male” or “female” or “man” or “woman,” though this is complicated in its own right. Respondents could identify in any number of ways, whether as transgender, non-cisgender, nonbinary, gender fluid, queer or something else. They could identify as a “man” or a “woman” to reflect a gender that does not align with the sex they were assigned at birth.There’s another issue with adding small categories: measurement error. If one in every 300 respondents is trolling, or if one in 300 interviewers mistakenly clicks the wrong gender button, this mismeasured 0.3 percent of the sample will have no discernible effect on our results among men and women. But it could make up a huge share of the tiny number of transgender respondents.In our most recent Times/Siena poll, “male” and “female” were the only explicitly listed options when we asked about gender. But if respondents said they identified in some other way, the interviewer would record it. In the end, we had three respondents who said they were transgender or nonbinary. This sample was too small for us to report. I’m not sure whether we — or anyone else — is handling this exactly right; I expect the industry to continue to experiment and evolve.Woe WisconsinI am a Wisconsin voter who is a Democrat. However, we do not have to declare a party. How did you fit that into your analysis? — Nancy EschenburgIf you’re looking for a niche explanation for recent polling errors in Wisconsin, this is an interesting place to start.Unlike with most states, pollsters have very little data on the partisanship of Wisconsin respondents, making it much harder to ensure an unbiased sample.The absence of party registration is the best example, but the issue runs deeper. We don’t have data on whether our respondents participated in a partisan primary (like voting in a Republican presidential race). In most of the states without party registration, this primary participation data is a decent alternative.The results by precinct aren’t very helpful, either. Outside of Madison and Milwaukee, very few voters live in overwhelmingly blue or red precincts. Even the most Republican counties in Wisconsin aren’t so Republican that we can be especially confident that an individual respondent will be a Trump supporter.One of our major goals in recently collecting more data in Wisconsin was to improve our ability to estimate whether someone was a Democrat or a Republican, based on the relatively limited data at our disposal. I wouldn’t say we’ve found anything revolutionary: There’s just no substitute for knowing whether someone is registered as a Democrat or a Republican.Don’t forget ArizonaHere in very hot Arizona we will have some very “hot” political races. Of course we are a critical presidential swing state. Biden vs. Trump (or another Republican) will be very close again.And our U.S. Senate race (with Senator Sinema now an independent) will be fascinating. Ruben Gallego & Kari Lake & perhaps Sinema — that will be very entertaining. And the race will be critical regarding Senate control.So I plead with you to increase your polling in Arizona. We are just as important as other swing states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia. — Chris HerstamChris, I think we deserve a little bit of credit! In 2020, Arizona was one of our core six battleground states in Times/Siena polling. We surveyed it five times during the cycle, tied for the most of any state. We surveyed it in 2018 and 2022 as well, something that can be said only of Arizona and Nevada.Heading into 2024, Arizona remains in the top tier. We’ll poll it just as much as Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia.Six kinds of Democrats?Loved your “Six Kinds of Republicans.” Please do the same with Dems. — Walter B. ShurdenI’d like to see the same article written about Democrats … We all know there is a big difference between a conservative Democrat and someone like A.O.C. — Craig WilsonYou’ll most likely have to wait until 2028! In the meantime, consider reading our breakdown of Democratic voters from 2019. There were five types of Democrats in that analysis, based on data from the Hidden Tribes project: progressive activists, traditional liberals, passive liberals, moderates and the politically disengaged.Another option to get you through until the next Democratic primary: Pew Research’s 2021 typology, which identified four Democratic-leaning groups: progressive left, establishment liberals, Democratic mainstays and the outsider left. More

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      Trump and DeSantis Push for Mass Deportations, Escalating Hard-Right Immigration Proposals

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      In dueling speeches in California, the two Republican candidates pushed for mass deportations, a position that is as extreme as it may be unfeasible.As a presidential candidate, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has said he would authorize the use of deadly force against people crossing the border, seek to end the practice of birthright citizenship and send the military to strike against drug cartels inside Mexico, a key ally of the United States, even without the permission of its government.Those positions put him on the hard right among the Republicans running for president, many of whom are tapping into deep anger among G.O.P. primary voters over immigration.Now, Mr. DeSantis, who often tries to stoke outrage with his border policies, has unveiled another extreme position: deporting all undocumented immigrants who crossed the border during the Biden administration.“Everyone that has come illegally under Biden” should be sent back, Mr. DeSantis said on Friday in response to a reporter’s question at a campaign event in Long Beach, Calif. “That’s probably six or seven million people right there. It’s going to require a lot of effort. It’s going to require us to lean in.”Though Mr. DeSantis greatly overestimated the number of people who have entered the country illegally since Mr. Biden took office, such mass deportations would require enormous investments in the nation’s immigration enforcement system and could do severe economic harm to key American industries.Conducting so many deportations would require Mr. DeSantis to hire more Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, authorize widespread raids into immigrant communities, significantly expand immigration detention space to meet national standards and substantially grow the fleet of airplanes used for deportations. Billions more dollars would need to be spent on bolstering immigration courts to adjudicate cases within months instead of years. Currently, some migrants who have recently arrived in the United States have been given court dates a decade from now because the immigration court backlog is so large.Still, Mr. DeSantis is not alone in his promises to upend the nation’s immigration system.Speaking to a crowd in Anaheim, Calif., former President Donald J. Trump pledged to enact the largest deportation in the country’s history.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesOn Friday, former President Donald J. Trump, who is leading the Florida governor by roughly 40 points in national polls, pledged to enact “the largest deportation operation in the history of our country” if re-elected. Mr. Trump was speaking at the same time as Mr. DeSantis, roughly 20 miles away at a convention of Republican activists in Anaheim, Calif.The dueling speeches highlighted how crucial an issue border security has become in the Republican presidential primary. At his campaign event, Mr. DeSantis took the opportunity to criticize Mr. Trump, saying that his rival had failed to “get the job done” on the border during his first term. Though the two men are largely aligned on immigration policy, Mr. DeSantis is making the argument that he would be more effective in carrying out a hard-line vision.“I would note that the former president is campaigning on the same promise he made in ’16 that he didn’t deliver on,” Mr. DeSantis said.With his “six or seven” million figure, Mr. DeSantis was probably referring to the roughly six million people who have been caught crossing the border since 2021. That is about double the number of unauthorized immigrants who actually entered the country under Mr. Biden and are still here.Of those six million, at least 1.6 million have been allowed to stay in the country temporarily and face charges in immigration court. Officials estimate about 1.5 million others have entered the country illegally without being detained.The government estimates about 11 million undocumented people live in the country overall.Mass deportations are not as simple as the Republican contenders make them sound.Many of the people they call illegal immigrants are eligible for legal status in the United States or are already here on a legal status. An example of a legal status is Temporary Protected Status, the humanitarian benefit Mr. Biden just extended to nearly 500,000 Venezuelans who have come to the country since the spring of 2021. People who are in the country and eligible for legal status are entitled to a hearing before an immigration judge, said Greg Chen, the senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.The time it would take to remove millions of people is substantial. In the past, the greatest number of deportations has been around 400,000 a year. The year with the highest number in recent history is 2013, during the Obama administration, when there were more than 432,000. During the Trump administration, the year that saw the most deportations was 2019, with more than 359,000.Deporting such a large amount of people poses “logistical, practical and legal challenges,” said Ron Vitiello, a former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the Trump administration.Justin Hamel for The New York Times“DeSantis’s statement demonstrates his utter lack of any understanding of immigration enforcement operations,” Mr. Chen said. “At a practical level, deporting that many people would be impossible in even a single term.”Mr. Chen also pointed out the serious economic costs of deporting many of the workers who take on the United States’ most dangerous and low-paying jobs, particularly in agriculture.Immigration laws signed by Mr. DeSantis in Florida this year have already led to worker shortages in the agricultural sector, as well as in construction and hospitality, some employers have said. In addition, undocumented workers play a key role in hurricane cleanup in the state, but many have said they would no longer risk traveling to Florida because of the threat of deportation.There is also a significant diplomatic component to deportations — countries must be willing to take back their citizens, and the United States must have relations with those countries to coordinate those return trips. This stipulation would pose a huge challenge in returning the hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans who have fled to the United States in the past few years. A DeSantis or Trump administration would most likely need to reestablish diplomatic relations with Venezuela and recognize the government of Nicolás Maduro — something Mr. Trump did not do as president — to carry out their plans.“Mass deportations are really, really, really hard to do,” said Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, the policy director at the American Immigration Council, a pro-immigrant organization. “The political backlash would be enormous.”Ron Vitiello, a former acting director of ICE during the Trump administration, acknowledged that there were “logistical, practical and legal challenges” to deporting so many people. But he said that immigrants would continue to cross the border illegally if they believed that they would be able to stay long-term.“If the rest of the world believes they’ll never be deported, that is an incentive for lots of people,” Mr. Vitiello said. “You have to end the incentives to change the traffic patterns at the border.”When Republicans tried to enact comprehensive immigration reform under President George W. Bush, the idea of deporting large numbers of undocumented people was not considered realistic or desirable, reflecting how deeply the political mood in the G.O.P. has shifted in the years since.“Mass deportation is not a workable solution,” the Bush administration argued in a 2007 fact sheet, at a time when the population of unauthorized immigrants was even higher than it is today. “Deporting the millions of illegal immigrants who are already in the country would be impractical, harmful to our economy, and potentially devastating to families with deep roots in their communities.”Jonathan Swan More

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      Why Non-Trump Republicans Must Join Or Die. (They’ll Probably Still Die.)

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      I’m not sure that an assembly of presidential candidates has ever given off stronger loser vibes, if I may use a word favored by the 45th president of the United States, than the Republicans who debated at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library this week.A snap 538/Washington Post/Ipsos poll and a CNN focus group showed Ron DeSantis as the night’s winner, and that seems right: After months of campaigning and two debates, DeSantis is still the only candidate not named Donald Trump who has a clear argument for why he should be president and a record that fits his party’s trajectory and mood.On the stage with his putative rivals, that makes him the one-eyed man in the kingdom of the blind. Against Trump, that’s probably going to be good for an extremely distant second place.The path that I (and others) once saw for the Florida governor, where he would run on his political success and voters would drift his way out of weariness with Trump’s destructive impact on Republican fortunes, has been closed off — by DeSantis’s own struggles, the rallying effect of Trump’s indictments and now Trump’s solid general-election poll numbers against Joe Biden. The path other pundits claimed to see for non-Trump candidates, where they were supposed to run directly against Trump and call him out as a threat to the Republic, was never a realistic one for anything but a protest candidate, as Chris Christie is demonstrating.So what remains for Trump’s rivals besides loserdom? Only this: They can refuse to simply replay 2016, refuse the pathetic distinction of claiming momentum from finishing third in early primaries and figure out a way to join their powers against Trump.This is not a path to likely victory. Trump is much stronger than eight years ago, when the crowded battle for second and third place in New Hampshire and South Carolina helped him build unstoppable momentum and the idea of a Ted Cruz-Marco Rubio unity ticket was pondered but never achieved. He’s also much stronger than Bernie Sanders four years ago, when Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar traded the ego-inflating satisfactions of delegate accumulations for a place on Joe Biden’s bandwagon.But unity has been the road not taken for anti-Trump Republicans thus far, and it feels like the only scenario in which this race stays remotely interesting after the Iowa results.One problem, of course, is that unity still requires a standard-bearer — it would have been Cruz first and Rubio second in 2016, for instance, which is probably one reason Rubio didn’t make the deal — and DeSantis’s edge over his rivals isn’t wide enough for them to feel they need to defer to him.Another problem, central to Trump’s resilience, is that the different non-Trump voters want very different things. Some want DeSantis’s attempts to execute populist ambitions more effectively or the novel spin on Trumpism contained in Vivek Ramaswamy’s performance art. Others want the promise of a George W. Bush restoration offered by Nikki Haley and Tim Scott; others still want the Never Trump absolutism of Christie. Would Ramaswamy’s voters go for Scott and Haley? Doubtful. Would Scott’s or Christie’s voters accept DeSantis? Probably, but he hasn’t made the sale.Meanwhile, despite Trump’s claim that he won’t pick as his vice president anyone who has run against him, he’s been known to change his mind — and that reality influences the ambitions of Ramaswamy (who at least hopes for a Buttigieg-style cabinet spot), Scott (who seems he’s been running to be V.P. from the start) and even Haley. So, too, does the possibility that a conviction before the Republican convention somehow prevents his coronation, creating theoretical incentives for delegate accumulation, however remote the odds.All of these incentives are probably enough to prevent real consolidation. But if the non-Trump Republicans were serious enough about their larger cause, they would be planning now for the morning after Iowa. If Haley or (less plausibly) Scott comes in second and DeSantis falls to third, the Florida governor should drop out and endorse the winner. If DeSantis wins but Haley is leading in New Hampshire, then he should offer a place on his ticket, and she should accept. Christie should then obviously drop out pre-New Hampshire and endorse the Iowa winner as well. (Ramaswamy, I assume, would eventually endorse Trump.)Since this maneuvering could still just lead to Trump winning primaries by “only” 60-40 instead of 52-21-14-7-6, a final impediment to consolidation is just the fear of looking a little bit ridiculous — like Cruz and Carly Fiorina campaigning as supposed running mates in the waning moments of the 2016 primaries.And that, too, is also part of how Trump has always steamrollered his Republican opponents. They tend to hesitate, Prufrock-like, on the brink of boldness, while he rolls the dice without a single qualm or doubt.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: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTOpinion) and Instagram. More

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      Robert Kennedy Jr. Hints Strongly at Third-Party Presidential Bid

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      The political scion, whose long-shot Democratic primary challenge has faltered, released a video teasing a third-party candidacy that would put Democrats on high alert.Robert F. Kennedy Jr. hinted strongly on Friday that he would run for president on a third-party ticket instead of continuing his long-shot Democratic primary challenge to President Biden, a move that would set off alarms among Democrats worried about its potential to cause chaos in November 2024.Mr. Kennedy, in a video released by his campaign, teased a “major announcement” in Philadelphia on Oct. 9, promising to speak about “a sea change in American politics” and dropping clues that he would be continuing his presidential campaign outside the Democratic Party.“How are we going to win against the established Washington interests?” Mr. Kennedy says in the video. “It’s not through playing the game by the corrupt rules that the corrupt powers and the vested interests have rigged to keep us all in their thrall. Instead, we’re going to have to rewrite the assumptions and change the habits of American politics.”“What I’ve come to understand after six months of campaigning: There is a path to victory,” he declares at another point, saying that the more he sees the inherent goodness of the American people, “the more the path to victory becomes visible.”Mr. Kennedy’s top aides declined to elaborate about his intentions. But his supporters have expressed frustration with the Democratic National Committee’s primary process, which has been geared toward backing Mr. Biden’s re-election bid.“It’s kind of obvious,” said Lincoln Chafee, the former Rhode Island governor and senator, who is backing Mr. Kennedy. “The primaries are so rigged, there’s no debates.”Mr. Kennedy, he added, “has to look at his options.”Democrats have watched Mr. Kennedy’s candidacy nervously since it began in April. They fear that any third-party candidacy could siphon off crucial votes from Mr. Biden, ultimately helping former President Donald J. Trump, the current favorite to be the Republican nominee.Mr. Kennedy, 69, an environmental lawyer and prominent purveyor of conspiracy theories whose family has symbolized Democratic politics for decades, has built a following among Silicon Valley tech executives, disaffected voters in both parties and skeptics of the medical and scientific establishments.After some polls in the late spring showed him with up to 20 percent of Democratic support, Mr. Kennedy’s fortunes fell as more attention was paid to his panoply of views on the coronavirus pandemic, immigration and vaccines that are well outside the party’s mainstream.By late summer, surveys showed Mr. Kennedy polling in the low single digits. With his campaign roiled by news coverage of recordings of bigoted remarks he made at a New York dinner, he no longer appeared to be a threat to Mr. Biden.In recent months, Mr. Kennedy has dropped hints about continuing his campaign as a third-party candidate. He met in July with the Libertarian Party chairwoman and suggested on a podcast that he could leave the Democratic Party.As the reality set in for Mr. Kennedy that Mr. Biden would not debate him, he began using his platform to become more critical of the party and its presidential election process.This month, he published an open letter to Jaime Harrison, the D.N.C. chairman, and party members pleading for accommodations.“The D.N.C. is not supposed to favor one candidate over another,” Mr. Kennedy wrote.The Biden campaign and its allies at the D.N.C. have summarily dismissed Mr. Kennedy’s candidacy. .The fact that some Republicans believe it would be advantageous to Mr. Trump if Mr. Kennedy embarks on a third-party run has raised questions about whether anyone in the former president’s world has encouraged it.But Mr. Kennedy has in recent months become far more popular with Republicans than he is with Democrats. His campaign in the Democratic primary has been supported by Republicans: David Sacks, a donor for Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, hosted a fund-raiser for him in June.While Democrats are nervous that any third-party options would hurt Mr. Biden, it’s not clear from whom Mr. Kennedy would draw more votes if he qualified for the ballot in key battleground states.Over the years, third-party candidacies have been a focus of Roger J. Stone Jr., Mr. Trump’s longest-serving political adviser.“I predict #RFK abandons the rigged Democrat nominating process and runs as an Independent,” Mr. Stone wrote on Sept. 24 on X, the website formerly known as Twitter.In a brief interview on Friday, Mr. Stone said he had no involvement in Mr. Kennedy’s effort. “I’m supporting Donald Trump,” he said.Corey Lewandowski, an ally of Mr. Trump who served as his campaign manager during the 2016 election, wrote on X in response to an article about Mr. Kennedy’s possible move, “If true the race is over for @JoeBiden⁩!”Despite Mr. Kennedy’s earlier flirtation with the Libertarian Party, Brian McWilliams, a spokesman for the party, said there had been no recent conversations between Mr. Kennedy and its leadership.Placing himself on the ballot as a candidate of a newly established third party would be an onerous and expensive proposition for Mr. Kennedy, who would have to navigate ballot access laws in enough states to be a serious presidential candidate.Maggie Haberman More

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      We Need to Talk About Joe Biden

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      Michelle Cottle, Ross Douthat, Carlos Lozada and Listen to and follow ‘Matter of Opinion’Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon MusicIn 2020, Joe Biden handily beat Donald Trump in a race that was never particularly close. But now that the twice-impeached and four-times-indicted former president may once again be the Republican nominee, polls suggest they might be even, at best. Why isn’t Biden doing better? Has his presidency really gone so poorly?This week on “Matter of Opinion,” the hosts discuss the uphill battle Biden is facing heading into 2024 and debate what kind of leader Americans really want.(A full transcript of the episode will be available midday on the Times website.)Illustration by The New York Times; Photograph by Evan Vucci/Associated PressMentioned in this episode:“Reagan Should Not Seek Second Term, Majority Believes,” by Barry Sussman in The Washington PostThoughts? Email us at matterofopinion@nytimes.com.Follow our hosts on Twitter: Michelle Cottle (@mcottle), Ross Douthat (@DouthatNYT), Carlos Lozada (@CarlosNYT) and Lydia Polgreen (@lpolgreen).“Matter of Opinion” is produced by Sophia Alvarez Boyd, Phoebe Lett and Derek Arthur. It is edited by Stephanie Joyce. Mixing by Pat McCusker. Original music by Isaac Jones, Efim Shapiro, Carole Sabouraud and Pat McCusker. Our fact-checking team is Kate Sinclair, Mary Marge Locker and Michelle Harris. Audience strategy by Shannon Busta and Kristina Samulewski. Our executive producer is Annie-Rose Strasser. More

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      With Shutdown Looming, Biden Points to Republican Infighting

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      The president and his team insist they do not want the government to shut down. But they are also confident that Republicans will receive the blame if it does.President Biden’s shutdown strategy is simple: Avoid one, if possible. But if not, make sure Americans know whom to blame.His aides at the White House and in his re-election campaign have spent the past several days describing the consequences of what they call an “extreme Republican shutdown” of the government: delayed disaster relief; no food stamps for poor women and children; no pay for troops, air traffic controllers, Border Patrol or Transportation Security Administration agents.“They pull the country toward an extreme government shutdown in the name of draconian cuts to education, law enforcement, Meals on Wheels and Head Start,” Andrew Bates, a White House spokesman, said in describing House Republicans.The president and his team are quick to insist that they do not want a shutdown, especially a lengthy one, because of the harms that would ripple across America. But they are also confident that Republicans will receive the blame, as they have during standoffs that temporarily shuttered government agencies in years past.White House aides also believe that the intraparty fighting in Congress is putting Republican dysfunction on display, to the benefit of Mr. Biden and Democrats. Speaker Kevin McCarthy and a handful of his most conservative colleagues are refusing to keep the government open unless their demands for border security and spending cuts are met. “Extreme House Republicans are playing partisan games with people’s lives and marching our country toward a government shutdown that would have damaging impacts across the country,” the White House said in a statement on Thursday, highlighting nearly 2,000 disaster recovery projects that would be delayed by a shutdown.Mr. McCarthy has tried to draw Mr. Biden into the drama by suggesting that he would be responsible for a work stoppage because of his refusal to support Republican proposals for more restrictions on migrants at the border with Mexico.Speaker Kevin McCarthy has suggested Mr. Biden is responsible for a government shutdown because of his refusal to support Republican proposals on immigration.Kenny Holston/The New York Times“The president, it’s in his hands,” Mr. McCarthy, Republican of California, told reporters on Capitol Hill this week. “He can keep the government open by taking an action on the border.”Mr. Biden has also been under pressure from members of his own party to confront the surge of migrants at the border, thousands of whom are putting enormous stress on social services in big cities like New York and Boston.The president and his aides have pointed to their efforts to provide more migrants with a chance to receive work permits. And they have repeatedly noted that Republicans blocked a comprehensive overhaul of the nation’s immigration system that might have helped the authorities manage migration more easily.Advisers to Mr. Biden, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss White House and campaign strategy, are confident that — with a little nudging — Americans will place the blame squarely on House Republicans if the government shuts down this weekend. That could benefit the president for the remainder of his term, they say, by bolstering his leverage with lawmakers and eroding support for the Republican majority in the House.Campaign aides also say the sense of disgust among Americans with the shenanigans on Capitol Hill will help Mr. Biden’s re-election campaign by sharpening the contrast with his rivals. Former President Donald J. Trump, the leading candidate for the Republican nomination, has urged House conservatives to shut down the government, a move that Mr. Biden’s advisers and supporters are quick to point out.“Except for President Trump, who called for Republicans to shut down the government, no one actually wants this, because it means real people will get hurt,” said Stephanie Cutter, a veteran Democratic strategist who has helped presidents develop messages inside the White House and during campaigns.Those running Mr. Biden’s campaign would be wise to repeatedly draw the public’s attention to the similarities between Mr. Trump and his conservative allies in Washington, Ms. Cutter said.“Republican infighting and dysfunction is the best example of the difference between Bidenomics and MAGAnomics,” she said. “These situations, when you’re thinking about your closing arguments, help you really crystallize the choice voters will have a year from now.”The president’s team has begun to do just that.His campaign issued a statement on Monday blasting Mr. Trump’s call for a shutdown, accusing House Republicans of “gleefully letting Donald Trump function as their chief political strategist at the expense of American families.” Mr. Biden’s most recent campaign ad, titled “The Way,” emphasizes bipartisan legislative achievements even as the current Congress is in stalemate.Inside the West Wing, the president’s closest advisers have been sending out daily talking points for their allies to deliver as a shutdown looms. Stephen Benjamin, the director of public engagement at the White House, and Anita Dunn, one of the president’s top strategists, emphasized those issues on a conference call on Thursday with Democratic surrogates.Aides are encouraging allies to stress several points.First, they are told to repeatedly remind voters that Mr. Biden and Mr. McCarthy shook hands on a spending agreement months ago that was supposed to avert a shutdown. The speaker, under pressure from his conservative members, later reneged on the deal.Second, Biden allies are urged to note how isolated Mr. McCarthy is. Senate Republicans, including Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, have urged their House colleagues to accept a short-term agreement to keep the government open.Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky is among the Republicans who have urged their colleagues in the House to accept a short-term agreement to keep the government open.Maansi Srivastava/The New York TimesFinally, Biden officials are asking their supporters to be specific about the pain that a shutdown is likely to inflict.The White House warned in a statement this week of the impact of a shutdown on the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC, which helps poor families buy food.“During an extreme Republican shutdown, women and children who count on WIC would soon start being turned away at grocery store counters, with a federal contingency fund drying up after just a few days and many states left with limited WIC funds to operate the program,” the statement said.The White House went into further detail with a state-by-state breakdown of exactly how many women, children and infants were enrolled in the program — 421,294 in Florida, 207,728 in Michigan, 139,765 in Arizona and so on — and at risk of losing assistance. 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      A Chaotic Republican Debate: ‘Turn Off the Mic!’

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      More from our inbox:Members of Congress, Still Paid in a ShutdownTwo Views of JusticeColumbia’s Contributions to New York CityHigh-Quality TV Shows‘I Love Dogs,’ but Biden’s Must GoThe candidates mostly ignored former President Donald J. Trump’s overwhelming lead during the debate last night.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “5 Takeaways From Another Trump-Free Republican Debate” (nytimes.com, Sept. 28):Turn off the mic!Seven people onstage at the same time. Just enough time for the evening’s bloviators to spew out their prefabricated talking points. Not enough time for discussions of substance.And then there’s something called rules. In lieu of decorum, our debates have devolved into two hours of rudeness, interruption and incivility. Year after year, moderators exhibit little control or are completely ignored. Candidates with the least to say won’t shut up, and those with a cogent thought don’t have time to express it.Suggestion: With a clearly displayed clock, give each candidate a prescribed amount of time for talk and rebuttal. If another candidate interrupts, turn off his or her mike. For further interruptions, deduct minutes from that candidate’s talking time.Would candidates be receptive to such an idea? If not, why?Karl AbbottNew YorkTo the Editor:The smartest man on the G.O.P. debate stage was Donald Trump. He was omnipresent without the necessity of actual presence.Why would he debate? He has the nomination wrapped up. The taunts (“Donald Trump is missing in action” — Ron DeSantis; “Voters deserve to hear him defend his record”— The Wall Street Journal) are futile rhetoric. Mr. Trump will not be provoked. He can continue to go about his business unscathed while watching his frenzied rivals with minuscule ratings continue to flail.Meanwhile, Mr. Trump gets to skate into the nomination on his terms thanks to a Republican Party that can’t get enough of him. As Mr. Trump himself used to tweet, “Sad.”William GoldmanLos AngelesTo the Editor:I’m a very proud, lifelong Democrat. But I like to watch the G.O.P. debate because I enjoy seeing the party implode and eat its own. But I stopped after 45 minutes.It was simply a bunch of lies, misleading statements and prepared applause lines. Not one of them has any idea how to solve America’s problems, nor do they even offer a sensible plan, or in many cases any plan, to do so.The party will simply anoint the twice-impeached, criminally indicted former POTUS. This is what the party wants, and, in short, nothing and no one will stop this from happening. We are all watching, in slow motion, the game play out before the final out.Ben MilanoLindenhurst, N.Y.Members of Congress, Still Paid in a Shutdown Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesTo the Editor:How is it that if there is a government shutdown, others suffer and go hungry but members of Congress still get paid? That is obviously wrong and needs to change.Joan PachnerHartsdale, N.Y.Two Views of Justice Dave Sanders for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “More Democrats Calling on Menendez to Resign” (front page, Sept. 27):Senator Robert Menendez is indicted by the Justice Department. Democratic lawmakers across the country call for him to resign.Donald Trump is indicted by the Justice Department. Republican lawmakers across the country call for investigations into the weaponization of the Justice Department.Can there be a clearer indication of which group has a higher regard for ethics, morality and the rule of law?Barry LuriePhiladelphiaColumbia’s Contributions to New York CityColumbia’s science center was built on a new campus in Harlem. As the university expanded its footprint in the city, the number of New Yorkers enrolling declined.Amir Hamja/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Columbia and N.Y.U. Expand, but Pay Little Tax” (front page, Sept. 27):Columbia is honored to call New York home, and we are committed to being a responsible and engaged citizen of this city. While we don’t profess to be perfect, we take pride in the estimated $14.6 billion we contribute in annual economic impact to our community, according to the most recent study by New York’s Commission on Independent Colleges & Universities.But whittling down the university’s local contributions to dollars spent ignores the broad array of commitments, large and small, that we have made to this city as one of its oldest and proudest institutional residents.I could point to the critical role played by the university and our health care providers throughout the pandemic, including providing space and logistical support to house health care workers, or to researchers at our Climate School, who are contributing their time and resources to studying harmful algae blooms in city parks.Most recently, our faculty and students have volunteered to help asylum seekers who are filing applications for the authorization to work.Columbia is expanding our commitments to the city. That includes doing more to recruit, admit and support New York City’s public school students.We know this is an all-hands-on-deck moment for New York City, and we are dedicated to contributing in every way we can to assure a bright future for it.Gerald M. RosbergNew YorkThe writer is senior executive vice president of Columbia University.High-Quality TV Shows Matteo Giuseppe PaniTo the Editor:Re “The Era of Prestige TV Is Ending. We’re Going to Miss It When It’s Gone,” by Roy Price (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Sept. 21):Before Netflix, before Amazon, before HBO, before any of the streamers, was “prestige” content from public broadcasting worldwide. And before that was “Playhouse 90” and other prestige content from the networks of television’s early years.Good content is not just produced by big distributors; look at the range of truly interesting shows that media creators are developing on easily accessible platforms that don’t demand big budgets and fancy pedigrees.Open your eyes beyond your narrow West Coast view, Mr. Price. There’s a lot to like out there.Alice CahnRockland, MaineThe writer is a former head of children’s programming for PBS and vice president at Cartoon Network.‘I Love Dogs,’ but Biden’s Must GoCommander, a 2-year-old German shepherd, has bitten several members of the Secret Service, including biting one officer on the arm and thigh badly enough that the officer was sent to the hospital.Carolyn Kaster/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Once Again, a Biden Dog Gives a Bite to an Agent” (news article, Sept. 27):I love dogs more than I love most humans. That said, I feel it’s long past time that Commander, President Biden’s German shepherd, is permanently exiled from the White House to a comfortable, safe environment, such as a farm, where he has fewer opportunities to bite people.I doubt that Mr. Biden wants this outcome, but a dog with his record of biting folks should have been sent away long ago.Richard B. EllenbergerNormandy Park, Wash. More