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      Hard Questions if Biden’s Approval Doesn’t Follow Economy’s Rise

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      This is about the time when many presidents see their standing turn around, including Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.President Biden promoting domestic chip manufacturing.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesDoesn’t it feel as if everything’s breaking President Biden’s way lately?His chief rival — whom Mr. Biden already beat in 2020 and whom Democrats, in a sense, beat again in the midterms — is facing criminal indictments and yet currently finds himself cruising to the nomination anyway.The economy — which teetered on the edge of recession for two years with inflation rising and real wages declining — seems as if it might be on track for a soft landing, with inflation falling, real wages rising and the stock market recovering.The backlash against “woke” — a topic Republicans seemed most keen on exploiting in the Biden era — appears to have receded significantly, whether because Donald J. Trump has taken up much of the oxygen; conservatives have overreached; or progressives have reined in their excesses and fallen back to defense after conservatives went on offense.It’s probably too soon to expect these recent developments to lift Mr. Biden’s approval ratings, which remain mired in the low 40s. But if these trends persist, many of the explanations for Mr. Biden’s low approval will quickly become less credible. If his numbers don’t start to move over the next several months — with the wind seemingly at his back — it will quickly begin to raise more serious questions about his standing heading into the 2024 election.To this point in his presidency, it has been fairly easy to attribute his low ratings to economic conditions. Yes, unemployment was low and growth remained steady. But inflation surged, real incomes dropped, stocks fell into a bear market, a recession seemed imminent, and voters could see the signs of a struggling economy everywhere, including supply chain shortages and onerous interest rates.It’s fair to question whether economic conditions have actually been as bad as voters say, but it’s also fair to acknowledge these kinds of conditions can yield a pessimistic electorate. Two bouts of inflation that are reminiscent of today’s post-pandemic economy — the postwar economies of 1920 and 1946 — were catastrophic for the party in power, even as unemployment remained low by the standards of the era.Historically, it can feel as if almost every major political upheaval comes with inflation, whether it’s the Great Unrest in Britain, the Red Summer in the U.S. or even the hyperinflation of Weimar Germany. If high bread prices can be argued to have helped cause the French Revolution, it’s easy to accept that 9 percent inflation (at its peak in June 2022) could hurt Mr. Biden’s approval ratings by five or 10 percentage points.But if inflation has been what’s holding Mr. Biden back, it’s hard to say it should hold him back for too much longer. Annual inflation fell to 3 percent last month, and real incomes have finally started to rise. The stock market — one of the most visible and consequential measures of the economy for millions of Americans — has increased around 15 percent over the last six months. The University of Michigan consumer sentiment index surged 13 percent in July, reaching the highest level since September 2021 — the first full month Mr. Biden’s approval ratings were beneath 50 percent.There’s another factor that ought to help Mr. Biden’s approval rating: the onset of a new phase of the Republican primary campaign, including debates. As the Republican candidates become more prominent in American life, voters may start judging Mr. Biden against the alternatives, not just in isolation. Some of the Democratic-leaning voters who currently disapprove of Mr. Biden might begin to look at the Biden presidency in a different light.Perhaps in part for these reasons, this is about the time when many presidents see their standing turn around. Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton’s approval ratings were clearly on the upswing at this stage of the election cycle — though both were still beneath 50 percent — as voters began to see and feel an improving economy.We will see in the months ahead whether Mr. Biden’s ratings begin to increase. I wouldn’t expect it to happen quickly: Mr. Reagan and Mr. Clinton’s ratings increased by less than a point per month between roughly this time and their re-election. Barack Obama’s ratings increased at a similar, if slightly slower, pace from his post-debt-ceiling-crisis nadir a little later in the year.But even if it is not quick, I would expect Mr. Biden’s ratings to begin to increase if these conditions remain in place. Today’s era may be polarized, but there are plenty of persuadable and even Democratic-leaning voters — who disapprove of his performance — available to return to his side.If the economy keeps improving and yet his ratings remain stagnant in the months ahead, it will gradually begin to raise hard questions about the real source of his weakness — including the possibility that his age, by feeding the perception of a feeble president, prevents voters from seeing him as effective, whatever his actual record. More

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      Trump Seeks UAW Endorsement as the Union Wavers on Backing Biden

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      A video from the former president attacked electric vehicles, predicting the demise of the American automotive industry.Donald J. Trump, seeing an opening with organized labor, appealed on Thursday for an endorsement from the United Auto Workers for his White House bid and said only his return to the presidency could save the automotive industry from President Biden’s “ridiculous Green New Deal crusade.”Mr. Trump’s apocalyptic vision of the state of the American auto industry does not comport with the reality of an auto sector that has steadily gained jobs over the past three years. But there has been friction between the White House and the new leadership of the old-line industrial auto union.The United Auto Workers, which has a record of backing Democratic candidates for president, including Mr. Biden, has been angered with the Biden administration for pumping tax money into nonunion electric vehicle suppliers, and has withheld its endorsement, even as most labor unions have rushed to back Mr. Biden’s re-election. The U.A.W.’s new president, Shawn Fain, met with Mr. Biden in the White House on Wednesday as contract talks with the Big Three automakers heat up over electric vehicle parts suppliers.In a video on Thursday, Mr. Trump predicted the demise of American auto manufacturing and the “slaughter” of 117,000 auto jobs. “I hope United Auto Workers is listening to this because I think you’d better endorse Trump,” he said. He explicitly warned that Mr. Biden’s policies would cost jobs in the key swing state of Michigan, as well as the more reliably Republican states of Ohio and Indiana.The auto industry has actually gained jobs steadily since Mr. Trump left office, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employment among auto manufacturers and their parts suppliers reached 1,071,600 in June, up 129,000 since December 2020, the last full month of Mr. Trump’s presidency.Mr. Trump’s insistence that electric vehicles are piling up unsold on car lots contradicts the industry’s own view of its inventory.“We would assert that demand for traditional vehicles and for electric vehicles is strong,” said Matt Blunt, a former Republican governor of Missouri, now president of the American Automotive Policy Council, the domestic auto industry’s trade association in Washington. “This is a time of dramatic transition, but the U.S. industry is well positioned.”But the tension between the U.A.W. and the Biden administration is real. It takes fewer workers to assemble an electric vehicle than one with an internal combustion engine. That has made organizing parts suppliers, especially battery makers, an imperative of the union’s insurgent new leadership.Yet much of the new battery investment prompted in part by Mr. Biden’s climate change policies and infrastructure law is landing in the union-resistant Southeast, especially Georgia, a vital battleground state in the 2024 election. That state has had more than 40 electric vehicle-related projects introduced since 2020, promising investments worth $22.7 billion and the creation of 28,400 jobs.Mr. Biden was at Philadelphia’s shipyard on Thursday, talking up new rules attached to his climate change law intended to help union apprenticeship programs vault workers into the middle class without a college degree.“A lot of my friends in organized labor know, when I think climate, I think jobs,” he said. “I think union jobs.”But Mr. Trump, looking beyond the Republican primaries to a rematch with Mr. Biden, continues to aim for the vote of union workers, if not their leaders. More

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      Should No Labels Run a Presidential Candidate?

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      More from our inbox:Oppenheimer’s Lessons on Politics and ScienceDisease Outbreaks in Animal IndustriesCans on the Newlyweds’ Car Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “With Centrist Platform, No Labels Pushes Cause and Latent Third-Party Bid” (news article, July 16):Although I would love to see our two-party system evolve and I think less acrimony is essential to moving forward, I have two basic problems with the No Labels party idea.First, the U.S. system simply doesn’t support the creation of viable alternate parties. Until the barriers in place are removed, all third parties can do is play spoiler.Second, I firmly believe that our first priority should be defending our democratic foundation. For the first time in U.S. history, we have one party actively and unashamedly undermining the rule of law and democracy itself. We need to defend and shore up our democracy first. Then it will be a great time to change the rules so we don’t have this seemingly black or white constraint for our choice of candidate.Since Harlan Crow, the Texas billionaire who gives generous gifts to Justice Clarence Thomas, is a contributor to No Labels, I am suspicious of the rest of the donors whom we don’t know about.I see this movement as a political effort designed to prey on the public’s good faith, good intentions and frustration with the chaos caused by anti-democracy forces in the U.S.The way forward is to stick together for democracy — not splinter.Deb GarriesCalgary, AlbertaThe writer is an American citizen.To the Editor:The article mentions the possibility of the No Labels movement in the U.S. seeking to be listed on state ballots as a political party. This is no easy job. Of the two largest American minor political parties, Libertarians and Greens, only the Libertarians have been getting their candidates on the ballot in all 50 states.Each state has its own often complex rules and requirements to be listed on its ballots. Any group such as No Labels could also face legal challenges by one or both of the major parties. Such an effort to gain ballot access for a new party typically requires years of work and much money.No Labels could cause problems in battleground states for President Biden’s re-election bid, but No Labels’ major battle would be just trying to get on state ballots.Dan DonovanBrooklynTo the Editor:The third-party scam must have the Trump wing of the G.O.P. chuckling with glee. Currently, only a Republican or Democrat can win the presidency, and that’s not going to change in a year and a half. Donald Trump’s followers will not be moved by persuasion or facts, so he will be a nominee.This week you reported on Mr. Trump’s intent to concentrate power in the executive branch, weakening the courts and Congress. He plans the end of the republic as we know it. Yet his followers will vote for him.The Republicans’ path to power is a continual drumbeat of “President Biden’s too old, we need fresh blood,” etc., shifting attention away from Mr. Biden’s effectiveness. The strategy: Persuade Democratic voters that they are too “sophisticated” (No Labels) to accept the binary choice, and should go for a Manchin, a Kennedy.In 2000, Ralph Nader voters helped elect George W. Bush, who attacked Iraq and ballooned the national debt. Many “Bernie Bros” in 2016 refused to vote for Hillary Clinton, helping clear the way for Mr. Trump.Thanks for nothing.This search for political purity, or just novelty, could ironically result in the beginning of American dictatorship next year. It is unrealistic to think that third-party votes will lead anywhere else.Howard SchmittGreen Tree, Pa.To the Editor:I’d like to propose an alternative way to refer to No Labels. It should be called what it is: Republicans Only Not in Name (RONIN). Not only is that resonant with the term RINO (Republicans in Name Only), which is used by many Republicans to refer to other Republicans they disapprove of. It’s also consistent with the Japanese term “ronin,” a kind of loose cannon in the feudal social structure.Ron GroveFlagstaff, Ariz.Oppenheimer’s Lessons on Politics and ScienceJ. Robert Oppenheimer in an undated photo.Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “‘Oppenheimer’ Shows the Danger of Politicizing Science,” by Kai Bird (Opinion guest essay, July 18):Mr. Bird’s excellent essay about J. Robert Oppenheimer illustrates all too well the dangers to our democracy in allowing political rhetoric and policies to alter scientific facts and theories.Such lessons do not belong only to the McCarthy era. The politicization of the Covid vaccine and the far right’s attack on Dr. Anthony Fauci are recent history. And indeed, as we speak, Republican strategists are planning increased executive and presidential political control over scientific and other now independent agencies.Let’s not let the lessons of Oppenheimer be lost. They are as relevant now as they were in the McCarthy era.Ken GoldmanBeverly Hills, Calif.To the Editor:Whether it’s harsh truths about atomic power or the merits of vaccines against Covid-19, influenza and childhood illnesses, it’s science — regularly, honestly and clearly explained — that is sanity’s ultimate home-field advantage.Peter J. PittsNew YorkThe writer, a former F.D.A. associate commissioner, is president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and a visiting professor at the University of Paris School of Medicine.Disease Outbreaks in Animal IndustriesThe United States produces 10 billion animals for food every year, including more pigs and poultry, which can harbor and transmit influenza, than nearly any other country.Gerry Broome/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Risk Seen in U.S. Animal Industries” (Science Times, July 11), about the risk of infectious disease outbreaks:This article is illuminating, but one element of the crisis is missing: the degree to which animals suffer in these appalling situations.Consider the complete lack of hygiene to which animals confined in farming operations and live animal markets are subjected without relief until they die, either at the hands of slaughterers or from chronic stress and disease.I doubt that much will be done to control the animal industries identified in the article until more people speak out against what these animals are forced to endure.The cruelty and contamination are linked. We might stretch our imaginations to make this connection and act on it.Karen DavisMachipongo, Va.The writer is the president of United Poultry Concerns, a nonprofit that promotes the respectful treatment of domesticated birds.Cans on the Newlyweds’ CarTo the Editor:Re “Where Those Cans Behind the Car Came From” (Traditions, Sunday Styles, July 16):When my wife, Laurie, and I were married, my brothers affixed a “Just Married” sign and a bouquet of cans to the bumper of my Jeep Cherokee.On our way to the airport that evening, we were pulled over by the Suffield, Conn., police. We weren’t speeding, and there was no one else on the road. Perhaps the officer wanted to congratulate the newlyweds?No; apparently a can had come loose from the vehicle. We were issued a warning — and informed that a ticket would have cost us $82 (more than $200 today) — for “operating with an unsecure load.”Despite that inauspicious start, my wife and I will celebrate our 34th anniversary in November.David CecchiAgawam, Mass. More

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      How Serious is No Labels?

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      GOFFSTOWN, N.H. — “I’m not afraid of losing,” Senator Joe Manchin said, with some real charm and conviction, on Monday night.He offered this in the middle of a substantive point, about honesty and political strength, but in a weird venue: the first town hall put on by No Labels, the longstanding centrist group now threatening to run a third-party presidential ticket if Joe Biden and Donald Trump are nominated. To think about losing, and not being afraid to lose, at this event went to the thing people fear about No Labels right now.The idea behind the town hall itself was to draw attention to the group’s policy agenda, titled “Common Sense.” Those words were visible at least 26 times on No Labels backdrops and placards around the room at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College. Staff members wore “Common Sense” T-shirts and handed out “Common Sense” hats and “Common Sense” booklets. Inside those booklets, prospective voters find proposals on entitlements, a vow to keep artificial intelligence research rolling, some interesting ideas about changing the way credit scores work and centrist platitudes on immigration and abortion. The idea is: On this we agree.At the actual event, though, in response to a woman’s question about climate change, Mr. Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia, and John Huntsman, a Republican former governor of Utah, ended up disagreeing about carbon pricing. (Mr. Huntsman brought it up, then Mr. Manchin volunteered that he’s always been against it.) Whether No Labels is for or against carbon pricing was seemingly never resolved at the event, even though it’s exactly the kind of thing two No Labels-types would agree on during a panel in Aspen or Davos. Faced with the minor disproof of concept, the event’s moderator asked the pair, “If there is a Republican and a Democrat who are in the White House, together, how would that work?”“It would work a helluva lot better than what we have today,” Mr. Huntsman cracked to laughter and so forth from the crowd. The moderator tried again: How would this actually work?“Nobody knows because we’ve never tried it,” Mr. Huntsman replied, which produced a slight hitch in the crowd, since people’s tolerance for the unknown has probably decreased over the past decade. “Well, they tried it in 1864,” Mr. Manchin, added, which produced an uneasier noise in the crowd.People talk about this thing as if it must be a dark-money plot to tip the election Donald Trump’s way. But while No Labels says it will proceed only if it thinks the unity ticket could actually win, the compelling, magnetic quality of this effort is its opaqueness. It’s really not clear what exactly No Labels is doing or why.At times, the entire enterprise seems more like an attractive market opportunity (the opportunity made possible by our national unhappiness) — like seeing a spike in electric vehicle production and buying up mineral rights to mine lithium. But even then, it’s not clear who in the No Labels universe believes what: Is threatening to run a third-party candidate a leverage thing? Against whom? Do they think that the right unity ticket could reach the ephemeral threshold of belief where enough voters think they could win to make the ticket viable?No Labels won’t say yet who’s funding it, or who its candidates will be or which party will take the presidential slot. There will be a convention, in April in Dallas, with delegates, but who are the delegates going to be? One of the Maine voters who accidentally switched their party registration to No Labels? The group rarely if ever seems to mention the circumstance where setting up the logistically challenging mechanisms for a backup candidate would make sense: for instance, if Mr. Biden withdrew late from the presidential race. If Mr. Biden weren’t president, he might even be the hypothetical candidate that Joe Lieberman, a No Labels co-chair — also present in New Hampshire — would be calling for.At least one No Labels board member has quit over the likelihood that the group could help re-elect Mr. Trump. At least one local chapter says it isn’t interested in the idea of a third-party run. On the anniversary of D-Day, Third Way (a different centrist group) convened a wide array of figures, including former Obama campaign advisers and former senators such as Heidi Heitkamp, to meet about how to stop No Labels. Dick Gephardt, a former House majority leader, is planning to establish a different group to stop No Labels.Since its beginning more than a decade ago, No Labels has taken on a dislocated, strange quality. Nine years ago, Mr. Manchin actually quit when the group endorsed Republican Cory Gardner (who is no longer in the Senate) against Democrat Mark Udall (also no longer in the Senate). In 2015, two of the three senators who were members of the group’s Problem Solvers Caucus were Republican Kelly Ayotte (who lost in 2016) and Democrat Bill Nelson (who lost in 2018). People tend to become “bipartisan problem solvers” in districts and states that routinely flip back and forth between parties. For a long time, No Labels members have been disappearing, or about to disappear or reappearing after a loss in this way.But it’s not just impermanence — there’s always been a kind of detachment from reality, too. No Labels is dedicated to bipartisanship and working together, leaning on the ways staying in Washington for decades creates the kind of personal, fruitful relationships better able to solve problems. Zoom out, though, and the entire life span of No Labels coincides with a period defined by how much voters hate Washington.In our time of No Labels, politics has taken such an apocalyptic, nihilistic turn that a mob tried to ransack the Capitol while we were midway through a once-a-century pandemic. It’s hard to believe sometimes that when robots can think and it’s 120 degrees in Arizona, No Labels is throwing out PoliSci seminar ideas about rejiggering how speakers of the House are chosen. The “Common Sense” booklet mentions, in a section on how expensive health care is, how Congress hasn’t tackled tort reform. Whose fault was that?No Labels’s dissociation from the problems it identifies comes through in weirder, more absurd, more hostile ways at times. At the event this week, a reporter asked Chris Sununu, the governor of New Hampshire, whether he’d endorse a No Labels candidate, to which he immediately replied, “I’m a Republican!” while what sounded like Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” played over the loudspeakers.In May, when a Problem Solvers Caucus member, Representative Brad Schneider of Illinois, said he wasn’t into this idea of a third-party ticket, No Labels sent this insane text to voters: “We were alarmed to learn that your U.S. Rep. Brad Schneider recently attacked the notion that you should have more choices in the 2024 presidential election.”On Monday night, when the moderator asked about the widely shared concern that No Labels would throw the election in Mr. Trump’s direction, Mr. Huntsman said this was “the latest talking point” and then actually compared No Labels critics to Russian and Chinese authoritarians. “So if you live in a place like China or Russia — and I’ve lived in both, running both U.S. embassies — they don’t allow any choice,” he said. “There’s no participation. They’re complete, pure authoritarian systems. So when I start hearing people here say, ‘That’s not a good thing. You shouldn’t do things to expand and enhance our participation in the system. It might result in A, B or C losing,’ I say, ‘I’ve heard that before — but not in this country.’”Alongside the group’s strangeness, there’s also been an earnestness that in the end, people still want the kinds of things they wanted before, in the 1990s and 2000s in particular. No Labels is this last refuge, a resting place inside and outside the two parties and a half-finished Washington dreamscape. In New Hampshire, the Manchin-Huntsman event drew a crowd that on the surface looked like a Republican event of 20 years ago — collared shirts in shades of blue. That kind of voter, in New Hampshire or suburban Atlanta or Colorado, can feel the Republican Party falling away from them in real time.And the country can feel like it’s in fading, chaotic straits more often than anyone would like. Voters do not want what they seem likely to get in a Biden-Trump rematch. This fact is the firm but vibrating floor beneath the No Labels project and the panic it has produced — the recognition that we’re approaching a 2024 election that will make American voters unhappy. But how unhappy? Unhappy enough to resume voting for protest candidates? Unhappy enough to vote for a mystery unity ticket, only on the principle of their unhappiness?I don’t know that the electoral effects of No Labels are as clear as people say. It’s possible that running Mr. Manchin and Larry Hogan, a former governor of Maryland, would peel off those old-school suburban Republicans who voted for Mr. Biden, or that those voters might be the ones who would otherwise stay home or return to the Republican fold, or that few people would risk a third-party vote anyway. What is real, though, in a deep and human way, is that plenty of people fear a second Trump term and are dissatisfied with how life is in America. And No Labels is here to take advantage of that sadness with a half-finished idea.Katherine Miller is a staff writer and editor in Opinion.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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      Biden Attacks Trump and MAGA but Avoids Indictment Talk

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      The president has taken swipes at Republicans, including a video playfully featuring Marjorie Taylor Greene as a narrator, but he and his allies are avoiding one target: his predecessor’s legal woes.For months, President Biden has appeared to delight in needling Donald J. Trump and his Republican allies, trying at every turn to make MAGA and ultra-MAGA a shorthand for the entire party.This week, Mr. Biden cheekily highlighted a video in which Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia derisively ticks through his first-term accomplishments and likens him — not positively — to Franklin Delano Roosevelt. “I approve this message,” the president commented on the video, which was viewed more than 43 million times in 24 hours.Mr. Biden recently did a victory lap when Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama promoted local spending in the bipartisan infrastructure bill, which Mr. Tuberville had voted against.And his campaign took a shot at Mr. Trump for not visiting Wisconsin during his current presidential bid, accusing him of a “failure to deliver on his promised American manufacturing boom.”But when it comes to the topic dominating the presidential race this week, Mr. Biden and his top allies are treating Mr. Trump’s legal troubles like Voldemort — avoiding, at all costs, any mention of the indictments that must not be named.This moment comes after weeks of polling, both public and private, that suggests Mr. Trump, who is comfortably the front-runner in the Republican primary race, would be a weaker general-election opponent next year than Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida or other G.O.P. candidates.The White House and the Biden campaign have not sent explicit instructions to surrogates and supporters telling them to steer clear of Mr. Trump’s legal issues, but plenty of those on Team Biden have gotten the message loud and clear: Don’t talk about the Trump indictments.“The American people want the judicial process to play out without interference from politicians,” said Representative Ro Khanna of California, a member of the Biden campaign’s national advisory board. “President Biden has his pulse on the sentiments of the American public by talking about what matters to them.”Mr. Biden has said he won’t comment on investigations into and charges against Mr. Trump — a reflection of his clear desire not to be seen as intruding on Justice Department independence, as well as the political imperative of deflecting Republicans’ relentless, evidence-free accusations that he is the hidden hand behind the prosecutions.The Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee have repeatedly declined to comment or answer questions about Mr. Trump’s indictments. The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, has dodged numerous questions about Mr. Trump’s legal travails in recent weeks.“I’m just not going to respond to any hypotheticals that’s currently, you know, out there in the world,” Ms. Jean-Pierre said Tuesday after Mr. Trump revealed he had received a so-called target letter from federal investigators, a sign that he could soon be indicted in the investigation into the events that culminated in the Capitol riot. “Just not going to comment from here.”The Biden world’s approach to Mr. Trump’s indictments echoes how Democrats handled Mr. Trump, then the president, during the 2018 midterm elections.Scores of resistance-fueled Democrats ran for and won House seats by focusing on health care policy without placing Mr. Trump at the center of their campaigns. They didn’t have to talk Trump then, the thinking went, because voters had already made up their minds about him.“He is omnipresent and the voters who are motivated to vote against him and his party already know what they need to know,” said Meredith Kelly, a strategist who worked for the House Democrats’ campaign arm in 2018. “This allowed congressional candidates to talk about real kitchen-table issues impacting families and continues to be the case this cycle as he looms large over the battlefield in 2024.”There’s also little question that polling shows Mr. Biden is stronger against Mr. Trump than Mr. DeSantis or others, giving the president little incentive to do anything to hurt Mr. Trump’s standing among Republican primary voters.A Michigan poll conducted last week by a Republican-leaning polling firm found Mr. Biden up by a percentage point against Mr. Trump but down by two to Mr. DeSantis. The same firm’s poll of Nevada showed Mr. Biden up by four against Mr. Trump and trailing Mr. DeSantis by two. And in Wisconsin, a poll last month from Marquette University Law School found Mr. Biden with a nine-point lead over Mr. Trump but a two-point lead over Mr. DeSantis.According to the Marquette pollster, Charles Franklin, both Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis hold support from hard-core Republicans in a matchup against Mr. Biden, but among Republican-leaning independents, Mr. Trump’s support drops while Mr. DeSantis’s does not.The public polling aligns with the White House’s own polling of battleground states.One person who is more than happy to amplify discussions about the investigations and indictments is Mr. Trump himself. It was the former president, of course, who revealed that he had received the target letter.“Crooked Joe Biden has weaponized the Justice Department to go after his top political opponent, President Trump, who is the overwhelming front-runner to take back the White House,” said Steven Cheung, Mr. Trump’s campaign spokesman. “Biden wants to meddle in the election because he knows he stands no chance against President Trump.”Mr. Biden’s campaign on Wednesday referred to Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene as an “unintentional campaign” spokeswoman.Saul Martinez for The New York TimesThe Biden campaign’s video of Ms. Greene served to tweak and elevate one of Mr. Trump’s staunchest far-right supporters and promote Mr. Biden’s own record without getting into the legal cases against Mr. Trump. Polling conducted for the White House last year found that Ms. Greene was known and disliked by a large portion of voters and that independent voters associated her with Mr. Trump’s MAGA movement.Mr. Biden’s campaign referred to her on Wednesday as an “unintentional campaign” spokeswoman.“Joe Biden had the largest public investment in social infrastructure and environmental programs that is actually finishing what F.D.R. started, that L.B.J. expanded on, and Joe Biden is attempting to complete,” Ms. Greene said at the Turning Point Action conference over the weekend, in the video clipped by the Biden campaign.The result is a crisp 35-second video, distributed on Mr. Biden’s Twitter feed with the introduction, “I approve this message.”The clip was similar to the moment last month when Mr. Biden highlighted unusual and unexpected support from another Trump-centric Republican, Senator Tuberville, who praised spending in Alabama from the infrastructure law, which Mr. Biden signed and the senator had voted against.In that instance, Mr. Biden played up Mr. Tuberville’s support during a Chicago speech, theatrically drawing the sign of the cross on his chest as if the senator had undergone a political conversion.The president has previously sought to draw attention to Ms. Greene, who is already a leading social media and fund-raising star in the Republican Party. During a speech this month in South Carolina, he said that he would soon make a visit to her northwest Georgia district to celebrate the beginning of construction of a solar power manufacturing plant there.The crowd laughed. Mr. Biden has not yet scheduled a trip to the groundbreaking. More

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      Are We Doomed to Witness the Trump-Biden Rematch Nobody Wants?

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      Have you met anyone truly excited about Joe Biden running for re-election? And by that, I mean downright Obama-circa-2008 energized — brimming with enthusiasm about what four more years of Biden would bring to our body politic, our economy, our national mood, our culture?Let’s be more realistic. Is there a single one among us who can muster even a quiet “Yay!”? And no, we’re not counting the guy who sounds like he’s performing elaborate mental dance moves to persuade himself nor anyone who is paid to say so. According to a recent report in The Times, Biden’s fund-raising thus far doesn’t exactly reveal a groundswell of grass roots excitement.Instead, most Democrats seem to view what looks like an inexorable rematch between Biden and Donald Trump with a sense of impending doom. My personal metaphor comes from Lars von Trier’s film “Melancholia,” in which a rogue planet makes its way through space toward an inevitable collision with Earth. In that film, the looming disaster symbolized the all-encompassing nature of depression; here, the feel is more dispiritedness and terror, as if we’re barreling toward either certain catastrophe or possibly-not-a-catastrophe. Or it’s barreling toward us.A Biden-Trump rematch would mean a choice between two candidates who, for very different reasons, don’t seem 100 percent there or necessarily likely to be there — physically, mentally and/or not in prison — for the duration of another four-year term.To take, momentarily, a slightly more optimistic view, here is the best case for Biden: His presidency has thus far meant a re-establishment of norms, a return to government function and the restoration of long-held international alliances. He has presided over a slow-churning economy that has turned roughly in his favor. He’s been decent.But really, wasn’t the bar for all these things set abysmally low during the Trump administration (if we can even use that word given its relentless mismanagement)? We continue to have a deeply divided Congress and electorate, a good chunk of which is still maniacally in Trump’s corner. American faith in institutions continues to erode, not helped by Biden’s mutter about the Supreme Court’s most recent term, “This is not a normal court.” The 2020 protests led to few meaningfully changed policies favoring the poor or disempowered.A Biden-Trump rematch feels like a concession, as if we couldn’t do any better or have given up trying. It wasn’t as though there was huge passion for Biden the first time around. The 2020 election should have been much more of a blowout victory for Democrats. Yet compared with his election in 2016, Trump in 2020 made inroads with nearly every major demographic group, including Blacks, Latinos and women, except for white men. The sentiment most Democrats seemed to muster in Biden’s favor while he was running was that he was inoffensive. The animating sentiment once he scraped by into office was relief.This time, we don’t even have the luxury of relief. In the two other branches of government, Democrats have been shown the perils of holding people in positions of power for too long — Ruth Bader Ginsburg in the judiciary and Dianne Feinstein in the legislature. Democrats and the media seem to have become more vocal in pointing out the hazards of Biden’s advancing age. In an April poll, of the 70 percent of Americans who said Biden shouldn’t run again, 69 percent said it’s because of his old age.That old age is showing. Never an incantatory speaker or a sparkling wit, Biden seems to have altogether thrown in the oratorical towel. Several weeks ago, he appeared to actually wander off a set on MSNBC after figuratively wandering through 20 minutes of the host Nicolle Wallace’s gentle questions. In another recent interview, with Fareed Zakaria, when asked specific questions about U.S.-China policy, Biden waded into a muddle of vague bromides and personal anecdotes about his travels as vice president with China’s leader, Xi Jinping. When asked point blank whether it’s time for him to step aside, Biden said, almost tangentially, “I just want to finish the job.”But what if he can’t? Kamala Harris, briefly a promising figure during the previous primary season, has proved lackluster at best in office. Like Biden, she seems at perpetual war with words, grasping to articulate whatever loose thought might be struggling to get out. The thought of her in the Oval Office is far from encouraging.One clear sign of America’s deepening hopelessness is the weird welcoming of loony-tune candidates like Robert Kennedy Jr., who has polled as high as a disturbing 20 percent among Democratic voters. Among never-Trumpian Republicans, there is an unseemly enthusiasm for bridge troll Chris Christie, despite his early capitulation to Trump, for the sole reason that among Republican primary candidates, he’s the one who most vociferously denounces his former leader. And a Washington nonprofit, No Labels, is gearing up for a third-party run with a platform that threatens to leach support from a Democratic candidate who is saddled with a favorable rating of a limp 41 percent.Trump, of course, remains the formidable threat underlying our malaise. Though he blundered into office in 2016 without a whit of past experience or the faintest clue about the future, this time he and his team of madmen are far better equipped to inflict their agenda. As a recent editorial in The Economist put it, “a professional corps of America First populists are dedicating themselves to ensuring that Trump Two will be disciplined and focused on getting things done.” The idea that Trump — and worse, a competent Trump — might win a second term makes our passive embrace of Biden even more nerve-racking. Will we look back and have only ourselves to blame?It is hard to imagine Democrats, or most Americans, eager to relive any aspect of the annus horribilis that was 2020. Yet it’s as if we’re collectively paralyzed, less complacent than utterly bewildered, waiting for “something” to happen — say, a health crisis or an arrest or a supernatural event — before 2024. While we wait, we lurch ever closer to something of a historical re-enactment, our actual history hanging perilously in the balance.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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      Today’s Top News: Biden Invites Netanyahu to the U.S., and More

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      The New York Times Audio app is home to journalism and storytelling, and provides news, depth and serendipity. If you haven’t already, download it here — available to Times news subscribers on iOS — and sign up for our weekly newsletter.The Headlines brings you the biggest stories of the day from the Times journalists who are covering them, all in about 10 minutes. Hosted by Annie Correal, the new morning show features three top stories from reporters across the newsroom and around the world, so you always have a sense of what’s happening, even if you only have a few minutes to spare.President Biden’s invitation to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, right, came as a surprise to many.Abir Sultan/EPA, via ShutterstockOn Today’s Episode:Biden Invites Netanyahu to U.S., Easing Tensions, with Patrick KingsleyWith a Centrist Manifesto, No Labels Pushes Its Presidential Bid Forward, with Jonathan WeismanRussia Pulls Out of the Black Sea Grain Deal, with Farnaz FassihiEli Cohen More

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      DeSantis, Haley and Pence Attack Democrats in Speeches Supporting Israel

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      President Biden and progressive congresswomen were the focus of Republican presidential hopefuls’ criticism at the Christians United for Israel Summit.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida on Monday sharply criticized the Biden administration’s policies on Israel, calling them “disgraceful,” seeking to highlight his pro-Israel credentials as he goes head-to-head with former President Donald J. Trump for evangelical voters.In Washington at the Christians United for Israel Summit, an annual gathering of conservatives with ties to the Israeli right wing, Mr. DeSantis also vowed to never waver on Israel’s claim to Jerusalem and to forcefully oppose the boycott-Israel movement that he said promoted prejudice against Jewish people.Three Republican presidential candidates, including Mr. DeSantis, appeared at the event, which unfolded as President Biden on Monday invited Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to the White House and was set to meet in Washington later this week with Isaac Herzog, the Israeli president. The Netanyahu government has long cultivated its ties with evangelical Christians, whose beliefs that Israel is special to God has led many to hold hawkish views in support of the Jewish state.“You’re free as a person to have whatever views you want,” Mr. DeSantis told the crowd. “But when you concoct a movement that focuses all of your ire at the only Jewish state in this world, at the exclusion of all these other things,” he added, “that is antisemitism.”Mr. DeSantis never once mentioned the progressive Democrats who have said they will boycott a speech by Mr. Herzog to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday. But he used his speech to emphasize his strong support for Israel and attack White House policies, as many conservatives have sought to portray Democrats who criticize Israel as anti-Zionist or even antisemitic.His Republican presidential rivals who also spoke at the event — Nikki Haley, a former South Carolina governor and a United Nations ambassador in the Trump administration, and former Vice President Mike Pence — took direct aim at the progressive Democratic congresswomen who have pushed for a shift in thinking about the Mideast conflict, focusing the debate on human rights.Ms. Haley attacked Mr. Biden over how long it took to extend a White House invitation to Mr. Netanyahu after he re-entered office in December. In callbacks to the public fights between Mr. Trump and the “Squad,” she singled out Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, who is planning to skip the Herzog speech, and said “the Democratic Party is the definition of extreme.” She added, “It’s time to censure the Squad and get antisemitism out of America for good.”Antisemitism has been on the rise in recent years. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a long-shot Democratic presidential candidate who has been invited by House Republicans to testify on Capitol Hill on censorship, falsely claimed recently that the Covid-19 virus was engineered to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people, prompting accusations of antisemitism and racism.And top House Democrats have been rushing to reject comments from Representative Pramila Jayapal, a Washington Democrat who described Israel as “a racist state” at a progressive conference over the weekend.In a statement on Sunday, Ms. Jayapal, who heads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, sought to clarify her remarks. “I do not believe the idea of Israel as a nation is racist,” she said. “I do, however, believe that Netanyahu’s extreme right-wing government has engaged in discriminatory and outright racist policies and that there are extreme racists driving that policy within the leadership of the current government.”On Monday at the summit in Washington, Mr. Pence criticized Ms. Jayapal, Representative Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota for using what he described as “antisemitic tropes” and “antisemitic remarks.”“The words by these congresswomen are a disgrace,” Mr. Pence said, adding that “they are beneath the dignity of the relationship” between the United States and Israel. “President Biden and every Democrat member of Congress should denounce them and denounce them today.”Ms. Omar in 2019 apologized for implying that American support for Israel was fueled by money from a pro-Israel lobbying group, remarks that drew swift condemnation from fellow Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Ms. Tlaib, the first Palestinian American woman elected to Congress, has also faced criticism from Republicans and pro-Israel Democrats for calling Israel an “apartheid regime.”Coming out in support of Ms. Jayapal on Monday, Ms. Tlaib said, “The Israeli government is committing the crime of apartheid.”“Apartheid is a racist system of oppression,” she added.On Monday, Mr. DeSantis, who received loud applause and a standing ovation, rejected a two-state solution establishing an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel that has been at the basis of peace talks for decades but has proved difficult to achieve. And he denounced efforts that he argued used “the economy and business to impose a radical left-wing agenda” on Israeli policy.“The way they treat a strong ally like Prime Minister Netanyahu,” he said of the Biden administration, “what they’re trying to do to shoehorn Israel into bad policies has been disgraceful.” More