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      Should Biden Run for Re-election in 2024?

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      More from our inbox:A Threat to Free SpeechG.O.P. Election DeniersRepublicans Against Birth ControlPresident Biden with Senators Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, center, and Jon Tester of Montana. Many Democratic officials and voters bear no ill will toward Mr. Biden, but would like a new face to lead the party.Doug Mills/The New York TimesTo the Editor:“Biden in 2024? Many in Party Whisper, ‘No’” (front page, June 12) raises the question of why so many Democrats seem to be down on President Biden. He is guiding the U.S. out of the pandemic, encouraged and signed major infrastructure legislation, galvanized the international coalition that has enabled Ukraine to resist Russia’s horrific invasion and appointed highly qualified judges who are diverse in terms of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, ideology and experience, and who promise to counter the deleterious effects of Donald Trump appointees.These and many other accomplishments comprise an excellent record for a president’s first 17 months, especially when the Democrats possessed a razor-thin Senate majority.Carl TobiasRichmond, Va.The writer is a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law.To the Editor:A breathtakingly common theme, whether we read about gun massacres, the economy, climate legislation or crumbling infrastructure, is that our nation feels in crisis, rudderless, lacking a moral compass.I have great admiration for the decent, calm, highly experienced Joe Biden. But it is now clear to me that our nation needs a much more assertive, energetic leader who can move hearts, minds and legislation against a tsunami of Republican obstructionism, the selfish noncooperation of select Democratic senators, and the relentless lies and conspiracies masquerading as news.This is a herculean task. I’m not sure who is up to it. But I think Howard Dean is right. Go younger. And go bolder. We need someone with big ideas and the negotiating ability to move public opinion and legislation forward.Sally PeabodyPeabody, Mass.To the Editor:“Biden in 2024? Many in Party Whisper, ‘No’ ” is a thoughtful, interesting analysis of the many pros and cons of President Biden’s running again. But I think many of the points raised are irrelevant, because the controlling issue is the president’s age.The idea that a man in his 80s (he would be 82 when inaugurated for a second term and 86 by its end) would have the energy to do such a demanding job is simply wrong. I say this as a 90-year-old man who is able to cook, walk, drive, see friends and take part in public life.But it is clear that anyone’s energy in their 80s is greatly diminished. And as David Axelrod is quoted as saying, “The presidency is a monstrously taxing job.”Eric WolmanLittle Silver, N.J.To the Editor:President Biden may be down but it’s premature to count him out. In 1948 Harry Truman faced similar problems. Few people gave him any chance of winning the presidency. The economy was bad. The world was a mess. He was too blunt for most people. Many felt he was not up to the job. Support within his own party was disintegrating, just as Mr. Biden’s support is declining.What happened? Truman did not give up, and he won the election. Will Mr. Biden be the 21st-century Truman?Paul FeinerGreenburgh, N.Y.A Threat to Free Speech Pablo DelcanTo the Editor:The New York Times editorial board has said it plans to identify threats to free speech and offer solutions.One of the most dangerous threats to free speech is the tremendous growth over three to four decades of government agencies, businesses and others barring employees from speaking to journalists. Sometimes bans are total. Sometimes they prohibit contact unless authorities oversee it, often through public information offices.Legal analysis from the Brechner Center for Freedom of Information finds that such constraints in public agencies, although very common, are unconstitutional. Many courts have agreed.Despite our pride in some outstanding journalism, no news outlet overcomes all the blockages and intimidation of sources that this censorship creates. Quite enough information is successfully hidden to be corrosive.The press should not be taking the risk of assuming that what we get is all there is when so many people are silenced. We should be openly fighting these controls.Haisten WillisKathryn FoxhallTimothy WheelerMr. Willis and Ms. Foxhall are chair and vice chair, respectively, of the Freedom of Information Committee, Society of Professional Journalists. Mr. Wheeler is chair of the Freedom of Information Task Force, Society of Environmental Journalists.G.O.P. Election DeniersJim Marchant in Carson City, Nev., in March 2021. He is the Republican nominee for Nevada secretary of state and an organizer of a Trump-inspired coalition of candidates who falsely insist the 2020 election was stolen.Ricardo Torres-Cortez/Las Vegas Sun, via Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Far-Right Election Deniers Pressing Closer to Controlling Votes” (news analysis, June 16):The alarming rise of far-right Republicans who could hold significant sway over the electoral systems of several swing states leaves me feeling incredibly worried.That we as citizens of the United States would ever have to even ponder whether or not the candidate who won the majority of votes would be certified as the victor in an election is nothing short of horrifying.Despite knowing better, far too many self-serving Republicans have allowed their party to become a den of showy snake oil salesmen and women who peddle conspiracies and mistruths. The dangerous state our democracy finds itself in now is their responsibility.Cody LyonBrooklynRepublicans Against Birth ControlHailey Kramer, the chief nurse practitioner at Tri-Rivers Family Planning, said her patients make clear that birth control is a deeply personal decision.Whitney Curtis for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Missouri Battle on Birth Control Gives Hint of a Post-Roe Nation” (front page, June 14):Those same Republican conservatives who advocate personal responsibility not only want to ban all abortions for women. Now they also want to deprive women of their ability to prevent pregnancy by taking away funding for methods of birth control.It’s illogical and unconscionable, but sadly no longer unthinkable.Merri RosenbergArdsley, N.Y. More

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      Trump Campaign Chief to Headline Jan. 6 Hearing on Election Lies

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      Bill Stepien is expected to appear alongside a fired Fox News editor who called Trump’s loss and a former U.S. attorney who resigned rather than go along with false claims of election fraud.WASHINGTON — The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol plans to use the testimony of former President Donald J. Trump’s own campaign manager against him on Monday as it lays out evidence that Mr. Trump knowingly spread the lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him in an attempt to overturn his defeat.The committee plans to call Bill Stepien, the final chairman of Mr. Trump’s campaign, who is expected to be asked to detail what the campaign and the former president himself knew about his fictitious claims of widespread election fraud. Those claims will be the focus of the second in a series of hearings the panel is holding this month to reveal the findings of its sprawling investigation.After an explosive first hearing last week in prime time, leaders of the committee are aiming to keep up a steady stream of revelations about the magnitude of Mr. Trump’s plot to overturn the election and how it sowed the seeds of the violent siege of the Capitol by his supporters last year.On Monday, they plan to describe the origin and spread of Mr. Trump’s election lies, including the former president’s refusal to listen to advisers who told him that he had lost and that there was no evidence of widespread irregularities that could change the outcome. Then they plan on demonstrating the chaos those falsehoods caused throughout several states, ultimately resulting in the riot.A committee aide said the panel would focus in particular on Mr. Trump’s decision on election night to declare victory even though he had been told he did not have the numbers to win.A second panel of witnesses will include Byung J. Pak, a former U.S. attorney in Atlanta who resigned abruptly after refusing to say that widespread voter fraud had been found in Georgia.According to an internal memo made public as part of a court case, the Trump campaign knew as early as November that its outlandish fraud claims were false. Last week, the panel showed videotaped testimony of his top advisers and even the attorney general at the time, William P. Barr, saying that they had told Mr. Trump and top White House officials as much.Mr. Stepien was present for key conversations about what the data showed about Mr. Trump’s chances of succeeding in an effort to win swing states, beginning on election night. He was part of a meeting with Mr. Trump on Nov. 7, 2020, just after the election had been called by television networks in favor of President Joseph R. Biden Jr., in which he told Mr. Trump of the exceedingly low odds of success with his challenges.Mr. Trump, urged on by his lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, wanted to press forward anyway.Mr. Stepien, who rarely speaks in public, is appearing under subpoena, raising questions about how willing a witness he will be against Mr. Trump.Mr. Stepien is currently serving as an adviser to Harriet Hageman, a Republican endorsed by Mr. Trump who is mounting a primary challenge to Representative Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming and the panel’s vice chairwoman, setting up a potentially adversarial dynamic for his questioning on Monday.Read More on the Jan. 6 House Committee HearingsMaking a Case Against Trump: The committee appears to be laying out a road map for prosecutors to indict former President Donald J. Trump. But the path to any trial is uncertain.The Meaning of the Hearings: While the public sessions aren’t going to unite the country, they could significantly affect public opinion.An Unsettling Narrative: During the first hearing, the panel presented a gripping story with a sprawling cast of characters, but only three main players: Mr. Trump, the Proud Boys and a Capitol Police officer.Trump’s Depiction: Mr. Trump was portrayed as a would-be autocrat willing to shred the Constitution to hang onto power. Liz Cheney: The vice chairwoman of the House committee has been unrepentant in continuing to blame Mr. Trump for stoking the attack on Jan. 6, 2021.The Jan. 6 committee suggested in a letter sent to Mr. Stepien that it had evidence that he was aware that the campaign was raising money by making false claims about election fraud.“As manager of the Trump 2020 re-election campaign, you oversaw all aspects of the campaign,” the letter said. “You then supervised the conversion of the Trump presidential campaign to an effort focused on ‘Stop the Steal’ messaging and related fund-raising. That messaging included the promotion of certain false claims related to voting machines despite an internal campaign memo in which campaign staff determined that such claims were false.”Mr. Stepien will appear alongside Chris Stirewalt, the former political editor at Fox News who was fired after Fox correctly called the 2020 president election in Arizona for Mr. Biden, a move that angered Mr. Trump.U.S. Attorney Byung J. Pak, who resigned after learning that Mr. Trump wanted to fire him for rejecting claims of rampant voter fraud in Georgia, in Atlanta in 2019.Bob Andres/Atlanta Journal-Constitution, via Associated PressThe second part of the hearing will turn to the reverberations of Mr. Trump’s false claims around the country, particularly in competitive states. Along with Mr. Pak, who resigned after learning that Mr. Trump wanted to fire him for rejecting claims of rampant voter fraud in Georgia, the panel is scheduled to hear from Al Schmidt, a Republican former city commissioner in Philadelphia who also stood up to Mr. Trump’s lies. Benjamin Ginsberg, a Republican election lawyer who served as the national counsel to George W. Bush’s presidential campaign and played a central role in the Florida recount of 2000, is also slated to appear.Monday’s lineup of witnesses suggests that the committee wants to chart the impact Mr. Trump’s lies had in conservative media and in various states, as well as contrasting the baseless nature of Mr. Trump’s claims with legitimate legal challenges from Republican campaigns of the past.A committee aide said the panel would present evidence during the hearing from witnesses who had investigated Mr. Trump’s claims of fraud and found them to be false.The panel also plans to show how Mr. Trump’s fiction of a stolen election was used as a fund-raising tool, bringing in hundreds of millions of dollars between Election Day 2020 and Jan. 6. A fraudulent fund-raising effort could be grounds for a possible criminal referral to the Justice Department against Mr. Trump and his allies.And some on the committee have long believed that one way they could break through to Mr. Trump’s supporters would be to prove to them that they had been duped into donating their money to a bogus cause.Aides said the committee would also try on Monday to show how the rioters who stormed the Capitol had echoed back Mr. Trump’s words, and cited him as their motivation in storming the building in an attempt to stop Congress from formalizing his defeat.Representative Zoe Lofgren, Democrat of California and the chairwoman of the House Administration Committee, is slated to play a key role presenting evidence at the hearing, aides said.Time and again, top Trump administration officials told Mr. Trump he had lost the 2020 election. But time and again, Mr. Trump pressed forward with his lies of widespread fraud.Shortly after the election, as ballots were still being counted, the top data expert in Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign told him bluntly that he was going to lose.In the weeks that followed, as Mr. Trump continued to insist that he had won, a senior Justice Department official told him repeatedly that his claims of widespread voting fraud were meritless, ultimately warning him that they would “hurt the country.”Those concerns were echoed by the top White House lawyer, who told the president that he would be entering into a “murder-suicide pact” if he continued to pursue extreme plans to try to invalidate the results of the 2020 election.Last week, the Jan. 6 panel played video of an interview showing Mr. Barr testifying that he knew the president’s claims were false, and told him so on three occasions.“I told the president it was bullshit,” Mr. Barr is heard telling the committee’s investigators. “I didn’t want to be a part of it.”Al Schmidt, a Philadelphia city commissioner, outside City Hall in Philadelphia in 2020.Michelle Gustafson for The New York TimesCommittee members previewed some of the evidence they plan to present at Monday’s hearing during television news interviews Sunday.“Former President Trump was told by multiple people — it should have been abundantly clear — that there was no evidence that showed the election was stolen, and he ignored that,” Representative Elaine Luria, Democrat of Virginia and a member of the committee, said on NBC’s “Meet The Press.”Representative Adam Kinzinger, Republican of Illinois, drew a contrast between those close to Mr. Trump who told him the truth and the “yes people” who encouraged his fantasy of a stolen election in order to please him.“If you truly believe the election was stolen, then if the president truly believed that, he’s not mentally capable to be president,” Mr. Kinzinger said on CBS’s “Face The Nation,” adding: “I think he didn’t believe it. I think the people around him didn’t believe it. This was all about keeping power against the will of the American people.”Michael S. Schmidt More

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      If You Must Point Fingers on Inflation, Here’s Where to Point Them

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      As the midterm elections draw nearer, a central conservative narrative is coming into sharp focus: President Joe Biden and the Democratic-controlled Congress have a made a mess of the American economy. Republicans see pure political gold in this year’s slow-motion stock market crash, which seems to be accelerating at the perfect time for a party seeking to regain control of Congress in the fall.The National Republican Congressional Committee in a tweet last month quipped that the Democratic House agenda includes a “tanking stock market.” Conservatives have been highlighting a video clip from 2020 when then-president Donald Trump warned about a Joe Biden presidency: “If he’s elected, the stock market will crash.” Right wing pundit Sean Hannity’s blog featured the clip under the headline: “TRUMP WAS RIGHT.”But the narrative pinning blame for the economy’s woes squarely on Democrats’ shoulders elides the true culprit: the Federal Reserve. The financial earthquakes of 2022 trace their origin to underground pressures the Fed has been steadily creating for a over a decade.It started back in 2010, when the Fed embarked on the unprecedented and experimental path of using its power to create money as a primary engine of American economic growth. To put it simply, the Fed created years of super-easy money, with short-term interest rates held near zero while it pumped trillions of dollars into the banking system. One way to understand the scale of these programs is to measure the size of the Fed’s balance sheet. The balance sheet was about $900 billion in mid-2008, before the financial market crash. It rose to $4.5 trillion in 2015 and is just short of $9 trillion today.All of this easy money had a distinct impact on our financial system — it incentivized investors to push their money into ever riskier bets. Wall Street-types coined a term for this effect: “search for yield.” What that means is the Fed pushed a lot of money into a system that was searching for assets to buy that might, in return, provide a decent profit, or yield. So money poured into relatively risky assets like technology stocks, corporate junk debt, commercial real estate bonds, and even cryptocurrencies and nonfungible tokens, known as NFTs. This drove the prices of those risky assets higher, drawing in yet more investment.The Fed has steadily inflated stock prices over the last decade by keeping interest rates extremely low and buying up bonds — through a program called quantitative easing — which has the effect of pushing new cash into asset markets and driving up prices. The Fed then supercharged those stock prices after the pandemic meltdown of 2020 by pumping trillions into the banking system. It was the Fed that primarily dropped the ball on addressing inflation in 2021, missing the opportunity to act quickly and effectively as the Fed chairman, Jerome Powell, reassured the public that inflation was likely to be merely transitory even as it gained steam. And it’s the Fed that is playing a frantic game of financial catch-up, hiking rates quickly and precipitating a wrenching market correction.So, now the bill is coming due. Unexpectedly high inflation — running at the hottest levels in four decades — is forcing the Fed to do what it has avoided doing for years: tighten the money supply quickly and forcefully. Last month, the Fed raised short-term rates by half-a-percentage point, the single largest rate hike since 2000. The aggressiveness of the move signaled that the Fed could take similarly dramatic measures again this year.A sobering realization is now unfolding on Wall Street. The decade of super-easy money is likely over. Because of inflation’s impact, the Fed likely won’t be able to turn on the money spigots at will if asset prices collapse. This is the driving force behind falling stock prices, and why the end of the collapse is probably not yet in sight. The reality of a higher-interest-rate world is working its way through the corridors of Wall Street and will likely topple more fragile structures before it’s all over.After the stock and bond markets adjust downward, for example, investors must evaluate the true value of other fragile towers of risky assets, like corporate junk debt. The enormous market for corporate debt began to collapse in 2020, but the Fed stopped the carnage by directly bailing out junk debt for the first time. This didn’t just save the corporate debt market, but added fuel to it, helping since 2021 to inflate bond prices. Now those bonds will have to be re-priced in light of higher interest rates, and history indicates that their prices will not go up.And while the Fed is a prime driver of this year’s volatility, the central bank continues to evade public accountability for it.Just last month, for instance, the Senate confirmed Mr. Powell to serve another four-year term as Fed chairman. The vote — more than four to one in favor — reflects the amazingly high level of bipartisan support that Mr. Powell enjoys. The president, at a White House meeting in May, presented Mr. Powell as an ally in the fight against inflation rather than the culprit for much of this year’s financial market volatility. “My plan is to address inflation. It starts with a simple proposition: Respect the Fed and respect the Fed’s independence,” the president said.This leaves the field open for the Republican Party to pin the blame for Wall Street’s woes on the Democratic Party’s inaction. As Jim Jordan, the Republican congressman from Ohio, phrased it on Twitter recently, “Your 401k misses President Trump.” This almost certainly presages a Republican line of attack over the summer and fall. It won’t matter that this rhetoric is the opposite of Mr. Trump’s back in 2018 and 2019, when the Fed was tightening and causing markets to teeter. Back then, Mr. Trump attacked Mr. Powell on Twitter and pressured the Fed chairman to cut interest rates even though the economy was growing. (The Fed complied in the summer of 2019.) But things are different now. Mr. Biden is in office, and the Fed’s tightening paves a clear pathway for the Republican Party to claim majorities in the House and Senate.Republicans have also honed in on Mr. Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, meant to mitigate the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, as a cause for runaway inflation. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen rejected that, noting in testimony before members of Congress: “We’re seeing high inflation in almost all of the developed countries around the world. And they have very different fiscal policies. So it can’t be the case that the bulk of the inflation that we’re experiencing reflects the impact” of the American Rescue Plan.Democrats would be wise to point to the source of the problem: a decade of easy money policies at the Fed, not from anything done at the White House or in Congress over the past year and a half.The real tragedy is that this fall’s election might reinforce the very dynamics that created the problem in the first place. During the 2010s, Congress fell into a state of dysfunction and paralysis at the very moment when its economic policymaking power was needed most. It should be viewed as no coincidence that the Fed announced that it would intensify its experiments in quantitative easing on Nov. 3, 2010, the day after members of the Tea Party movement were swept into power in the House. The Fed was seen as the only federal agency equipped to forcefully drive economic growth as Congress relegated itself to the sidelines.With prices for gas, food and other goods still on the rise and the stock market in a state of flux, there may still be considerable pain ahead for consumers. But Americans shouldn’t fall for simplistic rhetoric that blames this all on Mr. Biden. More than a decade of monetary policy brought us to this moment, not 17 months of Democratic control in Washington. Voters should be clear-eyed about the cause of this economic chaos, and vote for the party they think can best lead us out of it.Christopher Leonard (@CLeonardNews) is the author, most recently, of “The Lords of Easy Money: How the Federal Reserve Broke the American Economy” and executive director of the Watchdog Writers Group at the Missouri School of Journalism.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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      Should Biden Run in 2024? Democratic Whispers of ‘No’ Start to Rise.

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      In interviews, dozens of frustrated Democratic officials, members of Congress and voters expressed doubts about the president’s ability to rescue his reeling party and take the fight to Republicans.Midway through the 2022 primary season, many Democratic lawmakers and party officials are venting their frustrations with President Biden’s struggle to advance the bulk of his agenda, doubting his ability to rescue the party from a predicted midterm trouncing and increasingly viewing him as an anchor that should be cut loose in 2024.As the challenges facing the nation mount and fatigued base voters show low enthusiasm, Democrats in union meetings, the back rooms of Capitol Hill and party gatherings from coast to coast are quietly worrying about Mr. Biden’s leadership, his age and his capability to take the fight to former President Donald J. Trump a second time.Interviews with nearly 50 Democratic officials, from county leaders to members of Congress, as well as with disappointed voters who backed Mr. Biden in 2020, reveal a party alarmed about Republicans’ rising strength and extraordinarily pessimistic about an immediate path forward.“To say our country was on the right track would flagrantly depart from reality,” said Steve Simeonidis, a Democratic National Committee member from Miami. Mr. Biden, he said, “should announce his intent not to seek re-election in ’24 right after the midterms.”Democrats’ concerns come as the opening hearing of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol made clear the stakes of a 2024 presidential election in which Mr. Trump, whose lies fueled a riot that disrupted the peaceful transfer of power, may well seek to return to the White House.For Mr. Biden and his party, the hearings’ vivid reminder of the Trump-inspired mob violence represents perhaps the last, best chance before the midterms to break through with persuadable swing voters who have been more focused on inflation and gas prices. If the party cannot, it may miss its final opportunity to hold Mr. Trump accountable as Mr. Biden faces a tumultuous two years of a Republican-led House obstructing and investigating him.Most top elected Democrats were reluctant to speak on the record about Mr. Biden’s future, and no one interviewed expressed any ill will toward Mr. Biden, to whom they are universally grateful for ousting Mr. Trump from office.But the repeated failures of his administration to pass big-ticket legislation on signature Democratic issues, as well as his halting efforts to use the bully pulpit of the White House to move public opinion, have left the president with sagging approval ratings and a party that, as much as anything, seems to feel sorry for him.That has left Democratic leaders struggling to explain away a series of calamities for the party that all seem beyond Mr. Biden’s control: inflation rates unseen in four decades, surging gas prices, a lingering pandemic, a spate of mass shootings, a Supreme Court poised to end the federal right to an abortion, and key congressional Democrats’ refusal to muscle through the president’s Build Back Better agenda or an expansion of voting rights.Rising inflation has increased prices of groceries and other everyday goods for voters, in a worry for Democrats.Saul Loeb/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWorries about age, and a successorTo nearly all the Democrats interviewed, the president’s age — 79 now, 82 by the time the winner of the 2024 election is inaugurated — is a deep concern about his political viability. They have watched as a commander in chief who built a reputation for gaffes has repeatedly rattled global diplomacy with unexpected remarks that were later walked back by his White House staff, and as he has sat for fewer interviews than any of his recent predecessors.“The presidency is a monstrously taxing job and the stark reality is the president would be closer to 90 than 80 at the end of a second term, and that would be a major issue,” said David Axelrod, the chief strategist for Barack Obama’s two winning presidential campaigns.“Biden doesn’t get the credit he deserves for steering the country through the worst of the pandemic, passing historic legislation, pulling the NATO alliance together against Russian aggression and restoring decency and decorum to the White House,” Mr. Axelrod added. “And part of the reason he doesn’t is performative. He looks his age and isn’t as agile in front of a camera as he once was, and this has fed a narrative about competence that isn’t rooted in reality.”Understand the June 7 Primary ElectionBy showing little enthusiasm for progressive and Trumpian candidates alike, voters in seven states showed the limits of the ideologies of both parties.Takeaways: For all the talk of sweeping away the old order, the primaries on June 7 largely saw the establishment striking back. Here’s what else we learned.Winners and Losers: Here is a rundown of some of the most notable wins and losses.California Races: The recall of a progressive prosecutor showed the shifting winds on criminal justice. In Los Angeles, Rick Caruso and Representative Karen Bass are heading to a runoff mayoral election.New Mexico’s Governor Race: Mark Ronchetti, a former television meteorologist, has won New Mexico’s Republican nomination for governor.Mr. Biden has repeatedly said that he expects to run again in 2024. But if he does not, there is little consensus about who would lead the party.Vice President Kamala Harris, left, with Katherine Tai, the U.S. trade representative, at the White House in May. If Mr. Biden does not run in 2024, Ms. Harris is seen as likely to jump into the race, but she would probably have competition.Pete Marovich for The New York TimesFew Democrats interviewed expect that high-profile leaders with White House ambitions would defer to Vice President Kamala Harris, who has had a series of political hiccups of her own in office.These Democrats mentioned a host of other figures who lost to Mr. Biden in the 2020 primary: Senators Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Cory Booker of New Jersey; Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg; and Beto O’Rourke, the former congressman who is now running for Texas governor, among others.Mr. Biden’s supporters insist he has the country on the right track, despite the obstacles.“Only one person steered a transition past Trump’s lies and court challenges and insurrection to take office on Jan. 20: Joe Biden,” said Anita Dunn, a senior adviser to the president, citing strong jobs numbers and efforts to combat the pandemic.Other Biden allies dismissed suggestions that any other Democrat would do better than him in 2024.“This the same hand-wringing that we heard about Barack Obama in 2010 and 2011,” said Ben LaBolt, who worked on Mr. Obama’s campaigns.Cristóbal Alex, who was a senior adviser for the Biden campaign and was the deputy cabinet secretary in the White House until last month, said Mr. Biden was the only Democrat who could win a national election.Mr. Alex said it was the responsibility of congressional Democrats to highlight Mr. Biden’s successes and pass legislation he, and most of them, campaigned on.Cristóbal Alex, a former senior adviser to the Biden campaign, said the president was the only Democrat who could win a national election.Shuran Huang for The New York Times“I am worried that leaders in the party aren’t more aggressively touting the success of the administration,” he said. “The narrative needs to shift, and that can only happen with a powerful echo chamber combined with action in Congress on remaining priorities. The American people feel unsettled.”Nikki Fried, the Florida agriculture commissioner who is running for governor, said she would welcome Mr. Biden to campaign with her in Florida, but stopped short of endorsing him for a second term. “There is a lot of time between now and 2024,” she said.Still, public polling shows that Mr. Biden is at a low point in his popularity among Democratic voters. A survey last month from The Associated Press found Mr. Biden’s approval among his fellow party members at 73 percent — the lowest point in his presidency, and nine points lower than at any point in 2021. There is little recent public polling asking if Democrats want Mr. Biden to seek a second term, but in January just 48 percent of Democrats wanted him to run again, according to The A.P.’s polling.‘We’re lacking in the excitement’Elected Democrats are cautious about openly discussing Mr. Biden’s future.“I’m not allowed to have feelings right now,” said Jasmine Crockett, a Texas state representative who last month won a primary runoff for a heavily Democratic House seat based in Dallas. “When you’re an incoming freshman, you just don’t get to.”Jasmine Crockett, a Texas state representative who is likely to head to Congress next year, said Democrats needed to do more to build enthusiasm among voters.Emil Lippe for The New York TimesStill, Ms. Crockett lamented a stark enthusiasm gap between Republicans, who in Texas have passed legislation to restrict voting rights and abortion rights while expanding gun rights, and Democrats, who have not used their narrow control of the federal government to advance a progressive agenda.“Democrats are like, ‘What the hell is going on?’” Ms. Crockett said. “Our country is completely falling apart. And so I think we’re lacking in the excitement.”Many Democratic leaders and voters want Mr. Biden to fight harder against Republicans, while others want him to seek more compromise. Many of them are eyeing 2024 hoping for some sort of idealized nominee — somebody who isn’t Mr. Biden or Ms. Harris.Hurting Mr. Biden the most, said Faiz Shakir, who was campaign manager for Mr. Sanders in 2020, is a perception of weakness.Mr. Shakir circulated a memo in April stating that Mr. Sanders “has not ruled out” running in 2024 if Mr. Biden does not. In an interview, Mr. Shakir said he believed that Mr. Biden could beat Mr. Trump a second time — but that if Republicans nominate a newer face, like Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, Mr. Biden may not be the best choice.“If it’s DeSantis or somebody, I think that would be a different kind of a challenge,” Mr. Shakir said.Understand the 2022 Midterm ElectionsCard 1 of 6Why are these midterms so important? More

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      Trump and Unreleased Video Expected to Be Focus of First Jan 6. Hearing

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      The House panel investigating the attack will lead its public sessions with video testimony from people close to the former president and footage revealing the role of the Proud Boys.WASHINGTON — The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol plans to open a landmark series of public hearings on Thursday by playing previously unreleased video of former President Donald J. Trump’s top aides and family members testifying before its staff, as well as footage revealing the role of the Proud Boys, a right-wing extremist group, in the assault.Committee aides say the evidence will show that Mr. Trump was at the center of a “coordinated, multi-step effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election” that resulted in a mob of his supporters storming the halls of Congress and disrupting the official electoral count that is a pivotal step in the peaceful transfer of presidential power.The 8 p.m. hearing is the first in a series of six planned for this month, during which the panel will lay out for Americans the full magnitude and significance of Mr. Trump’s systematic drive to invalidate the 2020 election and remain in power.“We’ll demonstrate the multipronged effort to overturn a presidential election, how one strategy to subvert the election led to another, culminating in a violent attack on our democracy,” said Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and a member of the committee. “It’s an important story, and one that must be told to ensure it never happens again.”The prime-time hearing will feature live testimony from a documentary filmmaker, Nick Quested, who was embedded with the Proud Boys during the attack, and a Capitol Police officer, Caroline Edwards, who was injured as rioters breached barricades and stormed into the building.The committee also plans to present what aides called a small but “meaningful” portion of the recorded interviews its investigators conducted with more than 1,000 witnesses, including senior Trump White House officials, campaign officials and Mr. Trump’s family members.Mr. Trump’s elder daughter Ivanka Trump, his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his son Donald Trump Jr. are among the high-profile witnesses who have testified before the panel.Mr. Quested, a British documentarian who has worked in war zones such as Afghanistan, spent a good deal of the postelection period filming members of the Proud Boys, including the group’s former chairman, Enrique Tarrio, who has been charged with seditious conspiracy in connection with the Capitol riot. Mr. Quested accompanied the Proud Boys to pro-Trump rallies in Washington in November and December 2020 and was on the ground with members of the group on Jan. 6, when several played a crucial role in breaching the Capitol.Mr. Quested was also present with a camera crew on the day before the attack, when Mr. Tarrio met in an underground parking garage near the Capitol with a small group of pro-Trump activists, including Stewart Rhodes, the founder and leader of the Oath Keepers militia. Late in the day on Jan. 6, Mr. Quested and his crew were with Mr. Tarrio in Baltimore, filming him as he responded in real time to news about the riot.Ms. Edwards, a well-respected Capitol Police officer, is believed to be the first officer injured in the attack, when she sustained a concussion during an assault at a barricade at the base of Capitol Hill. A man who has been charged with taking part in the assault, Ryan Samsel, told the F.B.I. during an interview more than a year ago that just before he approached the barricade, a high-ranking member of the Proud Boys, Joseph Biggs, had encouraged him to confront the police.Other officers around the building recall hearing Officer Edwards calling for help over the radio — one of the first signs that mob violence was beginning to overrun the police presence. Months after the attack, she continued to have fainting spells believed to be connected to her injuries.A committee aide said Mr. Quested and Officer Edwards would describe their experiences, including “what they saw and heard from the rioters who tried to occupy the Capitol and tried to stop the transfer of power.”The committee’s investigators believe Mr. Quested overheard conversations among the Proud Boys during the planning for Jan. 6.Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi and the committee chairman, and Representative Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming and the vice chairwoman, are expected to lead the presentation of the panel’s evidence and question the witnesses.The session will kick off an ambitious effort by the committee, which was formed in July after Republicans blocked the creation of a nonpartisan commission to investigate the attack, to lay out for Americans the full story of an unprecedented assault on U.S. democracy that led to a deadly riot, an impeachment and a crisis of confidence in the political system that continues to reverberate.The hearings are unfolding five months before midterm elections in which the Democrats’ majority is at stake, at a time when they are eager to draw a sharp contrast between themselves and the Republicans who enabled and embraced Mr. Trump, including the members of Congress who abetted his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.Other hearings are expected to focus on various aspects of the committee’s investigation, including Mr. Trump’s promotion of the lie that the election had been stolen, despite being told his claims were false; his attempts to misuse the Justice Department to help him cling to power; a pressure campaign on Vice President Mike Pence to throw out legitimate electoral votes for Joseph R. Biden Jr.; the way the mob was assembled, and how it descended on Washington on Jan. 6; and the fact that Mr. Trump did nothing to stop the violence for more than three hours while the assault was underway.The Jan. 6 panel has not yet committed to the full slate of witnesses for the six televised hearings, and it is still discussing the possibility of public testimony with several prominent Trump-era officials.Among the witnesses the committee has formally approached to testify next week are Jeffrey A. Rosen, the former acting attorney general, and Richard P. Donoghue, the former acting deputy attorney general, according to two people briefed on the matter.Mr. Rosen and Mr. Donoghue have told multiple congressional committees that Mr. Trump and his allies pressured the department to falsely say that it had found voter fraud and to use its power to undo the election results. Last May, Mr. Rosen took part in a public hearing of the House Oversight and Reform Committee on events leading up to the assault on the Capitol.The Jan. 6 committee is still in informal talks with Pat A. Cipollone, the former White House Counsel, as well as Byung J. Pak, the former U.S. attorney in Atlanta, who abruptly resigned on Jan. 4, 2021, after learning that Mr. Trump planned to fire him for not finding voter fraud, according to those people familiar with the discussions.Mr. Cipollone would be able to speak on a range of issues, including Mr. Trump’s efforts to pressure the Justice Department and his unwillingness to accept the results of the election, despite the fact that officials time and again failed to uncover fraud.Mr. Pak could have information pertaining to Georgia, a battleground state that Mr. Trump was particularly fixated on.Alan Feuer More

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      There Has to Be a Tipping Point on Guns, Right?

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      Bret Stephens: Hi, Gail. I know we’ll talk about Joe Biden’s gun-control proposals, but I wanted to ask how Dan is feeling — about Covid and the Celtics.Gail Collins: Thanks for asking, Bret. I can now march around with a little badge saying “My husband’s testing negative!” He didn’t have a major Covid case, but it was a reminder of how any illness can really lay a family low. And what a disaster it must be for, say, single mothers or poor seniors. And how important it is to have good social services for those folks and …Bret: And a timely prescription of Paxlovid, I presume. Glad he’s better.Gail: OK, not gonna try to lure you into an activist-government argument today. Will move on instead to the championship-contender Boston Celtics and my theory that professional sports, while cheesy in many ways, are an extremely useful part of the culture, not only providing diversion but also uniting folks who would otherwise have absolutely nothing in common.Anybody you’re rooting for?Bret: The Celtics, of course. What’s your over-under on the series, now that it’s tied? Or your bet on Biden getting anything passed on gun legislation?Gail: Sports-wise, I don’t like the idea of betting on whether some team will score over X points or under. Just tell me who you think is going to win.Bret: The Men in Green. Not only does God root for them, he also used to play for them.Gail: However, when it comes to betting on the Senate, God help us, I guess you need to look for ways to celebrate minimal achievement. I can imagine them passing a bill to raise the age for buying an assault rifle to 21, but don’t expect me to throw a party.Bret: I’m hardly the first person to suggest that no one should be able to legally buy a gun in the United States who can’t legally buy a beer in the United States. I’d also argue that every would-be gun buyer should be required to purchase a gun safe while also passing a criminal-background check, a psychiatric evaluation, a three-day waiting period and an extensive gun-safety course. Perhaps a few of the conservatives who argue that school shootings are part of a mental-health crisis might be persuaded to sign on.Gail: Can I also say how it drives me crazy when lawmakers respond to these gun crises by ranting about police efficiency or school construction?Bret: Well, the performance of the police in Uvalde was shameful and I hope the episode lives on as an example to cops everywhere of how not to act when the lives of children and teachers are at risk.Gail: Of course you want well-trained security officers, but that’s not going to stop all these horrors. And kinda amazed by the idea of eliminating entrances to reduce the chance of a murderer sneaking into a school. Could pose a problem if you’re down to one door and the building catches fire.Bret: Which sort of brings us to the nub of the problem: Conservatives want policies that don’t work in practice and liberals want policies that don’t work in politics.Our news-side colleague Nate Cohn had an eye-opening analysis last week on the wide disparity between the way gun-control measures poll and how people actually vote on them. Turns out, gun control just isn’t as popular at the ballot box as many liberals contend. And every time there’s a gun massacre, gun sales go up, not down. Liberals need to reconsider the way they make their case. Your thoughts?Gail: Well, my first idea would be to … ask an extremely talented communicator with ties to the right. Take it, Bret!Bret: Hmmm. Can I start with what doesn’t work?When Beto O’Rourke says, “Hell yes, we’re going to take your AR-15s,” it just encourages people to buy them. When Jimmy Kimmel makes a moving plea for gun control, he is preaching to the converted, but he isn’t moving the needle. When hyper-progressives say “abolish the police,” they are tacitly encouraging people — especially in low-income communities — to purchase weapons as a logical means of self-defense. When coastal elites denigrate gun culture, they foster precisely the kinds of cultural resentments that lead people to “cling to guns,” to use Barack Obama’s famous phrase. When Biden pleads “do something,” he merely invites the question: do what, exactly?Gail: As someone who is in favor of getting rid of every assault weapon in the world, I have to protest. Let’s open a conversation about what kind of guns are good for hunting and target shooting and separate them from the ones that are ideal for mowing down students or shoppers or whoever turn out to be the next heartbreaking mass murder victims.The major barrier is the profit-making gun manufacturers and the culture they subsidize. But I understand I’m not exactly moving many AR-15 owners. Give me a better strategy.Bret: Imagine a TV ad from a moderate Democrat like Ohio’s Tim Ryan or Virginia’s Abigail Spanberger that goes something like this:“I believe in the Second Amendment. But not for this guy,” followed by a picture of the Tucson, Ariz., mass murderer Jared Lee Loughner, “or this guy” — a picture of Aurora, Colo., mass murderer James Holmes, “or this guy” — a picture of Newtown, Conn., mass murderer Adam Lanza.It would continue: “I also believe in the right to own firearms responsibly for hunting and self-defense. But not for this” — a picture of the scene outside the Uvalde school, “or this” — a picture of the scene from the Buffalo grocery store, “or this” — scenes from the Parkland massacre.And it could conclude: “Justice Robert Jackson once told us that the Bill of Rights cannot become a suicide pact. That includes the Second Amendment. We can protect your guns while keeping them out of the hands of crazy and dangerous people by using common-sense background checks, 21-years-of-age purchasing requirements, three-day waiting periods and mental-health exams. It’s not about denying your constitutional rights. It’s so your children come home from school alive.”What do you think?Gail: I’m sold. And I have a feeling we’ll be talking about this much, much more as this election year goes on.Bret: Let’s hope it’s not after the next school shooting. Though, considering what we saw over the weekend in Philadelphia or Chattanooga, it may not be long.Gail: Let’s take a rest and talk about politics in the old, non-profound sense. I was fascinated when Mike Pence made a very public endorsement of Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp in the primary. Kemp was perhaps Donald Trump’s top target — he hates him for allowing the state’s presidential vote to go, accurately, to Joe Biden.Bret: At least Pence has better political acumen than Trump. Kemp won his primary over David Perdue by more than 50 points, which was a very satisfying humiliation of one of Trump’s favorite bootlickers.Gail: And our colleague Maggie Haberman recently posted a story from her upcoming book, about the vice president’s security being warned that Trump was going to turn on Pence before Pence went on to accurately record the results of the presidential election.Are we looking at Pence as a hero in a possible primary with his old boss in 2024?Bret: I don’t see how a man whose political theme song might as well have been the Meat Loaf classic, “I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)” can sell himself as any kind of hero, much less as a plausible Republican nominee. He’s too close to Trump not to be tainted by his presidency and too alienated from Trump not to be diminished by his wrath.Frankly, Trump’s only serious opponent for the nomination at this point is Ron DeSantis, who seems to be beating the former president in the straw polls, at least in some states. Between those two, who would you prefer as the G.O.P. candidate?Gail: Well DeSantis made a trademark move last week when he canceled funding for a Tampa Bay Rays training facility because the team issued an anti-mass-shooting tweet. (They dared to say: “This cannot be normal.”) He’s horrible, and his advantage is that he’s smarter than Trump. But he doesn’t have nearly as much of that raise-the-rafters-split-the-country creepy charisma.Bret: You have to admire the ideological flexibility of self-described conservatives who are for free speech, until they aren’t, and who think corporations have speech rights, until they don’t. Still, DeSantis is very effective.Sorry, go on.Gail: Not quite sure who scares me more. Especially in an era when people are being encouraged to doubt the whole electoral system. Did you see the story in Politico about Republican poll workers being prepared to contest the Election Day process rather than making it work properly?Bret: This is the mental infection Trump has unleashed on the republic. The notion that elections are a case of “heads I win, tails you lose.”Gail: Just looking forward, I’m imagining an election this fall where either the Republicans win everything or the whole process gets blocked from even taking place. Or both.OK, I’m being way too negative. Be a pal and cheer me up.Bret: Here’s what my crystal ball tells me: ​​Democrats get hammered in the midterms. Biden realizes he has to announce he isn’t running in 2024 so that a savior can appear. Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, beats Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina for the Democratic nomination, and then chooses the widely respected retired Adm. Jim Stavridis as her running mate.Meanwhile, Republicans split acrimoniously between DeSantis and Trump. A brokered convention produces a compromise ticket headed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia with Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina as his veep choice. On Election Day, Americans breathe a little easier knowing that none of the candidates is out to destroy the Constitution, and we’re back to politics as it was before Trump.Reality check: Naaaaaaaaaaaaaah.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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      David McCormick Concedes to Dr. Oz in the G.O.P. Primary for Senate in Pennsylvania

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      David McCormick, a former hedge fund executive, conceded the exceedingly close race for the Republican nomination for Senate in Pennsylvania on Friday to Dr. Mehmet Oz, the celebrity television physician, with a statewide recount underway and no official race call.Dr. Oz had a lead of fewer than 1,000 votes, or .07 percent, before the county-by-county recount began last week. The unexpected early concession — five days before the recount’s full results were to be released — was a recognition that Mr. McCormick had gained only handfuls of votes so far and faced an insurmountable hurdle in making up his deficit. His decision sets up one of the most pivotal contests of the midterms, a November election between Dr. Oz and the Democratic nominee, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman.“We spent the last 17 days making sure every Republican vote was counted,” Mr. McCormick said in an appearance in Harrisburg with supporters on Friday evening. “But it’s now clear to me that with the recount largely complete, that we have a nominee. And today I called Mehmet Oz to congratulate him on his victory.”The primary initially produced a photo finish in which both campaigns’ calling for all votes to be counted vividly contrasted with how Republican supporters of former President Donald J. Trump reacted to his loss in Pennsylvania in 2020, when he and his allies tried to block the counting of ballots beyond Election Day.Mr. Trump, who endorsed Dr. Oz, urged him the day after the election to follow his own conspiratorial script — he still maintains the presidential election was “stolen” — and declare victory before all the votes were in. Dr. Oz, the longtime host of “The Dr. Oz Show” on daytime television, mostly ignored the advice. But as the recount began on May 27, he declared himself the “presumptive” nominee. The recount was ordered by Leigh M. Chapman, the state’s acting secretary of the commonwealth, and was triggered automatically by Pennsylvania law because the gap between candidates was under 0.5 percent. Understand the 2022 Midterm Elections So FarAfter key races in Georgia, Pennsylvania and other states, here’s what we’ve learned.Trump’s Invincibility in Doubt: With many of Donald J. Trump’s endorsed candidates failing to win, some Republicans see an opening for a post-Trump candidate in 2024.G.O.P. Governors Emboldened: Many Republican governors are in strong political shape. And some are openly opposing Mr. Trump.Voter Fraud Claims Fade: Republicans have been accepting their primary victories with little concern about the voter fraud they once falsely claimed caused Mr. Trump’s 2020 loss.The Politics of Guns: Republicans have been far more likely than Democrats to use messaging about guns to galvanize their base in the midterms. Here’s why.Armies of lawyers for the candidates challenged small batches of provisional ballots in front of county election boards, sought hand recounts in certain precincts and went to court, scrapping over every vote. Mr. McCormick, who led his opponent on mail ballots, sued to include 850 or so mail-in votes that were received on time but did not have voters’ handwritten dates on the envelopes. Although he received a favorable ruling from the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, it was clear that there just weren’t enough outstanding votes under any scenario for Mr. McCormick to prevail.Suspense around the race for weeks deflected attention from Mr. Fetterman, who suffered a stroke May 13, days before the election, leading to a hospital stay and the implantation of a pacemaker and defibrillator in his heart. Mr. Fetterman’s absence from the campaign trail ever since and his refusal until Friday to offer more than scant details of his condition raised questions about his ability to campaign in the general election. Mr. Fetterman, 52, revealed on Friday that he had “almost died” after ignoring for years a doctor’s warning that his heart’s pumping was diminished. His cardiologist made public a diagnosis of cardiomyopathy, which makes it harder for the heart’s muscles to pump. Ramesh R. Chandra, the cardiologist, said if Mr. Fetterman follows his instructions and takes his health seriously this time, “he should be able to campaign and serve in the U.S. Senate without a problem.”The November election holds high stakes for both parties: Pennsylvania is probably Democrats’ best chance to add a seat to their fragile 50-50 control of the Senate, in which Vice President Kamala Harris holds the tiebreaking vote. With Senator Patrick J. Toomey retiring, the seat is the only G.O.P.-held open Senate seat in a state that Joseph R. Biden Jr. won in 2020. For Republicans, retaining it would ease their path to a Senate majority in a year when the political climate is strongly in their favor.In a statement after Mr. McCormick’s concession, Dr. Oz said, “Now that our primary is over, we will make sure that this U.S. Senate seat does not fall into the hands of the radical left, led by John Fetterman.” Dr. Oz, 61, who won Mr. Trump’s endorsement in large part because of his television charisma, was never fully embraced by core Trump supporters, as evidenced by the closeness of the race. At a rally Mr. Trump held in Pennsylvania 11 days before Election Day, boos greeted the mention of Dr. Oz’s name. Mr. McCormick, a West Point graduate and the former chief executive of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, was more competitive than polls and many political experts had expected. In part that was because of Dr. Oz’s history of espousing liberal views, notably on abortion and transgender issues, which made him toxic to some conservatives. David McCormick conceded the race amid a statewide recount.Mark Makela/Getty ImagesHesitance to embrace Dr. Oz by the Trump-centric base allowed a late surge by a hard-right candidate, Kathy Barnette. On Election Day, when she finished third with about 25 percent of the vote, she appeared to have siphoned grass-roots Trump supporters from Dr. Oz. She did so after declaring “MAGA does not belong to President Trump,” and despite Mr. Trump’s dismissal that Ms. Barnette, who has a history of homophobic and anti-Muslim remarks, “will never be able to win the general election.”Dr. Oz and Mr. McCormick, both first-time candidates, worked hard to transform themselves from members of the East Coast elite, with middle-of-the-road politics, into credible champions of the MAGA movement. Understand the 2022 Midterm ElectionsCard 1 of 6Why are these midterms so important? More

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      The Good News in Georgia That’s Bad News for Trump

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      This is a column about good news, written in the shadow of the worst news imaginable.Like many people, the mass shooting of children in Uvalde, Texas, is basically the only thing I’ve read about for days. But as I’ve marinated in the horror — and, increasingly, in rage at the police response — I’ve also been aware of the way our media experience works today, how we are constantly cycled from one crisis to another, each one seemingly existential and yet seemingly forgotten when the wheel turns, the headlines change.Climate change, systemic racism, toxic masculinity, online disinformation, gun violence, police violence, the next Trump coup, the latest Covid variant, the death of democracy, climate change again. This is the liberal crisis list; the conservative list is different. But for everyone there are relatively few opportunities to take a breath and acknowledge when anything actually gets better.So my next column will be about the darkness in Texas and the possible policy response. In this one I want to acknowledge that in a different zone of existential agitation, things just meaningfully improved.In Georgia, the state at the center of the 45th president’s attempt to defy the public will and stay in office, there were two Republican primary races that doubled as referendums on the Trumpian demand that G.O.P. officials follow him into a constitutional crisis — and in both of them his candidate lost badly.The higher-profile race was the battle for the gubernatorial nomination between Brian Kemp and David Perdue, which Kemp won in an extraordinary rout. But the more important one was the Republican primary for secretary of state, in which Brad Raffensperger, the special target of Trump’s strong-arm tactics and then his public ire, defeated Jody Hice, Trump’s candidate — and did so without a runoff. Probably some crossover Democratic votes helped push him over 50 percent, but most of his voters were Republicans who listened to his challenger’s constant talk of voter fraud and decided to stick with the guy who stood up to Trump.Brian KempNicole Craine for The New York TimesBrad RaffenspergerAudra Melton for The New York TimesThe Kemp victory was expected; the easy Raffensperger win less so, and certainly it wasn’t expected at this time last year. Back then, if you pointed out that all the Republicans in positions that really mattered in the aftermath of the 2020 election, across multiple states and multiple offices, did their jobs and declined to go along with Trump, the usual response was maybe it happened once but wouldn’t happen again, because Trump’s enmity was a guaranteed career-ender.Now that narrative, happily, has been exploded. Any Republican in a key swing-state office come 2024 can look at Kemp and Raffensperger and know that they have a future in G.O.P. politics if, in the event of a contested election, they simply do their job.Moreover, the primary balloting in Georgia saw record early-voting turnout and no evidence of meaningful impediments to voting, which exploded a different crisis narrative that took hold on the left — and in corporate America and the Biden White House — when the state passed new voting regulations last year. According to that narrative, in trying to address the paranoia of their own constituents, Republicans were essentially rolling back voting rights, even recreating Jim Crow — “on steroids,” to quote our president.There was little good evidence for this narrative at the time, and even less evidence in the turnout rate for the Georgia primary, where early voting numbers were higher even than in 2020. “Jim Crow on steroids” should be stricken from the crisis cycle; it does not exist.On the other hand the Trumpian peril, the risk of election subversion and constitutional crisis, does still exist. Doug Mastriano’s recent primary victory in Pennsylvania proves as much, and there may be other swing-state nominees who, like Mastriano, can’t be trusted to imitate Kemp and Raffensperger in the clutch.But the results in Georgia prove that the faction that elevates figures like Mastriano does not have a simple veto in the party. It shows the effectiveness of what you might call a “stay and govern” strategy of dealing with Trump’s hold on the G.O.P., one with wide application as the party moves toward 2024.And it indicates the limits of the all-or-nothing thinking that a crisis mentality imposes. I can easily imagine an alternative timeline where Raffensperger resigned his office rather than standing for re-election, inked a deal with MSNBC, turned his subsequent book into a mega-bestseller in the style of so many Trump-administration exposés and adopted Biden-administration talking points to denounce Georgia election laws. That timeline would have unquestionably been better for the Raffensperger family’s bank account, and it would have prompted many liberals to hail him as a profile in Republican courage.But for everyone else — Georgians, the G.O.P., the country — that timeline would have been worse. Whereas because he stayed in the party, ran again and won, even in a dark week for America one region of our common life looks a little better, and one of our crises should feel a little bit less dire.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