Campaign Finance

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Jumaane Williams Owns the Left Lane. Why Hasn’t His Campaign Taken Off?

      by

      Mr. Williams, whose candidacy for New York governor was celebrated by progressives, has not gained much momentum and is far behind in fund-raising.At an outdoor event space in Buffalo, a diverse crowd gathered for a benefit to help the families affected by the horrific mass shooting at a supermarket in the city’s East Side.Jumaane Williams, the New York City public advocate who is running for governor, had planned to attend, his campaign said. But as the crowd hushed and the names and ages of the victims were read aloud, Mr. Williams was absent.Running late, the candidate had decided instead to head directly to the Tops Friendly Market where the racist massacre occurred, milling around a group of volunteers handing out groceries and food to residents.Mr. Williams seemed cautious at first, but eventually he struck up a conversation with Brenda Williams McDuffie, a former president of the Buffalo Urban League and a Brooklyn native.“They want people they trust to be able to communicate sometimes on their behalf,” Ms. McDuffie said. “I know his voice and how he uses his voice and his values and love for the community, so it’s exceptional for him to come.”Still, she conceded that many in Buffalo were less familiar with him. “I knew he was running for governor, but I haven’t really followed it, because I think I haven’t really seen him in upstate New York,” she said.Mr. Williams, at an event to help the families of the shooting victims in Buffalo, said that his wife’s cancer and the premature birth of his daughter had curtailed his campaigning.Libby March for The New York TimesAfter a competitive run for lieutenant governor four years ago, Mr. Williams generated excitement in progressive circles when he announced that he would challenge Gov. Kathy Hochul in her bid for her first full term.He had name recognition, charisma and a clear political lane: Ms. Hochul and another primary rival, Representative Thomas R. Suozzi, are considered centrist Democrats; Mr. Williams is backed by numerous progressive-oriented groups, including the Working Families Party.But Mr. Williams has failed to gain much momentum ahead of the June 28 primary. He is far behind in fund-raising, has not run any television ads, and has done far fewer campaign events than might be expected of a major candidate for governor.Beneath it all is an underlying issue, though Mr. Williams is careful not to blame his campaign woes on it: His wife was diagnosed with cervical cancer last year, and their daughter was born prematurely in February.Mr. Williams’s wife, India Sneed-Williams, a lawyer, said her husband had twice privately offered to drop out of the governor’s race. She refused, she said. She wouldn’t let him because “I know who I had married.”Mr. Williams acknowledged in an interview that he came “closer than I had ever been” to dropping out of the race.“There were a few times that I think it did impact the campaign,” Mr. Williams said.“Could I give everything I would normally give to a campaign while I’m going through this?” he added. “The answer is no.”But he decided to push on, even as his campaign worried that it would not have enough money to compete. “It was always about the ability to show a path, even if it was uphill,” he said.With a month remaining before the primary, Mr. Williams’s supporters recognize that describing his path as uphill undersells just how steep it is.Sochie Nnaemeka, the head of the New York State Working Families Party, described Mr. Williams as a “moral figure” who can “contrast a Hochul administration that believes that the ultra-wealthy also deserve government to do their bidding for them.”Mr. Williams, comforting the family of an 11-year-old girl killed by a stray bullet in the Bronx, has called on state leaders to better address the root causes of violent crime.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesMr. Williams and his aides concur. They hope that he can use two upcoming debates to portray Ms. Hochul as a nicer version of her predecessor, Andrew M. Cuomo, who supports many of the same policies as he did, such as changes to the bail reform law, and raises millions from the same special interests, labor unions and business groups that supported him.Ms. Hochul has shown other recent signs of potential vulnerability: Her chosen lieutenant governor resigned in April after being indicted on fraud and bribery charges. She has also been criticized for pushing $600 million in state subsidies to build a football stadium for the Buffalo Bills.“It’s unfortunate because those things aligned with Jumaane having a baby that was very premature and also his wife going through cancer treatments,” said Jonathan Westin, director of New York Communities for Change, a grass-roots organizing group that has endorsed Mr. Williams. “It was hard for him to be out there as much as he wanted to be.”Ms. Sneed-Williams finished chemotherapy three weeks ago, and their “miracle baby” is now healthy.Ms. Hochul, whose campaign spokesman declined to comment, has largely ignored Mr. Williams. She has amassed an overwhelming advantage in fund-raising and has a solid lead in the polls.The governor has $18.5 million on hand and has raised $31.7 million, her campaign said this week. Mr. Williams had raised just $221,000 as of January, according to the most recent round of financial disclosure reports, and is set to report updated numbers later on Friday.Mr. Williams ran a spirited campaign for lieutenant governor in 2018 against the incumbent, Kathy Hochul, who is now governor.Hilary Swift for The New York Times“We always had a conversation about is this sustainable? Are you OK? Do you want to keep going?” Ana María Archila, a candidate for lieutenant governor and his running mate, said. His decision to stay in the race, she added, solidified Mr. Williams as a candidate “who brings his life into he public arena in a way that humanizes everybody else.”Mr. Williams’s campaign expects to be able to air ads on cable closer to the primary, and noted that he did not widely advertise during the primary for lieutenant governor in 2018, when he beat Ms. Hochul by 60,000 votes in New York City.Bruce Gyory, a Democratic strategist, said that although Ms. Hochul was not exciting the Democratic base, she had not antagonized it either. He still expected Mr. Williams to have a better showing than the 12 percent he received in a recent poll.“He’s working the progressives hard and he has a Hispanic lieutenant governor working hard out there, too,” Mr. Gyory said. “I think there’s more energy on the ground for Jumaane than there is for Suozzi.”Mr. Williams, a self-described “activist elected official,” is known for speaking out against discriminatory policing practices and getting arrested to protest them.When he won a special election for public advocate in 2019, Mr. Williams spoke candidly during his acceptance speech about seeking therapy for mental health challenges. And in the video announcing his bid for governor, he talked about living with Tourette’s Syndrome and the involuntary body movements that come with it.During a walk-through at Kingsborough Houses in Brooklyn with Ms. Archila, Mr. Williams easily connected with tenants as they explained how they had to deal with everything from rundown apartments to the lack of a safe park space.He ran into some he knew from his early days as an activist, and connected others with the public advocate’s office to deal with issues such as a backed-up sewer at the day care center.“Could you see Gov. Hochul really walking around here authentically talking with people?” said Jamell Henderson, a Kingsborough resident who led the visit.Mr. Williams and his running mate, Ana María Archila, at a recent visit to the Kingsborough Houses in Brooklyn.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesAt another recent event in the Bronx, where various public officials addressed the death of an 11-year-old girl who was struck by a stray bullet, Mr. Williams was the last elected official to speak.He offered a fiery denunciation of Ms. Hochul, accusing her of failing to designate enough funding in the state’s $220 billion budget to address the root causes of violence.At his appearance in Buffalo, Mr. Williams again attacked the governor, this time for funding the Bills stadium while the Black neighborhood where the shooting occurred suffered from decades of systemic racism.He said he was angry that Ms. Hochul had said she lived 10 minutes from the scene of the massacre, but did nothing to help the neighborhood add other grocery options beyond Tops, the only supermarket in the area. “I’m like, ‘You just found that out?’” Mr. Williams said.By the time he made it to the next event, its organizers were packing up. Mr. Williams apologized and chatted for a few minutes. What did he make of his chances, one of the organizers, Willie Aytch, asked?“It’s always uphill for me,” Mr. Williams said. “But I fight uphill.”Jesse McKinley reported from Buffalo, N.Y. More

    • 138 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      N.Y. Governor Candidates Flood the Airwaves With $20 Million in Ads

      by

      With the June 28 primary fast approaching, candidates for governor are spending big to get their message out to voters.An Army veteran. A bartender’s son. A hard-working executive, burning the midnight oil.These are just a few of the ways in which candidates vying to be New York’s next governor have introduced themselves to voters in a barrage of campaign advertisements before the June 28 primaries.In the Covid era where in-person campaigning still remains fraught, political ads offer candidates an opportunity to speak directly to voters, showcasing their qualifications and vision for the future.Four of the candidates for governor have spent a combined $19.8 million on television ads: Gov. Kathy Hochul and Representative Thomas Suozzi, both Democrats, and Representative Lee Zeldin and Harry Wilson on the Republican side. Other candidates, including the New York City public advocate, Jumaane Williams, a left-leaning Democrat, and Andrew Giuliani, a pro-Trump conservative, have not yet purchased ads on television, according to AdImpact, a firm that tracks television ad spending.There has, however, been some major ad spending on behalf of a familiar noncandidate, who is at least as of now not running for governor — former governor Andrew M. Cuomo.Hochul leads the spending warMs. Hochul’s first television ad shows the governor late at night at her desk in her Albany office, portraying her as an executive who has worked tirelessly since ascending to the governorship following the unexpected resignation of Mr. Cuomo in August.What the 30-second spot does not show is how Ms. Hochul has also worked tirelessly to raise campaign funds.The governor, who as of January had amassed a record-smashing $21.6 million campaign war chest, has so far spent more than $6.8 million in ad buys, according to AdImpact. Most of the spending, not surprisingly, has been focused on New York City and its suburbs, where most Democratic primary voters live.Wielding the power of incumbency, Ms. Hochul utilized her first ad to highlight some of the voter-friendly policy priorities she negotiated with lawmakers as part of the state budget in April. The ad underscores her efforts to confront some of the biggest election-year issues — crime and skyrocketing prices — by touting measures to crack down on illegal guns and cut taxes for the middle class.Ms. Hochul released a second television ad last week focused on her commitment to protect abortion rights in New York, shortly after news broke that the Supreme Court was likely to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision that legalized abortion across the country in 1973.Similar to other Democratic campaigns nationwide, Ms. Hochul’s operatives are hoping to wield the issue against Republicans — the ad accuses two of her Republican rivals of wanting to ban abortion — and to galvanize Democratic voters in November, when control of Congress will also be in play.Representative Tom Suozzi has used his ads to focus on his vows to combat crime and lower taxes.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesSuozzi focuses on crime and taxesMr. Suozzi, a centrist Democrat from Long Island, has used his campaign ads to cast himself as the “common-sense” candidate and to attack Ms. Hochul. Some of the ads blame her for failing to address rising gun violence, chiding her for an endorsement she received from the National Rifle Association during her time in Congress.Mr. Suozzi has focused most of his ads on his promise to lower income and property taxes and to further roll back the changes to the state’s bail laws that the Democrat-led Legislature passed in 2019.Mr. Suozzi has repeatedly blamed bail reform for leading to the release of more criminals. He has accused the governor of not doing enough to fix what he sees as deficiencies in the bail laws, even though Ms. Hochul recently persuaded lawmakers to approve some changes.Mr. Suozzi, who trails Ms. Hochul in public polls, faces an uphill battle: The Democratic primary tends to attract the party’s most liberal voters, but he is running as an unabashed moderate unafraid of taking on the party’s vocal left wing.“It’s not about being politically correct, it’s about doing the correct thing for the people of New York,” he says in one ad, which the campaign named, “No B.S.”Mr. Suozzi, who had about $5.4 million in the bank as of earlier this year, has poured just over $3.9 million into television ad buys.He began spending on television ads as early as January, far before Ms. Hochul, but his campaign has not made ad buys in the most recent weeks of May, according to AdImpact.A representative from Mr. Suozzi’s campaign said that it had halted buying because of some uncertainty around the date of the primary, but planned to soon resume.Representative Lee Zeldin is running negative ads attacking the governor.Johnny Milano for The New York TimesZeldin goes negative on Hochul and state of New YorkMr. Zeldin’s television ads have consistently sought to link Ms. Hochul to the ills that his campaign argues have befallen New York because of Democratic rule, a recurring theme as he seeks to become the state’s first Republican governor in 16 years.Anchored on a pledge to “Save Our State,” Mr. Zeldin’s ads home in heavily on crime — they rail against bail reform and the defund the police movement — as well as the state’s high taxes and population loss.They also seek to tie Ms. Hochul, who served as Mr. Cuomo’s lieutenant governor for six years, to the scandals that led to his resignation (one calls her a “silent accomplice”). His campaign’s most recent television ad is focused exclusively on the arrest in May of Ms. Hochul’s former lieutenant governor, Brian Benjamin, on federal bribery charges.Mr. Zeldin, who is the Republican Party’s designee in the race, has used the ads to tout his own credentials as a military veteran and as a “tax-fighting, trusted conservative.”They make no mention of his staunch support for former President Donald J. Trump, who remains largely unpopular in his home state, where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans two to one. Mr. Zeldin voted against certifying last year’s presidential election in January 2021, a move Democrats have used as a cudgel against him.Of the more than $5 million in campaign money Mr. Zeldin had as of January, about $3.9 million has been steered into television ads.While Mr. Zeldin has spent almost $1.5 million in the New York City area, the majority of his television ad spending has gone outside the downstate region, targeting the state’s conservative voters.Harry Wilson, a businessman who contemplated running for governor in 2018, is hoping to upset the Republican nominee, Representative Lee Zeldin.John Minchillo/Associated PressHarry Wilson spends big on airtimeMr. Wilson, a businessman who has run for state office before, nonetheless entered the race largely unknown to voters. But he’s hoping that a slate of ad buys stretching from February to June will change that.Mr. Wilson, who is reported to be largely self-funding his campaign, has spent more than $5.2 million, according to AdImpact, outspending Mr. Zeldin, who is widely seen as the front-runner on the Republican side.Mr. Wilson ran a well-regarded campaign for comptroller in 2010 that captured the support of three major editorial boards, but he lost narrowly to the Democratic nominee, Thomas P. DiNapoli. He also contemplated running for governor four years ago, but decided against it.Mr. Wilson hopes that his record coaching troubled companies and center-right social views will appeal to moderate voters looking for a change.His ads focus on bureaucratic inefficiency, rising costs and population losses that Mr. Wilson blames on “corrupt go-along to get-along politicians.” Like some of his competitors, he promises to lower taxes and add police officers. But he also pitches himself as a fiscally conscious political outsider, with the perspective and experience to turn around a failing state.“I’m running for governor because I cannot sit by and watch as New York is devastated by career politicians,” he says in one ad.Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo has released two political ads and has spoken at churches as part of his campaign to rehabilitate his image.Victor J. Blue for The New York TimesCuomo to New York: Don’t you forget about meThough he is not an official candidate for any office, the former governor has also run two ads — spending $2.8 million out of the campaign fund he left office with, according to AdImpact.The ads seek to restore Mr. Cuomo’s image after his resignation last year amid allegations of sexual harassment and to reframe him as the victim of political attacks.Mr. Cuomo ran the ads from late February until late March, heightening speculation that he might jump into the race, but hasn’t made any ad buys since then.Mr. Cuomo has denied any inappropriate behavior, and five district attorneys declined to prosecute claims against him after opening inquiries. However, the New York State attorney general, Letitia James, State Assembly investigators and many of those same district attorneys found Mr. Cuomo’s accusers to be credible.One 30-second advertisement begins with a smattering of newspaper headlines memorializing the closure of several investigations into sexual harassment and assault allegations, concluding that “political attacks won, and New Yorkers lost a proven leader.”The other seeks to remind New Yorkers of Mr. Cuomo’s achievements in office, citing the state’s gun laws, the $15 minimum wage and major airport and bridge projects.“I never stopped fighting for New Yorkers, and I never will,” he says. More

    • 175 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Attack ads have fueled sharp ups and downs in the Alabama G.O.P. Senate race.

      by

      The three leaders of Alabama’s Republican Senate race have experienced giddy ascents and, in some cases, steep plunges, with the result that Representative Mo Brooks and two first-time candidates, Katie Britt and Mike Durant, enter Tuesday’s primary election tightly bunched together in recent polling. Unless one tops 50 percent, which seems unlikely, there will be a runoff between the top two.One factor driving the ups and downs in the race is a flood of attack ads from deep-pocketed outside groups aligned with the candidates, which have spent freely to drive up negative impressions of their rivals. When voters say they aren’t swayed by TV ads, Alabama is Exhibit 1 that that is not the case.Mr. Brooks, who jumped to a lead in the race last year and was endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump, was attacked by a super PAC that received $2 million from the Senate Leadership Fund, which is aligned with Senator Mitch McConnell. The Senate G.O.P. leader, who is often at odds with Mr. Trump for influence in the party, doesn’t want the hard-right Mr. Brooks to join his caucus next year.An attack ad paid for by the super PAC funded partly by the McConnell group dredged up old clips of Mr. Brooks — a leader of Mr. Trump’s crusade to reverse the 2020 election — disparaging him in 2016. “I don’t think you can trust Donald Trump with anything he says,” Mr. Brooks said then.During the time the ad was on the air, Mr. Brooks saw his support plunge to 16 percent in one poll. Shortly afterward, Mr. Trump withdrew his endorsement. Mr. Brooks has since regained a competitive footing, thanks in no small part to attack ads aimed at his two rivals.Mr. Durant, a retired Army pilot who figured in the 1993 “Black Hawk Down” episode in Somalia, appeared to lead the race in the spring. But lately he has faltered, after being raked over the coals by a group calling itself Alabama RINO PAC, which is funded in part by the McConnell-aligned group. One ad, quoting without context remarks that Mr. Durant once delivered at the U.S. Army War College, includes him saying, “The first thing that needs to be done is to disarm the population.”Another ad went after a supporter of Mr. Durant’s as “a top Never Trumper.”The money behind both the anti-Brooks and anti-Durant ads comes from supporters, in state and out, of Ms. Britt, a former chief of staff of Senator Richard C. Shelby, whose retirement has opened the seat.But Ms. Britt has hardly gotten off unscathed. The Club for Growth, the powerful anti-tax group based in Washington, which supports Mr. Brooks, is trying to undermine Ms. Britt. One ad says she is “really a lobbyist” because of a prior job leading a business group in Alabama; it goes on to quote a tweet from Donald Trump Jr. in 2021 — back when his father liked Mr. Brooks — calling her “the Alabama Liz Cheney.”Many of the attacks seemed to have landed with voters, but also apparently confused them. There is no clear leader in the latest polls. More

    • 138 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Bernie Sanders Prepares for ‘War’ With AIPAC and Its Super PAC

      by

      Senator Bernie Sanders, the progressive former presidential candidate who rose to prominence in part by denouncing the influence of wealthy interests in politics, has a new target in his sights: the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its affiliated super PAC, which is spending heavily in Democratic primaries for the first time this year.After Mr. Sanders traveled last week to Pittsburgh to campaign for Summer Lee, a liberal state legislator whose House campaign was opposed by millions of dollars in such spending, he is now headed to Texas. There, he is aiming to lift up another progressive congressional candidate, Jessica Cisneros, whose left-wing challenge of a moderate incumbent has been met with significant spending from the pro-Israel super PAC.“This is a war,” Mr. Sanders said in an interview, “for the future of the Democratic Party.”AIPAC has long been a bipartisan organization, and its entry this year into direct political spending has included giving to both Democrats and Republicans. That has earned the ire of Mr. Sanders and other progressives because the group’s super PAC also ran ads attacking Ms. Lee as an insufficiently loyal Democrat.“Why would an organization go around criticizing someone like Summer Lee for not being a strong enough Democrat when they themselves have endorsed extreme right-wing Republicans?” Mr. Sanders said. “In my view, their goal is to create a two-party system, Democrats and Republicans, in which both parties are responsive to the needs of corporate America and the billionaire class.”Mr. Sanders specifically called out the committee for donating to congressional Republicans who refused to certify the 2020 election, while its super PAC, the United Democracy Project, has framed itself as a pro-democracy group.“That just exposes the hypocrisy,” Mr. Sanders said.Marshall Wittmann, a spokesman for AIPAC, said in response to Mr. Sanders, who is Jewish, that the group “will not be intimidated in our efforts to elect pro-Israel candidates — including scores of pro-Israel progressives.”“It is very revealing that some who don’t take issue with super PAC support for anti-Israel candidates get indignant when pro-Israel activists use the same tools,” Mr. Wittmann said.After the Pennsylvania and North Carolina PrimariesMay 17 was the biggest day so far in the 2022 midterm cycle.The Stakes: G.O.P. voters are showing a willingness to nominate candidates who parrot Donald J. Trump’s 2020 lies, making clear that this year’s races may affect the fate of free and fair elections in the country.Trump’s Limits: The MAGA movement is dominating Republican primaries, but Mr. Trump’s control over it may be slipping.Trump Endorsements: Most of the candidates backed by the former president have prevailed. However, there are some noteworthy losses.Up Next: Closely watched races in Georgia and Alabama on May 24 will offer a clearer picture of Mr. Trump’s influence.More Takeaways: ​​Democratic voters are pushing for change over consensus, nominating a left-leaning political brawler for Senate in Pennsylvania. Here’s what else we’ve learned.The three candidates that Mr. Sanders has been most personally invested in backing so far have also had all super PAC support, though two were heavily outspent.Despite more than $3 million in opposition spending from pro-Israel groups, Ms. Lee is narrowly ahead in her primary against Steve Irwin, a lawyer; The Associated Press has not yet called the race.In North Carolina, Nida Allam, the Sanders-backed candidate, lost to Valerie Foushee, a state legislator, in an open congressional race. Ms. Foushee’s campaign was supported by nearly $3.5 million in spending from two pro-Israel groups and a super PAC linked to a cryptocurrency billionaire. Super PAC spending for Ms. Allam was $370,000.Maya Handa, Ms. Allam’s campaign manager, said Mr. Sanders’s megaphone — he did robocalls, sent a fund-raising email to his giant list and held a virtual event — brought invaluable attention to the outside money flooding in the race.The message broke through to some voters. In Hillsborough, Elese Stutts, 44, a bookseller, had been planning to vote for Ms. Foushee. However, on Election Day, Ms. Stutts said, she was turned off after learning about the origin of the super PAC money that had helped Ms. Foushee’s campaign.Ms. Foushee ultimately won the Democratic primary for a district that includes several major universities, including Duke and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and where Mr. Sanders registered 83 percent favorability among Democratic primary voters in the Allam campaign’s polling.Mr. Sanders has sparred with pro-Israel groups over the years, including during his 2020 presidential run, when a group called the Democratic Majority for Israel PAC spent money to attack him when he emerged as a front-runner early in the primary season.And when one of Mr. Sanders’s national co-chairs, Nina Turner, ran for Congress in a special election in 2021 and again in 2022, that group and the AIPAC-aligned super PAC both spent heavily to defeat her.Understand the 2022 Midterm ElectionsCard 1 of 6Why are these midterms so important? More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      The Little Red Boxes Making a Mockery of Campaign Finance Laws

      by

      Facing a threat from his left flank, Representative Kurt Schrader of Oregon wanted to send an urgent message to allies ahead of his upcoming primary: It was time to go on the attack.The challenge: Campaign finance rules bar candidates from directly coordinating with the very outside groups that Mr. Schrader, a top moderate in Congress, needed to alert. So instead, he used a little red box.On April 29, Mr. Schrader issued a not-quite-private directive inside a red-bordered box on an obscure corner of his website, sketching out a three-pronged takedown of what he called his “toxic” challenger, Jamie McLeod-Skinner — helpfully including a link to a two-page, opposition-research document about her tenure as a city manager.The message was received.On May 3, a super PAC that has received all its money from a secret-money group with ties to the pharmaceutical industry began running television ads that did little more than copy, paste and reorder the precise three lines of attack Mr. Schrader had outlined.Kurt Schrader for CongressAn ad attacking Jamie McLeod-Skinner reflects language used on her opponent Kurt Schrader’s campaign website.Center ForwardFrom Oregon to Texas, North Carolina to Pennsylvania, Democratic candidates nationwide are using such red boxes to pioneer new frontiers in soliciting and directing money from friendly super PACs financed by multimillionaires, billionaires and special-interest groups.Campaign watchdogs complain that the practice further blurs the lines meant to keep big-money interests from influencing people running for office, effectively evading the strict donation limits imposed on federal candidates. And while the tactic is not new to 2022, it is becoming so widespread that a New York Times survey of candidate websites found at least 19 Democrats deploying some version of a red box in four of the states holding contested congressional primaries on Tuesday.The practice is both brazen and breathtakingly simple. To work around the prohibition on directly coordinating with super PACs, candidates are posting their instructions to them inside the red boxes on public pages that super PACs continuously monitor.The boxes highlight the aspects of candidates’ biographies that they want amplified and the skeletons in their opponents’ closets that they want exposed. Then, they add instructions that can be extremely detailed: Steering advertising spending to particular cities or counties, asking for different types of advertising and even slicing who should be targeted by age, gender and ethnicity.“Liberals, voters under 50 and women — across only San Antonio, Guadalupe and Atascosa counties,” reads the targeting guidance from Jessica Cisneros, a Democratic challenger in South Texas.Understand the Pennsylvania Primary ElectionThe crucial swing state will hold its primary on May 17, with key races for a U.S. Senate seat and the governorship.Hard-Liners Gain: Republican voters appear to be rallying behind far-right candidates in two pivotal races, worrying both parties about what that could mean in November.G.O.P. Senate Race: Kathy Barnette, a conservative commentator, is making a surprise late surge against big-spending rivals, Dr. Mehmet Oz and David McCormick.Democratic Senate Race: Representative Conor Lamb had all the makings of a front-runner, but John Fetterman, the state’s shorts-wearing lieutenant governor, is resonating with voters.Abortion Battleground: Pennsylvania is one of a handful of states where abortion access hangs in the balance with midterm elections this year.Electability Concerns: Starting with Pennsylvania, the coming weeks will offer a window into the mood of Democratic voters who are deeply worried about a challenging midterm campaign environment.“Black voters ages 45+ in Durham and white women ages 45+ in Orange” was the recent directive from Valerie Foushee, a Democratic House candidate in North Carolina locked in a competitive primary for an open seat.Red-boxing spans the ideological spectrum of the Democratic Party, from Blue Dog Democrats like Mr. Schrader to progressives like his challenger and Ms. Cisneros, who has the backing of the Working Families Party and Justice Democrats as she tries to unseat Representative Henry Cuellar.It is not clear why Democratic candidates have so thoroughly embraced the red box tactic in primaries while Republicans have not. Republicans work hand in glove with their super PACs, too, but in different ways.In 2014, some Republican groups tried using anonymous Twitter accounts to share internal polling data through coded tweets. More recently, J.D. Vance outsourced some of his Ohio Senate campaign’s most basic operations. His allied super PAC, funded by $15 million from the Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel, posted troves of internal and polling data on an unpublicized Medium page that campaign officials used to guide decisions.The Vance super PAC was so central to the campaign that when Mr. Vance walked onstage at a rally with Donald J. Trump, the cameraman filming him from behind worked for the super PAC, not the Vance campaign.Adav Noti, the legal director of the watchdog group the Campaign Legal Center, said that red boxes were erasing the very barriers that were erected to make politicians feel less indebted to their biggest financial benefactors. Federal candidates can legally raise only $2,900 for a primary per donor; super PACs can receive donations of $1 million — or even more.“It’s a joke,” he said. “The coordination of super PACs and candidates is the primary mechanism for corruption of federal campaigns in 2022.”In Democratic primaries, the biggest money is often aligned with the more moderate wing of the party, and sometimes with very specific interest groups.In her race in North Carolina, Ms. Foushee, a state legislator, has been aided by more than $3 million in spending from two of the bigger new players in Democratic House races. One is a super PAC funded by an arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobbying group (a separate pro-Israel group has spent nearly $300,000 more). And the other is a super PAC financed chiefly by the 30-year-old crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried.Ms. Foushee is running against, among others, Nida Allam, a Durham County commissioner who promotes herself as the first Muslim woman elected in North Carolina, and who has been critical of U.S. military aid to Israel “being used to oppress the Palestinian people.”The super PAC that Mr. Bankman-Fried is bankrolling, Protect Our Future, has spent more than $11 million in another open Oregon House race — an astounding sum to lift a political newcomer, Carrick Flynn. At least one of the many ads run in the race echoes the language in Mr. Flynn’s red box.Red boxes are typically hidden in plain sight in “Media Center” or “Media Resources” sections of campaign websites that operatives know how to find, and often use thinly veiled terms to convey their instructions: Saying voters need to “hear” something is a request for radio ads, “see” means television, “read” means direct mail, and “see while on the go” usually means digital ads.Ms. Allam used “on the go” in an April 20 red box update to request online ads telling voters — “especially women, Democrats under 50 and progressives” — that she would “be an unapologetic progressive.”The Working Families Party used those exact words — along with other verbatim phrases — in a Facebook ad that began running on May 5. Facebook records show that 95 percent of the ad’s impressions were with women and people under 54.End runs around campaign limits are themselves nothing new: For years, candidates have posted flattering pictures and videos of themselves for super PACs to download and use. But the explosion of red boxes and their unabashed specificity is the latest example of how America’s system of financing political campaigns — and the restrictions put in place to curb the power of the wealthy in the wake of Watergate a half-century ago — is teetering toward collapse.“This page only exists because of our broken campaign finance system,” reads a web page that Lt. Gov. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, a leading candidate in Tuesday’s Democratic Senate primary, posted this year to make suggestions to super PACs. (Like some others, he did not surround his instructions in a red box.)Mr. Fetterman was not above providing guidance: His site asked only for positive ads and included some biographical bullet points. Sure enough, a super PAC ran a positive ad employing some of those arguments — like the fact that he had refused to live in a state mansion to save taxpayers money.Conor Lamb for U.S. SenatePennsylvania ProgressMr. Fetterman’s leading rival, Representative Conor Lamb, used his own red box earlier this year to outline the attacks he hoped his supportive super PAC would broadcast against Mr. Fetterman. In short order, a television ad appeared warning Democrats that Mr. Fetterman had once been called a “Silver Spoon Socialist” and that “Republicans think they could crush” him. It also echoed verbatim the recommended talking points about Mr. Lamb’s background.Understand the 2022 Midterm ElectionsCard 1 of 6Why are these midterms so important? More

    • 138 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Rob Stein, Who Changed How Politics Is Funded, Dies at 78

      by

      In the wake of Republican electoral victories in 2004, he convened major liberal donors to finance a network of political groups aligned with Democrats.Rob Stein, a Democratic strategist who helped reshape American politics by pioneering new ways for wealthy liberals to influence policy debates and elections, died on Monday at a hospice facility in Washington. He was 78.His son Gideon said the cause was metastatic prostate cancer.After a varied career in which he worked as a public interest lawyer and a top adviser to the Democratic Party and the Clinton administration and created nonprofit groups and a venture capital fund, Mr. Stein found his calling in the wake of the 2002 elections.The president’s party usually fares poorly in midterm elections, but Republicans captured the Senate, giving them control of both chambers of Congress and the presidency, as well as the majority of governorships and state legislative seats. This left Mr. Stein concerned that Republicans could be headed for long-term dominance if Democrats failed to understand and counter their rivals’ superior tactics and political machinery.He spent months obsessing over the advocacy groups and think tanks that collectively constituted the conservative movement. He routinely stayed awake past midnight studying tax filings to map the flow of cash to these groups.Mr. Stein crystallized his research into a PowerPoint presentation called “The Conservative Message Machine’s Money Matrix,” which was intended as a sort of Rosetta stone for understanding the conservative movement and its funding. He began showing it to Democratic political operatives and major donors around the country, developing a following among some of the most influential figures on the left.After President George W. Bush was re-elected and Republicans increased their majorities in Congress in 2004, Mr. Stein launched a coalition of major liberal donors, the Democracy Alliance, to offset the Republican advantages detailed in his presentation. Each member had to commit to donating at least $200,000 a year to groups recommended by the alliance — including outfits supporting progressive causes, like fighting climate change and protecting abortion rights, that generally aligned with the Democratic Party.Its founding members included some of the biggest donors on the left, among them the financier George Soros.The alliance’s donors have combined to give more than $2 billion to recommended groups, the organization said. Their donations have helped seed some of the most important institutions on the left, including America Votes, Media Matters and the Center for American Progress.It wasn’t long before Republicans were trying to organize donor coalitions of their own to mimic some of the strategy behind the Democracy Alliance.“It just changed the way people thought about their philanthropy,” said David Brock, the former conservative journalist who became a leading Democratic operative and who founded Media Matters.In the 2022 election cycle, Media Matters and a network of affiliated groups subsequently created by Mr. Brock are on pace to spend $100 million, Mr. Brock said. He added that none of that would have been possible without Mr. Stein and the Democracy Alliance.“It was revolutionary for our side, and over the last 20 years it was the sole reason why sustainable Democratic infrastructure got built,” he said.Mr. Stein, center, with Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado, a Democrat, and Kerry Healey, a former Republican lieutenant governor of Massachusetts, in 2018. Mr. Stein worked on building coalitions of donors and operatives across party lines.Leigh Vogel/Getty Images for Concordia SummitRobert Jay Stein was born on Oct. 26, 1943, in Wheeling, W.Va. His father, Charles, owned a chain of lumberyards, and his mother, Janis (Harrison) Stein, was involved in local arts, social service and religious organizations.He graduated from the Linsly Military Institute (now the Linsly School) in Wheeling before attending Antioch College in Ohio, a hotbed of progressive politics and activism.The abrupt transition shaped Mr. Stein’s politics.“It opened my brain to both conservative values and liberal values, and I became respectful of both, even though over time I became more in the liberal camp,” Mr. Stein said in an interview last month.He went on to the George Washington University Law School in Washington, where he would make his home for the rest of his life.He worked as a public interest lawyer for 10 years, then helped create or run a series of nonprofit organizations focused on issues including nutrition, refugees, organizational management and voter participation.Ahead of the 1988 Democratic National Convention, Mr. Stein was recruited to develop a presentation about mobilizing voters. That led to positions as an adviser to the Democratic National Committee under Chairman Ronald H. Brown, and then as chief of staff to Mr. Brown when President Bill Clinton named him commerce secretary in 1993.Mr. Stein left the Commerce Department shortly before Mr. Brown’s death in a plane crash in 1996 to help start a venture capital fund focused on women-owned businesses. When he formed the Democracy Alliance, he infused it with principles typically associated with venture investing.In addition to his son Gideon, from his marriage to Mary Ann (Efroymson) Stein, which ended in divorce, Mr. Stein is survived by his wife, Ellen Miley Perry; their daughter, Kat Stein; two other children from his first marriage, Dorothy and Noah Stein; and five grandchildren.After the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision prompted a surge in political spending, much of it funded by undisclosed sources, Mr. Stein grew increasingly concerned that big money was deepening polarization and distrust in government.While he urged Democrats not to “unilaterally disarm,” he also began talking about ways to bridge partisan divides and reform politics. That became a larger part of Mr. Stein’s focus after Donald J. Trump’s election in 2016.He advised several groups on building coalitions of donors and operatives across the political spectrum to fight what he saw as a slide into authoritarianism exacerbated by Mr. Trump.Mr. Stein applied thinking and strategy from the Democracy Alliance to encourage “a new cross-partisan pro-democracy infrastructure,” said Sarah Longwell, a longtime Republican operative who has worked to loosen Mr. Trump’s grip on the party.“He was especially attentive to those of us on the right who had never had common cause with Democrats,” said Ms. Longwell, who helped create and run two organizations that oppose Mr. Trump and his allies: the Bulwark website and the political group Defending Democracy Together.She said Mr. Stein, whom she considers a mentor, was “a relentless cheerleader for the project of democracy.” More

    • 150 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      As Marine Le Pen Moves Closer to French Presidency, Putin Ties Persist

      by

      As elections approach Sunday, the far-right candidate is linked to the Russian president by a web of financial ties and a history of support that has hardly dimmed despite the war in Ukraine.PARIS — When Europe’s far-right leaders gathered in Madrid in January, they had no problem finding unity on the issues they hold dear, whether cracking down on immigrants or upholding “European Christian ideals.” But as Russian troops massed on the Ukrainian border, they were divided on one issue: the threat posed by President Vladimir V. Putin.Marine Le Pen, the extreme-right challenger for the French presidency, objected to a paragraph in the final statement calling for European solidarity to confront “Russian military actions on the eastern border of Europe.” Even in a gathering of illiberal nationalists, she was an outlier in her fealty to Mr. Putin.Now, on her campaign website, the leaders’ statement appears with that paragraph cut in an unacknowledged change to the text. This little subterfuge is consistent with an embrace of Mr. Putin so complete that even his ravaging of Ukraine has hardly diminished it.Over the past decade, Ms. Le Pen’s party, the National Rally, formerly the National Front, has borrowed millions from a Russian bank, and Ms. Le Pen has supported Mr. Putin’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, as well as his incendiary meddling that year in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, where just this week Russia redoubled its offensive.Her support for Mr. Putin is one thing in a time of peace and another in a time of war. Russia, a nuclear power, has invaded a European state, and Ms. Le Pen is closer than ever to her cherished goal of becoming president of France, having narrowed the gap with President Emmanuel Macron before the decisive round of the election on Sunday.Supporters of Ms. Le Pen at a campaign rally in Stiring-Wendel, France, on April 1. She has come closer to Mr. Macron in polls as a decisive election round nears.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesWith polls showing Ms. Le Pen gaining about 44.5 percent of the vote to Mr. Macron’s 55.5 percent, she is within range of the shocks that produced Brexit and Donald J. Trump’s victory in 2016. As in Britain and the United States, alienation and economic hardship have fed a French readiness to gamble on nationalist dreams.If Ms. Le Pen wins, which is not likely but possible, her victory will almost certainly fracture the allied unity engineered by President Biden in an attempt to defeat Mr. Putin. It would hand Mr. Putin by far his most important ally in Europe, one he could leverage in his aims to divide Europe from the United States and fracture Europe’s decades-old project of unity.France, a core member of the European Union and NATO, is suddenly the possible soft underbelly of the West.Julien Nocetti, a Russia expert at the French Institute of International Relations, said there was “a complete ideological alignment between Putin and Le Pen” — one that would be deeply worrying to France’s American and European allies.The Ukraine war has caused Ms. Le Pen to pivot a little by saying Mr. Putin crossed “a red line” with the invasion, but she still says her foreign-policy priority is a rapprochement with Russia once the fighting stops.Bodies being loaded onto a truck in Bucha, Ukraine, where evidence of Russian atrocities mounted. Ms. Le Pen said that Mr. Putin crossed “a red line” with the invasion but also that she will seek a rapprochement with Russia.Daniel Berehulak for The New York TimesSince Ms. Le Pen, 53, took over the leadership of her party in 2011, she has only deepened its Putin predilection, making four trips to Moscow and one to Crimea. She would support sanctions against Russia, she says, but not cutting off imports of Russian oil and gas, which she has equated with economic death for France.“We have to think of our people,” she said in a recent TV interview, a position consistent with the strong focus on pocketbook issues that has propelled her campaign. The majority of French people are more focused on getting to the end of the month than getting Russia out of Ukraine.Certainly, Ms. Le Pen vaunted her connection with Mr. Putin until he went to war on Feb. 24. She included a photo of herself shaking hands with him in her election brochure as evidence of her “international stature.” This handout disappeared abruptly from view after the Russian invasion.The photo was taken at the Kremlin on March 24, 2017. That was less than five weeks before the first round of the last presidential election, in which Mr. Macron defeated Ms. Le Pen by 66.1 percent to 33.9 percent. The National Rally leader said then that she would immediately review lifting “unjust” sanctions against Russia if elected.As for Mr. Putin, he said with a knowing smirk that Russia did “not want to influence events in any way.”Shopping at a supermarket in Livry-Gargan, Paris, in December. Most French voters are more concerned about the economy than the Ukraine war.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesJean-Maurice Ripert, the French ambassador in Moscow from 2013 to 2017, said in an interview that a fellow European ambassador, a close friend, had asked the Russian leader after the French election why he had backed Ms. Le Pen.“Because I had been told she was going to win,” Mr. Putin said.Certainly that is what he wanted. Ms. Le Pen, committed to “equidistance” between great powers and hostile to “America’s protectorate on European soil,” sees in Mr. Putin the defender of the nation-state, family and Christianity against border-eroding multilateralism and irreligious cultural decay.“It’s all about sovereignty,” said Marlène Laruelle, the French director of the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian studies at George Washington University. “The sovereign state against international organizations; the sovereign traditional family against L.G.B.T.Q. rights.”Then there is the money. Unable to get a loan from French banks, Ms. Le Pen and several of her top aides scrambled for cash in Russia, accepting a 9.4 million euro loan, then $12.2 million, at a 6 percent interest rate, from the First Czech-Russian Bank in September 2014. It was supposed to be repaid by 2019.A branch of the First Czech-Russian Bank in Moscow, before it collapsed in 2016. Ms. Le Pen received millions in loans from the bank.Dmitry Serebryakov/TASS/Alamy Live NewsWallerand de Saint-Just, who was long the National Rally’s treasurer before leaving the position last year, negotiated the deal in Moscow. In a written answer to a question as to why French banks had refused any loan to the National Rally, he said “My experience with the six big French banking groups is that they obey orders from the political executive.”But given the lack of transparency and accountability in Russia’s financial sector — and Mr. Putin’s sway over it in his pay-to-play system — the sum has long raised hard questions of just how beholden Ms. Le Pen actually is to the Russian president, and whether some of her outspoken backing for him has been a consequence.I asked Ms. Le Pen this month at a news conference whether the outstanding loan did not create at least the impression of dependence on Russia, a liability for any future president?“Absolutely not,” she said. “I am totally independent of any link to any power.”In her current campaign, again unable to get a loan from a French bank, Ms. Le Pen turned to Hungary, where Viktor Orban, the anti-immigrant Hungarian prime minister, has been in power for 12 years. A Hungarian bank has now lent the National Rally another $11.4 million, so if she were to win she would be indebted to both Mr. Putin and Mr. Orban.Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orban, center, attending a meeting of far-right and conservative leaders in Madrid, in January.Oscar Del Pozo/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAlready her backing of Mr. Putin has been borderline fawning. Ms. Le Pen visited Moscow and Crimea in June 2013; Moscow in April 2014; and Moscow again in May 2015. She was received by the president of the Duma, the lower chamber of Russia’s Parliament, during the first of these visits, and sprinkled her Russian sojourns with pro-Putin remarks.In 2013, she blamed the European Union for a new “Cold War on Russia.” In 2015, also while in Moscow, she criticized France’s pro-American stance and suggested this would change “in 2017 with Marine Le Pen as president.” In 2021, she recommended Russia’s uncertain Sputnik vaccine for the coronavirus, saying “our anti-Russian ideology should not ruin our capacity to vaccinate our fellow citizens.”The 2014 visit came at a particularly delicate moment, given the Crimea annexation. It was one of several demonstrations of support for Mr. Putin from prominent members of Ms. Le Pen’s party who visited Crimea that year, and the Donbas, the Ukrainian region where clashes kindled by Moscow had begun.Among them was Aymeric Chauprade, her former top diplomatic adviser, who went to Crimea to observe the dubious March 2014 referendum that massively backed the Russian annexation. A United Nations General Assembly resolution declared the vote invalid.“It was the West that began changing European borders with Kosovo’s independence in 2008,” Mr. Chauprade, who has since left the National Rally, said in an interview. “There was an openness to accepting invitations from Russia, a good atmosphere.”Russian troops guarded a Ukrainian marine base in Crimea as Mr. Putin moved to annex the peninsula in March 2014. Le Pen has visited Moscow and Crimea and made remarks that were supportive of Russia.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesMediapart, a French investigative news website, was the first to expose the Russian loan to the National Rally in September 2014. In an earlier interview with Mediapart, Mr. Chauprade said visits to the Donbas that year and in 2015 by Jean-Luc Schaffhauser, a former National Rally member of the European Parliament, had been a “quid pro quo” for the loan.What to Know About France’s Presidential ElectionCard 1 of 4Heading to a runoff. More

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      ‘Lo necesitamos’: la enorme influencia de Trump en el Partido Republicano

      by

      Mientras acumula fondos, reparte favores y trata de aplastar a sus rivales, el expresidente domina a su partido y se prepara para otra campaña respaldando a quienes lo ayudan a expulsar a los funcionarios que frustraron su intento de subversión de las elecciones de 2020.PALM BEACH, Florida — Una noche cualquiera, Donald Trump se pasea por el patio de Mar-a-Lago y pronuncia unas palabras desde un atril para darle la bienvenida al candidato que le paga por el privilegio de recaudar fondos allí.“Este es un lugar especial”, dijo Trump en una de esas noches de febrero en su club privado. “Solía decir que era la ‘zona cero’, pero después del World Trade Center ya no usamos ese término. Este es el lugar donde todo el mundo quiere estar”.Durante 15 meses, un desfile de aspirantes (senadores, gobernadores, líderes del Congreso y contendientes republicanos de todas las tendencias) ha hecho el recorrido para jurarle lealtad y presentar su candidatura. Algunos han contratado a los asesores de Trump con la esperanza de obtener una ventaja al buscar su respaldo. Otros compran anuncios en Fox News que solo se transmiten en el sur de Florida. Y están los que le llevan regalos; y los que sacan los trapos sucios. Casi todos repiten la mentira de que las elecciones de 2020 fueron robadas.Mientras trabaja desde un gran escritorio de madera que recuerda al que usó en la Oficina Oval, Trump ha transformado la antigua suite nupcial de Mar-a-Lago en una sede informal del Partido Republicano y ha amasado más de 120 millones de dólares, una suma que duplica la del Comité Nacional Republicano. Los registros federales muestran que su iniciativa recaudó más fondos en línea que el partido, casi todos los días durante los últimos seis meses de 2021. La excepción fueron dos jornadas, una de las cuales fue la víspera de Navidad.Y mientras otros expresidentes han cedido el escenario político, Trump ha hecho lo contrario, ya que trata de emprender una agresiva campaña de venganza contra los republicanos que lo han perjudicado, con su respaldo a más de 140 candidatos en todo el país y con la transformación de las primarias de 2022 en una prueba de su persistente influencia.Al inspirar miedo, acaparar dinero, repartir favores y tratar de aplastar a sus rivales, Trump no solo se está comportando como un poderoso actor, sino como algo más cercano al jefe de una maquinaria política del siglo XIX.“Los líderes de los partidos nunca han desempeñado el papel que Trump está desempeñando”, dijo Roger Stone, un asesor intermitente de Trump desde la década de 1980 a quien se ha visto en fechas recientes en Mar-a-Lago. “Porque él puede, y no se rige por las reglas convencionales de la política”, explicó.Esta imagen de Trump como un jefe de partido moderno se ha extraído de más de 50 entrevistas con asesores en activo y retirados de Trump, rivales políticos, republicanos que han buscado su apoyo y funcionarios y estrategas del Partido Republicano que están lidiando con su influencia.Es evidente que Trump disfruta del poder. Pero mientras insinúa una y otra vez la posibilidad de aspirar a la Casa Blanca por tercera vez, la pregunta que se plantea es si puede seguir siendo el rey de la nación si no aspira a la corona.Por ahora, se ha adentrado en las minucias de limpiar al Partido Republicano de sus críticos, incluso si, de manera típica, la planificación y ejecución pueden ser desordenadas. Ha centrado sus esfuerzos casi obsesivamente en instalar personajes leales en puestos estatales clave en el campo de batalla (gobernadores, senadores, miembros de la Cámara, secretarios de Estado y fiscales generales de los estados) a menudo en vez de los mismos funcionarios que frustraron sus intentos de subvertir los resultados de 2020.Ha presionado a los candidatos para que cambien las contiendas en las que participan, aconsejó a los republicanos sobre a quién contratar, se involucró en las reglas de registro del partido en Wyoming y en la contienda por el presidente de la cámara estatal en Michigan. También condicionó su respaldo al gobernador Mike Dunleavy de Alaska a que no apoyara a la senadora titular del estado, Lisa Murkowski; Dunleavy accedió rápidamente. La semana pasada, mostró su desacuerdo al instar a los residentes de Pensilvania a no votar por Bill McSwain en las primarias para gobernador, con el argumento de que el político no había aceptado por completo sus acusaciones de fraude electoral de 2020.Trump no quiso ser entrevistado para este artículo.Las personas cercanas a Trump dicen que se siente complacido por el ejercicio crudo de su poder. Escucha a los cabilderos de los republicanos de alto rango, como el representante Kevin McCarthy, líder del partido en la Cámara de Representantes, y luego los ataca sin previo aviso. Un día después de que McCarthy regañó al representante republicano de Carolina del Norte, Madison Cawthorn, por decir que sus colegas en Washington habían celebrado orgías y consumido cocaína, Trump le concedió a Cawthorn un codiciado espacio para hablar en su próximo mitin.Durante 15 meses, un desfile de aspirantes (senadores, gobernadores, líderes del Congreso y contendientes republicanos de todas las tendencias) ha hecho el recorrido hasta Mar-a-LagoSaul Martinez para The New York Times‘Clientelismo político en desarrollo’Ahora, toda una economía política gira en torno a Trump, en la cual sus propiedades están haciéndose de enormes sumas: tan solo los candidatos federales y las comisiones han pagado casi 1,3 millones de dólares por la celebración de eventos en Mar-a-Lago, según muestran los registros. Ha surgido una falange de aduladores de Trump, a los que los candidatos pagan con la esperanza de conseguir reuniones, aunque los antiguos seguidores de Trump advierten que, en el juego de la influencia, el comprador siempre debe tener cuidado.“Si alguien anda por ahí vendiendo su capacidad para conseguir respaldos, está vendiendo algo que no es suyo”, dijo Michael Caputo, un exasesor que todavía habla con Trump. “Lo que parece ser clientelismo político en desarrollo, en realidad, es la confluencia de muchos asesores que fingen saber cómo conseguir el respaldo de Trump. Pero, en realidad, nadie sabe el camino a seguir”.Sin embargo, aunque el clientelismo político en Nueva York no es nuevo, como lo demuestra Tammany Hall, una máquina política que perduró durante casi dos siglos y cuya longevidad se debe a la difusión del patrocinio, Trump puede ser muy tacaño. Aunque celebra mítines para algunos candidatos, en muchos casos, su apoyo no va más allá de un correo electrónico y un cheque de 5000 dólares. Trump casi nunca ha desplegado su enorme lista de seguidores para ayudar a otros políticos con el fin de que recauden dinero (la representante Elise Stefanik de Nueva York fue una rara excepción, a principios de este año). Frente a la posibilidad de las derrotas de alto perfil, el equipo del exmandatario planea gastar directamente para ayudar a algunos candidatos vulnerables que han recibido su respaldo; una transferencia de efectivo a un súper PAC de Georgia fue solo el primer paso.Taylor Budowich, uno de sus voceros, señaló que centrarse solo en el gasto directo no toma en cuenta el valor que tiene el aval de Trump para los votantes y la “cobertura mediática gratuita” que genera. “Alguna vez se llegó a decir que un respaldo ni siquiera vale el papel en el que está impreso, pero ahora hay una excepción: el respaldo de Trump”, dijo Budowich.A diferencia de los jefes políticos del pasado, Trump ha hecho mucho énfasis en los mecanismos electorales, además de sembrar en todo momento la desconfianza en el sistema mediante afirmaciones falsas de manipulación de votos.Como decía el corrupto “Boss” Tweed, de Tammany, mientras se apoyaba en una urna en una famosa caricatura de la década de 1870: “Mientras yo cuente los votos, ¿qué vas a hacer al respecto?”.O como le dijo Trump a Breitbart News este mes: “Hay una expresión de que los contadores de votos son más importantes que el candidato, y podrías usar esa expresión en este momento”.Ejercer el poder sobre el partido y vender la ficción de unas elecciones robadas también son estrategias para desviar la atención de la desafortunada salida de Trump de la Casa Blanca como perdedor.Michael D’Antonio, biógrafo de Trump, trazó un paralelismo entre este periodo y una crisis anterior en la carrera de Trump: su bancarrota a principios de 1990. “Para cualquier otra persona estos habrían sido acontecimientos demoledores”, dijo. “Pero para Trump solo marcaron un cambio en su método y en su búsqueda del poder. Y nunca aceptó que fueran derrotas de verdad”.Los demócratas se están preparando para las derrotas en 2022. Pero los estrategas de ambos partidos dicen que el gran perfil público de Trump representa un riesgo para los republicanos, porque las encuestas privadas y los grupos de discusión muestran que sigue siendo un poderoso factor de rechazo para los votantes indecisos.Pero las primarias republicanas son otra historia, donde pocos candidatos serios se han separado de Trump. “La toma del control del Partido Republicano por parte del presidente Trump ha sido tan completa”, dijo Boris Epshteyn, otro exasesor de Trump que a veces visita Mar-a-Lago, “que incluso los republicanos más moderados están intentando hablar de MAGA”.El representante Madison Cawthorn de Carolina del Norte fue reprendido por decir que sus colegas en Washington habían organizado orgías y consumido cocaína, sin embargo, Trump le otorgó un codiciado espacio para hablar en su próximo mitin.Veasey Conway para The New York Times“Necesito ver las encuestas, necesito ver la financiación, necesito ver que te estás haciendo un nombre”, le dijo Trump a Joe Kent, quien ganó su respaldo para intentar vencer a Jaime Herrera Beutler, la representante por el estado de Washington.Nathan Howard/Associated Press‘Como cangrejos en una cubeta’No hay mejor ejemplo del dominio de Trump sobre el partido que las genuflexiones y maniobras de quienes buscan su visto bueno en la política.Algunos candidatos pagan para asistir a las recaudaciones de fondos en Mar-a-Lago de otros aspirantes, y esperan lograr captar la atención de Trump, o mejor aún, una foto. “Momento épico”, fue el término que usó una candidata a la Cámara de Representantes para describir los pocos segundos que estuvo con Trump y que subió en un video a su cuenta de Instagram.Cuando Trump invitó a los candidatos de Michigan para que lo acompañaran en un evento, resonó la voz de un hombre: “Yo también me postulo para gobernador, ¿puedo ir?”. Era Ryan Kelley. “¿Te postulas para gobernador de qué?”, le preguntó Trump, un poco confundido. “¡Michigan!”, le respondió Kelley y se acercó, estrechando la mano de Perry Johnson, uno de sus oponentes.Johnson, por su parte, ha frecuentado Mar-a-Lago y publicó con orgullo un video pixelado de Trump alabando sus “buenos números en las encuestas” en otra recaudación de fondos. Incluso pagó un anuncio de televisión dándole la bienvenida a Trump a Michigan, antes de un mitin celebrado el 2 de abril.Sin embargo, Trump lo desairó en el mitin y, en cambio, elogió a una candidata rival, Tudor Dixon, que había realizado su propia recaudación de fondos en Mar-a-Lago en febrero.En muchos sentidos, la búsqueda de su respaldo es una réplica en la vida real del antiguo papel de Trump en la telerrealidad.“¿Qué era El aprendiz sino un lamentable tumulto de personas que se comportaban como cangrejos en una cubeta y que pedían que él los sacara de ahí?”, recordó D’Antonio, su biógrafo. “Estas personas no son otra cosa que concursantes que compiten por su aprobación”.En una de las escenas más recordadas, el año pasado, Trump llevó a varios candidatos al Senado de Ohio a una sala de Mar-a-Lago, donde empezaron a atacarse unos a otros con discursos mientras él los observaba. “Las cosas se salieron de control”, dijo un candidato, Bernie Moreno, quien no culpó a Trump por el caos, sino a sus rivales. Desde entonces, Moreno se retiró porque no quiere dividir el voto a favor de Trump.Casi todos los contendientes de Ohio han publicado anuncios que resaltan sus vínculos con Trump y buscan su respaldo de manera personal. Jane Timken se define como “la verdadera conservadora de Trump”. Josh Mandel se presenta como “pro-Dios, pro-armas, pro-Trump”. Mike Gibbons dice que él y Trump son dos “hombres de negocios con los mismos principios”.Trump no respaldó a ninguno de ellos; en cambio, apoyó al escritor J. D. Vance. En un debate previo al respaldo, Matt Dolan, el único aspirante republicano que no compite por el apoyo de Trump, sugirió que sus rivales estaban poniendo a los electores de Ohio en segundo lugar. “Hay gente en este escenario que, literalmente, está luchando por obtener un voto”, afirmó, “y la persona que les dará ese voto no está en Ohio”.Dolan es una excepción. En general, una audiencia con Trump puede llevar al éxito o al fracaso de una candidatura. Por eso, los candidatos planean mucho sus estrategias.A Trump le gusta la adulación y le gusta recompensar a los aduladores. Pero los expertos dicen que llevar material visual convincente también es importante. El uso de letras de gran tamaño es fundamental, con fotos y gráficos en color.“No es un tipo muy digitalizado, así que llevamos todo impreso”, dijo Joe Kent, quien logró ganarse el respaldo de Trump en su esfuerzo por desbancar a la representante republicana de Washington, Jaime Herrera Beutler, una de las diez representantes republicanas que votaron a favor del juicio político en contra de Trump.“Necesito ver las encuestas, necesito ver la financiación, necesito ver que te estás haciendo un nombre”, le indicó Trump, como recordó Kent.Cuando le gusta lo que ve, Trump envía unas palabras de aliento, garabateadas con un marcador en las impresiones de las noticias. “¡Lo estás haciendo genial!”, le escribió en enero a Kent. “¡Lo estás haciendo genial!”, también le escribió en octubre pasado a Harriet Hageman, quien está desafiando a Liz Cheney, la representante por Wyoming.Cuando el representante Billy Long, candidato al Senado en Missouri, se reunió por primera vez con Trump el año pasado, le llevó una copia impresa de una encuesta favorable. Pero sintió que lo habían derrotado cuando Trump “estiró el brazo y recogió otra encuesta” que Long supuso que provenía de un rival, aunque podría haber formado parte del paquete que su equipo le prepara para las reuniones con los candidatos.“Donald Trump hará lo que quiera hacer cuando quiera hacerlo”, dijo Long. “Eso no es ningún secreto”.En marzo, un grupo que instó a Trump para que cesara su respaldo a Matthew DePerno, candidato a fiscal general de Michigan, compró un anuncio que se publicó en West Palm Beach.Nic Antaya para The New York TimesTrump ha expresado su deseo de tomar el control de los puestos de conteo de votos en Michigan, con el fin de reunir apoyos para Kristina Karamo, su candidata para ser secretaria de Estado.Brittany Greeson for The New York TimesTelevisión de precisiónLa televisión es una vía popular para llegar a Trump y algunos candidatos tratan de hacerlo mediante la transmisión de anuncios lejos de su electorado. Durante el verano, Trump estuvo en su club de golf de Bedminster, Nueva Jersey, y Jim Lamon, un candidato al Senado de Arizona, pagó por un anuncio en Fox News de Nueva Jersey.Michele Fiore, concejala de la ciudad de Las Vegas, anunció su candidatura a gobernadora de Nevada con un comercial pro-Trump que se transmitió en West Palm Beach. Luego desistió y decidió postularse al cargo de tesorera estatal y dijo en otro comercial que el equipo de Trump le aconsejó que optara por ese cargo.Y en marzo, un grupo que instó a Trump a rescindir su respaldo a Matthew DePerno, un republicano que se postulaba para fiscal general en Michigan, lanzó un comercial que atacaba a DePerno y que se transmitió en West Palm Beach.Otros han utilizado los medios audiovisuales con una precisión aún mayor.En noviembre, Blake Masters, candidato al Senado en Arizona, publicó un video que decía: “Creo que Trump ganó en 2020”, el día antes de volar a Florida para una recaudación de fondos en Mar-a-Lago. Según los registros de su campaña, el comercial costó 29.798,70 dólares.Algunos atraen la atención de Trump en televisión, entre comerciales.La vicegobernadora de Idaho, Janice McGeachin, apareció en el programa de Fox News de Tucker Carlson en junio y se deshizo en elogios hacia Trump. Al día siguiente, él la llamó.“Fue lo mejor”, afirmó la vicegobernadora, quien agregó que “le hizo saber” al exmandatario que planeaba desafiar al gobernador Brad Little, el republicano en funciones y le pidió su apoyo. Poco después, estaba en un avión rumbo a Nueva York para una reunión en la Torre Trump. “Lo que quería era darle un gran abrazo y decirle cuánto lo amamos”, dijo. “Y eso fue lo primero que hice”.McGeachin le dijo a Trump que Little no había luchado lo suficiente para anular las elecciones de 2020. En el otoño presentó su propuesta en Mar-a-Lago, y se marchó con una gorra roja firmada por el expresidente que suele usar en sus eventos. Pronto, Trump la apoyó de manera formal, aunque no dejó de elogiar a Little, que apenas unos días antes asistió a una recaudación de fondos en Mar-a-Lago para una organización no lucrativa afín a Trump.McGeachin, quien causó revuelo recientemente al grabar un discurso para una reunión de nacionalistas blancos, es vista como una candidata con pocas posibilidades en las primarias de mayo.El episodio encapsula las peculiaridades del estilo de Trump como jefe del partido: la receptividad al cortejo intensivo, la toma de decisiones aleatoria, la posibilidad de excederse y la exigencia de que se amplifiquen sus falsas afirmaciones de fraude electoral.“Creo que es el respaldo más codiciado en la historia política”, dijo McGeachin.Las encuestas han mostrado que David Perdue está detrás del gobernador de Georgia, Brian Kemp, en la contienda del 24 de mayo, lo que se considera como una muestra de la influencia de Trump.Audra Melton para The New York TimesTed Budd, representante por Carolina del Norte, es el candidato de Trump para el Senado y desafiará en las primarias de mayo al representante Mark Walker, un antiguo aliado del expresidente Trump.Veasey Conway para The New York TimesMano duraCon la vista puesta en su historial de victorias y derrotas en materia de respaldos, Trump está tratando cada vez más a los candidatos republicanos como piezas de ajedrez que se pueden mover, intercambiar o abandonar. Pero, hasta ahora, los resultados han sido dispares.En Georgia, reclutó al exsenador David Perdue para enfrentar al gobernador Brian Kemp, un republicano que desafió a Trump al certificar las elecciones de 2020 y respaldar el resultado. Trump presionó al otro candidato en la campaña, Vernon Jones, un exdemócrata, para que se postulara a la Cámara de Representantes, con su respaldo.Esa maniobra funcionó, pero las encuestas han mostrado que Perdue está detrás de Kemp de cara a la contienda del 24 de mayo, lo que es visto como una primera muestra de la influencia de Trump.En Carolina del Norte, Trump trató de conseguir que un aliado, el diputado Mark Walker, abandonara su campaña al Senado y dejara la vía libre para el candidato que él respaldaba, el diputado Ted Budd, para que se enfrentara al exgobernador Pat McCrory en las primarias de mayo. Pero después de que los tribunales alteraron los mapas políticos del estado, Walker se negó y amenazó con dividir el voto pro-Trump, aunque las encuestas muestran que Budd lidera de todos modos.Trump ya retiró uno de sus respaldos. Fue el caso de Mo Brooks, representante por Alabama que quería postularse al Senado de ese estado, y Trump cesó su apoyo después de que Brooks cayó en las encuestas y se cree que podría hacer lo mismo con otros aspirantes que no lideran las encuestas. Por ejemplo, ha hablado en privado de moderar su postura a favor de McGeachin.Trump ha sido especialmente efectivo en el reclutamiento de rivales para sus críticos republicanos más importantes, como Cheney.El año pasado, entrevistó a varios contrincantes potenciales, con la esperanza de establecer un enfrentamiento de dos personas. Entre ellos se encontraba Darin Smith, un abogado de Cheyenne, que voló a Bedminster y luego dijo que lamentaba no haber contado antes con la asesoría de los miembros del equipo de Trump. Finalmente, el expresidente respaldó a Harriet Hageman, exfuncionaria del partido, cuyos asesores incluyen a los estrategas actuales y anteriores de Trump como Justin Clark, Nick Trainer, Bill Stepien y Tim Murtaugh.“Ya sea que ames el pantano o lo odies, es una realidad”, dijo Smith, quien desde entonces ha respaldado a Hageman. “Hay órbitas alrededor de Trump”.Es posible que en ningún otro lugar Trump haya profundizado más en la política local que en Michigan, guiado en parte por la copresidenta del partido, Meshawn Maddock, una aliada cercana que organizó autobuses para llevar a los manifestantes a Washington el 6 de enero de 2021. En noviembre de 2020, después de que Trump convocó a los legisladores de Michigan a la Casa Blanca para una reunión extraordinaria mientras buscaba anular las elecciones, los dos líderes legislativos del Partido Republicano del estado lo rechazaron. Ahora, Trump ha dado su respaldo a más de media decena de candidatos a la legislatura de Michigan para encumbrar al marido de Maddock, el diputado estatal Matt Maddock, como próximo presidente de la Cámara de Representantes del estado.Trump no ha ocultado su deseo de tomar el control de los puestos de conteo de votos del estado mientras reúne apoyos para DePerno y Kristina Karamo, sus candidatos a los cargos de fiscal general del estado y la Secretaría de Estado.“Recuerden que no solo se trata de 2022, se trata de asegurarnos de que Michigan no sea manipulado y robado nuevamente en 2024”, dijo Trump en las afueras de Detroit el 2 de abril. Y agregó: “No hago esto a menudo con la gente de los estados. Pero esto es muy importante”.Mitch McConnell, líder de la minoría del Senado; Kevin McCarthy, el líder de la minoría de la Cámara de Representantes; y el exvicepresidente Mike Pence en la Oficina Oval con Trump, en marzo de 2020Erin Schaff/The New York TimesAfirmando el dominioEs cierto que la estrategia de guerra de Trump proyecta poder, pero lo que más asusta a otros líderes republicanos es su perdurable popularidad entre la base del partido.El flujo interminable de mensajes de recaudación de fondos republicanos que usan el nombre de Trump, y que a veces dan la idea de que el dinero es para él, es evidencia de su influencia con los pequeños donantes. Las encuestas también muestran que la mayoría de los votantes republicanos valoran su respaldo. “Su dominio del partido a nivel de votantes de base no tiene precedentes”, dijo Stone, quien ha sido asesor de Trump desde hace mucho tiempo.Plenamente consciente de esto, Trump también ha afirmado su dominio sobre los líderes republicanos del Congreso.En la Cámara de Representantes, McCarthy, que espera convertirse en el presidente de ese órgano legislativo después de las elecciones intermedias, ha tratado de mantener a Trump al margen en algunas primarias, ejerciendo presión, por ejemplo, para que deje de respaldar a Mary Miller, la representante por Illinois, quien fue elegida en el mismo distrito que el representante Rodney Davis. Pero Trump la respaldó de todos modos.“El temor legítimo de McCarthy es que se gane la mayoría, pero que 10 miembros de la Cámara se unan y digan: ‘No vamos a votar por usted ni por nada que desee’”, dijo Stone. Y agregó que, en ese caso, Trump tendría influencia en esos votos.En el Senado, Mitch McConnell de Kentucky, el líder de la minoría, no ha hablado con Trump desde que dejó la Casa Blanca, pero accedió a que el exmandatario respaldara a Herschel Walker para el Senado en Georgia, a pesar de las dudas iniciales de su equipo.Quienes están descontentos con el reinado de Trump como jefe del partido están buscando señales de que su control se está perdiendo, y varios rivales potenciales para 2024 (Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie, Tom Cotton) parecen menos temerosos últimamente de estar en desacuerdo públicamente con Trump.Las contiendas en las que Trump ha respaldado a un candidato serán objeto de estudio para ver si disminuyen su poder. Pero el hecho es que muchos de los candidatos a los que se opone en las primarias siguen diciendo que son republicanos que apoyan a Trump. Pocos ven una fecha de caducidad en su dominio hasta, y a menos, que decline postularse de nuevo en 2024 o sea derrotado.Una reciente aparición en el pódcast del Comité Nacional Republicano captó tanto las ventajas como los inconvenientes del inquebrantable apego del partido hacia Trump. Por mucho, se trató del episodio del pódcast más visto en YouTube, hasta que el sitio lo retiró por difundir información errónea.“No se puede subestimar el poder de su apoyo”, le había dicho Ronna McDaniel, la presidenta del partido, a Trump. Y luego agregó: “Lo necesitamos”.Shane Goldmacher es reportero político nacional y antes fue el corresponsal político en jefe de la sección Metro. Antes de unirse al Times, trabajó en Politico, donde cubrió la política del Partido Republicano a nivel nacional y la campaña presidencial de 2016. @ShaneGoldmacher More