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      A Campaign Tactic by Democrats: Smart? Risky? Unethical?

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      More from our inbox:Covid Priorities, in the Schools and BeyondThe Needs of Ukraine’s StudentsThe Kansas Abortion Vote Trent Bozeman for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “A Cynical Low for the Democratic Party” (editorial, Aug. 4):Cynical, indeed! As a moderate Democrat, I find it appalling that Democratic campaign organizations are contributing money to finance the primary campaigns of ultra-right, pro-Trump supporters and election deniers.Money contributed to these Democratic organizations should go to candidates promoting free and fair elections, and who work to combat lies, racism and antisemitism. I want campaign dollars to support and guarantee that women have the right to make decisions about their own health and welfare.To learn now that our campaign dollars are going to promote extreme right-wingers and Trumpers makes me wonder: Why would I ever consider making contributions again to Democratic groups if they give money to the campaigns of the very people I wish to see defeated?Robert D. GreenbergBethesda, Md.To the Editor:I would beg to differ with the editorial board’s view that the Democratic Party’s support for Trump Republican proponents of the Big Lie is a “cynical low.” Your argument is that Democrats, who claim to stand up for the truth, should not be supporting the deniers of truth, and, furthermore, that theirs is a “repugnant and risky strategy.”But can it also be considered a deft political strategy and worth the risk? It is not an illegal action, and it is probably not immoral, but just plain smart politics.Raymond ComeauBelmont, Mass.To the Editor:While Democrats’ efforts to promote far-right candidates, whom they perceive to be easier targets in the general election, may succeed in swaying a few Republican primary voters, they pose the greater risk of alienating large swaths of independent voters like me who simply want politicians to act with a modicum of honesty and integrity.Especially in battleground states like Michigan, where independents have the power to decide races with far-reaching consequences, Democrats would be wise to build the moral high ground on election integrity rather than actively undermining it.John ZaineaAnn Arbor, Mich.To the Editor:Let’s be cleareyed. There no longer is such a thing as a moderate Republican politician. I, too, detest Democratic donations going to nominate election deniers. But Republicans who didn’t get Donald Trump’s endorsement by and large deny climate change, support abortion bans and favor a tax system that tilts toward corporations and the wealthy.Don’t shift the political landscape even farther in that direction by describing those right-wing Republicans as “moderate.” They aren’t.Ken EudyRaleigh, N.C.The writer is a retired senior adviser to Gov. Roy Cooper.Covid Priorities, in the Schools and Beyond Jonathan Kirn/Getty ImagesTo the Editor:Re “A Proposal for School Covid Policies This Year,” by Joseph G. Allen (Opinion guest essay, Aug. 6):While I appreciate the critical thought and expertise that Dr. Allen brought to the discourse on Covid policies in our education system, I’m concerned that the scope too frequently narrowed on children’s resilience.Children may be far less likely to be hospitalized or experience severe symptoms, but they are just as likely to pass symptoms to adult family members who could be at high risk.The guidelines from Britain’s education system referred to in the article suggest that children go to school unmasked if symptoms are only minor (a runny nose, a slight cough, etc). Those children may easily pass those minor symptoms to their classmates, who may just as easily pass them to an adult (a family member or staff at the school) who experiences Covid more seriously.Yes, the alternative is damaging: children missing school. But our educators and families could pay a larger price if we let children pass it among themselves and to adults.Alexandra DavisBrooklynTo the Editor:Joseph G. Allen says he is writing in these capacities: “As a public health scientist. As someone who has spent nearly 20 years doing risk assessments of indoor environmental hazards. As a dad of three school-age kids, and an uncle to 15.”But Covid policy in schools affects people schoolchildren interact with outside school. This includes the old and immunocomromised adults who cannot take Paxlovid because it interacts with their other medicines.Writing as an old person, a liberal and a bioethicist, I wonder why a public health expert thinks “the overriding goal for the next school year should be to maximize time in the classroom and make school look and feel much like it did before the pandemic started,” rather than recognizing that the overriding goal of any Covid policy should be to save lives.Felicia Nimue AckermanProvidence, R.I.The Needs of Ukraine’s Students Emile Ducke for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “For Children of War, a Time for Play” (news article and photo essay, Aug. 8):As children, their families and teachers get excited about the new school year throughout the world, it is imperative to continue to publicize the dire education needs of Ukrainian children.In addition to the physical destruction of school infrastructure, there are shortages of supplies from laptops to textbooks. Some teachers have had to physically defend their schools as Russian invaders entered.Professors have been giving lectures from the front lines. Others have been teaching in person from shelters, where air-raid sirens wail. The dedication of the teachers in wartime is heroic.Students are the future of any country. The education of students in Ukraine, as had been taking place before the invasion in February, is essential to the rebuilding of the country. They deserve our support. As do their teachers.Anna NagurneyAmherst, Mass.The writer is the Eugene M. Isenberg chair in integrative studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst, and co-chair of the board of directors of the Kyiv School of Economics.The Kansas Abortion VoteIn its most recent term, in addition to overturning Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court expanded gun rights, limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to address climate change and expanded the role of religion in public life.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Defying the Supreme Court,” by David Leonhardt (The Morning newsletter, Aug. 4):Those, like me, rejoicing over the overwhelming rejection in Kansas of a measure to allow banning abortion there ought to curb their enthusiasm. The outcome of that referendum could exemplify the adage “Be careful what you ask for; you might get it.”That Kansas voters refused to permit their legislature to roll back women’s reproductive rights plays into the narrative of the Supreme Court’s rationale in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case, in which the justices reasoned that decisions on women’s control over their own bodies should be left to each of the states.By demonstrating that this tenet can work to protect individual rights, the Kansas vote could bolster the states’ rights argument underlying the Dobbs decision. It may be invoked to justify the inclination of the supermajority radicals on the court to reconsider decisions involving contraception and same-sex marriage, among other matters, as advocated in the Dobbs case by Justice Clarence Thomas.Marshall H. TanickMinneapolisThe writer is a lawyer. More

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      Your Friday Briefing: U.S. to Unseal Trump Warrant

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      Plus Russia prepares for show trials and Taiwan does not rise to China’s provocations.Good morning. We’re covering moves by the U.S. to unseal the Mar-a-Lago search warrant, Russia’s preparation for possible show trials and Taiwan’s undeterred diplomacy.Attorney General Merrick Garland had come under pressure to provide more information about the search at former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence.Drew Angerer/Getty ImagesU.S. to unseal the Trump warrantMerrick Garland, the U.S. attorney general, moved to unseal the warrant authorizing the F.B.I. search for classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s residence in Florida. Garland said he personally approved the decision to seek the warrant.Garland’s statement followed revelations that Trump received a subpoena for documents this spring, months before the F.B.I. search on Monday. It also came a day after Trump asserted his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when he was questioned by New York’s attorney general in a civil case about his business practices.The subpoena suggests the Justice Department tried methods short of a search warrant to account for the material before taking the politically explosive step of sending F.B.I. agents, unannounced, to the former president’s doorstep. Here are live updates.Details: Officials think the former president improperly took documents with him after leaving office. The Justice Department has provided no information about the precise nature of the material it has been seeking to recover, but it has signaled that the material involved classified information of a sensitive nature.Analysis: Garland’s decision to make a public appearance came at an extraordinary moment in the department’s 152-year history, as the sprawling investigation of a former president who remains a powerful political force gains momentum. After coming under pressure, Garland said he decided to go public to serve the “public interest.”The Mariupol Chamber Philharmonic will be used for upcoming show trials of Ukrainian soldiers. Associated PressRussia readies for likely show trialsRussia has installed cages in a large Mariupol theater, an apparent preparation for show trials of captured Ukrainian soldiers on newly occupied soil. The trials could begin on Aug. 24, Ukrainian Independence Day.Some fear that the Kremlin plans to use the trappings of legal proceedings to reinforce its narrative about fighters who defended the southern Ukrainian city and spent weeks underneath a steel plant. Ukrainian officials have called for international intervention.Moscow may also use the trials to deflect responsibility for atrocities Russia committed as its forces laid siege to Mariupol. The Kremlin has a long and brutal history of using such trials to give a veneer of credibility to efforts to silence critics. Here are live updates.Our Coverage of the Russia-Ukraine WarOn the Ground: A series of explosions that Ukraine took credit for rocked a key Russian air base in Kremlin-occupied Crimea. Russia played down the extent of the damage, but the evidence available told a different story.Drones: To counter Russia’s advantage in artillery and tanks, Ukraine has seized on drone warfare and produced an array of inexpensive, plastic aircraft rigged to drop grenades or other munitions.Nuclear Shelter: The Russian military is using а nuclear power station in southern Ukraine as a fortress, stymying Ukrainian forces and unnerving locals, faced with intensifying fighting and the threat of a radiation leak.Starting Over: Ukrainians forced from their hometowns by Russia’s invasion find some solace, and success setting up businesses in new cities.Context: Concerns for prisoners’ safety have only grown since last month, when the Ukrainian authorities accused Moscow of orchestrating an explosion at a Russian prison camp that killed at least 50 Ukrainian prisoners of war.Other updates:Satellite images show that Russia lost at least eight warplanes in a Tuesday explosion at a Crimean air base.New shelling at a Russian-occupied nuclear plant in southern Ukraine added to concerns of possible disaster.Turkey needs Russian cash and gas ahead of an election. Russia needs friends to evade sanctions. The country’s leaders have a wary, mutually beneficial rapport.Taiwanese soldiers conducted a live-fire drill earlier this week. Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesChina’s drills did not deter TaiwanChina’s continuing military drills have not deterred Taiwan, my colleagues write in an analysis.In fact, the drills have hardened the self-ruled island’s belief in the value of its diplomatic, economic and military maneuverings to stake out a middle ground in the big-power standoff between Beijing and Washington.Under Tsai Ing-wen, the current president, Taiwanese officials have quietly courted the U.S., making gains with weapon sales and vows of support. They have also turned China’s bluster into a growing international awareness about the island’s plight.But Taiwan has held back from flaunting that success in an effort to avoid outbursts from China. When Beijing recently sent dozens of fighters across the water that separates China and Taiwan, the Taiwanese military said it would not escalate and took relatively soft countermeasures. Officials offered sober statements and welcomed support from the Group of 7 nations.What’s next: American officials have considered stockpiling arms in Taiwan out of concern that it might be tough to supply the island in the event of a Chinese military blockade.THE LATEST NEWSAsiaAn undated North Korean state media photograph showed Kim Jong-un attending a meeting about Covid-19.Korean Central News Agency, via ReutersKim Jong-un declared “victory” over North Korea’s coronavirus outbreak, despite a lack of vaccines, state news reported.Hong Kong suffered a record 1.6 percent population decline over the past 12 months, the South China Morning Post reports.A new animal-derived virus, Langya henipavirus, has infected at least 35 people in China’s eastern Shandong and Henan provinces, the BBC reports.Seoul announced a ban on underground homes after people drowned during recent flooding, The Korea Herald reports.The PacificOlivia Newton-John will receive a state memorial service in Australia, CNN reports.New Zealand’s tourism minister dismissed budget travelers and said the country planned to focus on attracting “high quality,” “big spender” visitors, The Guardian reports.World NewsAfter peaking in June, the lower price of gas is a welcome change for drivers.Gabby Jones for The New York TimesU.S. gas prices fell below $4 a gallon yesterday, back to where they were in March.The Arctic is warming four times faster than the global average, not the commonly reported two to three times, researchers said.The W.H.O. warned people to not blame monkeys for monkeypox after a report that animals were harmed in Brazil amid fear of transmission.Wildfires are again ripping through France, weeks after the last heat wave.A Morning ReadSo-called carbon farming has become a key element of New Zealand’s drive to be carbon neutral by 2050.Fiona Goodall/Getty ImagesNew Zealand put a growing price on greenhouse emissions. But the plan may be threatening its iconic farmland: Forestry investors are rushing to buy up pastures to plant carbon-sucking trees.ARTS AND IDEASSelling democracy to AfricaThe U.S. unveiled a new Africa policy this week that leaned on a familiar strategy, promoting democracy. The challenge will come in selling it to a changing continent.“Too often, African nations have been treated as instruments of other nations’ progress rather than the authors of their own,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as he presented the new U.S. approach during a tour that included South Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda.The U.S. “will not dictate Africa’s choices,” he added, in an apparent response to criticism that America’s stance toward Africa can be patronizing, if not insulting. “I think, given history, the approach has to be somewhat different, and I would recommend a greater attention to tools that Africans have developed,” said Naledi Pandor, South Africa’s foreign minister.Along with their own tools and institutions, like the African Union, more African states are wealthier than they were a generation ago, Bob Wekesa, the deputy director of the African Center for the Study of the United States in Johannesburg, said.“They can afford to say, ‘We can choose who to deal with on certain issues,’” Wekesa said. Those new partnerships include not only U.S. rivals Russia and China, but also emerging powers like Turkey and India. Traditional U.S. allies like Botswana and Zambia are likely to embrace the American strategy, but strongman leaders in Uganda and even Rwanda are likely to be more resistant, he added.In Kigali yesterday, Blinken said that he had urged the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to end their support for militias in eastern Congo. He also raised concerns about the detention of the U.S. resident who inspired the film “Hotel Rwanda,” Paul Rusesabagina.But just hours before his meeting with Blinken, President Paul Kagame poured cold water over suggestions that he would be swayed on the Rusesabagina case. “No worries … there are things that just don’t work like that here!!” he said on Twitter. — Lynsey Chutel, Briefings writer based in Johannesburg.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookChristopher Testani for The New York TimesCaramelized brown sugar adds complexity to this berry upside-down cake.What to Watch“Inu-oh” is a visually sumptuous anime film about a 14th-century Japanese performer.TravelRetirees are taking on part-time work loading baggage at airports or passing out towels to make their way through Europe on the cheap.Now Time to PlayPlay today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: “Crucial” (three letters).Here are today’s Wordle and Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. The Times will bring back its Food Festival for the first time since 2019. Mark your calendars: Oct. 8, in New York City.The latest episode of “The Daily” is on abortion in the U.S.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Your Thursday Briefing: Trump Declines to Answer Questions

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      Plus new details about explosions in Crimea and revelations about the victims of Seoul’s floods.Good morning. We’re covering Donald Trump’s decision not to answer questions in a civil inquiry and details about the victims of Seoul’s floods.Donald Trump left Trump Tower in New York City yesterday. Brittainy Newman for The New York TimesTrump sidesteps legal questionsDonald Trump declined to answer questions in a civil inquiry into his company’s business practices yesterday, invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.He made the surprising gamble in a high-stakes legal interview with the New York attorney general’s office. His strategy is likely to determine the course of the investigation.Trump’s office released a statement shortly after the questioning began yesterday, explaining that he “declined to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution.” Here are live updates.Background: Since March 2019, the New York attorney general’s office has investigated whether Trump and his company improperly inflated the value of his hotels, golf clubs and other assets. Context: In his statement yesterday, Trump cast the inquiry as part of a grander conspiracy against him. He linked it to the F.B.I. search at Mar-a-Lago, his home and private club in Palm Beach, Fla., on Monday. Analysis: His sidestep could help him in a parallel criminal inquiry into whether he fraudulently inflated valuations of his properties.Smoke rose after explosions were heard near a Russian military air base in Crimea on Tuesday.ReutersDetails emerge about Crimea blastThe damage at a Russian air base in Crimea appears to be worse than the Kremlin initially claimed.After a series of explosions on Tuesday, Crimea’s leader declared a state of emergency and said that more than 250 people had to evacuate from their homes. Officials on the Russian-occupied peninsula said at least one person was killed and dozens more were wounded.Ukraine has not officially taken responsibility for the explosions. But a senior military official said Ukraine’s special forces and partisan resistance fighters were behind the blast. Here are live updates.Our Coverage of the Russia-Ukraine WarOn the Ground: After a summer of few conclusive battles, Ukraine and Russia are now facing a quandary over how to concentrate their forces, leaving commanders guessing about each other’s next moves.Nuclear Shelter: The Russian military is using а nuclear power station in southern Ukraine as a fortress, stymying Ukrainian forces and unnerving locals, faced with intensifying fighting and the threat of a radiation leak.Ukrainians Abroad: Italy already had the biggest Ukrainian community in Western Europe before the war, but Russia’s invasion put a spotlight on the diaspora and forged a stronger sense of national identity.Prison Camp Explosion: After a blast at a Russian detention camp killed at least 50 Ukrainian prisoners of war, Ukrainian officials said that they were building a case of a war crime committed by Russian forces.Analysis: The blasts could be important, because any Ukrainian attack on Russian forces in the Crimean Peninsula would be a significant expansion of Ukraine’s offensive efforts. Until now, Ukraine has focused on pushing Russians back from territories occupied after the invasion began.Nuclear plant: Russian missiles killed 13 people near a Russian-held nuclear plant in the south, a Ukrainian official said. Russia may try to divert its electricity to Crimea, which could intensify military competition for the plant and heighten the risk of an accident.Press: Russian investigators detained a former state television journalist yesterday, months after she staged a rare on-air protest against the war in Ukraine.Rescue officials pumped water out of this home in Seoul to find a family of three dead inside.Woohae Cho for The New York TimesSouth Korea mourns flood victimsHeavy rains caused flooding in the Seoul area, which killed at least nine people. A family of three, who lived in a semi-underground room, are among the dead: a 13-year-old girl, her mother, 47, and her aunt, 48.Their deaths highlight the predicament of South Korea’s urban poor, who often live in such homes, called banjiha. (“Parasite,” which won the Academy Award for Best Film ​in 2020, dramatically depicted their flood hazard.)South Korea faces a growing housing crisis and hundreds of thousands of people in the Seoul area live in similar damp, musty quarters. They fear floods each monsoon season, but stay to find jobs, save money and educate their children in hopes of overcoming South Korea’s growing inequality.Details: The family knew the low-lying district was prone to flooding. But it was cheap and close to a welfare center where the girl’s aunt, who had Down syndrome, could get help.Quotable: “When I returned home from work, I found my banjiha under water,” one resident wrote on the web portal Naver. “It felt as if heaven had crashed down on me.”THE LATEST NEWSAsia and the PacificA U.S. Navy ship conducting a routine operation in the Taiwan Strait.U.S. Pacific Command, via Associated PressThe U.S. said it would continue operating in the Taiwan Strait in response to Chinese military drills that U.S. officials say are evolving into long-term military pressure on the island.Fumio Kishida, Japan’s leader, reshuffled his cabinet yesterday, The Associated Press reported. The move, which happened a month after the assassination of Shinzo Abe, was an effort to distance his government from the controversial Unification Church.New polling showed that New Zealand’s right-leaning coalition could have enough support to form a government, The Guardian reported. Jacinda Ardern’s popularity has plummeted.The U.S. returned 30 looted cultural artifacts to Cambodia this week.U.S. NewsU.S. stocks jumped yesterday, following news that inflation slowed in July. Here are live updates.The Justice Department charged a member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard with plotting to kill John Bolton, a Trump-era national security adviser.An Afghan immigrant was charged in the shooting deaths of two fellow Muslims in Albuquerque.President Biden signed legislation to expand benefits for veterans who were exposed to toxic burn pits.World NewsAntony Blinken visited Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo.Pool photo by Andrew HarnikAntony Blinken, the U.S. secretary of state, pushed the Democratic Republic of Congo to reconsider its plans to auction parts of its rainforest to oil and gas companies. The countries agreed to jointly examine the proposed extractions.The U.S. and Iran are considering the E.U.’s “final” offer to restore the 2015 nuclear deal, before talks collapse for good.Britain faces another heat wave.An Emirati court overturned the sentence of an American rights lawyer who worked with Jamal Khashoggi. He is expected to be released.What Else Is HappeningIn several poor countries, a U.N. agency has joined with oil companies to protect drilling sites from residents’ objections.Roughly 100 days before the World Cup starts, FIFA is seeking a schedule change to let Qatar, the host nation, play in the first match.A stranded beluga whale died in France after a last-ditch mission to rescue it from the Seine river.Astronomers think they have found our galaxy’s youngest planet: It may be just 1.5 million years old, so young that its building blocks of gas and dust are still coming together.Canadians are flocking to see Serena Williams play after she announced her upcoming retirement from tennis.A Morning ReadImee Marcos, a sister of the president of the Philippines, is the film’s executive producer.Jam Sta Rosa/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFerdinand Marcos Jr. was elected president of the Philippines this year. Now, a new film paints a sympathetic portrait of his family. Instead of focusing on the torture, excess and martial law that characterized his father’s dictatorship, the film portrays the elder Marcos and his wife Imelda as victims of a political vendetta.In so doing, historians and artists say, the movie opens up a new front in the battle against misinformation in the Philippines, bringing a popular myth that circulated online during the recent election into a new, more credible domain.ARTS AND IDEASIn China’s Shandong Province, 558 memorial tablets at a Taoist temple were inscribed with the names and hometowns of people who died from Covid.Tingshu Wang/ReutersMourning Covid-19’s victimsThere have always been monuments to commemorate the loss of life from calamitous events: wars, genocides, terrorist attacks.But Covid-19 poses a unique challenge. Millions of people have died, but not in a singular event or in a single location. Now, as the death toll continues to rise, communities are building new monuments and updating existing memorials, trying to keep up with their mounting grief.“These are kind of odd memorials in that names are being added,” said Erika Doss, who studies how Americans use memorials. “They are kind of fluid. They are timeless.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookBryan Gardner for The New York TimesDrizzle seasoned drippings from this grilled chicken dish onto corn, tomatoes and red onions.What to Watch“Easter Sunday,” from the standup Jo Koy, is a charming Filipino American family comedy.TechnologyChange these default settings to make your devices more enjoyable to use.Now Time to PlayPlay today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Deep purple fruit (four letters).Here are today’s Wordle and today’s Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. “I let them talk”: Rick Rojas, a Times national correspondent, on how he covered the devastation of Kentucky’s floods.The latest episode of “The Daily” is about the F.B.I. search of Mar-a-Lago.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Stacey Abrams temporarily steps off the campaign trail after contracting the coronavirus.

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      Stacey Abrams, the Democratic nominee for governor of Georgia, tested positive for the coronavirus on Wednesday, taking her off the campaign trail temporarily in her race against Gov. Brian Kemp.Ms. Abrams, 48, confirmed her diagnosis on Twitter, writing that she took daily tests and had received a positive result Wednesday morning. “I’m experiencing mild symptoms, and I’m grateful to have been vaccinated and boosted,” she wrote.She said she planned to hold meetings by Zoom and phone for “the next few days,” and added that she had tested negative before delivering a speech Tuesday evening in Atlanta.A spokeswoman, Jaylen Black, said Ms. Abrams would still make a scheduled appearance on the Pod Save America podcast on Saturday, by phone, if she feels up to it. Before her diagnosis, she was also scheduled to attend the March for Our Lives Atlanta rally for gun violence prevention on Saturday, and Ms. Black said it was “undetermined at the moment” if she will be able to participate.“Consistent with C.D.C. guidelines, she will isolate at home and looks forward to traveling across the state to meet Georgians as soon as possible,” Ms. Black said, adding that the campaign would send surrogates to some events in Ms. Abrams’s absence and that she would not do any in-person events during the C.D.C.-recommended isolation period.Guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention instruct people with the virus to isolate for at least five days — though many people remain positive on rapid tests, and potentially contagious, for longer than that — and to continue to wear a mask around others through Day 10.Ms. Black confirmed that Ms. Abrams had tested negative on a rapid antigen test before her speech on Tuesday, and on a P.C.R. test on Monday.The race between Ms. Abrams and Mr. Kemp is a rematch of a 2018 contest that Ms. Abrams narrowly lost, falling short by about 1.5 percentage points. Election forecasters rate this year’s race as “lean Republican,” meaning it is competitive but Mr. Kemp is favored; recent independent polls have found him leading by low to mid-single digits.Ms. Abrams is known for her voting rights advocacy, but her campaign this year has focused heavily on Georgia-specific policy issues as well as abortion rights. Mr. Kemp has been emphasizing economic issues, including inflation and taxes. More

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      How Some Parents Changed Their Politics in the Pandemic

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      ORINDA, Calif. — They waved signs that read “Defeat the mandates” and “No vaccines.” They chanted “Protect our kids” and “Our kids, our choice.”Almost everyone in the crowd of more than three dozen was a parent. And as they protested on a recent Friday in the Bay Area suburb of Orinda, Calif., they had the same refrain: They were there for their children.Most had never been to a political rally before. But after seeing their children isolated and despondent early in the coronavirus pandemic, they despaired, they said. On Facebook, they found other worried parents who sympathized with them. They shared notes and online articles — many of them misleading — about the reopening of schools and the efficacy of vaccines and masks. Soon, those issues crowded out other concerns.“I wish I’d woken up to this cause sooner,” said one protester, Lisa Longnecker, 54, who has a 17-year-old son. “But I can’t think of a single more important issue. It’s going to decide how I vote.”Ms. Longnecker and her fellow objectors are part of a potentially destabilizing new movement: parents who joined the anti-vaccine and anti-mask cause during the pandemic, narrowing their political beliefs to a single-minded obsession over those issues. Their thinking hardened even as Covid-19 restrictions and mandates were eased and lifted, cementing in some cases into a skepticism of all vaccines.Nearly half of Americans oppose masking and a similar share is against vaccine mandates for schoolchildren, polls show. But what is obscured in those numbers is the intensity with which some parents have embraced these views. While they once described themselves as Republicans or Democrats, they now identify as independents who plan to vote based solely on vaccine policies.Their transformation injects an unpredictable element into November’s midterm elections. Fueled by a sense of righteousness after Covid vaccine and mask mandates ended, many of these parents have become increasingly dogmatic, convinced that unless they act, new mandates will be passed after the midterms.To back up their beliefs, some have organized rallies and disrupted local school board meetings. Others are raising money for anti-mask and anti-vaccine candidates like J.D. Vance, the Republican nominee for Senate in Ohio; Reinette Senum, an independent running for governor in California; and Rob Astorino, a Republican gubernatorial candidate in New York.In interviews, 27 parents who called themselves anti-vaccine and anti-mask voters described strikingly similar paths to their new views. They said they had experienced alarm about their children during pandemic quarantines. They pushed to reopen schools and craved normalcy. They became angry, blaming lawmakers for the disruption to their children’s lives.Many congregated in Facebook groups that initially focused on advocating in-person schooling. Those groups soon latched onto other issues, such as anti-mask and anti-vaccine messaging. While some parents left the online groups when schools reopened, others took more extreme positions over time, burrowing into private anti-vaccine channels on messaging apps like WhatsApp and Telegram.Eventually, some began questioning vaccines for measles and other diseases, where inoculations have long been proven effective. Activists who oppose all vaccines further enticed them by joining online parent groups and posting inaccurate medical studies and falsehoods.“So many people, but especially young parents, have come to this cause in the last year,” said Janine Pera, 65, a longtime activist against all vaccines who attended the Orinda protest. “It’s been a huge gift to the movement.”The extent of activity is evident on Facebook. Since 2020, more than 200 Facebook groups aimed at reopening schools or opposing closings have been created in states including Texas, Florida and Ohio, with more than 300,000 members, according to a review by The New York Times. Another 100 anti-mask Facebook groups dedicated to ending masking in schools have also sprung up in states including New Jersey, New York and Connecticut, some with tens of thousands of members.Since the outbreak of Covid-19, many Facebook groups have sprung up opposing mask mandates.Renée DiResta, a research manager at the Stanford Internet Observatory who has studied anti-vaccine activism, said the movement had indoctrinated parents into feeling “like they are part of their community, and that community supports specific candidates or policies.”Their emergence has confounded Republican and Democratic strategists, who worried they were losing voters to candidates willing to take absolute positions on vaccines and masks.“A lot of Democrats might think these voters are now unreachable, even if they voted for the party recently,” said Dan Pfeiffer, a Democratic political adviser to former President Barack Obama.Read More on Facebook and MetaA New Name: In 2021, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook would change its name to Meta, as part of a wider strategy shift toward the so-called metaverse that aims at introducing people to shared virtual worlds.Morphing Into Meta: Mr. Zuckerberg is setting a relentless pace as he leads the company into the next phase. But the pivot  is causing internal disruption and uncertainty.Zuckerberg’s No. 2: In June, Sheryl Sandberg, the company’s chief financing officer announced she would step down from Meta, depriving Mr. Zuckerberg of his top deputy.Tough Times Ahead: After years of financial strength, the company is now grappling with upheaval in the global economy, a blow to its advertising business and a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit.Nathan Leamer, who worked at the Federal Communications Commission during the Trump administration and is now vice president of public affairs at the firm Targeted Victory, said Republican candidates — some of whom have publicly been against Covid vaccine mandates — were better positioned to attract these voters. He pointed to last year’s surprise win in Virginia of Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, after he gained the support of young parents by invoking their frustration over Covid-driven school closures.Even so, Mr. Leamer said, these parents were a wild card in November. “The truth is that we don’t really know what these voters will do,” he said.‘I Found My People’Natalya Murakhver, 50, once considered herself a Democrat who prioritized environmental and food sustainability issues. Sam James, 41, said he was a Democrat who worried about climate change. Sarah Levy, 37, was an independent who believed in social justice causes.That was before the pandemic. In 2020, when the coronavirus swept in and led to lockdowns, Ms. Murakhver’s two daughters — Violet, 5, and Clementine, 9 — climbed the walls of the family’s Manhattan apartment, complaining of boredom and crying that they missed their friends.In Chicago, Mr. James’s two toddlers developed social anxiety after their preschool shuttered, he said. Ms. Levy said her autistic 7-year-old son watched TV for hours and stopped speaking in full sentences.“We were seeing real trauma happening because programs for children were shut down,” said Ms. Levy, a stay-at-home mother in Miami.But when they posted about the fears for their children on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, they were told to stop complaining, they said. Other parents called them “selfish” and “whiny.” Alienated, they sought other like-minded parents online.Many found a community on Facebook. New groups, mostly started by parents, were rapidly appearing on the social network, with people pushing for schools to reopen. In California, 62 Facebook groups dedicated to reopening or keeping elementary schools open popped up late last year, according to a review by The Times. There were 21 such groups in Ohio and 37 in New York. Most ranged in size from under 100 members to more than 150,000.Facebook, which is owned by Meta, declined to comment.The company has removed groups that spread misinformation about Covid-19 and vaccines.“We couldn’t stand by and watch our children suffer without their friends and teachers,” said Natalya Murakhver, a mother of two.Marko Dukic for The New York TimesMs. Murakhver joined some Facebook groups and became particularly active in one called “Keep NYC Schools Open,” which petitioned the city to open schools and keep them open through Covid surges. Last year, she became a group administrator, helping to admit new members and moderating discussions. The group swelled to 2,500 members.“We had the same cause to rally behind,” Ms. Murakhver said. “We couldn’t stand by and watch our children suffer without their friends and teachers.”In Chicago, Mr. James joined two Facebook groups pushing Chicago schools to reopen. In Miami, Ms. Levy jumped into national Facebook groups and discussed how to force the federal government to mandate that schools everywhere reopen.“I found my people,” Ms. Levy said. While she had been an independent, she said she found common ground with Republicans “who understood that for us, worse than the virus, was having our kid trapped at home and out of school.”Into the Online Rabbit HoleThe Facebook groups were just the beginning of an online journey that took some parents from more mainstream views of reopening schools toward a single-issue position.In Chico, Calif., Kim Snyder, 36, who has a 7-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son, said she was a longtime Republican. After her children had to stay home in the pandemic, she helped create a Facebook group in 2020 for Chico parents committed to reopening schools full-time.At the time, her local schools had partially reopened and children were learning both online and in-person, Ms. Snyder said. But frustration over hybrid learning was mounting, and schools were repeatedly shut down when Covid surged.By mid-2021, Ms. Snyder’s Facebook group had splintered. Some parents were satisfied with the safety measures and hybrid learning and stopped participating in online discussions, she said. Others were angry that they had not returned to a prepandemic way of living.Protesters demanded the removal of the indoor mask mandate for the Los Angeles Unified School District in March.Caroline Brehman/EPA, via ShutterstockMs. Snyder counted herself in the latter category. She channeled her discontent by attending in-person protests against mask requirements at public schools. At the rallies, she met activists who opposed all types of vaccines. She invited some to join her Facebook group, she said, “because we were all fighting for the same thing. We wanted a return to normalcy.”The focus of her Facebook group soon morphed from reopening schools to standing against masks in schools. By late last year, more content decrying every vaccine had also started appearing in the Facebook group.“I started to read more about how masks and vaccines were causing all this damage to our kids,” Ms. Snyder said.Scientific advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus vaccine shots are considered safe for young children. But Ms. Snyder said she became convinced they were wrong. She browsed other Facebook groups too, to meet more parents with similar beliefs.Activists posted statistics about Covid vaccines in those Facebook groups. Often that information came from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, a database maintained by the C.D.C. and the Food and Drug Administration, which allows anyone to submit data. The C.D.C. has warned that the database “cannot prove that a vaccine caused a problem.”Yet in a September 2021 post in Ms. Snyder’s Facebook group, parents pointed to VAERS figures that they said showed thousands of vaccine-induced deaths.“This is absolutely dangerous!” one parent wrote. “This hasn’t been really tested and is NOT NECESSARY….OMG!”Another post titled “If you want to really know what is going on, read this” linked to an article that falsely claimed vaccines could leave children sterile. The article was originally posted to a Facebook group named Children’s Health Defense, which supports an organization founded and chaired by the anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr.That tipped some parents into repudiating every vaccine, from chickenpox to hepatitis, and against vaccine mandates of any kind. A right to self-determination so that parents could decide what vaccines their children took was paramount.“For the first time, I began to look at the statistics and questioned whether all the vaccines I had previously given my kids made sense,” Ms. Snyder said.Soon she joined explicitly anti-vaccine Facebook groups that activists linked to, including ones supporting Children’s Health Defense. In those forums, parents seethed at the authorities, arguing they had no right to tell them what to do with their children’s bodies. Activists posted other links to Twitter and Telegram and urged parents to join them there, warning that Facebook often removed their content for misinformation.One link led to a Telegram channel run by Denise Aguilar, an anti-vaccine activist in Stockton, Calif. Ms. Aguilar, who speaks about her experiences as a mother on social media and on conservative podcasts, also runs a survivalist organization called Mamalitia, a self-described mom militia. She has more than 100,000 followers across her TikTok and Telegram channels.Early in the pandemic, Ms. Aguilar posted conspiracy theories about the coronavirus’s origins and questioned the effectiveness of masking. Now her messaging has changed to focus on political activism for the midterms. Denise Aguilar, right, an anti-vaccine activist, joined other activists in blocking the door to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office in Sacramento in September 2019.Rich Pedroncelli/Associated PressIn June, Ms. Aguilar encouraged her Telegram followers to vote for Carlos Villapudua, a Democrat running for California State Assembly who voted against a bill that would let children aged 12 and older get vaccinated without parental consent.“Patriots unite!” wrote Ms. Aguilar, who didn’t respond to a request for comment. “We need to support freedom loving Americans.”From Talk to ActionBy late last year, the talk among parent groups on Facebook, Telegram and Instagram had shifted from vaccine dangers to taking action in the midterms.Ms. Snyder said her involvement against vaccines would “100 percent determine” whom she voted for in November. She said she was disappointed in Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a Democrat who encouraged masking and promoted the coronavirus vaccines.In New York, Ms. Murakhaver, who previously supported candidates who favored strong environmental protection laws, said she would vote based solely on a candidate’s position on mandates on all children’s vaccines.The Facebook group she helped operate, Keep NYC Schools Open, has shut down. But Ms. Murakhaver remains close with activists she met through the group, chatting with them on Signal and WhatsApp. While her children were vaccinated against measles and other diseases when they were babies, she now opposes any mandate that would force other parents to inoculate their children.“I’m a single-issue voter now, and I can’t see myself supporting Democratic Party candidates unless they show they fought to keep our kids in school and let parents make decisions about masks and vaccines,” she said, adding that she prefers Mr. Astorino for New York governor over the Democratic incumbent, Kathy Hochul.While states including California have deferred bills requiring Covid-19 vaccines for students attending public schools, many parents said they worried the mandates would be passed after the midterms.“If we don’t show up and vote, these bills could come back in the future,” Ms. Snyder said.A “Defeat the Mandate” rally in April to protest vaccine mandates.Damian Dovarganes/Associated PressAt the Orinda demonstration in April, more than 50 people gathered outside the office of Steve Glazer, a Democratic state senator to oppose coronavirus vaccine mandates.One was Jessica Barsotti, 56, who has two teenagers and was at her first rally. Previously a Democrat, Ms. Barsotti said elected officials had let her family down during the pandemic and planned to cast her ballot in November for candidates who were against vaccine mandates.“If that is Republicans so be it. If it is independents, fine,” she said. “I’m not looking at their party affiliation but how they fall on this one issue. It’s changed me as a person and as a voter.” More

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      Small Business Owners Are Still Struggling in New York

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      “I feel like it’s 50-50,” said the owner of a Brooklyn coffee shop who is finding it hard to rebound from the pandemic.Good morning. It’s Friday. We’ll look at how small businesses are holding up as the city tries to move out of the pandemic. We’ll go kayaking with a congressional hopeful who is one of more than a dozen Democrats running in the Aug. 23 primary in just one district. And, speaking of the primary, today is the last day to register to vote in it.Lanna Apisukh for The New York TimesKymme Williams-Davis opened a coffee shop in Brooklyn called Bushwick Grind in 2015. She spent $200,000 renovating the space she rented and added a kitchen. She specialized in coffee brewed from locally roasted fair-trade beans.Bushwick Grind did well until the pandemic hit and the shop had to close for nine months.But as my colleague Lydia DePillis wrote, running a small business hasn’t gotten any easier since Bushwick Grind reopened. Foot traffic has yet to rebound. Williams-Davis’s expenses for coffee and other ingredients have skyrocketed, in part because farmers from upstate New York she used to depend on are saving on gas by driving to the city less often.And enough employees have quit to add another complication to the demands of trying to operate at full strength.All that has left her uncertain about the future and Bushwick Grind’s chances for survival. “I feel like it’s 50-50,” she said, “because if I don’t find a way to reduce my liability and retain capital, I won’t be able to make it too much longer.”Williams-Davis’s concerns are widespread. The nonprofit Small Business Majority, in a survey this month, found that nearly one in three small businesses could not survive without additional capital or a change in business conditions. That finding was echoed in a survey by Alignable, a social network for small-business owners, which found that 43 percent of small businesses in New York were in jeopardy of closing in the fall, 12 percentage points more than a year ago.Chuck Casto of Alignable blamed patchy return-to-work policies that have left many Manhattan offices empty and nearby small businesses hurting. Some 41 percent of small businesses in New York could not pay their rent in full or on time in July, according to Alignable. That was up seven percentage points from last month. Only Massachusetts had a higher delinquency rate, and by only one percentage point.During the shutdown, Williams-Davis covered the rent by subletting the space, and she landed a contract to deliver 400 meals a day to city vaccination sites when she reopened. The contract gave her the cash flow to qualify for a loan so she could buy her own space.But she hasn’t come close to closing on a deal. She has been outbid more than once by investors with deeper pockets.New York’s 2022 ElectionsAs prominent Democratic officials seek to defend their records, Republicans see opportunities to make inroads in general election races.N.Y. Governor’s Race: Following the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the issue of abortion rights has the potential to be a potent one in the battle between Gov. Kathy Hochul and Representative Lee Zeldin.10th Congressional District: Half a century after she became one of the youngest women ever to serve in Congress, Elizabeth Holtzman is running once again for a seat in the House of Representatives.12th Congressional District: As Representatives Jerrold Nadler and Carolyn Maloney, two titans of New York politics, battle it out, Suraj Patel is trying to eke out his own path to victory.This week the city announced a $1.5 million commitment to continue a public and private small-business outreach network that was created during the pandemic. The idea was to offer legal and technical assistance, among other things.“The hardest thing is this transition to a digital economy,” said Kathryn Wylde, the president of the Partnership for New York City, an influential business group that started the network, “because these are mostly brick-and-mortar businesses that did not have as sophisticated presence online or marketing capacity.”Kat Lloyd had much the same idea when she and a partner started a small business to do digital marketing for small businesses. Now, she said, “everybody else is struggling, so we’re struggling.”“I can’t hire more people to do the work I need — I need to focus on the bottom line,” said Lloyd, who like Williams-Davis is in Bushwick. “Every day for a few months, I woke up with this ball in my throat and a pit in my stomach about how I’m going to pay my landlord while I make sure my clients are taken care of.”WeatherExpect a partly sunny day with temps in the high 80s, with a chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon. The showers may continue into the evening, with temps dropping to the low 70s.ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKINGIn effect until Aug. 15 (Feast of the Assumption).The latest New York newsGov. Kathy Hochul, left, and Representative Lee Zeldin will be the only candidates on the New York ballot for governor.Jeenah Moon for The New York Times, Alyssa Schukar for The New York TimesThe two-party system: Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo championed changes in New York law that made it far more difficult for third parties to get on the ballot. For the first time in more than 75 years, only two candidates for governor are likely to appear on the ballot.The Supreme Court and guns: Public defenders say that the recent Supreme Court ruling last month expanding gun rights has left prosecutors without a case against their clients.Monkeypox: For gay and bisexual men in New York, the monkeypox crisis has echoes of the mistakes and discrimination of the early years of the AIDS crisis.‘Let’s go kayaking,’ said the candidateMary Inhea Kang for The New York TimesElizabeth Holtzman shattered glass ceilings and voted to impeach Richard Nixon when she was a congresswoman in the 1970s. Now she is running again, in a crowded primary field in the 10th Congressional District in Brooklyn and Manhattan. My colleague Nicholas Fandos not only interviewed her; he went kayaking with her. Here’s how he says that came about:Years ago, someone Elizabeth Holtzman did not know died and left modest bequests to her and two other pioneering congresswomen from New York, Bella Abzug and Shirley Chisholm.Holtzman, who was once the youngest woman elected to Congress, spent the money on a kayak, a dark green Walden that she uses in the summer to paddle around the Peconic River on eastern Long Island, where she often spends weekends.So when I first asked Holtzman this spring about her unusual decision to come out of a long political retirement and run for Congress at age 80, she suggested that perhaps we hit the water. As a political reporter, I’ve walked with candidates as they greeted voters outside supermarkets, in restaurants and at parades. I polished off plates of Mississippi ribs with a former cabinet secretary running in the Deep South. I even spent an afternoon in northern Montana with Senator Jon Tester as he tried to fix a grain auger, a large piece of farm equipment used to move his crops. But never before had a politician asked me to kayak.I am no kayaking expert, but of course I said yes to Holtzman.We agreed to meet at Pier 2 in Brooklyn Bridge Park on a sizzling summer evening earlier this month. We rented kayaks, snapped on life vests and headed out to a stretch of protected water off the Brooklyn waterfront. The Brooklyn Bridge floated above us. The skyline of the financial district towered across the East River, and there was a magical moment when the Statue of Liberty appeared across the harbor.Back on dry land a little later, she talked about deciding to get into the race because she was enraged by the leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade. “I said to myself, you know, I don’t have to sit on the sidelines,” she told me.If she wins, half a century after she set her first record, Holtzman would probably be the oldest non-incumbent ever elected to Congress. She is no stranger to long shots and record-breaking campaigns: Her victory in 1972 came against Emanuel Celler, a 50-year incumbent backed by the Brooklyn Democratic machine. Later, she was the first (and still only) woman elected district attorney in Brooklyn and New York City comptroller. (She was nearly New York’s first female senator, but lost to Alfonse D’Amato in 1980 in a close race.)Before we paddled back to Pier 2, we also talked about her family, Jewish immigrants who fled Russia and arrived at Ellis Island; about her work for Mayor John Lindsay; about the improving conditions in the East River; and about good kayaking spots around New York.Ms. Holtzman is keenly aware that, in a summer when Democrats are fretting about the age of President Biden and other Democratic leaders in Washington, there are concerns about her age. In the interview, she insisted she was every bit as vigorous as she once was. I asked if she was at all tired — a term she used to describe Celler in her first campaign.“You answer that question,” she said with a laugh, eventually adding, “I’m not tired. I’m not tired at all.”METROPOLITAN diaryA sidewalk suggestionDear Diary:A friend and I were walking along East 86th Street on a lovely spring afternoon. She was describing two outfits and asking my opinion about which one to wear to a fancy corporate dinner that evening.I was considering her choices when we heard a voice: “Wear the velvet jacket and silk pants.”Looking to our right, we saw a young woman pushing a baby carriage. Since we couldn’t decide which option was best, my friend took her advice.— Marilyn HillmanIllustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.Glad we could get together here. See you on Monday. — J.B.P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.Walker Clermont More

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      These Republican Governors Are Delivering Results, and Many Voters Like Them for It

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      Republican flamethrowers and culture warriors like Donald Trump and Representatives Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene typically draw an outsize amount of media attention.Americans may conclude from this that there is a striking, and perhaps unfortunate, relationship between extremism and political success.But Republicans aren’t hoping for a red wave in the midterms only because norm-thrashing or scandal sells. The truth is much more banal — yet also important for parties to internalize and better for politics generally: In states across the country, Republican governors are delivering real results for people they are physically more proximate to than federal officials.Now, it’s true that the party that controls the presidency nearly always gets whipped in midterm elections, and inflation would be a huge drag on any party in power. And it’s also true that among those governors are culture warriors like Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas.But people too often overlook the idea that actual results, especially ones related to pocketbook issues, can often be as important as rhetoric. Looked at that way, lots of Republicans — some with high public profiles, and some who fly below the radar — are excelling.Start with the simplest measure: popularity. Across the country, 13 of the 15 most popular governors are Republicans. That list does not just include red states. In fact, blue-state Republican governors like Phil Scott of Vermont, Charlie Baker of Massachusetts and Larry Hogan of Maryland are among the most popular.There are many reasons that G.O.P. governors seem to be succeeding. It’s true that governors can’t take credit for everything. Sometimes they just get lucky. But they do make policy choices, and particularly those made by governors since the start of Covid have made a difference.For example, take a look at the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics data on unemployment. In the 10 states with the lowest rates as of June, eight were led by Republican governors. Several governors who don’t make frequent appearances in national news stand out, like Pete Ricketts of Nebraska, Chris Sununu of New Hampshire, Spencer Cox of Utah and Phil Scott of Vermont. Their states have unemployment rates under 2.5 percent, and of the 20 states with the lowest unemployment rates, just four are led by Democrats.States with Republican governors have also excelled in economic recovery since the start of the pandemic. Standouts in this measure include Mr. Abbott and Doug Ducey of Arizona.These results reflect many things — some states have grown and others have shrunk, for example — but are at least in part a result of policy choices made by their elected leaders since the start of the pandemic. For example, governors like Kristi Noem in South Dakota often rejected lockdowns and economic closures.Republican governors were also far more likely to get children back to in-person school, despite intense criticism.Covid policy doesn’t explain everything. Fiscal governance has also made a difference. The Cato Institute’s Fiscal Report Card on America’s governors for 2020 (the most recent edition available), which grades them on tax and spending records, gives high marks to many Republicans. Nearly all of the top-ranked states in this report have Republican governors, like Kim Reynolds of Iowa or Mr. Ricketts. (Some Democratic governors also ranked highly, including Steve Sisolak of Nevada and Roy Cooper of North Carolina.) Some have made their mark with employer-attracting tax cuts; others with spending controls; others with a mixture.Most states mandate a balanced budget, so taxing and spending policies are important for fiscal stability. Low taxes tend to attract and keep employers and employees. Restrained budgets help ensure that taxes can be kept low, without sacrificing bond ratings, which may matter if debt-financed spending is needed in a crisis or to try to stimulate businesses to hire more.Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas has cut taxes for individuals, reduced the number of tax brackets and cut the corporate income tax rate. Mr. Sununu has restrained spending, vetoed a payroll tax proposal and cut business taxes. Brian Kemp of Georgia, by contrast, actually paused some tax cuts that had been scheduled — and focused almost exclusively on spending restraint, issuing a directive for state agencies to generate budget cuts and keeping 2020 general fund growth to a tiny 1 percent.Even in blue Vermont, Mr. Scott has constrained general fund spending — despite being an odd duck out among governors in that he is not constrained by a balanced-budget amendment — to rise by an annual average of just 2.4 percent between 2017 and 2020, and he has also cut taxes. He signed a bill to ensure that the federal tax reform instituted under Mr. Trump and limiting state and local tax deductions wouldn’t result in Vermonters getting hammered. He has also cut individual income tax rates, reduced the number of tax brackets and resisted new payroll taxes in favor of voluntary paid leave plans for private-sector employers.Republicans who have a big impact on the day-to-day lives of many Americans — unlike, say, Representative Kevin McCarthy or certainly Mr. Trump, and in terms of the quality of state economies, the local job market and education — are delivering. In our federalist system, a lot of power still sits with states and not the federal government and determines much about citizens’ lives.This is a big reason that Republicans are well-positioned heading into the midterms. It should be a warning to Joe Biden and Democrats — and to some of the culture warriors. Cable-news combat over whatever the outrage of the day is may deliver politicians the spotlight. But sound economic policy and focusing on the job, not theatrics, is delivering basic day-to-day results Americans want, need and will reward.Liz Mair (@LizMair), a strategist for campaigns by Scott Walker, Roy Blunt, Rand Paul, Carly Fiorina and Rick Perry, is the founder and president of Mair Strategies.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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      Mail Ballots Are at Issue as States Consider New Rules and Legal Action

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      As the nation prepares for yet another pandemic election, the rules for voting by mail remain a flash point in many states, a conflict that is being waged in courtrooms and state houses over Republican-backed restrictions.Here’s what happened this week:In North Carolina, the State Board of Elections rejected a signature-matching requirement for absentee ballots that was proposed by the state Republican Party. The measure, denied by a party-line vote on Thursday, would have let counties compare signatures on applications and return envelopes for absentee ballots with those on voter registration cards.The board’s three Democrats said that the verification method would conflict with state law and would contribute to voters being treated differently, which they cautioned would be unconstitutional. The panel’s two G.O.P. members contended that checking signatures “simply builds trust in the system.”North Carolina is not the only battleground state where Republicans and Democrats are clashing over mail-in ballots.Pennsylvania’s top election official, Leigh M. Chapman, a Democrat who is the acting secretary of the commonwealth, sued three counties on Tuesday over their refusal to include undated mail-in ballots in their official tallies from the May 7 primaries.A state court had directed counties in June to report two sets of tallies to Ms. Chapman’s office, one that included ballots without dates handwritten on their return envelopes as required by law and one that did not.The three counties — Berks, Fayette and Lancaster, which are controlled by Republicans — have prevented the state from completing its final certification of the primary results, state elections officials said.The lack of dates on ballot envelopes was a point of contention in the Republican Senate primary that was narrowly won by Dr. Mehmet Oz over David McCormick. Disputes over such ballots have resulted in legal action in state and federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.The conflict over mail-in voting is not limited to purple or red states.In deep-blue Massachusetts, the Supreme Judicial Court on Monday denied a lawsuit filed by the state Republican Party that had sought to block no-excuse mail-in voting from becoming permanent.The party had argued that voting by mail, made popular during the pandemic and codified as part of a law signed last month by Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, is unconstitutional.The court’s order in Massachusetts was not the only setback this week for Republicans.In Texas, a lawsuit challenging voting restrictions that were enacted in 2021 was for the most part allowed on Tuesday to move forward by a federal court judge in San Antonio.The secretary of state and state attorney general, offices held by Republicans, had sought to dismiss the legal action by several voting rights groups.The restrictions forbade balloting methods introduced in 2020 to make voting easier during the pandemic, including drive-through polling places and 24-hour voting. They also barred election officials from sending voters unsolicited absentee-ballot applications and from promoting the use of vote by mail.Voters must now provide their driver’s license number or the last four digits of their Social Security number on applications for mail-in ballots and on return envelopes. More