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      What Will Last Year’s Wins Mean for Democracy

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      Last year’s democratic wins could have big implications.Imagine if the U.S. and its allies had reacted less aggressively to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Without Western weapons to bolster its defenses, Ukraine could have fallen. Without Western sanctions, Russia might have felt little economic pressure. Such inaction would have sent a message: Western powers won’t stand up for other democracies.At one point, that scenario seemed plausible. After all, it’s what happened when Russia illegally annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 and after Russia invaded Georgia in 2008.Why am I writing about this now? Because the West’s enduring rally around Ukraine exemplifies an important trend from 2022 that could influence future global events: “This was the year liberal democracy fought back,” as Janan Ganesh wrote in The Financial Times.For years, democracies have become less representative. Some have fallen into authoritarian rule. Freedom House, which tracks the health of the world’s democracies, has called the decline a “long democratic recession.” But in 2022, small-d democrats fought back not just in Ukraine but also in Brazil, the U.S. and even authoritarian countries like Iran and China.It’s far too early to declare 2022 a turning point. Yet democracy experts, who are often a pessimistic group, are feeling more optimistic. “I tend to be the skunk at the garden party,” said Michael Abramowitz, president of Freedom House. “But I do think the story of the last year has been, if hopeful isn’t the right word, at least more mixed.”Today’s newsletter will look at how 2022 gave democracy a boost and the potential ramifications for the world.Fighting backIn several countries, people stood up against antidemocratic forces that had grown for years.In Brazil, former President Jair Bolsonaro, elected in 2018, initially suggested that he would reject the results if he lost re-election. But after he was defeated, Bolsonaro accepted a peaceful transition to the presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was sworn in on Sunday. Bolsonaro also criticized what he called an attempted “terrorist act” after police stopped one of his supporters from setting off a bomb in Brasília.In Iran, protests have continued for months against the country’s authoritarian government after a 22-year-old woman died in the custody of the morality police. They are the longest-running anti-government protests since the Islamic revolution of 1979, according to the BBC.In China, resentment over the country’s strict zero-Covid policies spilled over into unusually widespread protests that at times questioned the legitimacy of Xi Jinping’s rule. The Chinese government responded with a crackdown but also eased the Covid policies, partially giving in to the public’s demands.The demonstrations also revealed something bigger: Chinese propaganda has long argued that the country’s one-party model is more effective and efficient than the competitive systems of Western democracies. But China’s handling of Covid and the resulting economic downturn and public outcry show how the government blunders and causes big crises.The U.S. avoided some potential threats to democracy, too. Election deniers who lost midterm races accepted the results. Donald Trump, who continues to falsely question the outcome of the 2020 election, also saw his political prospects damaged after many of his endorsed candidates lost in the midterms.Looking aheadOne good year does not mean that the global democratic recession is over, experts cautioned.With support for Ukraine, “we are now seeing a fatigue,” said Jennifer McCoy, a political scientist at Georgia State University. Westerners could pull back support if it means dealing with higher energy prices for much longer, she added. “It is a question: How long will populations continue to sacrifice for this cause?”There are still other points of concern. India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, has overseen a deterioration in civil liberties, and the country’s independent news media has slowly collapsed. Indonesia passed a law last month restricting free speech. Israel’s new government could threaten judicial independence. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban won re-election after manipulating the rules in his favor. Coup attempts in Peru and Guinea-Bissau also exposed the fragility of democratic rule.But given the past few years of bad news, even a mixed year can be a welcome reprieve. “It was a much better year than it could have been — but from a very low bar,” said Rachel Kleinfeld, a senior fellow at Carnegie’s Democracy, Conflict and Governance Program.It’s hard to say where any of this will go. But 2022 showed that democrats can fight back.Related: A slice of the U.S. electorate broke with its own voting history to reject extremist Republican candidates — at least partly out of concern for the political system.THE LATEST NEWSCongressRepresentative Kevin McCarthy, left.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesRepresentative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader, is struggling to lock down the votes he needs to become House speaker today.Who could succeed if McCarthy fails? These are the Republicans to watch.Nancy Pelosi, the outgoing speaker, leaves a legacy that will be difficult to match.Brazilian authorities say they will revive a 2008 fraud case against Representative-elect George Santos.N.F.L. Damar Hamlin suffered cardiac arrest after being hit during a game last night.Joshua A. Bickel/Associated PressDamar Hamlin, a 24-year-old safety for the Buffalo Bills, is in critical condition after suffering cardiac arrest during a Monday-night game, the team said.Medical personnel revived Hamlin’s heartbeat, the Bills said.The game — against the Cincinnati Bengals — was postponed. Read the latest on The Athletic.Other Big StoriesUkrainian soldiers fire a mortar round toward in the Donetsk region.Nicole Tung for The New York TimesA Ukrainian attack killed dozens of Russian soldiers in the occupied Donetsk region, Moscow said, in one of the war’s deadliest single strikes against Russia.Trump saw the push to overturn the 2020 election as a financial opportunity and tried to trademark the phrase “Rigged Election,” according to the Jan. 6 committee’s final documents.A storm could bring ice storms, snow and tornadoes to the Midwest and the South.The actor Jeremy Renner had surgery and is in critical condition after a snow plowing accident, his representative said.The number of new U.S. citizens hit its highest annual mark in 15 years.OpinionsAmericans’ confidence in Congress will diminish if the House fails to elect a speaker on the first ballot, Brendan Buck writes.An unfairly arduous college admissions process means that many teenagers with mental health conditions end up at lower-quality schools, Emi Nietfeld says.MORNING READSJuan TamarizIbai Acevedo for The New York TimesMaestro: He made Spain the magic capital of the world.Astronomy: Expect solar eclipses this year. (Sync your calendar to never miss one.)Relationship quiz: How strong are your bonds?Alt-country music: Margo Price has a contrarian streak.Cloud storage: Keep a copy of your memories.Advice from Wirecutter: Browse the most popular kitchen tools.Lives Lived: Jeremiah Green was one of the founding members of Modest Mouse, an indie rock band known for its textured and wide-ranging sound. Green died at 45.SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETICThe 70-point club: The Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell became the sixth N.B.A. player to score 70 or more points in a contest with his 71-point, 11-assist outing against the Bulls. Cotton Bowl: Tulane pulled off a last-minute comeback win over U.S.C. and sealed the best season-to-season turnaround in F.B.S. history. ARTS AND IDEAS Jon Bois said he was “making sports documentaries for people who don’t watch sports.”Lila Barth for The New York TimesStatistics as riveting cinemaThe writer-director Jon Bois makes documentaries about seemingly unremarkable sports teams, but his films stand out. They’re full of graphs, charts and diagrams, bordering on scientific, Calum Marsh writes in The Times. Bois hopes to appeal to viewers who don’t watch a lot of sports.“I was one of the weird kids who actually liked high-school algebra,” Bois told The Times. “The ability to condense sports into a bar graph or a pie chart or a scatter plot — in a way, you can watch a thousand games in 10 seconds. It’s like a little time warp.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookJulia Gartland for The New York TimesA giant crisp and buttery almond croissant is easy to pull off.What to WatchWes Bentley deploys his knowledge of life’s difficulty in his role in “Yellowstone.”Where to GoIsland hopping in the Grenadines.Now Time to PlayThe pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were ineffective and infective. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Per person (four letters).And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — GermanP.S. Alaska became a state on this day in 1959.Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about McCarthy’s bid for speaker.Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson and Claire Moses contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      Lula asume la presidencia de Brasil, con Bolsonaro en Florida

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      Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva tomó posesión como el nuevo presidente de Brasil. Mientras tanto, el expresidente Jair Bolsonaro, quien enfrenta investigaciones, se refugia en Orlando.El presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva tomó las riendas del gobierno brasileño el domingo en una elaborada toma de posesión, que contó con una caravana de automóviles, un festival de música y cientos de miles de seguidores que llenaron la explanada central de Brasilia, la capital del país.Pero faltaba una persona clave: Jair Bolsonaro, el presidente saliente de extrema derecha.Se suponía que Bolsonaro iba a entregar a Lula la banda presidencial el domingo, un símbolo importante de la transición pacífica del poder en un país donde mucha gente aún recuerda los 21 años de una dictadura militar que terminó en 1985.En cambio, Bolsonaro se despertó el domingo a miles de kilómetros de distancia, en una casa alquilada propiedad de un luchador profesional de artes marciales mixtas a unos cuantos kilómetros de Disney World. Enfrentado a varias investigaciones por su gestión, Bolsonaro voló a Orlando el viernes por la noche y planea permanecer en Florida durante al menos un mes.Bolsonaro cuestionó durante meses la confiabilidad de los sistemas electorales de Brasil, sin pruebas, y cuando perdió en octubre, se negó a reconocerlo inequívocamente. En una especie de discurso de despedida el viernes, rompiendo semanas de un silencio casi absoluto, dijo que trató de impedir que Lula asumiera el cargo, pero fracasó.“Dentro de las leyes, respetando la Constitución, busqué una salida”, dijo. Luego pareció animar a sus partidarios a seguir adelante. “Vivimos en una democracia o no vivimos”, dijo. “Nadie quiere una aventura”.Una multitud de simpatizantes saluda a la comitiva del presidente de Brasil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, y su esposa, Rosângela da Silva, tras su toma de posesión en Brasilia el domingo.Dado Galdieri para The New York TimesEl domingo, Lula subió la rampa de acceso a las oficinas presidenciales con un grupo diverso de brasileños, entre ellos una mujer negra, un hombre discapacitado, un niño de 10 años, un hombre indígena y un trabajador de una fábrica. Una voz anunció entonces que Lula aceptaría la banda verde y amarilla del “pueblo brasileño”, y Aline Sousa, una recolectora de basura de 33 años, tomó el papel de Bolsonaro y colocó la banda al nuevo presidente.En un discurso ante el Congreso el domingo, Lula dijo que combatiría el hambre y la deforestación, levantaría la economía e intentaría unir al país. Pero también apuntó contra su predecesor, diciendo que Bolsonaro había amenazado la democracia de Brasil.“Bajo los vientos de la redemocratización, solíamos decir: ‘Dictadura nunca más’”, dijo. “Hoy, después del terrible desafío que hemos superado, debemos decir: ‘Democracia para siempre’”.El ascenso de Lula a la presidencia culmina una asombrosa remontada política. En su día fue el presidente más popular de Brasil, y dejó el cargo con un índice de aprobación superior al 80 por ciento. Luego cumplió 580 días en prisión, de 2018 a 2019, por cargos de corrupción relacionados con aceptar un departamento y renovaciones de empresas de construcción que licitaban contratos gubernamentales.Después de que esas condenas fueran anuladas porque el Supremo Tribunal Federal de Brasil dictaminó que el juez del caso de Lula había sido parcial, se postuló de nuevo para la presidencia, y ganó.Lula, de 77 años, y sus partidarios sostienen que fue víctima de una persecución política. Bolsonaro y sus partidarios dicen que Brasil tiene ahora un criminal como presidente.Cientos de miles de personas acudieron a Brasilia —la capital extensa y planificada que fue fundada en 1960 para albergar al gobierno brasileño—, muchos de ellos vestidos con el rojo vivo del izquierdista Partido de los Trabajadores de Lula.Simpatizantes del Presidente Lula vitorean durante su toma de posesión.Dado Galdieri para The New York TimesDurante el fin de semana, los pasajeros de los aviones cantaron canciones sobre Lula, los juerguistas bailaron samba en las fiestas de Año Nuevo y, por toda la ciudad, se oyeron gritos espontáneos desde balcones y esquinas, anunciando la llegada de Lula y la salida de Bolsonaro.“La toma de posesión de Lula tiene que ver sobre todo con la esperanza”, dijo Isabela Nascimento, de 30 años, una desarrolladora de software que acudió a las festividades el domingo. “Espero verlo representando no solo a un partido político, sino a toda una población: todo un grupo de personas que solo quieren ser más felices”.Sin embargo, en otras partes de la ciudad, miles de partidarios de Bolsonaro permanecieron acampados frente a la sede del ejército, como lo han estado desde las elecciones, muchos diciendo que estaban convencidos de que los militares evitarían que Lula asumiera el cargo el domingo.“El ejército tiene patriotismo y amor por el país y, en el pasado, el ejército hizo lo mismo”, dijo el sábado Magno Rodrigues, de 60 años, un mecánico y conserje retirado que da discursos diarios en las protestas, refiriéndose al golpe militar de 1964 que dio paso a la dictadura.Magno Rodrigues, de 60 años, mecánico y conserje retirado, ha pasado las últimas nueve semanas acampado frente al cuartel general del ejército brasileño, durmiendo en una tienda de campaña sobre una estrecha colchoneta con su esposa.Dado Galdieri para The New York TimesRodrigues ha pasado las últimas nueve semanas durmiendo con su esposa en una tienda de campaña en un colchón pequeño. Ofreció un recorrido por el campamento, convertido en una pequeña aldea desde que Bolsonaro perdió las elecciones. Cuenta con duchas, servicio de lavandería, estaciones de recarga de teléfonos celulares, un hospital y 28 puestos de comida.En gran medida, las protestas no han sido violentas —con más rezos que disturbios—, pero un pequeño grupo de personas ha incendiado vehículos. El gobierno de transición de Lula había dado a entender que los campamentos no se tolerarían durante mucho más tiempo.¿Cuánto tiempo estaba Rodrigues dispuesto a quedarse? “El tiempo que haga falta para liberar a mi país”, dijo. “El resto de mi vida si es necesario”.La ausencia de Bolsonaro y la presencia de miles de manifestantes que creen que la elección fue robada ilustran la profunda división y los enormes desafíos que enfrenta Lula en su tercer mandato como presidente del país más grande de América Latina y una de las mayores democracias del mundo.Lula presidió el auge económico de Brasil entre 2003 y 2011, pero el país no estaba tan polarizado entonces y los vientos económicos eran mucho más promisorios. La elección de Lula culmina una ola izquierdista en América Latina, en la que desde 2018 seis de los siete países más grandes de la región eligieron a líderes de izquierda, impulsados por una reacción contra los mandatarios en el poder.Una gran multitud se reunió para la toma de posesión el domingo en la capital de Brasil.Silvia Izquierdo/Associated PressLa decisión de Bolsonaro de pasar al menos las primeras semanas de la presidencia de Lula en Florida muestra su inquietud sobre su futuro en Brasil. Bolsonaro, de 67 años, está vinculado a cinco investigaciones separadas, entre ellas, una sobre la divulgación de documentos relacionados con una investigación clasificada, otra sobre sus ataques a las máquinas de votación de Brasil y otra sobre sus posibles conexiones con “milicias digitales” que difunden desinformación en su nombre.Como ciudadano común, Bolsonaro perderá ahora la inmunidad procesal que tenía como presidente. Algunos casos en su contra probablemente serán trasladados del Supremo Tribunal Federal a las cortes locales.Algunos de los principales fiscales federales que han trabajado en los casos creen que hay pruebas suficientes para condenar a Bolsonaro, particularmente en el caso relacionado con la divulgación de material clasificado, según un alto fiscal federal que habló bajo condición de anonimato para discutir investigaciones confidenciales.El domingo, Lula dijo al Congreso que Bolsonaro podría enfrentar consecuencias. “No tenemos ningún ánimo de revancha contra quienes intentaron someter a la nación a sus planes personales e ideológicos, pero garantizaremos el imperio de la ley”, dijo. “Quien erró responderá por sus errores”.Es poco probable que la presencia de Bolsonaro en Estados Unidos pueda protegerlo de ser procesado en Brasil. Aun así, Florida se ha convertido en una especie de refugio para los brasileños conservadores en los últimos años.Comentaristas prominentes de algunos de los programas de entrevistas más populares de Brasil tienen su sede en Florida. Un provocador de extrema derecha que se enfrenta a la detención en Brasil por amenazar a jueces ha vivido en Florida mientras espera una respuesta a su solicitud de asilo político en Estados Unidos. Y Carla Zambelli, una de las principales aliadas de Bolsonaro en el Congreso de Brasil, huyó a Florida durante casi tres semanas después de que fuera filmada persiguiendo a un hombre a punta de pistola en la víspera de las elecciones.El expresidente Jair Bolsonaro, tercero desde la derecha, llegando a votar en Río de Janeiro en octubre. El viernes partió hacia Estados Unidos.Maria Magdalena Arrellaga para The New York TimesBolsonaro planea permanecer en Florida de uno a tres meses, lo que le da cierta distancia para observar si el gobierno de Lula impulsará alguna de las investigaciones en su contra, según un amigo cercano de la familia Bolsonaro que habló bajo condición de anonimato para discutir planes privados. El gobierno brasileño también autorizó a cuatro ayudantes a pasar un mes en Florida con Bolsonaro, según un aviso oficial.El sábado, Bolsonaro saludó a sus nuevos vecinos en la entrada de su casa alquilada en Orlando, muchos de ellos inmigrantes brasileños que se tomaron selfis con el presidente saliente. Luego fue a comer a un KFC.No es infrecuente que ex jefes de Estado vivan en Estados Unidos para ocupar cargos académicos o similares. Pero no es habitual que un jefe de Estado busque refugio en Estados Unidos ante un posible enjuiciamiento en su país, especialmente cuando el país de origen es un aliado democrático de Estados Unidos.Bolsonaro y sus aliados argumentan que es un objetivo político de la izquierda brasileña y, en particular, del Supremo Tribunal Federal de Brasil. Han abandonado en gran medida las afirmaciones de que las elecciones fueron amañadas debido al fraude electoral, pero en su lugar ahora afirman que fueron injustas porque Alexandre de Moraes, un juez del Supremo Tribunal que encabeza el organismo electoral de Brasil, inclinó la balanza a favor de Lula.Un campamento de partidarios de Bolsonaro se ha convertido en una pequeña ciudad frente al cuartel general del ejército en Brasilia.Dado Galdieri para The New York TimesDe Moraes fue un actor activo en las elecciones, al suspender las cuentas de redes sociales de muchos de los partidarios de Bolsonaro y conceder a Lula más tiempo en televisión debido a declaraciones engañosas en los anuncios políticos de Bolsonaro. De Moraes ha dicho que necesitaba actuar para contrarrestar las posturas antidemocráticas de Bolsonaro y sus partidarios. A algunos juristas les preocupa que haya abusado de su poder, al actuar a menudo de forma unilateral en formas que van mucho más allá de las de un típico juez del Supremo Tribunal.Aun así, Bolsonaro se ha enfrentado a críticas generalizadas, tanto en la derecha como en la izquierda, por su respuesta a su derrota electoral. Después de insinuar durante meses que rebatiría cualquier derrota, encendiendo a sus partidarios y preocupando a sus críticos, se mantuvo en silencio y se negó a reconocer públicamente la victoria de Lula. Su gobierno llevó a cabo la transición mientras él se alejaba de los focos y de muchas de sus funciones oficiales.El sábado por la noche, en su discurso de despedida a la nación, incluso su vicepresidente, Hamilton Mourão, un general retirado, dejó clara su opinión sobre los últimos momentos de Bolsonaro como presidente.“Líderes que deberían tranquilizar y unir a la nación en torno a un proyecto de país han dejado que su silencio o su protagonismo inoportuno y dañino creen un clima de caos y desintegración social”, dijo Mourão.Jack Nicas es el jefe de la corresponsalía del Times en Brasil, que abarca Brasil, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay y Uruguay. Antes cubría tecnología desde San Francisco. Antes de unirse al Times, en 2018, trabajó durante siete años en The Wall Street Journal. @jacknicas • Facebook More

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      Lula Becomes Brazil’s President, With Bolsonaro in Florida

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      Brazil inaugurates its new president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, on Sunday. Facing investigations, former President Jair Bolsonaro has taken refuge in Orlando. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took the reins of the Brazilian government on Sunday in an elaborate inauguration, complete with a motorcade, music festival and hundreds of thousands of supporters filling the central esplanade of Brasília, the nation’s capital.But one key person was missing: the departing far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro.Mr. Bolsonaro was supposed to pass Mr. Lula the presidential sash on Sunday, an important symbol of the peaceful transition of power in a nation where many people still recall the 21-year military dictatorship that ended in 1985.Instead, Mr. Bolsonaro woke up Sunday 6,000 miles away, in a rented house owned by a professional mixed-martial-arts fighter a few miles from Disney World. Facing various investigations from his time in his office, Mr. Bolsonaro flew to Orlando on Friday night and plans to stay in Florida for at least a month.Mr. Bolsonaro had questioned the reliability of Brazil’s election systems for months, without evidence, and when he lost in October, he refused to concede unequivocally. In a sort of farewell address on Friday, breaking weeks of near silence, he said that he tried to block Mr. Lula from taking office but failed.“Within the laws, respecting the Constitution, I searched for a way out of this,” he said. He then appeared to encourage his supporters to move on. “We live in a democracy or we don’t,” he said. “No one wants an adventure.”A crowd of well-wishers greeted the motorcade of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil and his wife, Rosangela da Silva, after his swearing-in in Brasília on Sunday.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesOn Sunday, Mr. Lula ascended the ramp to the presidential offices with a diverse group of Brazilians, including a Black woman, a disabled man, a 10-year-old boy, an Indigenous man and a factory worker. A voice then announced that Mr. Lula would accept the green-and-yellow sash from “the Brazilian people,” and Aline Sousa, a 33-year-old garbage collector, played the role of Mr. Bolsonaro and placed the sash on the new president.In an address to Congress on Sunday, Mr. Lula said that he would fight hunger and deforestation, lift the economy and try to unite the country. But he also took aim at his predecessor, saying that Mr. Bolsonaro had threatened Brazil’s democracy.“Under the winds of redemocratization, we used to say, ‘Dictatorship never again,’” he said. “Today, after the terrible challenge we’ve overcome, we must say, ‘Democracy forever.’”Mr. Lula’s ascension to the presidency caps a stunning political comeback. He was once Brazil’s most popular president, leaving office with an approval rating above 80 percent. He then served 580 days in prison, from 2018 to 2019, on corruption charges that he accepted a condo and renovations from construction companies bidding on government contracts.Brazil’s New PresidentLula Returns: Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva takes the reins of Latin America’s largest nation 20 years after his first presidential term. He will lead a country that has drastically changed.Bolsonaro Flees: Jair Bolsonaro, the departing far-right president, has taken refuge in Orlando as he faces various investigations from his time in his office.Climate Challenges: Mr. Lula, who made climate a cornerstone of his campaign, has pledged to protect the Amazon rainforest. Here are his other plans to tackle climate change.Lessons in Democracy: The United States and Brazil both had presidents who attacked their elections. But their responses — and the aftermaths — differed greatly.After those convictions were thrown out because Brazil’s Supreme Court ruled that the judge in Mr. Lula’s case was biased, he ran for the presidency again — and won.Mr. Lula, 77, and his supporters maintain that he was the victim of political persecution. Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters say that Brazil now has a criminal as president.In Brasília, hundreds of thousands of people streamed into the sprawling, planned capital, founded in 1960 to house the Brazilian government, with many dressed in the bright red of Mr. Lula’s leftist Workers’ Party.Supporters of President Lula cheered during his inauguration.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesOver the weekend, passengers on arriving planes broke into rally songs about Mr. Lula, revelers danced to samba at New Year’s Eve parties and, across the city, spontaneous cries rang out from balconies and street corners, heralding Mr. Lula’s arrival and Mr. Bolsonaro’s exit.“Lula’s inauguration is mainly about hope,” said Isabela Nascimento, 30, a software developer walking to the festivities on Sunday. “I hope to see him representing not only a political party, but an entire population — a whole group of people who just want to be happier.”Yet elsewhere in the city, thousands of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters remained camped outside the army headquarters, as they have been since the election, many saying they were convinced that at the final moment on Sunday, the military would prevent Mr. Lula from taking office..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}What we consider before using anonymous sources. Do the sources know the information? What’s their motivation for telling us? Have they proved reliable in the past? Can we corroborate the information? Even with these questions satisfied, The Times uses anonymous sources as a last resort. The reporter and at least one editor know the identity of the source.Learn more about our process.“The army has patriotism and love for the country, and in the past, the army did the same thing,” Magno Rodrigues, 60, a former mechanic and janitor who gives daily speeches at the protests, said on Saturday, referring to the 1964 military coup that ushered in the dictatorship.Magno Rodrigues, 60, a former mechanic and janitor, has spent the past nine weeks camped outside the Brazilian Army headquarters, sleeping in a tent on a narrow pad with his wife. Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesMr. Rodrigues has spent the past nine weeks sleeping in a tent on a narrow pad with his wife. He provided a tour of the encampment, which had become a small village since Mr. Bolsonaro lost the election. It has showers, a laundry service, cellphone-charging stations, a hospital and 28 food stalls.The protests have been overwhelmingly nonviolent — with more praying than rioting — but a small group of people have set fire to vehicles. Mr. Lula’s transitional government had suggested that the encampments would not be tolerated for much longer.How long was Mr. Rodrigues prepared to stay? “As long as it takes to liberate my country,” he said. “For the rest of my life if I have to.”The absence of Mr. Bolsonaro and the presence of thousands of protesters who believe the election was stolen illustrate the deep divide and tall challenges that Mr. Lula faces in his third term as president of Latin America’s biggest country and one of the world’s largest democracies.He oversaw a boom in Brazil from 2003 to 2011, but the country was not nearly as polarized then, and the economic tailwinds were far stronger. Mr. Lula’s election caps a leftist wave in Latin America, with six of the region’s seven largest countries electing leftist leaders since 2018, fueled by an anti-incumbent backlash.A large crowd gathered for the inauguration on Sunday in Brazil’s capital.Silvia Izquierdo/Associated PressMr. Bolsonaro’s decision to spend at least the first weeks of Mr. Lula’s presidency in Florida shows his unease about his future in Brazil. Mr. Bolsonaro, 67, is linked to five separate inquiries, including one into his release of documents related to a classified investigation, another on his attacks on Brazil’s voting machines and another into his potential connections to “digital militias” that spread misinformation on his behalf.As a regular citizen, Mr. Bolsonaro will now lose the prosecutorial immunity he had as president. Some cases against him will probably be moved to local courts from the Supreme Court.Some top federal prosecutors who have worked on the cases believe there is enough evidence to convict Mr. Bolsonaro, particularly in the case related to the release of classified material, according to a top federal prosecutor who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential investigations.On Sunday, Mr. Lula told Congress that Mr. Bolsonaro could face consequences. “We have no intention of revenge against those who tried to subjugate the nation to their personal and ideological plans, but we will guarantee the rule of law,” he said. “Those who have done wrong will answer for their mistakes.”It is unlikely that Mr. Bolsonaro’s presence in the United States could protect him from prosecution in Brazil. Still, Florida has become a sort of refuge for conservative Brazilians in recent years.Prominent pundits on some of Brazil’s most popular talk shows are based in Florida. A far-right provocateur who faces arrest in Brazil for threatening judges has lived in Florida as he awaits a response to his political asylum request in the United States. And Carla Zambelli, one of Mr. Bolsonaro’s top allies in Brazil’s Congress, fled to Florida for nearly three weeks after she was filmed pursuing a man at gunpoint on the eve of the election.President Jair Bolsonaro, third from right, arriving to vote in Rio de Janeiro in October. On Friday he left for the United States.Maria Magdalena Arrellaga for The New York TimesMr. Bolsonaro plans to stay in Florida for one to three months, giving him some distance to observe whether Mr. Lula’s administration will push any of the investigations against him, according to a close friend of the Bolsonaro family who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private plans. The Brazilian government has also authorized four aides to spend a month in Florida with Mr. Bolsonaro, according to an official notice.On Saturday, Mr. Bolsonaro greeted his new neighbors in the driveway of his rented Orlando house, many of them Brazilian immigrants who took selfies with the departing president. He then went to a KFC to eat. It is not uncommon for former heads of state to live in the United States for posts in academia or similar ventures. But it is unusual for a head of state to seek safe haven in the United States from possible prosecution at home, particularly when the home country is a democratic U.S. ally. Mr. Bolsonaro and his allies argue that he is a political target of Brazil’s left and particularly Brazil’s Supreme Court. They have largely dropped claims that the election was rigged because of voter fraud but instead now claim that it was unfair because Alexandre de Moraes, a Supreme Court justice who runs Brazil’s election agency, tipped the scales for Mr. Lula.An encampment of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters has turned into a village outside the army headquarters in Brasília.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesMr. Moraes was an active player in the election, suspending the social-media accounts of many of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters and granting Mr. Lula more television time because of misleading statements in Mr. Bolsonaro’s political ads. Mr. Moraes has said he needed to act to counter the antidemocratic stances of Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters. Some legal experts worry that he abused his power, often acting unilaterally in ways that go far beyond that of a typical Supreme Court judge.Still, Mr. Bolsonaro has faced widespread criticism, on both the right and the left, for his response to his election loss. After suggesting for months he would dispute any loss — firing up his supporters and worrying his critics — he instead went silent, refusing to acknowledge Mr. Lula’s victory publicly. His administration carried out the transition as he receded from the spotlight and many of his official duties.On Saturday night, in his departing speech to the nation, even his vice president, Hamilton Mourão, a former general, made clear his views on Mr. Bolsonaro’s final moments as president.“Leaders that should reassure and unite the nation around a project for the country have let their silence or inopportune and harmful protagonism create a climate of chaos and social disintegration,” Mr. Mourão said. More

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      ¿El mundo se está acabando? ¿O solo es el miedo?

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      ¿Qué podemos decir de este último año en Estados Unidos? Hay quien afirma que esto es el fin, o el principio del fin; que la infraestructura de nuestra democracia se está desmoronando; que los sismos de la economía auguran un colapso y que el riesgo nuclear en la guerra rusa contra Ucrania podría combustionar y provocar algo mucho mayor. En cambio, otros dicen que, a pesar de todas estas tensiones, en realidad estamos viendo cómo se sostiene el sistema, que la democracia prevalece y que el peligro se está disipando.Esos argumentos se pueden calificar de histéricos, displicentes o ajenos a la realidad, pero también se pueden plantear de manera abierta y franca. Quizás estemos de verdad al borde de algo peor, como en algunos largos periodos del siglo XX, y quizás así era como se sentía la gente en esas épocas sobre las cuales has leído. ¿Se está acabando el mundo tal como lo conocíamos? ¿Lo sabrías, siquiera, antes de que fuera demasiado tarde, antes de que en efecto se hubiera acabado?En 2022, podíamos ver cómo el discurso oscilaba entre el apocalipsis y la relativización, y entre el pánico y la cautela, en la política, en los medios, en Twitter e Instagram, en mensajes de texto, en persona, dentro y fuera de facciones ideológicas, sobre la guerra en Europa, el estado de la democracia estadounidense, el iliberalismo y el posible repliegue del globalismo, la violencia, la COVID-19, la inteligencia artificial, la inflación y los precios de la energía y el criptocontagio. Hay versiones profundas de este debate, y luego hay versiones reduccionistas que se entrevén en los comentarios de Instagram, o en una columna de opinión, que interpretan todo mal. Este debate incluso lo puede mantener una persona consigo misma.Lo más probable es que ya estés al tanto de las posibilidades apocalípticas respecto a la democracia estadounidense. Fundamentalmente, este país no funciona si el traspaso pacífico del poder no funciona. Este país no funciona, y no funcionó en la memoria reciente, si la gente no puede votar. Y puede haber un umbral a partir del cual deje de funcionar si el suficiente número de personas desconfía de los resultados electorales. Estas cuestiones existenciales se han canalizado ahora en problemas concretos: en 2022, hubo gente que llamó a las oficinas de campaña electoral y dejó amenazas de muerte; gente con equipo táctico apostada ante las urnas; y oficinas de campaña que instalaron cristales antibalas. Los republicanos mandaron candidatos a Arizona y Pensilvania que se postularon con la premisa de que en este país las elecciones son una mentira. Millones de personas vieron las audiencias sobre el 6 de enero donde se indagó en lo caóticos y precarios que fueron en realidad los últimos días de la Casa Blanca de Trump.Después, en este frágil paisaje de confianza, estaban las cortes. En verano, la Corte Suprema anuló completamente el caso Roe contra Wade, sentencia que se esperaba desde tiempo atrás, pero que aun así pareció conmocionar hasta a las personas que estaban a favor, incluso después de la surrealista publicación de un borrador de la opinión de la Corte en la primavera. Que eso llegara a suceder —que de pronto una mujer tuviera que ir a otro estado a realizarse un aborto para no arriesgarse a morir a causa de las complicaciones— no solo comportó ese tipo de consecuencias tangibles en mil momentos privados de la vida las personas, sino que también abrió un mundo de otras posibilidades que podrían ocurrir. Quizá la Corte revoque la igualdad del matrimonio. O refrende la rebuscada teoría de la “legislatura estatal independiente”, adoptada por un grupo de derechistas y que consiste en ampliar los poderes de las legislaturas estatales para celebrar elecciones, con el peligro de desestabilizar todo el sistema.Todos estos acontecimientos fueron aparejados de un discurso desorientador, de alto riesgo, sobre cómo y cuánto hablar de las teorías de la conspiración y las amenazas antidemocráticas. Sabemos que lo que dice la gente —lo que decimos— en las redes sociales, y por supuesto en los medios de comunicación, moldea la percepción de los demás sobre la política, pero de un modo difícil de medir, y saber esto puede convertir cada artículo o mensaje en las redes en una oportunidad o un error. Hubo articulistas que sostuvieron que centrarse excesivamente en la democracia podría ahuyentar a los votantes, en vez de persuadirlos, o incluso corromper las instituciones al entremezclar las preocupaciones constitucionales con las de índole partidista.Después estuvo el mundo más allá del discurso, donde nadie pudo controlar gran cosa más allá de un solo hombre. Desde la anexión de Crimea en 2014 y la tibieza con que respondió Occidente a ella, la gente llevaba meses, y años, advirtiendo de que Vladimir Putin ordenaría la invasión total de Ucrania. Y entonces ocurrió. No hay muchas personas, en Rusia u otras partes, que parezcan querer esto, más allá de Putin, pero eso no impidió que Ucrania se convirtiera en el tipo de lugar donde un niño tiene que averiguar por sí mismo que los soldados han fusilado a su madre y a su padrastro porque nadie sabe cómo decírselo; donde la gente tenía que beberse el agua de los radiadores para mantenerse con vida; donde, al reflexionar sobre las salvajes muertes en la ciudad, alguien puede acabar señalando con tristeza que “en teoría, los organismos internacionales tienen la autoridad de procesar los crímenes de guerra donde y cuandoquiera que se produzcan”.La rápida transición desde la invasión como algo esperado pero hipotético a algo muy real, con muertes innecesarias y millones de ucranianos y rusos teniendo que dejar sus casas quizá para siempre, abrió otras siniestras posibilidades. Parecía una cuestión existencial, primero para Ucrania, y después para el resto de Europa del este. La alianza de la OTAN podía fracturarse, en el caso de una escalada. La posibilidad de que China invadiera Taiwán —y de una guerra total a escala mundial— pareció de pronto más fácil de concebir, incluso de esperar. Las armas nucleares pasaron a ser algo en lo que gente piensa, en serio. Y, de forma más inmediata, pareció que las interrupciones en el suministro de gas y baterías y en la producción y distribución del grano iban a causar estragos a lo largo y ancho de los países.De debatir si la inflación pospandémica podría ser transitoria se pasó a plantear si podría parecerse a la de la década de 1970, con las dificultades de la estanflación y las escaseces de energía; después, de si la quiebra de las criptomonedas podría recordar a la del mercado inmobiliario en la década de 2000; qué consecuencias políticas y de otro tipo podría tener el disparo de los precios; y, peor aún, que los precios del grano puedan provocar una ola de hambrunas en todo el mundo. En Odd Lots, el pódcast sobre finanzas de Bloomberg, los presentadores señalan con frecuencia que se ha producido una “tormenta perfecta” de condiciones para la crisis: en la logística del comercio marítimo, en los precios del café, en la menor producción de cobre, en las dificultades de empezar a extraer más petróleo. Todo parece haberse estropeado o torcido un poco al mismo tiempo. ¿Se trata de un intenso periodo de acontecimientos inusuales, o de un momento de calma antes de que todas las piezas interconectadas colapsen?Y esto sin contar otras preocupaciones más profundas que tienen las personas, y que también contribuyen a generar la sensación de desintegración social: la depresión y la ansiedad entre los adolescentes, el descenso de nivel en lectura y matemáticas, la omnipresencia del fentanilo y el resurgimiento del antisemitismo y la violencia anti-LGBTQ. La policía tardó una hora en intervenir mientras un joven disparaba contra niños. Jóvenes que disparan a los clientes de una tienda de comestibles porque eran negros; clientes que lo hacen en un club gay y trans; y también jugadores de fútbol universitario, después de una excursión para ver un partido. Vidas truncadas en un contexto de normalidad, y pocas cosas pueden hacer sentir más a la gente que el mundo se acaba.Existe una razón por la que a muchas personas les preocupa una mayor soledad social, la cual es difícil de definir y más aún de subsanar. Existe una razón por la que muchas personas dicen que es como caminar en medio de la niebla. “Por ahora, estamos vivos en el fin del mundo, traumatizados por los titulares y las alarmas del reloj”, escribió el poeta Saeed Jones en su poemario más reciente.A pesar de todo este dolor y esta nefasta posibilidad, algunas noticias han desafiado las expectativas. Rusia no se ha llevado Ucrania por delante; Estados Unidos y Europa se mantienen unidos; la gente celebra en la retirada de las tropas rusas de sus ciudades sin luz. Muchos de los grandes exponentes de las teorías conspirativas sobre las elecciones en Estados Unidos —y en especial quienes querían hacerse con las riendas de la burocracia electoral— perdieron en los estados más importantes de cara al traspaso de poderes presidenciales. El colapso de las grandes plataformas de intercambio de criptomonedas no se ha extendido, por ahora, a todo el sistema financiero. La Corte Suprema pareció escéptica este mes respecto a la teoría de las legislaturas estatales, aunque en realidad no podremos confirmarlo hasta el año que viene. No ha habido violencia o agitación generales en la jornada electoral o en reacción a los resultados.Tal vez a los seres humanos se nos ha infravalorado frente a la inteligencia artificial, como apuntó mi colega Farhad Manjoo; hubo un avance en la fusión nuclear, aunque el desarrollo a partir de ahí podría ser verdaderamente complicado; es muy probable que pronto se administre una vacuna contra la malaria que pueda transformar el modo de propagación de la enfermedad. Algunas de las predicciones más funestas sobre el cambio climático podrían resultar al final haber sido demasiado funestas. Como escribió mi colega David Wallace-Wells este año: “El margen de posibles futuros climáticos se está reduciendo, y, por tanto, nos estamos haciendo una mejor idea de lo que vendrá: un nuevo mundo, lleno de disrupciones, pero también de miles de millones de personas que vivirán con un clima que distará de ser normal, pero también, afortunadamente, del verdadero apocalipsis climático”.Él sostiene que, en parte, algunos de esos mejores resultados se derivan de la movilización a causa de un profundo temor. Esto va ligado a la misteriosa relación entre las advertencias ominosas y los resultados positivos, a ese miedo que puede mitigar la causa del miedo. Quizá fue eso lo que impidió ganar las elecciones a los teóricos conspirativos a ultranza: que los votantes indecisos visualizaron el funesto panorama de lo que podría pasar y decidieron actuar. O quizá solo quieren más estabilidad; quizá mucha gente la quiere.Esta es, en teoría, la razón por la que la gente debate sobre el carácter de nuestros problemas y su gravedad en Twitter y en lugares como The New York Times: la respuesta. El debate científico privado y público sobre, por ejemplo, la gravedad de una nueva variante de un virus tiene el potencial de guiar la respuesta del gobierno y de la sociedad.Pero no puede bastar con eso, ciertamente, porque la mayoría de este tipo de conversaciones no se mantienen con la expectativa de que Joe Biden esté escuchándolas.Oír hablar de que el mundo se acaba, o que te digan que deberías calmarte, puede ser absolutamente exasperante si no tienes el ánimo para ello: la persona que parece demasiado alarmista, cuyo pánico te crispa los nervios o se filtra en tu psique y se adhiere a todas tus preocupaciones menores; o ese tipo de argumentos que dicen que la democracia está perdida: derribarán sin excepción cualquier cosa que digas que pueda hacer más compleja la imagen. O la persona que es demasiado displicente, incapaz de reconocer una preocupación genuina de la gente, que en última instancia no te reconoce a ti; que no ve, o se niega a ver, que la crisis está aquí ya.Preocuparse sobre el fin de todo, desdeñar eso, debatirlo, apostar por lo que vendrá después: esta podría ser una manera de ejercer control sobre lo incontrolable, de afirmar nuestra propia voluntad de acción o marcar distancias entre nosotros y lo inesperado. Las cosas simplemente suceden ahora, más allá de las creencias, la racionalidad y, a veces, las palabras. Y tiene algo de esperanzador —en cuanto validación de que estamos vivos y podemos influir en los acontecimientos— que intentemos darle sentido a todo ello.Katherine Miller es redactora y editora de Opinión. More

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      Adam Schiff: Don’t Forget That Many Republicans in Congress Enabled Trump’s Big Lie

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      On Dec. 27, 2020, more than six weeks after losing re-election, an infuriated President Donald Trump telephoned his acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen. Mr. Trump’s former attorney general, Bill Barr, had announced his resignation less than two weeks earlier, after telling the president that the claims of election fraud Mr. Trump had been trumpeting were — as Mr. Barr later bluntly put it in testimony — “bullshit” and publicly affirming that there was no fraud on a scale that would affect the outcome of the election.With Mr. Rosen’s deputy, Richard Donoghue, also on the line, Mr. Trump launched into the same tired, disproved and discredited allegations he had propagated so often at rallies, during news conferences and on social media. None of it was true, and Mr. Donoghue told him so. According to Mr. Donoghue, Mr. Trump, exasperated that his own handpicked top appointees at the Justice Department would not affirm his baseless allegations, responded: “Just say that the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.”It was a remarkable statement, even for a president who had serially abused the powers of his office. Having been told by the very department that had investigated his claims of fraud that they were untrue, Mr. Trump told the acting attorney general and his deputy to lie about it and said he would take it from there.That Mr. Trump was willing to lie so baldly about a matter at the heart of our democracy — whether the American people can rely on elections to ensure the peaceful transfer of power — now seems self-evident, even unremarkable, when we consider the violent attack on the Capitol he incited days later. But Americans shouldn’t lose sight of how this behavior indicts the former president, and not just the former president but the Republican members of Congress whom he knew would go along with his big lie.The report released Thursday from the Jan. 6 committee, on which I served, makes abundantly clear that there were multiple lines of effort to overturn the 2020 election. Some involved attempts to pressure state legislatures to declare the loser to be the winner. Others involved a fake electors plot, pressure on the vice president to violate his constitutional duty and efforts to force an elections official to “find” thousands of votes that didn’t exist. It was only when all of these other efforts failed that the president resorted to inciting mob violence to try to stop the transfer of power.But one line of effort to overturn the election is given scant attention, and that involved the willingness of so many members of Congress to vote to overturn it. Even after Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police put down the insurrection at great cost to themselves, the majority of Republicans in the House picked up right where they left off, still voting to overturn the results in important states.At one of our Jan. 6 committee hearings, the committee vice chair Liz Cheney, a Republican, called out her colleagues in Congress for their duplicity in the most searing terms: “There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain.”With our work on the committee largely concluded, it will now fall to the Justice Department to ensure a form of accountability that Congress is not empowered to provide, and to vindicate the rule of law in a manner beyond our reach: through prosecution. Multiple laws were violated in the course of a broad attempt to overturn the election, and not just by the foot soldiers who broke into the Capitol building that day and brutally assaulted police officers, but also by those who incited them, encouraged them and, when it was all over, gave them aid and comfort. Bringing a former president to justice who even now calls for the “termination” of our Constitution is a perilous endeavor. Not doing so is far more dangerous.There is a growing disdain for the law and for our country’s institutions, and a frightening acceptance of the use of violence to resolve political disputes. Mr. Trump’s big lie has been one of the most powerful instigators of political violence, since it persuaded millions of people that the election they lost must have been rigged or fraudulent. If people can be convinced of that, what is left but violence to decide who should govern? The attack on the Capitol was an all too foreseeable consequence of Mr. Trump’s relentless effort to alienate the people from their government and from the most important foundation of governance: their right to vote.Even the Constitution cannot protect us if the people sworn to uphold it do not give meaning to their oath of office, if that oath is not informed by ideas of right and wrong, and if people are unwilling to accept the basic truth of things. None of it will be enough.But if we allow ourselves to be guided by facts — not factions — and if we choose our representatives based on their allegiance to the law and to the Constitution, then we should have every confidence that our proud legacy of self-government will go on. It is our hope that this report will make a small contribution to that effort. Our country has never before faced the kind of threat we documented. May it never again.Adam B. Schiff is a Democratic member of Congress from California and the author, most recently, of “Midnight in Washington: How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could.”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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      Israel’s New Government Pushes A Rush of Far-Right Initiatives

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      Benjamin Netanyahu needed the support of far-right factions to return to the prime minister’s office. Now they want to curb the powers of the judiciary, giving rise to fears about an erosion of democracy.JERUSALEM — As Israel’s prime minister designate, Benjamin Netanyahu, prepares to swear in his new hard-line government and return to office, his deals to cement the support of far-right coalition partners are raising widespread concerns about the country’s future as a liberal democracy.The emerging coalition will be the most hard-right and religious administration in Israel’s history, made up of Mr. Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party and another five far-right and ultra-Orthodox factions. Mr. Netanyahu, Israel’s longest serving prime minister, who was ousted 18 months ago, is on trial for corruption and has grown ever more dependent on these hard-line allies because the more liberal parties refuse to sit in a government led by a premier under criminal indictment.That dependency, critics say, has weakened him in the coalition negotiations, forcing him to go along with at least some of the demands for far-reaching changes that would limit the powers of the judiciary and curb the independence of the police.Mr. Netanyahu’s hard-line allies need him just as much as he needs them; they, too, have no alternative path to power. But their fundamental lack of trust in Mr. Netanyahu, who has a record of breaking promises to coalition partners, led them to insist on a rush of legislation to anchor their new roles and authorities in law, with potentially damaging consequences for the democratic system.Israelis demonstrating against the new government of Benjamin Netanyahu last week in Jerusalem.Atef Safadi/EPA, via Shutterstock“What we see in the legislation preceding the formation of the government is a change in the rules of the game of Israeli democracy,” said Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.The outgoing prime minister, Yair Lapid, a centrist, described the incoming government on Thursday as “dangerous, extremist, irresponsible.”“It will end badly,” he said, calling it “a clearance sale of Israel’s future.”The legislative rush and drafts of coalition agreements include proposals that would allow Parliament to override Supreme Court decisions and would give more weight to politicians in the selection of judges.Legal amendments would greatly expand the powers of the incoming minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the police. Mr. Ben-Gvir is the leader of the ultranationalist Jewish Power party and the main advocate of the bill, which would give him the authority to set policy for the police, something critics say will allow him to politicize the force’s operations.He was convicted in the past on charges of inciting racism and of support for a terrorist group, and ran in the election on a bullish ticket of fighting organized crime and increasing governance, particularly in areas heavily populated by members of Israel’s Arab minority.What to Know About Israel’s New GovernmentNetanyahu’s Return: Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, is set to return to power at the helm of the most right-wing administration in Israeli history.The Far Right’s Rise: To win election, Mr. Netanyahu and his far-right allies harnessed perceived threats to Israel’s Jewish identity after ethnic unrest and the subsequent inclusion of Arab lawmakers in the government.Arab Allies: Mr. Netanyahu’s far-right allies have a history of making anti-Arab statements. Three Arab countries that normalized relations with Israel in 2020 appear unconcerned.Worries Among Palestinians: To some Palestinians, the rise of Israel’s far right can scarcely make things worse. But many fear a surge of violence.Another amendment will allow Bezalel Smotrich, the leader of the Religious Zionism party, to serve as a second minister in the hallowed Ministry of Defense. Mr. Smotrich, whose party ultimately seeks to annex the occupied West Bank, has been promised authority over the agencies dealing with Jewish settlements and Palestinian and Israeli civilian life in the occupied West Bank, in consultation with the prime minister.A third change will allow Aryeh Deri, the leader of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, to serve as a minister despite a recent conviction and a suspended prison sentence for tax fraud. That amendment, analysts say, could end up applying to Mr. Netanyahu should he ultimately be convicted or reach a plea deal including a suspended sentence.Mr. Netanyahu denies all wrongdoing and says the cases against him will collapse in court.The incoming minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the police. Mr. Ben-Gvir is the leader of the ultranationalist Jewish Power party and the main advocate behind a bill greatly expanding his powers.Gil Cohen-Magen/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesStill, experts say, the proposed changes outlined in the coalition agreements are still in flux.“Constitutional political changes are being carried out in record speed, even before the government has been established,” said Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a nonpartisan research center. “This demonstrates the fragility of our democracy.”But Mr. Plesner emphasized that such practices were not unprecedented in Israel and that there were still many possible outcomes.“There is a discrepancy,” he said, “between the ideas and initiatives and declarations of politicians before elections, and what is actually happening in the negotiating room and being manifested in coalition agreements and government policy.”Mr. Netanyahu, who has already pushed Israel further to the right during his 15 years in power, will now be the main force of moderation in his government compared with his more hard-line partners. Though he is known for his aggressive campaign tactics, Mr. Netanyahu has generally protected the democratic system during his long tenure.He has rejected the warnings about damage to Israeli democracy as fear-mongering by those who lost the election and has pledged to act in the interest of all Israel’s citizens.“We were elected to lead in our way, the way of the national right and the way of the liberal right,” he said in a recent speech to Parliament, “and that’s what we will do.”The most immediate concerns revolve around the law expanding the powers of Mr. Ben-Gvir, the national security minister. It has passed its first reading in Parliament but is still pending final approval.In the past, the minister overseeing the police would set policy priorities in consultation with the commissioner of police, but would not interfere in operational matters or have any influence over investigations.The proposed legislation subordinates the police to the minister’s authority, leading legal officials and experts to fear a politicization of the force. And it grants the minister the right to set priorities and time frames for investigations in a departure from past practices.“The Israel Police will be run under a threatening and belligerent man who lacks responsibility and experience, who wishes to turn it into a political agency,” and to turn the police commissioner into a “puppet,” the outgoing minister of public security, Omer Bar-Lev, told Parliament this week.Mr. Ben-Gvir argues that the police should be subordinate to a minister’s policy in the same way that the military carries out the government’s policy. But critics say that unlike the military, which fights Israel’s enemies, the mission of the police is to deal with Israeli citizens — including corrupt politicians.Aida Touma-Sliman, a Palestinian-Israeli lawmaker, told the committee discussing the bill that the incoming minister’s goals were “ideological” and “racist” and would end up creating a “political police.”Human rights activists say they are worried that the legislation giving Mr. Ben-Gvir broader control over the police could be used to suppress protests.Noa Sattath, the executive director of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, said her organization petitioned the parliamentary committee discussing the bill to exclude protests from Mr. Ben-Gvir’s areas of authority, as did the committee’s own legal adviser. But Mr. Ben-Gvir rejected that recommendation.“Clearly the minister wants to have authority over the way the police deal with protests,” said Ms. Sattath, who described the bill as endangering one of the foundations of the Israeli democratic system.Clash between Palestinians and the Israeli army in Nablus, in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday.Zain Jaafar/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIn the face of mounting criticism, Mr. Ben-Gvir told the parliamentary committee on Thursday that he would postpone the discussions and voting on the most contentious parts of the bill until after the inauguration of the government.Also of concern are the proposals to change the way the judiciary operates.If implemented, they will dramatically curb the powers of the Supreme Court, which has long been seen by liberal Israelis and analysts as one of the country’s most important institutions safeguarding against the erosion of liberal democratic values. Because Israel has only one house of Parliament and no formal constitution, the judiciary plays a critical role in protecting minority rights and offsetting rule by the parliamentary majority.The coalition partners are keen to see these judicial changes, not least to ensure that the Supreme Court cannot overturn the hasty legislation now making its way through Parliament.“In the coming weeks we will have to face the most significant threats Israeli democracy has seen in recent decades,” Mr. Plesner said at a recent conference at his institute on the implications of the judicial changes proposed by members of the incoming coalition.“The issues on the agenda concern the nature of the state and the basic rights of each and every one of us.”Myra Noveck More

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      The Last Lesson of the Jan. 6 Committee

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      The hearings of the House select committee on the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol presented a careful, convincing and disturbing account of former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. They provided an abundance of detail about what we’ve long known: that Mr. Trump and his allies engaged not only in an assault on Congress, but on democracy itself.The work done by the committee over the past 18 months may be even more important than its report, which is expected to be released Thursday. The long months of scouring investigation and the carefully staged hearings, in which the evidence of Mr. Trump’s malfeasance was presented to the public, were critical elements in the nation’s full understanding of the attack on the Capitol. Through the work of these hearings, Congress showed that the best possible answer to political violence lay in the tools that were right at hand: the rule of law, checks and balances, testimony given under oath and the careful process of bureaucracy.Like a slow-motion replay, the committee’s work also gave Americans a second chance to comprehend the enormity of what transpired on Jan. 6. It seems plausible, as some members of the panel have asserted, that the hearings made protecting democracy a significant issue in the midterm elections and helped to persuade voters to reject some election deniers who ran for state offices. The sustained attention on Mr. Trump’s conduct in his final days in office is also valuable as he mounts a renewed campaign for the presidency. And the hearings focused the attention of the public and policymakers on the extremist groups that participated in the attack on the Capitol and that pose a threat of renewed violence.Congressional hearings are often filled with the distraction of partisan squabbling, grandstanding and detours into tangential subjects. The Jan. 6 committee was different, and the American people were better off for it. Mr. Trump and others refused to answer subpoenas from the committee, which would have given them an opportunity to answer questions and make their case. Their refusal is unfortunate; they deserve the chance to defend themselves and present their account of the facts, and Americans deserve the chance to hear from them. They’re still due that chance, and Mr. Trump may still have his say in a court of law.The seven Democrats and two Republicans who served on the committee captured the attention of Americans who may not have been sufficiently informed or alarmed about Mr. Trump’s role in the events of Jan. 6 to take notice. The two Republicans on the committee, Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, deserve particular credit for defying their own party to participate. Their presence, and the damning testimony delivered by Mr. Trump’s own aides and allies, conveyed the message that some things are necessarily more important than loyalty to a political party.Americans have also learned, thanks to these hearings, exactly how close this country came to even greater tragedies. Rioters came within 40 feet of Vice President Mike Pence. A Justice Department official, Jeffrey Clark, in late December 2020 sought to send a letter — based on lies — to officials in Georgia and potentially several other key states that warned of election irregularities and called for a special legislative session to select alternate slates of presidential electors.The lesson, in part, is that our democracy is inescapably fragile. It requires Americans, and those who serve them as elected officials and in law enforcement, to act in good faith. The committee rightly spent many hours of its work documenting the actions of all those local, state and federal officials who defied Mr. Trump’s demands and acted in many different ways to protect democracy.The dangers remain clear and present, so this work is not complete. House Republicans will be in the majority come January, including many who sought to overturn President Biden’s victory, and some who encouraged the rioters.Political violence is on the rise, especially among right-wing extremists.And Mr. Trump is running for president again on a platform of his grievances, still insistent that he did not lose the last election, still refusing to accept the rule of law. He is, in fact, escalating his rhetoric.The nation needs to respond to these threats. Congress needs to pass the reforms to the electoral process that are included in the year-end omnibus spending bill. Law enforcement can do more to crack down on extremist violence. Voters should reject Mr. Trump at the polls.As the select committee’s chairman, Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, emphasized at its final hearing on Monday, the government should continue to pursue those responsible for the Jan. 6 attack and to hold them accountable.More than 900 people already have been charged with crimes related to the attack on the Capitol, and several hundred of those have either been convicted or pleaded guilty. Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the extremist Oath Keepers group, was convicted of seditious conspiracy in November. Jury selection has begun in the federal trial of Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the Proud Boys, another extremist group, who faces similar charges.The committee called upon the Justice Department to also bring criminal charges against Mr. Trump and the lawyer John Eastman, for their efforts to overturn the 2020 election, including Mr. Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 attack. The Justice Department is still engaged in its own investigation. As we wrote in August, if there is sufficient evidence to establish Mr. Trump’s guilt on a serious charge in a court of law, then he should be charged and tried; the same goes for all of the others whom the committee referred to the Justice Department.Mr. Thompson, urging action on all these fronts, said that as a nation, “We remain in strange and uncharted waters.” Yet the hearings also underscored that the country is better off with clarity and truth.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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      As Tunisia Drifts Farther From Democracy, Voters Shun Election

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      Turnout in Saturday’s parliamentary elections was just over 11 percent, reflecting deep skepticism that politics can solve the North African nation’s grave governmental and economic crises.A feeble turnout in Tunisia’s inconclusive parliamentary elections over the weekend drew opposition calls for the country’s strongman president to step down, with critics calling it yet another step in the North African’s nation descent from the only democracy to emerge from the Arab Spring uprisings to an increasingly autocratic state.Just over 11 percent of eligible voters cast ballots in the first election since President Kais Saied orchestrated a sweeping power grab in 2021, suspending the Parliament and sidelining political parties. As Tunisia drifts farther and farther from its decade-long experiment with democracy, opponents say the president now relies on elections only to add a sheen of legitimacy to his actions.“No one can find a single party of importance across the political spectrum or a civil society organization that sees Saturday’s election as anything other than a sham vote to create a Potemkin parliament,” said Monica Marks, an assistant professor of Middle East politics at New York University Abu Dhabi.The largest opposition coalition, the Salvation Front, called for protests and sit-ins, saying the low turnout indicated that Mr. Saied lacked legitimacy and should leave office. Abir Moussi, the head of the opposition Free Constitutional Party, also called on the president to step down, saying that the vast majority of Tunisians had “rejected Saied’s plan.”The election was the first step in reinstating the Parliament, but with drastically reduced powers that will transform it essentially into an advisory body. It cannot fire the government or remove the president, and bills that Mr. Saied presents will take priority over those proposed by lawmakers. He also barred political parties from participating in elections, making it difficult to decipher the political leanings of the mostly unknown candidates who won seats.Ms. Marks described the candidates that were able to run under the new election law “a shambolic grab bag of individual esoteric loyalists, jobless people who simply wanted a salary and random community members.”President Kais Saied preparing to cast his ballot at a polling station on Saturday. Mr. Saied was elected in 2019 and concentrated power in his own hands in 2021, sidelining Parliament and political parties.Tunisian Presidential Press ServiceShe called Mr. Saied’s ruling style “adhocracy,” meaning he makes it up as he goes along, with minimal checks and balances.The election commission announced late Monday the victors in races for only 23 of the body’s 161 seats; most of the remainder will be decided in runoff elections expected next month.The election came just days after President Biden hosted leaders from across Africa in Washington to declare the United States’ commitment to the continent and voice his support for democracy.Mr. Saied attended the summit and roundly dismissed American criticism of his power grab in a meeting with the editorial board of The Washington Post. He blamed “fake news” for creating the sense that he is an autocrat and accused unidentified “foreign forces” of supporting his political foes.“There are so many enemies of democracy in Tunisia who want to do everything they can to torpedo the country’s democratic and social life from within,” Mr. Saied said.The Biden administration drew some criticism over its sanguine reaction to the election. Ned Price, a State Department spokesman, called it “an essential initial step toward restoring the country’s democratic trajectory.”Ms. Marks said on Twitter that the U.S. statement “absurdly dubbed the sham ballot ‘essential step’ to return to democracy.”The electoral commission said on Monday that only 11.2 percent of eligible voters had cast ballots in what was the country’s fourth election since Tunisians toppled their longtime dictator in a 2011 popular uprising, which set off the wave of Arab Spring revolts across the Middle East.That was the lowest participation level since the revolution and analysts attributed it to dwindling faith among voters in democracy itself. It was even below the roughly 30 percent turnout for a July constitutional referendum that enshrined the expansion of Mr. Saied’s powers and well below the participation rate in the 2019 presidential vote that brought him to power, which was about 50 percent. In 2014, about two-thirds of registered voters participated in parliamentary elections.The 23 confirmed winners included Ibrahim Bouderbala, the former head of the Tunisian Bar Association and a vocal supporter of Mr. Saied. Three women also won seats.When the Arab Spring revolts toppled leaders across the Arab world, Tunisia was lauded as the only one to emerge from the tumult as a multiparty democracy. But that legacy has fallen apart in recent years, as economic distress has spread and Mr. Saied has concentrated power in his hands, all but killing the country’s young democracy.After being elected by a large margin in 2019, Mr. Saied, formerly a little known constitutional law professor, suspended Parliament in 2021 in a move that many Tunisians welcomed, hoping it was a step toward curbing corruption and reviving the economy.A rally against Mr. Saied in Tunis this month organized by the opposition Salvation Front. The coalition called for protests and sit-ins after this weekend’s vote.Fethi Belaid/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut change has not come, with poverty spreading and increasing numbers of Tunisians attempting often-lethal boat trips to Europe in hopes of starting new lives. Mr. Saied has ruled by presidential decree, pushed through a new constitution that grants him greater powers and issued the electoral law that governed Saturday’s election.That law banned political parties from the electoral process, instead allowing voters to choose individual candidates in each district. It also did away with quotas for women and young candidates, provisions added after the revolution.Contributing to the low turnout was the absence of activities by political parties — which many Tunisians despise as corrupt and responsible for the country’s declining fortunes. The major parties boycotted the referendum this year that made Mr. Saied’s constitution into law.Also keeping people away were deep economic woes and a growing sense among voters that it would make little difference who won anyway.Mr. Saied’s supporters argued that the new electoral law would increase accountability by allowing voters to chose their representatives directly and not only as members of party lists.But critics said that keeping the parties out meant that only candidates wealthy enough to finance their own campaigns would be able to run.Analysts had low expectations for the newly chosen Parliament in any case, saying the lack of organized parties to set an agenda would leave it fractured and chaotic, and likely to follow Mr. Saied’s lead on any legislation.Ben Hubbard More