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      The U.S. Lacks What Every Democracy Needs

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      The history of voting in the United States shows the high costs of living with an old Constitution, unevenly enforced by a reluctant Supreme Court.Unlike the constitutions of many other advanced democracies, the U.S. Constitution contains no affirmative right to vote. We have nothing like Section 3 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, providing that “every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly and to be qualified for membership therein,” or like Article 38 of the Basic Law of the Federal Republic of Germany, which provides that when it comes to election of the Bundestag, “any person who has attained the age of 18 shall be entitled to vote.”As we enter yet another fraught election season, it’s easy to miss that many of the problems we have with voting and elections in the United States can be traced to this fundamental constitutional defect. Our problems are only going to get worse until we get constitutional change.The framers were skeptical of universal voting. The original U.S. Constitution provided for voting only for the House of Representatives, not for the Senate or the presidency, leaving voter qualifications for House elections to the states. Later amendments framed voting protections in the negative: If there’s going to be an election, a state may not discriminate on the basis of race (15th Amendment), gender (19th Amendment) or status as an 18-to-20-year old (26th Amendment).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Pritzker Is Among Democrats Making Case for Biden in Iowa

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      All the political action in Iowa may be among Republicans, but President Biden’s campaign sought on Monday to get a piece of the action, sending three top surrogates to Des Moines to promote his agenda and trash his potential opponents.Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, Senator Tina Smith of Minnesota and Jeffrey Katzenberg, a Hollywood megadonor and a campaign co-chairman, all made their case for re-electing Mr. Biden before a dozen TV cameras and a gaggle of journalists in a conference room at the Iowa Events Center.Mr. Pritzker said there was no difference between former President Donald J. Trump and his G.O.P. rivals, Ms. Smith warned that Republicans would ban abortion nationwide if they won back the White House and Mr. Katzenberg did a victory lap on the campaign’s latest fund-raising announcement.“Tonight’s contest is simply a contest of whether you like MAGA in its original packaging or in high heels or with lifts in their boots,” Mr. Pritzker said, jabbing at Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who quipped during a debate about wearing heels, and at Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who has been suspected of wearing lifts in his shoes.Beyond cracks about the Republican candidates’ footwear, the Biden surrogates did not share much new information about the re-election campaign or the president’s thinking. Mr. Pritzker fended off questions about immigration policy and the Supreme Court case concerning Mr. Trump’s eligibility to be on the ballot, while Mr. Katzenberg declined to engage in a debate over whether the Biden campaign is too focused on coastal supporters.Instead, they sought to convey their argument that the future of the nation would be at risk if Mr. Trump were re-elected.“The campaign is running an operation like our democracy depends on it,” Mr. Katzenberg said. “Because in some respect it does.” More

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      Biden and Democratic Allies Announce $97 Million Fund-Raising Haul

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      President Biden’s re-election campaign said on Monday that, along with two allied committees, it had pulled in $97 million during the most recent fund-raising period. Together, they entered 2024 with more than $117 million in cash on hand, the campaign said.The Biden operation’s $97 million haul is significant, but its cash on hand number is just $27 million more than it had at the end of September, a function of the campaign’s significant spending on new personnel and more than $25 million in advertising it bought in general-election battlegrounds, where Mr. Biden’s poll numbers have been weak.The Biden campaign released its fund-raising data more than two weeks before it was required to do so, a clear attempt to distract attention from the Iowa caucuses on Monday, the first nominating contest for the Republican presidential candidates aiming to oust Mr. Biden from the White House.“The Team Biden-Harris coalition knows the stakes of this election and is ready to win this November,” said Julie Chávez Rodríguez, Mr. Biden’s campaign manager. “These numbers prove that the American people know the stakes and are taking action early to help defeat the extreme MAGA Republican agenda again.”Former President Donald J. Trump, who has a large lead in polls of the Republican race and is widely expected to win in Iowa, has not yet released his year-end fund-raising numbers. The Trump campaign had $37.5 million in cash on hand at the end of September, the last time filings were reported, and Mr. Biden’s campaign had $32.2 million.In January 2020, Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign committee alone had $102.8 million on hand — a function of a cash bonanza that followed his first impeachment.Of the other top Republican candidates, only former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina has revealed her end-of-year fund-raising totals. This month, she announced she had raised $24 million in the fourth quarter for her campaign and its two associated committees. The campaign said it had $14.5 million in cash to begin the new year.The Biden campaign offered few useful details about the money it has raised. The campaign pointed to 520,000 individual donors during the three-month period that ended Dec. 31, but did not reveal how much of its money came from donors who gave less than $200, the typical measuring stick for grass-roots enthusiasm.Small-dollar donors are vital to a campaign’s health because they can be tapped for repeated contributions, and they are a sign of grass-roots engagement with a candidate.It is not clear yet how much of the cash raised by the Biden operation is in the campaign account that can accept contributions of $6,600 per person or other accounts to which donors can give nearly $1 million. How the money is divided won’t be known until Jan. 31, when all of the federal campaign committees are required to file fund-raising reports with the Federal Election Commission. More

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      How, Where and When to Caucus in Iowa on Monday

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      The Iowans who will brave frigid temperatures Monday for the first test of support for Republican presidential hopefuls will be caucusing — a process that’s distinct from other ballot-box affairs.Unlike in other elections, Iowa’s Democratic and Republican parties, not the state’s government, organize and run the caucuses. And members of the two parties will conduct business a little differently.What happens during a caucus?Once participating Republican voters arrive at the caucus precinct, they must check in with precinct workers, who will verify that they are eligible to participate. (Only registered Republicans may participate in G.O.P. caucuses, but party rules allow unregistered voters, Democrats and independents to register or switch their party affiliation at the caucus site.)Then, the caucusgoers will elect a chair and secretary to preside over the event. Supporters of each candidate will speak to the caucus, pitching their peers on why they should support their preferred candidates.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Democrats Fret That Biden’s Power Players Are Not at His Campaign Base

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      President Biden has a re-election campaign with two distinct centers of gravity — the White House and his Delaware headquarters — and advisers who are juggling two jobs at once.With less than 10 months to go until the 2024 election, the nerve center of President Biden’s bid for a second term is stationed not at his campaign’s headquarters in Delaware but within feet of the Oval Office.The president and his chief strategist, Mike Donilon, have repeatedly discussed when to move him over to the campaign — perhaps after the 2022 midterm elections, then after the 2023 off-year elections and again at the end of 2023. Each time, no move happened after the president told aides he wanted to keep Mr. Donilon within walking distance.Anita Dunn, the longtime Democratic operative who stepped in to help revive Mr. Biden’s fledging operation four years ago, is devising the re-election message again, even as she oversees communications at the White House. Jen O’Malley Dillon, Mr. Biden’s deputy White House chief of staff and former campaign manager, is also splitting her day job with her role as one of the most powerful voices in the campaign.So far, almost none of the people in the president’s inner circle have left for campaign headquarters in Wilmington, Del., prompting some donors and strategists to worry that too much of Mr. Biden’s team remains cloistered inside the White House. Less than a year before Election Day, the president has a campaign with two distinct centers of gravity, advisers juggling two jobs at once, and months of internal debate about when to consolidate everyone in one place.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More

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      Manchin Stirs Chatter of 2024 Third-Party Bid in New Hampshire

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      The attention-seeking West Virginia senator, who has teased a late third-party presidential bid, tried to keep up the suspense at a Friday appearance in the state.During an eyebrow-raising visit to New Hampshire on Friday, Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia name-checked friends who are elected officials in the Granite State and complimented the discerning nature of its voters.He paid homage to the state’s first-in-the-nation primary tradition and swiped at President Biden’s decision to undercut New Hampshire’s power in this year’s Democratic contest.And when pressed on his own ambitions, the conservative Democratic senator offered a message that would-be candidates have often deployed as they flirt with this historically influential early-voting state: He declined to rule anything out.“How would you feel if a bunch of Democrats in New Hampshire wrote in ‘Joe’ — not Biden — but wrote in ‘Joe Manchin’?” an attendee asked as Mr. Manchin kicked off a “listening tour” at Politics and Eggs, an event series at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics that has long hosted presidential candidates and potential contenders.“I cannot prevent whatever you want to do,” Mr. Manchin replied to applause from the audience in Manchester, N.H., before insisting that he was “not here campaigning.”The question of what Mr. Manchin wants to do has long infuriated and confounded many of his Democratic colleagues in Washington, who have often seen him as a roadblock to their legislative agenda, even as he has played a pivotal role in eventually passing key priorities.Now, Mr. Manchin — known for a love of the spotlight that stands out even among U.S. senators — is stoking new questions about his next steps.Speculation has grown about whether he might embark on a late, long-shot presidential bid this year, and he has attracted interest from No Labels, a centrist group that is searching for a “unity ticket” to mount a potential third-party bid. Democratic allies of Mr. Biden are trying to stave off such efforts.Mr. Manchin, who announced in November that he would not seek re-election in his deep-red state in 2024, has teased a potential third-party run for the presidency.Charles Krupa/Associated Press“He really deserves most serious consideration from No Labels because he is part of our movement” if he is interested in a third-party bid, said former Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, the founding chairman of the group. He said he had spoken with Mr. Manchin after the senator announced in November that he would not seek re-election. “He’s walked the centrist, bipartisan, problem-solving walk.”(Mr. Lieberman has also talked up a run by former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who dropped out of the Republican presidential race this week. But he said on Thursday that while Mr. Christie had many fans at No Labels, the last time he had personally spoken to him was probably “at a Mets game last summer.”)Mr. Manchin did not offer a ringing endorsement of the group’s plans when asked on Friday about the electoral potential of such a bid.“It’s admirable what they’re trying to do to provide an option — OK, they’re working very hard towards that, and their best intentions are to bring people together,” he said, noting his longtime involvement with the group. Pressed again on the question of viability, he replied: “I don’t know. I mean, you have to — the people decide that. I think by Super Tuesday, you’ll know what’s going on.”Mr. Manchin, with his daughter, has started an organization called Americans Together, designed to elevate moderate voices — the “responsible, sensible, common-sense middle,” he said on Friday — whom he casts as often politically homeless. The New Hampshire swing was the first stop on what his team has called a listening tour, but he emphasized that his group was “completely different” from No Labels.Throughout his appearances — at the breakfast, in speaking with reporters and at a diner where he was trailed by climate-focused protesters — Mr. Manchin denounced the far right and the far left (though any notion that Mr. Biden falls close to that category is risible to his many left-wing detractors). And at times, Mr. Manchin seemed to slip into overt campaign mode, even as he insisted at other points that he had made no decisions about a run.“Everyone says, ‘Well, are you running for this, or running for that?’” he said on Friday morning, adding that, no, he was “running” to “bring the country together.”“I want you to know there’s hope,” he continued. “Nobody can win up here unless they get the independent vote. Nobody can win unless they get the center left and center right.”He also repeatedly declined to say whether he would support Mr. Biden over former President Donald J. Trump in a November matchup, though he has said in the past that he will not back Mr. Trump.“I’m not picking anything right now until we see what we have,” he said, though he later allowed in an interview that he was “absolutely comfortable with Biden’s character.” He added: “Do I agree with the politics? Not all of the time.”He also nodded to recent polls that have shown Mr. Biden struggling, calling them “alarming,” adding, “The whole thing is alarming, from a standpoint, how close it can be again, how it might even flip to a different direction.”Democrats worry that third-party bids could siphon votes from Mr. Biden and hand the election to Mr. Trump if he is the Republican nominee. Matt Bennett, a founder of the center-left group Third Way, who has been engaged in efforts to block third-party and independent candidates, expressed optimism that Mr. Manchin would not go that route. Mr. Manchin, for his part, has insisted that he has no interest in being a “spoiler.”“Joe Manchin is on a listening tour to talk to voters about the value of moderate ideas, and we think that’s fantastic,” Mr. Bennett said in a text message. “We think it’s smart for him to have started in N.H. and get the attention from the giant political press corps there. We know he hasn’t made a final decision on running for president, but we’re confident that he won’t.”Mr. Manchin suggested on Friday that the country was interested in more options, but he seemed uncomfortable directly engaging in talk of a third-party bid himself, saying vaguely at one point: “There might be more choices. There might be different choices. We just don’t know yet.”In an interview, he said: “I’m looking for, how do you bring the country together, how do we get people involved? And if that’s a decision to make, I’ll live with whatever decision.”As he wrapped up glad-handing at the diner in Derry, where he told a Republican fan that he did not know if he would run, a reporter asked if he could name one thing that appealed to him about a third-party bid and one thing that would give him pause.The usually voluble senator smiled, declared that he was there to bring Americans together and walked away. More

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      Biden Campaign to Send Top Allies to Iowa to Spread Democrats’ Message

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      Iowa is dominated by Republicans right now. The events by presidential candidates are for Republicans, the voters who come to see them are Republicans and the main event, Monday’s caucuses, will feature Republicans.But Democrats will try to get in on the action on Monday, when President Biden’s campaign is expected to dispatch some of its biggest surrogates to Iowa to make the party’s case in the hours before Republicans gather to vote.These allies include Jeffrey Katzenberg, the Hollywood mogul and a co-chairman of Mr. Biden’s campaign; Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, who is a member of the campaign’s national advisory board; and Senator Tina Smith of Minnesota. They are planning to appear at a news conference in downtown Des Moines on Monday afternoon shortly before the caucuses begin, according to two people familiar with the campaign’s scheduling.Mr. Katzenberg is a longtime Democratic megadonor who has taken on his largest political role to date with the Biden campaign, serving as a conduit to big donors while assuming a role of publicly calming worries about Mr. Biden’s fund-raising, staffing and political vulnerabilities.Mr. Pritzker, America’s wealthiest elected official, is organizing this summer’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Ms. Smith, who represents a neighboring state, is in her first full term as senator.“Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans’ all-out assault on democracy and Americans’ personal freedoms will be front and center as Iowans begin to caucus Monday,” said Ammar Moussa, a Biden campaign spokesman. “The Biden campaign will be on the ground, talking directly to voters and reminding everyone that President Biden is fighting to ensure MAGA Republicans’ extreme, out-of-touch agenda continues to lose at the ballot box.” More

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      Caucus de Iowa: esto es lo que puede esperarse la noche del lunes

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      Quien se impone en las primarias republicanas de Iowa no siempre gana la nominación presidencial del partido. Los candidatos intentarán derrotar a sus oponentes y superar las expectativas.Pareciera haber pocas dudas sobre quién probablemente ganará el caucus presidencial republicano en Iowa el lunes.Pero en Iowa, lo inesperado puede ser lo esperado y una victoria no siempre es una victoria. El resultado podría moldear el futuro del Partido Republicano en un momento de transición, así como el futuro de los caucus de Iowa después de una década difícil. Podría ayudar a determinar si Nikki Haley, quien fungió como embajadora de Estados Unidos, representa un obstáculo serio para el regreso de Donald Trump al poder o si Ron DeSantis, el gobernador de Florida, se verá obligado a abandonar la contienda.A continuación, una guía de algunos resultados posibles y lo que significan para los contendientes:Una victoria de TrumpTodas las suposiciones que anticipan una gran noche para Trump significan que el mayor contrincante que el expresidente tendría que vencer podrían ser las expectativas y no sus dos principales rivales en las boletas, Haley y DeSantis. Trump y su campaña han puesto el listón muy alto. Trump se ha postulado como si fuera el presidente en funciones, sin siquiera debatir con sus oponentes. Sus asesores dicen que creen que puede establecer un récord para una contienda abierta si termina al menos 12 puntos por delante de su rival más cercano.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?  More