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Trump Highlights Abortion Supreme Court Decision at Faith and Freedom Conference
Former President Donald J. Trump told an evangelical gathering that no president had done more for Christians than he did.One year after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, former President Donald J. Trump reminded a gathering of evangelical activists in the nation’s capital how he had shaped the court’s conservative supermajority that ended nearly 50 years of constitutional protections for abortion.Appearing at a Faith & Freedom Coalition gala in Washington on Saturday night, he cited his appointment of three of the six justices who voted to strike down the law as a capstone of his presidency. And he cast himself as an unflinching crusader for the Christian right in a meandering speech that lasted nearly 90 minutes.“No president has ever fought for Christians as hard as I have,” he said, adding, “I got it done, and nobody thought it was even a possibility.”It was the eighth appearance by Mr. Trump in front of the group, whose support he is seeking to consolidate in a crowded G.OP. competition for the 2024 nomination, though he is the front-runner in the field. He said that Republican voters were skeptical of claims by some of his rivals that they were stronger opponents of abortion, and suggested that the skepticism had arisen on the campaign trail.“A woman stood up and said, ‘This guy ended Roe v. Wade. How the hell can you go against him?’” Mr. Trump said.A few thousand activists gave Mr. Trump an ovation when he mentioned the ruling, which he said gave conservatives leverage in the ongoing battle over abortion rights. Several hundred more filled an overflow room.“You have power for the first time,” he said.Former Vice President Mike Pence called for the 2024 Republican field to back a 15-week federal abortion ban — an abortion policy more extreme than what Mr. Trump has supported.Pete Marovich for The New York TimesVirtually all of Mr. Trump’s rivals in the crowded G.O.P. field appeared during the group’s three-day Road to Majority conference at the Washington Hilton. The lineup included Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, Mr. Trump’s chief rival, and former Vice President Mike Pence, Mr. Trump’s onetime running mate.At a rally in front of the Lincoln Memorial earlier on Saturday commemorating the court’s ruling, Mr. Pence urged anti-abortion activists to continue fighting to place further restrictions on the procedure at the state level.“Save the babies, and we will save America,” he said, adding, “As the old book says, that many more are with us than are with them.”In a speech at the gathering a day earlier, Mr. Pence called on the entire 2024 Republican presidential field to pledge support for a national abortion ban at 15 weeks — a ban more extreme than what Mr. Trump has backed so far.David Porter, 64, a Republican from Newport News, Va., who wore a “Walk With Jesus” hat to the rally, commended Mr. Trump for his imprint on the judiciary.“He’s my guy right now,” he said.Several times in his speech on Saturday night, Mr. Trump sought to align himself with the faith community and said that it was under attack, much like he was.“Together, we’re warriors in a righteous crusade to stop the arsonists, the atheists, globalists and the Marxists,” he said.Each indictment, he added, was a “great badge of courage.”“I’m being indicted for you,” he said.Mr. Trump’s alliance with the Christian right is a study in political opportunism, one that has yielded prodigious dividends for both.In 2016, evangelical voters helped propel Mr. Trump to successive Republican primary victories in South Carolina and other key states, giving him a pathway to the nomination and ultimately the presidency.The influential electoral bloc demonstrated its willingness to look beyond the impieties of the twice-divorced Mr. Trump, whose extramarital affairs had long been tabloid fodder and who came with a history of supporting abortion rights in the 1990s. Evangelical voters bought into Mr. Trump’s populist narrative, as well as his pledges to carry out a hard-line reset of the nation’s immigration and trade policies and to appoint “pro-life” justices.The group collected its returns during Mr. Trump’s presidency when he cemented a supermajority on the Supreme Court.Mr. Trump has heralded his remake of the nation’s highest court as he once again seeks the support of evangelical voters, this time beset by a cascade of indictments, including one in a hush-money case involving a porn star.But even as Mr. Trump has highlighted his role in the right’s fight to end abortion rights, he has repeatedly sidestepped questions about whether he would sign a federal abortion ban if Republicans managed to steer one through the divided Congress.Mr. Porter, the anti-abortion activist from Virginia, said Mr. Trump’s evasiveness was concerning.Mr. Trump has suggested that a six-week abortion ban signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida was “too harsh,” causing some of his rivals to see an opening on the right of Mr. Trump on the issue.Pete Marovich for The New York Times“Either you stand for what you believe in or you don’t,” he said.Mr. DeSantis, who spoke on Friday at the evangelical conclave, has sought to stake out the right flank against Mr. Trump on abortion policy. He criticized the former president for suggesting that a six-week abortion ban that Mr. DeSantis signed in Florida was “too harsh.”Susan Migliore, an anti-abortion activist from Falls Church, Va., who said she was religious but not evangelical, said at the Lincoln Memorial rally that she was grateful for Mr. Trump’s court picks, but had not decided which candidate she will support in 2024. More
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Pence Challenges 2024 Republicans to Embrace 15-Week National Abortion Ban
At a gathering of evangelicals, the former vice president and other top Republican candidates backed a ban that is more strict than what former President Donald J. Trump has said he would support.In a speech one year after the reversal of Roe v. Wade, former Vice President Mike Pence challenged the entire 2024 Republican presidential field to support a national abortion ban at 15 weeks, demanding that the party go farther than its primary front-runner, former President Donald J. Trump, has so far been willing to go.Mr. Pence issued the call at the Faith and Freedom Coalition conference, a major two-day evangelical gathering in Washington, D.C., that drew Mr. Trump’s leading challengers and at the same time showcased the steep climb ahead of them.Mr. Trump was a focus of attention for candidates and attendees alike. Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, was booed for rebuking the former president for his lack of leadership. Mr. Pence settled for drawing contrasts with Mr. Trump without naming him. And Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, Mr. Trump’s leading — yet still far behind — rival in the polls, gave a speech that was well received, in part because he referred to his disagreements with Mr. Trump only implicitly.“Everyone is running to bring Trump down, not to be the nominee,” said Veronica Steinkirchner, 75, who came to the conference from the Pittsburgh area and supports Mr. Trump. “If you look at the polls, they’re not going to catch him.”Mr. DeSantis recently signed a six-week abortion ban in Florida that Mr. Trump said some in the anti-abortion movement considered “too harsh.” Both Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Pence have seized on that phrase to criticize the former president, though neither did so by name on Friday.“It was the right thing to do,” Mr. DeSantis said Friday of signing the law. “Don’t let anyone tell you it wasn’t.”It was revealing that some of the loudest cheers at the conference came not for any of Mr. Trump’s rivals but for Mark Robinson, the lieutenant governor of North Carolina who is running for governor, and who made a surprise endorsement onstage of the former president.“This nation is at war,” Mr. Robinson said. “We need a warrior.”Still, the Republican candidates present, including Mr. Pence and Mr. DeSantis, see abortion as providing an important political opening on Mr. Trump’s right flank and a chance to appeal to evangelical voters, who are an especially large voting bloc in two of the early-voting states, Iowa and South Carolina.In a sign of the sway Christian conservatives are expected to have in the party’s primaries, the Faith and Freedom Coalition conference is the first gathering to draw the top candidates for the Republican nomination to the same event. Seven Republican candidates addressed the crowd in the windowless ballroom of the Washington Hilton on Friday; others will speak on Saturday, including Mr. Trump, who will headline an evening gala.“There is no path to the nomination that doesn’t run through the evangelical community,” Ralph Reed, who is the chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition and a decades-long fixture on the Christian right, said in an interview.Mr. DeSantis, who is Catholic, recently sat for an interview with David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network, telling him that, “Our household is a Christ-centered household.” He recounted that his son, then 4, had wanted a slingshot for Christmas “to be like David slaying Goliath.”The long-running tension in Mr. Trump’s relationship with the evangelical right is between the New York businessman’s personal behavior and the policies he pursued as president. He is both a three-times-married celebrity who was indicted in Manhattan this year over a hush-money payment to a porn star and a former president who rarely hewed from the policy preferences of conservative evangelical leaders while in office.While Mr. Trump has repeatedly taken credit for appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, he has so far resisted embracing a federal ban and has blamed backlash surrounding “the abortion issue” for some of the party’s losses in 2022.Mr. Pence, who has sought to position himself as a leading opponent of abortion, pressed that point, declaring, “Every Republican candidate for president should support a ban on abortion before 15 weeks as a minimum nationwide standard.” He told the audience that “we must not rest and must not relent until we restore the sanctity of life to the center of American law in every state.”Mr. Trump has repeatedly avoided taking a clear stance on whether he would support a national abortion ban that would curb access to the procedure even in Democrat-controlled states. In his CNN town hall earlier this year, Mr. Trump said he would strike some type of undefined deal on abortion if he returned to the White House. “What I’ll do is negotiate so people are happy,” Mr. Trump said at one point. “Make a deal that’s going to be good,” he said at another.At the conference, Mr. Trump also received pressure on the issue from supporters, like Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who has endorsed Mr. Trump and is the sponsor of a 15-week ban in the Senate. Mr. Graham urged all the candidates to support the proposal.“I challenge everybody wanting to be the standard-bearer for the Republican Party to be proudly pro-life,” Mr. Graham said. “You should want to talk about this. You need to talk about this.”Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri who has not endorsed in the race yet, told reporters after his own speech on Friday that a 15-week ban was a “consensus position.”“The deal ought to be 15 weeks,” Mr. Hawley said. “There, made it easy.”While abortion was a dominant topic on the eve of the Dobbs decision anniversary at the evangelical gathering, there was also an intense focus on transgender policies in almost every speech.Mr. Pence, who received a polite reception, also spurred cheers when he vowed, “We will end the gender ideology that is running rampant in our school.”Some of the candidates mixed the messages on abortion and transgender issues.“God is real, unborn life is life, there are two genders,” Vivek Ramaswamy, another Republican candidate for president, said in his speech, which received louder applause than some more prominent Republican candidates.But if there were loud cheers for every mention of “gender ideology,” it was a different story when candidates talked about Mr. Trump, including when Mr. Christie criticized him for blaming aides for his own shortcomings.“That is not leadership, everybody,” he said, “That is s a failure of leadership.” The crowd hissed, with some shouting “We love Trump!”“You can love him all you want, but I can tell you, doing that kind of thing makes our country smaller,” Mr. Christie retorted.Like many in the crowd, Billy Walkowiak, who is running for as a Republican for county commissioner in Gastonia, N.C., said he still liked Mr. Trump’s message. But with all the legal threats facing Mr. Trump — he was indicted this month for the second time this year and accused of obstruction and of mishandling classified documents — “There’s a lot of uncertainty of what’s going to happen with him.”“The door” for Mr. Trump’s rivals, Mr. Walkowiak said, “is ajar.”Alyce McFadden More
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Vivek Ramaswamy Is ‘a Hint of the Future’: Our Writers on His Candidacy
As Republican candidates enter the race for their party’s 2024 presidential nomination, Times columnists, Opinion writers and others will assess their strengths and weaknesses with a scorecard. We rate the candidates on a scale of 1 to 10: 1 means the candidate will probably drop out before any caucus or primary voting; 10 means the candidate has a very strong chance of receiving the party’s nomination next summer. This entry assesses Vivek Ramaswamy, a hedge fund analyst turned biotech executive. More
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DeSantis Dodges Question on Endorsing Trump as 2024 Nominee
The Florida governor did say he would “respect the outcome” of the primaries while Donald Trump has refused to commit to backing the party’s 2024 nominee if the former president falls short.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida on Thursday avoided saying directly that he would endorse Donald J. Trump in 2024 should the former president win the Republican nomination, showing his reluctance to make a benign show of support for the man who is beating him by a wide margin in national polls and insulting him nearly every day.Asked by a reporter at a news conference in Tampa about whether he would endorse Mr. Trump, the governor responded by complaining that Mr. Trump had recently criticized his policies during the coronavirus pandemic. Mr. DeSantis noted in particular that his rival had compared him unfavorably to New York’s former governor, Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat.“So what I would say is this: When you are saying that Cuomo did better on Covid than Florida did, you are revealing yourself to just be full of it,” Mr. DeSantis said. “Nobody believes that.”“I remember in 2020 and 2021, when he was praising Florida for being open, saying we did it much better than New York and Michigan and everyone was coming to Florida and that we were one of the great governors in the United States,” he continued, his voice rising. “And he used to say that all the time. Now, all of a sudden, his tune is changing. And I would just tell people, do you find it credible? Do you honestly find it credible?”Mr. Trump himself has not pledged to back the party’s nominee in 2024 if a rival defeats him in the primaries, underscoring the level of division in the Republican field. Mr. Trump’s federal indictment has led some of the other candidates to more openly criticize him, questioning his judgment. But Mr. Trump, who regularly calls Mr. DeSantis “Ron DeSanctimonious” and accuses him of needing a “personality transplant,” retains the support of many Republican voters.At the end of his answer, Mr. DeSantis, who is trailing Mr. Trump by roughly 30 percentage points in national polls as more candidates jump into the race, turned to acknowledge the importance of the nominating contest.“It’s an important process and, you know, you respect the process and you respect the people’s decisions how this goes,” he said. “But I’m very confident that those decisions are going to be positive for us.”On social media, Mr. Trump’s allies quickly pounced on Mr. DeSantis’s refusal to pledge loyalty to his rival if he falls short.“Ron DeSantis just proved once again why he’s a Never Trumper in the mold of Liz Cheney and Jeb Bush, completely disqualifying him for 2024, as well as 2028,” Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, said in a statement.But Mr. Trump, of course, has taken a similar stance.“It would depend,” Mr. Trump said in a radio interview earlier this year when asked if he would support “whoever” won the party’s nomination. He added, “It would have to depend on who the nominee was.”Republicans have generally shown far more grace to Mr. Trump than to his rivals, chastising those challenging the former president for sentiments similar to ones he has also expressed.The Republican National Committee has said that candidates must promise to support the party’s eventual nominee if they want to participate in debates.Later on Thursday, at a campaign event in South Carolina, Mr. DeSantis seemed to backtrack slightly, interrupting a reporter who asked why he had seemed to avoid committing to support Mr. Trump.“I didn’t avoid, no, I was misquoted,” Mr. DeSantis shot back. “Here’s what I said, I said: ‘You run this process. You compete and you respect the outcome of the process.’ And I’ve always said that. And so that’s what I said before. That’s what I’ll do. I think I’m going to be the nominee. No matter what happens, I’m going to work to beat Joe Biden.”Voters at the South Carolina event said they hoped Mr. DeSantis and other Republican candidates would back Mr. Trump, should the former president be the nominee.“I think everybody should unite, whoever gets the nomination,” said Shawn Risseeuw, 57, a mechanical engineer who lives in North Augusta, S.C., and described himself as a strong DeSantis supporter. “They’re fools if they don’t.” More
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Senator Rick Scott of Florida Weighing 2024 Presidential Campaign
If he runs, Mr. Scott would become the fourth Republican presidential candidate from Florida, joining Donald Trump, Gov. Ron DeSantis and Mayor Francis X. Suarez of Miami.Senator Rick Scott of Florida is considering a late entry into the Republican presidential primary race, a move that would make him the latest high-profile Florida Republican to try to wrest the nomination from Donald J. Trump, according to two people familiar with the discussions.Should he enter the race, Mr. Scott, Florida’s former governor, would be challenging both the front-runner, Mr. Trump, as well as the distant-second rival, Ron DeSantis, the state’s current governor. Mr. Scott would also join Mr. Trump, Mr. DeSantis and Mayor Francis X. Suarez of Miami as the fourth Republican presidential candidate from Florida. Mr. DeSantis in particular could see his support erode further if Mr. Scott adds to an already crowded field of Trump alternatives.Mr. Scott, who came to power as governor during the Tea Party wave of 2010, has been discussing a possible campaign for several weeks, according to the people familiar with the talks. Like other recent entries, Mr. Scott appears to be assessing a G.O.P. field in which Mr. DeSantis, with whom Mr. Scott has had a difficult relationship, has lost some support after a series of missteps and unforced errors.Larry Hogan, the Republican former governor of Maryland, captured this sentiment in a recent CBS News interview, calling Mr. DeSantis’s campaign “one of the worst I’ve seen so far.” He added, “Everyone was thinking he was the guy to beat, and now I don’t think too many people think that.”On Thursday, Will Hurd, a moderate Republican and former Texas congressman, announced a long-shot candidacy for president in a video message.For Mr. Scott, who is 70 years old and wealthy enough that he can fund his own candidacy, the campaign could be the last chance he has to make a bid for the White House, a run he has long shown interest in. Should a Republican unseat President Biden in the 2024 election, it would be difficult for Mr. Scott or anyone else in the party to challenge that new president during a re-election effort four years later.But running for president would be a dramatic shift for Mr. Scott, who announced earlier this year that he would seek a second six-year term in the Senate in 2024 instead of a national campaign.Mr. Scott’s senior adviser, Chris Hartline, said in a statement to The New York Times: “It’s flattering that some have mentioned the possibility of Senator Scott running for President, but as he’s said many times, he’s running for re-election to the Senate.”If Mr. Scott does decide to enter the race, it is unclear how aggressively he would challenge Mr. Trump, who currently dominates the field even after being indicted twice.Mr. Scott led a major for-profit hospital chain before getting involved in politics. He served as governor of Florida for two terms before running for Senate in 2018. In 2021 and 2022, he was the chairman of the Senate Republican campaign arm, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, a prestige perch that senators often use to boost their national profiles ahead of a presidential campaign. Mr. Scott’s tenure was rocky, marked by a cash drain from the committee and criticisms about how the money was spent.Mr. Trump made clear early on that he planned on trying to keep his grip on the Republican Party after the attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, 2021. Mr. Scott visited Mr. Trump at Mar-a-Lago, the former president’s private club, in April 2021 to grant him a newly-created award from the National Republican Senatorial Committee.“This weekend I was proud to recognize President Donald Trump with the inaugural @NRSC Champion for Freedom Award,” Mr. Scott wrote on Twitter, posing in a picture with Mr. Trump. “President Trump fought for American workers, secured the border, and protected our constitutional rights.”At the time, Mr. Trump remained popular with the Republican Party’s base even after his baseless claims that the 2020 election was “rigged” against him. Mr. Scott, as chairman of a party committee, appeared to find harmony with Mr. Trump to be in the best interests of Senate nominees.Mr. Scott has had a more contentious relationship with Mr. DeSantis.Before Mr. DeSantis signed into state law a bill restricting most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, Mr. Scott said that he favored keeping what were then the current restrictions, after 15 weeks of pregnancy. He also called for “cooler heads” to “prevail” as Mr. DeSantis escalated a feud with Disney, the largest private employer in Florida. A monthslong fight between the governor and the company stemmed from the opposition some officials at Disney had to a new state law restricting gender and sexuality education in elementary schools.Mr. Scott was not a favorite of some of his colleagues in the Senate. In 2022, he ran an ultimately failed bid to oust the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, from his leadership position, the capstone in what had become a toxic relationship between the two Republicans.Should Mr. Scott abandon a re-election bid in favor of a presidential run, it would create an open primary for his Senate seat. And it would potentially add another layer to the Trump-DeSantis rivalry, as a Trump-backed candidate would likely face off against a DeSantis-backed one.A Republican congressman from Florida, Representative Mike Waltz, is strongly considering a run for Senate to replace Mr. Scott if Mr. Scott makes a bid for the White House, according to a person familiar with the discussions. Mr. Waltz has endorsed Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign for president. More
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Morteza Hosseini Provided Ron DeSantis With a Costly Golf Simulator
The NewsA top political donor and close ally to Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida who has frequently lent him his plane also gave him an expensive golf simulator, as an indefinite loan to the governor’s mansion, Mr. DeSantis’s office acknowledged on Wednesday.The simulator was given by Morteza Hosseini, according to a letter released by the governor’s office. Mr. Hosseini is a giant in Florida’s influential home-building industry who serves as the chairman of the University of Florida board of trustees.The Washington Post and Reuters reported on Wednesday on the golf simulator, which sells for tens of thousands of dollars, and noted that it was structured as a loan to a state agency called the Mansion Commission, which is controlled by Florida’s Department of Management Services.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida campaigning this year in Illinois. He has previously faced scrutiny over gifts.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesWhy It Matters: Mr. DeSantis has previously faced scrutiny over donations.Mr. DeSantis, a Republican, is running for the party’s presidential nomination in 2024 and is a chief rival to former President Donald J. Trump. Mr. DeSantis has previously faced scrutiny over potential conflicts in accepting generous in-kind donations from Florida business owners.Some of those donations have avoided being reported under Florida campaign and ethics regulations, slipping through loopholes in state disclosure rules meant to prevent any undue influence.The New York Times reported last month that such loopholes might have allowed Mr. DeSantis to accept private plane donations from Mr. Hosseini and others, sometimes without disclosure, as he traveled the country before he made his candidacy official.Jeremy Redfern, the governor’s press secretary, said on Wednesday that the golf simulator loan was “coordinated by staff and approved by legal counsel.” Mr. Redfern added that previous administrations had accepted donations to the governor’s mansion. A list of the mansion’s acquisitions that was provided by the governor’s office included rugs and a Peloton bike donated to a previous administration.Background: The donor of the golf simulator is a heavyweight in Florida politics.On the campaign trail, Mr. DeSantis, an avid golfer, has been playing up his working-class roots in an effort to connect with voters in early voting states.Yet he has relied on a cadre of rich Florida businesspeople, including Mr. Hosseini, for perks like private planes since he first ran for governor in 2018.Mr. Hosseini, the chairman of ICI Homes, has long been a major player in Florida business and politics. He has donated his plane repeatedly to Mr. DeSantis’s political committee, dating to his early days in office, and has been a frequent presence in the governor’s office, according to two people familiar with the inner workings of the office who requested anonymity to speak freely.He serves as chairman of the University of Florida board of trustees, often regarded as a highly coveted appointment. His appointment predated Mr. DeSantis’s first term in office, but he was reappointed by Mr. DeSantis in 2021.In a statement, Mr. Hosseini said he had provided the golf simulator for use by the DeSantis family, guests and staff and understood it to be permissible under Florida law. He also said the state could keep it for as long as it wanted.In a 2019 letter to Mr. Hosseini released by the governor’s office, James Uthmeier, who was then a lawyer for the governor and is now his chief of staff, said he had personally cleared the loan with the Mansion Commission and verified it as permissible under state ethics codes.What’s Next: Mr. DeSantis will be back on the campaign trail.Mr. DeSantis’s opponents in the presidential nomination contest could seize on such donations and gifts as a contrast with his attempts to relate to working-class voters. This month he has campaign events in South Carolina and New Hampshire. The first debate of the Republican race is scheduled for Aug. 23 in Milwaukee.The front-runner, Mr. Trump, has repeatedly sought to draw attention to Mr. DeSantis’s use of private donor planes. Jason Miller, a Trump aide, reacted to the news reports on Wednesday on Twitter, saying it was “Ron DeSantis’ Florida Swamp in Action!” More
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Mailbag: Does Trump Represent Half the Country?
Settling a marital dispute, and a question that gets at a tension within today’s conservatism — in this month’s reader mailbag.Mary Altaffer/Associated PressHelp settle a disputeNate, help me settle a marital dispute. My wife contends that 50 percent of the country are Trump supporters, while I believe the number is closer to 35-40 percent. Knowing that there is not a definitive answer — are we talking about all people, registered voters, etc. — who do you think is closer to being right? — Phil StevensonWhenever possible, it’s important for both partners to feel good with the settlement of a marital dispute. So let me suggest that the answer depends on your preferred definition of a “Trump supporter.”If a Trump supporter is someone who voted for Donald J. Trump or, alternately, someone who will vote for him over President Biden in the next election, I think the answer is closer to your wife’s 50 percent tally. After all, Mr. Trump won 47 percent of voters in 2020 and 46 percent in 2016. I’m open-minded about what he could win in 2024, but if the election were held today it’s reasonable to think he’d win something closer to 50 percent than 37.5 percent, the midway point of your 35-40 percent range.But if being a Trump supporter requires something more than merely preferring him over Mr. Biden, the number of Trump supporters is probably closer to your 35-40 percent range. To take one simple measure: Mr. Trump has around a 40 percent national favorability rating. Another option: Only 35 percent said they wanted him to run for president in an NBC poll taken in April.A.I. and pollingI am curious to know if you think A.I. has a place in the future of polling. — Brian BakerAt the moment, I’m more concerned that A.I. might claim an unintended place in the present of polling: by making it even easier for bots to contaminate online panels. I’m not sure that common data quality measures — like open-ended responses — will work for long.A boost for Haley?Does DeSantis’s decline offer any hope to Nikki Haley— David NewbergerThis is like asking whether the decline of the Mets — one of baseball’s best teams last year — gives any hope to the Washington Nationals (currently the National League’s worst team, but now just 6.5 games behind the Mets!). I suppose it must be good news for the Nats at some level, but the Mets weren’t really their problem. At the moment, Ms. Haley is not plainly outpacing the likes of Tim Scott, Chris Christie or Mike Pence. Ron DeSantis isn’t really her problem.What about Asa?Would love to hear your thoughts on the way Asa Hutchinson’s candidacy may play out. — Merideth TomlinsonWho? I’m joking of course (he’s the former Arkansas governor), but he’ll need to find a way to break out of obscurity in a big field. I would guess he’ll need to dazzle in the debates to even earn a look from most voters. I’m not sure you should count on it, but you never know.Books by candidatesI previously mentioned that I don’t read books by aspiring presidential candidates. Is that always a good idea?I was interested in your description of how you prepare yourself when evaluating candidates. What you do clearly makes sense, EXCEPT you immediately reminded me how I decided to support Barack Obama in 2008. I thought he was not a strong candidate, but he was an interesting person, so I read “Dreams From My Father” … and became a big Obama fan! I imagine I am not the only voter who had this experience. Of course, someone is unlikely to read a book by a candidate unless they are somewhat interested in that person. — Angie BoyterWhen I wrote that I don’t read a presidential candidate’s book, I was mainly thinking about the genre of political books written by someone just about to run for president. These books often weave biographical detail, policy proposals and a political message into a preview of a coming campaign. They largely go unread, but they offer an excuse for TV producers to book a presidential hopeful on their shows. Mr. Obama’s 2006 book, “The Audacity of Hope,” falls into this category.Why don’t I want to read a book like this? I want to know the message a candidate emphasizes in speeches, advertisements and interviews, not the one that makes it into a 100,000-word book.Your experience with “Dreams From My Father” — a literary autobiography — is quite different. The book was widely read, and the content was distinct from what Mr. Obama talked about on the campaign trail. This is pretty unusual; J.D. Vance’s “Hillbilly Elegy” is the only recent example that comes to mind of something like it. Perhaps that’s a case where there’s a better argument for reading the book.On DeSantis and freedomThis isn’t really a question, but it’s an interesting observation that gets at a tension within conservatism nowadays:He’s been popular with Democrats and Republicans alike in Florida for his freedoms, not restrictions. Limiting people’s freedoms, regardless of the topic, will definitely harm him. — John FahrenwaldMr. DeSantis rose to prominence by fighting for freedom from coronavirus restrictions, and this remains an important part of his brand. His budget is branded as a “Framework for Freedom.” His book — which by now you may have guessed I have not read — is titled “The Courage to Be Free.”But as Mr. DeSantis’s fight for freedom has transitioned to a fight against “woke,” his orientation toward “freedom” has become a bit more complicated. He signed a six-week abortion ban. He’s used his authority as governor to crack down on “woke” corporations, and he’s expressed skepticism about giving tax breaks to companies who go on to advance the left’s values. This is emblematic of a broader turn on the intellectual right in which many want to use the power of the government to defend what they say are traditional values and fight the influence of the left in academia, the media and corporate America.This is sometimes called “post-liberal” conservatism. Here, liberal is meant in the classical sense of supporting liberty, free markets and limited government (as it is still used in Europe), not the American sense of liberal: a regulated market economy with a welfare state. In this context, the Republican Party has represented a liberal conservatism for most of the last half-century. The post-liberal conservatives prioritize conserving traditional values over conserving liberty.This post-liberal turn among a segment of conservative intellectual elites may reflect genuine fears of the threat posed by the left to traditional values, but it’s hard to see a political winner here. America is fundamentally a liberal country — again, in the classical, lower-case-l sense. It’s hard to think of anything more deeply embedded in traditional American values than individual liberty and freedom. It is not Hungary. I would guess that the constituency for an explicitly post-liberal conservatism is pretty small; perhaps that’s why Mr. DeSantis continues to brand himself as someone fighting for freedom, even as he increasingly supports measures that arguably restrict it. More
