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      Wisconsin Republicans Stand on the Verge of Total, Veto-Proof Power

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      FRANKS FIELD, Wis. — The three counties in Wisconsin’s far northwest corner make up one of the last patches of rural America that have remained loyal to Democrats through the Obama and Trump years.But after voting Democratic in every presidential election since 1976, and consistently sending the party’s candidates to the State Legislature for even longer, the area could now defect to the Republican Party. The ramifications would ripple far beyond the shores of Lake Superior.If Wisconsin Democrats lose several low-budget state legislative contests here on Tuesday — which appears increasingly likely because of new and even more gerrymandered political maps — it may not matter who wins the $114 million tossup contest for governor between Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, and Tim Michels, a Republican. Those northern seats would put Republicans in reach of veto-proof supermajorities that would render a Democratic governor functionally irrelevant.Even though Wisconsin remains a 50-50 state in statewide elections, Democrats would be on the verge of obsolescence.“The erosion of our democratic institutions that Republicans are looking to take down should be frightening to anyone,” said John Adams, a Democratic candidate for the State Assembly from Washburn, on the Chequamegon Bay of Lake Superior. “When you start losing whole offices in government, I don’t know where they’re going to stop.”Laura Gapske, a Democratic candidate for the Assembly, is running against a Republican who tweeted during the Capitol riot, “Rage on, Patriots!”Tim Gruber for The New York TimesWisconsin’s state legislative districts are heavily gerrymandered.Tim Gruber for The New York TimesThis rural corner of Wisconsin — Douglas, Bayfield and Ashland Counties — has become pivotal because it has three Democratic-held seats that Republicans appear likely to capture; two in the Assembly and one in the State Senate. Statewide, the party needs to flip just five Assembly districts and one in the Senate to take the two-thirds majorities required to override a governor’s veto.That outcome — “terrifying,” as Melissa Agard, a Democratic state senator and the leader of the party’s campaign arm in the chamber, described it — would clear a runway for Republican state legislators to follow through on their promises to eliminate the state’s bipartisan elections commission and take direct control of voting procedures and the certification of elections.Wisconsin is not the only state facing the prospect of a Democratic governor and veto-proof Republican majorities in its legislature.North Carolina Republicans, who also drew a gerrymandered legislative map, need to flip just three seats in the State House and two in the State Senate to be able to override vetoes by Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat. Gov. Laura Kelly of Kansas, a Democrat in a tight contest for re-election, already faces veto-proof Republican majorities, as do the Democratic governors of deep-red Kentucky and Louisiana.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsElection Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.Biden’s Speech: In a prime-time address, President Biden denounced Republicans who deny the legitimacy of elections, warning that the country’s democratic traditions are on the line.State Supreme Court Races: The traditionally overlooked contests have emerged this year as crucial battlefields in the struggle over the course of American democracy.Democrats’ Mounting Anxiety: Top Democratic officials are openly second-guessing their party’s pitch and tactics, saying Democrats have failed to unite around one central message.Social Security and Medicare: Republicans, eyeing a midterms victory, are floating changes to the safety net programs. Democrats have seized on the proposals to galvanize voters.Wisconsin Republicans, who have had a viselike grip on the Legislature since enacting the nation’s most aggressive gerrymander after their 2010 sweep of the state’s elections, make no apologies for pressing their advantage to its limits. Mr. Michels, the party’s nominee for governor, told supporters this week, “Republicans will never lose another election in Wisconsin after I’m elected governor.”Former Representative Reid Ribble, a Republican who served northeastern Wisconsin, said, “There’s a lot of complaining about gerrymandered House or State Assembly seats, and there’s some truth to that.”But he added: “At the end of the day, you’d be hard-pressed to come up with a district in rural Wisconsin that would elect a Democrat right now.”Republican control of the Wisconsin Legislature is so entrenched that party officials now use it as a campaign tactic. Craig Rosand, the G.O.P. chairman in Douglas County, said that because Democrats had so little influence at the State Capitol, voters who want a say in their government should elect Republicans.This northwest corner of Wisconsin has voted Democratic in presidential elections going back decades.Tim Gruber for The New York Times“The majority caucus always determines what passes,” he said. “Having a representative that’s part of the majority gets them in the room where the decisions are made.”Of Wisconsin’s 33 State Senate seats, 17 are on the ballot on Tuesday, including two Democratic-held districts that President Donald J. Trump carried in 2020. The picture is similarly bleak for Democrats in the State Assembly, where President Biden, who won the state by about 20,000 votes, carried just 35 of 99 districts.“When you can win a majority of voters and have close to a third of the seats, it’s not true democracy,” said Greta Neubauer, the Democratic leader in the State Assembly. “We are very much at risk of people deciding that it’s not worthwhile for them to continue to engage because they see how rigged the system is against the people of the state in favor of Republican politicians.”As former President Barack Obama campaigned for Wisconsin Democrats on Saturday in Milwaukee, he addressed the implications of Republican supermajorities in the Legislature.“If they pick up a few more seats in both chambers, they’ll be able to force through extreme, unpopular laws on everything from guns to education to abortion,” Mr. Obama said. “And there won’t be anything Democrats can do about it.”The Republican leaders in the Wisconsin Legislature say they will bring back all 146 bills Mr. Evers has vetoed during his four years in office — measures on elections, school funding, pandemic mitigation efforts, policing, abortion and the state’s gun laws — if they win a supermajority or if Mr. Michels is elected. Mr. Evers warned of “hand-to-hand combat” to find moderate Republican legislators to sustain vetoes if he is re-elected with a G.O.P. supermajority.Mr. Adams, the Assembly candidate, knocked on voters’ doors on Thursday in Franks Field, Wis.Tim Gruber for The New York TimesA Trump flag in Ashland, Wis. In the latest round of redistricting, three state districts that President Biden won were redrawn, and now would have been carried by Donald J. Trump.Tim Gruber for The New York Times“Katy, bar the door,” Mr. Evers said Thursday during an interview on his campaign bus in Ashland. “They’re going to shove all this stuff down our throat and it’s going to happen quickly and before anybody can pay attention. It could be bad.”Mr. Evers predicted that Democrats would be able to narrowly sustain veto power in the Assembly. The State Senate, he said, is “tougher.”In northwest Wisconsin, the three incumbent Democratic legislators decided against running for re-election under new, more Republican-friendly maps. Under the old maps, Mr. Biden carried each of the districts, which are home to large numbers of unionized workers in paper mills, mines and shipyards. Under the new lines Republicans adopted last year, Mr. Trump would have won them all.Kelly Westlund, a Democrat running for the State Senate here, spent Wednesday morning going up and down the long driveways of rural homes 15 miles south of Superior. It was grueling door-to-door outreach that illustrated the difficulty of introducing herself to voters as a new candidate in a new district that includes three media markets.“You don’t find a whole lot of folks here that are super jazzed about Joe Biden,” Ms. Westlund said. “But you do find people that understand there’s a lot at stake.”Her pitch included warnings about what would happen if Republicans flip her seat and claim a supermajority. Few of the voters she met knew much about the candidates for the Legislature — but they did express strong feelings about the national parties.“The Democrats have to own up to a certain amount of things that are going on now,” said John Tesarek, a retired commercial floor installer who would not commit to voting for Ms. Westlund. “I’m not totally certain I’m hearing them own up to much.”Gov. Tony Evers said in an interview that if Republicans gain supermajorities, “they’re going to shove all this stuff down our throat and it’s going to happen quickly.” Tim Gruber for The New York TimesThe picture wasn’t much different during early voting at the city clerk’s office in Superior.Ann Marie Allen, a hospital janitor, said she had voted for Mr. Evers and Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, the Democrat challenging Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican. But she said she had also backed Ms. Westlund’s Republican opponent, Romaine Quinn, because she liked that he had his toddler son in his commercials. Mr. Quinn has spent eight times as much on TV ads as Ms. Westlund has.“There was no smut in his ads,” Ms. Allen said. “You know how they cut down on other people? There wasn’t that much of that.”Chad Frantz, a plumber, said he had voted a straight Republican ticket.“I’ve been watching the Democrats bash every Republican,” he said. “They’ve been trying to make out every guy that’s a Republican running for a position into a male chauvinist pig.”Mayor Jim Paine of Superior, a Democrat, said Republicans were capitalizing on “fissures” in local Democratic politics between union workers and environmentalists.“Labor and the environment are both very important, but it’s leading to very real challenges,” Mr. Paine said. “They’re breaking up. That’s why you see more Republicans getting elected.”The Republicans likely to head to Madison are far different from their Democratic predecessors.Nick Milroy, a moderate Democrat, won seven terms in the Assembly and ran unopposed for a decade until he was re-elected in 2020 by just 139 votes. His old district was Democratic in presidential years; Mr. Trump carried the new one by two percentage points.Storefronts in Ashland, which sits on Lake Superior.Tim Gruber for The New York TimesKelly Westlund, a Democrat running for the State Senate, canvassing voters near Superior, Wis. “You don’t find a whole lot of folks here that are super jazzed about Joe Biden,” she said.Tim Gruber for The New York TimesThe Republican who would replace him is Angie Sapik, a marketing executive. During the Capitol riot in 2021, Ms. Sapik tweeted, “It’s about time Republicans stood up for their rights,” “Rage on, Patriots!” and “Come on, Mike Pence!”In a brief phone call, Ms. Sapik agreed to an interview, then ended the call and did not respond to subsequent messages.Her Democratic opponent is Laura Gapske, a Superior school board member who said she had to call the police after receiving threatening calls when advertising that promoted Ms. Sapik’s candidacy included her cellphone number.Democrats here described an uphill battle against better-funded Republican opponents, with the political atmosphere colored by inflation, concerns about faraway crime and an unpopular president.They also spoke of the difficulty of spreading their message in what is effectively a news desert.Mr. Adams, the Assembly candidate, is running in a district Mr. Trump would have carried by four points. Last week, Mr. Adams — an organic farmer who previously worked at small-town newspapers in Minnesota and Montana — drove two hours each way to Rhinelander to be interviewed by a local TV station.“Because we live in a low-media environment up here, too many of us are getting our cable news and not enough are getting our local news,” he said. “If Fox News is telling the story of Democrats, then we lose.”Mr. Adams and other Democrats spoke of the challenge of spreading their message, with thinly staffed newspapers and distant TV stations that pay little attention to the area. Tim Gruber for The New York Times More

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      Trump’s Guys Have Their Work Cut Out for Them

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      If Democrats do better than expected in next week’s elections, let’s hope they send a thank-you card to Donald Trump.Just because it’d drive him crazy. But his meddling is also a real factor: If you look at some of the most competitive races, the awfulness of the Republican nominee is thanks in good part to Trumpian support.“My record is unparalleled, my endorsements, it’s totally unparalleled,” he bragged earlier this year. It certainly was extensive — he reportedly made about 200 primary endorsements. But there weren’t a ton of heavy lifts. His choices were mainly incumbents and others who were virtually unopposed.“It’s like the Celtics winning a game against the Little Sisters of the Poor,” said a friend of mine.Still, when there was a serious race, Trump had a major-league talent for picking the least attractive possibility.Take Georgia. Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock should probably be in deep, deep trouble given the general political climate. But the polls show a near-even race. Warnock sure is lucky that Trump made such a heroic effort to promote Herschel Walker, who was terrible even before he plunged into his serial abortion scandals.And then there’s J.D. Vance, who Trump is backing in the Ohio Senate race. The former president showed up for a Vance rally last month in Youngstown, standing right next to the contender, who, he told the crowd, “is kissing my ass, he wants my support so much.”A comment that has been quoted a time or 20 by Vance’s opponent, Tim Ryan.To be fair — if you really feel like being fair — Trump’s favorites generally did win. ( “Nobody’s ever had a record like this. I’m almost unblemished.”)Of course, it’s natural that voters in Republican primaries would care about the opinion of the last Republican president. Trump’s endorsement certainly made a difference in Arizona — where the deeply unappealing Blake Masters won the Senate nomination with his help.And his backing was also very important in Pennsylvania, where Republicans are now stuck in the governor’s race with Doug Mastriano, a state senator who’s argued that women who have abortions relatively early in a pregnancy should be charged with murder.The general elections are a different kind of competition, where the Trump name can be a little less, um, attractive. Wisconsin observers couldn’t help noticing that once Tim Michels had won the Republican nomination for governor, his campaign website scrubbed all references to “Endorsed by President Trump,” only to put them back up an hour later. Such is the life of the Trump acolyte.In New York, the Democratic candidate for governor, Kathy Hochul, cannot remind voters enough that her opponent, Lee Zeldin, has Trump’s backing. Zeldin, who was happy to have Trump appear at a September fund-raiser, now likes to focus on crime, and you will probably not hear the 45th president’s name in his ads unless Trump gets mugged on Park Avenue.Even when he’s not promoting anybody, Trump is … keeping in touch. It’s hard to avoid his emails, the vast, vast majority of which are asking for money. My absolute favorite, which arrived last month, announced he “just couldn’t wait any longer to tell you this EXCITING NEWS.”Which was — wait for it:“I HAVE BEEN NAMED THE #1 PRESIDENTIAL GOLFER IN HISTORY!”The namer was a conservative website called the DC Enquirer. We will not mention the very different opinion of experts like the sportswriter Rick Reilly, who wrote about Trump’s game in his book “Commander in Cheat.”But our former president was sharing this exciting news to remind us that “we still have a few boxes left of our LIMITED EDITION Trump Golf Balls.” A collector’s item!You can get any of this stuff by clicking a box and making a contribution — pick any amount you want, although that vibrant blue $250 box is doing a special happy dance. All the money goes to Trump’s own personal election fund-raising operation, which cynics might just refer to as Donald’s Piggy Bank. From which he’s forked out more than $13 million for TV ads over the last month to help out his fellow Republicans.That may sound nice, but put in another context, it amounts to about 15 percent of what he had on hand. And about one-fifth of the $71 million Republicans are getting from the Senate Leadership Fund, Mitch McConnell’s super PAC. McConnell, by Trump’s calculation, is a “Broken Old Crow.” So, of course, nothing Mitch does counts.I guarantee the emails will keep on coming. What else can Trump do? He’s still banned from Twitter and his attempt at a substitute, Truth Social, probably has fewer followers than some minor celebrities. Although definitely more than a semi-popular college sophomore.Well, hey, D.J.T. does need some diversion. His business organization is wrestling with multitudinous court cases in New York right now — tax fraud is a central topic.He’s been on the road a lot, making speeches, raising money and being protected by Secret Service agents who the Trump Organization has charged up to $1,185 per night for hotel rooms. Yeah, he’s so grateful for security over the past few years he’s billed us more than $1.4 million.Let’s see what happens next. If his pitiful candidates don’t survive, maybe some Republicans will ask for their money back.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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      Can Lee Zeldin Reinvent His Way to the NY Governor’s Mansion?

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      SHIRLEY, N.Y. — As a young U.S. Army lawyer of unmistakable ambition, Lee Zeldin could almost see his future unfurling before him. It was his first stint in Iraq, and he was already imagining the kind of distinguished career in uniform that would have laid the groundwork for one in politics.Then a Red Cross message arrived on the base where Mr. Zeldin was embedded as a captain with the 82nd Airborne Division. His girlfriend had gone into dangerously premature labor with twin girls. Doctors were not optimistic about the babies’ survival. His commanding officer sent him home to mourn.“This I vividly remember the emotion of,” Mr. Zeldin, now a conservative congressman, recalled in a recent interview. “My priorities became all about my daughters.”The girls survived after months in the hospital. But rather than returning to Iraq, Mr. Zeldin took a desk job back at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, got married and then was discharged. At just 27, he found that the life he had imagined had veered off course.It was not the first time, nor the last. As a high school senior here on the South Shore of Long Island, Mr. Zeldin sought a prestigious appointment to West Point, only to fall short. After leaving the Army in 2007, he almost immediately entered a race for Congress, hoping to jump-start his political career. He lost in a blowout.But in every case, Mr. Zeldin has shown aptitude for finding a quick path to reinvention that has helped fuel his political ascent. Now, at age 42, it has put him closer than any Republican since George E. Pataki two decades ago to one of the nation’s most influential political posts, the governorship of New York.A few hundred Zeldin supporters attended a rally on Monday in Westchester County, traditionally an area controlled by Democrats. Brittainy Newman for The New York TimesThough Gov. Kathy Hochul, the Democratic incumbent, remains the front-runner, Mr. Zeldin’s late surge in the polls has shocked even political strategists and sent Democrats scrambling to prop up their candidate. With Ms. Hochul’s huge war chest and a vast Democratic registration advantage, few expected Mr. Zeldin to come close to winning, and perhaps with good reason: He does not easily fit the profile of a New York power player.In a state shaped by wealthy business interests and often governed by larger-than-life personalities and family dynasties, Mr. Zeldin is an outlier. He grew up in law enforcement households of modest means. He can be introverted and awkward with voters. And in a state dominated by the political left, he is probably the most conservative serious contender for the governorship in modern memory — even voting to overturn the 2020 election on Jan. 6, 2021.Yet a careful review of his public and private life, including two dozen interviews with family, friends, colleagues and critics, shows that Mr. Zeldin’s emergence as a political force stems from decades of meticulous planning, comfort with taking risks, well-timed alliances with more powerful Republicans and, above all, a knack honed from a young age for what allies call adaptation but his critics view as a more cynical political shape-shifting.Those qualities have been on full display in this fall’s campaign, as Mr. Zeldin moved swiftly to tap into two powerful currents of discontent that Democrats appear to have misjudged and that threaten to scramble the state’s usual political order: painful inflation eroding New Yorkers’ sense of financial well-being and fears about rising crime.“He’s grabbed the right issues and hasn’t let go,” said Rob Astorino, who lost to Mr. Zeldin in this year’s Republican primary.Mr. Zeldin, center, has heavily courted the Hasidic vote during his campaign stops in New York City, including a recent visit to Williamsburg, Brooklyn.Andrew Seng for The New York TimesBut his instincts have also been evident as he tries to execute another on-the-fly transformation, playing down hard-line positions that served him well while he climbed the Republican ranks in Albany and Washington but are now politically inconvenient, while offering scant details on some of his latest policy proposals.Who Is Lee Zeldin Up Against?Card 1 of 5Gov. Kathy Hochul’s rise to power. More

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      Mike Pence Visits Georgia as Gov. Brian Kemp Plays Up Early Turnout

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      CUMMING, Ga. — Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia, flanked by former Vice President Mike Pence and several fellow state Republican candidates, stressed the importance of voter turnout Tuesday in a campaign swing through Atlanta’s northern suburbs.With a week to go until Election Day, Mr. Pence ticked through a list of Mr. Kemp’s conservative policy achievements on crime and abortion, and underscored the role that Georgia — where Democrats have made significant inroads over the last four years — will play in national politics.“We need Georgia to lead the way to a great American comeback by re-electing Gov. Brian Kemp,” Mr. Pence told a crowd of supporters at a rally near the town square in Cumming, about 30 miles northeast of Atlanta.Their joint appearance came during the final four days of early voting in Georgia. Mr. Kemp is leading his Democratic opponent, Stacey Abrams, in most polls but implored his supporters to ignore those numbers and turn out. He noted that the party had trailed Democrats in the size and scale of its field operations in recent elections — and that his campaign had helped finance a renewed effort for the 2022 midterms.He pointed to Georgia’s record early vote turnout numbers as proof of the success of that operation — and to rebut complaints from Democratic leaders and voting rights advocates who say the state’s new voting law is suppressive because of its tighter restrictions on ballot drop boxes, voting schedules and absentee ballots, among other provisions.Ms. Abrams has said repeatedly that high turnout numbers do not negate potential voter suppression, an idea that Mr. Kemp called “fuzzy Washington, D.C., math.”“We’re seeing record turnout,” he said. “I would encourage people to go vote and vote for somebody that has been truthful with you.”Mr. Pence, who also campaigned alongside Mr. Kemp last spring as the incumbent fended off a primary challenge from a candidate backed by former President Donald J. Trump, is one of several high-profile Republicans steering clear of Mr. Trump who will visit Georgia on Mr. Kemp’s behalf in the coming days. Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona will campaign alongside Mr. Kemp on Wednesday and Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, will join the bus tour on Thursday and Friday. More

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      With Allies Nearby, Hochul and Zeldin Try to Spur Voters to Polls

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      With eight days until Election Day, the candidates in New York’s governors race are hoping popular politicians can help them drum up support from their bases.With the race for governor of New York closer than expected, the two candidates on Monday put their strategies and proxies front and center: Representative Lee Zeldin, a Republican, held a campaign rally with Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia, and Gov. Kathy Hochul appeared with a pair of Black and Latino Democratic lawmakers.For Mr. Zeldin, the rally in Westchester County served to remind voters of Mr. Youngkin’s victory last year, seen by some Republicans as a kind of how-to for conservatives in left-leaning states.For Ms. Hochul, the appearance underscored her need to stir up enthusiasm among Black and Latino populations she is eager to draw to the polls.Speaking at the Madison Square Boys & Girls Club in Harlem alongside Representatives Jamaal Bowman and Adriano Espaillat, Ms. Hochul focused heavily on gun control and public safety, as she sought to address Mr. Zeldin’s campaign emphasis on crime, which has helped him gain traction with voters.Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin with Lee Zeldin at a Get Out the Vote Rally in Thornwood Monday. Brittainy Newman for The New York TimesAs anti-violence activists and parents who have lost children to gun violence stood nearby, the governor spoke about legislation she championed to help stop the flow of illegal firearms into New York. She accused Mr. Zeldin of failing to back up his rhetoric on public safety with a clear plan.She asserted that Mr. Zeldin supported plans that would help more guns come into the state, including arming school safety officers and possibly teachers with weapons, ideas she denounced as “absurd” and “insanity.”“Don’t come here today and tell us that you’ve got a tough on crime plan that’s just soft and squishy on guns,” Ms. Hochul said.Some 20 miles to the north, Mr. Zeldin accused Ms. Hochul of ignoring a “crime emergency” in the state and urged voters in liberal New York to place their personal views above party identity.“This isn’t about Republicans verse Democrats, this is about all of us together,” Mr. Zeldin said. “Republicans, Democrats and independents uniting as New Yorkers to save our state.”Recent polls have suggested Ms. Hochul, seeking her first full term as governor, is leading in the race. But support for Mr. Zeldin has grown, particularly as public safety has become a top concern for voters.The governor’s campaign has shifted in response. Though Ms. Hochul had earlier focused her pitch to voters on abortion rights, and tying Mr. Zeldin to his party’s extremist flank, she has since broadened her message.As part of this change, Ms. Hochul’s campaign released a new television ad on Monday that focused on public safety. The ad emphasized gun control laws that she signed in June, and her successful effort to tighten New York’s bail laws.Bruce Gyory, a Democratic strategist, said Ms. Hochul’s focus on guns as the cause of crime made sense.“The gun safety issue is a major issue that unites suburban women and inner-city women,” Mr. Gyory said. “I think that’s a strong hook to hang your hat on, so to speak, for her.”Ms. Hochul’s event on Monday is one of several that she is expected to hold in the city in the next eight days as she seeks to boost turnout, particularly from Black and Latino voters whom New York Democrats have long relied on.Monday Mr. Bowman, who represents the northern Bronx and southern Westchester, accused Mr. Zeldin of “fear mongering.” He criticized the Republican for not voting in Congress to support legislation addressing gun violence and gun safety.Mayor Eric Adams alongside Governor Kathy Hochul in Queens Sunday. Johnny Milano for The New York TimesMr. Espaillat, whose district includes parts of Upper Manhattan and Harlem, criticized Mr. Zeldin for not being present in the communities most affected by the surge in violence that has been at the center of his campaign.“Where is Lee when two young men confront each other with handguns on a weekend night?” Mr. Espaillat said.Hours later, Mr. Zeldin was with Mr. Youngkin, addressing a cheering crowd of hundreds outside the American Legion in Thornwood, N.Y. His focus was on his anti-crime platform, and he repeated promises to roll back New York’s bail laws, and fire Manhattan’s district attorney.Mr. Youngkin, a rising figure in the Republican Party, commended Mr. Zeldin for putting Democrats on edge in a state whose electoral fealty they had largely taken for granted.“The momentum is building like they can’t believe. You can see them all of a sudden go from cocky to scared, it happens just like that,” Mr. Youngkin said, comparing Mr. Zeldin’s campaign to the one that saw him become governor last year in Virginia, a state that President Biden won handily in 2020 and where Democrats had built increasing support.Mr. Youngkin also carefully courted suburban voters who turned away from the Republican Party under former President Donald J. Trump, keeping the former president at a distance during his campaign yet being careful not to criticize him. Mr. Youngkin also downplayed his opposition to abortion, focusing instead on inflation, safety, and how race and equity are discussed in schools.Mr. Zeldin has tried to manage the same balance in his campaign, particularly as he tries to pick off moderate voters in the suburbs.Rosemary Eshghi, 68, of Chappaqua, N.Y., said that she used to be a Democrat but was now part of a group called Republican Women of Westchester. She came to the rally because she appreciated Mr. Youngkin’s views on schools, which she believed Mr. Zeldin was aligned with.Her vote, she said, would go to the Republican ticket, in part because Ms. Hochul “does not represent those ideals that I believed in 30 years ago. I left the party, and she’s totally inviting chaos.”But Andrew Lynch, 64, of New Rochelle, who said that he used to be a registered Republican but was no longer affiliated with the party, would not be voting for Mr. Zeldin, in part because the Jan. 6 Capitol riot convinced him that Republicans were trampling on the rule of law.He was at the rally, he said, to see Mr. Zeldin and Mr. Youngkin up close and to “see if it’s as horrible as I think it is when you’re actually live and in person.” More

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      4 Takeaways From the Last Kemp-Abrams Debate Before Election Day

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      Gov. Brian Kemp and Stacey Abrams, who would like to replace him, met Sunday night for one of the last major televised debates of the 2022 midterm election cycle, and the Georgia showdown delivered an hour heavy on substance and light on political fireworks and viral moments.Mr. Kemp, a Republican who narrowly defeated Ms. Abrams, a Democrat, in 2018, holds a durable lead of 5 to 10 percentage points in public and private polling, a status that was evident throughout their discussion.Mr. Kemp took few chances, stuck to his talking points about how Ms. Abrams has spent the years since their last contest and tried to sell Georgia voters on how good they have things now.Ms. Abrams, as she has done throughout her campaign, pressed a message that prosperity in Mr. Kemp’s Georgia has not been shared equally. Under an Abrams administration, she said, Black people and women would have more input into their relationship with the government — or in the case of abortion rights, pushing the government away from any relationship at all.Here are four takeaways from Sunday’s debate:Abrams tried to catch up.With just about all of Ms. Abrams’s arguments against Mr. Kemp well worn by now — she has been making parts of them fairly consistently since their 2018 race — she sought a new approach to chip away at Mr. Kemp’s advantage in the race and remind her supporters that the election isn’t over.So she turned to Herschel Walker, seeking to tie Mr. Kemp to Georgia’s Republican Senate nominee. Mr. Walker’s campaign has been plagued by a host of revelations about his past: that despite opposing abortion rights, he pushed women with whom he’d had relationships to undergo abortions and that he had physically attacked women and family members — accusations Georgians are seeing nonstop in television advertising.A watch event in Atlanta for the governor’s debate on Sunday evening.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesDuring a segment discussing new restrictions on abortion that Mr. Kemp signed into law, Ms. Abrams accused him of refusing to defend women.“And yet he defended Herschel Walker, saying that he didn’t want to be involved” in Mr. Walker’s personal life, she said. She added, “But he doesn’t mind being involved in the personal lives and the personal medical choices of the women in Georgia. What’s the difference? Well, I would say the equipment.”Kemp: Check my record.Ms. Abrams criticized Mr. Kemp for a majority of the policy decisions during his term as governor, like ignoring public health guidance to keep businesses open at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic and supporting a law that allows the purchase of firearms without a permit. But Mr. Kemp dismissed her arguments with an I’m-rubber-and-you’re-glue argument.“This debate’s going to be a lot like the last one,” he said early on, before delivering a line he’d repeat throughout the hour. “Ms. Abrams is going to attack my record because she doesn’t want to talk about her own record.”The refrain is a common one from Mr. Kemp and one he used against his Republican primary opponent, David Perdue. It also underlines a key feature of Mr. Kemp’s re-election campaign, which has focused largely on his first term. And while Ms. Abrams has a policy record dating back to her years as State House minority leader, hers did not include policymaking from the governor’s mansion.She recognized that fact in her rebuttal before reading off a laundry list of his policies she disagreed with: “I have not been in office for the last four years.”Mr. Kemp stuck to his talking points on Sunday in the debate in Atlanta.Ben Gray/Associated PressLong answers led to fewer fireworks.Hosted by the Atlanta TV station WSB, the debate was meant to be heavy on policy and light on drama — and policy heavy it was. The format gave each candidate 90 seconds — as opposed to 60 or even 45 in some other debates — to answer each question, with rebuttals that often lasted just as long.It was also a performance in which both candidates kept within the rules. There were no interruptions or interjections and at no point in the hourlong debate did the moderators have to remind either candidate of the agreed-upon time limits.That gave the candidates ample time to articulate their views and gave Georgia’s voters one of the clearest opportunities to judge for themselves the candidates’ policy and stylistic differences.The moderators also left the job of policing fact from fiction to the candidates themselves — a responsibility both Mr. Kemp and Ms. Abrams did not hesitate to accept. The questions posed were open-ended, allowing a robust discussion but not one in which the moderators challenged the candidates on their own past positions and statements.Two candidates who disagree on everything.There is virtually no overlap in Ms. Abrams’s and Mr. Kemp’s views on the issues most animating the race. Those stark differences came into full view during their back-and-forth on firearms, abortion, the state’s election laws and use of the state’s budget.Mr. Kemp argued that universal access to guns would allow more people in Georgia to protect themselves. Ms. Abrams said that logic would put more people in danger and increase the likelihood of mass shootings.Ms. Abrams has loudly criticized the state’s newly instituted law outlawing abortion after six weeks of pregnancy — Mr. Kemp signed and defended the law. And on the state’s more than $6 billion state budget surplus, Mr. Kemp said he supported allocating the funds for tax relief while Ms. Abrams has proposed using it to fund an array of state programs.The differences highlighted the candidates’ contrasting partisan instincts and put a clear choice between the two on display for an electorate that is very closely divided. More

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      Clinton, Obama and DeSantis Lend Star Power to Tight N.Y. Races

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      A high-profile display of Republican and Democratic efforts illustrates how many of the state’s races have become unexpectedly close, including the governor’s race.HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — New York’s status as a battleground state was cemented over the weekend as a star-studded lineup of the country’s top Democrats and Republicans descended on the state.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida visited Long Island on Saturday night; hours earlier, former President Bill Clinton was the star attraction at a rally in Rockland County. And on the airwaves, former President Barack Obama lent his voice in support of Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat facing an unexpectedly stiff challenge from Representative Lee Zeldin, a Republican.In a sign of how close the governor’s race has gotten, the Democratic Governors Association filed paperwork in recent days to form a super PAC in New York that will prop up Ms. Hochul on TV and try to stave off losses further down the ballot. After watching from the sidelines for months, the group will now join prominent labor groups in rushing to start spending on behalf of Ms. Hochul in the race’s final days, as concerned Democrats scramble to ensure that their base turns out to vote.The high-profile display of Democratic force amounted to the type of last-minute intervention that traditionally plays out in swing states, not a liberal state like New York, underscoring just how vulnerable Democrats believe they have become in this election cycle.Indeed, Ms. Hochul and Mr. Zeldin are each entering the final stretch with about $6 million in their war chests, the campaigns said on Friday, a surprisingly leveled playing field given that the governor significantly outpaced Mr. Zeldin in fund-raising during much of the race. Ms. Hochul, who has raised nearly $50 million since she entered the race, and spent much of it, said she raised $3.37 million in the last three-week filing period. Mr. Zeldin reported raising slightly more — $3.6 million.Mr. DeSantis’s hastily organized appearance in Suffolk County — the rally for Mr. Zeldin, which drew thousands of people, was planned one day in advance — was a reflection of the party’s renewed bullishness in a state that hasn’t elected a Republican governor in 20 years.“You need someone to just go and clean house in Albany,” Mr. DeSantis, a presidential hopeful, told thousands of mostly white supporters at a raucous rally at a parking lot on Long Island that was one of the largest campaign events of the governor’s race. He railed against Covid-19 mandates, crime, inflation and illegal immigration, before concluding that Mr. Zeldin’s potential victory would amount to “the 21st century version of the shot heard ’round the world.”Gov. Ron DeSantis, left, suggested that Mr. Zeldin, right, was someone who could “go and clean house in Albany.”Johnny Milano for The New York TimesEarlier in the day, the Hochul campaign sought to show off its own firepower by unveiling Mr. Obama’s radio ad, where he tells listeners that “the stakes could not be higher” in the governor’s race, which polls suggest Ms. Hochul is leading, even as Mr. Zeldin has surged in recent weeks.Mr. Clinton emerged in the Hudson Valley to deliver a nearly half-hour speech attacking the Republican Party while campaigning with Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, a top Democrat and longtime friend of Mr. Clinton’s who is locked in an unexpectedly close contest to retain his House seat.And on Sunday, Jill Biden, the first lady, was scheduled to speak at a fund-raiser for Mr. Maloney in Westchester, before traveling to Long Island for a phone banking event with Ms. Hochul.The Democratic Governors Association had not initially planned to spend on the race, but as polls have tightened and the Republican Governors Association began dumping $2 million into a pro-Zeldin super PAC, the Democrats decided to act. A spokesman for the D.G.A., David Turner, did not say how much it planned to spend.“Republican super PACs have spent a record amount of nearly $12 million to insert an election-denying, abortion-banning, MAGA Republican who would make New York less safe by rolling back laws to take illegal guns off the street,” Mr. Turner said. “The D.G.A. is taking nothing for granted, and won’t sit idly by.”Republicans are doubling down on the newfound enthusiasm around Mr. Zeldin: On Monday, he will campaign in Westchester alongside Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia, a Republican who won in an upset victory last year..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;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.As early voting kicked off on Saturday, Ms. Hochul has begun to significantly scale up her campaigning: She was expected to make at least 14 campaign appearances this weekend. She cast her ballot in Buffalo, her hometown, on Saturday morning before traveling to Rochester and Syracuse, all Democratic-leaning bastions in upstate.Governor Hochul was stepping up her ground game, with at least 14 campaign events on her weekend schedule, including a stop at Syracuse University.Benjamin Cleeton for The New York TimesOn Sunday morning, she gave brief remarks at four Black churches in Nassau County on Long Island, an increasingly competitive battleground where polls suggest Mr. Zeldin has made significant inroads in recent weeks. Amid concerns that she may be struggling to animate Black voters, one of the most reliable Democratic constituencies, Ms. Hochul was joined by Hazel Dukes, the head of the New York State N.A.A.C.P., who introduced Ms. Hochul to churchgoers at the church stops on Sunday.“She’s comfortable with all of us,” Ms. Dukes told Black congregants at Antioch Baptist Church, highlighting her working-class roots and record on public safety and investments in public education. “In her soul and in her heart, she cares about the least of us.”At Union Baptist Church, the Rev. Dr. Sedgwick Easley told churchgoers that it was “important that in minority communities like ours, our people go out to the polls and vote.”When it was her turn to talk, Ms. Hochul made no mention of her commitment to protecting the state’s strict abortion rights, one of the pillars of her campaign. Instead, she emphasized her initiatives to strengthen gun laws and fight crime, including legislation she passed earlier this year to tighten the state’s contentious bail laws, a constant target of Mr. Zeldin’s attacks.“Having guns is not the answer. We have to stand up to that radical idea that this should become the wild West,” Ms. Hochul said. “We’re not going there. Donald Trump won’t take us there. His surrogate running for governor won’t take us there, because I am the firewall. You are the firewall.”Later, Ms. Hochul joined an array of Democratic elected officials from Long Island for a rally with hundreds of union workers, before traveling to southeast Queens to campaign with Mayor Eric Adams for the first time in the general election.Mr. Adams and the governor spoke to a crowd of several hundred people who gathered inside a shopping mall; some were union workers, but many of them were local residents who said they had received emails and fliers about the rally. Praising Ms. Hochul’s response to the pandemic and warning of the consequences of not voting, Mr. Adams said: “We cannot say on the Wednesday after Election Day, ‘we wish we had voted.’”Several attendees said they had already cast their ballot early for Ms. Hochul, including Robert Manigault, 70 a retired postal clerk who is Black and cited his experience during the civil rights era as one of the reasons for his vote.“I feel that she’s going to take us places,” he said. “I feel the Republicans are going to take us backward. I’ve been there and I don’t like it.”Later in the day, in an unannounced campaign stop, Mr. Zeldin visited Borough Park in Brooklyn, where he was greeted by hundreds of residents from the Orthodox and Hasidic community, a small but powerful voting contingent he has actively courted.Mr. Zeldin received a far larger reception on Saturday night in his hometown, Suffolk County, a Republican stronghold he has represented in Congress since 2015. Standing in front of a red tour bus emblazoned with his campaign’s slogan — “Save Our State” — he spoke to an audience that sported MAGA hats and appeared as familiar with Mr. Zeldin as they were curious about Mr. DeSantis visiting the small hamlet of Hauppauge.Mr. Zeldin said that the state’s conditions were leading New Yorkers to continue to move to Florida, “seeing that their money will go further, they’ll feel safer, they’ll live life freer, and that’s why New York leads the entire nation in population loss.”“For the next 10 days, there is no way that Kathy Hochul will be able to replicate the energy and momentum that we have,” Mr. Zeldin added.In the crowd, Laura Ortiz, 52, said she supported Mr. Zeldin because of his focus on public safety, saying her house in Lindenhurst was one of 13 houses on her street that were recently robbed in a spree that also saw one residence set on fire.“I know what it feels like to be violated,” said Ms. Ortiz, who was wearing a headband with a pair of American flags that bounced on springs each time she moved. “I don’t want to see anyone get hurt.”Nicholas Fandos More

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      Kemp and Abrams Face Off Sunday for Final Debate in Georgia’s Governor Race

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      ATLANTA — Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia, a Republican, and Stacey Abrams, his Democratic challenger, will meet again onstage on Sunday for their second and final debate in a campaign rematch for governor.The one-hour debate will be hosted by WSB-TV in Atlanta and begin at 7 p.m. Eastern time. It will be broadcast live on local Atlanta television and carried on WSB-TV’s streaming service. Reporters from The New York Times will provide live analysis and updates.To participate in this debate, candidates had to meet a 10 percent polling threshold, which disqualified the Libertarian candidate, Shane Hazel.Early voting is already in full swing in Georgia as the last full week of campaigning before Election Day begins. Several high-profile surrogates from both parties have visited the state to bolster Mr. Kemp’s and Ms. Abrams’s campaigns, including former President Barack Obama, who held a rally in Atlanta for the Democratic ticket on Friday. Former Vice President Mike Pence will campaign with Mr. Kemp around the Atlanta area on Tuesday.Sunday’s debate will provide both candidates with a platform to deliver their closing messages to voters in a race for governor that has largely been defined by national trends. Ms. Abrams has made health care and abortion access a cornerstone of her campaign in light of the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, while Mr. Kemp has hammered her and Democrats in Washington over rising prices and the volatile economy.As of Friday, polls showed Mr. Kemp ahead of Ms. Abrams by an average of seven percentage points. More