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      Zeldin Sees a Path to Becoming Governor. It Runs Through Brooklyn.

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      A curious thing happened last weekend when Representative Lee Zeldin brought his Republican campaign for governor of New York into Hasidic Brooklyn.Mr. Zeldin, a pronounced underdog, was greeted like a rock star. Crowds chanted in approval. Yiddish-language campaign posters littered the streets. “Mister Lee Zeldin, you got my vote,” a paramedic yelled out of an ambulance inscribed in Hebrew lettering.Mr. Zeldin, one of only two Jewish Republicans in Congress, has long been a fierce supporter of Israel and a fixture at Republican Jewish Coalition events. But in recent weeks, he has maneuvered aggressively to position himself in lock step with Orthodox Jewish concerns over an increase in hate crimes and ongoing state attempts to regulate private religious schools, known as yeshivas.“It’s not just on our streets, but even in our schools where we are being targeted,” he said during a visit Sunday to Borough Park.With less than 50 days until Election Day, Mr. Zeldin’s Jewish outreach is at the center of a concerted and overlooked effort to court enclaves like these in boroughs outside Manhattan, where English is often a second language and voters appear to be highly motivated by education issues, congestion pricing and threats to public safety — along with a leftward drift among Democrats they have long supported.Mr. Zeldin, whose campaign is strongest in areas far outside New York City, has recently made other stops in the city at Asian American neighborhoods in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, and Flushing, Queens; Russian-speaking communities around Brighton Beach, Brooklyn; and a conservative Hispanic church in the Bronx. Pro-Zeldin super PACs are providing backup with foreign-language ads and outreach on WeChat and WhatsApp.Whether he can move enough votes to destabilize Democrats’ New York City firewall remains to be seen. Recent polls from Emerson and Siena Colleges show him trailing Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, by roughly 15 percentage points, although other polls suggest that the race may be tighter.No Republican candidate for governor has earned more than 30 percent of the city vote — Mr. Zeldin’s benchmark — in two decades. And even if he did, he would still have to pull off commanding victories upstate and in New York’s increasingly diverse suburbs to beat Ms. Hochul, who is spending freely from overflowing campaign accounts to try to ensure that does not happen.But for New York Republicans locked in the political wilderness since former President Donald J. Trump’s election, the promise of a longer-term realignment among crucial Asian and Jewish voting blocks is tantalizing — even if the party has to wait until after November for it to happen.“These are voters who are free agents,” said Chapin Fay, a former Zeldin adviser leading one of the super PACs, who nonetheless remains worried Republicans are not doing enough to capitalize on the opening.Mr. Zeldin’s campaign passed out signs in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on Sunday.Andrew Seng for The New York TimesThe recent Emerson College poll found Ms. Hochul leading among voters who identified as Asian, but by only 10 percentage points, compared to her 37-point lead among Hispanics and 60-point lead among African Americans.“It’s hard for me to go into any group that I’m in without seeing a Zeldin news article, or a flier, or a Republican piece of literature, on WeChat,” said Yiatin Chu, the president of Asian Wave Alliance, a nonpartisan political club formed to help organize voters.Ms. Chu has never voted for a Republican. But after Mr. Zeldin met with a group of Asian leaders last year, she was convinced that he would prioritize fighting anti-Asian violence, and block changes to the admissions process for elite public schools, which enroll large numbers of Asian Americans. “My message to Democrats locally and nationally is please don’t take our communities for granted,” said Representative Grace Meng, the state’s only Asian American congresswoman, who started sounding alarms about aggressive Republican outreach in her Queens district last year.But she predicted that Ms. Hochul would fare well there, particularly given her outspoken support for abortion rights, aggressive steps to combat gun violence and distance from former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s unpopular education policies.As for Mr. Zeldin’s outreach: “It’s a little late.”Democrats are making their own large investments in many of the same communities, along with more reliable segments of the party’s base that could offset Mr. Zeldin’s gains.Ms. Hochul’s campaign said it would spend six figures on ads aimed at Jewish voters and another $1 million on Spanish-language ads. Many will tout her work on gun control and mental health while hammering Mr. Zeldin for opposing abortion rights and supporting Mr. Trump, who remains broadly unpopular here.Despite Mr. Zeldin’s optimism about Orthodox Jewish groups, some estimates suggest that the Hasidic vote typically represents less than 2 percent of statewide turnout, while other religious Jewish groups, including the modern Orthodox, account for another 2 to 3 percent. And Ms. Hochul, who made a series of cold calls last week seeking to shore up ties with prominent Jewish allies, is still expected to win Jewish voters overall, running up the score among non-Orthodox voters.“From Borough Park to the South Bronx, Governor Hochul has built a broad coalition of New Yorkers who are supporting her campaign because of her effective leadership and ability to get things done,” said a Hochul spokesman, Jerrel Harvey.Still, Mr. Zeldin may have good reason to think he can notch gains.In southern Brooklyn, Russian and Ukrainian immigrants — many of them Jewish — helped flip a City Council seat for Republicans last year. The large population of immigrants who fled the former Soviet Union voted enthusiastically for Mr. Trump and have increasingly rejected Democrats — even moderates like Mayor Eric Adams and Ms. Hochul — for their ties to a party that harbors a small minority of democratic socialists.“Even if it’s a centrist Democrat, they will select a Republican at this point,” said Inna Vernikov, a Democrat-turned-Republican who won the Council seat.Republicans also believe opposition to the state’s new congestion pricing plan, which would make commuting into Manhattan more expensive for middle-class New Yorkers at a time of sharp inflation, could help motivate turnout.For now, the competition for votes appears to be fiercest in New York’s politically influential and fast-growing Hasidic communities, which have also shifted quickly to the right in recent years.Though they are not exceptionally large, these groups tend to turn out when other voters do not and vote as a bloc. And right now, they may be some of the most motivated voters in the state.Most of New York’s major Hasidic groups backed Gov. Kathy Hochul ahead of the Democratic primary this summer, but have not yet made their endorsements for the general election. Andrew Seng for The New York TimesHasidic Jews have been particularly visible targets of an uptick in antisemitic violence. And in recent weeks, government intervention in Hasidic yeshivas has been framed as an existential threat to the community.Earlier this month, The New York Times published an investigation that found that roughly 100 Hasidic boys’ schools were systematically denying their students a basic secular education and regularly using corporal punishment, while receiving large sums of taxpayer funds. A few days later, a state education panel passed long-awaited rules to regulate nonreligious studies in private schools.“New York State declares a war against its ultra-Orthodox residents,” screamed the front page of Der Blatt, a Yiddish-language newspaper.While Ms. Hochul has maintained a studied silence on yeshivas, Mr. Zeldin had sought to capitalize on the issue.In recent days, he has crisscrossed Hasidic areas to declare that he will protect yeshivas from the government he is hoping to run. Mr. Zeldin often stresses that his mother taught at a yeshiva, and highlights his defense of Israel in Congress. (Mr. Zeldin is also targeting modern Orthodox Jewish voters, who often vote for Republicans.)English- and Yiddish-language ads quickly appeared last week to amplify Mr. Zeldin’s defense of the yeshivas. “They both want our support,” one read, referring to the two candidates. “Only Lee Zeldin stands up to defend us. Only Lee Zeldin is a friend we can rely on.”Earlier this summer, Mr. Zeldin visited a summer camp in the Catskills with Joel Rosenfeld, a Hasidic leader. Sitting in front of a hand-scribbled sign that read “Make New York Great Again,” Mr. Zeldin listened as a large group of boys sang in unison.“A governor who hears, a governor who cares, that’s Congressman Lee Zeldin,” they sang, raising their voices for the finale: “A leader who understands our needs and demands, Congressman Lee Zeldin!”Mr. Zeldin began his day Sunday with a visit to the grave of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the revered leader of the Lubavitcher group of Hasidic Jews. Later in Williamsburg, he visited the book-lined apartment of a religious leader of a minor Hasidic sect, where he cited statistics about antisemitic violence and suggested the state should be more concerned about struggling public schools than yeshivas.All of it has fueled speculation about whether he will win endorsements from Hasidic groups that backed Ms. Hochul in the primary.In recent visits to Hasidic neighborhoods, Mr. Zeldin has vowed to protect yeshivas from governmental interference, reminding voters that his mother taught at a yeshiva.Andrew Seng for The New York TimesYet Hasidic leaders have maintained an intensely pragmatic streak in local elections, supporting ruling Democrats and calling upon their followers to do the same. Supporting a Republican could be risky for Hasidic leaders who rely on Democrats to serve a community that has some of the highest poverty rates in New York — and who draw some of their power from a perception among politicians that their word moves votes.Still, some religious leaders may decide to back Mr. Zeldin, or simply stay neutral, with the knowledge that many Hasidic voters are likely to support the congressman, regardless of how their leaders steer them.Moishe Indig, a Hasidic leader whose group has not yet made an endorsement in the race, said in a statement: “Governor Hochul has always been a friend of our community and she remains a friend of our community.” More

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      Moderate Republicans No Longer Have a Home, and It Started With My Defeat

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      Illustration by Sam Whitney/The New York Times; image by Mint Images via Getty ImagesOver the last 30 years, the Republican Party has effectively eliminated its moderate and liberal voices — as well as the conservative voices that put country over party. The consequences of this takeover by an increasingly right-wing faction include the threats to democracy that have become increasingly prominent since the Jan. 6 riots.When I lost my seat in Congress in 1990, I knew it was because I had co-sponsored a bill to ban assault weapons. The National Rifle Association and conservative Republicans in Vermont and elsewhere united to defeat me, calling the independent challenger, Bernie Sanders, the “lesser of two evils.” First, a right-wing candidate challenged me in the Republican primary, then many of his supporters aided the Sanders campaign in the general election.Their plan: Elect Bernie Sanders for one term, then defeat him the next time around. The only problem: They couldn’t weaken him in a primary the same way and consistently failed to beat him in a general election. And the rest is history.I didn’t realize it at the time, but my defeat was an early step in the elimination of the moderate and liberal wing of the Republican Party. That process, aimed at members of Congress and state-level officials, began with the ascent of Newt Gingrich’s style of full-throated partisanship and has continued to this day. When moderates like Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine retired, the party typically nominated more right-wing candidates to succeed them. Over the years, the party’s capture by hard-line activists — and now, as seen in New Hampshire’s primaries last week, election deniers — has resulted in ever more extreme nominees.When Mr. Gingrich was elected Republican minority whip by a single vote in 1989, he and his supporters seemingly had one goal: not to govern, but to control, stifle and stymie Congress. They got less actual governing done as they frustrated Congress’s work, and in many ways their strategy worked.The long-term consequences of their scheme led to the election of Donald Trump and the rise of today’s hard-right extremism. It has also weakened and undermined the Republican Party and multiparty government in states where more liberal general election voters reject hard-liners who become Republican nominees.About three weeks after his election as whip, Mr. Gingrich called me into his office. He asked whether I was having dinner with Democrats. I was, I said: A colleague from Tennessee and I were hosting fellow freshman members for dinner regularly to share experiences. Mr. Gingrich demanded that I stop; he didn’t want Republicans consorting with Democrats.I responded — not overly politely — that I was from Vermont and nobody told me what people I could eat with. But his demand was a harbinger of the decline of moderate and liberal Republicans. (Mr. Gingrich told The Times he did not recall the meeting, but noted that he was working to unify the Republican caucus at the time.)What followed over the next few years was the deliberate quarantining of Republicans from Democrats: separate orientations for new members, a sharp curtailing of bipartisan activities and an increasing insistence that members toe the party line. The very idea of “voting your district” — which was alive and well when I was elected — became anathema within the Republican caucus. Simultaneously, the weaponization of the evangelical religious right and the organization of wealthy conservative donors was going on, largely behind the scenes, with money and organizing often used against moderate Republicans as well as Democrats.Republican Party leaders fueled the shift to the right by promising results to their conservative base that they could not deliver: banning abortion, eliminating the deficit, slashing federal regulations, cracking down on L.G.B.T.Q. rights and greatly cutting taxes. Mr. Gingrich’s “Contract With America” — and the government shutdown it caused — set the stage for decades of unkept promises and primed primary voters to turn against the moderate and liberal elected officials who had once been a critical component of the Republican coalition, especially in the Northeast, when those officials could be readily blamed for not sufficiently supporting the party line.As Republican voters and nominees adopted an increasingly extreme agenda, even a Republican Congress could not produce the results they had promised. While Republican officials delivered significant tax cuts for the very wealthy and, under George W. Bush, put numerous conservatives onto the federal bench, they failed to meaningfully relieve the tax burden for working- and middle-class people or to fully realize any of their culture-war goals, instead seeing same-sex marriage become the law of the land.These failures drove a further rightward shift that resulted in the rise of the Tea Party. And when the Tea Partyers failed to stop President Barack Obama and his Affordable Care Act, we arrived at the 2016 presidential primaries and the rise of Donald Trump. The base of the party had become angry and alienated because the Gingrich-era promises had not been delivered.During this period, some Republicans in the Northeast swam against the tide. Senator Jim Jeffords of Vermont, my predecessor in the U.S. House, became an independent before his retirement. In her last term, Senator Snowe cast a critical vote in committee to put the Affordable Care Act before the full Senate. She believed health care reform merited consideration by the full Senate, not a quiet death in committee. She favored “governing” over “controlling.”But even in New England, long a bastion of liberal and moderate Republicanism, moderates are now losing in Republican primaries. This year, a Trump-backed candidate won the nomination for governor of Massachusetts; candidates endorsed by Donald Trump or who deny the validity of the 2020 election won races in New Hampshire; and Vermont Republicans nominated a right-wing figure for Senate. Increasingly, moderate candidates without a deeply established electoral history are unable to win nomination for major offices.There have been a few moderate and liberal Republican success stories, but they are anomalies, peculiar to the person or the situation. In Vermont, Jim Douglas, governor from 2003 to 2011, and the current governor, Phil Scott, built long electoral careers and personal brands that made them more resistant to hard-right primary challengers. Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts developed a reputation as a competent administrator in the 1990s, long before he ran for office.But the refusal by Gov. Chris Sununu of New Hampshire to run for Senate this year speaks volumes about the culture and philosophy that the national Republican Party and its elected officials are enforcing in primary elections and in Congress. That doctrine has made a national political career less achievable and enticing, even for an extremely popular right-of-center governor like Mr. Sununu.I believe that the current attempts to overthrow our democratic traditions will fail, but we must understand the successes produced by the right wing’s focus on control at all costs over governing.Beyond Mr. Trump’s election, those successes include the numerous right-wing ideologues confirmed to federal judgeships, a major effort to restrict voting rights, the increasing presence of dark money in politics, the elimination of abortion rights and a lack of critical progress in combating the global climate crisis. Moderate figures in the Republican Party opposed many of these policies, from the abortion-rights supporters who were once part of the G.O.P. caucus to environmental advocates like John Anderson, the Illinois representative who ran for president as an independent in 1980.Mr. Gingrich’s style of politics has informed much of what has come since. Under Mr. Trump and his acolytes, the emphasis on power and control has remained, at the expense not only of governing but also of decency.In 1950, Senator Margaret Chase Smith, a moderate Republican from Maine, attacked McCarthyism and its “four horsemen of calumny — fear, ignorance, bigotry and smear.” Republicans today seem to use Smith’s warning as an inspiration, projecting their own worst excesses upon their opponents. There is little room left in the G.O.P. for any disagreement — indeed, of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump, only one appears very likely to be in Congress next January.It may be too late for the Republican Party to again welcome moderate and liberal voices into its ranks. But the focus of moderate and liberal Republicans — both elected officials and the voters who supported us — was historically on governing to solve America’s critical problems, not on accruing control for its own sake. If the Republican Party cannot be an instrument of democracy, independent-minded moderates will do what we’ve always done: Vote our conscience, and vote for someone else.Peter Smith (@PeterPSmith), a Republican, represented Vermont in the House of Representatives from 1989 to 1991. He was the founding president of the Community College of Vermont and California State University, Monterey Bay, and was an assistant director general for education at UNESCO.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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      These Trump-Backed Candidates Won’t Promise to Accept Election Results

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      Six Republican nominees for governor and the Senate in key midterm states, all backed by Donald Trump, would not commit to accepting the November outcome. Five others did not answer the question.WASHINGTON — Nearly two years after President Donald J. Trump refused to accept his defeat in the 2020 election, some of his most loyal Republican acolytes might follow in his footsteps.When asked, six Trump-backed Republican nominees for governor and the Senate in midterm battlegrounds would not commit to accepting this year’s election results, and another five Republicans ignored or declined to answer a question about embracing the November outcome. All of them, along with many other G.O.P. candidates, have pre-emptively cast doubt on how their states count votes.The New York Times contacted Republican and Democratic candidates or their aides in 20 key contests for governor and the Senate. All of the Democrats said, or have said publicly, that they would respect the November results — including Stacey Abrams of Georgia, who refused to concede her 2018 defeat to Brian Kemp in the state’s race for governor. Mr. Kemp, now running against her for another term, “will of course accept the outcome of the 2022 election,” said his press secretary, Tate Mitchell.But several Republicans endorsed by Mr. Trump are hesitant to say that they will not fight the results.Among the party’s Senate candidates, Ted Budd in North Carolina, Blake Masters in Arizona, Kelly Tshibaka in Alaska and J.D. Vance in Ohio all declined to commit to accepting the 2022 results. So did Tudor Dixon, the Republican nominee for governor of Michigan, and Geoff Diehl, who won the G.O.P. primary for governor of Massachusetts this month.The candidates and their aides offered an array of explanations. Some blamed Democratic state election officials or made unsubstantiated claims that their opponents would cheat. In Alaska, a spokesman for Ms. Tshibaka pointed to a new ranked-choice voting system that has been criticized by Republicans and already helped deliver victory to a Democrat in a House special election this year.Kelly Tshibaka, a Republican candidate for Senate in Alaska, at a rally hosted by former President Donald J. Trump in Anchorage. She has also declined to say whether she will respect this year’s election results.Ash Adams for The New York TimesAn aide to Ms. Dixon, Sara Broadwater, said “there’s no reason to believe” that Michigan election officials, including Jocelyn Benson, the Democratic secretary of state, “are very serious about secure elections.”To some degree, the stances by these Republican candidates — which echo Mr. Trump’s comments before the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections — may amount to political posturing, in an effort to appeal to G.O.P. voters who do not believe the former president lost in 2020. An aide to one Republican nominee insisted that the candidate would accept this year’s results, but the aide declined to be publicly identified saying so.And unlike Mr. Trump two years ago, the candidates who suggest they might dispute the November results do not hold executive office, and lack control of the levers of government power. If any were to reject a fair defeat, they would be far less likely to ignite the kind of democratic crisis that Mr. Trump set off after his 2020 loss.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries over, both parties are shifting their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.Midterm Data: Could the 2020 polling miss repeat itself? Will this election cycle really be different? Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, looks at the data in his new newsletter.Republicans’ Abortion Struggles: Senator Lindsey Graham’s proposed nationwide 15-week abortion ban was intended to unite the G.O.P. before the November elections. But it has only exposed the party’s divisions.Democrats’ Dilemma: The party’s candidates have been trying to signal their independence from the White House, while not distancing themselves from President Biden’s base or agenda.But they do have loud megaphones in a highly polarized media environment, and any unwarranted challenges from the candidates and their allies could fuel anger, confusion and misinformation.“The danger of a Trumpist coup is far from over,” said Rosa Brooks, a law professor at Georgetown University who in early 2020 convened a group to brainstorm ways Mr. Trump could disrupt that year’s election. “As long as we have a significant number of Americans who don’t accept principles of democracy and the rule of law, our democracy remains in jeopardy.”The positions of these Republican candidates also reflect how, over the last two years, some of those aligned with Mr. Trump increasingly reject the idea that it is possible for their side to lose a legitimate election.“You accept the results of the election if the election is fair and honest,” said John Fredericks, a syndicated talk radio host who was a chairman of Mr. Trump’s campaigns in Virginia in 2016 and 2020. “If it’s not fair and honest, you don’t.”Still, many Republican candidates, including several who have cast doubt on the 2020 outcome, said they would recognize this year’s results. Darren Bailey, the Republican nominee for governor of Illinois — who said in a June interview that he did not know if the 2020 election had been decided fairly — responded that “yes,” he would accept the 2022 result.In Nevada, the campaign of Adam Laxalt, the Republican nominee for Senate, said he would not challenge the final results — even though Mr. Laxalt, a former state attorney general, helped lead the effort to overturn Mr. Trump’s 2020 defeat in the state, spoke last year about plans to file lawsuits to contest the 2022 election and called voter fraud the “biggest issue” in his campaign.Joe Lombardo, left, a Republican running for governor of Nevada, and Adam Laxalt, center, the party’s nominee for the Senate, said they would not challenge the state’s results.Roger Kisby for The New York Times“Of course he’ll accept Nevada’s certified election results, even if your failing publication won’t,” said Brian Freimuth, a spokesman for Mr. Laxalt..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-ok2gjs{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-ok2gjs 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.And Dr. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, who said during his successful Republican primary campaign for Senate that “we cannot move on” from the 2020 election, promised to uphold voters’ will.“Yes, Dr. Oz will accept the result of the PA Senate race in November,” Rachel Tripp, an Oz spokeswoman, wrote in a text message.Three other Republican Senate candidates — Herschel Walker in Georgia, Joe O’Dea in Colorado and Senator Lisa Murkowski in Alaska — committed to embracing their state’s election results. So did several Republicans running for governor, including Mr. Kemp, Joe Lombardo in Nevada and Christine Drazan of Oregon.Aides to several Republican nominees for governor who have questioned the 2020 election’s legitimacy did not respond to repeated requests for comment on their own races in November. Those candidates included Doug Mastriano of Pennsylvania, Kari Lake of Arizona, Tim Michels of Wisconsin and Dan Cox of Maryland.Ms. Lake was asked in a radio interview this month whether she would concede a defeat to Katie Hobbs, her Democratic rival and Arizona’s secretary of state. “I’m not losing to Katie Hobbs,” Ms. Lake replied.Ms. Hobbs’s spokeswoman, Sarah Robinson, said her candidate “will accept the results of the election in November.”Aides to Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Don Bolduc, the Republican Senate nominee in New Hampshire, declined to answer questions about acknowledging the results. Mr. Johnson has been a prolific spreader of misinformation about the 2020 election and the Capitol riot. Mr. Bolduc claimed that the 2020 contest was stolen from Mr. Trump until Thursday, when he announced two days after winning his primary that President Biden had won legitimately.During a Republican primary debate in Michigan in June, Ms. Dixon would not commit to honoring the results of the primary — which she went on to win — or the general election, pre-emptively accusing Ms. Benson, the secretary of state, of election fraud.“If we see the secretary of state running a fair election the way she should be, then that’s a different story,” Ms. Dixon said. “We have to see what she’s going to do to make sure it’s going to be a fair election.”In a statement, a representative for Ms. Benson said she and her staff “work tirelessly to ensure the state’s elections are secure and accurate, and expect every candidate and election official to respect the will of the people.”A crowd in Phoenix watched in September 2021 as the findings of a widely criticized Republican-led review of the state’s 2020 votes were presented to state lawmakers.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesIn Arizona — where Republicans spent months on a government-funded review of 2020 ballots that failed to show any evidence of fraud — Mr. Masters, the Trump-backed Republican nominee for Senate, baselessly predicted to supporters in July that even if he defeated Senator Mark Kelly, the incumbent Democrat, enough votes would somehow be produced to flip the result.“There’s always cheating, probably, in every election,” Mr. Masters said. “The question is, what’s the cheating capacity?”A Masters aide, Katie Miller, sent The Times an August article in The Arizona Republic in which Mr. Masters said there was “evidence of incompetence” but not of fraud in the state’s primary election. Ms. Miller declined to say if Mr. Masters would respect the November results.Mr. Kelly “has total trust in Arizona’s electoral process,” said a spokeswoman, Sarah Guggenheimer.An aide to Mr. Vance, Taylor Van Kirk, cited the candidate’s primary-season endorsement from Ohio’s Republican secretary of state, Frank LaRose. At the time, Mr. Vance predicted “a successfully run primary election.” But Ms. Van Kirk would not say if Mr. Vance would recognize the November outcome. Mr. Vance did not respond to messages.Mr. Vance’s Democratic opponent, Representative Tim Ryan, “will accept the results of the election,” said his spokeswoman, Jordan Fuja.In Alaska, Republican hesitancy to accept election results centers on the new ranked-choice voting system. After losing an August special election for the House, Sarah Palin warned baselessly that the method was “very, very potentially fraught with fraud.”Tim Murtaugh, a spokesman for Ms. Tshibaka, who is challenging Ms. Murkowski, a fellow Republican, said his candidate would not commit to honoring the race’s outcome. Mr. Murtaugh said — not without merit — that the new voting system “was installed to protect Lisa Murkowski.”Ms. Murkowski’s spokesman, Shea Siegert, said that “the Alaskan people can trust” the state’s elections.Jonathan Felts, a spokesman for Representative Ted Budd of North Carolina, the state’s Republican nominee for Senate — who in Congress voted against certifying the 2020 election — declined to say if Mr. Budd would uphold the state’s results and claimed without evidence that Cheri Beasley, the Democratic nominee and a former State Supreme Court justice, might try to disenfranchise voters.Ms. Beasley said, “I trust that our 2022 election will be administered fairly.”Officials on other Republican campaigns expressed worries that if voters heard too much skepticism about the validity of this year’s elections, it could lead to a replay of the Georgia Senate races in January 2021, when Democrats eked out two narrow victories after Mr. Trump spent weeks railing falsely about election fraud.“The most important thing is to not get depressed about the elections and say, ‘Oh, it’s going to be stolen, so what’s the point of doing this?’” Mr. Diehl, the Republican nominee for governor of Massachusetts, said in a recent radio interview. Mr. Diehl’s spokeswoman, Peggy Rose, replied “no comment” when asked if he would agree to the outcome of the November election.His Democratic opponent, Maura Healey, the state’s attorney general, said, “We will always accept the will of the people.” More

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      Stacey Abrams Painted as Enemy by Flier in Georgia County With Racist History

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      ATLANTA — After a digital flier featuring the logo of the Republican Party of Forsyth County, Ga., urged residents to rally against Stacey Abrams, alarming and infuriating local Democratic leaders who said its message sounded dangerously evocative of the county’s notoriously racist past, the Forsyth Republican Party announced that it was calling the rally off. Using inflammatory language as if Ms. Abrams, the Democratic nominee for governor, were an invading enemy, the flier issued a “call to action” encouraging “conservatives and patriots” to “save and protect our neighborhoods.” It emerged this week in response to news that Ms. Abrams would be campaigning alongside other members of the Democratic ticket in the area on Sunday.“The moment is at hand,” the flier read, calling Ms. Abrams and Senator Raphael Warnock, the incumbent Georgia Democrat seeking a full term, “the designers of destructive radicalism and socialism” and warning that they would be “crossing over our county border” and into the county seat, Cumming. It said they would appear at “OUR FoCal Center,” referring to a county arts building.Mr. Warnock is not expected to appear alongside Ms. Abrams, Democratic officials said.Cumming, about 40 miles north of Atlanta, is more than 75 percent white. It owes its racial homogeneity in large part to a violent campaign by Forsyth County’s white residents in 1912 that pushed out thousands of Black residents.Audra Melton for The New York TimesThe text of the flier surfaced on Wednesday on a local online conservative news outlet, which said it had spotted it on the Forsyth G.O.P. website, and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution published the flier Friday morning after county Democrats circulated it to journalists.As of midmorning Friday, the flier did not appear on the Forsyth Republican Party’s website or Facebook page.Reached by text message late Friday afternoon and asked four times whether the county party had produced or distributed the flier, Jerry Marinich, the group’s chairman, did not answer. He said only that the party “does not plan on participating in any rally on Sunday.”Late Friday evening, the party issued a statement saying it would no longer hold the rally. “We will always strive to make choices that honor and protect Forsyth County,” it wrote, calling it a “proud and diverse county with conservative values.” It went on, “In the interest of all involved, we will err on the side of caution and withdraw our planned rally.”Instead, according to the statement, members will redirect their efforts to prepare for a campaign event with Gov. Brian Kemp the following day. Ms. Abrams’s campaign declined to comment except to confirm that she would be attending the Forsyth event, though it was not listed on her weekend campaign schedule.Cumming, about 40 miles north of Atlanta, is more than 75 percent white, as is Forsyth as a whole. It owes its racial homogeneity in large part to a violent campaign by Forsyth County’s white residents in 1912 that pushed out thousands of Black residents through intimidation and deadly force.The legacy of that campaign and the racist thinking that gave rise to it persisted as late as 1987, when a group of civil rights activists were attacked while trying to mark the 75th anniversary of Black residents’ initial expulsion from the county.“We strongly condemn the dangerous and embarrassing rhetoric of the Forsyth County, Georgia, Republican Party,” Melissa Clink, chair of the county’s Democratic Party, said in a statement on Friday before the rally was canceled. “Forsyth County’s history of racial cleansing and being a documented sundown town make this line especially incendiary, disgusting and shameful,” she said, using a term for places that discriminate, often severely, against nonwhite residents.The Republican Women of Forsyth County, seeking to avoid condemnation by association, issued a statement Friday underlining its status as a private club independent of the party organization.“We do not condone nor engage in tactics that are intended to intimidate, harass or silence people who hold different political views,” the group said, adding that conservative ideals “are best exemplified when we engage in civil discourse, allowing all sides to be heard.” More

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      Daniel McKee, Rhode Island Governor, Wins Nomination to Run for Seat

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      Daniel McKee, the governor of Rhode Island, has secured the Democratic nomination to run for his first full term in office, according to The Associated Press. Mr. McKee, 71, overcame four challengers in a hard-fought primary with a focus on his leadership through the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic recovery.Mr. McKee had served as the state’s lieutenant governor since 2015 and was first sworn in as governor in March 2021, when former Gov. Gina Raimondo resigned to join President Biden’s cabinet as commerce secretary.In the primary, he had been neck and neck with Secretary of State Nellie Gorbea, 55, with whom he was elected to statewide office in 2014 and who drew from the same well of support. But it was Helena Foulkes, 58, a former CVS executive, who came in second place after a late-breaking surge in momentum that followed a strong debate performance and an endorsement from Speaker Nancy Pelosi.His other opponents included Matt Brown, a former Rhode Island secretary of state, and Dr. Luis Daniel Muñoz, a community activist.Mr. McKee will face Ashley Kalus, a Republican businesswoman and first-time candidate. A college freshman, Zachary Hurwitz, also collected enough signatures to run as an independent.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries over, both parties are shifting their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.A Fierce Primary Season Ends: Democrats are entering the final sprint to November with more optimism, especially in the Senate. But Republicans are confident they can gain a House majority.Midterm Data: Could the 2020 polling miss repeat itself? Will this election cycle really be different? Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, looks at the data in his new newsletter.Republicans’ Abortion Struggles: Senator Lindsey Graham’s proposed nationwide 15-week abortion ban was intended to unite the G.O.P. before the November elections. But it has only exposed the party’s divisions.Democrats’ Dilemma: The party’s candidates have been trying to signal their independence from the White House, while not distancing themselves from President Biden’s base or agenda.Ms. Gorbea, born and raised in Puerto Rico, had sought to become the first Latina elected governor in New England, touting her 30 years of experience as a community activist and nonprofit leader focused on addressing the state’s housing crisis. She rocked the Rhode Island political world when she won her campaign for secretary of state in 2014 with little funding or name recognition, and many expected her to do the same in the governor’s race.But she stumbled after her campaign aired an attack ad about Mr. McKee that cited an article from a conservative commentator. Her office also was heavily criticized after new touch-screen voting machines listed the wrong candidates on the Spanish-language ballot, which led to the discarding of more than 50 ballots.The missteps gave a small opening to Ms. Foulkes, who proved to be a prolific fund-raiser and whose mother was close friends with Ms. Pelosi. “I just want to say one word to you,” Ms. Pelosi told a crowd of more than 200 people gathered Sunday in Providence. “Helena.”A former mayor of the town of Cumberland, Mr. McKee is not seen as a natural politician and has tended to stay behind the scenes in his political career. His campaign was clouded by state and federal investigations into a multimillion-dollar education consulting contract that his administration awarded to the ILO Group, a consulting firm to which he has ties and that was created two days after he took office.But Mr. McKee had three factors working in his favor, said Adam Myers, an associate professor of political science at Providence College: a strong base of voters in the Blackstone River Valley, the northeast pocket of the state that he is from; an ability to consolidate the support of organized labor groups; and his appeals to Latino voters.Mr. McKee had appointed Sabina Matos to replace him, making her the first Afro-Latina lieutenant governor and the first Dominican American in the country to hold statewide office. He also had a star endorser — his 94-year-old mother. She became a campaign sensation when she appeared in an ad playing cards with her son in oversized sunglasses.In the ad, Mr. McKee champions his efforts to steer the state through the pandemic, his elimination of the car tax and his signing of gun safety laws. She responds: “Not bad for a governor that lives with his mother.” More

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      Rhode Island Primary: How to Vote and Who’s on the Ballot

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      Rhode Island voters are heading to the polls to pick candidates for governor and an open House seat. Here’s what to know about voting in the state:How to voteThe deadline to register for Rhode Island’s primary elections has passed. You can check your registration status on the secretary of state’s website here.In-person voting runs from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., which is also the time by which mail ballots must be received. It is too late to return a ballot in the mail, but you can deliver it by hand to a drop box or to the Board of Elections office in Cranston.If you’ve already mailed your ballot, you can track its status here.Where to voteYou can find your nearest polling place here.Mail ballots can be delivered to drop boxes at designated locations. You can find your town’s drop box location here or use this map.Who’s on the ballotVoters will pick parties’ nominees for governor. Four Democrats are challenging Gov. Daniel McKee, who was appointed last year after former Gov. Gina Raimondo became President Biden’s secretary of commerce.Two Republicans are vying for their party’s place on the November ballot: Ashley Kalus, a health care executive and businesswoman, and Jonathan Riccitelli, who owns a hotel and maintenance company and whose criminal record — much of it under another name — was reported by The Boston Globe. Representative Jim Langevin, a Democrat, is retiring at the end of his term. The state treasurer, Seth Magaziner, leads the pack of six Democrats hoping to replace him. The winner of that race will face Allan Fung, a Republican and former Cranston mayor, in November.There are also Republican and Democratic primaries for lieutenant governor and a Democratic primary for secretary of state. You can see a full sample ballot online here. More