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      How Carl Paladino Is Dividing New York Republicans

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      For New York’s beleaguered Republican Party, all signs had been pointing for months toward 2022 being an exceptional year.As Democrats battle the traditional midterm slump, Republicans were blessed with unforeseen fortune, including a court victory that resulted in new congressional lines pitting veteran liberals against each other and putting new House districts in play. Add in Gov. Kathy Hochul’s middling poll numbers, and many New York conservatives were dreaming of a united G.O.P. winning its first statewide election since 2002.Then Carl Paladino walked in.Mr. Paladino, the party’s lightning rod former gubernatorial nominee, unexpectedly re-emerged in the past week as a candidate in the newly drawn 23rd Congressional District in Western New York, a development that has driven a sharp wedge between some Republicans, including those who feel Mr. Paladino’s history of racist and outrageous remarks disqualifies him and could endanger Republicans up and down the ballot.It is also fueling a potentially nasty proxy war between two of the party’s younger Trump-aligned leaders vying for dominance: Representative Elise Stefanik, the powerful North Country conservative who has endorsed Mr. Paladino, and Nick Langworthy, the state party chairman who formally declared his candidacy for the 23rd District on Friday, taking a veiled swipe at his onetime ally’s tendency toward incendiary statements.“We don’t just need people who like to make noise,” said Mr. Langworthy, in a campaign announcement video. “We need proven fighters who know how to win.”Far from rattled, Ms. Stefanik, the No. 3 House Republican, is standing by Mr. Paladino, whom she endorsed moments after the district’s current congressman, Representative Chris Jacobs, announced last week that he would not seek re-election in the face of furious backlash for his embrace of gun control measures after mass shootings in Buffalo — near his district — and in Uvalde, Texas.Representative Elise Stefanik, a member of House Republican leadership, has endorsed Mr. Paladino and is helping him qualify for the ballot.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesMs. Stefanik’s team spent the week helping Mr. Paladino collect signatures to qualify for the ballot. And privately, she and her allies are fanning discontent for Mr. Langworthy among midlevel party leaders and lawmakers, a growing number of whom believe his congressional run could prove a costly distraction for the party if he does not resign as chairman.Needless to say, a rough-and-tumble primary battle on the banks of Lake Erie is not what Republicans had in mind ahead of critical midterm elections that were shaping up to be the most promising for the party in two decades.After the redistricting fiasco for Democrats, party leaders planned to compete seriously in as many as a dozen House districts across the state.And in a likely race for the governorship against Ms. Hochul, a Democrat who has seen her job performance ratings sag in the face of concerns about crime and the economy, Republicans are hoping for a serious shot at breaking a lengthy losing streak in a state in which registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by more than two to one.Four Republicans are facing off in the June 28 primary for governor, with Representative Lee M. Zeldin of Long Island receiving the party’s blessing. Andrew Giuliani, the son of the former New York City mayor; Rob Astorino, the former Westchester County executive; and Harry Wilson, a corporate turnout expert, are also all on the ballot and will meet for their first debate on Monday.“This is a distraction in a battle that nobody needs at all,” Thomas Doherty, a former top aide to Gov. George Pataki, the last Republican elected statewide in New York, said about Mr. Paladino and the debris spinning off his campaign.“You have the leading Republican in the House supporting a guy who has a ton of baggage against the Republican chairman,” Mr. Doherty added. “It just doesn’t make any sense.”Since Mr. Paladino entered the race last Friday, Media Matters, the left-leaning watchdog group, has already unearthed a Facebook post amplifying conspiracy theories about the mass shootings in Buffalo and Texas and a 2021 radio interview in which Mr. Paladino praised Adolf Hitler as “the kind of leader we need today.”Mr. Paladino, 75, who was soundly defeated in the governor’s race by Andrew M. Cuomo in 2010, has long been known for racist and homophobic comments. He partially apologized for the Hitler remarks on Thursday, calling them a “serious mistake” that he nonetheless claimed had been twisted by the news media.On Friday, Mr. Paladino’s campaign said it would not comment on Mr. Langworthy’s candidacy, but it said he planned to file more than 3,000 petition signatures to qualify for the ballot, more than his opponent.“I am so grateful for the outpouring of grass-roots support from thousands of Republicans across NY-23 in such a short amount of time,” Mr. Paladino said in a statement. “Onward to victory!”In her own statement, Ms. Stefanik said she was “focused on winning back the majority this November,” while serving her constituents and the House Republican Conference she leads in Washington.But some Republican state leaders were apoplectic about Mr. Paladino, including Keith H. Wofford, a Black corporate lawyer who was the party’s 2018 nominee for attorney general. He issued an unsparing statement on Friday saying that his personal experience left no room for doubt about who Mr. Paladino was.“There are many times where people have called one Republican or another a racist, and I have explained to those accusers why they were wrong,” Mr. Wofford said. “But Carl Paladino is a racist. Not ‘racially insensitive’; not ‘unsophisticated’; a straight-up, old-school racist.”He added: “If he wins the primary, I hope he loses in November.”Democrats have chosen Max Della Pia, an Air Force veteran and community activist, as their nominee in the district.Nick Langworthy, who chairs the New York State Republican Party, is running against Mr. Paladino in a House primary. “We don’t just need people who like to make noise,” he said in a video announcing his candidacy.Johnny Milano for The New York TimesMr. Langworthy’s decision to run — after he pushed Mr. Jacobs to step aside — has not been without controversy. A series of county party leaders have criticized him for trying to run for Congress and lead the state party simultaneously, raising concerns about conflicts of interest.“It has to be all hands on deck and our state chair can’t be hunkered down in the 23rd Congressional District running a primary while we are simultaneously trying to elect a governor,” said Lawrence A. Garvey, the party chairman in Rockland County.He called on Mr. Langworthy to resign.“The potential is very much there to squander what good options we have this year,” Mr. Garvey added, clarifying that he was not trying to boost Mr. Paladino either: “No person in their right mind could defend some of the things he has said.”That sentiment was echoed by Susan McNeil, the Republican Party chair in Fulton County, northwest of Albany, and Mike Rendino, her counterpart in the Bronx.“You can’t serve two masters,” said Ms. McNeil, who is close with Ms. Stefanik. “I’m not arrogant enough to think I could do both.”Mr. Rendino said Mr. Langworthy would make a fine congressman, but said “we need a state chair committed to raising the money necessary for ballot security and protecting the party in the upcoming statewide elections.”In an interview, Mr. Langworthy, 41, argued that he was advancing the party’s interests by taking on Mr. Paladino and said that he maintained the support of the “vast majority” of county G.O.P. chairs in the state.He also predicted he would have no trouble focusing on winning the governor’s race for Republicans in the general election after defeating Mr. Paladino in the primary.“There’s naysayers and people who have self-interest in any organization, and perhaps they are egged on by certain elected officials, but I won’t take the bait,” he said. “The most destructive thing that can happen is for us to have a leadership election.”Mr. Langworthy’s run for office comes after a career as a party operative, including a stint in Mr. Pataki’s office and time spent working for two Republican House members. In 2010, he became the chairman of the Erie County G.O.P., a position he used to boost Mr. Paladino’s raw and rambunctious campaign for governor.Both he and Mr. Paladino urged Donald J. Trump to run for governor against Mr. Cuomo in 2013, ultimately failing to convince him. Both stumped for Mr. Trump in his 2016 presidential run.In 2019, Mr. Langworthy helped oust the party’s longtime chairman, Edward F. Cox, with the then-president’s support and took the job himself, promising a new face for the party.The 23rd District, which was redrawn by a court-appointed mapmaker last month, should be safely Republican. It runs from the Buffalo suburbs to the Southern Tier, on the New York-Pennsylvania border, and includes some of the state’s most conservative counties.Still, after suffering a brutal spring — with their carefully crafted redistricting plan shredded by the courts and their lieutenant governor indicted on bribery charges — Democrats seemed delighted on Friday to sit back and let the Republicans share the glare of scrutiny.“I would not call the past few months perfect for my team, and it worried me as a Democrat,” said Christine C. Quinn, a state party leader.But she called the G.O.P. strife an ongoing “train wreck.”“Republicans seem committed to messing this thing up so badly,” she added. More

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      Supreme Court Allows Undated Ballots in Pennsylvania Election

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      A state law required mailed ballots to be accompanied by a signed and dated declaration, but a federal appeals court ruled that undated declarations sufficed.WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said on Thursday that election officials in Pennsylvania may count mailed ballots accompanied by voters’ declarations that were signed but not dated. The court’s order came in a tight race for a seat on a state court, but it is likely to affect other contests in the state as well.The court’s brief order gave no reasons, which is typical when the justices act on emergency applications.The court’s three most conservative members — Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch — dissented, saying that the court should address the issue presented in the case in time for the November elections.The case concerned a state law enacted in 2019 that permitted all registered voters to vote by mail. The law required voters using mailed ballots to “fill out, date and sign” a declaration printed on the outside of the return envelope that said they were qualified to vote.The Supreme Court’s order let stand a ruling from a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in Philadelphia, which said the part of the state law requiring the declarations to be dated ran afoul of a provision of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964. The provision prohibits government officials from denying the right to vote “because of an error or omission” if it “is not material in determining whether such individual is qualified under state law to vote.”The case arose from an election in November 2021 for a seat on the Lehigh County Court of Common Pleas in which David Ritter, a Republican, leads Zachary Cohen, a Democrat, by 71 votes. The local elections board determined that it would also count 257 undated ballots, and challenges in state and federal court followed.It was undisputed that the undated ballots were received by Election Day and that the elections board had accepted ballots with incorrect dates, including birth dates, rejecting only missing ones.The suit, brought by five voters who had submitted undated ballots, argued that the federal law required that all 257 undated ballots be counted. The voters, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, told the Supreme Court that requiring a date served no purpose.“The handwritten date is so inconsequential that the Board of Elections accepted ballots where voters wrote any date whatsoever on the return envelope, even dates from decades ago,” the voters’ brief said. “The county clerk affirmed he would have accepted envelope dates from the future. Yet voters who mistakenly omitted the envelope date were disenfranchised.”In March, Judge Joseph F. Leeson Jr. of the Federal District Court in Allentown, Pa., rejected the suit, saying that only the attorney general was authorized to sue under the federal law.The Third Circuit disagreed, saying that the voters were entitled to sue and that the requirement of a dated declaration did not help determine whether the voter was qualified. “The requirement is material if it goes to determining age, citizenship, residency or current imprisonment for a felony,” Judge Theodore A. McKee wrote, concluding that adding a date to a signature did not aid in those determinations.Justice Alito, writing for the three dissenters, said the federal law did not appear to address the requirement that voters date their declarations.“When a mail-in ballot is not counted because it was not filled out correctly, the voter is not denied ‘the right to vote,’” he wrote. “Rather, that individual’s vote is not counted because he or she did not follow the rules for casting a ballot.”Understand the Battle Over U.S. Voting RightsCard 1 of 6Why are voting rights an issue now? More

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      Jan. 6 Inquiry Votes Aren’t Costing G.O.P. Incumbents in Primaries, Yet

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      When 35 Republicans defied Donald J. Trump to vote in favor of an independent, bipartisan investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, they immediately braced for backlash from the former president’s most loyal voters.But it hasn’t quite hit as hard as expected — at least not yet.Only one of the 35 has lost a primary challenge, while least 10 of the 13 incumbents in contested races had survived primary challenges as of Wednesday. (Nine of the 35 who voted for the panel opted to retire or have resigned.)The fate of two incumbents whose races had elections on Tuesday still has not been determined, with Representative David Valadao of California expected to advance to the November election after appearing to finish second in Tuesday’s open primary and Representative Michael Guest of Mississippi being pushed into a June 28 runoff after narrowly trailing Michael Cassidy.The lone casualty so far has been Representative David McKinley of West Virginia, who lost a May primary to Representative Alex Mooney, a Republican colleague who had been endorsed by Mr. Trump in the newly drawn Second District. Their districts were consolidated after West Virginia lost a seat in the House because of the state’s declining population.There are plenty of high-profile opportunities for Mr. Trump in the months ahead to settle scores with Republicans who voted for the plan to form the independent commission, a proposal that ultimately died in the Senate. A House committee that is investigating the riot at the Capitol will hold a televised hearing in prime time on Thursday.Here are some key races involving Republicans who voted for a commission:In Wyoming, Representative Liz Cheney was ousted last year from her House leadership post and punished by Republicans in her home state after voting to impeach Mr. Trump for his role in the Capitol attack. She will face Harriet Hageman, a Trump-endorsed challenger, in an Aug. 16 primary that is drawing national attention.In South Carolina, Representative Tom Rice is fighting for his survival in a seven-way primary that features Russell Fry, a state legislator who was endorsed by Mr. Trump. Mr. Rice also voted for impeachment and said he was willing to stake his political career on that position.In Michigan, where Mr. Trump’s attempts to domineer the Republican Party have encountered some notable setbacks, Representative Peter Meijer has drawn the wrath of the former president. Calling Mr. Meijer a “RINO” — a Republican in name only — Mr. Trump endorsed John Gibbs, the conservative challenger to Mr. Meijer in the Aug. 2 primary.As a result of redistricting in Illinois, Representative Rodney Davis is locked in a primary battle with Representative Mary Miller, a House colleague who has been endorsed by Mr. Trump. The primary is June 28. Ms. Miller was one of 175 Republicans who voted against the commission in the House, which is controlled by Democrats.In Florida, the pro-Trump America First political committee named Representative Carlos Gimenez as its “top target for removal from Congress.” Mr. Gimenez will face two challengers in the Aug. 23 primary, including Ruth Swanson, who has said that the 2020 election was “thrown” and has contributed campaign funds to Project Veritas, the conservative group. More

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      Kean Will Face Malinowski, and Another Menendez Is on the Rise

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      Tom Kean Jr., the son of a popular two-term New Jersey governor, beat six Republican opponents Tuesday to win the nomination to compete against Representative Tom Malinowski, an embattled Democrat accused of ethical lapses, in what is shaping up to be the state’s most competitive midterm contest.Another son of a storied New Jersey political family, Robert Menendez Jr., easily won a Democratic House primary, making it likely that he and his father and namesake, the state’s senior senator, will serve together in the Capitol.Mr. Malinowski, 56, in a swipe at Mr. Kean’s three unsuccessful campaigns for Congress, said: “I want to do this job. He just wants to have this job.”Mr. Kean, 53, who narrowly lost to Mr. Malinowski in 2020, said his opponent had “squandered” the opportunity to serve New Jersey during two terms in Washington.Mr. Kean’s primary opponents had challenged him from the right as they competed for the support of conservative Republican voters aligned with former President Donald J. Trump. Outside a school near Mr. Kean’s home in Westfield, N.J., where he voted on Tuesday with his wife and daughters, a sign parroting one of Mr. Trump’s favorite labels read, “Warning RINO alert.”But just after midnight, he was more than 22 percentage points ahead of his closest opponent in a race that was seen at least in part as a measure of Mr. Trump’s grip on the Republican Party in a state better known for a moderate brand of Republican politics once epitomized by leaders like Mr. Kean’s father, Gov. Thomas H. Kean.The largely suburban Seventh Congressional District is filled with the type of affluent, well-educated voters who helped Democrats take control of the House in 2018.During the last midterm cycle, Democrats in New Jersey flipped four seats — many of which, including Mr. Malinowski’s, are again seen as potential battlegrounds.As he runs for re-election, Mr. Malinowski is facing allegations that he failed to report stock trades as required. He is also running in a district that gained more Republican-leaning towns when the borders were redrawn to reflect demographic changes in the 2020 census.But late Tuesday, Mr. Malinowski’s campaign got a potential boost from an unlikely camp: Republicans hoping to make a home for centrist voters with the creation of a new party, the Moderate Party. The new party, which will almost certainly face legal challenges, has filed nominating petitions on behalf of Mr. Malinowski.Mr. Menendez won in a largely urban district where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans five to one; winning the primary in the Eighth Congressional District, which includes parts of New Jersey’s two largest cities, is often tantamount to victory in the general election.A lawyer making his first run for office, Mr. Menendez had an array of political and union support early on — as well as crucial backing from his father, also a Democrat and the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Just after midnight, when The Associated Press called the race for Mr. Menendez, he was 70 percentage points ahead of his main challenger, David Ocampo Grajales.If he wins in November, Mr. Menendez, 36, will occupy a seat held for a decade by Representative Albio Sires, a Democrat who announced in December he would not run for re-election.Mr. Ocampo Grajales, the son of immigrants from Colombia, said last week that he had entered the race to give Democrats a viable alternative to a handpicked candidate.“It’s not so much who Menendez is himself, but what he represents: more of the same,” said Mr. Ocampo Grajales, 25.The New Jersey congressional candidate Tom Kean Jr., with his family, after voting at Wilson Elementary School in Westfield, N.J., on Tuesday.Bryan Anselm for The New York TimesA Republican primary in a central New Jersey swing district represented by Andy Kim, a Democrat running for his third term in Congress, was the state’s most colorful contest.Bob Healey Jr., a former singer in a punk band who helps run his family’s yacht-manufacturing company, beat two challengers, Nicholas J. Ferrera and Ian A. Smith, with the backing of the Republican Party.In March, Mr. Smith, the former owner of a gym that repeatedly flouted Covid-19 lockdown rules, was charged with driving under the influence, reviving talk of his past conviction for vehicular homicide. He served time in prison for killing a teenager in 2007 while under the influence of alcohol, and has pleaded not guilty to the new charges.“I may have sung in my past about killing someone,” Mr. Healey said during a debate in May. “Ian actually did kill someone.”By midnight, the winner of the Republican primary to face Representative Josh Gottheimer, a Democrat competing for re-election to a fourth term, had not yet been called.Frank Pallotta, a wealthy former investment banker who lost to Mr. Gottheimer two years ago, was 5 percentage points ahead of Nick De Gregorio, a Marine Corps veteran, with about 85 percent of the vote counted.Mr. Pallotta won the endorsement of former President Donald J. Trump in 2020, but not this time. He also had raised significantly less money than Mr. De Gregorio, who had emphasized his service in combat roles in Iraq and Afghanistan.“We did everything we possibly could, and we left no stones unturned,” Mr. De Gregorio said as he watched the returns come in from the Republican Party headquarters in Bergen County. “We went out there and we listened to what the voters had to say.”Mr. Menendez will be a heavy favorite in November against Marcos Arroyo, a housing inspector from West New York, N.J., who was the lone Republican candidate to enter the race.Mr. Menendez has said that, if elected, he would focus on expanding access to early childhood education and issues that affect the cost of living in New Jersey, where property owners pay some of the nation’s highest taxes.“One of the things we’ve focused on — just because we don’t know the climate that we’re going to be walking into, should we win — is trying to think about what Democratic proposals haven’t been passed yet that we can have bipartisan support for,” Mr. Menendez said in an interview on Saturday.Before being appointed to the Senate in 2006, Senator Menendez held the House seat that his son is now seeking. The borders of the district, formerly the 13th Congressional District, have since been redrawn slightly.The state debuted a new electronic voting system in November, but this was the first time that New Jersey voters were offered a chance to cast ballots in person, on machines, during a primary election.Still, with no statewide races on the ballot, turnout was low.“We were told that we were the fourth and fifth people in our district to be voting today,” Gov. Philip D. Murphy said on Tuesday morning, “and they’ve been open for a while.”Shlomo Schorr contributed reporting. More