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      Quién era Fernando Villavicencio, asesinado en Ecuador

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      El candidato presidencial asesinado el miércoles tenía un largo historial en la vida pública de Ecuador, en gran parte como antagonista al poder.Líder sindical. Periodista de investigación. Legislador. Candidato presidencial. Y ahora, víctima de asesinato.Fernando Villavicencio, quien fue derribado a tiros el miércoles en un mitin, tenía un largo historial en la vida pública ecuatoriana, en gran parte como antagonista de quienes ocupaban el poder. Destacó como líder sindical en la empresa petrolera estatal, Petroecuador, y luego tuvo un papel clave para dar a conocer un escándalo de corrupción que finalmente condujo a la condena del expresidente Rafael Correa.Correa, un socialista, lideró al país durante una década hasta 2017, el mandato ininterrumpido más largo de un presidente elegido de manera democrática en Ecuador. Un auge de las materias primas le ayudó a sacar a millones de personas de la pobreza, pero su estilo autoritario y las denuncias de corrupción en su contra dividieron profundamente al país.Y Villavicencio estuvo “permanentemente en contestación al poder” de Correa, según Caroline Ávila, analista política ecuatoriana.“Eso le puso en un lugar destacado entre los activistas de los movimientos sociales de Ecuador”, afirmó Mauricio Alarcón Salvador, director del capítulo de Transparencia Internacional en Ecuador.Durante dos décadas, Villavicencio se dedicó al periodismo de investigación, centrándose en la corrupción en el sector petrolero. “Y eso, entre muchas otras cosas, provocó la rabia, la ira de quienes estaban en el poder”, dijo Alarcón.Nacido en el seno de una familia pobre que vivía en un pequeño pueblo de la provincia de Chimborazo, en el centro del país, Villavicencio se trasladó a Quito cuando era adolescente para terminar el bachillerato en clases nocturnas, explicó Juan Carlos Calderón, director de la organización de investigación periodística Plan V y compañero de universidad y colaborador periodístico de Villavicencio.Sus compañeros de clase durante su etapa como estudiante de periodismo en la Universidad Central del Ecuador lo describieron como un apasionado izquierdista y un excelente polemista.“Yo siempre lo vi como una persona muy valiente, muy potente en todo lo que emprendía”, dijo Calderón. “Realmente nunca dejó de serlo”.Como periodista, Villavicencio obtuvo documentos sobre un programa de vigilancia gubernamental que envió a WikiLeaks, pero que finalmente publicó por su cuenta. Algunos de sus trabajos le valieron amenazas de muerte y acusaciones que fueron muy criticadas por considerarse que tenían motivaciones políticas. Trabajó junto al político Clever Jiménez y el activista Carlos Figueroa, quien estaba con Villavicencio en el mitin de campaña en el que le dispararon.Correa desató “una persecución judicial sin precedentes” contra los tres, y en particular contra Villavicencio, dijo Alarcón, quien actuó como su abogado ante la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos, organismo que les concedió medidas cautelares de protección. La persecución incluyó el allanamiento de sus hogares en Nochebuena y amenazas a sus familias, añadió.“Creo que eso es una muestra también de que el trabajo de Villavicencio tocaba permanentemente fibras sensibles, fibras vinculadas a relaciones que antes se creían intocables”, dijo.En 2014, Villavicencio se refugió durante varios meses en la comunidad indígena Sarayaku, en la Amazonía, tras ser condenado a prisión por insultar a Correa. También pasó seis meses escondido en 2017, antes de solicitar asilo político en Perú.Ahí se reunió con una amiga de sus épocas universitarias en la Universidad Central de Ecuador. No tenía dinero para defenderse de las acusaciones que se le imputaban y se había visto obligado a dejar atrás a sus dos hijos pequeños.Se sentía “acosado y humillado”, relató la amiga, Grace Jaramillo, quien ahora es politóloga en la Universidad de Columbia Británica.Pero Correa dejó el cargo posteriormente ese año y Villavicencio volvió a casa. ​​Un tribunal federal lo declaró inocente, y siguió publicando investigaciones sobre corrupción y presentando denuncias ante el fiscal general de Ecuador, muchas de las cuales fueron corroboradas.A veces fue criticado por mezclar sus funciones de periodista y activista, incluso Calderón discrepó de sus decisiones de presentar denuncias ante el fiscal general.“Yo siempre consideré que uno es periodista y punto. No es fiscal ni denunciante”, dijo.Pero dijo que Villavicencio “tenía esta idea de que ser periodista no era suficiente, no era suficiente denunciar. Él consideraba que era importante actuar más allá de eso para que no hubiera impunidad”.Esa determinación hizo que se dedicara definitivamente a la política, y en 2021 logró una curul en la Asamblea Nacional, donde fungió como asambleísta hasta mayo, cuando la legislatura fue disuelta por el presidente Guillermo Lasso, que enfrentaba un juicio político por acusaciones de malversación de fondos.La medida de Lasso también dio pie a unas elecciones presidenciales que se llevarán a cabo el 20 de agosto. Para su candidatura presidencial, Villavicencio, de 59 años, se presentó como el candidato anticorrupción. Representaba al Movimiento Construye, una amplia coalición, y también habló de temas de seguridad personal en un país que ha sido consumido por la violencia relacionada con el narcotráfico.Habló de manera abierta sobre los vínculos entre los gobiernos municipales y el dinero del narcotráfico, lo que le granjeó enemigos, según Calderón.“Yo siempre pensaba que él, en el fondo, era un sindicalista”, dijo. “Y ese espíritu lo llevó a la campaña”.En una contienda con ocho candidatos, Villavicencio aparecía en los sondeos al medio, pero de acuerdo con Jaramillo, tenía esperanza de sus posibilidades. Fue abatido antes de que los votantes pudieran dar su veredicto.La última vez que Calderón habló con el candidato presidencial fue el martes, el día antes de su muerte. Cuando se enteró del asesinato, él y otros amigos corrieron al hospital, donde permanecieron hasta que el cuerpo de Villavicencio fue trasladado a la morgue.“Sabíamos que estaba amenazado. Creíamos que estaba protegido”, dijo. “Uno no cree que eso le pueda pasar a alguien muy cercano”.Poco después del asesinato, Correa acudió a las redes sociales.“Han asesinado a Fernando Villavicencio”, escribió el expresidente en la plataforma X, antes Twitter. “Ecuador se ha convertido en un Estado fallido”. More

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      Ecuador Reels From Assassination of Fernando Villavicencio

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      The 12 shots fired on Wednesday evening, killing an Ecuadorean presidential candidate as he exited a campaign event, marked a dramatic turning point for a nation that a few years ago seemed an island of security in a violent region.A video of the moments just before the killing of the candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, began circulating online even before his death had been confirmed. And for many Ecuadoreans, those shots echoed with a bleak message: Their nation was forever changed.“I feel that it represents a total loss of control for the government,” said Ingrid Ríos, a political scientist in the city of Guayaquil, “and for the citizens, as well.”Ecuador, a country of 18 million on South America’s western coast, has survived authoritarian governments, financial crises, mass protests and at least one presidential kidnapping. It has never, however, been shaken by the kind of drug-related warfare that has plagued neighboring Colombia, unleashing violence that has killed thousands, corroded democracy and turned citizens against one another.Until now.The headquarters of Mr. Villavicencio’s political party. He was assassinated outside a school where he was holding a campaign event.Johanna Alarcón for The New York TimesHours after the candidate’s killing, President Guillermo Lasso declared a state of emergency, suspending some civil liberties, he said, to help him deal with growing crime.And on Thursday afternoon, Ecuador’s interior minister, Juan Zapata, said that six suspects arrested in connection with Mr. Villavicencio’s killing were all Colombian, adding a new dimension to a story line that already seemed to be imported from another place.In the past five years, the narco-trafficking industry has gained extraordinary power in Ecuador, as foreign drug mafias have joined forces with local prison and street gangs. In just a few years, they have transformed entire swaths of the country, extorting businesses, recruiting young people, infiltrating the government and killing those who investigate them.The similarities to the problems that plagued Colombia in the 1980s and ’90s, as narco-trafficking groups assumed control of broad parts of the country and infiltrated the government, have become almost impossible for Ecuadoreans to ignore.On Thursday, some began to compare Mr. Villavicencio’s killing to that of Luis Carlos Galán, a Colombian presidential candidate gunned down on the campaign trail in 1989. Like Mr. Villavicencio, Mr. Galán was a harsh critic of the illegal drug industry.Mr. Galán’s death still reverberates in Colombia as a symbol of the dangers of speaking out against criminal power and of the inability of the state to protect its citizens.More broadly, Colombia is still grappling with the effects of the drug-trafficking industry, which continues to hold sway over the electoral process and is responsible for the deaths and displacement of thousands of people each year.On Thursday, mourners gathered outside a morgue in the Ecuadorean capital, Quito, where Mr. Villavicencio’s body was being held. The air filled with desperate cries. Irina Tejada, 48, a teacher, wept as she spoke.“They’ve stolen our hero,” she said. Then, addressing corrupt politicians, she went on: “Why don’t they side with our people, not with those criminal narcos? The pain and outrage!”Irina Tejada, a teacher, mourning outside the morgue where Mr. Villavicencio’s body was being held.Johanna Alarcón for The New York TimesSoon, the silver hearse carrying Mr. Villavicencio’s body left the morgue, and the crowd began to clap, at first mournfully, then with a rapid anger.People screamed at the police escort surrounding the body.“Now you protect him, when it is too late!” a woman shouted.Mr. Villavicencio, who had worked as a journalist, activist and legislator, was polling near the middle of a group of eight candidates in a presidential election set for Aug. 20. He was among the most outspoken about the link between organized crime and government officials.On Wednesday evening, he arrived at a school in Quito, the capital, where he stood on a stage in front of a packed crowd and spoke out “against the mafias that have subjugated this homeland.” Then, as he exited the school under an enormous banner that bore his face and the words “presidente,” the shots were fired.Mr. Lasso, the president, immediately blamed the death on “organized crime.” The national prosecutor’s office quickly said that one suspect had been killed and six others arrested.The following day, Mr. Lasso said he had requested the help of the F.B.I., which agreed to assist in investigating the case.Wearing a bulletproof vest, Andrea González, Mr. Villavicencio’s running mate, held a news conference on Thursday.Johanna Alarcón for The New York TimesJust after Mr. Villavicencio’s death, Carlos Figueroa, a member of his campaign who had witnessed the shooting, spoke to The Times, his voice wobbly.“The mafias are too powerful,” he said. “They have taken over our country; they have taken over the economic system, the police, the judicial system.”“We are desperate,” he continued. “We don’t know our country’s future, in which hands, or by whom, it will be taken over.”Mr. Villavicencio, 59, gained prominence as an opponent of correísmo, the leftist movement of former President Rafael Correa, who served from 2007 to 2017 and still holds political power in Ecuador.In the days before the assassination, Mr. Villavicencio had appeared on television, saying that he had received three specific threats from members of a criminal group called Los Choneros.In an initial threat, he said, representatives of a Choneros leader named Fito visited a member of Mr. Villavicencio’s team “to tell them that if I keep mentioning Fito’s name, mentioning the Choneros, they’re going to break me. That’s how it was. And my decision was to continue with the electoral campaign.”Police officers guarding the motorcade carrying Mr. Villavicencio’s body on Thursday.Johanna Alarcón for The New York TimesMr. Villavicencio’s killing casts a pall on an already-contentious presidential election, which will go on as planned. A candidate who has Mr. Correa’s backing, Luisa González, is leading in the polls.Yet, because Mr. Villavicencio was such a harsh critic of Mr. Correa, some Ecuadoreans have begun to blame correísta candidates for Mr. Villavicencio’s death. There is no evidence of their involvement.“Not a single vote for correísmo,” one woman chanted outside the morgue.Other voters said they were turning toward Jan Topic, a candidate and former soldier in the French Foreign Legion whose focus has been taking a hard line on security, and who has been mirroring the promises of El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele. Mr. Bukele’s hard line on gangs, including mass imprisonments, has helped drive down violence, but he has also been accused of violating civil liberties.Germán Martínez, a coroner who happened to be at the morgue where Mr. Villavicencio’s body lay on Thursday, said that after the killing, he had decided to switch his vote to Mr. Topic.“Where are we, as Ecuadoreans?” he asked. “We can’t remain with our heads low. We need to fight criminals. We need a strong hand.”Genevieve Glatsky More

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      Ecuador Presidential Candidate Is Assassinated During Rally

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      The candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, had been vocal about ties between the state and organized crime, in a country roiled by violence tied to drug trafficking.Fernando Villavicencio was shot after speaking at a campaign rally in Quito, Ecuador.Karen Toro/ReutersA presidential candidate in Ecuador who had been outspoken about the link between organized crime and government officials was assassinated Wednesday evening at a political rally in the capital, just days before voting begins in an election that has been dominated by concerns over drug-related violence.The candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, a former journalist, was gunned down outside a high school in the capital, Quito, after speaking to young supporters. A suspect was killed in the melee that followed, and nine other people were shot, officials said.“There was nothing to be done, because they were shots to the head,” Carlos Figueroa, who worked for Mr. Villavicencio’s campaign and was at the rally, said of the candidate.Mr. Villavicencio, 59, was polling near the middle of an eight-person race. He was among the most vocal candidates on the issue of crime and state corruption.It was the first assassination of a presidential candidate in Ecuador and came less than a month after the mayor of Manta, a port city, was fatally shot during a public appearance. Ecuador, once a relatively safe nation, has been consumed by violence related to narco-trafficking in the last five years.“Outraged and shocked by the assassination,” President Guillermo Lasso wrote on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, late Wednesday, blaming the death on “organized crime.”Mr. Lasso said the attackers had thrown a grenade into the street as a distraction as they tried to flee, but that it failed to explode. The national prosecutor’s office, also posting on the X platform, said that a suspect had been shot and apprehended amid crossfire with security forces, and had died shortly afterward. The office later said the authorities had carried out raids and detained six people in connection with the assassination.The nine other people shot included two police officers and a candidate for a National Assembly seat, according to the prosecutor’s office. There was no immediate information about the condition of the nine people; it was unclear late Wednesday night whether any of them had died.The killing is a major blow to a nation that was already suffering deep economic, social and political upheaval.“Electorally speaking, this year is the most violent in our history,” said Arianna Tanca, an Ecuadorean political scientist. “I think that what is going to change is the way we conceive of politics. I think that from now on it becomes a high-risk profession.”Ecuador, on South America’s western edge, witnessed an extraordinary transformation between 2005 and 2015 as millions of people rose out of poverty, riding the wave of an oil boom whose profits were poured into education, health care and other social programs.But more recently, the country has been dominated by an increasingly powerful narco-trafficking industry. Foreign drug mafias have joined forces with local prison and street gangs, unleashing a wave of violence unlike anything in the country’s recent history. Homicide rates are at record levels.Today, the violence is often horrific and public, meant to induce fear and exert control: There are regular reports of car bombings, beheadings and children being gunned down outside their schools.Complicating the situation, Mr. Lasso disbanded the country’s opposition-led National Assembly in May, a drastic move he made as he faced impeachment proceedings over accusations of embezzlement.The move, which is allowed under the Constitution, meant that new elections for president and legislative representatives would be held. The vote in which Mr. Villavicencio was supposed to compete is set for Aug. 20; a second round of voting will be held in October if no single candidate wins a clear victory.Investigators at the scene of the rally where Mr. Villavicencio was killed and others were wounded.Jose Jacome/EPA, via ShutterstockDiana Atamaint, the president of the National Electoral Council, said the election date would not be moved, citing constitutional and legal issues. In a televised statement early Thursday, Mr. Lasso declared a 60-day, nationwide state of emergency, a measure that involves the restriction of some civil liberties, and he said security forces would be deployed across the country. Such emergency declarations, meant for extraordinary circumstances, have become more common in recent years, but have done little to curtail Ecuador’s soaring violence.Mr. Lasso stressed, however, that the elections would proceed as scheduled. “This was a political crime, terrorism,” he said. “And there is no doubt that this assassination is an attempt to sabotage the electoral process. It is no coincidence this happened days before the first round of voting.”Mr. Villavicencio, who had worked as a journalist, activist and legislator, gained prominence as an opponent of correísmo, the leftist movement of former President Rafael Correa, who served from 2007 to 2017 and still holds major political sway in Ecuador. A presidential candidate who has Mr. Correa’s backing, Luisa González, is leading in the polls.Mr. Villavicencio wrote often about alleged corruption in the Correa government, which made him the subject of legal persecution and death threats. He briefly sought political asylum in Peru.In 2017, Mr. Villavicencio successfully ran for a seat in the National Assembly, where he served until the legislature was dissolved by Mr. Lasso.Mr. Correa, writing on the X platform late Wednesday, lamented Mr. Villavicencio’s death. “Ecuador has become a failed state,” he wrote. “My solidarity with his family and with all the families of the victims of violence.”Grace Jaramillo, an Ecuadorean professor of political science at the University of British Columbia who went to university with Mr. Villavicencio, remembered running against him in an election for student body president. He ran as a Trotskyist, and she represented a party called Democracy in Our House; both lost, to a student representing the Chinese Communist Party.“He was really a fighter all the time and very good at arguments,” Ms. Jaramillo said. “An arguer, a challenger. He used to love lively discussions.”After university, she said, Mr. Villavicencio became a union leader at Petroecuador, the country’s national oil company. Soon after Mr. Correa came to power, he started writing about government corruption as a political journalist.Ms. Jaramillo said she met with him at the time to give him advice. His house had been raided, and he had no money to fight the charges that had been brought against him, she said.“He was downtrodden. He felt bullied and diminished,” she added.But a few weeks ago, when she saw him on a trip to Quito, he was “really hopeful and enthusiastic,” Ms. Jaramillo said. “He was convinced that he could make it to the second round” of the presidential election.His death, she said, will be “a long-lasting memory of how difficult it is to fight corruption and to be safe at the same time.”Andrés R. Martínez More

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      What to Know About Fernando Villavicencio, Who Was Assassinated in Ecuador

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      The presidential candidate who was assassinated on Wednesday had a long history in Ecuador’s public affairs, largely as an antagonist to those in power.Union leader. Muckraking journalist. Legislator. Presidential candidate. And now, assassin’s victim.Fernando Villavicencio, who was gunned down at a rally on Wednesday, had a long history in Ecuadorean public affairs, largely as an antagonist to those in power. He rose to prominence as a union leader at the state oil company, Petroecuador, and later played a crucial role in exposing a corruption scandal involving the administration of former President Rafael Correa.Mr. Correa, a socialist, was Ecuador’s longest-serving democratically elected president, leading the nation for a decade, through 2017. A commodities boom helped him lift millions out of poverty, but his authoritarian style and the corruption allegations that trailed him deeply divided the country.And Mr. Villavicencio was “always contesting the power” of Mr. Correa, according to Caroline Ávila, an Ecuadorean political analyst.As a journalist, Mr. Villavicencio obtained documents about a government surveillance program that he sent to WikiLeaks but eventually published himself. Some of his work led to death threats and charges that were widely criticized as politically motivated. He fled to Peru in 2017 to seek political asylum.There, he met with a friend from his undergraduate days at the Central University of Ecuador. He had no money to fight the charges against him, and had been forced to leave behind his wife and two young children.“He felt bullied and diminished,” said the friend, Grace Jaramillo, who is now a political scientist at the University of British Columbia.But later that year, Mr. Correa left office, and Mr. Villavicencio returned home. He won a seat in the National Assembly, where he served until May, when the legislature was dissolved by President Guillermo Lasso, who was facing impeachment proceedings over embezzlement accusations.Mr. Lasso’s move also triggered a presidential election, with a vote set for Aug. 20. For his presidential run, Mr. Villavicencio, 59, cast himself as the anticorruption candidate. He was representing the Build Ecuador Movement, a broad coalition, and also campaigned on issues like personal safety, in a country that has been consumed by violence related to narco-trafficking.Mr. Villavicencio was polling near the middle of an eight-person race, but remained hopeful about his chances, according to Ms. Jaramillo. But he was gunned down before voters could deliver their verdict.Soon after the killing, Mr. Correa, the former president, issued a lament on social media.“They have assassinated Fernando Villavicencio,” Mr. Correa wrote. “Ecuador has become a failed state.” More

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      Imran Khan Sentenced to Prison in Pakistan

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      The former prime minister of Pakistan was taken into custody, sentenced to three years after a court found him guilty of illegally selling state gifts and concealing the assets.Former Prime Minister Imran Khan of Pakistan was arrested on Saturday after a trial court sentenced him to three years in prison, a verdict likely to end his chances of running in upcoming general elections.The police took Mr. Khan into custody from his home in the eastern city of Lahore soon after the court’s decision was announced in Islamabad.The verdict is a climactic turn in a political showdown between Mr. Khan and Pakistan’s powerful military that has embroiled the country for over a year.It comes on the heels of a monthslong intimidation campaign by the military aimed at hollowing out Mr. Khan’s political party and stifling the remarkable political comeback he has made since being ousted from office last year in a vote of no confidence.Now, the prospect that Mr. Khan, a cricket star turned populist politician, will be disqualified from running in the country’s general elections — the next ones are expected this fall — has offered a major victory to a military establishment that appears intent on sidelining him from politics.It has also sent a powerful message to Mr. Khan and his supporters, who have directly confronted and defied the military like few else in Pakistan’s 75-year history: The military is the ultimate hand wielding political power behind the government, and no amount of public backlash will change that.“Imran Khan’s arrest marks a significant turning point in the state’s actions against P.T.I.,” said Zaigham Khan, a political analyst and columnist based in Islamabad, using the initials of Mr. Khan’s political party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. That effort seems “designed to hinder the P.T.I.’s chances in the upcoming elections,” he added.Supporters of Mr. Khan clashed with the police in Peshawar in May.Arshad Arbab/EPA, via ShutterstockIn its ruling on Saturday, the trial court found the former prime minister guilty of hiding assets after illegally selling state gifts.“The allegations against Mr. Khan are proven,” said Judge Humayun Dilawar, who announced the verdict in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital. The court also imposed a fine of around $355.The case is related to an inquiry by the country’s election commission, which found last October that Mr. Khan had illegally sold gifts given to him by other countries when he was prime minister and concealed the profits from the authorities.Mr. Khan has denied any wrongdoing. He and his lawyers had accused Judge Dilawar of bias and sought to have the case transferred to another judge. They are likely to appeal this ruling.In a statement, Mr. Khan’s party rejected the verdict, calling it “the worst example of political revenge.”Members of the country’s governing coalition, led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, welcomed the outcome. In a statement, the country’s information minister, Marriyum Aurangzeb, hailed Mr. Khan’s arrest and denied that it was linked to “political persecution” or that it was part of a plot to prevent the former prime minister from running in the country’s next elections.“My message to Imran Khan is straightforward: Your time is up,” she said.The verdict is the culmination of a nationwide political saga that has escalated since Mr. Khan was ousted in April 2022. In the months that followed, he drew thousands out to protests where he railed against the country’s powerful military establishment and accused Pakistan’s generals of orchestrating his fall from power — an accusation they deny.Mr. Khan, who is facing an array of court cases, was briefly arrested earlier this year in a different one. That arrest, on May 9, set off violent protests across the country, as well as attacks on military installations. Days afterward, the country’s top court declared that the authorities had unlawfully detained Mr. Khan and ordered his release.The protests channeling anger toward the military were widely considered to have crossed an unspoken red line of defiance — a rare rebuke in a country where few defy military leaders. Since then, Pakistan’s military establishment has staged an extensive crackdown.Security forces near an office of Mr. Khan’s party in Karachi on Saturday.Rehan Khan/EPA, via ShutterstockThrongs of supporters of Mr. Khan were arrested in connection with the protests in May. Media personalities considered sympathetic to him said they were intimidated. And many prominent leaders of his party resigned — after they were arrested or said they had been threatened with criminal charges and arrests.After Mr. Khan was arrested on Saturday in Lahore, the police in several cities were put on alert in case his supporters again took to the streets.In a prerecorded message before his arrest in Lahore on Saturday, Mr. Khan urged his supporters to stage peaceful protests and not remain silent at home. In the port city of Karachi and in Peshawar, a few dozen supporters staged small protests.But unlike when Mr. Khan was arrested in May, by Saturday evening there were no mass protests in support of Mr. Khan — a sign of the effectiveness of the military’s efforts to intimidate his supporters in recent months, analysts say.In recent weeks, Pakistan’s governing coalition had signaled that it was considering postponing the fall elections so that the military’s crackdown on Mr. Khan’s party could continue and so that the coalition’s political leaders could be sure that he would not pose a major political threat in the race. But now, his arrest and likely disqualification may make that unnecessary, observers say.“Khan’s removal from the scene may actually expedite the election process, potentially allowing them to be held within 90 days, if not sooner,” said Zaigham Khan, the political analyst. “What remains to be seen is whether he can obtain any immediate relief from the superior courts, where his sentence could be suspended.” More

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      Mississippi Primary Election 2023: Live Results

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      Gov. Tate Reeves, a Republican, is seeking a second term in office against two long-shot primary challengers. He is expected to face off in November against a state public service commissioner, Brandon Presley, a Democrat and a second cousin of Elvis Presley. More