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      The Washington Post and Los Angeles Times Endorsement Calls Are Self-Sabotage

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      I can think of some compelling reasons that leading independent newspapers should not be in the business of endorsing candidates for president.Unfortunately, the acts of self-sabotage by The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times do not reflect any of them. And so one more bulwark against autocracy erodes.The owners of both papers took as long as possible to reveal what they had already concluded: For the first time in years — since 2004 for The Los Angeles Times and 1988 for The Post — each would refrain from endorsing a presidential candidate. This inspired Donald Trump’s campaign to whoop that even Vice President Kamala Harris’s “fellow Californians know she’s not up for the job.” The Times’s editorial editor, Mariel Garza, resigned and said the decision made the organization look “craven and hypocritical.” Others followed.The Post’s endorsement of Ms. Harris had reportedly already been drafted, only to be shelved on the orders of its owner, Amazon’s founder, Mr. Bezos. But it fell to the paper’s publisher, William Lewis, to announce the decision, saying, “We are returning to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates.” Its editorial editor, David Shipley, in the face of his mutinous editorial board, said he owned the outcome, which he called a way of creating “independent space” for voters to make up their own minds.I’m not worried that Post and Los Angeles Times readers will have trouble deciding how to vote. I’m worried they’ll have trouble deciding whom to trust.Both papers are owned by billionaires — Patrick Soon-Shiong at The Times and Mr. Bezos at The Post — and it is this grim similarity that raises alarms, especially in the case of The Post, whose “Democracy dies in darkness” motto now moans like an epitaph. Rightly or wrongly, readers will reasonably conclude The Post backed off an endorsement of Ms. Harris to protect the owner’s business interests. Those interests are vast, spread across commerce, the military and, increasingly, the frothing frontiers of artificial intelligence. How now can readers trust The Post’s often excellent news coverage of those topics, which are core to its mission? It did not help the paper’s credibility when, on the day the nonendorsement was announced, Mr. Trump was spotted greeting executives of Mr. Bezos’ Blue Origin space company in Austin, Texas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      82 American Nobel Prize Winners Endorse Kamala Harris

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      More than 80 American Nobel Prize winners in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics have signed an open letter endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president.“This is the most consequential presidential election in a long time, perhaps ever, for the future of science and the United States,” reads the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times. “We, the undersigned, strongly support Harris.”The letter praises Ms. Harris for understanding that “the enormous increases in living standards and life expectancies over the past two centuries are largely the result of advances in science and technology.” Former President Donald Trump, by contrast, would “jeopardize any advancements in our standards of living, slow the progress of science and technology and impede our responses to climate change,” the letter said.Eighty-two Nobel laureates — from a physicist who helped discover leftover light from the Big Bang to an immunologist who paved the way for one type of Covid-19 vaccine — have signed the letter. The laureates include the molecular biologist Gary Ruvkun, the chemist David Baker, the physicist John Hopfield and the economist Daron Acemoglu, all of whom won Nobels this month.Read the Letter from Nobel Laureates Endorsing Kamala Harris for PresidentMore than 80 American Nobel Prize winners in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics have signed an open letter endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president.Read Document 4 pagesJoseph Stiglitz, an economist at Columbia University who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 2001, drafted the endorsement. He said he was motivated by the “enormous cuts in science budgets” Mr. Trump proposed during his presidency, as well as what Dr. Stiglitz described as the former president’s “anti-science” and “anti-university” stances.While in office, Mr. Trump proposed a budget that would have led to a severe loss of funds for federal health and science agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Science Foundation and the Environmental Protection Agency. On the campaign trail this year, Mr. Trump has suggested shutting down the Department of Education.“I hope it’s a wake-up call for people,” Dr. Stiglitz said of the letter. “A consequence of this election is the really profound impact that his agenda has on science and technology.”The letter also praised Ms. Harris’s recognition of the role that immigrants play in advancing science and technology, both nationally and on a global scale. Immigration has been a key issue in this year’s election, with both candidates promising a stricter approach than their prior presidential campaigns.Many scientists are inclined to “stick to their knitting,” Dr. Stiglitz said — focusing on their research rather than politics, and on knowledge for knowledge’s sake instead of the real-world applications that result from it.“But they’ve recognized this is a moment where you can’t be silent,” he said. More

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      Read the Letter from Nobel Laureates Endorsing Kamala Harris for President

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      At no time in our nation’s history has there been a greater need for our leaders to appreciate the
      value of science in formulating public policy.
      The enormous increases in living standards and life expectancies over the past two centuries are
      largely the result of advances in science and technology. Kamala Harris recognizes this and
      understands that maintaining America’s leadership in these fields requires budgetary support
      from the federal government, independent universities, and international collaboration. Harris
      also recognizes the key role that immigrants have always played in the advancement of science.
      Should Donald Trump win the presidential election, he would undermine future US leadership on
      these and other fronts, as well as jeopardize any advancements in our standards of living, slow
      the progress of science and technology, and impede our responses to climate change.
      This is the most consequential presidential election in a long time, perhaps ever, for the future of
      science and the United States. We, the undersigned, strongly support Harris.
      Signed,
      Peter Agre
      Chemistry 2003
      Frances H. Arnold
      Chemistry 2018
      David Baker
      Chemistry 2024
      Moungi G. Bawendi Chemistry 2023
      Martin Chalfie
      Chemistry 2008
      Elias James Corey,
      Chemistry 1990
      Johann Deisenhofer
      Chemistry 1988
      Joachim Frank
      Chemistry 2017
      Alan Heeger
      Roald Hoffmann
      Brian K. Kobilka
      Chemistry 2000
      Chemistry 1981
      Chemistry 2012
      Roger D. Kornberg
      Chemistry 2006
      Robert J. Lefkowitz
      Chemistry 2012
      Michael Levitt
      Chemistry 2013
      William E. Moerner Chemistry 2014
      Richard R. Schrock Chemistry 2005
      Sir James Fraser Stoddart
      Chemistry 2016
      Sir M. Stanley Whittingham Chemistry 2019 More

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      A Wisconsin Mayor, a Former Republican, Endorses Harris

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      Shawn Reilly, the mayor of Waukesha, Wis., said he had never thrown his support behind a Democrat before.Mayor Shawn Reilly of Waukesha, Wis., an independent who was a Republican for most of his life, said in an interview on Wednesday that he was endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president.The endorsement is a key one for Ms. Harris, whose campaign has lavished attention on the suburbs of Milwaukee, which lean Republican but are so densely populated that they deliver a pivotal number of Democratic votes in the swing state.Mr. Reilly, 63, said that he had never endorsed a Democrat before. But this election is different, he said, describing his own evolution from loyal Republican for decades to an independent in 2021.“It’s very easy to not even stick your nose in this — that’s the easiest way to go about it,” he said. “But the reason I’m doing it is because I think we’re at a crossroads. I’m very afraid of the direction our country will head in if Donald Trump becomes president. I think we’ll be heading down a road of authoritarianism and fascism.”The Harris campaign has poured considerable energy and resources into Waukesha County, which includes the city of Waukesha, hoping that Ms. Harris will be able to cut into Mr. Trump’s margins there. In 2020, Mr. Trump won the county with just under 60 percent of the vote. More than 400,000 people live in Waukesha County, the third-most populous county in Wisconsin, behind Milwaukee and Dane.Since 2014, Mr. Reilly has been the mayor, a nonpartisan role. When asked during his initial mayoral campaign if he was a Republican, he always answered yes, he said.When Mr. Trump ran for president in 2016, Mr. Reilly did not vote for him, but did not vote for Hillary Clinton, the Democrat, either. After the attack on the Capitol in 2021, Mr. Reilly disavowed the Republican Party, saying he no longer considered himself a member.He attended a rally in Waukesha County on Monday, where Ms. Harris appeared with former Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, in an appeal to conservative women in the Milwaukee suburbs.On Tuesday, early voting began in Wisconsin. From Mr. Reilly’s perch in City Hall in Waukesha, he could see a line of voters snaking down the sidewalk. About 800 people were voting in person each day, he said.Mr. Reilly said he was concerned about whether Ms. Harris would win Wisconsin, a crucial battleground state that President Biden won by less than 21,000 votes in 2020.He probably should have endorsed Mr. Harris sooner, he said.“But it’s one of those things where I’d much rather do it now, even if it doesn’t have as much of an effect,” he said. More

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      At a Rally in North Carolina, Trump Avoids Topic A: Mark Robinson

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      Through an awkward quirk of scheduling former President Donald J. Trump found himself headlining a rally in North Carolina on Saturday just two days after the man he endorsed to become the state’s next governor, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, was accused of making a series of disturbing posts on a pornographic website.In the lead-up to the rally, there was a great deal of curiosity in political circles about how Mr. Trump, who had called Mr. Robinson “Martin Luther King on steroids,” might react to an explosive CNN report that Mr. Robinson had once called himself a “black NAZI” and defended slavery years ago on a pornographic forum.The answer? He wouldn’t.Speaking for just over an hour at a boisterous rally on an airport tarmac in Wilmington, N.C., Mr. Trump made no mention of Mr. Robinson or the scandal surrounding him, even as he gave shout-outs to a number of the state’s officials and politicians. And Mr. Robinson, who has denied the accusations, was conspicuous by his absence.Instead, Mr. Trump delivered a fairly standard rally speech, attacking Vice President Kamala Harris and the Democrats on the economy and immigration while digressing to criticize Ms. Harris’s livestreamed event this week with Oprah Winfrey; to call her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, “weird”; to say that he would ask Elon Musk to help him send rockets to Mars; and to claim falsely that an Olympic boxer was transgender.One of the only speakers at Saturday’s rally to acknowledge the controversy engulfing Mr. Robinson was Representative Dan Bishop, the Republican candidate for state attorney general, who called the revelations “a meticulously timed and coordinated character assassination.”Building on his effort to make immigration, an area where voters are dissatisfied with Democrats, the central issue of the presidential campaign, Mr. Trump announced that he would push Congress to pass legislation outlawing so-called sanctuary cities, places that limit how local law enforcement can cooperate with federal immigration authorities. During his presidency, Mr. Trump issued an executive order that tried to withhold federal grants to such locales, an effort that was blocked by federal courts.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Heads to North Carolina as Mark Robinson’s Campaign Reels

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      With somewhat awkward timing, former President Donald J. Trump plans to campaign in North Carolina on Saturday as his pick for governor, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, faces accusations of making disturbing posts on a pornographic website.Mr. Trump’s visit to Wilmington, N.C., for a rally will take place two days after CNN reported that Mr. Robinson had once called himself a “black NAZI!” and defended slavery years ago on a pornographic forum.Mr. Robinson, whom Mr. Trump endorsed in March, has denied the report and vowed to stay in the race. But both parties are looking closely at the fallout, which could have a spillover effect in the presidential contest, given that North Carolina is a key battleground state that Mr. Trump won twice but that Democrats see as competitive.The lieutenant governor, who has a long history of making inflammatory and offensive remarks, is not expected to attend Mr. Trump’s rally on Saturday, according to a person familiar with the program’s details. Mr. Robinson was also absent when Mr. Trump’s running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, visited the state on Wednesday, the day before CNN released its report.A spokesman for Mr. Robinson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday. The Trump campaign avoided weighing in on the controversy when asked for comment on Friday.Democrats, who last carried North Carolina in the 2008 presidential race, are seeking to remind voters in the increasingly competitive state about Mr. Trump’s past praise for Mr. Robinson. Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign released a television ad on Friday, “Both Wrong,” highlighting Mr. Trump’s past warm words for Mr. Robinson and some of Mr. Robinson’s past polarizing statements. At least nine electronic billboards around the state will display ads on Friday and Saturday paid for by the Democratic National Committee linking the two Republicans.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Dismisses Taylor Swift’s Harris-Walz Endorsement

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      Former President Donald J. Trump was not happy that Taylor Swift endorsed his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, though perhaps he was not surprised.“She seems to always endorse a Democrat. And she’ll probably pay a price for it in the marketplace,” Mr. Trump said Wednesday morning on Fox News. Ms. Swift, one of the most successful musical artists in the world, endorsed President Biden in 2020. Mr. Trump said in the interview that he preferred Brittany Mahomes, a fitness entrepreneur who is married to Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and was reported to have liked a social media post supporting Mr. Trump. Ms. Swift and Ms. Mahomes are friends, as are Mr. Mahomes and his teammate, Travis Kelce, who is dating Ms. Swift.“I actually like Mrs. Mahomes much better, if you want to know the truth,” Mr. Trump said. “She’s a big Trump fan. I was not a Taylor Swift fan.”“I think Brittany’s great,” he went on. “Brittany got a lot of news last week. She’s a big MAGA fan. That’s the one I like much better than Taylor Swift.”Ms. Mahomes has not endorsed Mr. Trump.Ms. Swift’s endorsement disgruntled a number of Trump supporters, including Elon Musk, the tech billionaire, who responded on X, the social media platform he owns.“Fine Taylor … you win … I will give you a child and guard your cats with my life,” Mr. Musk wrote.Ms. Swift had signed her endorsement on Instagram with the words “childless cat lady,” a reference to past comments by Senator JD Vance of Ohio, Mr. Trump’s running mate. More