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      David McCormick’s Financial Disclosures in Senate Race Reveal His Wealth

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      The Republican Senate candidate’s financial disclosure statement depicts a wealthy man comfortable walking the halls of power.We can say this much with confidence about David McCormick: The man is rich.In ads and campaign appearances, McCormick, who is running in the Republican primary for a Pennsylvania Senate seat, emphasizes his roots in Bloomsburg, a small town along the state’s Susquehanna River.But his personal financial disclosure statement, which is required of all candidates for federal office, paints the picture of a consummate New York and Washington insider.Last year alone, McCormick pulled in more than $22 million in salary from Bridgewater Associates, the Connecticut hedge fund where he was chief executive until stepping down in January. He sold options in Bechtel, a politically connected global construction firm where he was a board member, for an additional $2.2 million. For serving on the board of In-Q-Tel, a nonprofit venture capital firm close to the U.S. intelligence community, he earned $70,000 more. (McCormick is also a member of the Defense Policy Board, and maintains a security clearance.)And that’s just income. Because federal disclosure forms require candidates to list assets only within broad ranges, it’s not possible to calculate McCormick’s net worth with any precision. But this much is clear: If McCormick were to win the Senate seat, which is being vacated by the retiring Pat Toomey, he would rank among the wealthiest members of Congress.The same would be true of his top rival, Mehmet Oz.Winning against Oz, Carla Sands and Jeff Bartos in next month’s primary won’t be an easy task. Oz, the celebrity doctor, last week won Donald Trump’s endorsement, despite McCormick’s assiduous efforts to court the former president. An average of public polls shows McCormick clinging to a lead of around 4 percentage points, though it’s worth noting that polls of statewide races are famously unreliable.Breaking down McCormick’s wealthMcCormick is married to Dina Powell McCormick, a former Trump administration official who now works for Goldman Sachs. The couple listed assets worth between $116 million and $290 million, and possibly more.They own a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania, which once belonged to his parents; a ranch investment property in Colorado; and rental properties in several other cities. McCormick often mentions the farm, which he bought 10 years ago, in his campaign ads and appearances. He has expanded it to grow soy and other crops, the campaign says, but with a value listed at $1 million to $5 million, it represents just a fraction of his wealth.The couple has tens of millions distributed across various funds — notably, they have at least $50 million worth of stock in Bridgewater, his former employer. McCormick has faced questions about the firm’s investments in China, as well as about its handling of teacher pensions in Pennsylvania.McCormick is also an investor in ArcelorMittal, a multinational steel company that competes with the Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel — via a revocable trust, a type of trust that can be amended during life and that is often used to manage assets and avoid probate at death.The couple also owns corporate bonds in Delta Air Lines, Ford, General Electric, General Motors, Hilton, Oracle and UPS. For good measure, they own a few million dollars’ worth of U.S. Treasuries.David McCormick and his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, at the White House for a state dinner in 2018.Lawrence Jackson for The New York TimesRarefied companyThe McCormicks’ liabilities similarly showcase their extraordinary wealth and connections.They listed between $20 million and $93.5 million in liabilities, including for two mortgages and a line of credit of up to $25 million. Their other liabilities are for various “capital commitments,” meaning potential private equity investments, including as much as half a million dollars to Revolution’s “Rise of the Rest” seed fund.The fund, run by the AOL founder Steve Case, invests in start-up companies outside of the usual Silicon Valley and East Coast haunts. Among the fund’s investors are Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder; Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia; Eric Schmidt, the former Google chief executive; James Murdoch, the son of the Fox News founder Rupert Murdoch; Tory Burch, the fashion designer; and David Rubenstein, a founder of the Carlyle Group.One interesting coincidence here: J.D. Vance, who was once a managing partner at Revolution, is now a candidate for Senate in neighboring Ohio. Vance’s rags-to-riches personal story, as detailed in his book “Hillbilly Elegy,” was integral to the fund’s sales pitch.Although Vance is nearly 20 years younger, the two men have led remarkably parallel lives. Like McCormick, Vance served in the U.S. military and went on to earn an Ivy League education before starting a career in finance. Both reinvented themselves as MAGA warriors as they decided to run for Senate seats in the Midwest.But Vance scored Trump’s endorsement, while McCormick did not.In Pennsylvania, McCormick has fought bitterly with Oz, trading accusations over which man has closer ties to China, who is a more committed conservative and who is the more authentic representative of the state. Each has plowed millions of his own money into the Senate contest — with McCormick having donated nearly $7 million to his campaign, and Oz contributing more than $11 million to his effort.McCormick has benefited from his Wall Street ties. More than 60 executives at Goldman Sachs have contributed the maximum allowable amount to his campaign, according to a Bloomberg analysis.A super PAC supporting McCormick, Honor Pennsylvania, has raised $15.3 million. Nearly a third of that money has come from Ken Griffin, a billionaire hedge fund manager who backs Republican candidates. Another of the super PAC’s donors is Harry Sloan, a former MGM executive who backed Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid in 2016.Intriguingly, Arjun Gupta, the founder and “chief believer” of TeleSoft Partners, also chipped in $100,000. He usually donates to Democrats. McCormick’s disclosure statement indicates that he is a limited partner in a TeleSoft investment fund. Until McCormick decided to run for office, both men were trustees of the Aspen Institute, a think tank that aims to “solve the greatest challenges of our time.”Alyce McFadden contributed research.What to read One day after a federal judge struck down federal mask mandates on airplanes, buses and trains, President Biden said that Americans should decide for themselves if they want to wear masks on public transportation, Katie Roger reports.Jonathan Weisman examines a phenomenon that frustrates Democratic Party leaders: their base’s penchant for throwing millions of dollars at candidates with no hope of winning.The federal Education Department is retroactively crediting millions of borrowers with additional payments toward loan forgiveness, Stacy Cowley reports. Student debt has become a major political cause on the left, with pressure increasing on President Biden to relieve borrowers through executive action.how they runJim Pillen, left, and Charles Herbster are among Republicans vying to replace Gov. Pete Ricketts, who is term-limited, in Nebraska.Grant Schulte/Associated Press; Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post, via Getty ImagesAfter assault accusations, an ad with … pig jokesTwo new television ads in Nebraska signal how sexual assault accusations against the Republican front-runner for governor will play out in the final weeks of the campaign.Neither the ad by the front-runner, Charles Herbster, nor the one from his top Republican rival, Jim Pillen, mentions the accusations. Not directly, at least.Herbster, who was accused of groping several women including a Republican state senator, has denied the allegations in a radio interview and on Twitter.“Just like the establishment attacked President Trump, now they’re lying about me,” said Herbster in the ad he released, which quickly moved on to other issues. Herbster, a farmer and wealthy businessman, has Trump’s backing in his bid to replace Gov. Pete Ricketts, who is term-limited.The ad from Pillen, who is also a farmer and wealthy businessman, features his young grandchildren asking him political questions. He responds with short, pig-inspired answers. Do you want to cut property taxes? “Whole hog.” Do politicians spend too much? “Like pigs at a trough.” Ban homework? “When pigs fly.” The scene seems intended to convey that Pillen is not only a conservative, but a guy you can trust around your family.As Jonathan Weisman reported, Republican candidates in several states are facing allegations of sexual assault and domestic violence — yet few of their primary rivals, even in competitive races, want to talk about it.On Tuesday, Trump announced he would hold a rally in Nebraska at the end of April. A guest speaker: Herbster.— Blake & LeahIs there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. More

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      As G.O.P. Candidates Face Accusations, Rivals Tread Carefully

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      In several states, Republican candidates are contending with allegations of domestic violence and sexual assault. Few of their primary rivals want to talk about it.WASHINGTON — When fresh allegations of domestic violence were lodged against former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens last month, one of his Republican rivals for the state’s open Senate seat, Representative Vicky Hartzler, stepped up and called for him to end his campaign.Then she moved on to an issue perhaps more resonant with Republican primary voters: transgender women in sports.“Eric Greitens is a toxic candidate unfit to hold office,” Michael Hafner, a spokesman for Ms. Hartzler’s Senate campaign, said, before declaring the central message of her campaign: “Missouri family values, freedom, and taking back our country.”In Missouri, Georgia, Ohio and now Nebraska, Republican men running for high office face significant allegations of domestic violence, stalking, even sexual assault — accusations that once would have derailed any run for office. But in an era of Republican politics when Donald J. Trump could survive and thrive amid accusations of sexual assault, opposing candidates are finding little traction in dwelling on the issues.Political scientists who have studied Republican voting since the rise of Trumpism are not surprised that accused candidates have soldiered on — and that their primary rivals have approached the accusations tepidly. In this fiercely partisan moment, concerns about personal behavior are dwarfed by the struggle between Republicans and Democrats, which Republican men and women see as life-or-death. Increasingly, Republicans cast accusations of sexual misconduct as an attempt by liberals to silence conservatives.The candidates who do speak of their opponents’ domestic violence and assault allegations often raise them not as disqualifications in looming Republican primaries, but as matters ripe for exploitation by Democrats in the fall.“It’s a horrible problem; he’ll never be elected, and that’s the educational process we’re going through right now,” Gary Black, Georgia’s agriculture commissioner, said of domestic violence and assault allegations leveled at Herschel Walker, his Trump-backed Republican rival to take on Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock in November. “There’s a great desire for Republicans to get their seat back. Electability is going to be the issue over the next six weeks.”Herschel Walker, a Trump-backed Senate candidate in Georgia, has owned up to accusations of violence against his wife but has denied the accusations of violent threats against two other women.Audra Melton for The New York TimesEric Greitens resigned as Missouri’s governor after a sexual misconduct scandal, and is facing domestic violence allegations amid his current Senate campaign.Jeff Roberson/Associated PressDemocrats, including President Biden and Keith Ellison, the attorney general of Minnesota, have weathered their own accusations of misconduct in the past — and where such charges have proven difficult to discount, the party has shown itself more willing to jettison its candidates.The accusations facing some Republican men are so stark that they raise the question: What would disqualify a candidate in a Republican primary? Mr. Greitens resigned as Missouri’s governor after a hairdresser testified under oath in 2018 that he had taped her hands to pull-up rings in his basement, blindfolded her, stripped her clothes off and taken a photo of her, which he threatened to release if she revealed their affair.Amid his current Senate campaign, Mr. Greitens was accused last month in a sworn affidavit from his former wife that he had violently abused her and had hit one of their sons as his governorship unraveled. Still, a poll taken after the accusations came to light showed Mr. Greitens neck and neck with Ms. Hartzler and Eric Schmitt, Missouri’s attorney general.Mr. Walker, a former college and pro football star who has the backing not only of Mr. Trump but also much of the Republican establishment, has been accused by his ex-wife of attacking her in bed, choking her and threatening to kill her. Mr. Walker doesn’t deny the assault and has said he was suffering from mental illness.Mallory Blount, a spokeswoman for Mr. Walker’s campaign, said he “emphatically denies” the “false claims” from another woman who said he had been her longtime boyfriend and that when she broke up with him, he had threatened to kill her and himself. Ms. Blount also said he has denied a violent stalking charge by a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader.Mr. Walker “has owned up to his mistakes, sought forgiveness, gotten treatment, and dedicated his life to helping others who are struggling,” Ms. Blount said, condemning the media for surfacing past allegations.Max Miller, another Trump-backed candidate and a former White House aide running for an Ohio House seat, was accused by one of Mr. Trump’s press secretaries, Stephanie Grisham, of hitting her the day they broke up. Mr. Miller denied the allegation, then sued Ms. Grisham for defamation, accusing her of making “libelous and defamatory false statements.” His campaign did not respond to requests for comment.“It used to be that being accused of domestic violence was an automatic disqualifier, regardless of party,” Ms. Grisham’s lawyer, Adam VanHo, said. “And to turn around and sue to silence your accuser was even more abhorrent.”Max Miller, a Trump-backed candidate for an Ohio House seat, was accused by a former White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, above, of hitting her after they broke up. He then sued her for defamation.Doug Mills/The New York TimesOn Thursday, a Republican state senator in Nebraska, Julie Slama, accused a leading Republican candidate for governor in that state, Charles Herbster, of sexually assaulting her three years ago when she was 22, saying in a statement that she had “prayed I would never have to relive this trauma.” Mr. Herbster denied the charges, claiming he was being targeted by political rivals. He linked himself to others who have beaten back similar accusations.“They did it with Brett Kavanaugh. They certainly did it with Donald J. Trump and now they’re trying to do it with Charles W. Herbster,” he told a local radio station.In Missouri, Mr. Greitens’s defiance spurred Rene Artman, who chairs the Republican central committee of St. Louis County, to organize other Republican women to pressure the party chairman, Nick Myers, to demand Mr. Greitens withdraw.“We’ve heard not a thing, not a thing,” she said on Friday. “This is the breakdown of society. When you take morals and God out of country, this is what happens. I don’t think you can blame this on Trump whatsoever.”Republican candidates, by and large, have remained defiant. One exception is Sean Parnell, Mr. Trump’s pick for an open Senate seat in Pennsylvania, who suspended his campaign after his estranged wife testified that he had repeatedly abused her and their children.Political scientists are not surprised by Republicans’ tolerance for accusations. Charges of misogyny, sexual harassment and even domestic abuse have “become deeply partisan in terms of beliefs about what is acceptable and what is appropriate,” said Kelly Dittmar, a professor at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. “And now it’s fallen into the talk of ‘cancel culture’ in the broader society.”It was widely believed that Mr. Trump’s own confession, caught on an infamous video recorded for “Access Hollywood,” that he routinely grabbed women by the genitals — and the plethora of accusations that followed — would drive away women voters.But in 2016, 88 percent of Republican women voted for Mr. Trump, just a percentage point below the share of Republican men who did. Even in 2018, when women were widely seen as having delivered the House to Democrats in response to the Trump presidency, Republican women were no more likely to vote for Democrats than they had been two years before, said Erin C. Cassese, a professor of political science at the University of Delaware who studies women’s voting patterns.The #MeToo movement and the current debate over transgender rights and education are only widening the gap between Republican women and women who identify as Democrats and independents, Prof. Cassese said. For female candidates, appeals to gender solidarity or attacks on misogyny do not seem to work in Republican primaries.“It’s very hard to make those appeals, even for women candidates appealing to women,” she said. “We don’t have any sense of what messages might work.”Jane Timken, the only woman in the Republican primary for a Senate seat in Ohio, chided her male rivals in an advertisement. Andrew Spear/Getty ImagesJane Timken, the only woman in the Republican Senate primary in Ohio, has injected gender into the race — though delicately. In February, she released an advertisement chiding her male rivals: “We all know guys who overcompensate for their inadequacies, and that description fits the guys in the Senate race to a T.”But in an interview on Friday, she explicitly dismissed the issue of gender. “They’re not bad male candidates. They’re just bad candidates,” she said of her opponents, adding that the mistreatment of women is “not an issue that I’m campaigning on. I’m campaigning on the Biden failed policies of border security, inflation and jobs.”In the Trump era, the men who are accused of wrongdoing have become adept at framing themselves as the victims of a broader conspiracy or an intolerant society. Mr. Greitens has blamed George W. Bush’s former political aide, Karl Rove; the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell; even the liberal philanthropist George Soros for the release of his ex-wife’s abuse allegations. His campaign did not respond to requests for comment.Republicans running against those accused say they do see an opening, as long as it’s navigated carefully. Representative Billy Long, who is running in the Missouri Republican Senate primary, emphasized the “$400,000 or so in costs, fines and penalties” that state taxpayers have already shouldered for investigations into Mr. Greitens’s activities. Then there’s the ongoing child custody fight between Mr. Greitens and his ex-wife.“If domestic violence is proven true, he’s toast,” Mr. Long said.Jazmine Ulloa More

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      Nebraska State Senator Says Candidate for Governor Groped Her

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      The state senator, Julie Slama, confirmed a news report saying that Charles Herbster, a leading candidate for governor, had touched her inappropriately in 2019. He denied the allegations.A Republican state senator in Nebraska said on Thursday that she had been groped three years ago by a fellow Republican who is now a leading candidate in the party’s primary election for governor next month.The candidate, Charles Herbster, denied the allegations from the state senator, Julie Slama, calling them “100 percent false.”Ms. Slama issued her statement after The Nebraska Examiner published an article about the alleged incident, which she said had occurred at a Douglas County Republican Party dinner in April 2019.“Today’s Nebraska Examiner report about Charles Herbster sexually assaulting me in 2019, when I was 22 years old, is true,” Ms. Slama said, adding that she had “prayed I would never have to relive this trauma.”She said that when the news outlet asked her about what had happened, “I was not going to deny the truth.” Ms. Slama’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In February, she referred to the alleged assault during a speech on the floor of the Legislature, though she did not name Mr. Herbster at the time.Mr. Herbster, who owns a large agricultural company and was endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump ahead of the May 10 primary election, said in a statement that the allegations were “a ridiculous, unfounded dirty political trick” being carried out by his political opponents in the state, including Gov. Pete Ricketts, also a Republican.“For over 30 years, I’ve employed hundreds of people,” Mr. Herbster said. “I’ve respected and empowered women to run my company, my farm and now my campaign. Not once has my integrity EVER been challenged in this manner.” Later, he told a local radio station: “They did it with Brett Kavanaugh. They certainly did it with Donald J. Trump and now they’re trying to do it with Charles W. Herbster.”Mr. Herbster’s campaign manager, Ellen Keast, issued a separate statement that “unequivocally” denied the allegations and accused Mr. Ricketts at greater length of being behind the story. Ms. Keast noted that Mr. Ricketts and Ms. Slama had political ties; she worked as press secretary on his 2018 campaign for governor before he appointed her to the Legislature the next year.Asked to respond, Mr. Ricketts said in an interview: “Well, I would read the article. I have rarely seen an article on this topic that is so extensively corroborated by witnesses.” Referring to Ms. Slama’s decision to speak publicly about the alleged incident, he said, “It’s probably one of the most courageous things I’ve ever seen.”Mr. Ricketts said that Mr. Herbster “should seek help and he should resign from his campaign.”A spokeswoman for Mr. Ricketts later said that the governor had learned of the accusations only when the article was published.Mr. Herbster and the Douglas County Republican Party did not immediately respond to messages on Thursday.State Senator Julie Slama in 2019, the year she said the incident occurred.Nati Harnik/Associated PressAccording to the article, Ms. Slama, who was appointed to the Legislature in January 2019, was in a crowded ballroom at the Douglas County Republican Party’s annual Elephant Remembers dinner that April when she walked by Mr. Herbster. The news outlet reported that he then “reached up her skirt, without her consent, and touched her inappropriately.”On Thursday afternoon, after one prominent supporter of Mr. Herbster was quoted on social media asking what Ms. Slama was wearing the night of the Republican dinner, she posted a photograph on Twitter with the message, “This dress is what I was wearing when I was sexually assaulted.”In her February speech, Ms. Slama said, “Early on, when I got into politics at age 22 in Nebraska, I was groped at a political event by someone who was not a member of this body and not a current or former officeholder.”Mentioning other instances of being touched or spoken to inappropriately, Ms. Slama said she often did not speak out about such experiences because “as a young female, you worry that it is going to be the thing that defines you.”The Examiner reported that in addition to Ms. Slama, six other women said Mr. Herbster had touched them inappropriately at various events dating to 2017, and a seventh said he had kissed her forcibly. The women were not identified in the article, and The New York Times could not contact them to independently corroborate their allegations.The Nebraska Examiner, which was formed in January, describes itself as a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom and as part of a national group bolstering local reporting.Mr. Herbster is among nine Republicans looking to replace Mr. Ricketts, who is term-limited. Mr. Herbster’s campaign has spent more than $4 million so far, the most of any candidate, though Jim Pillen, a veterinarian who owns a large family farm and was endorsed by Mr. Ricketts and Ms. Slama, has a similar sum in his campaign war chest.Mr. Herbster’s campaign has spent $4.8 million on advertising so far, compared with nearly $3.7 million spent by Mr. Pillen’s campaign, according to Ad Impact, a media tracking firm.During the 2016 election, Mr. Trump’s campaign named Mr. Herbster, the chief executive of the Conklin Company, to its agricultural and rural advisory committee along with dozens of other supporters. After Mr. Trump endorsed Mr. Herbster for governor, Mr. Ricketts acknowledged that he had asked the former president to “stay out of the race.”Kirsten Noyes More