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    Erdogan’s Election Prospects Take a Hit as a Challenger Drops Out

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    With Turks going to the polls on Sunday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had hoped for a swift victory. But the departure of one challenger is likely to benefit his main competitor.Three days before Turks vote in crucial presidential elections, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s chances of securing a swift victory took a hit on Thursday when one of his challengers left the race, a move likely to benefit Mr. Erdogan’s main competitor.The withdrawal of one of the race’s four contenders also increased the possibility that the main opposition candidate, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, could obtain a simple majority of votes on Sunday, a win that would suddenly end Mr. Erdogan’s 20-year streak as Turkey’s most prominent politician.The simultaneous presidential and parliamentary elections will set the future course for Turkey, a major economy at the intersection of Europe, Asia and the Middle East, and a NATO ally of the United States.Opponents of Mr. Erdogan also view the elections as a make or break moment for Turkish democracy. A win for Mr. Erdogan, they say, would enable a leader who has extended his control over much of the state to gain even more power, whereas a loss could allow for a more democratic future.“That is the real choice we seem to be facing now: going down the road to authoritarianism or switching track and going back to democracy,” said Ersin Kalaycioglu, a professor of political science at Sabanci University in Istanbul.The election could also alter Turkey’s foreign affairs. Under Mr. Erdogan, Turkey has pursued a nonaligned foreign policy that has unnerved its NATO allies. While Turkey condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and has sent aid to the Ukrainian military, Mr. Erdogan has pursued a closer relationship with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.Mr. Erdogan has also hobbled efforts to expand NATO. Although Turkey eventually voted to allow Finland to join the alliance, greatly lengthening its border with Russia, Mr. Erdogan has so far refused to do the same for Sweden. Turkey has accused the Swedes of harboring Turkish terrorists. European officials have countered that Mr. Erdogan appears to be leveraging Turkey’s position in the alliance to settle political scores.Supporters of Kemal Kilicdaroglu and his party during a rally in Kayseri, last month.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesAt home, Mr. Erdogan’s standing has sunk, primarily because of extremely high inflation that has eaten into family budgets. Many economists attribute the inflation, which exceeded 80 percent last year, to Mr. Erdogan’s ill-advised financial policies.Seeking to unseat Mr. Erdogan is a coalition of six opposition parties that have backed a joint presidential candidate, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, a former civil servant. Mr. Kilicdaroglu has vowed that if he wins he will undo Mr. Erdogan’s legacy by restoring the independence of state institutions like the central bank in the Foreign Ministry, releasing political prisoners and strengthening democratic norms.Recent polls have suggested a slight lead for Mr. Kilicdaroglu, which would likely receive a lift from the withdrawal of one of the other candidates on Thursday.That candidate, Muharrem Ince, was predicted to win votes in the single digits, but even that could have been enough to deprive any other candidate of winning a majority, prompting a runoff between the top two vote-getters on May 28.Mr. Ince announced on Thursday that he was withdrawing from the race after sex tapes that supposedly showed him in compromising positions surfaced on social media. Mr. Ince dismissed them as fakes, but withdrew from the race nevertheless. He did not endorse another candidate, but pollsters said voters who would have voted for him were more likely to choose Mr. Kilicdaroglu over Mr. Erdogan.Since the ballots have already been printed, Mr. Ince’s name will still appear at the polls.Muharrem Ince, who dropped out of the election this week, with his supporters in Ankara, in April.Cagla Gurdogan/ReutersAnother candidate, Sinan Ogan, is also in the race, but his support is thought to be negligible.Analysts caution that many Turkish polls have proven unreliable in the past, and that how this one plays out could be surprising. Mr. Erdogan remains popular among a significant share of Turks, who like his nationalist rhetoric, credit him with developing the country or simply have a hard time imagining anyone else in power.Mr. Erdogan has also tapped state resources to increase his chances. In recent months, he has raised the minimum wage, increased civil servant salaries, changed regulations to allow millions of Turks to receive government pensions early and expanded assistance programs for the poor.Marketing himself as a leader who has increased Turkey’s stature on the world stage, he had a Turkish-built warship parked in central Istanbul, became the first owner of Turkey’s first domestically produced electric car and observed, via video link, the first fuel delivery to a Russian-built nuclear plant near the Mediterranean.He and his ministers have attacked the opposition as incompetent, backed by foreign powers and out to undermine family values by expanding L.G.B.T. rights.The opposition has tried to sell voters on the prospect of a brighter future if they win, vowing to tame inflation, restore political rights and move Turkey away from what they consider one-man rule.“This election is very important, and we have to end this autocratic, crazy system,” said Bilge Yilmaz, an economist who oversees economic policy for one of the six opposition parties. “The country deserves better, needs to do better.” More

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      Turkey’s Election: What You Need to Know

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      With the economy in crisis, the vote on Sunday is shaping up to be one of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s toughest fights to hold onto power in his 20 years as the country’s premier politician.Sunday’s presidential and parliamentary elections in Turkey are shaping up to be a referendum on the long tenure of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan — the country’s dominant politician over the last two decades.Mr. Erdogan, 69, has led Turkey since 2003, when he became prime minister. At the start, he was widely hailed as an Islamist democrat who promised to make the predominately Muslim country and NATO member a bridge between the Muslim world and the West. But more recently, critics have accused him of mismanaging a deep economic crisis.Now, Mr. Erdogan, who has long staved off challengers with a fiery populist style, finds himself in an extremely tight race as he seeks a third five-year term as president.What’s at stake?At the top of voters’ concerns is the reeling economy. Inflation, which surpassed 80 percent last year but has since come down, has severely eroded their purchasing power.The government has also been criticized for its initially slow response to the catastrophic earthquakes in February, which left more than 50,000 people dead. The natural disaster raised questions about whether the government bore responsibility, in part, for a raft of shoddy construction projects across the country in recent years that contributed to the high death toll.The election could also affect Turkey’s geopolitical position. The country’s relations with the United States and other NATO allies have been strained as Mr. Erdogan has strengthened ties with Russia, even after its invasion of Ukraine last year.When Mr. Erdogan first became prime minister in 2003, many Turks saw him as a dynamic figure who promised a bright economic future. And for many years, his government delivered. Incomes rose, lifting millions of Turks into the middle class as new airports, roads and hospitals were built across the country. He also reduced the power of the country’s secular elite and tamed the military, which had held great sway since Turkey’s founding in 1923.But in more recent years, and especially since he became president in 2014, critics have accused Mr. Erdogan of using the democratic process to enhance his powers, pushing the country toward autocracy.All along, Mr. Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party remained a force at the ballot box, winning elections and passing referendums that allowed Mr. Erdogan to seize even more power, largely with the support of poorer, religiously conservative voters.But economic trouble began around 2014. The value of the national currency eroded, foreign investors fled and, more recently, inflation spiked.A master of self-preservation, Mr. Erdogan earned a reputation for marginalizing anyone who challenged him. After an attempted coup in 2016, his government jailed tens of thousands of people accused of belonging to the religious movement formerly allied with Mr. Erdogan that the government accused of cooking up the plot to oust him. More than 100,000 others were removed from state jobs.Today, Turkey is one of the world’s leading jailers of journalists.After the earthquake, workers cleared rubble from what was an apartment complex in Antakya, Turkey, in February.Emily Garthwaite for The New York TimesWho is running?Mr. Erdogan faces stiff competition from a newly unified opposition that has appealed to voters’ disillusionment with his stewardship of the economy and what they call his push for one-man rule. They are backing a joint candidate, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, a retired civil servant who has vowed to restore Turkish democracy and the independence of state bodies like the central bank while improving ties with the West.Mr. Kilicdaroglu is the leader of the Republican People’s Party.Recent polls suggest a slight edge for Mr. Kilicdaroglu, 74, who is campaigning in opposition not only to Erdogan’s polices, but also to his brash style. He has fashioned himself as a steady Everyman and has pledged to retire after one term to spend time with his grandchildren.“The opposition has made a pretty good case that Turks have suffered economically because of Mr. Erdogan’s mismanagement,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a Turkey scholar at the Brookings Institution.Other candidates include Muharrem Ince, who split from the Republican People’s Party to found the Homeland Party. Votes for him and another candidate, Sinan Ogan, could prevent either of the two front-runners from winning an outright majority, which would lead to a runoff on May 28.Kemal Kilicdaroglu is the front-runner among the opposition candidates for president.Sedat Suna/EPA, via ShutterstockWill these elections be free and fair?As in previous elections, Mr. Erdogan has used his expanded presidential powers to try and tilt the playing field in his favor.In recent months, he has increased the minimum wage, boosted civil servant salaries, increased assistance to poor families and changed regulations to allow millions of Turks to receive their government pensions earlier, all to insulate voters from the effects of rising prices.In December, a judge believed to be acting in support of Mr. Erdogan barred the mayor of Istanbul, a potential presidential challenger at the time, from politics after convicting him of insulting public officials. The mayor has remained in office pending appeal.Electoral posters for the Republican People’s Party, or C.H.P., in Kayseri.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesThis would not be the first time that potential opponents of Mr. Erdogan have been sidelined.Selahattin Demirtas, of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party, ran his presidential campaign from prison in 2018. The Turkish authorities have accused him of affiliation with a terrorist organization, but rights organizations have called his imprisonment politically motivated.Turkey has fought a decades-long battle with Kurdish separatists in the country and considers them terrorists.Mr. Demirtas’ party, the country’s third largest, has come under pressure from the constitutional court in the lead-up to the election. It is now running its campaign under a different party.The news media, largely controlled by private companies loyal to the government, have “worked as loyal propaganda machines,” said Ms. Aydintasbas, saying pro-government journalists have downplayed the economic crisis and trumpeted Mr. Erdogan’s response to the earthquake crisis as heroic.A local official in Antakya counting voting lists and slips ahead of this weekend’s election.Umit Bektas/ReutersWhat’s next?Voters will cast their ballots for the president and Parliament at polls across the country, which will open on Sunday at 8 a.m. local time and close at 5 p.m. Preliminary presidential results are expected later that evening, and parliamentary results on Monday.If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the votes, the election will go to a runoff on May 28.Gulsin Harman More