Midterm Elections (2022)

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      Doug Mastriano Gets Pennsylvania Republicans to Close Ranks Behind Him

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      STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Before Pennsylvania’s primary, much of the state’s Republican establishment agreed that Doug Mastriano would be a disaster as the nominee for governor.Andy Reilly, the state’s Republican national committeeman, had joined a stop-Mastriano effort by rival candidates, who feared that the far-right state senator and prolific spreader of election conspiracy theories would squander an otherwise winnable race.Yet on a warm evening last month, Mr. Reilly opened his suburban Philadelphia home for a backyard fund-raiser for Mr. Mastriano, who won his primary in May. Guests chipped in $150 for ribs and pulled pork and listened to Mr. Mastriano, fresh from an uproar over his presence on Gab, a social media site that is a haven for hate speech.Mr. Reilly later defended Mr. Mastriano as the better choice to lead Pennsylvania over his Democratic opponent, Josh Shapiro. “The question is can Doug Mastriano keep the Republican Party base and all the factions together?” Mr. Reilly said.In one of the most closely watched governor’s races of the year, Pennsylvania Republican officials who had warned that Mr. Mastriano was unelectable have largely closed ranks behind him, after he proved to be the overwhelming choice of base Republicans. On Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida plans to headline a rally with Mr. Mastriano in Pittsburgh, a bearhug from one of the party’s most popular national figures.Mr. Shapiro, the state attorney general, has used a huge fund-raising advantage to batter Mr. Mastriano in TV attack ads as an extremist on abortion and on the 2020 election, opening a double-digit lead in polls. Still, Democrats remain anxious they could lose to Mr. Mastriano because of the free-floating anger of the electorate this year, with most voters worried primarily about the economy.Josh Shapiro, with supporters in Lock Haven, Pa., has battered Mr. Mastriano in TV attack ads as an extremist.Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York TimesWhether the recent run of Democratic successes nationally — including the climate and drug-pricing legislative package and the resounding defeat of an anti-abortion measure in Kansas — can shift the fundamental midterm equation remains unclear.“The environment that Joe Biden has created for Josh Shapiro makes this year probably the only year that a Mastriano-type candidate could win in a purple state like Pennsylvania,” said Matt Brouillette, the head of a conservative political group in the state that opposed Mr. Mastriano in the primary. “While the Democrats want to focus on Jan. 6 and Roe v. Wade, the electorate is focused on putting food on their table and filling up the tanks in their cars.”The Democratic anxiety was on display recently at a party picnic in liberal State College, the home of Pennsylvania State University. At Mr. Shapiro’s mention of Mr. Mastriano during a speech, a woman shouted, “You better win!”More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid. But her mission to thwart Donald J. Trump presents challenges.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.There was nervous laughter. The worry reflects the alarm of Democrats that if Mr. Mastriano, 58, becomes governor, he would sign severe abortion restrictions and would have the power to subvert the 2024 presidential election in the swing state in favor of the G.O.P. nominee.A Shapiro campaign event in State College. Democrats in Pennsylvania are worried about Mr. Mastriano’s positions on abortion and voting.Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York Times“I hear it every single day,” Mr. Shapiro told the crowd. “They’re worried about their rights being ripped away from them.”Mr. Mastriano, a retired Army officer who led Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the election in Pennsylvania, marched on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, passing police barricades breached by other marchers. He has boasted that as governor, “I get to decertify any or all machines in the state.” He has called for compelling all nine million registered voters in the state to re-register, which experts say would violate federal law.“These are dangerous, extreme positions he’s taken, and these are things I know the people of Pennsylvania reject,” Mr. Shapiro, 49, said in an interview.Mr. Shapiro compared the unusually high turnout in deep-red Kansas in favor of abortion rights to how the issue is motivating his own supporters. “We have seen incredible intensity in our campaign post-Dobbs,” he said, referring to the Supreme Court decision leaving it to states to protect or deny abortion access.Many women who attended his events agreed, saying that abortion is their most important issue. “I was the generation that was young when Roe vs. Wade became the law of the land, and I’ve known women whose health was ruined because of an illegal abortion,” said Bonnie Hannis, 80, who came to hear Mr. Shapiro in rural Clinton County.“I’m excited to defend my reproductive rights,” said Gianna Renzo, 19, who grew up in the county and is now a student at Princeton. “I see women my age who are typically from Republican families, and they’re going to come over to the Democratic side” because of abortion.Mr. Mastriano, the sponsor in the State Legislature of a six-week abortion ban with no exceptions, has appeared to modulate that position lately, saying lawmakers will write whatever bill they choose and “my personal views are irrelevant.”But there are few signs that he has broadened his appeal to independent and swing voters, especially in the suburbs, who have played a pivotal role in recent Pennsylvania elections. He was supported by 82 percent of Republicans in a Fox News poll in late July, but independents preferred Mr. Shapiro by 28 points.It remains to be seen if Mr. Mastriano can broaden his appeal to independent and swing voters.Dustin Franz for The New York TimesMr. Mastriano declined to comment for this article.He has routinely snubbed the state’s TV news outlets and newspapers that might help him reach a broader audience. It is a purposeful strategy aimed at exciting conservatives who believe that Democrats have “the media in their pockets,” as he recently put it.This week, he said he would not participate in traditional debates run by independent news organizations because of what he called their “hidden partisan agenda.” He proposed debates in which each candidate names a moderator — a nonstarter for the Shapiro campaign, which called the idea an “obvious stunt.”Mr. Mastriano speaks almost exclusively to far-right podcasters like Stephen K. Bannon, conservative talk radio hosts and Fox News. On a recent swing through northwest Pennsylvania, he brushed off a Pittsburgh TV station that sought to interview him, and even the small-circulation Meadville Tribune.One result of that approach is that he seldom has to field tough questions. And his poor fund-raising — he ended the primary season with just $400,000 in his campaign account, compared with $13.4 million for Mr. Shapiro — has left him unable to run TV ads all summer to counter a barrage of attacks from his opponent.The Shapiro ads use Mr. Mastriano’s words to paint him as outside the mainstream, not just on abortion and election denial, but on gay marriage, which he has said should “absolutely not” be legal, and on global warming, which he called “fake science.”“You’ve basically got a one-person governor’s race right now in terms of voter contact,” said Christopher Nicholas, a Republican consultant in the state. “All the folks who listen to those far-right podcasts, I think he maxed out his vote potential. He has to move past his base.”At a recent appearance by Mr. Mastriano at the York County Fair, there were no signs on the sprawling fairgrounds directing potential voters his way. Outside the hall where he was to appear, a large crowd on bleachers at the appointed hour turned out to be waiting for the Hot Dog Pig Races.Mr. Mastriano showed up inside at the county Republican booth. He did not give a speech, but shook hands and posed for pictures with several dozen supporters.Donna VanDyne, an insurance agent, supported a no-exceptions abortion ban, claiming that victims of rape or incest who give birth adjust. “When they have their baby, they have each other and become support systems for one another,” she said.Dawn Smith, an aspiring teacher’s aide, repeated a debunked conspiracy theory Mr. Mastriano had spread about voting machines. “They switched President Trump’s votes to Joe Biden’s votes with the Dominion machines,” she claimed.Wayne Liek, a retired truck driver, recalling prayers he said in school in the 1960s, agreed with Mr. Mastriano that the Constitutional separation of church and state was, as Mr. Mastriano described it, “a myth.”A core of Mr. Mastriano’s popularity with Republicans is his embrace of views associated with Christian nationalism, the belief that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, and often intertwined with far-right conspiratorial thinking.Mr. Mastriano, the sponsor in the legislature of a six-week abortion ban with no exceptions, has appeared to modulate that position lately.Dustin Franz for The New York TimesFew attendees seemed aware of the furor over Mr. Mastriano’s presence on Gab. His campaign had paid $5,000 to broaden his support with users of the social media site, which is known as a haven for white nationalists. A post by Mr. Mastriano in July criticizing Democratic policies drew dozens of replies that were antisemitic insults of Mr. Shapiro.Gab’s founder, Andrew Torba, defended Mr. Mastriano in videos laced with antisemitic vitriol. Mr. Mastriano distanced himself from Mr. Torba on July 28, saying that he rejected “antisemitism in any form.’’At a later appearance where he did give a speech, in Cochranton, Mr. Mastriano said: “It’s funny, they want to call us extremists. They’re the extremists.’’He attacked Mr. Shapiro for suing, as attorney general, to keep a mask mandate in schools and to uphold Gov. Tom Wolf’s shutdown of nonessential businesses early in the pandemic. Mr. Mastriano first gained a following for leading protests against restrictions to prevent the spread of Covid. Fury at those orders lingers for many conservatives.Asked about the suits, Mr. Shapiro said that he personally opposes mandates for masks and vaccines, but as the state’s top lawyer he was required to represent the governor and executive branch in litigation. He prevailed in both cases.Before he campaigned in State College, a blue island in a sea of red in central Pennsylvania, Mr. Shapiro had visited Lock Haven in nearby Clinton County.Mike Hanna Sr., a retired Democratic state lawmaker from the area, said Mr. Mastriano “has a strong base here, just like Trump.” But Mr. Hanna said the former president had lost support since inciting the mob that attacked the Capitol.“I hunt with a bunch of veterans, and they just shake their heads,” Mr. Hanna said. “Trump has done a lot to erode his standing with his base, and Mastriano’s participation in all that, and the extreme positions he’s taken, have done the same thing.”“It’d be a lot scarier for us,” Mr. Hanna said, “if the Republicans had selected a moderate.” More

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      3 Election Officials Resigned in a Texas County

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      The recent resignations of all three election officials in a Texas county — at least one of whom cited repeated death threats and stalking — has created turmoil in an area that President Donald J. Trump won by 59 percentage points in 2020.The exodus left Gillespie County, which has 27,000 residents and is about 75 miles west of Austin, without an election staff just over two months before early voting begins for the Nov. 8 midterm election, though the state planned to provide support to the county.The resignations of the county’s elections administrator, Anissa Herrera, and the office’s remaining two employees were confirmed to The New York Times on Thursday by Sam Taylor, a spokesman for the Texas secretary of state. He said the county did not provide specific details about the nature of the threats.“Threats on election officials are reprehensible, and we encourage any and all election officials who are targeted by such threats to report them to law enforcement immediately,” Mr. Taylor said in an email, adding that “unfortunately, threats like these drive away the very officials our state needs now more than ever to help instill confidence in our election system.”The resignations were reported earlier by The Fredericksburg Standard-Radio Post, which Ms. Herrera told, “The year 2020 was when I got the death threats.”“I’ve been stalked, I’ve been called out on social media,” she said to The Standard-Radio Post. “And it’s just dangerous misinformation.”Ms. Herrera did not elaborate to the news organization on the nature of the grievances that led to the threats against her and the other two employees who resigned. She did not immediately respond on Thursday to a message left at a phone number listed for her.In a resignation letter that was obtained through a public records request by Votebeat, a journalism nonprofit focused on election administration and voting access, Ms. Herrera said that, in addition to threats, misinformation and insufficient staff, “absurd legislation” had completely changed her job.Republicans in Texas enacted restrictions last year that included an end to balloting methods introduced in 2020 to make voting easier during the pandemic, like drive-through polling places and 24-hour voting. The state also barred election officials from sending voters unsolicited absentee-ballot applications and from promoting the use of voting by mail, while greatly empowering partisan poll watchers.It was not clear whether Ms. Herrera had filed any complaints with the Gillespie County sheriff’s office or the Fredericksburg Police Department, neither of which immediately responded to requests for comment on Thursday. More

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      After Loss, Liz Cheney Begins Difficult Mission of Thwarting Trump

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      JACKSON, Wyo. — Hours after her landslide loss, Representative Liz Cheney wasted no time Wednesday taking her first steps toward what she says is now her singular goal: blocking Donald J. Trump from returning to power.Ms. Cheney announced that her newly rebranded political organization, the Great Task, would be dedicated to mobilizing opposition to Mr. Trump. And in an early morning television interview, she for the first time acknowledged what many have suspected: She is “thinking” about running for president in 2024, she said on NBC’s “Today Show,” and would decide in the “coming months.”Despite the effort to shift quickly from her defeat to her future, Ms. Cheney and her advisers remained vague about precisely how the congresswoman, who lost to a Trump-backed primary challenger by 37 points in Wyoming on Tuesday, planned to build a movement that could thwart a figure with a strong hold on many of his party’s voters and a set of imposing advantages.Allies, advisers and Ms. Cheney herself insist there are no detailed plans prepared for her mission. Her focus remains on the panel investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, they said. (As if to underscore the point, Ms. Cheney on Wednesday jetted from Wyoming back to Washington, where Congress is in recess for the summer.)But Ms. Cheney’s every move will be watched closely by a pocket of the political class that has been increasingly agitating for a third party that they argue could not only block Mr. Trump, but ease the rising political polarization.“The amount of money that is available for Liz Cheney to continue her work to keep Trump from terrorizing us depends on how good her plans are,” said Dmitri Mehlhorn, an adviser to several major Democratic donors, including Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn. “If she has really good plans, then the amount of money available to her is definitely in the double-digit millions.”For the moment, Ms. Cheney’s infrastructure is not much bigger than her family and a handful of aides in her congressional office. But she had over $7.4 million in the bank last month, money she can transfer to the new entity she’s forming.Ms. Cheney’s options may be obvious, but there’s no clear path ahead — and she faces the risk of inadvertently aiding Mr. Trump’s comeback.A policy wonk with no great enthusiasm for retail politics, she could build a political operation dedicated to defeating Republicans who endorse Mr. Trump’s false claims of winning the 2020 election. That would inevitably mean openly supporting Democrats, something she has yet to commit to. On Wednesday, when asked if she believes the country would be better off under Democratic control in Washington, she dodged.“I think we have to make sure that we are fighting against every single election denier,” she said. “The election deniers, right now, are Republicans. And I think that it shouldn’t matter what party you are. Nobody should be voting for those people, supporting them or backing them.”More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid, a prospect that would test the national viability of a conservative, anti-Trump platform.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.Ms. Cheney also could focus on laying the groundwork for her own candidacy for president — either as a Republican or as an independent. The latter effort risks peeling away votes from Democrats and ultimately helping Mr. Trump win if he runs, as is widely expected.If she runs as an expressly anti-Trump candidate in the 2024 Republican primary, harnessing the media attention that would come with even a long-shot bid, it may only serve to fracture the share of the G.O.P. electorate eager for a Trump alternative. Ms. Cheney needs no reminding that the former president claimed the 2016 nomination with pluralities in many early nominating states, as he had no single, formidable opponent.Former Vice President Mike Pence, campaigning in New Hampshire on Wednesday for local Republicans, called on Donald Trump’s defenders to halt their attacks on the F.B.I.CJ Gunther/EPA, via ShutterstockIt’s clear Ms. Cheney would have competition for the anybody-but-Trump vote in a Republican primary. On Wednesday, Vice President Mike Pence was in first-in-the-nation New Hampshire, offering his critique of the former president and his most ardent defenders. Mr. Pence declared that Republicans’ “attacks on the F.B.I. must stop” and likened calls to defund the F.B.I. after the bureau’s recent search of Mr. Trump’s home to retrieve classified documents to left-wing calls to defund the police. More

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      America Needs More Caregiving Support

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      On Tuesday President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, which contains parts of his Build Back Better agenda, including major climate investments and authorization for Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug prices. The law will reduce the cost of health care, slash carbon emissions to roughly 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2030, invest in clean energy vehicles and raise taxes on corporations, among other things.Make no mistake, President Biden and the Democrats in Congress have achieved a transformative investment in our future.But investments in Medicaid home and community-based services for older adults and people with disabilities, raising wages for the work force that provides caregiving, four weeks of paid family and medical leave, and subsidies for families in need of child care did not make it into law.Infrastructure isn’t only sustainable modes of transportation. As Senator Bob Casey recently said: “The bridge to work for many is someone who can come into their home and care for aging parents. For others, it’s quality, affordable child care for their kids.” Fair pay for caregiving would free up more Americans to take part in the economy.For too long we have underinvested in and undervalued caregivers. After the coronavirus pandemic hit, a breakthrough seemed possible when policies intended to help families became the focus of a national conversation.A 2020 report by AARP and the National Alliance for Caregiving found that more than one in five Americans were caregivers and almost one in four of these was caring for more than one person. A more recent study by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research showed that a vast majority of Americans want to age at home and want the government to act to help them do so.But we can hardly sustain the existing home care work force with workers’ current median annual income just over $18,000 per year. What will we do when the aging baby boomer generation — roughly 73 million people — needs more support and services?There are more than 12 million working parents with children younger than 6 years old. Without access to paid leave, these parents must find affordable child care in order to work and provide for their families. The American Rescue Plan Act included funding to stabilize child care programs for low-income families and expanded the child tax credit for 2021, but what will happen when that funding runs out?Lawmakers must now decide how to support the care economy — including administrative and regulatory reforms as well as legislation. We should see investments in care reflected in appropriations and at the heart of the next budget reconciliation. Many voters want representatives who refuse to devalue women and families and who want caregivers to have the freedom to choose whether they leave the work force rather than be forced out of it.The Biden administration’s economic agenda has often been compared to Roosevelt’s New Deal in scope and significance, but the New Deal explicitly excluded two groups of workers — farm workers and domestic workers. Over time, these domestic workers became the backbone of the care economy, but the government never advanced comprehensive solutions to support them.Mr. Biden’s original agenda not only included these workers, but it highlighted the importance of investing holistically in the care that families need and the jobs that support it. Today, we understand that the economy doesn’t grow or work without care, including for the work force entrusted with the people who matter most in our lives. Let’s not wait another 80 years to act on that vision.Ai-jen Poo is the executive director of Caring Across Generations and the president of the National Domestic Workers Alliance.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Liz Cheney Lost in Wyoming, but Won in All the Ways That Count

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      Jordan Gale for The New York TimesI know what the numbers say. I can read the returns. By those hard, cold, simplistic measures, Liz Cheney was defeated overwhelmingly in her House Republican primary in Wyoming on Tuesday night, and her time in Congress is winding down.But it’s impossible for me to say that she lost.She got many, many fewer votes than her opponent, an unscrupulous shape shifter unfit to shine her shoes, because she chose the tough world of truth over Donald Trump’s underworld of lies. That’s a moral victory.She was spurned by conservatives in Wyoming because she had the cleareyed vision to see Trump for what he is and — unlike Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, whose titles perversely include the word “leader” — she wouldn’t don a blindfold. That makes her a champion in the ways that count most.Come January, she will no longer be Representative Cheney because she represents steadfast principle in an era with a devastating deficit of it. History will smile on her for that. It will remember the likes of McConnell and McCarthy for different, darker reasons. You tell me who’s the winner in this crowd.I don’t mean to idealize her too much — easy to do, given the cowardice of so many others in her party. She’s not some paragon of altruism, and a few conservatives I respect rolled their eyes when she first separated herself from the House pack to denounce Trump in the most sweeping terms possible. They sensed that she had inherited Dick Cheney’s arrogance. They suspected that her motives included grandstanding. They rightly augured that she’d become more of a political celebrity in exile than she would by playing along, and they guessed that she was making that calculation.But there could be no dispute, at least not among honest and sensible patriots, about the correctness of her positions on Trump, on her party’s fealty to him and on the peril that he poses to the future of American democracy.And there’s no question at this point about her genuineness. You can’t endure and survive the kind of nastiness that she has if you don’t believe in what you’re doing. You can’t radiate the calm and conviction that she has as the vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee if you’re not confident that you’re on the side of the angels.Additionally, she didn’t do what more than a few other Never Trumpers did and essentially morph into a Democrat, tweaking and twisting long-held positions so that she could still belong somewhere. She simply and importantly made cause with Democrats, which didn’t erase her past, had greater authenticity and was enough.I was sad and angry when she celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, because I think she’s wrong: An embryo doesn’t take precedence over a woman, who should not have to become a fugitive from her state to exercise control over her own body. But I grudgingly respected Cheney’s fidelity to her beliefs and readiness to alienate her newest fans.She’s a cantankerous sort — like father, like daughter — and heroes are as messy as villains. But a hero she is, because she models independent-mindedness for a country in which too many people fall into tribal line.She’s not going away. She was clear about her determination to hold on to her megaphone and continue fighting Trump in her Tuesday night concession speech, which was less concession than vow — and an extravagant vow at that. It invoked and put her in the company of Abraham Lincoln, who, she noted, “was defeated in elections for the Senate and the House before he won the most important election of all.” She’s alert to the past and perhaps inherited that from Lynne Cheney, who writes serious books on the country’s political history. Like mother, like daughter.Was her Lincoln reference an indication that she’ll run for president in 2024? Political observers wonder. They’re right to. We’ll find out soon enough. But we know this much now: The losers on Tuesday night were the Republican Party, which needs her more than she needs it, and the United States, which needs rescue from its ruinous indulgence of Trump. Cheney has made that case as forcefully as anyone, holding on to the greatest prize of all: her dignity. More

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      What Liz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss Says About the State of the G.O.P.

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      Representative Liz Cheney’s martyr-like quest to stop Donald J. Trump has ensured her place in Republican Party history. But her lopsided defeat in Wyoming on Tuesday also exposed the remarkable degree to which the former president still controls the party’s present — and its near future.Ten House Republicans voted to impeach Mr. Trump in early 2021 for his role inciting the mob that stormed the Capitol. Only two have survived the 2022 Republican primaries, a breathtaking run of losses and forced retirements in a chamber where incumbents typically prevail with ease.No single defeat was as freighted with significance as Ms. Cheney’s, or as revealing of the party’s realignment.The sheer scope of her loss — the daughter of a former vice president was defeated in a landslide — may have only strengthened Mr. Trump’s hand as he asserts his grip over the Republican Party, by revealing the futility among Republican voters of even the most vigorous prosecution of the case against him.Casting her mission of combating election denialism as a moral imperative and her work as just beginning, Ms. Cheney pledged to “do whatever it takes” to prevent a second Trump presidency. “Freedom must not, cannot and will not die here,” she declared in her concession speech on Tuesday night in Jackson.Not long ago, Ms. Cheney had been seen as a rising Republican star, even a potential House speaker-in-waiting. Now, after becoming her party’s most dogged Trump detractor — turning the Jan. 6 committee hearings into a bullhorn with which to warn of the dangers Mr. Trump and his enablers posed to the party, the country and even democracy itself — she is soon to be out of her job.Ms. Cheney had hoped the Jan. 6 riot would be a turning point for Republicans. It did prove to be a dividing line. But it was those who crossed Mr. Trump who have suffered the electoral consequences.“She may have been fighting for principles,” said Taylor Budowich, a spokesman and adviser to Mr. Trump. “But they are not the principles of the Republican Party.”Ms. Cheney made clear she was more than willing to lose her House seat, and she hinted broadly at a 2024 presidential campaign of her own, invoking Abraham Lincoln’s failed bids for lesser offices before he sought and won the presidency. On Wednesday, she formed a new political action committee, the Great Task, whose name nods to Lincoln and which will be filled with leftover campaign cash, and said she was “thinking” of running for president.But the outcome in Wyoming showed that while anti-Trump Republicans can count on ample money and media attention, the actual Republican constituency for them is far more limited. Indeed, one of Ms. Cheney’s last gasps was an effort to get Democrats to switch parties to vote in the G.O.P. primary.While anti-Trump Republicans may garner media attention, Mr. Trump is tightening his grip on the party.Emil Lippe for The New York TimesHer loss was also the latest sign that the central organizing principles of today’s Republican Party are tethered less to specific policies — she was a reliable vote for much of the Trump agenda — than to whatever Mr. Trump wants at any given time.Most recently, that has meant lashing out at federal law enforcement authorities over the search of Mr. Trump’s Florida home for missing materials with classified markings. More broadly, it has meant embracing his obsession with denying his 2020 defeat and amplifying his false claims of election fraud, regardless of the bloody fallout nearly 20 months ago or its destabilizing effect on the nation.More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid, a prospect that would test the national viability of a conservative, anti-Trump platform.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.“You could write the history of the modern Republican Party over the last two years, and what does Jan. 6 look like? A hiccup,” said William Kristol, the neoconservative writer who co-founded Republican Voters Against Trump, a group spending millions of dollars to oppose Trump-backed election deniers. “The price of admission to today’s Republican Party is turning a blind eye to Jan. 6.”That was the experience of Representative Peter Meijer of Michigan, who voted for Mr. Trump’s impeachment weeks after taking office and lost his re-election primary this month. He said his constituents asked him about his impeachment vote 10 times as much as about anything else.“Policy is not policy toward improving government,” Mr. Meijer explained. “It’s policy as a signifier of whether you’re part of the in group or the out group.”Refusing to repeat the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, he said, put Mr. Meijer squarely in the “out group.”In Michigan, Representative Peter Meijer, who voted for impeachment, lost his primary to a Trump-backed rival. Brittany Greeson for The New York Times“I can’t tell you the number of times somebody said, ‘You don’t have to believe the election is stolen, the important thing isn’t believing it, it’s saying it,’” Mr. Meijer recalled in an interview. “That is what a Republican is supposed to do right now.”If a series of primary setbacks this spring had showed that Mr. Trump was not invincible, then races in August have showcased his enduring influence.Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington State, another Republican vote for impeachment, was ousted by a Trump supporter. A Trump-backed candidate, Tim Michels, who has entertained trying to overturn the 2020 election, won the Republican nomination for governor of Wisconsin. And Mr. Trump’s preferred candidates swept the nominations in Arizona for Senate, governor, attorney general and secretary of state. All embraced his election denialism. More

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      Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin Survive Primary Battles, but a Democrat Breaks Through

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      ANCHORAGE — Two of the most prominent women in Alaskan Republican politics — Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin — appeared to be on divergent paths early Wednesday following the state’s special election and primary. Ms. Murkowski, 65, spurned by former President Donald J. Trump, advanced to the general election in November in the Senate race, according to The Associated Press. Ms. Palin, 58, who had Mr. Trump’s backing, also advanced in the fall for an open House seat but was trailing her Democratic opponent.Both races captured the fierce division among Republicans across the country and gave a glimpse into the independent and libertarian streak unique to Alaskan politics. They also underscored the surprising sway of Democrats in what has been a reliably red state, as well as the power of Native voters, a sizable electorate that does not predictably break for either party. The support of Native voters was key to the strong showings of both Ms. Murkowski and Ms. Palin’s main Democratic rival, Mary Peltola, a former state lawmaker who is Yup’ik and who would become the first Alaska Native in Congress if elected. More than 15 percent of Alaska’s population identifies as Indigenous.Still, final official results in the elections could take days and even weeks, as election officials in Alaska continue to collect and count mail-in ballots. The races Tuesday also tested a new complex voting system that allowed voters to rank their preferences in the special election. The process had rankled some Republicans who worried about losing power, but was seen by its proponents as encouraging candidates to appeal to voters beyond their base.In the Senate race, Ms. Murkowski has been in one of the toughest fights of her political career after voting to convict Mr. Trump in his impeachment trial following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Although she has lost support among Trump Republicans, she has attempted to forge a path to victory by solidifying a coalition of moderate Republicans, Democrats and independents that has helped keep her in office for three terms. She and Trump-endorsed Kelly Tshibaka advanced in a 19-way Senate primary. Ms. Murkowski was in the lead by three percentage points.Ms. Peltola, 48, took 37.8 percent of the vote in the special election to fill Alaska’s lone congressional seat through January, putting her more than five percentage points ahead of Ms. Palin, the state’s former governor and 2008 vice-presidential Republican nominee. Ms. Peltola was also leading Ms. Palin by nearly four percentage votes in the primary race to fill that seat beyond 2023. A win in the special election could provide a major boost in name recognition and momentum for Ms. Peltola, who has quickly risen to prominence since placing fourth in a June special election primary. On Tuesday, Ms. Peltola mingled with supporters at an Anchorage brewery as the results rolled in.“It’s just really overwhelming to see the kind of support that I’m getting,” she said. “I am hopeful.”More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid, a prospect that would test the national viability of a conservative, anti-Trump platform.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.The House race began taking shape soon after the sudden death in March of Don Young, who represented Alaskans in Congress for nearly 50 years. As she has attempted to stage a political comeback, Ms. Palin has leaned on a solid base of support among evangelical conservatives and Trump devotees. She has shunned the establishment and mostly ignored the press. But a debate has brewed among Republicans over whether she is pursuing the seat in the name of public service or celebrity. Ahead of Tuesday, she and her top Republican challenger, Nick Begich III, had been trading barbs over their brands of conservatism and loyalties to Alaska. The infighting appeared to give Ms. Peltola an edge as she campaigned on bipartisanship and healing divisions.She and Ms. Palin have had a warm relationship since the two were expectant young mothers when Ms. Palin was governor and Ms. Peltola was still serving in the State Legislature. At a candidate forum hosted by The Anchorage Daily News, Ms. Palin even pointed to Ms. Peltola when asked who she would rank second on the ballot. On Tuesday, Ms. Peltola said Ms. Palin had texted her that morning to wish her well and remind her to dress warm.Sarah Palin at a rally in July hosted by former President Donald J. Trump in Anchorage. She is trying to make a comeback after more than a decade out of politics.Ash Adams for The New York TimesBut Ms. Palin seemed to mostly avoid everyone else. As national reporters flew into Anchorage and her hometown of Wasilla, her campaign did not respond to requests for interviews and did not release details about any election-night events. She posted a Facebook video of herself waving signs with volunteers in the early hours Tuesday. Later on a busy thoroughfare in central Anchorage, groups of Palin supporters and volunteers for other campaigns roamed in a final push to get voters to the polls.Decked out in Palin gear, Lisa Smith, 73, a retired educator, argued that Ms. Palin did not need the publicity. “The long-term Alaskans know her, and she has a history that is solid and caring,” she said.Mary Peltola, the only Democrat in the 22-candidate House primary, would become the first Alaska Native in Congress if elected. She was in the lead with about two-thirds of votes counted.Ash Adams for The New York TimesThe House race centered on abortion rights, the economy, climate change and the use of Alaska’s mineral resources. In the undertow was Mr. Trump, who made a rare visit to the state in July to promote Ms. Palin and Ms. Murkowski’s main challenger, Ms. Tshibaka. Ms. Palin appeared to retain a strong well of support in her hometown of Wasilla, a small city of 10,000 north of Anchorage, and in other parts of the state. Many of her most ardent admirers are conservative women who praise her accomplishments as a politician and as a mother, and see her as an answer to strong-minded and vocal women on the left, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.“People want to bring up that she resigned being governor, but there are reasons for that, and they were legitimate, and she was looking out for Alaskans,” said Melinda Michener, 62, an elementary-school teacher who has known Ms. Palin since Ms. Michener’s husband became a pastor at Ms. Palin’s childhood church.Yet, pollsters see a difficult climb for Ms. Palin given her dismal overall approval ratings. The Alaska Survey Research in late July found that 31 percent of registered Alaska voters viewed her positively and 61 percent viewed her negatively. In a different analysis, Republican pollster Matt Larkin believed it was most likely that Ms. Peltola or Mr. Begich would win the special election based on Ms. Palin’s low favorability numbers.Many voters disapproved of the persona and rhetoric that Ms. Palin adopted when she entered national politics in 2008 as the vice-presidential nominee for John McCain. Others argued that she had spent most of her time since then in the lower 48 states, a particularly stinging affront to many Alaskans who often pride themselves as being separate from the rest of the United States. Nick Begich III, the Republican scion of the state’s most prominent Democratic political family, at a campaign event in Wasilla, Alaska.Ash Adams for The New York TimesMr. Begich, 44, the founder and chief executive of a software development company, also faced accusations of being an outsider. He was born in Alaska but grew up in Florida after his parents split. He sought to define himself as a young and idealistic fiscal conservative, despite sharing a last name with the best-known Democratic family in the state. His true ideological opponent over the direction of the state was Ms. Peltola, who has strongly championed abortion rights, called for higher taxes on the wealthy and has sought an approach to development of Alaska’s resources focused on sustaining communities over corporate interests. As a Yup’ik woman, she has said a “pro-family ethic” shapes her identity.In the Senate race, Ms. Tshibaka has sought to capitalize on longtime conservative frustrations with Ms. Murkowski, including her vote in 2017 against repealing the Affordable Care Act and her support of Deb Haaland for Interior Secretary under the Biden administration.Kelly Tshibaka campaigning on Tuesday in Alaska. She sought to run to the right of Ms. Murkowski in their Senate race.Ash Adams for The New York TimesOn Tuesday in Anchorage, hours before the polls closed, she and Ms. Murkowski waved signs and cheered at honking cars on opposite sides of the street. “It is a choice between the senator Joe Biden wants to have and the senator for Alaska values and Alaska’s interests,” Ms. Tshibaka said, as supporters behind her screamed, “Vote for Kelly.”Ms. Murkowski has maintained that there is still a place for her bipartisan relationships and her independent streak. The open primary system, coupled with a general election in November that will allow voters to once more rank their choices, is widely seen as designed to benefit more centrist candidates like her.This is not the first time Ms. Murkowski has found herself in a fight for political survival. In 2010, after she was defeated in the Republican primary, she beat a Tea Party candidate in a long-shot run for re-election as a write-in candidate. Her campaign team at the time emblazoned her name on silicon wristbands to help voters remember how to properly spell her name on the ballot. After her victory, she had a replica made in gold. “I’ve worn it on my wrist every day since 2010 to remind me that I was not returned to the United States Senate in a traditional way,” she told reporters Friday after meeting with voters in Talkeetna. “I returned at the request of Alaskans.”Emily Cochrane More

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      Wyoming Governor Primary Election Results 2022

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      Source: Election results and race calls from The Associated Press. The Times estimates the number of remaining votes based on historic turnout data and reporting from The Associated Press. These are only estimates and they may not be informed by official reports from election officials.The New York Times’s results team is a group of graphics editors, engineers and reporters who build and maintain software to publish election results in real-time as they are reported by results providers. To learn more about how election results work, read this article.The Times’s election results pages are produced by Michael Andre, Aliza Aufrichtig, Neil Berg, Matthew Bloch, Véronique Brossier, Irineo Cabreros, Sean Catangui, Andrew Chavez, Nate Cohn, Alastair Coote, Annie Daniel, Asmaa Elkeurti, Tiffany Fehr, Andrew Fischer, Will Houp, Josh Katz, Aaron Krolik, Jasmine C. Lee, Rebecca Lieberman, Ilana Marcus, Jaymin Patel, Rachel Shorey, Charlie Smart, Umi Syam, Urvashi Uberoy, Isaac White and Christine Zhang. Reporting by Reid J. Epstein, Lalena Fisher and Jazmine Ulloa; production by Amanda Cordero and Jessica White; editing by Wilson Andrews, Kenan Davis, William P. Davis, Amy Hughes and Ben Koski. More