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      Mike Pence Answers Jan. 6 Question From Iowa Voter

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      It was midway through a three-day swing of Iowa for Mike Pence when Luann Bertrand confronted him at a Pizza Ranch.Ms. Bertrand, a retired store manager whose family also farms corn and raises cattle outside Sioux City, had a question about Jan. 6, 2021, the date that looms under the Pence campaign like a land mine.Mr. Pence took questions from voters at a meet-and-greet at Pizza Ranch, a chain restaurant in Sioux City. Luann Bertrand, a retired store manager whose family also farms corn and raises cattle outside Sioux City, was among them.Jesse Brothers/Sioux City Journal, via Associated PressIn Iowa, the state whose caucuses next year are make-or-break for Mr. Pence, Ms. Bertrand accused the former vice president of putting President Biden in the White House. Seated at a table of G.O.P. voters in the restaurant, Ms. Bertrand, dressed in gray, shook a finger at Mr. Pence as she told him he should have rejected the electoral votes of certain states on Jan. 6.Mr. Pence, after listening with hands clutching his belt, offered a forceful rebuttal.A Question for Mike Pence“If it wasn’t for your vote, we would not have Joe Biden in the White House. Joe Biden shouldn’t be there. And all those wonderful things you and Trump were doing together would be continuing, and this country would be on the right path. Do you ever second-guess yourself? That was a constitutional right that you had to send those votes back to the states. It was not like you were going to personally elect him. We all know by the number of votes that were there who won that election. You changed history for this country.”The SubtextFor a former vice president, Mr. Pence holds a position in the Republican presidential race that is both credibly strong and incredibly weak: He ranks third in polling averages, but with only about 7 percent support, far behind former President Donald J. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida.Digging into the polls suggests why: About one in three potential Republican primary voters views Mr. Pence unfavorably. In a survey of registered voters nationwide, the same share says they would never vote for him.Anti-Trump Republicans are wary of Mr. Pence’s years of quiet servitude as the No. 2, while much of the G.O.P. base that embraces Mr. Trump and his continued lying about the 2020 election blames Mr. Pence for his actions on Jan. 6, when he refused to block certification of the results.Mike Pence’s Answer“The Constitution affords no authority to the vice president or anyone else to reject votes or return votes to the states. It had never been done before. It should never be done in the future. I’m sorry, ma’am, but that’s actually what the Constitution says. No vice president in American history ever asserted the authority that you have been convinced that I had. I want to tell you, with all due respect — I’ve said it before, I say it right now — that President Trump was wrong about my authority that day, and he’s still wrong.”The SubtextMr. Pence is not running a race focused on Jan. 6; he presents himself as a traditional conservative in the Ronald Reagan mold. Still, the exchange was a crucial moment for Mr. Pence, in the eyes of the candidate, his campaign, a super PAC that supports him and outside Republican strategists.What Other People Are SayingDevin O’Malley, a spokesman for the campaign, said it was the first time a voter openly queried Mr. Pence about “sending back” 2020 electoral votes to state legislatures, a common fallacy on the right. Mr. Pence decided to lean into his response to make a statement, Mr. O’Malley said.“I don’t think the moment was lost on him that the answer that he gave was going to be one that was kind of the answer of record and would be given a lot of attention.“We view it as an opportunity to set ourselves apart from other candidates. On the issue of who stands firmly with the Constitution of the United States under immense pressure, I don’t think there’s a moment in recent history that any one political leader has faced which has put on display their character and their judgment more than that one day.”On Friday, Mr. Pence returns to Iowa with other Republican candidates (but not Mr. Trump) for the Family Leadership Summit, a gathering of evangelical voters. These voters make up the most crucial bloc for Mr. Pence’s candidacy, but they retain a strong allegiance to Mr. Trump.Bob Vander Plaats, president of the Family Leader, the group sponsoring the summit, said Mr. Pence did the right thing by tackling Jan. 6 head-on in Sioux City, though there are many voters he might never bring around.“He has to own it and double down on it. Everybody’s got their hurdle, and this is going to be one that Mike Pence is going to have to clear.”“Because the former president has boastfully said Pence was wrong and he wimped out and he lacked courage, his base of supporters are going to believe that. Pence is not going to win that issue with Trump’s base. But Pence isn’t trying to win Trump’s base.”Scott Reed, co-chairman of a super PAC working to elect Mr. Pence through grass-roots organizing and advertising in Iowa, agreed. To him, Mr. Pence’s response to the voter was golden. “We put it in the can,” he said, meaning that the tape will show up in a future television ad.“There’s a segment of the party that we’re never going to get — the Steve Bannon crowd. And there’s plenty of the party left for us to get.”David Oman, a longtime center-right Republican strategist in Iowa who is unaffiliated with a campaign, said it was unclear whether Mr. Pence’s rebuttal of the voter — and his swipe at Mr. Trump — would help in the caucuses, which are Jan. 15, 2024.“Will it be helpful or unhelpful in six months? We’ll see.”“My personal view is history will be good to Mike Pence with respect to what happened on Jan. 6. Someday he’ll get the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Probably from a Democratic president.”What the Voter SaysIn a follow-up interview, Ms. Bertrand, the voter who challenged Mr. Pence, repeated a falsehood that lawyers who told Mr. Trump that his vice president could refuse states’ electoral votes had won prior cases for Mr. Trump.(The Trump lawyer who advanced that fringe theory about the 2020 election, John Eastman, is facing disbarment in California. Mr. Pence’s legal advisers told him that Mr. Eastman was wrong, and one testified before a grand jury investigating Mr. Trump over the Jan. 6 riot.)Although Ms. Bertrand was a Trump supporter in 2020, she is uncertain whether she will back him in the caucuses next year and said she wanted to hear from other candidates. Mr. Pence, however, failed to convince her that he acted correctly on Jan. 6.“President Trump has been accused time and again and went to court and won every case, and so I’m under the assumption that in this case, when President Trump said he had a right to challenge Pence on his decision, it was his lawyers that told him that — the same lawyers who had come out on top before.”“But if I am right or I am wrong is not important. To me, the idea Pence needs to know is there are people in Iowa — and I think in the entire country — that still believe this. That’s a challenge he’s up against when he’s running.”“I did not feel that I was personally attacking him. I just wanted him to know, hey, there’s more of me than of you out there.” More

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      Iowa Republicans Set the Date for the Party’s Caucuses — and It’s Early

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      The state party will hold a nominating contest in January, the earliest it has been held in recent campaign cycles.The NewsIowa Republicans voted on Saturday to hold their caucuses on Jan. 15, 2024, pushing the state’s first-in-the-nation nominating contest weeks earlier than in recent years.The state party voted unanimously to hold the elections on the third Monday of the month, which coincides with the federal holiday recognizing the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.Jeff Kaufmann, chairman of the state party, said in a statement after the vote that the Republicans “remain committed to maintaining Iowa’s cherished first-in-the-nation caucuses and look forward to holding a historic caucus in the coming months and defeating Joe Biden come November 2024.”Iowa Democrats were “aware of the decision” but “did not have a chance to have any input” on the date selection, according to a statement from Rita Hart, the chair of the state party.“No matter what, Iowa Democrats are committed to moving forward with the most inclusive caucus process in Iowa’s history,” Ms. Hart said.Republican voters at a caucus location in Pella, Iowa, in February 2016.Eric Thayer for The New York TimesWhy It Matters: Republicans Reaffirm While Democrats ReorderRepublican presidential hopefuls have been campaigning aggressively in the state, which is seen as crucial to many candidates, including former President Donald J. Trump, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, former Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, all of whom are courting the state’s more rural and evangelical voters in an effort to gain early momentum in the race.The selected day is also the date that a judge has set for a defamation trial against Mr. Trump filed by E. Jean Carroll. Ms. Carroll (who also has filed a separate defamation suit) won a civil case against Mr. Trump in May.Iowa’s status as the first presidential contest was seemingly upended last year, when Democrats reordered their nominating calendar to prioritize states with more racial diversity and move away from the caucus system.With Mr. Biden’s approval, the D.N.C. in February voted in favor of a new calendar that propelled South Carolina — the state that saved his candidacy in 2020 — to the first primary spot on Feb. 3, 2024, from the fourth position it held in 2020. Democrats in New Hampshire and Nevada would then hold their contests three days later.Republicans did not follow suit, keeping Iowa in first position, meaning the Midwestern state remains a key battleground for Republicans as the large field of contenders try to dislodge Mr. Trump from his position as the front-runner for the party’s nomination.Background: Iowa Isn’t Always Right, but It’s Still ImportantThe date chosen by the state party is weeks earlier than it was for the past several caucuses: In 2020 the contest was held on Feb. 3, and in 2016 it fell on Feb. 1. The last time the state held its caucuses in January was in 2012, when they occurred just three days into the new year.Iowa has not selected the party’s eventual nominee, excluding incumbent presidents, since 2000, when George W. Bush won the caucuses and then the general election.Still, many Republican candidates, and voters nationwide, see the now-firmly-red state as crucial to gaining early momentum and national attention. In a year when Mr. Trump maintains a considerable lead in the primary polls, performing well with a constituency well-accustomed to being courted by politicians is seen by many candidates in the 2024 race as vital to any chance at success.What’s Next: The Date Has Changed, but Not Much ElseRepublican presidential hopefuls will continue to court Iowans in the six remaining months before the caucuses, as front-runners and long-shot candidates alike have ramped up their appearances in the state.Mr. Trump held a rally in Iowa on Friday, where he made farming issues central to his pitch for why voters should select him, a clear nod to the state’s agriculture-based economy. And Mr. DeSantis’s wife, Casey, visited Iowa on Thursday for an event held alongside the state’s Republican governor, Kim Reynolds.Several candidates will appear in the state next week for the Family Leadership Summit in Des Moines, advertised as “the Midwest’s biggest gathering of Christians seeking cultural transformation.” The event will feature appearances from candidates including Mr. Scott and Mr. Pence, as well as an interview with Mr. DeSantis and the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. More

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      Stumping on July 4, Trump’s Rivals Pitch Themselves to Early-State Voters

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      Donald J. Trump loomed large over the campaign trail, even though he was among the few G.O.P. contenders who stayed away from it.At a high school cafeteria in Merrimack, N.H., on Tuesday, where patriotic music blasted from the speakers and the lunch tables were decked in star-spangled napery, Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota mingled with families who were digging into eggs, sausage and pancakes at a Fourth of July breakfast hosted by the local Rotary Club.Nelson Disco, 88, one of the prospective voters in the small crowd, had a couple of questions for him. What was he running for? And with which party?“You’ve got some competition,” Mr. Disco exclaimed, as the North Dakota governor told him he was seeking the Republican nomination for president.But Mr. Burgum was undeterred: “Feeling great” about the race, he said.It was the final Fourth of July before New Hampshire’s first-in-the nation Republican primary, set for February, and the famed kingmaking caucuses in Iowa — plenty of time to make up ground, but it was clear for the darkest of dark horses who were burning shoe leather on Tuesday that there was a lot of ground to make up.Some better-known competitors were in New Hampshire too. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is in a distant second place in the Republican primary polls to former President Donald J. Trump, walked in two parades, including one that also drew Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, who is still well back in the pack. The weather was less than agreeable: Mr. DeSantis, Mr. Scott and others walking in the afternoon parade in Merrimack, N.H., were soaked when a rainstorm swept through.Independence Day campaigning is a tradition in New Hampshire and Iowa, as old as the caucuses and the primary in those states. That would be more than a century of front-runners and also-rans at the parades, picnics and pancake breakfasts of the Granite State. This year, however, there was a twist: The prohibitive front-runner, Mr. Trump, skipped the hustings, staying home with his family and firing off vulgar social media posts.Yet the minions of his campaign and his own bulky shadow still hung heavily over his competition.Former Vice President Mike Pence greeted spectators at an Independence Day parade in Urbandale, Iowa.Jordan Gale for The New York TimesIn Urbandale, Iowa, where Mr. Trump’s former vice president and current competitor, Mike Pence, was marching in the parade, spectators broke into a chant — “Trump, Trump, Trump” — as he passed by.Melody Krejci, 60, of Urbandale, said: “My whole family is Trump supporters, even down to our grandbabies. They also wear Trump clothing and Trump hats.” There are posters of Trump in their rooms, too, she said.She added, “I think Pence is a coward,” alluding to the erroneous belief, still pushed by Mr. Trump, that his vice president could have rejected enough electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021, to send the 2020 election back to the states, and possibly overturn Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory.In the old days — before super PACs flooded the airwaves, social media brought politicians’ messages directly to voters’ smartphones and partisans were glued to their favored cable news shows — showing up on the Fourth of July really mattered.“Retail has always been mostly theater, but now it’s all a performance for the cameras, not about meeting regular people and listening to their concerns,” said Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee.This year, Mr. Trump’s rivals hoped it still did matter. In Merrimack, N.H., volunteers and supporters backing Mr. DeSantis waited to walk with their candidate in the Fourth of the July parade there, standing near a dance troupe in hot pink shirts, a wooden float filled with members of the Bektash Shrine Clowns and a yellow school bus decorated as the boat from the Boston Tea Party.But it was another Republican presidential hopeful, Mr. Scott, who caused a stir first, showing up on the parade route trailed by a passel of photographers and television cameras.“Hopefully some of those voters will become our voters,” Mr. Scott told reporters when asked his thoughts on the people in DeSantis and Trump gear who were coming up to shake his hand. “But at the end of the day, we thank God that we have folks that are committed to the country, committed to the concept that the conservative values always work.”Outside a pancake breakfast in Merrimack, N.H., former Representative Will Hurd of Texas and his wife, Lynlie Wallace, mixed with runners at a road race.Mr. Hurd, a moderate Republican and a fierce critic of Mr. Trump’s who is trying to get his fledgling presidential campaign out of the starting gate, said he had just finished touring the northern border near Vermont, which he said faces problems similar to those at the southern border in his home state: low resources and increased drug trafficking. Those were the sorts of issues he wanted to tackle, he said. But for now, he added, he was just happy to simply be out shaking hands.“Today is about meeting people, right?” Mr. Hurd said. “Not everybody is doom scrolling on social media or consuming cable news.”And Trump? “I’m sure people are thankful he’s not out,” he said. “He comes with a lot of baggage.”If there were glimmers of hope for the dark horses, it came from voter acknowledgment of that baggage, which now includes felony charges in New York connected to the payment of hush money to a porn star and federal felony charges in Miami accusing him of misusing highly classified documents and obstructing the government’s efforts to retrieve them.Senator Tim Scott joked with a Trump supporter before walking in the July Fourth parade in Merrimack, N.H., on Tuesday.Reba Saldanha/Associated Press PhotoIn Iowa, Jim Miller, 73, was sitting along the Urbandale parade route with his wife and other family members. He said he had voted for Mr. Trump twice but had been disappointed in his attitude. He wants a candidate who puts being American ahead of being a Republican or a Democrat.Asked to compare Mr. Pence with Mr. Trump, Mr. Miller said: “Not even close. I’d take Pence any day.”As for Mr. Burgum, he expressed an understanding of just how steep his climb would be to even get into contention for his party’s presidential nomination. The name recognition challenge is “familiar,” he said. But he also noted that people had underestimated him when he left a lifelong career in the private sector to run for governor in 2016.He won that race by 20 percentage points, and he has not been seriously challenged in North Dakota since.Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota in Iowa last month. Mr. Burgum was among a number of Republican presidential hopefuls who spent the July Fourth holiday in New Hampshire.Charlie Neibergall/Associated PressNot everyone was in the dark on his campaign. A volunteer, Maureen Tracey, 55, rushed up from the back of the room to ask for a selfie with him. She said she liked Mr. Burgum because, like Mr. Trump, he seemed “different from a politician.” But unlike Mr. Trump, she added, Mr. Burgum seemed to be someone she could trust.Mr. Trump “has hurt too many people, and when you hurt so many people, there is no trust,” Ms. Tracey said.Mr. Burgum, contrasting himself with the highest-profile Republican in the race, Mr. Trump, without mentioning him, said that he had decided to run because the country needed a leader who would work for every American, regardless of political affiliation.“Republicans, Independents, Democrats — they all drive on the U.S. roads, they all go to U.S. schools, they all get health care in America,” he said. “Today’s the day to really reflect on that.”Ann Hinga Klein More

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      Trump Won’t Campaign at a July 4 Parade, but Other Republican Hopefuls Will

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      But for early-state G.O.P. voters hoping for more attention on Independence Day, the pickings will be plentiful: Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis and others will be on the trail.It’s the final Fourth of July before the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary — still more than six months away, yes. But all the same, the Republicans vying for their party’s presidential nomination will be on the trail, waving to supporters from parades, shaking hands with voters and taking selfies.But not the front-runner: Donald J. Trump will be conspicuously absent on the 247th anniversary of the nation’s independence.Mike Pence is headed to Iowa, while Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida will do double duty with two parades in New Hampshire, the state that is also drawing Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina and North Dakota’s governor, Doug Burgum, a dark-horse candidate, among others.The former president has upended the traditional expectations of Iowa and New Hampshire voters. For decades they have prided themselves on their discernment of presidential candidates and have demanded to get to know them personally before casting the first ballots in the nation.Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign, objected to the notion that the former president is avoiding retail politics over the Fourth of July holiday, pointing to Mr. Trump’s rally in South Carolina on Saturday, which, he said, counted as Independence Day weekend. Mr. Trump also appeared at the Moms for Liberty conference in Philadelphia on Friday, and he even dropped by Pat’s King of Steaks, a cheese steak palace that has been a mainstay for politicians in Philly for decades.And this Friday the former president will be in Council Bluffs, Iowa.But on the actual anniversary of the nation’s birth?“His campaign will have an overwhelming presence in various parades and patriotic events in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, engaging with voters and Americans who are sick of Joe Biden’s failed leadership,” Mr. Cheung said.But Mr. Trump himself will be spending the day with his family, Mr. Cheung said.“I’m sure people are thankful he’s not out,” former Representative Will Hurd of Texas, a recent entrant in the Republican primary race, quipped outside a pancake breakfast in Merrimack, N.H. “He comes with a lot of baggage.”Former President Donald J. Trump during a rally on Saturday in Pickens, S.C.Doug Mills/The New York TimesFor early-state Republican voters hoping for more personal attention on the Fourth, the pickings will be plentiful — just not Mr. Trump. Mr. Pence, the former vice president, will walk the parade route in Urbandale, Iowa, then meet voters 35 miles north in Boone, Iowa, on Tuesday.Both Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Scott will be at the July 4 parade in Merrimack, as will several other Republican presidential hopefuls: Mr. Burgum, Mr. Hurd, the entrepreneur and author Vivek Ramaswamy, and Perry Johnson, a Michigan businessman. Marianne Williamson, a long-shot challenger of President Biden for the Democratic nomination, will be there too, as well as at an earlier parade in Wolfeboro — where Mr. DeSantis will also be.Mr. Biden will be using a bit of presidential prerogative to host active-duty military families for barbecue at the White House. He will also have military and veteran families, caregivers and survivors on the White House lawn for Washington’s traditional fireworks — but not before some politicking at an event with the nation’s largest teachers union, the National Education Association.Mr. Trump’s campaign evinces no concern that his absence from the stage will give his rivals any room to make up ground in the Republican primaries. After queries about his July 4 plans, his team released a memo Monday afternoon highlighting his campaign’s plans to celebrate the holiday in Iowa and New Hampshire — and calling out his dominant position in Republican primary polling.Republican veterans don’t see much of an opening for Mr. Trump’s rivals either.“He definitely plays by a different set of rules,” said David Kochel, a longtime Republican adviser and strategist in Iowa. Mr. Trump has made some recent adjustments with unscheduled stops at restaurants like Pat’s and, after his arraignment on the first federal felony charges ever levied on a former president, at Versailles, Miami’s beloved Cuban restaurant. He will be appearing with virtually the entire G.O.P. field at the Republican Party of Iowa’s biggest fund-raiser, the Lincoln Dinner, on July 28.“But,” Mr. Kochel said, “his celebrity and the fact that he was president gives him more flexibility.”The retail politics tradition in Iowa and New Hampshire may well be overrated, an artifact of a time before super PACs saturated airwaves, social media reached voters’ phones and celebrity pervaded the zeitgeist, regardless of who was in the diners and pizza joints.“Retail has always been mostly theater, but now it’s all a performance for the cameras, not about meeting regular people and listening to their concerns,” said Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee.Mr. Burgum got a taste of the hill he has to climb on Tuesday when Nelson Disco, 88, a retired engineer, asked him at a pancake breakfast in Merrimack, N.H., what he was running for and which party he was registered with.“You’ve got some competition,” Mr. Disco exclaimed, as the North Dakota governor told him he was running for president.For someone like Mr. DeSantis, who joined the primary campaign relatively late, appearances like his two July 4 parades do demonstrate that he is putting in the effort and taking New Hampshire seriously, said Mr. Cullen, who is now a Republican consultant in the state.As for the former president, “Can you imagine Trump walking in the Wolfeboro Fourth of July parade?” he asked. “I don’t think so.”Limiting Mr. Trump’s public appearances and emphasizing large rallies over glad-handing with a few dozen supporters may help to preserve the former president’s celebrity and mystique among his faithful while projecting confidence. And Republican primary voters already know how they feel about the former president. His fate in the primary contest may depend more on external factors — like his indictments in two cases and the trials that may ensue, as well as other inquiries he is facing — than on his power of persuasion at an Iowa Pizza Ranch.Mr. Cheung insisted, even as he outlined a relatively sparse schedule for Mr. Trump,“It would be incorrect to write that he will be sparing retail politics and limiting public appearances.” But the rest of the Republican field, with weaker field operations and later starts, do not have that luxury, said Dave Carney, another New Hampshire Republican consultant and veteran organizer.For those laboring to break out of the pack, Mr. Trump’s absence on July 4 presented a moment to introduce themselves to at least a few voters in person.“Today is about meeting people, right?” Mr. Hurd said. “Not everybody is doom scrolling on social media or consuming cable news.” More

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      Republican Presidential Candidates Celebrate Student Loan Ruling

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      Much of the Republican field of presidential candidates was unanimous in praising the Supreme Court’s decision on Friday to reject President Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan.Former President Donald J. Trump praised the ruling during an address to attendees at the Moms For Liberty conference in Philadelphia.“Today the Supreme Court also ruled that President Biden cannot wipe out hundred of billions, perhaps trillions of dollars in student loan debt, which would have been very unfair to the millions and millions of people who paid their debt through hard work and diligence, very unfair,” he said. He called Mr. Biden a “corrupt president” and lamented that the plan was “a way to buy votes.”Senator Tim Scott, Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence were among the first of the 2024 contenders to signal their alignment with the six conservative justices in supporting the decision.“The U.S. Supreme Court was right to end the illegal and immoral effort by the Biden Administration to transfer student debt to taxpayers,” Mr. Scott wrote on Twitter. “If you take out a loan, you pay it back.”He called on colleges and universities to “act to lower tuition and improve the quality of their programs” and vowed that as president, he would take action to make education more affordable and to expand access to vocational training.Mr. Pence sought credit for having “played a role in appointing three of the Justices that ensured today’s welcomed decision” — though he did not mention former President Donald J. Trump even as he highlighted one of the Trump administration’s signature achievements.“Joe Biden’s massive trillion-dollar student loan bailout subsidizes the education of elites on the backs of hardworking Americans,” Mr. Pence wrote on Twitter, “and it was an egregious violation of the Constitution for him to attempt to do so unilaterally with the stroke of the executive pen.”Ms. Haley was similarly critical, painting the president’s plan as unfair.“A president cannot just wave his hand and eliminate loans for students he favors, while leaving out all those who worked hard to pay back their loans or made other career choices,” Ms. Haley wrote on Twitter.In a speech Friday morning in Philadelphia, she heaped praise on the court: “Can I just say God bless the Supreme Court? They are righting a lot of wrongs.”Vivek Ramaswamy and Asa Hutchinson soon joined in as well, and while Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has not released an official statement, his campaign used the moment to highlight his higher education policies in Florida.In a video published by his campaign’s account on Twitter, Mr. DeSantis is seen on the campaign trail in South Carolina, promoting Florida’s rules on state school tuition rates and saying that colleges and universities “should be responsible for defaulted student loan debt.”“If you produce somebody that can’t pay it back,” he continues, “that’s on you.”Mr. Ramaswamy posted a two-and-a-half minute video to Twitter extolling the decision, citing its legal underpinnings as a “powerful precedent” that could target “most of the regulations of the administrative state.”Mr. Hutchinson, the former governor of Arkansas, also commended the decision, stating that the “ruling reaffirms the importance of upholding our legal framework and preserving the checks and balances that ensure the proper functioning of our government.” He also called for finding a legislative solution to the student loan debt crisis.Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota added his voice to the chorus of praise for the decision later Friday afternoon: “Erasing the debt of high-paid, college-educated workers at the expense of blue-collar Americans is wrong, and would have exacerbated inflation significantly,” he said in a statement, adding that “the Constitution clearly states that spending originates in Congress.”Another Republican candidate, former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, has not publicly commented on the decision.Anjali Huynh More

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      Pence Meets With Zelensky in Ukraine, Highlighting G.O.P. Split Over War

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      Former Vice President Mike Pence made an unannounced visit to Ukraine on Thursday, a detour from the presidential campaign trail that was intended to highlight his unwavering support for the nation as it battles Russia and to contrast it with the views of two key Republican rivals: Donald J. Trump and Ron DeSantis.Both Mr. Trump, the former president, and Mr. DeSantis, the Florida governor, have criticized U.S. involvement in the defense of Ukraine. The United States has provided more than $40 billion in military and humanitarian aid.During his 12-hour stay, with an NBC News crew accompanying him, Mr. Pence met with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, and toured a mass burial site, placing flowers at a memorial, according to an adviser.For more than 16 months, Ukraine has been fighting to repel the Russian invasion, in a war that has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians and soldiers.“Look, the war here in Ukraine is not our war, but freedom is our fight,” Mr. Pence told NBC News. He is the first Republican candidate to visit Ukraine during the 2024 campaign. President Biden was in Kyiv in February.In his nightly address to his nation, Mr. Zelensky thanked Mr. Pence for his support and said that American support for Ukraine was vital.Mr. Pence added to NBC News, “I think we’re advancing not only the interests of freedom, but let me be clear, my other message is we’re advancing our national interest.”The show of solidarity by Mr. Pence, who was Mr. Trump’s vice president, contrasted sharply with the G.O.P.’s top tier of presidential candidates.During a CNN town hall in May, Mr. Trump, the Republican front-runner, refused to say whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war.He also would not call President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia a war criminal, saying that doing so would make it more difficult to end the hostilities. Mr. Trump did say Mr. Putin had “made a bad mistake” by invading Ukraine.Mr. DeSantis, a former House member, has aligned himself more closely with Mr. Trump on U.S. aid for Ukraine.In a statement to Fox News in March before formally entering the race, Mr. DeSantis said that protecting Ukraine’s borders was not a vital U.S. interest and that policymakers should instead focus attention at home. He was responding to a questionnaire from Tucker Carlson, the conservative commentator who was later fired by the network.At that time, Mr. DeSantis was criticized by some hawks in the G.O.P. for describing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a “territorial dispute.” In an attempt to clarify his remarks, he later called Mr. Putin a “war criminal” who should be “held accountable.”Jonathan Swan More

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      Republican Presidential Candidates Hail the Affirmative Action Decision

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      The Republicans running for president applauded the Supreme Court’s ruling on Thursday to strike down race-based affirmative action in college admissions, a policy that for decades has stoked the conservative agenda.Former President Donald J. Trump called the decision a “great day for America” in a statement.“People with extraordinary ability and everything else necessary for success, including future greatness for our country, are finally being rewarded,” he said, adding, “We’re going back to all merit-based — and that’s the way it should be!”Mr. Trump’s political organization, the MAGA War Room, cast him as a main catalyst for the court’s ruling to end affirmative action, saying on Twitter that “he delivered on his promise to appoint constitutional justices.”It also made an outlandish comparison between Mr. Trump, the Republican front-runner who has been indicted twice since leaving the White House, and Abraham Lincoln, one of the party’s iconic forebears.“President Trump will end affirmative action like Lincoln ended slavery,” the group wrote on Twitter.Mr. Trump appointed three of the six justices who voted to reject affirmative action at colleges, the same conservative supermajority that delivered another seismic victory for conservatives a year ago when it overturned Roe v. Wade, eliminating the constitutional right to abortion.Mike Pence, Mr. Trump’s former vice president, who is now a 2024 rival, suggested in a statement on Thursday that he deserved a measure of credit for the court’s rightward shift and said that the “egregious” policy had “only served to perpetuate racism.”“I am honored to have played a role in appointing three of the justices that ensured today’s welcomed decision, and as president I will continue to appoint judges who will strictly apply the law rather than twisting it to serve woke and progressive ends,” he said.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, Mr. Trump’s chief G.O.P. rival, also welcomed the court’s move.“College admissions should be based on merit and applicants should not be judged on their race or ethnicity,” he wrote on Twitter. “The Supreme Court has correctly upheld the Constitution and ended discrimination by colleges and universities.”Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, who is Black, said in a statement that race should not determine who gets certain opportunities.“We will not be judged solely by the color of our skin,” he said. “That’s what the ruling said today. But that is the story of America. That is a story of American progress, and we can all celebrate that today.”Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and onetime United Nations ambassador under Mr. Trump, said in a statement that the court’s ruling had reaffirmed how Americans value freedom and opportunity.“Picking winners and losers based on race is fundamentally wrong,” Ms. Haley said. “This decision will help every student — no matter their background — have a better opportunity to achieve the American Dream.”Vivek Ramaswamy, a multimillionaire entrepreneur who graduated from Harvard College, which was a defendant in the Supreme Court case, pledged to take further steps to end affirmative action. In a statement, he said would repeal a decades-old presidential executive order that requires federal contractors to adopt race-based hiring preferences.“I’m glad the U.S. Supreme Court finally laid to rest one of the worst failed experiments in American history: affirmative action,” he said. “Still, the ruling is likely to mark the beginning of a new era of ‘shadow’ racial balancing and quotas, where elite universities like Harvard and woke employers play games to suit their desires for preferences that benefit perceived ‘marginalized’ groups.” More

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      in Elections

      Biden Warns That Republicans Are Not Finished on Abortion

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      A year after the end of Roe v. Wade, Biden administration officials are working with a limited set of tools, including executive orders and the bully pulpit, to galvanize supporters on abortion rights.Minutes after the Supreme Court voted to overturn Roe v. Wade last summer, a group of West Wing aides raced to the Oval Office to brief President Biden on the decision. As they drafted a speech, Mr. Biden was the first person in the room to say what has been his administration’s rallying cry ever since.Passing federal legislation, he told the group, was “the only thing that will actually restore the rights that were just taken away,” recalled Jen Klein, the director of the White House Gender Policy Council.But if the prospect of codifying Roe’s protections in Congress seemed like a long shot a year ago, it is all but impossible to imagine now, with an ascendant far-right bloc in the House and a slim Democratic majority in the Senate.Instead, with the battle over abortion rights turning to individual states, officials in the Biden administration are working with a limited set of tools, including executive orders and the galvanizing power of the presidency, to argue that Republicans running in next year’s elections would impose even further restrictions on abortion.“Make no mistake, this election is about freedom on the ballot,” Mr. Biden said Friday at a Democratic National Committee event, where he collected the endorsements of several abortion rights groups.On Saturday, Vice President Kamala Harris was set to deliver a speech in North Carolina marking the one-year anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision to eliminate the constitutional right to an abortion after almost 50 years. Ms. Klein, who recalled refreshing news websites on the day the decision came down last June, said that she was “shocked but not surprised” by the court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.She added that “efforts to really take extreme action do not represent the majority of opinion of where people are on this.”The White House has argued that Mr. Biden is reaching the legal limits of his powers through executive actions. On Friday, his latest executive action in response to the Dobbs decision ordered federal agencies to look for ways to ensure and expand access to birth control.Mr. Biden previously has issued a memorandum to protect access to abortion medication at pharmacies and taken action to protect patients who cross state lines to seek care. The Justice Department has taken legal action against some states restricting abortion. And the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion-pill drug mifepristone was quickly challenged in the courts. (In April, the Supreme Court issued an order to preserve access to the pill as litigation continues.)The Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee will make abortion a primary focus of the president’s re-election effort.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesAs the White House has clarified its message around abortion rights, framing the fight as one in support of privacy, safety and civil rights, so has the president. Mr. Biden, a Catholic who attends mass almost every week, has struggled throughout his career with defending abortion rights. Since Roe was overturned, he has grown more outspoken.“I think that he is somebody who really has his own personal views, and has also been quite clear that Roe v. Wade was rightly decided,” Ms. Klein said.Recent polling shows that a majority of Americans may feel similarly. A USA Today/Suffolk University poll conducted earlier this month found that one in four Americans said that restrictive abortion bans enacted at the state level have made them more supportive of abortion rights. Another poll, conducted by PBS NewsHour, NPR and Marist, said that 61 percent of American adults support abortion rights.Some activists suspect that some Republican presidential candidates are paying attention to the polling. Mike Pence, the former vice president and presidential candidate, said on Friday that he would support a 15-week national ban on the procedure. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina has also backed such a ban.Other candidates have avoided a definitive stance. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida signed a six-week abortion ban into law in his state, though he has not said whether he would support a national ban.“It was the right thing to do,” Mr. DeSantis said Friday of signing the law.The G.O.P. primary front-runner, former President Donald J. Trump, takes credit for appointing the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, but he has so far also resisted embracing a federal ban.As the G.O.P. field assembles, the Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee will make abortion a primary focus of the president’s re-election effort. Earlier this month, the Biden campaign launched an advertisement campaign focused on battleground states, including the funding of billboards in Times Square that will highlight Republican efforts to restrict abortion access.The Democratic National Committee is also encouraging local Democrats to press Republicans to specify what their position is on national bans, believing it will help contrast Mr. Biden’s approach with extremist positions, according to a D.N.C. official.Inside the White House, Ms. Klein said officials are tracking court cases in individual states and bringing abortion-rights activists together to compare notes on which policies have succeeded.Still, activists are wary that court victories can be short-lived and do not take away the threat of a wider abortion ban the way legislation would.In recent months, administration officials have regularly highlighted the stories of women who have been denied emergency medical care when suffering pregnancy loss.Ms. Harris, who has made several trips and delivered speeches in defense of abortion rights, has frequently introduced medical care providers at her events to bolster the argument that the decision to end a pregnancy is a private one and not to be toyed with by local politicians.Vice President Kamala Harris, displaying a map showing abortion access, has emerged as a strong voice in the administration on abortion rights.Oliver Contreras for The New York TimesJill Biden, the first lady, has also been enlisted in the effort. On Tuesday, she hosted a group of women in the Blue Room of the White House and asked them to share their stories. One of the women, Dr. Austin Dennard, a physician in Texas, said she was forced to travel out of state for an abortion when her fetus was diagnosed with anencephaly, a condition that causes a baby to be born without parts of the brain and skull.Another, a Houston-based Democratic campaign worker named Elizabeth Weller, had gone into labor at 18 weeks and was directed to go home until she developed an infection so severe that a hospital ethics panel allowed a doctor to end the pregnancy.“Joe is doing everything he can do,” the first lady told the group.Mini Timmaraju, the president of the abortion rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America, agreed that the Biden administration is “doing everything they can,” but she said the limitations are real.“We have to give them a pro-choice majority Congress,” she said. “That’s it. They’ve done everything they can up until that point, but without the support of Congress, they are limited and we are limited in what we can do.” More