Politics and Government

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      The Good News in Georgia That’s Bad News for Trump

      by

      This is a column about good news, written in the shadow of the worst news imaginable.Like many people, the mass shooting of children in Uvalde, Texas, is basically the only thing I’ve read about for days. But as I’ve marinated in the horror — and, increasingly, in rage at the police response — I’ve also been aware of the way our media experience works today, how we are constantly cycled from one crisis to another, each one seemingly existential and yet seemingly forgotten when the wheel turns, the headlines change.Climate change, systemic racism, toxic masculinity, online disinformation, gun violence, police violence, the next Trump coup, the latest Covid variant, the death of democracy, climate change again. This is the liberal crisis list; the conservative list is different. But for everyone there are relatively few opportunities to take a breath and acknowledge when anything actually gets better.So my next column will be about the darkness in Texas and the possible policy response. In this one I want to acknowledge that in a different zone of existential agitation, things just meaningfully improved.In Georgia, the state at the center of the 45th president’s attempt to defy the public will and stay in office, there were two Republican primary races that doubled as referendums on the Trumpian demand that G.O.P. officials follow him into a constitutional crisis — and in both of them his candidate lost badly.The higher-profile race was the battle for the gubernatorial nomination between Brian Kemp and David Perdue, which Kemp won in an extraordinary rout. But the more important one was the Republican primary for secretary of state, in which Brad Raffensperger, the special target of Trump’s strong-arm tactics and then his public ire, defeated Jody Hice, Trump’s candidate — and did so without a runoff. Probably some crossover Democratic votes helped push him over 50 percent, but most of his voters were Republicans who listened to his challenger’s constant talk of voter fraud and decided to stick with the guy who stood up to Trump.Brian KempNicole Craine for The New York TimesBrad RaffenspergerAudra Melton for The New York TimesThe Kemp victory was expected; the easy Raffensperger win less so, and certainly it wasn’t expected at this time last year. Back then, if you pointed out that all the Republicans in positions that really mattered in the aftermath of the 2020 election, across multiple states and multiple offices, did their jobs and declined to go along with Trump, the usual response was maybe it happened once but wouldn’t happen again, because Trump’s enmity was a guaranteed career-ender.Now that narrative, happily, has been exploded. Any Republican in a key swing-state office come 2024 can look at Kemp and Raffensperger and know that they have a future in G.O.P. politics if, in the event of a contested election, they simply do their job.Moreover, the primary balloting in Georgia saw record early-voting turnout and no evidence of meaningful impediments to voting, which exploded a different crisis narrative that took hold on the left — and in corporate America and the Biden White House — when the state passed new voting regulations last year. According to that narrative, in trying to address the paranoia of their own constituents, Republicans were essentially rolling back voting rights, even recreating Jim Crow — “on steroids,” to quote our president.There was little good evidence for this narrative at the time, and even less evidence in the turnout rate for the Georgia primary, where early voting numbers were higher even than in 2020. “Jim Crow on steroids” should be stricken from the crisis cycle; it does not exist.On the other hand the Trumpian peril, the risk of election subversion and constitutional crisis, does still exist. Doug Mastriano’s recent primary victory in Pennsylvania proves as much, and there may be other swing-state nominees who, like Mastriano, can’t be trusted to imitate Kemp and Raffensperger in the clutch.But the results in Georgia prove that the faction that elevates figures like Mastriano does not have a simple veto in the party. It shows the effectiveness of what you might call a “stay and govern” strategy of dealing with Trump’s hold on the G.O.P., one with wide application as the party moves toward 2024.And it indicates the limits of the all-or-nothing thinking that a crisis mentality imposes. I can easily imagine an alternative timeline where Raffensperger resigned his office rather than standing for re-election, inked a deal with MSNBC, turned his subsequent book into a mega-bestseller in the style of so many Trump-administration exposés and adopted Biden-administration talking points to denounce Georgia election laws. That timeline would have unquestionably been better for the Raffensperger family’s bank account, and it would have prompted many liberals to hail him as a profile in Republican courage.But for everyone else — Georgians, the G.O.P., the country — that timeline would have been worse. Whereas because he stayed in the party, ran again and won, even in a dark week for America one region of our common life looks a little better, and one of our crises should feel a little bit less dire.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

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      How a Mapmaker Became New York’s Most Unexpected Power Broker

      by

      Jonathan Cervas, a former bartender from Las Vegas, radically redrew New York’s House district lines, forcing some Democratic incumbents to scramble for new seats.He is a postdoctoral fellow from Pittsburgh, a bartender turned political mapmaker. Now, Jonathan Cervas is suddenly New York’s most unforeseen power broker.Last month, a New York State judge chose Mr. Cervas to create new district maps in New York for the House and State Senate, after maps approved by state Democratic leaders were declared unconstitutional.Mr. Cervas’s new maps radically reshaped several districts, scrambling the future of the state’s political establishment for the next decade. Republicans were quietly pleased, and some anti-gerrymandering groups praised his work. But Democrats, who saw several potential pickups in the House of Representatives potentially evaporate, were outraged. Mr. Cervas’s decisions — the rationale for which he outlined in a lengthy explanation released early Saturday — have already caused vicious infighting and prospective primaries between some incumbent Democrats, including one pitting Representatives Jerrold Nadler and Carolyn Maloney against each other in Manhattan.For his part, Mr. Cervas, 37, insists he was just doing his job, the importance of which he says has been exaggerated by the fact that the state’s changes came so late in the 2022 election cycle.“People have made a narrative how the House of Representatives is going to be determined by one man who is from Pennsylvania; nothing could be further from the truth, ” he said in a lengthy interview this week, adding that “people still have to run” for office.“I serve the court, I serve democracy. That’s it,” he added. “If people want to make me important, so be it, but I just stick with my moral principles and things I’ve learned and apply the law as its written.”That said, the impact of Mr. Cervas’s circumscription has already been profound, creating the likelihood of highly competitive general-election campaigns from Long Island to upstate New York. Some races in the New York State Senate, where Democrats hold a comfortable majority, have also been upended by new lines.Representative Hakeem Jeffries, who represents parts of Brooklyn and Queens, was particularly galled by the congressional changes, likening the new lines to “Jim Crow” laws — which restricted Black involvement in voting and other aspects of society — and skewering Mr. Cervas’s work as having “degraded the Black and Latino populations in five New York City-based congressional districts.”“The unelected, out-of-town special master did a terrible job, produced an unfair map that did great violence to Black and Latino communities throughout the city, and unnecessarily detonated the most Jewish district in America,” said Mr. Jeffries, who is chairman of the House Democratic Caucus and the second-highest-ranking Black lawmaker in Congress. “That’s problematic and that cannot be excused or explained in any fair or rational fashion.”What to Know About RedistrictingRedistricting, Explained: Here are some answers to your most pressing questions about the process that is reshaping American politics.Understand Gerrymandering: Can you gerrymander your party to power? Try to draw your own districts in this imaginary state.Killing Competition: The number of competitive districts is dropping, as both parties use redistricting to draw themselves into safe seats.Deepening Divides: As political mapmakers create lopsided new district lines, the already polarized parties are being pulled even farther apart.Mr. Cervas said that his map “fully reflected” how many of New York’s largest minority populations — including Black, Latino, and Asian groups — are “geographically concentrated.”As for Mr. Cervas’s political beliefs, they are somewhat hard to divine. He describes his political leanings as “pro-democracy,” rather than professing allegiance to any party, though he adds that belief happens “to align more closely with one party than another.” He is registered as an independent in Pennsylvania, where he lives, but he says he recently voted in a Republican primary there in hopes of electing moderate members of that party.What’s more, he says he hates politics, preferring institutions and policy to electoral battles.“I like governance,” Mr. Cervas said. “I don’t really like the bickering, the animosities, the games. Those types of things are uninteresting to me.”Ross Mantle for The New York TimesRoss Mantle for The New York TimesMr. Cervas was appointed as a so-called special master by Justice Patrick F. McAllister of State Supreme Court in Steuben County, who ordered new maps drawn up after a successful lawsuit from Republicans. Justice McAllister, a Republican, found that Democratic lawmakers in Albany had adopted lines that were “unconstitutionally drawn with political bias.”Mr. Cervas’s was appointed in mid-April, after Nate Persily, a Stanford law professor who helped draw New York’s current congressional map in 2012, turned down Justice McAllister. His previous work had been as an assistant on more limited redistricting cases in Georgia, Virginia and Utah. Last year, however, Mr. Cervas was hired for a statewide project, as part of a redistricting commission in Pennsylvania, where the chairman, Mark Nordenberg, said he proved invaluable as a redistricting specialist, as well as having “a deep knowledge of the law” and, of course, “technical, mapping skills.”“He approached everything we did in a fair and nonpartisan fashion,” said Mr. Nordenberg, the former chancellor of the University of Pittsburgh, noting he “would hire him again if I had the opportunity.”That said, Mr. Cervas had never been a special master, particularly on such a tight deadline: about five weeks to deliver the final maps, including and incorporating revisions. He worked with several assistants and solicited comments from the public, both online and in a single, in-person hearing in Steuben County, about 275 miles from New York City.And while the remoteness of that location made court appearances cumbersome, some anti-gerrymandering advocates made the trip to voice support for the new maps.“I have to say I was pleasantly surprised,” said Jerry Vattamala, the director of the Democracy Program at the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, which was part of a coalition lobbying for more representation for people of color in New York City, adding that Mr. Cervas seemed responsive to the thousands of comments he received. “So the six-hour drive, I guess, was worth it.”In some ways, Mr. Cervas seems destined to have played an outsize role in Democratic woe: He was born, outside Pittsburgh, on Election Day in 1984, when Ronald Reagan humiliated the party’s nominee, Walter Mondale, winning a second term. His upbringing — in two swing states — was working-class: His father was a field service representative for Whittle Communications, his mother worked at Kmart.The family moved to Las Vegas in the early 1990s, and Mr. Cervas became interested in politics, eventually studying the topic at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas and graduating with a degree in political science. He supported himself by working in a movie theater at a casino and eventually tending bar, a job he said helped him learn how to listen to divergent opinions.“It’s actually an education on how to be moderate,” he said. “When people say things that are inflammatory, you have to not take it too personally. ”Before working on New York’s lines, Mr. Cervas was a redistricting specialist for a Pennsylvania commission.Ross Mantle for The New York TimesIf there was a turning point in the road for Mr. Cervas, it may have come nearly a decade ago at a rock concert in Anaheim, Calif.How U.S. Redistricting WorksCard 1 of 8What is redistricting? More

    • 150 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Jumaane Williams Owns the Left Lane. Why Hasn’t His Campaign Taken Off?

      by

      Mr. Williams, whose candidacy for New York governor was celebrated by progressives, has not gained much momentum and is far behind in fund-raising.At an outdoor event space in Buffalo, a diverse crowd gathered for a benefit to help the families affected by the horrific mass shooting at a supermarket in the city’s East Side.Jumaane Williams, the New York City public advocate who is running for governor, had planned to attend, his campaign said. But as the crowd hushed and the names and ages of the victims were read aloud, Mr. Williams was absent.Running late, the candidate had decided instead to head directly to the Tops Friendly Market where the racist massacre occurred, milling around a group of volunteers handing out groceries and food to residents.Mr. Williams seemed cautious at first, but eventually he struck up a conversation with Brenda Williams McDuffie, a former president of the Buffalo Urban League and a Brooklyn native.“They want people they trust to be able to communicate sometimes on their behalf,” Ms. McDuffie said. “I know his voice and how he uses his voice and his values and love for the community, so it’s exceptional for him to come.”Still, she conceded that many in Buffalo were less familiar with him. “I knew he was running for governor, but I haven’t really followed it, because I think I haven’t really seen him in upstate New York,” she said.Mr. Williams, at an event to help the families of the shooting victims in Buffalo, said that his wife’s cancer and the premature birth of his daughter had curtailed his campaigning.Libby March for The New York TimesAfter a competitive run for lieutenant governor four years ago, Mr. Williams generated excitement in progressive circles when he announced that he would challenge Gov. Kathy Hochul in her bid for her first full term.He had name recognition, charisma and a clear political lane: Ms. Hochul and another primary rival, Representative Thomas R. Suozzi, are considered centrist Democrats; Mr. Williams is backed by numerous progressive-oriented groups, including the Working Families Party.But Mr. Williams has failed to gain much momentum ahead of the June 28 primary. He is far behind in fund-raising, has not run any television ads, and has done far fewer campaign events than might be expected of a major candidate for governor.Beneath it all is an underlying issue, though Mr. Williams is careful not to blame his campaign woes on it: His wife was diagnosed with cervical cancer last year, and their daughter was born prematurely in February.Mr. Williams’s wife, India Sneed-Williams, a lawyer, said her husband had twice privately offered to drop out of the governor’s race. She refused, she said. She wouldn’t let him because “I know who I had married.”Mr. Williams acknowledged in an interview that he came “closer than I had ever been” to dropping out of the race.“There were a few times that I think it did impact the campaign,” Mr. Williams said.“Could I give everything I would normally give to a campaign while I’m going through this?” he added. “The answer is no.”But he decided to push on, even as his campaign worried that it would not have enough money to compete. “It was always about the ability to show a path, even if it was uphill,” he said.With a month remaining before the primary, Mr. Williams’s supporters recognize that describing his path as uphill undersells just how steep it is.Sochie Nnaemeka, the head of the New York State Working Families Party, described Mr. Williams as a “moral figure” who can “contrast a Hochul administration that believes that the ultra-wealthy also deserve government to do their bidding for them.”Mr. Williams, comforting the family of an 11-year-old girl killed by a stray bullet in the Bronx, has called on state leaders to better address the root causes of violent crime.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesMr. Williams and his aides concur. They hope that he can use two upcoming debates to portray Ms. Hochul as a nicer version of her predecessor, Andrew M. Cuomo, who supports many of the same policies as he did, such as changes to the bail reform law, and raises millions from the same special interests, labor unions and business groups that supported him.Ms. Hochul has shown other recent signs of potential vulnerability: Her chosen lieutenant governor resigned in April after being indicted on fraud and bribery charges. She has also been criticized for pushing $600 million in state subsidies to build a football stadium for the Buffalo Bills.“It’s unfortunate because those things aligned with Jumaane having a baby that was very premature and also his wife going through cancer treatments,” said Jonathan Westin, director of New York Communities for Change, a grass-roots organizing group that has endorsed Mr. Williams. “It was hard for him to be out there as much as he wanted to be.”Ms. Sneed-Williams finished chemotherapy three weeks ago, and their “miracle baby” is now healthy.Ms. Hochul, whose campaign spokesman declined to comment, has largely ignored Mr. Williams. She has amassed an overwhelming advantage in fund-raising and has a solid lead in the polls.The governor has $18.5 million on hand and has raised $31.7 million, her campaign said this week. Mr. Williams had raised just $221,000 as of January, according to the most recent round of financial disclosure reports, and is set to report updated numbers later on Friday.Mr. Williams ran a spirited campaign for lieutenant governor in 2018 against the incumbent, Kathy Hochul, who is now governor.Hilary Swift for The New York Times“We always had a conversation about is this sustainable? Are you OK? Do you want to keep going?” Ana María Archila, a candidate for lieutenant governor and his running mate, said. His decision to stay in the race, she added, solidified Mr. Williams as a candidate “who brings his life into he public arena in a way that humanizes everybody else.”Mr. Williams’s campaign expects to be able to air ads on cable closer to the primary, and noted that he did not widely advertise during the primary for lieutenant governor in 2018, when he beat Ms. Hochul by 60,000 votes in New York City.Bruce Gyory, a Democratic strategist, said that although Ms. Hochul was not exciting the Democratic base, she had not antagonized it either. He still expected Mr. Williams to have a better showing than the 12 percent he received in a recent poll.“He’s working the progressives hard and he has a Hispanic lieutenant governor working hard out there, too,” Mr. Gyory said. “I think there’s more energy on the ground for Jumaane than there is for Suozzi.”Mr. Williams, a self-described “activist elected official,” is known for speaking out against discriminatory policing practices and getting arrested to protest them.When he won a special election for public advocate in 2019, Mr. Williams spoke candidly during his acceptance speech about seeking therapy for mental health challenges. And in the video announcing his bid for governor, he talked about living with Tourette’s Syndrome and the involuntary body movements that come with it.During a walk-through at Kingsborough Houses in Brooklyn with Ms. Archila, Mr. Williams easily connected with tenants as they explained how they had to deal with everything from rundown apartments to the lack of a safe park space.He ran into some he knew from his early days as an activist, and connected others with the public advocate’s office to deal with issues such as a backed-up sewer at the day care center.“Could you see Gov. Hochul really walking around here authentically talking with people?” said Jamell Henderson, a Kingsborough resident who led the visit.Mr. Williams and his running mate, Ana María Archila, at a recent visit to the Kingsborough Houses in Brooklyn.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesAt another recent event in the Bronx, where various public officials addressed the death of an 11-year-old girl who was struck by a stray bullet, Mr. Williams was the last elected official to speak.He offered a fiery denunciation of Ms. Hochul, accusing her of failing to designate enough funding in the state’s $220 billion budget to address the root causes of violence.At his appearance in Buffalo, Mr. Williams again attacked the governor, this time for funding the Bills stadium while the Black neighborhood where the shooting occurred suffered from decades of systemic racism.He said he was angry that Ms. Hochul had said she lived 10 minutes from the scene of the massacre, but did nothing to help the neighborhood add other grocery options beyond Tops, the only supermarket in the area. “I’m like, ‘You just found that out?’” Mr. Williams said.By the time he made it to the next event, its organizers were packing up. Mr. Williams apologized and chatted for a few minutes. What did he make of his chances, one of the organizers, Willie Aytch, asked?“It’s always uphill for me,” Mr. Williams said. “But I fight uphill.”Jesse McKinley reported from Buffalo, N.Y. More

    • 113 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Colombia Election: Angry, Mobilized and Voting for Gustavo Petro

      by

      A large and loud youth electorate hungry to transform one of Latin America’s most unequal societies could propel Gustavo Petro, a former rebel, to the presidency.May 26, 2022FUSAGASUGÁ, Colombia — The man onstage surrounded by a screaming, sweating, fawning crowd seemed like an odd choice for a youth icon. Gustavo Petro is gray-haired, 62, and, in his speeches, he’s more roaring preacher than conversational TikTok star.But after an improbable rise from clandestine rebel to Bogotá mayor and bullish face of the Colombian opposition, Mr. Petro could soon become the country’s first leftist president, a watershed moment for one of the most politically conservative societies in Latin America.And his ascent has, in no small part, been propelled by the biggest, loudest and possibly angriest youth electorate in Colombia’s history, demanding the transformation of a country long cleaved by deep social and racial inequality.There are now nearly nine million Colombian voters 28 or younger, the most in history, and a quarter of the electorate. They are restive, raised on promises of higher education and good jobs, disillusioned by current prospects, more digitally connected and arguably more empowered than any previous generation.“Petro is change,” said Camila Riveros, 30, wrapped in a Colombian flag at a campaign event this month outside Bogotá, the capital. “People are tired of eating dirt.”Gustavo Petro this month in Santa Marta. He has held a steady lead in most polls, though he may not have enough support to avoid a runoff. As Colombians prepare to vote on Sunday, Mr. Petro has promised to overhaul the country’s capitalist economic model and vastly expand social programs, pledging to introduce guaranteed work with a basic income, shift the country to a publicly controlled health system and increase access to higher education, in part by raising taxes on the rich.Mr. Petro has been ahead in the polls for months — though surveys suggest he will face a runoff in June — and his popularity reflects both leftist gains across Latin America and an anti-incumbent fervor that has intensified as the pandemic has battered the region.“We have a decision to make,” Mr. Petro said at another campaign event this month in the Caribbean city of Cartagena. “We maintain things the way they are, or we scream: Freedom!”But critics say Mr. Petro is ill-suited for office, arguing that his policies, which include a plan to halt all new oil exploration in a country where fuel is a critical export, would ruin the economy.He has also taken direct swings at the country’s major institutions — most notably the armed forces — escalating tensions with military leaders and leading to concerns about the stability of Colombia’s longstanding but vulnerable democracy.Mr. Petro’s main opponent, Federico Gutiérrez, 47, a former mayor of Medellín, the country’s second largest city, and the candidate of the conservative establishment, proposes a more modest path forward.“Of course we need to change many things,” he said in an interview, citing a plan that would ramp up fracking for oil, steer more money to local governments and create a special unit to fight urban crime. “But changes can never mean a leap into the void without a parachute.”A third candidate, Rodolfo Hernández, 77, a former mayor with a populist, anti-corruption platform has been climbing in the polls.Mr. Petro’s main opponent, Federico Gutiérrez, is a former mayor of Medellín, the country’s second largest city, and the candidate of the conservative establishment.The election comes at a difficult moment for the country. Polls show widespread dissatisfaction with the government of the current president, Iván Duque, who is backed by the same political coalition as Mr. Gutiérrez, and frustration over chronic poverty, a widening income gap and insecurity, all of which have worsened during the pandemic.Among those hurt the most by these problems are younger Colombians, who are likely to play a big role in determining whether the country takes a major lurch to the left.Young people led anti-government protests that filled the streets of Colombia last year, dominating the national conversation for weeks. At least 46 people died — many of them young, unarmed protesters and many at the hands of the police — in what became referred to as the “national strike.”Some analysts expect young people to vote in record numbers, energized not just by Mr. Petro, but by his running mate, Francia Márquez, 40, an environmental activist with a gender, race and class-conscious focus who would be the country’s first Black vice president.“The TikTok generation that is very connected to Francia, that is very connected to Petro, is going to be decisive,” said Fernando Posada, 30, a political analyst.Some analysts expect young people to vote in record numbers, energized not just by Mr. Petro but by his running mate, Francia Márquez, an environmental activist.Today’s younger generation is the most educated in Colombian history, but is also grappling with 10 percent annual inflation, a 20 percent youth unemployment rate and a 40 percent poverty rate. Many — both supporters and critics of Mr. Petro — say they feel betrayed by decades of leaders who have promised opportunity but delivered little.In a May poll by the firm Invamer, more than 53 percent of voters ages 18 to 24 and about 45 percent of voters ages 25 to 34 said they were planning to vote for Mr. Petro. In both age categories, less than half those numbers said they would vote for Mr. Gutierrez or Mr. Hernández.Natalia Arévalo, 30, a single mother of three, marched for days during protests last year, with her daughter, Lizeth, 10, wearing a placard around her neck that read: “What awaits us children?”“You have to choose between paying your debts and feeding your kids,” said Ms. Arévalo, who supports Mr. Petro.“You can’t eat eggs, you can’t eat meat, you can’t eat anything,” she added. “We have to give a 180-degree turn to all that we’ve had for the last 20 years.”José Fernando Mazo, a law student, waving in the crowd at a rally for Mr. Petro in Cartagena on May 14.To be sure, many young voters are skeptical of Mr. Petro’s ability to deliver on his promises.In Fusagasugá, Nina Cruz, 27, a cafe worker, said Mr. Petro would fail Colombia’s struggling families, and she was particularly repulsed by his past as a member of a leftist rebel group.The country has a long history of violent militias that claim to help the indigent — and end up terrorizing them.“What he is saying is: ‘I’m going to help the poor,’” she said. “That’s a total lie.”Mr. Petro, an economist, grew up outside Bogotá. As a teenager, he joined the M-19, a leftist urban militia that sought to seize power and claimed to promote social justice.The group was never as large or as violent as the country’s main guerrilla force, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. But in 1985, the M-19 occupied a national judicial building, sparking a battle with the police and the military that left 94 people dead.Mr. Petro, who did not participate in the takeover, ended up in prison for his involvement with the group.He eventually demobilized and ran for a senate seat, emerging as the combative face of the left, pushing open conversations about corruption and wrongdoing.Some critics have warned that Mr. Petro’s energy proposals would bankrupt the country. Oil represents 40 percent of Colombia’s exports and Juan Carlos Echeverry, a former finance minister, has said that halting oil exploration “would be economic suicide.’’Ballistic shields on stage during Mr. Petro’s appearance in Cartagena. He has been the recent target of death threats. Mr. Petro also has a reputation for an authoritarian streak. As mayor of Bogotá, he circumvented the City Council and often failed to listen to advisers, said Daniel Garcia-Peña, who worked with Mr. Petro for a decade before quitting in 2012. In his resignation letter Mr. Garcia-Peña called Mr. Petro “a despot.”The election comes as polls show growing distrust in the country’s democratic institutions, including the country’s national registrar, an election body that bungled the initial vote count in a congressional election in March.The error, which the registrar called procedural, has led to concerns that losing candidates will declare fraud, setting off a legitimacy crisis.The country is also being roiled by rising violence, threatening to undermine the democratic process. The Mission for Electoral Observation, a local group, called this pre-election period the most violent in 12 years.Candidates pushing change have been murdered on the campaign trail before.Both Mr. Petro and Ms. Márquez have received death threats, and at his campaign event in Cartagena, he took the stage flanked by men holding bulletproof shields.Young supporters of Mr. Petro at a rally in Cartagena on May 14. A recent poll found that Mr. Petro was the leading candidate among voters 18 to 34.Some voters held signs that read “Black children’s lives matter,” and “if it’s not Petro, we’re screwed.”There was excitement — but also trepidation.“What we want are opportunities for everyone,” said Lauren Jiménez, 21, a university student.But “if Petro can’t follow through, I know we will see the same thing that happened with the Duque government: a social explosion,” she warned. “Because we’re tired of staying quiet.”Sofía Villamil More

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      5 G.O.P. Candidates for Michigan Governor Are Disqualified Over Forged Signatures

      by

      Five Republican candidates for Michigan governor were disqualified by a state canvassing board on Thursday for submitting nominating petitions that officials said had contained thousands of forged signatures. The decision sent the race, in a key battleground state, into chaos and dealt a serious blow to the party’s plans to challenge Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the Democratic incumbent.The five candidates, half of the party’s field, were denied a spot on the Aug. 2 primary ballot by the Board of State Canvassers, including James Craig, a former Detroit police chief, and Perry Johnson, a wealthy businessman.Both had widely been viewed as favorites for the Republican nomination before election officials this week rejected thousands of signatures gathered on behalf of the candidates, finding that the names had been forged and were collected by fraudulent petition circulators.The ruling was expected to draw a host of lawsuits from Republicans, who have characterized the move as politically motivated.“It is a travesty that partisans in a position to uphold democracy and the will of the people allowed politics to get in the way,” Mr. Craig said in a statement on Thursday, vowing to appeal the decision in court.Deadlocked along party lines, with two Democrats supporting the disqualification and two Republicans opposing it, the canvassing board upheld a recommendation by the Michigan Bureau of Elections to exclude the candidates. A candidate must get a majority of votes from the board’s four members to be certified for a spot on the ballot.On Monday, the elections bureau determined that the five Republican candidates for governor did not meet the requirement of submitting signatures from at least 15,000 registered voters.In a statement on Thursday, Ron Weiser, the chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, sharply criticized the decision.“The way this bureau deviated from its historical practice is unprecedented, and I think the arguments laid out by the challengers should have their time in court,” Mr. Weiser said. “This is about fighting against voter disenfranchisement and for choice at the ballot box.”John Yob, a campaign strategist for Mr. Johnson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday. In a series of tweets on Monday night, Mr. Yob said Mr. Johnson’s campaign would challenge the ruling.Perry Johnson greeting supporters last month at the Michigan Republican Convention.Daniel Shular/Mlive.Com/The Grand Rapids Press, via Associated PressRepublicans have directed criticism at the head of the state agency that runs the elections bureau: Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat who is secretary of state.A spokeswoman for Ms. Benson declined to comment on Thursday after the canvassing board’s decision, noting that it is an independent entity.In its review this week of the nominating petitions, the elections bureau issued a stinging indictment of the methods used by the candidates’ campaigns to collect signatures and the operatives working for the candidates.“The bureau is unaware of another election cycle in which this many circulators submitted such a substantial volume of fraudulent petition sheets consisting of invalid signatures,” the bureau said. It also clarified that it saw no evidence that the candidates had any knowledge of the fraud.Understand the Battle Over U.S. Voting RightsCard 1 of 6Why are voting rights an issue now? More

    • 225 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      ‘The G.O.P. Has Gone Even Farther to the Right Than I Expected’: Three Writers Talk About the Midterms

      by

      Frank Bruni, a contributing Opinion writer, hosted an online conversation with Lis Smith, a Democratic communications strategist, and Matthew Continetti of the American Enterprise Institute about a month of primaries, how they have shaped the midterms and what Democrats and Republicans can hope for and expect.FRANK BRUNI: On Tuesday, at least 19 children and two teachers were killed in the latest mass school shooting in a country that has witnessed too many of them. In my heartfelt (and heartsick) opinion, that should change the political landscape. But, realistically, will it?LIS SMITH: It should, but I unfortunately don’t think it will move the needle a ton.MATTHEW CONTINETTI: I agree. Unfortunately, history suggests that the political landscape won’t change after the horror in Texas.There’s a long and terrible list of school shootings. Each incident has been met with public horror and with calls for gun controls. But little has happened to either reduce the number of guns in America or to shift power to advocates for firearm regulation.SMITH: After Sandy Hook, we did see a number of states — Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, New York — take strong action on gun control, and I still believe that we will most likely see gun-control legislation on the state versus the federal level.And this does raise the stakes of the midterms. It will allow Democrats in marginal, suburban seats to use the issue against their Republican opponents, given that nearly every Republican in the House voted against H.R. 8, which would implement background checks and common-sense restrictions of the sort that have had broad public support.BRUNI: After that cheery start, let’s pull back and zoom out to a bigger picture. Have the primaries so far conformed to your expectations — or are there particular results or general patterns that surprise you and that challenge, or throw into doubt, your assumptions about what will happen in November?CONTINETTI: I’d say they are shaping up as one might expect. The president’s party rarely does well in midterms. The Biden Democrats appear to be no exception. What has surprised me is the depth of public disillusionment with President Biden, his party and the direction of the country. My guess is Democrats are surprised as well.SMITH: We have seen common-sense Democrats like Shontel Brown in Ohio, Valerie Foushee in North Carolina and Morgan McGarvey in Kentucky win against far-left Democrats, and that’s a good thing for the party and our chances in November.The G.O.P. has gone even farther right than I expected. Just look at Doug Mastriano, who won the Republican governor’s primary in Pennsylvania. He funded buses to shuttle people to the Capitol on Jan. 6 and helped efforts to overturn the 2020 election in the state. He opposes abortion without exceptions. He makes Ron DeSantis look like Charlie Baker.BRUNI: Matt, do ultra-MAGA Republican candidates like him or for that matter Ted Budd in the North Carolina Senate race potentially undermine what might otherwise be a red-wave year? I’m thinking about a guest essay you wrote for The Times not long ago in which you raised the concern that Donald Trump and his minions would spoil things. Does that concern persist?CONTINETTI: Indeed, it does. Where Republicans got the idea that Trump is a political winner is a mystery to me. By the end of his presidency, Democrats were in full control of government. And he has been unpopular with the independents and suburban moderates necessary for any party to win a majority.I draw a distinction, though, between Mastriano and Budd. Mastriano is, as you say, ultra-MAGA. Even Trump was wary of him until the very end of the primary. Budd is a more typical fusion of conservative movement traits with Trump MAGA traits. If I had to guess, Budd is more likely to win than Mastriano.BRUNI: Lis, is Matt splitting hairs? I mean, in the House, Budd voted to overturn the 2020 election results. I worry that we’re cutting certain Republican conspiracists a break because they’re not as flagrant conspiracists as, say, Marjorie Taylor Greene or Madison Cawthorn.SMITH: It’s splitting hairs a bit. But he’s right — Mastriano proved so polarizing and so toxic that you had a former Trump adviser in Pennsylvania, David Urban, say that he was too extreme. He was too MAGA for the MAGA crowd. The G.O.P. has been more welcoming of Budd, but he also wanted to overturn 2020 and he also opposes abortion in every instance. North Carolina voters have a history of turning back candidates with extreme social views. That’s one of the reasons Roy Cooper won his first race for governor — the G.O.P. overreached on the bathrooms issue, the law that restricted restroom access for transgender people.BRUNI: What shall we call “too MAGA for MAGA”? Mega-MAGA? Meta-MAGA? Maxi-MAGA? Regardless, we keep asking, after every primary: What does this say about Trump’s level of sway? Is that question distracting us from bigger, more relevant ones?SMITH: Trump is a factor here, but Democrats really need to keep the focus on these candidates and their beliefs and make this an election between the Democratic candidate and the Republican candidate. As we saw in Virginia, Democrats can’t rely on painting their opponents as Trump 2.0 — they need to explicitly define and disqualify the opposition, and these mega-MAGA extremists give us plenty of material. The people who aren’t as out there as Mastriano give us plenty of material, too.BRUNI: Matt, I know you’re not here to help Democrats, but if you were advising them, what would you tell them to do to head off a possible or probable midterms drubbing?CONTINETTI: If I were a Democratic consultant, the first thing I would tell my clients would be to take shelter from the storm. There is no escaping Biden’s unpopularity. The best hope for Democratic incumbents is to somehow denationalize their campaigns. Even that probably won’t be enough to escape the gravitational pull of Biden’s declining job approval.BRUNI: Lis, the “plenty of material” you refer to must include abortion. Along those lines, do you see anything potentially happening in the months ahead that could change the trajectory of the midterms? For example, what if the Supreme Court in June in fact overturns Roe or further weakens gun regulations? What about hearings on the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol?SMITH: Roe is an example of something that could change the trajectory of the election. I usually think of the presidential election as when the broad electorate turns out and midterms as when pissed-off voters come out to vote. The Supreme Court taking away something that has been a fundamental right for 50 years will definitely piss people off and bring some of the Biden voters who might have otherwise voted Republican this year back into our corner. But voters have more reasons to be angry than just Roe.BRUNI: What are you thinking of? I’d like to hear it and then what Matt has to say about it.SMITH: We need to be screaming from the rooftops about what the Republicans in Congress are doing. They voted against the American Rescue Plan (then took credit for the checks that went to American households), mostly voted against infrastructure (then took credit for projects in their districts), mostly voted against capping the price of insulin, voted against stopping oil companies from price gouging, mostly voted against a bill that would include importing baby formula.Why? Because they want to impose as much misery as possible on the American people so that voters blame Biden and vote Republican in November. It’s really cynical, dark stuff. And then when they win, they want to criminalize abortions and ensure that we never have free and fair elections again. That’s my rant.CONTINETTI: Voters will hear a lot of what Lis is saying before November, but the Democrats’ problem is that they are in power as inflation comes roaring back after a 40-year absence. I am open to the idea that the end of Roe v. Wade may induce pro-choice voters off the sidelines in some swing districts, but in the weeks since the leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion, the evidence of a pro-abortion-rights surge among voters is scattered at best. As the great Mark Shields likes to say, “When the economy is bad, the economy is the only issue.” Right now the economy is the issue, and it’s hurting the Democratic Party.BRUNI: As we were all typing, Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat who’s running for governor in Texas, where this latest horrible massacre occurred, interrupted a news conference being held by the incumbent Republican governor, Greg Abbott, to shout at Abbott that he was doing nothing to stop such bloodshed. In its urgency and passion, is that smart politics that could make a difference, Lis?SMITH: That’s a great example of going on the offensive, generating the emotion and pissed-off-ness that Democrats need to turn out our voters in the midterms. We often lose the gun debate because it’s about policy particulars. If Democrats can channel the outrage that a lot of Americans feel — particularly parents — toward the politicians who are just sitting behind tables and choosing inaction and make this about political courage, we can potentially flip the script. Sometimes these sorts of confrontations can come across as a little stunt-y, but in this case, it was executed well and made Governor Abbott and his lackeys look cowardly.CONTINETTI: O’Rourke is running 10 points behind Abbott, and I don’t think his outburst will help him close that gap. Many Democrats believe that pissed-off-ness is the key to winning elections, but I don’t know what evidence there is for that case. The key to winning elections is to appeal to independent voters and moderates in the suburbs.SMITH: Trump’s whole pitch is to play on grievances! And midterm elections are traditionally where voters air their grievances: They’re mad about inflation, mad about gas prices — in 2018, they were mad about Republicans’ trying to repeal Obamacare. This is a strategy that appeals to independent and moderate voters in the suburbs — they are often with Democrats on abortion, with us on guns.CONTINETTI: As you know, Trump did not win the popular vote in either 2016 or 2020. Pissed-off-ness gets you only so far. I agree that it helps when you are the out party in a national election and can blame the incumbent for poor economic and social conditions. Whether getting angry will work in Texas this year and for this candidate is another matter.BRUNI: Matt, why aren’t the Republicans who are losing to other Republicans in these primaries, as Lis put it earlier, “screaming from the rooftops” about election irregularities and rigged results the way they do when they lose to Democrats? Either a state holds trustworthy elections or it doesn’t, no?CONTINETTI: We’ve been reminded in recent weeks of what you might call Trumpian Exceptionalism. Whenever Trump loses, he says the result is fraudulent. He’s been urging his choice in the Pennsylvania Senate primary, Mehmet Oz, to declare victory in a race too close to call. Yet Oz has refrained, as have other Trump picks like the former senator David Perdue, who lost in a landslide in Georgia to the incumbent governor, Brian Kemp. Is there a Republican future in which candidates regularly ignore Trump? Some of us hope so. Though we’ve learned not to hope too much.BRUNI: Let’s end with a lighting round of short questions. At this point, just over five months out, what percentage chance would you say the Democrats have of holding the House? The Senate?CONTINETTI: Math, much less statistics, has never been my strong suit. Let’s just say that the Democrats have a very slim chance of holding the House and a slightly less-than-even chance of holding the Senate.SMITH: Emphasis on “at this point”: 51 percent chance Democrats hold the Senate, 15 percent House.BRUNI: In 2028 or 2032, will we be talking about Sarah Huckabee Sanders, possible Republican presidential nominee?!?!SMITH: Wow, I’ve never thought of that, but I can see it. At some point the Republicans will nominate a woman for president — let’s hope that you didn’t just conjure this one.CONTINETTI: I can see that, too — maybe that’s when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will make her presidential debut as well.BRUNI: Thoughts on Herschel Walker (potentially) in the Senate, in five words or less.SMITH: Death of an institution.CONTINETTI: Fun to watch.BRUNI: Lastly, in one sentence without too many conjunctions and clauses, give me a reason not to feel too despondent-verging-on-hopeless about our political present and immediate future?SMITH: We’ve gotten through worse.CONTINETTI: When you study history, you are reminded that America has been through a lot like this before — and worse — and has not only endured but prospered. We’ll get through this moment. It will just take time.Sorry, that’s three sentences — but important ones!Frank Bruni (@FrankBruni) is a professor of public policy at Duke, the author of the book “The Beauty of Dusk,” and a contributing Opinion writer. He writes a weekly email newsletter and can be found on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Matthew Continetti (@continetti) is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of “The Right: The Hundred Year War for American Conservatism.” Lis Smith (@Lis_Smith), a Democratic communications strategist, was a senior adviser to Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign and is the author of the forthcoming memoir “Any Given Tuesday: A Political Love Story.”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

    • 113 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Tom Kean’s Strategy in Run for Congress: Say Less

      by

      Ahead of next month’s primary, Tom Kean Jr., running in New Jersey’s most competitive House race, hopes to avoid alienating moderate swing voters while facing challengers from the right.Tom Kean Jr., a New Jersey Republican locked in the state’s most competitive congressional race, has refused to debate his primary opponents.He has avoided talking to most reporters.And he has dodged questions about whether he agrees with the Republican National Committee’s characterization of the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol as “legitimate political discourse.”Mr. Kean, the scion of a storied political family, has adopted what appears to be a core strategy as he tries to avoid alienating moderate swing voters while facing challengers from the right: to keep his mouth, basically, shut.“I’m calling it the vow of silence,” said Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University.Julie Roginsky, a Democratic political consultant, said a key question will be whether Mr. Kean’s strategy — however cynical — works.“Did Tom Kean figure out a winning formula in these kinds of swing districts? Which is to say nothing?” she said.“Then use the media’s castigation of you for keeping your mouth shut as a dog whistle to the base?” she added.Whether the political calculation works or not, the results of next month’s primary are likely to be seen as a measure of former President Donald J. Trump’s grip on the G.O.P. in a state better known for a moderate brand of Republican politics once epitomized by leaders like Mr. Kean’s father, a popular two-term governor.Most of Mr. Kean’s six primary opponents have tried to dent his credentials as a conservative as they compete for the attention of voters loyal to Mr. Trump.One opponent, State Assemblyman Erik Peterson, a leader among Republican lawmakers who staged a public challenge to a State House Covid-19 vaccine mandate, said Mr. Kean had “never been a conservative until this race.” Another, Phil Rizzo, a former evangelical Christian pastor who has promoted Mr. Trump’s claims of voter fraud and said he remained unconvinced of President Biden’s victory, has highlighted what he calls Mr. Kean’s “liberal voting record.”A former state assemblyman and senator, Mr. Kean, 53, has the institutional support of county and state leaders and a prime spot on ballots. The large field of candidates is expected to splinter the conservative vote, benefiting Mr. Kean, who has raised nine times as much campaign cash as his next closest opponent, Mr. Rizzo.If Mr. Kean wins the primary on June 7, he is likely to again face the incumbent, Tom Malinowski, a second-term Democrat who narrowly beat Mr. Kean in 2020.The primary may also offer hints about whether Republicans in vital swing districts will remain as energized as they appeared to be last year.Largely affluent and suburban, the Seventh Congressional District is filled with the type of well-educated swing voters who helped Democrats across the country flip control of the House in 2018 and who are seen as crucial to November’s midterm elections.Registered Democrats in New Jersey outnumber Republicans by more than one million voters. Yet Republican turnout surged in November, and Gov. Philip D. Murphy, a Democrat, won a second term by a far narrower margin than expected. The Democratic Party retained control of the Legislature but lost seven seats, including one held by the powerful Senate president, Stephen M. Sweeney.Gov. Philip D. Murphy is the first Democrat to win re-election in New Jersey since 1977. But he won by a far smaller margin than expected. Michelle Gustafson for The New York Times“The question is going to be whether or not Republican enthusiasm continues to be at an elevated rate,” Professor Rasmussen said.Mr. Kean’s campaign said he was not available for an interview and said it did not provide his public schedules, while noting that he planned to attend several parades and events over Memorial Day weekend.Last weekend, at a large block party that drew candidates for state and federal races, Mr. Rizzo was filmed asking Mr. Kean, “We going to debate or not?” Mr. Kean did not respond, and Mr. Rizzo, 45, posted the video on Twitter.At the same time, Mr. Kean has actively played to the more conservative wing of the G.O.P., a fact the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has tried to exploit in regular email blasts.Mr. Kean stood with Kevin McCarthy, the polarizing Republican minority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives, to announce his candidacy. He traveled to the Mexican border to highlight his opposition to Mr. Biden’s immigration policy, even though it is not an issue that separates him from his primary opponents.Last year, on Jan. 6, Mr. Kean and a liberal former Democratic senator, Loretta Weinberg, issued a joint statement urging Capitol protesters to “go home immediately or face the full force of the law.”“What we are witnessing in Washington,” the statement read, “is not how our democracy is supposed to function.”But he remained silent earlier this year as other prominent New Jersey Republicans like former Gov. Christine Todd Whitman and Leonard Lance — who in 2018 lost to Mr. Malinowski — signed a letter calling the Republican National Committee’s stance on the Jan. 6 events “an affront to the rule of law, peaceful self-government and the constitutional order.”The state’s largest news outlet, The Star-Ledger, criticized his decision not to take a position in an editorial that ran under a headline that described Mr. Kean as a “cowering candidate.”The Seventh Congressional District takes in New York City commuter towns like Westfield, where Mr. Kean lives, reaches north into one of the most conservative sections of the state and west into well-heeled communities dotted with genteel estates.With a winning mix of college-educated voters and, in 2018, widespread anti-Trump fervor, it was one of four New Jersey congressional districts that flipped to Democratic control during the last midterm cycle.But Mr. Trump is no longer in the White House and Mr. Biden’s popularity is waning. 401(k) retirement plans have stopped their meteoric ascent. And gas prices are ticking toward $5 a gallon as affordability becomes the watchword among politicians.In 2020, in his third run for Congress, Mr. Kean came within 5,329 votes of toppling Mr. Malinowski.Then, late last year, Mr. Kean’s odds of winning got better: The district’s boundaries were redrawn to include more Republican-dominant towns in a process designed to reflect statewide demographic shifts in the 2020 census. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report has since assigned the race a “leans Republican” rating.The Seventh Congressional District now includes Hunterdon and Warren Counties and parts of Morris, Somerset, Sussex and Union Counties.Morris County offers a vivid example of the type of political shift that contributed to Mr. Biden’s victory. It is roughly 70 percent white, more than half of its residents have four-year college degrees and the median income is $117,000.Republicans outnumber Democrats there by 21,000, but that advantage has narrowed since 2016, when the G.O.P. had a 39,000 voter edge, according to New Jersey’s Department of State.In 2016, Mr. Trump beat Hillary Clinton by 9 percentage points among voters in the portion of Morris County then included in the Seventh Congressional District, according to the Daily Kos. Four years later, Mr. Trump lost to Mr. Biden there by less than 1 percentage point.Ms. Roginsky said November’s elections will offer a window into whether the swing voters who cast ballots against Mr. Trump remain in the Democratic fold when the polarizing former president is not on the ballot or in the White House.“Whether that realignment is permanent — or whether that was just a reaction to Donald Trump’s presidency,” she said. “That to me is the biggest question mark of this election.”One unknown factor is abortion, and how a possible decision by the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, the legal precedent that has for nearly 50 years given women a right to terminate pregnancies, might energize female voters. Another is an investigation by the House Committee on Ethics into allegations that Mr. Malinowski failed to properly disclose hundreds of thousands of dollars in stock trades. Mr. Malinowski has blamed “carelessness on my part” for the lack of disclosure and said he regretted and took full responsibility for it.Assembly members Erik Peterson, right, and Brian Bergen, refused to comply with a State House rule requiring Covid-19 vaccination or a negative test.Mike Catalini/Associated PressMr. Rizzo and Mr. Peterson, who has been endorsed by New Jersey Right to Life, both said they do not believe abortion had factored heavily into the primary race against Mr. Kean, who voted against a bill that codified abortion rights in New Jersey.Mr. Rizzo, a real estate developer, does not live within the district where he is running, but said he and his family were in “a process of moving” there. He came in second in last year’s Republican primary for governor, and said the attraction voters have to people like him and Mr. Trump — whom he said he did not vote for in 2016 — was uncomplicated.“We have two parties in New Jersey: the political class and everybody else,” Mr. Rizzo said. “And nobody’s representing the everybody else.” More

    • 100 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      Two Republicans Face Disqualification in Michigan Governor’s Race

      by

      Two top Republican candidates for governor in Michigan are in danger of being denied a spot on the primary ballot after the state’s election bureau invalidated thousands of signatures submitted by their campaigns, saying many of the names had been forged and were collected by fraudulent petition circulators.The Michigan Bureau of Elections recommended on Monday that James Craig, a former Detroit police chief, and Perry Johnson, a wealthy businessman, be excluded from the Aug. 2 primary, finding that neither candidate met the requirement of submitting signatures from at least 15,000 registered voters.Republicans in the state characterized the move as a politically motivated effort from a Democratic-led agency, while Mr. Craig pointed to his standing in the race.“They want me out,” Mr. Craig said, alluding to Republicans and Democrats. “I’ve been leading.”Three other lesser-known Republican candidates for governor also fell short of the threshold, the bureau determined, meaning that five of the party’s 10 candidates who filed to run for the state’s top office would be ineligible.In its review of the nominating petitions for both candidates, the elections bureau issued a stinging indictment of the methods used by their campaigns to collect signatures and the operatives working for the candidates.“The Bureau is unaware of another election cycle in which this many circulators submitted such a substantial volume of fraudulent petition sheets consisting of invalid signatures,” the bureau said, but clarified that it saw no evidence that the candidates had any knowledge of the fraud.Mr. Craig said in an interview on Tuesday that he would go to court to challenge any effort to deny him access to the ballot.“None of the candidates knew about the fraud,” Mr. Craig said. “Certainly, I didn’t. There needs to be an investigation and prosecution, if, in fact, there is probable cause that they did in fact commit fraud.”While the final say over the candidates’ eligibility rests with the Board of State Canvassers, a separate panel that will meet on Thursday, the recommended disqualification of Mr. Craig and Mr. Johnson threatened to create chaos for Republicans in their quest to challenge Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat.Perry Johnson was also widely viewed as one of the top candidates in the state’s Republican primary for governor.Daniel Shular/The Grand Rapids Press, via Associated PressBoth Mr. Craig and Mr. Johnson were widely viewed as front-runners for the party’s nomination in a key battleground state, where Republicans have clashed with Democrats over the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election and pandemic restrictions.More than half of the 21,305 signatures submitted by Mr. Craig’s campaign were rejected, leaving him with 10,192 valid signatures, the bureau said in its report, which noted that little effort was made to vary handwriting.“In some cases, rather than attempting varying signatures, the circulator would intentionally scrawl illegibly. In other instances, they circulated petition sheets among themselves, each filling out a line,” the bureau said of the petitions for Mr. Craig.Mr. Craig identified Vanguard Field Strategies, an Austin, Texas, firm, as helping to manage the canvassing effort, one that he said relied on several subcontractors that were previously unknown to him. He said that the onus was on the firm to have checks and balances to detect fraud, and he called it “shortsighted” and unrealistic to expect that a busy candidate would verify more than 20,000 signatures.Vanguard Field Strategies confirmed on Tuesday that 18 of the people identified in the elections bureau’s report as circulating the fraudulent petitions had been working for another firm that it had subcontracted to help it gather signatures. The company would not identify the subcontractor, which it characterized in a statement on Tuesday as a nationally respected Republican firm.“The allegations of fraudulent activity, and individuals infiltrating Chief Craig’s campaign in an effort to sabotage it, is very concerning,” Joe J. Williams, Vanguard’s president, said in a statement. “I hope the individuals charged with fraud (none of which worked for or were paid by Vanguard) are held responsible if the allegations are true.”According to Vanguard, Mr. Craig’s campaign retained its services about two months ago, having collected just 500 signatures at the time — the deadline to submit them was April 19.The elections bureau rejected 9,393 of the 23,193 signatures submitted by Mr. Johnson’s campaign, leaving him with 13,800 valid signatures. Some of the fraudulent signatures represented voters who had died or moved out of the state, the bureau said.John Yob, a campaign strategist for Mr. Johnson, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday. In a series of tweets on Monday night, Mr. Yob said that the move to disqualify Republican candidates en masse was politically motivated and criticized the head of the state agency that the elections bureau is part of: Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat who is secretary of state.Mr. Yob said that the campaign would contest the bureau’s recommendation.“We strongly believe they are refusing to count thousands of signatures from legitimate voters who signed the petitions and look forward to winning this fight before the Board, and if necessary, in the courts,” he said.On Tuesday, Ron Weiser, the chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, slammed the move to exclude the Republicans from the primary ballot on Twitter.“This is far from over,” Mr. Weiser said. “Democrats claim to be the champions of democracy but are actively angling behind the scenes to disqualify their opponents in an unprecedented way because they want to take away choice from Michigan voters.”Tracy Wimmer, a spokeswoman for Ms. Benson, said in an email on Tuesday night that the election bureau was not swayed by politics.“The Bureau of Elections is staffed by election professionals of integrity who conducted their review of candidate submissions in a nonpartisan manner in accordance with state law,” Ms. Wimmer said.Election officials said that they had identified 36 people who had submitted fraudulent petition sheets consisting entirely of invalid signatures. On Monday, a total of 19 candidates learned that they had not met the signature requirement to get onto the ballot, including three Republicans and one Democrat seeking House seats, and 10 nonpartisan candidates seeking judicial posts.Democrats had separately challenged the petitions of Mr. Craig and Mr. Johnson, but the bureau did not take action because those candidates did not have enough signatures. Mark Brewer, a former chairman of the Michigan Democrats and a lawyer who challenged Mr. Craig’s petitions, defended the steps taken by the elections bureau on Twitter.“What kind of message does it send if any candidate with forged signatures is allowed on the ballot?” Mr. Brewer said on Tuesday. In a 17-page report detailing its findings on Monday, the elections bureau said that the head of one canvassing firm used by the candidates to gather signatures had pleaded guilty to two counts of election fraud in 2011 in Virginia. He was accused of instructing two individuals to sign as a witness on dozens of petition sheets filled with signatures they did not collect, the bureau said.The report did not identify the person, but cited links to news stories and court cases that pointed to Shawn Wilmoth, a political operative based in Michigan, and Mr. Wilmoth’s company, First Choice Contracting LLC.A person who answered the phone at the company on Tuesday said that Mr. Wilmoth was not available, and Mr. Wilmoth did not respond to messages seeking comment.When asked if Mr. Wilmoth or his firm had done work for his campaign, Mr. Craig said on Tuesday that he had learned only that day of a potential nexus.“I don’t want to make excuses,” Mr. Craig said. More