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      How to Keep Extremists Out of Power

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyHow to Keep Extremists Out of PowerEvery political reform proposal must be judged by its ability to fuel or weaken extremist candidates.Mr. Pildes has spent his career as a legal scholar analyzing the intersection of politics and law and how that impacts our elections.Feb. 25, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETCredit…Shay Horse/NurPhoto, via Getty ImagesAmerican democracy faces alarming risks from extremist forces that have rapidly gained ground in our politics. The most urgent focus of political reform must be to marginalize, to the extent possible, these destabilizing forces.Every reform proposal must be judged through this lens: Is it likely to fuel or to weaken the power of extremist politics and candidates?In healthy democracies, they are rewarded for appealing to the broadest forces in politics, not the narrowest. This is precisely why American elections take place in a “first past the post” system rather than the proportional representation system many other democracies use.What structural changes would reward politicians whose appeal is broadest? We should start with a focus on four areas.Reform the presidential nomination processUntil the 1970s, presidential nominees were selected through a convention-based system, which means that a candidate had to obtain a broad consensus among the various interests and factions in the party. “Brokered conventions” — which required several rounds of balloting to choose a nominee — offered a vivid demonstration of how the sausage of consensus was made. In 1952, for example, the Republican Party convention selected the more moderate Dwight D. Eisenhower over Robert A. Taft, the popular leader of the more extreme wing of the party, who opposed the creation of NATO.Our current primary system shifted control from party insiders to voters. Now, in a primary with several credible contenders, a candidate can “win” with 35 percent of the vote. This allows polarizing candidates to win the nomination even if many party members find them objectionable. (In 2016, Donald Trump won many primaries with less than 40 percent of the vote.)How can we restore some of the party-wide consensus the convention system required? The parties can use ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference. This rewards candidates with broad appeal to a party’s voters, even if they have fewer passionate supporters. In this system, a candidate intensely popular with 35 percent of the party’s voters but intensely disliked by much of the rest would not prevail. A candidate who is the first choice of only 35 percent but the second choice of another 50 percent would do better. Ranked-choice voting reduces the prospects of factional party candidates. Presidents with a broad base of support can institute major reforms, as Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan demonstrated.Reform the party primariesMany incumbents take more extreme positions than they might otherwise endorse because they worry about a primary challenge.One way to help defang that threat is to eliminate “sore-loser” laws. These laws, which exist in some form in 47 states, bar candidates who have lost in a party primary from running in the general election as an independent or third-party candidate. Thus, if a more moderate candidate loses in a primary to a more extreme one, that person is shut out from the general election — even if he or she would likely beat the (sometimes extreme) winners of the party primaries. One study finds that sore-loser laws favor more ideological candidates: Democratic candidates in states with the law are nearly six points more liberal and Republicans nearly nine-to-10 points more conservative than in states without these laws.Though Alaska has a sore-loser law, Senator Lisa Murkowski’s 2010 re-election is still instructive. That year, as an incumbent, she lost the Republican primary to a conservative candidate endorsed by the Tea Party and Sarah Palin. But the state permitted an exception to the sore-loser law for write-in candidates, and Ms. Murkowski, running as a write-in Republican candidate, won the general election.If sore-loser laws are eliminated, that reform should be combined with ranked-choice voting in the general election. That would ensure that in a multicandidate general election, the winner would reflect a broad consensus. Other ideas for restructuring primaries to minimize the existence of factional candidates include one adopted by Alaska voters in November: The top four candidates in a single primary move on to the general election, where the winner is chosen through ranked-choice voting.Reform gerrymanderingMany reformers agree on the need to take redistricting out of the hands of partisan state legislatures and give it to a commission. In several recent state ballot initiatives, voters have endorsed this change. But that still raises a question: What constitutes a fair map?Redistricting reform should have as a goal the creation of competitive election districts. Competitive districts pressure candidates from both the left and the right, which creates incentives to appeal to the political center. They also encourage more moderate candidates to run in the first place, because they know they have a greater prospect of winning than in a district whose seat is safe for the other party.In safe seat districts, as long as a candidate survives the primary, that person is assured of winning the general election — which means primary candidates don’t have to move toward the center.The sources of centrism in the House or Senate frequently come from politicians in swing districts or states. In the recent House impeachment, for example, the percentage of Republicans elected with 57 percent of the vote or less who voted for impeachment was more than double that of Republicans elected with more than 57 percent of the vote. Similarly, it was Democrats holding competitive seats who resisted the initial impeachment of President Trump, until news broke of his call with Ukraine.Not every district can be made competitive. But in 2018, maps that emphasized competitiveness could have produced at least 242 highly competitive districts, although only 72 races actually were competitive. The more senators and representatives who face competitive pressures in their general elections, the larger the forces of compromise and negotiation will be in Congress.The goal of creating competitive districts should not take a back seat to approaches that focus on whether the partisan outcomes match vote shares in a particular map. In these approaches, the closer a plan comes to matching the number of seats one party gets to its statewide share of the vote, the fairer that map is deemed to be. So, if 55 percent of the statewide vote goes to Democrats, then Democrats should have roughly 55 percent of the seats in the state Legislature and the U.S. House delegation from the state. The problem comes when a fair partisan map produces candidates, in getting to that 55 percent overall, who are all elected from seats so safe for one party, they never have to compete for voters in the center.If we want to reduce extremist forces in our politics, candidates should have to appeal to a diverse set of interests and voters in competitive districts as much as possible.Reform campaign-finance reformThe way campaigns are financed also has major effects on the types of candidates who run and win.Campaign-finance efforts are now rightly focused on “leveling up” campaign dollars — by providing public funds to candidates — rather than trying to “level down” by imposing caps on election spending. That shift is partly a result of Supreme Court doctrine, but also of the difficulties of narrowing the number of channels through which money can flow to candidates.But publicly financed elections can take at least two different basic forms, and the form taken can have significant ramifications for whether the forces of extremism are further accentuated or limited.In the traditional form of public financing, which is used in around 11 states that have public financing, the government provides grants of campaign funds to the qualified candidates.In the other form — which has taken up much of the reform energy in recent years — the government provides matching funds for small donations. This based on a matching-funds program that has existed in New York City for a number of years.The campaign-finance reform proposal that House Democrats passed after the 2018 midterms, which is now a focus of the Democratic agenda, would include a small-donor matching program. The legislation would provide $6 in public funds to candidates for every dollar they raise in small donations (those of $200 or less), up to a certain level.But there is a risk that making public funding proportional to small donations will accelerate polarization and extremism even further. Research suggests small donors are more ideologically extreme than average citizens and donate to ideologically more extreme candidates. In his campaigns, Mr. Trump raised a higher percentage of his contributions from small donors than any major-party presidential nominee in history.Numerous studies have shown that in general, individual donors (large and small) are the most ideological source of money in politics. Traditional public financing is far more neutral in the types of candidates who benefit.In debating campaign-finance reform, we must focus not just on the values of participation or equality but also on the overall effects different approaches to reform are likely to have on political extremism or moderation.Jan. 6 provided a painful demonstration of the dangerous currents gathering in American political culture. Every proposed election reform must now be measured against this reality to make sure political reform furthers American democracy.Richard H. Pildes is a professor at New York University’s School of Law and an author of the casebook “The Law of Democracy: Legal Structure of the Political Process.”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.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Arrest of Opposition Leader in Georgia Raises Fear of Growing Instability

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyArrest of Opposition Leader in Georgia Raises Fear of Growing InstabilityLawmakers from parties aligned against the government have vowed to continue a boycott of Parliament until Nika Melia is released from police custody.A protest on Tuesday in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, after the arrest of Nika Melia, an opposition leader.Credit…Vano Shlamov/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFeb. 24, 2021, 12:00 p.m. ETMOSCOW — Major opposition parties in the South Caucasus nation of Georgia vowed on Wednesday to boycott Parliament until the government releases a prominent opponent detained recently.The instability adds yet another country to a growing list of former Soviet republics gripped by political tensions, street protests or outright war.Just in the past few months, demonstrations have shaken the government in Belarus, Kyrgyzstan has endured its third post-Soviet revolution, and Azerbaijan and Armenia have fought a vicious war over a breakaway enclave.Though politics in Georgia, a country of just over four million people, have always been sharp-elbowed, the arrest of the opposition leader, Nika Melia, suggested an alarming pivot to more repressive policies by the governing party, Georgian Dream.Mr. Melia, chairman of the United National Movement, a political party founded by a former president, Mikheil Saakashvili, had blockaded himself into the party’s headquarters in Tbilisi, the capital. To make the arrest, police officers scaled fire ladders onto the roof and battered through barricades of furniture inside the building.Mr. Melia stands accused of fomenting a crowd to storm Parliament in 2019, a charge he has dismissed as politically motivated.In a joint statement issued on Tuesday, several United States senators sharply criticized the arrest, saying it “jeopardizes what remains of Georgia’s democracy and its Euro-Atlantic path.”Mr. Melia is the head of the United National Movement, a political party founded by a former president, Mikheil Saakashvili.Credit…Vano Shlamov/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe statement called for Mr. Melia’s release and for a dialogue between parties to resolve the political crisis that has been brewing since a contested election in October. Members of several opposition parties, including the United National Movement, contend that the vote was rigged and have refused to be seated in Parliament. They have vowed to continue the boycott until Mr. Melia is released.A member of the United National Movement, Zaal Udumashvili, told local news outlets, “We are ready to sit down at the negotiating table, provided that Nika Melia will also be sitting at the table.” Several thousand people protested Mr. Melia’s arrest in central Tbilisi on Tuesday evening.Underlying the political crisis are accusations from the opposition that a billionaire who went into politics, Bidzina Ivanishvili, a backer of the governing party, has destroyed the country’s pluralistic institutions, something Mr. Ivanishvili denies.Shota Utiashvili, vice president of the Atlantic Council of Georgia, said in a telephone interview, “Georgia has been labeled as a beacon of democracy in the region, and it’s really unfortunate to see it sliding toward these signs of authoritarianism.”“Georgia has never been a perfect democracy, but at least its trajectory was in the right direction,” he added.The arrest has also roiled Georgian Dream, the governing party. The prime minister, Giorgi Gakharia, a member of the party, resigned last week to protest the issuing of a warrant for Mr. Melia’s detention. “Polarization and confrontation pose the greatest risks to our country’s future,” he said.The escalating standoff over the disputed election has alarmed Western diplomats who for years have held up Georgia as a democratic success story in the former Soviet Union.The State Department issued a statement last week saying it was “deeply concerned” about the political parties’ inability to resolve the election dispute. The United States, it said, called “on all parties to exercise restraint and avoid any actions or rhetoric that could escalate tensions or result in violence.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Patriots’ Only: Beijing Plans Overhaul of Hong Kong’s Elections

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Patriots’ Only: Beijing Plans Overhaul of Hong Kong’s ElectionsThe central government is likely to bypass local officials, just as it did with last year’s national security law.China plans to impose restrictions on Hong Kong’s electoral system to root out candidates whom the Communist Party deems disloyal.Credit…Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesKeith Bradsher, Vivian Wang and Feb. 23, 2021, 8:05 a.m. ETBEIJING — China’s Communist Party already wields outsized influence over Hong Kong’s political landscape. Its allies have long controlled a committee that handpicks the territory’s leader. Its loyalists dominate the Hong Kong legislature. It ousted four of the city’s elected opposition lawmakers last year.Now, China plans to impose restrictions on Hong Kong’s electoral system to root out candidates the Communist Party deems disloyal, a move that could block democracy advocates in the city from running for any elected office.The planned overhaul reinforces the Communist Party’s resolve to quash the few remaining vestiges of political dissent after the antigovernment protests that roiled the territory in 2019. It also builds on a national security law for the city that Beijing enacted last summer, giving the authorities sweeping powers to target dissent.Collectively, those efforts are transforming Hong Kong’s freewheeling, often messy partial democracy into a political system more closely resembling mainland China’s authoritarian system, which demands almost total obedience.“In our country where socialist democracy is practiced, political dissent is allowed, but there is a red line here,” Xia Baolong, China’s director of Hong Kong and Macau affairs, said on Monday in a strongly worded speech that outlined Beijing’s intentions. “It must not be allowed to damage the fundamental system of the country — that is, damage the leadership of the Communist Party of China.”The central government wants Hong Kong to be run by “patriots,” Mr. Xia said, and will not let the Hong Kong government rewrite the territory’s laws, as previously expected, but will do so itself.President Xi Jinping of China, left, has told Hong Kong’s leader that having patriots govern the city is the only way to ensure its long-term stability.Credit…Kevin Frayer/Getty ImagesMr. Xia did not go into details, but Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, affirmed the broad strokes of the plan, saying on Tuesday that many years of intermittent protests over Hong Kong’s political future had forced the national government to act.When Britain returned Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, the territory was promised a high degree of autonomy, in addition to the preservation of its capitalist economic system and the rule of law.But in the decades since, many among the city’s 7.5 million residents have grown wary of Beijing’s encroachment on their freedoms and unfulfilled promises of universal suffrage. The Communist Party, for its part, has been alarmed by increasingly open resistance to its rule in the city and has blamed what it calls hostile foreign forces bent on undermining its sovereignty.These tensions escalated in 2019 when masses of Hong Kong residents took to the streets in protests for months, calling in part for universal suffrage. They also delivered a striking rebuke of Beijing by handing pro-democracy candidates a stunning victory in local district elections that had long been dominated by the establishment.The latest planned overhaul seeks to prevent such electoral upsets and, more important, would also give Beijing a much tighter grip on the 1,200-member committee that will decide early next year who will be the city’s chief executive for the next five years.Different groups in Hong Kong society — bankers, lawyers, accountants and others — will vote this year to choose their representatives on the committee. The urgency of the Communist Party’s move suggests a worry that pro-democracy sentiment in Hong Kong is so strong that the party could lose control of the committee unless it disqualifies democracy advocates from serving.A large-scale protest in Hong Kong in January 2020. Credit…Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesLau Siu-kai, a senior adviser to the Chinese leadership on Hong Kong policy, said China’s Communist Party-run national legislature was expected to push forward the electoral overhaul when it gathers in Beijing for its annual session starting on March 5.Mr. Lau, a former senior Hong Kong official, said the Chinese legislature, the National People’s Congress, would probably move to create a high-level group of government officials with the legal authority to investigate every candidate for public office and determine whether each candidate is genuinely loyal to Beijing.The plan would cover candidates for nearly 2,000 elected positions in Hong Kong, including the committee that chooses the chief executive, the legislature and the district councils, he said.The new election law now being drafted will not be retroactive, Mr. Lau said, and current district councilors will keep their seats as long as they adhere to the law and swear loyalty to Hong Kong and China.Beijing officials and state news media outlets have delivered a drumbeat of calls over the past month for Hong Kong to be run exclusively by people who are “patriots.” To Beijing, that term is narrowly defined as loyalty to mainland China and particularly to the Chinese Communist Party.China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, raised the issue in late January with Mrs. Lam, telling her that having patriots govern Hong Kong was the only way to ensure the city’s long-term stability. And on Tuesday, the Hong Kong government said it would introduce a bill requiring district councilors to take loyalty oaths and would ban candidates from standing for office for five years if they were deemed insincere or insufficiently patriotic.Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, said that years of intermittent protests over the city’s political future had forced the national government to act.Credit…Jerome Favre/EPA, via Shutterstock“You cannot say, ‘I’m patriotic but I don’t respect the fact that it is the Chinese Communist Party which leads the country,’” Erick Tsang, Hong Kong’s secretary for constitutional and mainland affairs, said at a news conference.Michael Mo, a pro-democracy district councilor who has been outspoken in his criticisms of the government, said that he planned to take the loyalty oath but that he had no control over whether that would be enough for the authorities.“It’s not up to me to define whether I’m a patriot,” Mr. Mo said. “The so-called passing mark is an unknown.”The government’s moves could further chill free speech and political debate in the city. Since Beijing imposed the national security law, the city’s authorities have used it for a wide-ranging crackdown. They have arrested more than 100 people, including activists, politicians, an American lawyer and a pro-democracy publisher.“I can only say people worry about that — for example, whether criticism of Communist Party or the political system in China would be regarded as not patriotic, then they have this kind of self-censorship,” said Ivan Choy, a senior lecturer in government and public administration at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.Before last year’s security law, Beijing generally let the Hong Kong legislature draft and enact laws governing the territory. In a sign of how drastic a departure the new approach is from previous years, some Hong Kong politicians initially expressed skepticism that Beijing would once again bypass local officials to enact legislation.Police officers firing tear gas against pro-democracy protesters in May 2020. Credit…Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesOn Monday, hours after the speech by Mr. Xia, the Chinese official in charge of Hong Kong affairs, Holden Chow, a pro-establishment lawmaker, said he still expected Hong Kong to formulate the electoral changes on its own, as was tradition.But on Tuesday, as a battery of officials declared their expectation that Beijing would act directly, Mr. Chow said that he had changed his mind and that he fully supported the central government’s intention to act from on high.He said Beijing’s actions did not diminish the influence of Hong Kong’s leaders. “I don’t think you’ll find these things very often,” he said of the direct action on electoral reform and the national security law.“It’s just in connection with these two major and important matters,” Mr. Chow said. “I still believe that, going forward, we still have a role to play.”Keith Bradsher reported from Beijing, and Vivian Wang and Austin Ramzy from Hong Kong. Tiffany May contributed reporting from Hong Kong.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Your Monday Briefing

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Aleksei NavalnyNavalny’s Life in OppositionKremlin AnxietyCourt DecisionWhat Will Yulia Navalnaya Do?Putin’s ‘Palace’AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyYour Monday BriefingThe Schengen Area closes up.Feb. 21, 2021, 10:13 p.m. ETGood morning.We’re covering travel restrictions within the E.U., the worst day of violence in Myanmar since the coup and the coming U.S. milestone of 500,000 deaths from Covid-19.[embedded content]A police officer addressing a driver at a checkpoint at the German-Czech border near Bad Gottleuba, Germany. Credit…Filip Singer/EPA, via ShutterstockA fresh blow to Europe’s open bordersAs new variants of the coronavirus are spreading rapidly, European countries such as Germany and Belgium have introduced new border restrictions, flying in the face of the free movement that has long been seen as a fundamental pillar of the European Union.The European Commission, the E.U. executive, has tried to pull countries back from limiting free movement since March, on the grounds that it had disrupted the bloc’s single market. The result has been an ever-shifting patchwork of border rules that has sown chaos and not always successfully limited the virus’s spread.But many countries cannot seem to resist taking back control of their borders. A suggestion by the commission that new restrictions be reversed induced a swift pushback from Germany, even as the new rules triggered supply chain disruptions and long lines of commuters from Austria and the Czech Republic.Background: Countries within the Schengen Area have the explicit right to reintroduce checks at their borders, but they need to clear a few legal hurdles to do so, and they are not meant to retain them over the long term.Here are the latest updates and maps of the pandemic.In other developments:As the American death toll nears 500,000, more Americans have now died of Covid-19 than on the battlefields of World War I, World War II and the Vietnam War combined. No other country has counted as many deaths in the pandemic.To secure the release of an Israeli civilian held in Syria, Israel secretly — and contentiously — agreed to finance a supply of Russian-made Covid-19 vaccines for Damascus.Australia began vaccinating its population against the coronavirus on Sunday, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison and 19 others getting their shots. The first to be vaccinated was an 84-year-old woman who lives in a nursing home.Dozens of protesters were injured in Mandalay, Myanmar, on Saturday.Credit…Aso/Associated PressMyanmar security forces open fire on protestersWitnesses said two people were killed and dozens wounded when security forces on Saturday opened fire on protesters in the city of Mandalay, Myanmar. It was the bloodiest day of protests so far against the military’s Feb. 1 coup.The shootings occurred as the authorities were trying to force workers back to their jobs at a local shipyard. The work stoppage there in protest of the ouster of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s civilian leader, has paralyzed river transport on the Irrawaddy, the country’s most important commercial waterway, according to Radio Free Asia.Details: The authorities used water cannons, rubber bullets, tear gas, slingshots and live ammunition to break up the crowd. At least 40 people were wounded, according to medics.Mansour Abbas, center, an Islamist leader hoping to join the next Israeli government, campaigning in Daburiyya, an Arab village in northern Israel.Credit…Dan Balilty for The New York TimesIn the Israeli election, an opportunity for ArabsAccelerated by Israel’s election campaign, two trends are converging: On the one hand, Arab politicians and voters increasingly believe that to improve the lives of Arabs in Israel, they need to seek power within the system instead of exerting pressure from the outside.Separately, mainstream Israeli parties are realizing they need to attract Arab voters to win a very close election — and some are willing to work with Arab parties as potential coalition partners.Both trends are born more of political pragmatism than dogma. But while the moment has the potential to give Arab voters real power, it could backfire and split the Arab vote, ultimately lowering the numbers of Arab lawmakers in the next Parliament.Context: Arab politicians and voters have not shed all their discomfort with Zionism and Israeli policies in the occupied territories. But there is a growing realization that problems the Arab community in Israel faces — gang violence, poverty and discrimination in access to housing and land — will not be solved without Arab politicians shaping policy at the highest level.If you have 7 minutes, this is worth itLibraries to honor women lost to violenceCredit…Kiana Hayeri for The New York TimesNajiba Hussaini, who died in a Taliban suicide bombing in Kabul in 2017, was a determined, highly accomplished scholar, who landed a prestigious job in Afghanistan’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum.Today, her memory lives on at the Najiba Hussaini Memorial Library, in the Afghan city of Nili, as a symbol of the progress made toward gender equality and access to education in Afghanistan. As of 2018, as many as 3.5 million girls were enrolled in school in the nation and one-third of its teachers were women.But amid negotiations between the Afghan government and the Taliban, many worry that a peace deal could mean that the progress Afghan women have made over the past two decades will be lost.Here’s what else is happeningAleksei Navalny: A Russian court has cleared the way for the possible transfer of the opposition leader to a penal colony, the latest step by the authorities to silence the country’s most vocal critic of President Vladimir Putin.Libya weapons: Erik Prince, the former head of the security firm Blackwater Worldwide and a supporter of former President Donald Trump, violated a United Nations arms embargo on Libya by sending weapons to a militia commander who was trying to overthrow the government in Tripoli, according to U.N. investigators. He has denied any wrongdoing.Venezuela: Millions of women in the troubled South American country are no longer able to find or afford birth control. The situation has pushed many into unplanned pregnancies or illegal abortions at a time when they can barely feed the children they have.ISIS: Frenchwomen who joined the Islamic State and are now held in squalid detention camps in Syria have gone on a hunger strike to protest France’s refusal to bring them back.Credit…Alana Holmberg for The New York TimesSnapshot: Above, Novak Djokovic won his third straight Australian Open title. His victory over the fourth-ranked Daniil Medvedev gave him his 18th career Grand Slam title. Naomi Osaka beat Jennifer Brady for her fourth Grand Slam title.Cephalopod sensing: An octopus’s arms can sense and respond to light — even when the octopus cannot see it with the eyes on its head, according to a study published this month in The Journal of Experimental Biology.Bollywood: Increasingly, new Hindi productions are showing mothers, and women over all, as full and complex human beings — not melodramatic side characters, but outspoken, independent leads who are in charge of their own fates.What we’re reading: The U.S. may experience a wonderful summer this year — even if the pandemic is not yet behind us, writes the health journalist James Hamblin in this long read from The Atlantic.Now, a break from the newsCredit…Con Poulos for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Jerrie-Joy Redman-Lloyd.Cook: This shrimp étouffée draws inspiration from Cajun and Creole cuisines.Listen: Radio drama, especially from its golden age in the 1930s through the ’50s, is now freely available, thanks to the internet. Here are six shows to enjoy.Do: Many mothers have felt obliged to put themselves last during the pandemic. But making time for self-care may give you what you need to keep on going.Restore your sense of self. At Home has our full collection of ideas on what to read, cook, watch, and do while staying safe at home. And now for the Back Story on …Taking stock of 500,000 deathsA graphic on Sunday’s front page of The New York Times depicts the totality of Covid’s devastation in the United States. From afar, the graphic looks like a blur of gray, but up close it shows something much darker: close to 500,000 individual dots, each representing a single life lost to the coronavirus.Credit…The New York TimesThis is not the first time The Times’s designers have used the front page to represent the scale of the pandemic’s toll. When Covid-19 deaths in the United States reached 100,000 last May, the page was filled with names of those lost — nearly a thousand of them, just 1 percent of the country’s deaths then.And as that number approached 200,000, the lead photograph on the page showed the yard of an artist in Texas who had filled his lawn with a small flag for every life lost to the virus in his state.But this is the first time the front page has depicted all the U.S. fatalities. “I think part of this technique, which is good, is that it overwhelms you — because it should,” said Lazaro Gamio, a graphics editor at The Times.That’s it for this briefing. See you on Tuesday.— NatashaThank youTo Theodore Kim and Jahaan Singh for the break from the news. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com.P.S.• We’re listening to “The Daily.” Our latest episode is on children and Covid.• Here’s our Mini Crossword, and a clue: What light travels in (five letters). You can find all our puzzles here.• Claire Cain Miller, a reporter who worked on our series on working mothers, “The Primal Scream,” spoke to NPR about the toll of the pandemic on women.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      In Israeli Election, a Chance for Arabs to Gain Influence, or Lose It

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyIn Israeli Election, a Chance for Arabs to Gain Influence, or Lose ItJewish politicians, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, are courting Arab Israeli voters, and some Arab politicians are prepared to work with them.Mansour Abbas, an Islamist leader hoping to join the next Israeli government, campaigns in Daburiyya, an Arab village in northern Israel.Credit…Dan Balilty for The New York TimesPatrick Kingsley and Feb. 21, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETKAFR KANNA, Israel — Mansour Abbas, a conservative Muslim, is an unlikely political partner for the leaders of the Jewish state.He is a proponent of political Islam. He heads an Arab party descended from the same religious stream that spawned the militant Hamas movement. And for most of his political life, he never considered supporting the right-leaning parties that have led Israel for most of the past four decades.Yet if Mr. Abbas has his way, he could help decide the next Israeli prime minister after next month’s general election, even if it means returning a right-wing alliance to power. Tired of the peripheral role traditionally played by Israel’s Arab parties, he hopes his small Islamist group, Raam, will hold the balance of power after the election and prove an unavoidable partner for any Jewish leader seeking to form a coalition.“We can work with anyone,” Mr. Abbas said in an interview on the campaign trail in Kafr Kanna, a small Arab town in northern Israel on the site where the Christian Bible says Jesus turned water into wine. In the past, “Arab politicians have been onlookers in the political process in Israel,” he said. Now, he added, “Arabs are looking for a real role in Israeli politics.”Mr. Abbas’s shift is part of a wider transformation occurring within the Arab political world in Israel.Accelerated by the election campaign, two trends are converging: On the one hand, Arab politicians and voters increasingly believe that to improve the lives of Arabs in Israel, they need to seek power within the system instead of exerting pressure from the outside. Separately, mainstream Israeli parties are realizing they need to attract Arab voters to win a very close election — and some are willing to work with Arab parties as potential coalition partners.Both trends are born more of political pragmatism than dogma. And while the moment has the potential to give Arab voters real power, it could backfire: Mr. Abbas’s actions will split the Arab vote, as will the overtures from Jewish-led parties, and both factors might lower the numbers of Arab lawmakers in the next Parliament.Campaign billboards for Balad, a left-wing Arab party, attacking Mr. Netanyahu. The one on the left says, “Out of tune.”Credit…Ammar Awad/ReutersBut after a strong showing in the last election, in which Arab parties won a record 15 seats, becoming the third-largest party in the 120-seat Parliament, and were still locked out of the governing coalition, some are looking for other options.“After more than a decade with Netanyahu in power, some Arab politicians have put forward a new approach: If you can’t beat him, join him,” said Mohammad Magadli, a well-known Arab television host. “This approach is bold, but it is also very dangerous.”Palestinian citizens of Israel form more than a fifth of the Israeli population. Since the founding of the state in 1948, they have always sent a handful of Arab lawmakers to Parliament. But those lawmakers have always struggled to make an impact.Jewish leaders have not seen Arab parties as acceptable coalition partners — some on the right vilifying them as enemies of the state and seeking the suspension of Arab lawmakers from Parliament. For their part, Arab parties have generally been more comfortable in opposition, lending infrequent support only to center-left parties whose influence has waned since the start of the century.In some ways, this dynamic worsened in recent years. In 2015, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited the threat of relatively high Arab turnout — “Arab voters are streaming in huge quantities to the polling stations,” he warned on Election Day — to scare his base into voting. In 2018, his government passed new legislation that downgraded the status of Arabic and formally described Israel as the nation-state of only the Jewish people. And in 2020, even his centrist rival, Benny Gantz, refused to form a government based on the support of Arab parties.But a year later, as Israel heads to its fourth election in two years of political deadlock, this paradigm is rapidly shifting.Mr. Netanyahu is now vigorously courting the Arab electorate. Following his lead, Yair Lapid, a centrist contender for the premiership, said he could form a coalition with Arab lawmakers, despite disparaging them earlier in his career. Two left-wing parties have promised to work with an alliance of Arab lawmakers to advance Arab interests.Polling suggests a majority of Palestinian citizens of Israel want their lawmakers to play a role in government. Mr. Abbas says Arab politicians should win influence by supporting parties that promise to improve Arab society. Another prominent Arab politician, Ali Salam, the mayor of Nazareth, Israel’s largest Arab city, has expressed support for Mr. Netanyahu, arguing that despite his past comments, the prime minister is sincere about improving Arab lives.Arab men in Umm al Fahm praying at a protest against increasing crime and violence in Arab communities.  Credit…Ahmad Gharabli/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“In the Israeli political system, it used to be a sin to collaborate with Arab parties or even Arab voters,” said Nahum Barnea, one of Israel’s best-known columnists. But Mr. Netanyahu has suddenly made Arabs “a legitimate partner to any political maneuver.”“In a way he opened a box that, I hope, cannot be closed from now on,” Mr. Barnea added.Mr. Netanyahu’s transition has been among the most remarkable. He has pledged greater resources for Arab communities and to fight endemic crime in Arab neighborhoods. And he has begun calling himself “Yair’s father” — a reference to his son, Yair, that also riffs affectionately on the Arab practice of referring to someone as the parent of their firstborn child.In a watershed moment in January, he announced a “new era” for Arab Israelis at a rally in Nazareth and made a qualified apology for his past comments about Arab voters. “I apologized then and I apologize today as well,” he said, before adding that critics had “twisted my words.”Critics say Mr. Netanyahu is courting Arab voters because he needs them to win, not because he sincerely cares about them. This month he also agreed to include within his next coalition a far-right party whose leader wants to disqualify many Arabs from running for Parliament. And he has ruled out forming a government that relies on Mr. Abbas’s support.Next month’s election is expected to be as close as each of the previous three.Mr. Netanyahu is currently on trial for corruption charges, and if he stays in power he could pursue laws that insulate him from prosecution.“What Netanyahu cares about is Netanyahu,” said Afif Abu Much, a prominent commentator on Arab politics in Israel.Courting Arab voters, Mr. Netanyahu has pledged greater resources for Arab communities and to fight endemic crime in Arab neighborhoods.Credit…Pool photo by Reuben CastroLikewise, Arab politicians and voters have not shed all their discomfort with Zionism and Israeli policies in the occupied territories. But there is a growing realization that problems the Arab community faces — gang violence, poverty and discrimination in access to housing and land — will not be solved without Arab politicians shaping policy at the highest level.“I want different results so I need to change the approach,” Mr. Abbas said. “The crises in Arab society reached a boiling point.”Yet Mr. Abbas’s plan could easily fail and undercut what little influence Arab citizens currently have.To run on his new platform, Mr. Abbas had to withdraw from an alliance of Arab parties, the Joint List, whose remaining members are unconvinced about working with the Israeli right. And this split could dilute the collective power of Arab lawmakers.Support for Mr. Abbas’s party currently hovers near the threshold of 3.25 percent that parties need to secure entry to Parliament. Even if his party scrapes above the line, there is no guarantee that any contender for the premiership will need or seek the party’s support to secure the 61 seats necessary to form a coalition.“Arabs are looking for a real role in Israeli politics,” Mr. Abbas says.Credit…Dan Balilty for The New York TimesMr. Netanyahu, despite his previous incitement against Arabs, could also draw Arab voters away from Arab parties, reducing their influence. Still more might stay home, disillusioned by the divisions within the Arab parties and their inability to achieve meaningful change, or to boycott a state whose authority they reject.“I don’t believe in any of them, or trust any of them,” said Siham Ighbariya, a 40-year-old homemaker. She rose to prominence through her quest to achieve justice for her husband and son, who were murdered at home in 2012 by an unknown killer.“I’ve dealt with all of them,” Ms. Ighbariya said of the Arab political class. “And nothing has happened.”For some Palestinians, participation in Israel’s government is a betrayal of the Palestinian cause — a criticism Mr. Abbas understands. “I have this deep personal conflict inside of me,” he acknowledged. “We have been engaged in a conflict for 100 years, a bloody and difficult conflict.”But it was time to move on, he added. “You need to be able to look to the future, and to build a better future for everyone, both Arabs and Jews.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Spain Hoped Catalonia’s Separatists Would Fade. They’re Gaining Ground.

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storySpain Hoped Catalonia’s Separatists Would Fade. They’re Gaining Ground.Although the pandemic has been a unifying force in much of Europe, parties seeking to create a breakaway state for Catalonia received a majority of votes in a regional election.Voting in the Catalan elections in Barcelona on Sunday.Credit…Finbarr O’Reilly/Getty ImagesNicholas Casey and Feb. 19, 2021Updated 10:03 a.m. ETMADRID — For years, Spain’s government dismissed the separatist movement in the Catalonia region as little more than a “soufflé” — easy to inflate but then collapsing in on itself.Yet the movement shows no signs of imploding anytime soon, even amid a pandemic that has bridged divides elsewhere in Europe.In a regional election on Sunday, parties seeking to create a breakaway state for Catalonia — the part of northeastern Spain that includes Barcelona — increased their majority in the regional Parliament. They began negotiations this week to form a coalition.Election turnout was sharply reduced by the coronavirus, but the final tally showed pro-independence parties receiving a majority of votes — a prize that had long eluded them.“From a pro-independence point of view, this is something to celebrate,” said Àdria Alsina, a Barcelona political analyst who supports breaking away from Spain. “It’s one less argument for those who are against independence and say we never got a majority.”Catalan independence, once a pipe dream of a small group of people, has arguably been Spain’s most polarizing issue for almost a decade. The standoff reached a boiling point in 2017, when the region’s separatist government organized an independence referendum. It went ahead even after Spain’s courts declared it illegal and the police cracked down on voters.Salvador Illa stepped down as Spain’s health minister to run in the Catalan election. His party won more support than any other.Credit…Emilio Morenatti/Associated PressThe referendum was followed by a declaration of independence, which prompted Spain’s central government to oust the Catalan government and charge its members with crimes including sedition. Some of them fled Spain to avoid prosecution, while others ended up in prison.Tensions heightened in Catalonia this week on another front after the police arrested a popular rapper, Pablo Hásel, in the town of Lleida. Mr. Hásel, 32, whose real name is Pablo Rivadulla Duró, faces nine months in prison on charges that his rap lyrics glorified terrorism and denigrated the monarchy. Protests in support of him began on Tuesday in Barcelona, Madrid and other cities, and have turned violent.Before Sunday’s vote, the central government led by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez dispatched its health minister, Salvador Illa, to run in the regional election on a platform that focused on remaining in Spain. He resigned his post in the national government and tried to capitalize on the prominence he had gained recently as the face of the government’s response to the pandemic’s health crisis.The strategy reaped some dividends: While Mr. Illa did not receive enough votes to form a governing coalition, his party garnered more support than any other.The results also pointed to moderation within the pro-independence camp. Among the pro-independence parties, voters favored Esquerra Republicana, a moderate left-wing party that has propped up Mr. Sánchez’s government in Madrid, but remains firm that it wants an independent state.Supporters of Esquerra Republicana at a campaign meeting in Barcelona last month.Credit…Emilio Morenatti/Associated PressSpeaking to reporters after Sunday’s vote, Arancha González Laya, Spain’s foreign minister, said the situation in Catalonia looked more “comfortable” from Madrid’s perspective, with left-wing and more moderate parties outflanking rivals on both sides of the separatism divide.“There has been an advance of those who are more inclined to a dialogue with the government,” Ms. González Laya said.After the vote, Spain’s government said an independence referendum was not on the cards, even as separatist politicians in Catalonia insisted that the demand should be at the heart of any future negotiation with Madrid.But one issue that appears more open for discussion is whether Madrid could pardon nine politicians and activists who were jailed for orchestrating the secession attempt in 2017.Carles Puigdemont, the president of Catalonia’s regional government at the time, fled the country to evade prosecution. He now lives in Brussels and has since been elected as a member of the European Parliament. He is fighting an attempt to lift his immunity as a member of that body, which could allow Spain’s judiciary to make a fresh attempt to extradite him.Jordi Cuixart, one of the politicians seeking a pardon after being sentenced to nine years in jail, said that “Spain has a democracy, but it still maintains an anti-democratic attitude.” He said he not only wanted to be released from prison, but was asking the government to absolve him and the others of any wrongdoing.Carles Puigdemont, who was president of Catalonia’s regional government during the 2017 independence vote, has since fled the country.Credit…Quique Garcia/EPA, via ShutterstockIf there is any resolution to the independence question, it will take time, said Sandra León, a political scientist at the Carlos III University in Madrid.While the moderate independence wing is likely to be in the driver’s seat, Mr. Puigdemont’s more hard-line party, Together for Catalonia, is likely to be part of the regional government as well.Vox, a Spanish far-right party that has made its anti-independence stance a central issue, will also join Catalonia’s Parliament for the first time, likely fueling further polarization, Ms. León said.Catalan separatists are closely following movements elsewhere in Europe, particularly in Scotland, where the drive for independence has been reignited by Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union. The Scots voted against independence in a 2014 referendum that was authorized by London, but then also voted against Britain’s exit from the European Union.“The independence movement is here to stay,” said Josep Ramoneda, a Catalan columnist and philosopher. “Sooner or later, somebody in Madrid will have to recognize that.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Gunfire at Mogadishu Protest Intensifies Somali Election Impasse

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyGunfire at Mogadishu Protest Intensifies Somali Election ImpasseOpposition political leaders said they were attacked by government forces on Friday, and two former presidents said they were targeted hours earlier.People fleeing the site of violent clashes in Mogadishu, Somalia, on Friday.Credit…Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAbdi Latif Dahir and Feb. 19, 2021, 7:25 a.m. ETNAIROBI — Opposition protests in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, were interrupted by gunfire on Friday, heightening a political standoff caused by the government’s refusal to hold elections that were scheduled for two weeks ago.Videos posted on social media and shared by local news outlets showed opposition leaders marching through the streets of the city before ducking and running for cover as gunfire is heard.The unfolding chaos in the capital is a flash point in a deteriorating political situation in Somalia, and it risks exacerbating clan-based grievances, emboldening the extremist group al-Shabab and undermining progress the country has made in recent years.The country has been in crisis after delays to a national and presidential election. The four-year term of Somalia’s president, Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, formally ended last week, but he has refused to leave office, setting off a political crisis.The government put the country under a lockdown before the demonstrations on Friday, suspending all public gatherings. While it said it imposed the restrictions because of the coronavirus pandemic, opposition critics attributed the move to an effort to tamp down protests.Hassan Ali Khaire, the former prime minister and a prominent opposition figure, said in a post on Facebook that he and several other presidential candidates, lawmakers, other officials and civilians survived an “assassination attempt” at the protest. Mr. Khaire later said in a news conference that shells fired against opposition protesters had landed inside the city’s international airport. Hassan Ali Khaire, a former prime minister, center, joined members of opposition parties on Friday to protest against the political impasse in Mogadishu. Credit…Said Yusuf Warsame/EPA, via ShutterstockThe chaos came just hours after an intense exchange of gunfire erupted in Mogadishu in the early hours of Friday morning. In a statement, Hassan Hundubey Jimale, the Somali minister of internal security, said “armed militias” had attacked military posts with the intention of taking over government buildings. Government forces repulsed the attackers, he said.Those raids were followed by reports of attacks by the government on other political figures, including Mr. Mohamed’s two presidential predecessors, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, who said on Twitter that the hotel where they were staying had been targeted.“The government forces tonight attacked the Ma’ida hotel where I and the former president were staying,” Mr. Mohamud wrote in a post on Twitter. “It is unfortunate that the outgoing president is shedding the blood of citizens who are preparing for a peaceful demonstration to express their views.”Mr. Ahmed wrote that he believed the attack was ordered by Mr. Mohamed, who is “trying to suppress and force the Somali people from expressing their views peacefully.” The two men had been staying in the hotel along with other opposition figures ahead of Friday’s rally.Somalia’s president is elected by the country’s lawmakers, a process that was scheduled to take place on Feb. 8, but the country has failed to hold the national elections to select those lawmakers.The impasse has inflamed tensions among the federal and regional governments and opposition parties. It has also alarmed the international community, with the United Nations, the United States, the European Union and several African countries, urging the parties involved to resolve the electoral issues “in order for credible and inclusive elections to proceed.”In addition to intensifying attacks from the Qaeda-linked group Shabab, Somalia is battling rising cases of the coronavirus, desert locusts that are destroying crops and climate shocks — creating a humanitarian crisis affecting millions of people. Somalia also severed diplomatic relations with Kenya in December after accusing it of meddling in its internal affairs.The U.S. Embassy in Somalia also called for “an end to all violence” and urged all parties to finalize an agreement on how to move ahead with the election.On Friday, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia said in a statement that it was “deeply concerned by armed clashes” in Mogadishu on Thursday night and Friday morning and called for “calm and restraint by all parties involved.”The clashes, it said, “underscore the urgent need” for government leaders to come together to reach political agreement on the electoral process.Murithi Mutiga, the Horn of Africa project director for the International Crisis Group, said that despite the unfolding events in the streets of Mogadishu, it was not too late for Mr. Mohamed to build consensus around the election and stave off another crisis in the region.“The region can hardly afford another crisis,” Mr. Mutiga said. “At a time when Ethiopia is experiencing internal turmoil and its troops are facing off with Sudanese forces over a disputed borderland and with Al Shabab seemingly resurgent in Somalia and northern Kenya, renewed violence in Somalia and the possible fracturing of the security forces along clan lines would be significantly destabilizing.”Abdi Latif Dahir More

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      Super PACs Are Raising Millions to Sway the N.Y.C. Mayor’s Race

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storySuper PACs Are Raising Millions to Sway the N.Y.C. Mayor’s RaceGroups representing big business are already working to influence the contest, while a new organization hopes to push the crowded field of candidates to the left.A super PAC backing Raymond J. McGuire, a former Wall Street executive who is running for mayor, quickly raised more than $1 million.Credit…Todd Heisler/The New York TimesDana Rubinstein and Feb. 19, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETThe last time there was an open mayoral election in New York City, an independent committee spent roughly $900,000 to help take down the presumptive front-runner, paving the way for Bill de Blasio’s victory.Eight years later, another onslaught of barely regulated money is heading New York’s way, with super PACs poised to play an outsize role in the race for mayor the most important election in recent city history.Business-friendly organizations have already raised millions of dollars. At least one candidate, Raymond J. McGuire, has a dedicated super PAC. And now progressive groups are getting in on the act, creating their own super PACs to supplement their on-the-ground and social media efforts.The rising tide of independent spending highlights the fierce debates unfolding across the political spectrum about how to manage the city’s post-pandemic recovery and what its future should look like.It also points to a hunger among donors in New York City — one of the nation’s political fund-raising capitals — to play a role in this year’s races without being bound by the strict rules governing direct donations to political campaigns.A super PAC called New York for Ray, which backs Mr. McGuire, a former Wall Street executive, has already raised more than $1 million since registering with the state in January, including $500,000 from a theater producer, Daryl Roth, whose husband, Steven Roth, is the head of Vornado Realty Trust; and $500,000 from John Hess, the chief executive of Hess Corporation. It also lists a $2,500 donation from Richard S. Fuld Jr., the former chief executive of Lehman Brothers.At the other end of the spectrum, a group of progressives are starting a super PAC that aims to raise up to $5 million, in hopes of pushing the field of more than 30 mayoral candidates and hundreds of City Council candidates to the left on matters including housing and diverting funding from the police.The super PAC, Our City, is being led by Gabe Tobias, a former senior adviser to Justice Democrats, which played a key role in helping Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez get elected to Congress. Mr. Tobias is also the co-founder of the Movement School, which grew from her campaign.Our City’s board includes Nelini Stamp, a senior official at the Working Families Party, and Ed Ott, the former executive director of the New York City Central Labor Council.“There’s no other effort like this in recent history that I’m aware of, a progressive independent expenditure aimed at winning control of city government,” Mr. Tobias, the director of the group, said. He is hoping to raise $300,000 in the group’s first month and go from there.Several of the leading candidates running in the June 22 Democratic primary for mayor are battling to emerge as the progressive standard-bearer, continuing a trend that has influenced a slew of recent elections from House races to City Hall.But various business interests in New York are trying to mount a counterattack: They persuaded Mr. McGuire, one of the highest-ranking and longest-serving Black executives on Wall Street, to enter the race; they have urged their employees to register to vote in the primary; and they are raising money to push their issues.James L. Dolan, the chief executive at Madison Square Garden Entertainment, has already started The Coalition to Restore New York, a super PAC to which he has directed more than $2 million in monetary and in-kind donations from the various Madison Square Garden affiliates he controls.Mr. Dolan declined an interview request, but his PAC says it is focused on getting the candidates to explain how they would restore the city’s economy, improve public safety and balance its budget. Stephen M. Ross, the developer of Hudson Yards, has put $1 million toward a super PAC called Common Sense NYC, which has a similar political bent as Mr. Dolan’s. It was originally considering targeting both the mayor’s race and the City Council races, but the crowded mayoral field inspired it to focus on the City Council, where it can presumably make more of an impact.The group recently spent roughly $200,000 on a special election for a Council seat in Queens, helping a former councilman, Jim Gennaro, defeat several rivals including Moumita Ahmed, a progressive whose views the group called “extreme” and “reckless.”“It completely changed the race in the final two weeks,” Ms. Ahmed said. It also turned Mr. Ross, who has supported both former President Donald J. Trump and Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, into even more of a boogeyman for the left. (Mr. Ross, whose company owns a controlling stake in Equinox, ignited anger among Democrats in 2019 when he hosted a fund-raiser for Mr. Trump.)Our City’s launch video juxtaposes a picture of Mr. Ross at Hudson Yards with an apparently homeless person sleeping on a cardboard box as a narrator talks about inequality. Mr. Ross declined to comment on the video.The New York Immigration Coalition is also planning to mount an independent expenditure committee, according to Murad Awawdeh, the group’s interim co-executive director.“What progressive organizations and progressives have realized is that super PACs are going to be part of the narrative, and until we have real reform that outlaws them, we have to be able to play the game and participate in that process,” Mr. Awawdeh said.In New York City, candidates running for mayor, and donors seeking to support them, are subject to strict limitations: Individuals who are doing business with the city can contribute up to $400 to a mayoral candidate; other donors are subject to caps varying between $2,000 and $5,100. Wealthy individuals and corporations can make unlimited contributions to a super PAC under New York and under federal law, according to Seth Agata, a former counsel in the governor’s office who helped write New York’s independent expenditure regulations.Even as more super PACs are expected to form in the weeks ahead, it remains to be seen whether outside spending eclipses the nearly $16 million spent during the 2013 New York City elections.Veterans of the mayoral primary that year recall only one independent expenditure committee that mattered. The committee, New York City Is Not for Sale, received backing from an animal rights group seeking to ban horse-drawn carriages. It focused on the race’s putative front-runner, Christine Quinn, then the City Council speaker.The effort ended up mired in controversy. But Ms. Quinn said it had a clear impact on her mayoral prospects.“These independent expenditures are merely ways around the best campaign finance law in the country, and I think they’re very destructive,” she said.New York for Ray is supposed to have a more positive message. Its goal is to increase Mr. McGuire’s name recognition and amplify his message, according to someone involved in the effort.“I have known Ray McGuire a long time and am confident in his ability to lead our city,” Ms. Roth, one of the group’s major donors, said. Mr. Hess, via a spokeswoman, declined to comment. It will be led by Quentin Fulks, an Illinois-based political consultant; Jennifer Bayer Michaels, a former fund-raiser for Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo; and Kimberly Peeler-Allen, an experienced New York fund-raiser who is also the co-founder of Higher Heights for America, an organization that aims to elevate Black women in politics, and the co-chair of its PAC.L. Joy Williams, who is working on Mr. McGuire’s campaign, is the Higher Heights PAC’s chairwoman. A campaign spokeswoman said Ms. Williams was unaware that Ms. Peeler-Allen was working on New York for Ray, and that there has been no coordination between the super PAC and the campaign.A serious super PAC effort on Mr. McGuire’s behalf — especially through paid advertising — could help him overcome his significant challenges with name identification. Among New York political operatives, the matter of whether Mr. McGuire would receive outside help had been a subject of great speculation. In recent months, there have been conversations within prominent Democratic firms about the prospect of doing work for a pro-McGuire independent expenditure effort, according to someone familiar with the conversations.The super PAC sees no gain in smearing Mr. McGuire’s opponents, the person involved in the effort said, given the advent of ranked-choice voting, which will allow New Yorkers voting for mayor to rank their top five choices.“Rule No. 1 is do no harm,” said Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist who has worked on multiple national independent expenditure efforts and lives in New York. “That means understanding how what you say in the campaign could reverberate on your preferred candidate, and how your entrance into the race could even reverberate on your candidate.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More