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      A Poll Reversal

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      Republicans have swiftly gained ground near the end of midterm elections polling.In the last days before Tuesday’s midterm elections, the polls have increasingly reached a consensus on the state of the race: Republicans lead.Most pollsters over the past few weeks have found Republicans opening a modest but consistent lead when they ask voters whether they’ll back Democrats or Republicans for Congress.The results are a reversal from polls conducted just over a month ago, when Democrats seemed to have the advantage.If the recent polls are right — and they may not be — Republicans will almost certainly take the House. The big question on election night would be whether and where individual Democratic candidates could withstand a hostile political environment. Control of the Senate would depend on it.How Republicans got hereIn one sense, the new Republican strength was foreseeable. The president’s party almost always gets pummeled in midterm elections, especially when his approval rating is as low as President Biden’s, which is hovering just over 40 percent. In the era of modern polling dating back nearly a century, no precedent exists for the president’s party to hold its own in the House when his approval rating is well beneath 50 percent.But for Democrats, the usual midterm losses for the party in the White House — or even a better than usual outcome — may still be something of a disappointment. Democrats seemed to be in a fairly strong position as recently as a few weeks ago. They gained support over the summer after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and amid rising concerns about the state of American democracy and gun violence. Some news also helped the party politically: falling gas prices and Biden’s surprising legislative successes.What is the most important problem facing the country today? More

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      Nevada’s Costly, Photo-Finish Senate Race Pits Abortion vs. Economy

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      NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. — As Senator Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada took the stage at a high school here this week, she was fighting for her political life.Her re-election bid is seen by many as the tightest Senate race in the country. Republicans are throwing money and energy behind her challenger, Adam Laxalt, a political scion who, like Ms. Cortez Masto, is a former Nevada attorney general.Neither candidate could be called an electric campaigner, and Ms. Cortez Masto had a difficult slot that evening: shortly after John Legend and right before Barack Obama.After the appearance by Mr. Legend — who recently wrapped up a Las Vegas residency and played a couple of songs on a piano for an adoring audience — Ms. Cortez Masto spoke about how her grandfather was “a baker from Chihuahua” and how, before her, “there had never been a Latina elected to the U.S. Senate.”Her biographical bullet points were politely received. Then Mr. Obama took the stage and offered a reminder that his party has still not found a successor to match his charisma.To raucous applause, he hammered home Ms. Cortez Masto’s personal history in his inimitable cadences: “Third-generation Nevadan. Grew up here in Vegas. Dad started out parking cars at the Dunes,” he said, referring to a defunct casino where Ms. Cortez Masto’s father once worked. “She knows what it’s like to struggle and work hard.”Democrats are sending star figures to Nevada as both parties pour money into a political fight that could decide the balance of power in the Senate. The race was the most expensive political contest in Nevada history even before an $80 million splurge over the last month brought total ad spending to $176 million, according to AdImpact, a media-tracking firm. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed the candidates deadlocked at 47 percent each; Mr. Laxalt had a comfortable lead among men, while Ms. Cortez Masto was likewise leading among women.Mr. Laxalt, a son and grandson of Nevada senators, held a rally in Las Vegas late last month with former Representative Tulsi Gabbard. Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesMs. Cortez Masto and her allies have sought to focus on abortion rights, attacking Mr. Laxalt over the issue.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesAnd increasingly, the campaign seems to be one of economics versus abortion.Democrats are battering Mr. Laxalt over his anti-abortion stance, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Nevada allows abortion up to 24 weeks, and after that in cases where the mother’s health is at risk. Mr. Laxalt has said he would support banning abortions in the state after 13 weeks, or the first trimester.One commercial broadcast Tuesday morning, paid for by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, featured a Nevada woman assailing his abortion position, saying: “I take it incredibly personally that Adam Laxalt is working to take away the rights of my daughters.” Another spot, from the Democratic-aligned Senate Majority PAC, includes audio of Mr. Laxalt saying during a breakfast with pastors that “Roe v. Wade was always a joke.”The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsElection Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.Governor’s Races: Democrats and Republicans are heading into the final stretch of more than a dozen competitive contests for governor. Some battleground races could also determine who controls the Senate.Democrats’ Mounting Anxiety: Top Democratic officials are openly second-guessing their party’s pitch and tactics, saying Democrats have failed to unite around one central message.Social Security and Medicare: Republicans, eyeing a midterms victory, are floating changes to the safety net programs. Democrats have seized on the proposals to galvanize voters.Debunking Misinformation: Falsehoods and rumors are flourishing ahead of Election Day, especially in Pennsylvania. We debunked five of the most widespread voting-related claims.Ms. Cortez Masto returned to the topic on Tuesday night: “We know we can’t trust Laxalt when it comes to a woman’s right to choose,” she told the crowd. “This is a man who called Roe vs. Wade a joke, and he celebrated when it was overturned.”So often has Mr. Laxalt been attacked on abortion that he felt compelled to write an opinion column in The Reno Gazette-Journal in August “setting the record straight” on his position. He explained that when he said Roe was “a joke,” it was “a shorthand way of saying that the decision had no basis in the text of the Constitution.”Republican groups and the Laxalt campaign are generally focusing on the economy. Nevada has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country and some of the highest gas prices, and a tourism-driven economy that was hit hard by the pandemic.“Inflation isn’t going away,” a narrator says in a Laxalt commercial running this week. “Gas and groceries are too expensive.” Another pro-Laxalt ad features a picture of Ms. Cortez Masto superimposed next to Speaker Nancy Pelosi as both are showered in cash. The spot, from the Senate Leadership Fund — the political action committee of Senate Republicans — makes the case that “Costly Catherine” is a high-spending Democrat.Mr. Laxalt and Ms. Gabbard at the rally in Las Vegas. He and his Republican allies have tried to put the spotlight on economic issues. Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesRory McShane, a Republican political consultant who is working on other races in the state, believes the current dynamic favors Republicans.“You see in the polling that the economy is trumping abortion,” he said in an interview. “I don’t think anything’s stronger than the economy,” he added. “You don’t have to run TV ads to tell people how bad the economy is.”Kenneth Miller, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said the Democratic strategy “poses a risk.”“Abortion is very important to a big segment of the electorate, but that also means there are large segments of the electorate that don’t particularly care about abortion either way,” he said. “They may have a pro-choice or pro-life position, but it’s not what drives them to make their vote choice or drives them to turn out.”Mr. Laxalt’s saber-rattling on the economy, however, has plenty of skeptics. Nevada’s largest union, the 60,000-strong Culinary Workers, has sent members — cooks, cleaners, food servers — door to door to make the case for Ms. Cortez Masto and other Democratic candidates. More than half of the union’s members are Latinos, a group Mr. Laxalt has courted in Spanish-language commercials.Ted Pappageorge, the union’s secretary-treasurer, said in an interview that Ms. Cortez Masto had been an important ally on pocketbook concerns for union members, including expanding health benefits for workers who lost their jobs during the pandemic.“In 2020, we knocked on 650,000 doors statewide, and that was in the middle of Covid,” he said. “This year, in a midterm, we’re going to hit a million doors, and if we hit those doors, we’re going to win.”Few dispute the importance of the contest.“This race is the 51st seat,” Mr. Laxalt said this summer. “The entire U.S. Senate will hinge on this race.” He was speaking at the Basque Fry, a Republican event started by his grandfather, former Senator Paul Laxalt, whose family hailed from the Basque region straddling France and Spain. Mr. Laxalt is also the son of another former senator, Pete Domenici.Mr. Laxalt has been a divisive politician. He parroted Donald J. Trump’s false claims of widespread election fraud when he served as the chairman of the former president’s 2020 campaign in Nevada. When he was attorney general, he was caught on a secret recording in which he pressured state gambling regulators on behalf of a major donor, Sheldon Adelson.And Mr. Laxalt’s bid to follow his forebears into the Senate has been fractious. Fourteen of his relatives have come out against him and thrown their support to Ms. Cortez Masto, calling her in a joint statement “a model of the ‘Nevada grit’ that we so often use to describe our Nevada forefathers.”Former President Barack Obama campaigned on Tuesday in Las Vegas for Nevada Democrats. “She knows what it’s like to struggle and work hard,” he said of Ms. Cortez Masto.Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times“The entire U.S. Senate will hinge on this race,” Mr. Laxalt said this summer. Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesMr. Obama seized on the episode in his remarks on Tuesday night. “We all might have a crazy uncle, the kind who goes off the rails, but if you’ve got a full Thanksgiving dinner table, and they’re all saying you don’t belong in the U.S. Senate?” he said. “When the people who know you the best think your opponent would do a better job, that says something about you.”In his own closing argument, Mr. Laxalt, who served in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps in the Navy, has tried to link Ms. Cortez Masto to President Biden, who polls show is unpopular in the state.“Her record is, she supported Joe Biden every step of the way,” he said at a recent campaign stop, according to Roll Call. “That’s why she doesn’t want Joe Biden to come here, because then she’s going to have to actually stand next to him and stand next to her voting record.”Ms. Cortez Masto is a protégé of Harry Reid, the former Senate majority leader who built a formidable political machine in the state and died last year. “She’s a workhorse, not a show horse,” Mr. Miller said, adding that in a typical year, a moderate like her “should be able to win a race like this by five points, but national conditions are a serious headwind.”Abortion has certainly not been her only issue. She has depicted Mr. Laxalt as a child of privilege in a “Succession”-style video and has put out commercials accusing him of being captive to big oil companies, in part because as state attorney general, he worked to thwart an investigation into Exxon Mobil over its climate policies.But abortion has been the most constant weapon for her and her surrogates.“Catherine’s opponent calls Roe vs. Wade a joke, and the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe a historic victory,” Mr. Obama said on Tuesday. “That may not be how most women in Nevada saw it.” More

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      Trump’s Guys Have Their Work Cut Out for Them

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      If Democrats do better than expected in next week’s elections, let’s hope they send a thank-you card to Donald Trump.Just because it’d drive him crazy. But his meddling is also a real factor: If you look at some of the most competitive races, the awfulness of the Republican nominee is thanks in good part to Trumpian support.“My record is unparalleled, my endorsements, it’s totally unparalleled,” he bragged earlier this year. It certainly was extensive — he reportedly made about 200 primary endorsements. But there weren’t a ton of heavy lifts. His choices were mainly incumbents and others who were virtually unopposed.“It’s like the Celtics winning a game against the Little Sisters of the Poor,” said a friend of mine.Still, when there was a serious race, Trump had a major-league talent for picking the least attractive possibility.Take Georgia. Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock should probably be in deep, deep trouble given the general political climate. But the polls show a near-even race. Warnock sure is lucky that Trump made such a heroic effort to promote Herschel Walker, who was terrible even before he plunged into his serial abortion scandals.And then there’s J.D. Vance, who Trump is backing in the Ohio Senate race. The former president showed up for a Vance rally last month in Youngstown, standing right next to the contender, who, he told the crowd, “is kissing my ass, he wants my support so much.”A comment that has been quoted a time or 20 by Vance’s opponent, Tim Ryan.To be fair — if you really feel like being fair — Trump’s favorites generally did win. ( “Nobody’s ever had a record like this. I’m almost unblemished.”)Of course, it’s natural that voters in Republican primaries would care about the opinion of the last Republican president. Trump’s endorsement certainly made a difference in Arizona — where the deeply unappealing Blake Masters won the Senate nomination with his help.And his backing was also very important in Pennsylvania, where Republicans are now stuck in the governor’s race with Doug Mastriano, a state senator who’s argued that women who have abortions relatively early in a pregnancy should be charged with murder.The general elections are a different kind of competition, where the Trump name can be a little less, um, attractive. Wisconsin observers couldn’t help noticing that once Tim Michels had won the Republican nomination for governor, his campaign website scrubbed all references to “Endorsed by President Trump,” only to put them back up an hour later. Such is the life of the Trump acolyte.In New York, the Democratic candidate for governor, Kathy Hochul, cannot remind voters enough that her opponent, Lee Zeldin, has Trump’s backing. Zeldin, who was happy to have Trump appear at a September fund-raiser, now likes to focus on crime, and you will probably not hear the 45th president’s name in his ads unless Trump gets mugged on Park Avenue.Even when he’s not promoting anybody, Trump is … keeping in touch. It’s hard to avoid his emails, the vast, vast majority of which are asking for money. My absolute favorite, which arrived last month, announced he “just couldn’t wait any longer to tell you this EXCITING NEWS.”Which was — wait for it:“I HAVE BEEN NAMED THE #1 PRESIDENTIAL GOLFER IN HISTORY!”The namer was a conservative website called the DC Enquirer. We will not mention the very different opinion of experts like the sportswriter Rick Reilly, who wrote about Trump’s game in his book “Commander in Cheat.”But our former president was sharing this exciting news to remind us that “we still have a few boxes left of our LIMITED EDITION Trump Golf Balls.” A collector’s item!You can get any of this stuff by clicking a box and making a contribution — pick any amount you want, although that vibrant blue $250 box is doing a special happy dance. All the money goes to Trump’s own personal election fund-raising operation, which cynics might just refer to as Donald’s Piggy Bank. From which he’s forked out more than $13 million for TV ads over the last month to help out his fellow Republicans.That may sound nice, but put in another context, it amounts to about 15 percent of what he had on hand. And about one-fifth of the $71 million Republicans are getting from the Senate Leadership Fund, Mitch McConnell’s super PAC. McConnell, by Trump’s calculation, is a “Broken Old Crow.” So, of course, nothing Mitch does counts.I guarantee the emails will keep on coming. What else can Trump do? He’s still banned from Twitter and his attempt at a substitute, Truth Social, probably has fewer followers than some minor celebrities. Although definitely more than a semi-popular college sophomore.Well, hey, D.J.T. does need some diversion. His business organization is wrestling with multitudinous court cases in New York right now — tax fraud is a central topic.He’s been on the road a lot, making speeches, raising money and being protected by Secret Service agents who the Trump Organization has charged up to $1,185 per night for hotel rooms. Yeah, he’s so grateful for security over the past few years he’s billed us more than $1.4 million.Let’s see what happens next. If his pitiful candidates don’t survive, maybe some Republicans will ask for their money back.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      The Truth About America’s Economic Recovery

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      As we approach the midterm elections, most political coverage I see frames the contest as a struggle between Republicans taking advantage of a bad economy and Democrats trying to scare voters about the G.O.P.’s regressive social agenda. Voters do, indeed, perceive a bad economy. But perceptions don’t necessarily match reality.In particular, while political reporting generally takes it for granted that the economy is in bad shape, the data tell a different story. Yes, we have troublingly high inflation. But other indicators paint a much more favorable picture. If inflation can be brought down without a severe recession — which seems like a real possibility — future historians will consider economic policy in the face of the pandemic a remarkable success story.When assessing the state of the economy, what period should we use for comparison? I’ve noted before that Republicans like to compare the current economy with an imaginary version of January 2021, one in which gas was $2 a gallon but less pleasant realities, like sky-high deaths from Covid and deeply depressed employment, are airbrushed from the picture. A much better comparison is with February 2020, just before the pandemic hit with full force.So how does the current economy compare with the eve of the pandemic?First, we’ve had a more or less complete recovery in jobs and production. The unemployment rate, at 3.5 percent, is right back where it was before the virus struck. So is the percentage of prime-age adults employed. Gross domestic product is close to what the Congressional Budget Office was projecting prepandemic.This good news shouldn’t be taken for granted. In the early months of the pandemic, there were many predictions that it would lead to “scarring,” persistent damage to jobs and growth. The sluggish recovery from the 2007-9 recession was still fresh in economists’ memories. So the speed with which we’ve returned to full employment is remarkable, so much so that we might dub it the Great Recovery.Still, while workers may have jobs again, hasn’t their purchasing power taken a big hit from inflation? The answer may surprise you.In September, consumer prices were 15 percent higher than they were on the eve of the pandemic. However, average wages were up by 14 percent, almost matching inflation. Wages of nonsupervisory workers, who make up more than 80 percent of the work force, were up 16 percent. So there wasn’t a large hit to real wages overall, although gas and food — which aren’t much affected by policy, but matter a lot to people’s lives — did become less affordable.Obligatory note: There are other measures of both prices and wages, and if you pick and choose you can make the story look a bit worse or a bit better. More important, some Americans are especially exposed to prices that have gone up a lot. On average, however, there hasn’t been a huge hit to living standards.But won’t bringing inflation down require an ugly recession? Maybe, and widespread predictions of recession may be taking a toll on public perceptions. But they are predictions, not an established fact — and many economists don’t agree with those predictions. I won’t rehash that ongoing debate here, except to say that there are plausible arguments to the effect that disinflation will be much easier this time than it was after the 1970s.Despite what I’ve said, however, the public has very negative economic perceptions. Doesn’t that tell us that the economy really is in bad shape?No, it doesn’t. People know how well they, themselves, are doing. Their views about the national economy, however, can diverge sharply from their personal experience.A Federal Reserve survey found that in 2021 there was a huge gap between the rising number of people with a positive view of their own finances and the falling number with a positive view of the economy; perceptions about the local economy, which people can see with their own eyes, were somewhere in between. I suspect that when we get results for 2022 they’ll look similar.To be fair, the resurgence of inflation after decades of quiescence, combined with fears of possible recession, has unnerved many Americans. The point, however, isn’t that the public is wrong to be concerned; it is that negative public views of the economy don’t refute the proposition that the economy is doing well in many though not all dimensions.Now, I’m not suggesting that Democrats spend their final campaigning days telling voters that the economy is actually just fine. It isn’t.But Democrats shouldn’t concede that the overall economy is in bad shape, either. Some very good things have happened on their watch, above all a jobs recovery that has exceeded almost everyone’s expectations. And they have every right to point out that while Republicans may denounce inflation, Republicans have no plan whatsoever to reduce it.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Your Tuesday Briefing: Jair Bolsonaro Loses

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      But he has not conceded Brazil’s presidential election.Supporters of President Jair Bolsonaro watched as the results of Brazil’s presidential election were announced on Sunday.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesLula defeats Bolsonaro in BrazilBrazilians elected Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a leftist former president, to lead the country. Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s divisive far-right leader, narrowly lost the election.Far-right lawmakers, conservative pundits and many of Bolsonaro’s supporters recognized his opponent’s victory, but Bolsonaro himself has yet to concede. Here are live updates.Lula, as the president-elect is known, made climate a cornerstone of his campaign and has vowed to protect the Amazon. Lula will likely work to undo Bolsonaro-era policies that accelerated the destruction of the rainforest, but congressional opposition will probably limit his agenda.Analysis: Bolsonaro’s silence is becoming increasingly worrying because he has been warning for months that he might not accept defeat. His efforts to undermine Brazil’s election system drew concern at home and abroad.Lula: The 77-year-old president-elect also led Brazil during its boom in the first decade of the century. He left office with an 80 percent approval rating but then was convicted on corruption charges and spent 580 days in prison. The convictions were annulled last year after Brazil’s Supreme Court ruled that the judge in his cases was biased.Bolsonaro: His volatile term was marked by clashes with the courts, attacks on democratic institutions and a pandemic that killed more people than any other country but the U.S. Bolsonaro’s political immunity ends once he leaves office on Jan. 1, and he faces a variety of investigations that could gain steam.Some people tried to swim to the fallen structure and climb up its tangled netting. Others were swept away.Ajit Solanki/Associated PressA deadly Indian bridge collapseAt least 134 people died on Sunday — many of them schoolchildren on vacation during Diwali — when a historic bridge collapsed in the western Indian state of Gujarat.In the midst of India’s most festive season, pedestrians had packed the suspension bridge, which was built in the Victorian era and had newly reopened. The 755-foot-long bridge (about 230 meters) is a famous tourist destination because of its sensation of swaying; people had bought tickets for about 20 cents.The State of the WarGrain Deal: After accusing Ukraine of attacking its ships in Crimea, Russia withdrew from an agreement allowing the export of grain from Ukrainian ports. The move jeopardized a rare case of wartime coordination aimed at lowering global food prices and combating hunger.Turning the Tables: With powerful Western weapons and deadly homemade drones, Ukraine now has an artillery advantage over Russia in the southern Kherson region, erasing what had been a critical asset for Moscow.Fears of Escalation: President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia repeated the unfounded claim that Ukraine was preparing to explode a so-called dirty bomb, as concerns rose in the West that the Kremlin was seeking a pretext to escalate the war.A Coalition Under Strain: President Biden is facing new challenges keeping together the bipartisan, multinational coalition supporting Ukraine. The alliance has shown signs of fraying with the approach of the U.S. midterm elections and a cold European winter.After people grabbed the netting to make the bridge shimmy, as countless others had done before them, the cables suddenly snapped, spilling people into the river.Now, India is asking why its infrastructure has failed so calamitously once again. The bridge had been opened without a “fitness certificate” or the authorities’ permission, an official told local news media. The company running the bridge blamed the victims, but it is unclear why it allowed so many on the bridge at once.Politics: Gujarat is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state. An opposition leader said that leaders of his party — which has governed the state for more than two decades — announced the bridge’s opening as a “Diwali gift” to the people of the town without ensuring its safety.How Russia pays for its warWestern nations imposed sanctions on Russia after it invaded Ukraine. But the punishments may have only limited effect: The value of Russia’s exports actually grew after the invasion, a Times analysis shows.The volume of Russia’s imports has plunged as sanctions and trade limits went into effect, but a few countries have deepened their relationships with Russia since the war began. Imports from Turkey have increased by 113 percent, and Chinese imports have increased 24 percent.Russia remains one of the world’s most important producers of oil, gas and raw materials. Many countries have found living without Russian raw materials incredibly difficult, and the high price of oil and gas in the last year has offset revenue lost to sanctions. India and China have emerged as much bigger buyers of Russian crude, albeit at a discounted rate.Infrastructure: Russian strikes knocked out most of Kyiv’s water.Grain: After suspending its participation in a grain deal, Russia said it won’t guarantee security for any cargo vessels crossing the Black Sea. Some African countries face immediate pain from its suspension.THE LATEST NEWSThe Seoul CrushPeople came to a makeshift memorial for the victims in Seoul.Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesOnly 137 police officers were in the area in Seoul where more than 150 people died in a Halloween crowd crush. For comparison, the police dispatched 1,300 officers for a BTS performance last month in Busan, which drew 55,000.The authorities also underestimated the size of the crowd, which swelled to 130,000. A politician in the opposition called it a “man-made disaster.”More than 100 of the dead were in their 20s.Asia PacificChina launched the third and final module of its Tiangong space station.Chinese stocks whipsawed yesterday. The volatility may reflect investors’ unease about Xi Jinping’s tightening grip on power as China’s leader.Gautam Adani is Asia’s richest man. His business decisions could help determine whether India helps the world avert a climate catastrophe.U.S. NewsThe Supreme Court heard arguments on college admissions policies, and the conservative majority seemed skeptical of affirmative action. Legal abortions fell around six percent in the two months after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.The trial of Donald Trump’s company began in New York yesterday.“This case is about greed and cheating,” a prosecutor told jurors.Science TimesAn artist’s impression of a “planet killer” asteroid, which had been hidden by the sun’s glare.DOE FNAL / DECam / CTIO / NOIRLab / NSF / AURA /J. da Silva – Space EngineScientists have identified an asteroid that poses a distant threat to Earth.Cholera is spreading: Droughts, floods and wars have forced many around the world to live in unsanitary conditions.A new study found that large groups of insects can create an atmospheric electrical charge as strong as those created by thunderstorms.In 2020, an enormous telescope in Puerto Rico collapsed. There is no plan to rebuild it, and astronomers and islanders are in mourning.A Morning ReadFor 8-year-old Shaffan Muhammad Ghulam to leave Australia would most likely be a death sentence, his doctors say.David Dare Parker for The New York TimesAustralia is considered a world leader in health care. But the country, along with neighboring New Zealand, is among the very few to routinely reject potential migrants on the basis of medical needs. That can leave families with one ill or disabled member stuck in legal limbo.CHINA INSIGHTIn the minutes before Hu Jintao was led away, he appeared to be reaching for a document on the table.The New York Times; video by CNA, via ReutersWhat happened to Hu Jintao?Nothing unscripted happens at the Communist Party congress in China. Nothing unscripted is allowed to happen.But last week, Hu Jintao, who once led China and was seated next to Xi Jinping, was abruptly led out of the closing ceremony. His apparently reluctant departure was the lone disruption in the meeting, where China’s leaders are anointed twice a decade, and analysts have said the chaos of the moment suggested that it was not planned.The moment led to wild speculation: Was Hu, 79, suffering from poor health, as Chinese state media would later report? Or was he being purged in a dramatic show by Xi, China’s current leader, for the world to see?A Times video analysis offers a clue. Hu — who was historically the only person with the stature to challenge the leader — was all but ignored by Xi; Li Keqiang, China’s premier; and other top politicians as he was escorted away. After he left, only Xi remained in the spotlight, an empty chair beside him.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookMichael Kraus for The New York TimesWelsh rarebit is an easy, cheesy late-night snack.Real EstateIf you’ve got a spare $4.6 million, check out this abandoned-fort-turned-estate in Rajasthan, in northwest India.PhotographyBoris Mikhailov is Ukraine’s greatest artist, our critic writes.The World Through a LensThere’s a circus at sea.Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Bit of tomfoolery (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. The U.S. tested the first hydrogen bomb 70 years ago in the Marshall Islands.“The Daily” is about Xi Jinping.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Times/Siena Polls Show Democrats Slightly Ahead in Key Senate Races

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      Respondents said they preferred Republicans to control the Senate, but individual matchups showed a different story.John Fetterman, left, holds a lead in our poll of the Pennsylvania Senate race, although most of the survey was held before his debate with Dr. Mehmet Oz./EPA, via ShutterstockEight days before the election, we have our final* midterm surveys: polls of the four states likeliest to determine control of the Senate.New York Times/Siena College pollsPennsylvania: John Fetterman (D) 49, Mehmet Oz (R) 44.Arizona: Mark Kelly (D) 51, Blake Masters (R) 45.Nevada: Adam Laxalt (R) 47, Catherine Cortez Masto (D) 47.Georgia: Raphael Warnock (D) 49, Herschel Walker (R) 46.All considered, this is a pretty good set of numbers for Democrats. If they win three of the four Senate seats, they hold the Senate if everywhere else goes as expected. Here, they lead in the magic three of four while remaining highly competitive in the fourth — though it’s very important to caution that most of this poll was taken before the Pennsylvania Senate debate.There’s also a bit of good news for Republicans: Respondents said they preferred Republicans to control the Senate. Democrats led anyway, presumably because of their distaste for some of the Republican nominees or their affection for Democratic incumbents. As we head down the stretch, Republicans can hope to lure some of these voters to their side.How the polls compareIf you compare our polls with the polling averages, they look even better for Democrats. Consider the current FiveThirtyEight averages:In Pennsylvania, Mr. Fetterman leads in the FiveThirtyEight average by one point, compared with our six-point lead (after rounding).In Arizona, Mr. Kelly leads in the average by 3.6 points, compared with our six-point lead.In Georgia, Mr. Warnock leads by 1.2 points, compared with our three-point edge.In Nevada, Ms. Cortez Masto leads by 0.4 points, compared with our tied race.There is a twist: Although our polls may look better for Democrats than the average, they look about the same as the other traditional polls that used to be considered the gold standard in survey research, like ABC/Washington Post, CNN/SSRS, Fox News, NBC, the university survey houses, and so on.In many of these states, our surveys are the first such poll in weeks. Consider the last such polls in the four states, and how much better they look for Democrats than the average — and how similar they look to our survey:Arizona: CNN/SSRS showed Mr. Kelly +6 about a month ago, in a poll conducted from Sept. 26 to Oct. 2.Nevada: USA Today/Suffolk showed Ms. Cortez Masto +2 in a poll taken from Oct. 4 to Oct. 7.Georgia: Quinnipiac showed Mr. Warnock up seven, in a poll taken from Oct. 7 to Oct. 10.Pennsylvania: Franklin and Marshall showed Mr. Fetterman +4 in a poll conducted from Oct. 14 to Oct. 23. In a survey fielded over a partly overlapping period, CNN/SSRS showed Mr. Fetterman up six from Oct. 13 to 17.The absence of surveys from reputable pollsters is remarkable. The drought is partly because of rising costs — our October national survey was eight times as expensive as our final polls in 2016, on a per-interview basis. But it’s also because of a crisis of confidence among the traditional pollsters — Times/Siena included — who don’t have a great explanation for the poor results in 2020 and are understandably treading a little lightly.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsElection Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.A Pivotal Test in Pennsylvania: A battle for blue-collar white voters is raging in President Biden’s birthplace, where Democrats have the furthest to fall and the most to gain.Governor’s Races: Democrats and Republicans are heading into the final stretch of more than a dozen competitive contests for governor. Some battleground races could also determine who controls the Senate.Biden’s Agenda at Risk: If Republicans capture one or both chambers of Congress, the president’s opportunities on several issues will shrink. Here are some major areas where the two sides would clash.Ohio Senate Race: Polls show Representative Tim Ryan competing within the margin of error against his G.O.P. opponent, J.D. Vance. Mr. Ryan said the race would be “the upset of the night,” but there is still a cold reality tilting against Democrats.The flip side: Most of the polling over the last few weeks is coming from partisan outfits — usually Republican — or auto-dial firms. These polls are cheap enough to flood the zone, and many of them were emboldened by the 2020 election, when their final results came close to the election results even as other pollsters struggled.A couple of the nontraditional firms are worth taking seriously — CBS/YouGov in particular — but a lot of the polls that are filling up the averages just aren’t underpinned by credible survey methods.They may have come close to the results in 2020 — and could easily come close yet again 2022 — but it’s not because they have a representative sample of the population. Imagine, for instance, a poll that is subject to the same pro-Democratic bias as the higher-quality surveys, but simply doesn’t call cellphones and misses people under 35.In that case, the headline results could be “right,” but it’s not because the pollster has some special sauce or has uncovered the secret to reaching Trump voters.To be clear: The point isn’t that our polls are right and the others are wrong. There’s plenty of reason to think Trump-era challenges still plague the survey industry. If so, the pollsters once considered gold standard may struggle yet again. And if so, the dearth of gold standard polls and the surge of partisan polling might just leave the polling averages closer to the results than the last election, even if it’s just as tough for pollsters as it was two years.Right or wrong, there’s not much question that Democrats would hold a more comfortable lead in the Senate if the pollsters who dominated the averages in the past were a bigger part of the averages this year.Note: *We will have one last set of findings for you: the results of a multi-survey study of Wisconsin. This study began in September, so it won’t exactly count as a final poll. But hopefully it will shed some light on the challenges facing pollsters and maybe even offer a path forward. I started to dig into this data only yesterday — and progress has been slow — but my goal is to report a few preliminary findings before the election. More

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      Senate Control Hinges on Neck-and-Neck Races, Times/Siena Poll Finds

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      The contests are close in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania. Many voters want Republicans to flip the Senate, but prefer the Democrat in their state.Control of the Senate rests on a knife’s edge, according to new polls by The New York Times and Siena College, with Republican challengers in Nevada and Georgia neck-and-neck with Democratic incumbents, and the Democratic candidate in Pennsylvania clinging to what appears to be a tenuous advantage.The bright spot for Democrats in the four key states polled was in Arizona, where Senator Mark Kelly is holding a small but steady lead over his Republican challenger, Blake Masters.The results indicate a deeply volatile and unpredictable Senate contest: More people across three of the states surveyed said they wanted Republicans to gain control of the Senate, but they preferred the individual Democratic candidates in their states — a sign that Republicans may be hampered by the shortcomings of their nominees.Midterm elections are typically referendums on the party in power, and Democrats must defy decades of that political history to win control of the Senate, an outcome that has not completely slipped out of the party’s grasp according to the findings of the Times/Siena surveys. Democrats control the 50-50 Senate with Vice President Kamala Harris as the tiebreaking vote. To gain the majority, Republicans need to gain just one seat.Senate Races in Four StatesIf this November’s election for U.S. Senate were held today, which candidate would you be more likely to vote for? More

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      The Battle for Blue-Collar White Voters Raging in Biden’s Birthplace

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      SCRANTON, Pa. — The fate of the Democratic Party in northeastern Pennsylvania lies in the hands of people like Steve Papp.A 30-year veteran carpenter, he describes his job almost poetically as “hanging out with your brothers, building America.” But there has been a harder labor in his life of late: selling his fellow carpenters, iron workers and masons on a Democratic Party that he sees as the protector of a “union way of life” but that they see as being increasingly out of step with their cultural values.“The guys aren’t hearing the message,” Mr. Papp said.Perhaps no place in the nation offers a more symbolic and consequential test of whether Democrats can win back some of the white working-class vote than Pennsylvania — and particularly the state’s northeastern corner, the birthplace of President Biden, where years of economic decline have scarred the coal-rich landscape. This region is where a pivotal Senate race could be decided, where two seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs and where a crucial governorship hangs in the balance.No single constituency, of course, will determine the outcome of these races in a state as big as Pennsylvania, let alone the 2022 midterms. Turning out Black voters in cities is critical for Democrats. Gaining ground in the swingy suburbs is a must for Republicans. But it is among white working-class voters in rural areas and smaller towns — places like Sugarloaf Township, where Mr. Papp lives — where the Democratic Party has, in some ways, both the furthest to fall and the most to gain.A highway sign outside Scranton, Pa.Ruth Fremson/The New York TimesSitting in the Scranton carpenters’ union hall, where Democratic lawn signs leaned up against the walls, Mr. Papp said that he often brought stickers to the job site for those he converted, but that he had recently been giving away fewer than he would like. He ticked through what he feels he has been up against. Talk radio. Social media. The Fox News megaphone. “Misinformation and lies,” as he put it, about the Black Lives Matter movement and the L.G.B.T.Q. community.“It’s about cultural issues and social issues,” Mr. Papp lamented. “People don’t even care about their economics. They want to hate.”Republicans counter that Democratic elites are the ones alienating the working class by advocating a “woke” cultural agenda and by treating them as deplorables. And they also argue that the current economy overseen by Democrats has been the issue pushing voters toward the right.The stakes are far higher than one corner of one state in one election.White blue-collar voters are a large and crucial constituency in a number of top Senate battlegrounds this year, including in Wisconsin, Nevada, New Hampshire and Ohio. And the need for Democrats to lose by less is already an urgent concern for party strategists heading into 2024, when Donald J. Trump, who accelerated the movement of blue-collar voters of all races away from Democrats, has signaled he plans to run again.Lt. Gov. John Fetterman boarding Air Force One after a meeting with President Biden.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesOne study from Pew Research Center showed that as recently as 2007, white voters without a college degree were about evenly divided in their party affiliations. But by 2020, Republicans had opened up an advantage of 59 percent over Democrats’ 35 percent.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsElection Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.Governor’s Races: Democrats and Republicans are heading into the final stretch of more than a dozen competitive contests for governor. Some battleground races could also determine who controls the Senate.Biden’s Agenda at Risk: If Republicans capture one or both chambers of Congress, the president’s opportunities on several issues will shrink. Here are some major areas where the two sides would clash.Ohio Senate Race: Polls show Representative Tim Ryan competing within the margin of error against his G.O.P. opponent, J.D. Vance. Mr. Ryan said the race would be “the upset of the night,” but there is still a cold reality tilting against Democrats.“You can’t get destroyed,” Christopher Borick, the director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion in Pennsylvania, said of the task in front of Democrats. “Cutting into Republican gains in the Trump era among white working-class voters is essential.”There are, quite simply, a lot of white voters without college degrees in America. Another Pew study found that such voters accounted for 42 percent of all voters in the 2020 presidential election. And, by some estimates, they could make up nearly half the vote in Pennsylvania this year.Luzerne County, just south of Scranton, had been reliably Democratic for years and years. Then, suddenly, in 2016, Mr. Trump won Luzerne in a nearly 20-point landslide. He won it again in 2020, but by 5 points fewer. There are Obama-Trump voters here, and Obama-Trump-Biden voters, too. The region may have tacked to the right politically in recent years, but it is still a place where the phrase “Irish Catholic Democrat” was long treated as almost a single word, and where it might be more possible to nudge at least some ancestral Democrats back toward the party.The Roosevelt Beer Hall in Dunmore, Pa.Ruth Fremson/The New York TimesScranton, a former coal town nestled in the scenic Wyoming Valley, has become synonymous with this voting bloc. Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, who hopes to become the next House speaker, visited the region this fall to unveil the Republican agenda, and both Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump traveled to the area for events kicking off the fall campaign.This year, the Pennsylvania Senate race looms especially large.The Democratic nominee, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, was seemingly engineered for the task of appealing to the working class. A bald and burly man with a political persona that revolves around Carhartt sweatshirts and tattoos, Mr. Fetterman has vowed from the start to compete in even the reddest corners of Pennsylvania. He is running against Mehmet Oz, a wealthy, out-of-state television celebrity who, according to polls, has been viewed skeptically from the start by the Republican base, and who talked of buying crudités at the grocery in a widely ridiculed video.Yet local Democrats said Mr. Fetterman was still facing an uphill climb among white working-class voters in the region, even before his halting debate performance as he recovers from a stroke. For those Democrats concerned about competing for the state’s biggest voting bloc, the success or failure of Mr. Fetterman’s candidacy has become an almost existential question: If not him and here, then who and where?Mr. Fetterman’s strategy to cut into Republican margins in red counties is displayed on his lawn signs: “Every county. Every vote.” But Republicans have worked relentlessly to undercut the blue-collar image Mr. Fetterman honed as the former mayor of Braddock, a downtrodden former steel town just outside Pittsburgh.Chris Tigue, a self-employed painter.Ruth Fremson/The New York Times“It’s a costume,” Tucker Carlson, the Fox News host, said in one segment last month. Republicans have highlighted Mr. Fetterman’s Harvard degree, his middle-class suburban upbringing, the financial support he received from his parents into his 40s and, most recently, a barrage of advertising that has cast him as a soft-on-crime liberal.Both sides are targeting voters like Chris Tigue, a 39-year-old who runs a one-man painting company and lives in Dunmore, a town bordering Scranton known for its enormous landfill. Mr. Tigue, a registered Republican, has gone on a political journey that may seem uncommon in most of the country but is more familiar here.He voted twice for Barack Obama. Then he voted twice for Donald Trump.As Mr. Tigue sat outside Roosevelt Beer Garden, a watering hole where the portrait of Franklin D. Roosevelt on the wall was a reminder of the area’s Democratic heritage, he explained that Mr. Fetterman had won him back, not just because of his working class “curb appeal,” but because of his stances on abortion and medical cannabis.Mr. Tigue said he was voting for Mr. Fetterman knowing that Mr. Fetterman would probably support the president’s economic agenda in the Senate, a prospect he called “a little scary.” But he said he was looking past that fact. “I’m focusing on the person,” he said.Justin Taylor, the mayor of nearby Carbondale, is another Obama-Trump voter. Elected as a 25-year-old Democrat almost two decades ago, he endorsed Mr. Trump in 2020 and grew increasingly more Republican, just like the city he serves.Mayor Justin Taylor of Carbondale, Pa., at the Anthracite Center, a former bank he converted into an event space.Ruth Fremson/The New York TimesToday, he is adamantly opposed to Mr. Fetterman, calling him a liberal caricature and the kind of candidate the left thinks will appeal to the people of Carbondale, a shrinking town of under 10,000 people that was founded on anthracite coal. “I think, quite honestly, he is an empty Carhartt sweatshirt and the people who are working class in Pennsylvania see that,” Mr. Taylor said.Mr. Taylor is still technically a registered Democrat, he said, but he feels judged by his own party. “The Democratic Party forces it down your throat,” he said, “and they make you a bigot, they make you a racist, they make you a homophobe if you don’t understand a concept, or you don’t 100 percent agree.”Still, Mr. Taylor said he might not vote in the Senate race at all. Of his fellow Fetterman doubters, and of Oz skeptics, he asked, “Do they stay home? That becomes the big question.”Northeastern Pennsylvania is also home to two bellwether House races with embattled Democratic incumbents.One race features Representative Matt Cartwright, who is the rarest of political survivors — the only House Democrat nationwide running this year who held a district that Mr. Trump carried in both 2016 and 2020. The other includes Representative Susan Wild, who is defending a swing district that contains one of only two Pennsylvania counties that Mr. Biden flipped in 2020.Representative Matt Cartwright, left. Ruth Fremson/The New York TimesThe union hall of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners Local 445. Ruth Fremson/The New York TimesTo emphasize his cross-partisan appeal, Mr. Cartwright has run an ad this year featuring endorsements from one man in a Trump hat and another in a Biden shirt. In an interview, he said the area’s long-term economic downturn, which he traced to the free-trade deals of the 1990s, had caused many people to work multiple jobs, sapping morale and even affecting the region’s psyche.“When something like that happens, who do you vote for?” Mr. Cartwright said. “You vote for the change candidate. And that’s what we saw a lot of. They voted for Obama twice. They voted for Trump twice. And my own view of it is when they vote that way, it’s a cry for help.”Demographic shifts in politics happen in both directions. As Democrats have hemorrhaged white working-class voters, they have made large gains with college-educated white voters who were once the financial and electoral base of Republicans. In Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia suburbs have become strongly Democratic, while the state’s less populated areas have become more Republican.Alexis McFarland Kelly, a 59-year-old former owner of a gourmet market near Scranton, is the kind of voter Democrats are newly winning over. Raised as a Republican, she was often warned by her father, a business owner, and her grandfather, a corporate vice president, of the excesses of labor and the left. But now, she is planning to vote for Mr. Fetterman.Her biggest misgiving is the hoodie-wearing persona that might appeal to the working class. “I just wish he’d put a suit on once in a while,” she said.Last year, she went to the local Department of Motor Vehicles and declared that she wanted to change her party registration to become a Democrat. The clerk was shocked. “She basically dropped her pen and said, ‘What?! A Democrat!’” Ms. Kelly recalled. “‘Everyone is going the other way.’”Nina Feldman More