Subterms
States with challenges to Trump’s candidacy Trump disqualified, decision appealed Decision pending Challenge dismissed or rejected Alaska Ariz. Calif. Colo. Conn. Del. Fla. Idaho Kan. La. Maine Mass. Mich. Minn. Mont. Nev. N.H. N.J. N.M. N.Y. N.C. Okla. Ore. Pa. R.I. S.C. Texas Utah Vt. Va. W.Va. Wis. Wyo. Formal challenges to Donald J. Trump’s […] More
Her failure to mention slavery in response to a question about the causes of the Civil War has given Chris Christie fresh ammunition as they compete for the anti-Trump vote.Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor seeking the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, appears to have weathered a holiday-season gaffe on the causes of the Civil War, but the controversy over her answer, which neglected to mention slavery, was a gift to a rival, former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey.And that fresh ammunition may be the most lasting fallout for her effort to catch former President Donald J. Trump in the nation’s first Republican primary in New Hampshire on Jan. 23.With less than two weeks before the Iowa caucuses, Ms. Haley is expected back in southern New Hampshire on Tuesday for a two-day campaign swing, working to maintain the momentum that has lifted her to second place in the state. But the final week of 2023 was a particularly rocky one. She flubbed the name of the Iowa Hawkeyes’ star basketball player Caitlin Clark, stirred anger and frustration among the independent and moderate factions of her base over her Civil War answer at a Berlin, N.H., town hall meeting, then potentially provoked the anti-Trump faction again when she said she would pardon Mr. Trump should he be convicted.Mr. Christie, who will be in the state on Thursday and Friday, has seized on Ms. Haley’s gaffe, and both of their campaigns are at a pivotal moment. They have long been on a collision course in New Hampshire, which Mr. Christie has made his do-or-die state and where Ms. Haley has been climbing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? More
The move attempts to overturn the decision which made Maine the second state to rule the former president ineligible for the primary ballot.Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump filed an appeal on Tuesday seeking to overturn the ruling last week by Shenna Bellows, Maine’s secretary of state, to bar him from appearing on the state’s Republican primary ballot.Ms. Bellows, a Democrat, “was a biased decision maker who should have recused herself and otherwise failed to provide lawful due process,” lawyers for Mr. Trump wrote in the 11-page appeal filed in Maine Superior Court. They further argued that she had “no legal authority to consider the federal constitutional issues presented by the challengers.”Ms. Bellows “made multiple errors of law and acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner,” the lawyers wrote. They demanded that the court vacate the secretary’s decision, which they described as “the product of a process infected by bias.”Maine became the second state to exclude Mr. Trump from its primary ballot on Dec. 28, when Ms. Bellows found him ineligible under the third section of the 14th Amendment, which prohibits people who have engaged in insurrection from holding office. Her decision followed a similar landmark finding in Colorado, where the state’s Supreme Court ruled on Dec. 19 that he could not appear on the ballot there.A spokesman for the Trump campaign previously called both states’ actions “partisan election interference” and “a hostile assault on American democracy.”Similar challenges to Mr. Trump are playing out in states around the country, mostly in the courts. Mr. Trump is expected to file an appeal of the Colorado ruling with the United States Supreme Court within days. If the court takes the case, it would most likely put a hold on legal challenges elsewhere, though the potential impact on Maine’s unfolding process remains unclear.Richard L. Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an election law expert, said he expects the appeal in Maine to proceed even if the Supreme Court takes up the Colorado case, because of the pressing need to resolve the matter, and because some of the legal questions in the two states differ.“I don’t think that will stop the process in its tracks,” he said. “Trump wants to move ahead because he’s off the ballot, and the state wants finality.”Given the need to finalize ballots promptly for voters in the military and overseas, the complex legal maneuvering is taking on increasing urgency. The Republican primaries in Maine and Colorado are both scheduled for Super Tuesday, March 5.Challenges to Mr. Trump’s candidacy have been filed in at least 33 states. Beyond Colorado and Maine, at least 17 states have unresolved challenges in play, including California, New Hampshire, Oregon and North Carolina.By law, the Superior Court in Maine must rule on Mr. Trump’s appeal by Jan. 17. That decision may then be appealed within three days to the state’s highest court, which must issue its own ruling within 14 days of the lower court’s decision.Reaction to the Maine decision has been mixed among residents and elected officials. Ms. Bellows, a former state senator, was elected by the state legislature to her second two-year term in December 2022.In the run-up to her decision, Mr. Trump’s lawyers demanded that she recuse herself because of prior social media posts in which she referred to the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as an “insurrection” — evidence, they said, that she had already made up her mind about that day’s events, and his role in them, before hearing any evidence.They argue in their appeal, as they did in their case filings, that the disqualification of a presidential candidate under the 14th Amendment is “a political question reserved for the Electoral College and Congress.”Since releasing her decision, Ms. Bellows and her staff have faced threats and harassment, she wrote in a post on social media on Saturday, including a “swatting” call to state police that reported a fake emergency at her home after her address was shared online.In her post on Facebook, Ms. Bellows called the threats “unacceptable,” adding, “We should be able to agree to disagree on important issues without threats and violence.”Mitch Smith More
Donald J. Trump is expected to participate in a Fox News town hall on the same day, the network announced Tuesday.A Republican presidential primary debate that CNN plans to host in Des Moines next week will be a one-on-one showdown between Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley, who are fighting to emerge from the state’s caucuses as the definitive alternative to former President Donald J. Trump.Both Mr. DeSantis, the governor of Florida, and Ms. Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, are long shots to win the caucuses, given that they are trailing Mr. Trump in polls of Iowans by more than 30 points on average. But if either one is to have even a small chance of claiming the nomination, that person needs to drive the other out of the race, which they could do — or at least take a first step toward doing — by beating them for second place in Iowa.Mr. Trump did not participate in the official debates sponsored by the Republican National Committee last year, and he will not participate in the CNN debate in Iowa either. (The Iowa event will be followed by a similar one in New Hampshire.) And no other candidate qualified by the deadline on Tuesday.Participants needed at least 10 percent support in three national or Iowa polls that met CNN’s criteria, including at least one poll of likely Iowa caucusgoers. The entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy; former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who has largely ignored Iowa in favor of campaigning in New Hampshire; and former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas did not meet that mark.In a post on X saying he wouldn’t participate even if he qualified, Mr. Ramaswamy expressed anger at CNN over the network’s fact-checking of the conspiracy theories he advanced during a town-hall event last month and about CNN anchors’ and commentators’ criticism of him. He also faulted the network for rejecting some polls that the Republican National Committee accepted to qualify candidates for its debates.He said he would instead do a live show with the right-wing commentator Tim Pool on Jan. 10, the night of the debate. Mr. Trump is scheduled to participate in his own counterprogramming: a town-hall event that Fox News announced on Tuesday.Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley both criticized Mr. Trump’s refusal to participate.“With only three candidates qualifying, it’s time for Donald Trump to show up,” Ms. Haley said in a statement. “As the debate stage continues to shrink, it’s getting harder for Donald Trump to hide.”A spokesman for Mr. DeSantis, Andrew Romeo, said Mr. Trump was “scared” to defend his record and said mockingly, “If it would make the debate more inviting, we would gladly agree to make it a seated format where the former president would be more comfortable.”Nicholas Nehamas More
We’re watching these developments in the year to come.Last year was the warmest in recorded history. What does 2024 have in store?For starters, it is almost certain to be another scorcher. The naturally occurring El Niño will push up temperatures in much of the world and humans will continue pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.That will very likely mean more extreme heat, like Phoenix saw last summer in a record streak of days that hit 110 degree Fahrenheit or higher. It will mean more wildfires, like the ones that torched Canada, Europe and North Africa. And it will mean more unusually hot ocean temperatures that threaten coral reefs and melt glaciers.But we’ll be keeping track of more than just the weather and temperatures this year. Here are six other big stories we’ll be watching: The U.S. presidential electionPresident Biden’s signature legislative success has been the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which turbocharged investment in clean energy. Biden has also strengthened emissions regulations and laid the groundwork for tackling industrial pollution. But more action looks unlikely if he fails to win a second term.Donald Trump, who holds a commanding lead for the Republican presidential nomination, leads Biden by 46 percent to 44 percent among registered voters, according to a December Times/Siena poll of registered voters. And if Trump returns to the White House, much of Biden’s work on climate change could be in jeopardy. During his four years as president, Trump pulled the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, rolled back environmental protections and promoted an across-the-board expansion of fossil fuels. A second Trump term would most likely see more of the same. Mr. Trump has recently spoken on the campaign trail about expanding oil and gas drilling, and vowed to renege on the U.S. pledge of $3 billion to the Green Climate Fund.If Trump wins, Republican operatives have prepared a comprehensive plan to undo federal efforts to address global warming: Shredding regulations to curb greenhouse gas pollution from cars, power plants, and oil and gas wells; dismantling almost every clean energy program in the federal government; and increasing the production of fossil fuelsFossil fuel productionA Venture Global liquefied natural gas facility on the Calcasieu Ship Channel in Cameron, La.Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York TimesThe United States is already the largest producer of oil and gas in the world, and even more production is on the way. The Biden administration last year approved the Willow drilling project. And as I reported over the holidays, it is currently considering approving a slew of natural gas export terminals that would set the stage for decades of additional methane production. Many other countries around the globe also have ambitious plans to expand oil, gas and even coal production in the years ahead.Those plans are hard to reconcile with the growing calls to phase out fossil fuels. Last month in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, leaders from more than 170 countries called for “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable manner.” So far, there are few meaningful signs that such a transition is actually underway. And until that happens, you can expect global temperatures to keep rising. Renewables growthWind turbines near Block Island, R.I., owned by Orsted, a Danish company.Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesThe world is hungry for energy, and while oil and gas production is growing, so, too, are solar and wind power. Globally, more money is being put toward the development of new clean energy than fossil fuels. Last year, investments in solar outpaced investments in oil for the first time.Those trends look set to continue, but renewable energy developers also face challenges ahead. The offshore wind business has been battered by rising costs, shaky supply chains and volatile interest rates. Proposed solar and wind farms are running into problems getting permits. Nimbyism continues to get in the way of many new clean energy developments. And even when projects do get built, they face hurdles connecting to a power grid badly in need of a large-scale expansion.For the U.S. to come close to achieving Biden’s goal of 100 percent renewable power generation by 2035, a lot will have to go right. Global finance reformsPressure has been building on the World Bank and International Monetary Fund to overhaul the way they help developing countries adapt to climate change. In recent months, the World Bank has made some changes, agreeing to pause debt and interest payments for nations hit by natural disasters, and helping establish accountable marketplaces for carbon credits.But the same old problems continue to bedevil poor countries looking for help navigating a rapidly warming planet. It is far more expensive to build new clean energy projects in the developing world than in the United States or Europe, because many risk-averse investors are less likely to finance the projects. More is at stake than many people realize. With more than a billion more people in need of reliable access to electricity in the decades ahead, it matters greatly whether that power will be generated by fossil fuels or renewables. Wind and solar plants could give the world a chance at keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. But building a new generation of gas and coal plants across the developing world could put that goal out of reach. LitigationOne of the surprise stories of 2023 was the surge in climate-related lawsuits. Children and young adults in Montana won a victory against the state over its support of fossil fuels. California sued big oil companies, accusing them of downplaying the risks that global warming poses to the public. And municipalities in Oregon, New Jersey and beyond brought cases against companies like Exxon, Chevron and Shell.Expect more lawsuits to be brought against fossil fuel companies and the governments that support them with subsidies and rubber-stamp permits. Some of those cases could see their days in court. In particular, there a decent chance that a landmark case brought by Massachusetts against Exxon could go to trial in 2024.Activism and actionClimate protesters from the group Just Stop Oil interrupted a televised match of the World Snooker Championship in April.Mike Egerton/Press Association, via Associated PressClimate protesters interrupted the U.S. Open tennis tournament and the Metropolitan Opera in New York. They continued to vandalize museums in Europe and elsewhere. And they shut down major streets and highways in England, the Netherlands and beyond.But not all climate action was so disruptive. During the United Nations General Assembly in New York, tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Midtown Manhattan for a peaceful march calling for an end to fossil fuels. A new generation of young environmentalists is using social media to protest new oil and gas projects. And the White House is starting the American Climate Corps, modeling the program on an effort in California that has put thousands of people to work addressing climate change in their own communities. Expect the action and activism around climate issues to keep going strong in the year ahead.Those are just some of the stories we’ll be following in 2024. Thanks for subscribing and we’ll be back with another edition of Climate Forward on Thursday.Other climate newsIndiana homeowners are concerned that plans to pipe in groundwater for a microchip factory will deplete residential wells. Prince Frederik, who will soon become King of Denmark, is among a generation of young royals who have embraced climate issues.Telsa sales rebounded during the last three months of 2023 after the company slashed prices to attract buyers. In the Times Magazine, the author of the upcoming book “Not the End of the World” talks about letting go of doomerism and working toward a sustainable future. In Spain, a drought revealed a prehistoric stone circle similar to Stonehenge. More
The authorities said they did not believe the shooting was related to previous threats against the justices who barred Donald J. Trump from the state’s primary ballot.A man was arrested early Tuesday after breaching the Colorado Supreme Court building, holding a guard at gunpoint and opening fire inside, the local authorities said. No injuries were reported, although the judicial center suffered extensive damage.The incident, coming two weeks after the court voted to bar former President Donald J. Trump from Colorado’s 2024 presidential primary ballot, comes as tensions have risen across the country over legal challenges to Mr. Trump’s eligibility to run for president.Justices on the court have reportedly received death threats since the decision on Mr. Trump was handed down, but the authorities in Colorado said they did not believe the shooting on Tuesday was associated with those threats, which remain under investigation.The man who opened fire inside the Colorado judicial center, which houses the state’s Supreme Court and other judicial agencies, had been involved in a car crash nearby and had reportedly pointed a handgun at the other driver, the State Patrol said in a news release.The gunman, identified by the Denver police as Brandon Olsen, 44, then shot out a window of the Judicial Center, entered the building and held one of the security guards at gunpoint, demanding the guard’s keys. The guard was not armed.The suspect then went to the seventh floor and fired additional shots inside the building, and at some point started a fire in the stairwell, the authorities said.Denver police officers and Colorado state troopers surrounded the building. At 3 a.m., officials said, the suspect called 911 and surrendered.Mr. Olsen is being held for investigation of robbery, burglary and arson, the police said. The Denver district attorney’s office will make a final determination on charges.Last week, Maine’s secretary of state, Shenna Bellows, was the victim of a “swatting” call to her home, just one day after she barred Mr. Trump from the Maine’s primary ballot because of his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.Ms. Bellows’s staff have also received “nonstop threatening communications” she said in a post on Facebook. “We should be able to agree to disagree on important issues without threats and violence,” she added. More
From elections and A.I. to antitrust and shadow banking, here are the big themes that could define the worlds of business and policy.What we’re watching in 2024 Andrew here. As we look ahead to the new year, the DealBook team has identified about a dozen themes that are likely to become running narratives that could define the business and policy ecosystem for the next 12 months.Of course, the presidential election, perhaps one of the most polarizing in history, is going to infect every part of the business world. Watch out for which C.E.O.s and other financiers back candidates — and, importantly, which ones go silent — and how companies deal with outspoken employees. Also: Look for some wealthy executives to avoid giving directly to candidates but instead donate to PACs as a shield, of sorts, from public scrutiny.Another story line that will probably remain part of the water cooler — er, Slack and X — conversation in business is the backlash against environmental, social and corporate governance principles, or E.S.G. This fight has manifested itself into a political battle and increasingly found its way in the past year into a debate about free speech on campuses (another theme that isn’t going away).Here’s a bit more detail on what we’re looking out for this year.The U.S. presidential election. The race seems set to come down to a rerun of 2020, with Donald Trump leading opinion polls to be the Republican candidate despite his mounting legal battles. The big question is how business leaders will respond. Will they coalesce around (and direct their money to) an anyone-but-Trump candidate? Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, is leading that race, but she has a long way to go to catch up to Trump. President Biden, who has made a series of consequential decisions on the economy, hopes voters will start to feel an economic upswing to reverse his sagging poll ratings.Private credit could be hit by a wave of defaults. Just as 1980s-style leveraged buyouts have been rechristened “private equity,” so too has “shadow banking” been rebranded as “private credit” and “direct lending” in time for the business to reach its highest levels yet. Direct lending by investment firms and hedge funds has become a $1.5 trillion titan, with scores of companies turning to the likes of Apollo and Ares for loans instead of, say, JPMorgan Chase.But the industry may face a test in 2024: Indebted borrowers, facing looming debt maturities and high interest rates, already are turning to private credit for yet more loans, raising concerns that lenders could face a wave of defaulting clients. A string of failures could hit these lenders hard, skeptics fear — leaving pension funds, insurers and other backers of private credit funds holding the bag.Paramount Pictures may be sold, a move that could be the start of a year of media deal-making.Hunter Kerhart for The New York TimesMedia deal mania? Reports that David Zaslav, the C.E.O. of Warner Bros. Discovery, held talks last month about a potential merger with Paramount set off a wave of speculation that 2024 would be a year of media consolidation. The industry has been transformed in recent years by the growth of streaming, changes in the way people consume media and big tech’s encroachment into sectors typically dominated by old-school media companies. Now, the industry is on the cusp of the next major shift with the rise of artificial intelligence.One date to put in your diary: April 8, 2024, the two-year anniversary of the merger of Warner Media and Discovery to create Warner Bros. Discovery — and the first day that the new company can be sold without risking a big tax bill.Will unions maintain their momentum? Organized labor had a banner year in 2023, with big wins in fights with Hollywood studios and the auto industry. Whether that signals a permanent turnaround for the labor movement is up for debate. But the election most likely will be a key factor. Both Biden and Trump tried to woo striking autoworkers this year, so expect more efforts to win over blue-collar voters.Middle East money will keep flowing. Tensions with China and economic sanctions have made it increasingly difficult for companies to raise money from a place that used to be top of the list. Middle Eastern investors have picked up the slack. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and others are spending money as they look to diversify their fossil fuel-dependent economies. The sectors are wide-ranging, including sports, tech companies, luxury, retail and media. Critics say the petrostates with dubious human rights records are trying to launder their reputations, but that hasn’t stopped Western business from seeking their lucre.One trend to watch: the growing ties between China and Middle Eastern money. Beijing is trying to deepen links with countries outside of Washington’s orbit or, at least, with those willing to play both sides.Lina Khan, the chair of the F.T.C., will keep challenging big deals despite losing some legal fights in 2023.Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesMore antitrust fights. A tough year for regulators — like Lina Khan at the F.T.C. and Jonathan Kanter of the Justice Department — ended with two wins after both Illumina and Adobe called off multibillion-dollar takeovers in the face of government pressure. Enforcers could already claim some success by forcing deal makers to weigh whether a big deal is worth pursuing, given the potential risk that they might have to spend months in court defending it. Don’t expect Khan to ease the pressure; do expect more antitrust fights.New climate disclosure rules. Public companies have been bracing for years for new climate-related disclosure rules from the S.E.C. In 2021, the agency signaled that climate change would be one of its priorities. About a year later, Gary Gensler, the S.E.C. chair, proposed new rules. The most contentious aspect of the draft regulations was a requirement that large companies disclose greenhouse gasses emitted along their value chain. The new rules are set to be finalized in the spring. But the probable lawsuits could go all the way to the Supreme Court.Another election to watch: India’s. The world’s biggest democracy and a rising superpower, India will go to the polls in April and May. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is benefiting from the West’s search for a regional bulwark to counter China. Business is looking at opportunities in India, as companies work to diversify their supply chains and tap into a fast-growing economy. The election will also be a crucial early test of how A.I. can factor into the spread of (mis)information during an election.Workplace shake-up. In late 2022, the release of ChatGPT propelled A.I. into the public consciousness. In 2023, companies experimented with new ways to build the technology into their operations, but few had yet to overhaul their procedures to cope with it. It’s still not clear exactly what A.I. will mean for jobs, but in 2024 we may see more companies making decisions about its use in ways that will have consequences for workers.The other big topic workplaces are grappling with is the response to the war in Gaza. Some companies are already considering changes to their workplace diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and executives face some of the same pressures as university presidents when it comes to how to handle their statements and responses to incidents related to the war. More
Summer Thomad, Luke Vander Ploeg, Rachelle Bonja, Rikki Novetsky and Rachel Quester, Brendan Klinkenberg and Pat McCusker More
