Presidential Election of 2024

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      Republicans Weigh New Debate Rules That Could Lead to More Onstage Clashes

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      The party is considering whether to open the door to debates not sponsored by the Republican National Committee, which could lead to more onstage clashes but also diminish their fanfare.The next Republican debate on Wednesday could be the last one sponsored by the Republican National Committee in the 2024 primary race, with the party considering debate rule changes that would open the door to more onstage clashes but also diminish the fanfare around them.The debate in Tuscaloosa, Ala., comes as Nikki Haley, the former United Nations ambassador, is trying to assert herself as the main rival to former President Donald J. Trump, after months in which Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has ceded ground. The R.N.C. is weighing a proposal to end its demand that candidates participate exclusively in the party’s debates, with a final decision expected this week.Few have been happy with how the debates, which are overseen by the R.N.C., have unfolded so far. Mr. Trump has boycotted them, dampening interest and lessening the stakes. His rivals have been forced to fight among themselves. And lower-polling candidates have steadily been pushed out by rising thresholds to qualify.Debates are traditionally the marquee events of a presidential primary contest, with voters eagerly tuning in to watch the candidates disagree on policy and vie for their support. But the Republican front-runner’s stubborn absence this election cycle has robbed them of much of their drama.The debate on Wednesday will feature four candidates, the R.N.C. announced on Monday evening: Ms. Haley, Mr. DeSantis, the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who appeared to have reached the polling requirement over the weekend as party officials met on Monday to approve a final poll that would allow him to qualify.“The fourth debate is another fantastic opportunity for our Republican candidates to share our winning agenda with the American people,” Ronna McDaniel, the party chairwoman, said in a statement.The party had previously signaled plans to hold forums in January in both Iowa and New Hampshire before those states’ nominating contests. Now, those debates may not happen as events sponsored by the party, according to four people involved in the process, though no final decisions have been made. The party could also still sponsor future debates even after stripping away the exclusivity requirement. Other news outlets have continued to engage in talks to hold debates.The debate rule change idea was presented last week to the R.N.C.’s debate committee by David Bossie, who has led that group and was a former top political aide to Mr. Trump. The proposal was first reported by The Washington Post.Multiple candidates have complained about the current limits, believing they have been denied the chance for exposure elsewhere. Still, some 2024 campaigns have been leery of the role that Mr. Bossie is playing for the party given his past close ties to Mr. Trump. The party’s debate committee will formally consider the proposal in a meeting after the debate in Alabama.“As has been the process throughout the entire year, the debate committee will meet to decide the details of future debates,” said Emma Vaughn, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee, declining to answer specific questions.Ratings for the debates have steadily shrunk. The first clash in Milwaukee, on Fox News, had 12.8 million viewers. The second debate, hosted by Fox Business, had 9.5 million. The third debate, on NBC News and other platforms, dwindled to 7.5 million, according to Nielsen figures.And the fourth debate will be on a lesser-known platform than the first three, NewsNation. The moderators will be Elizabeth Vargas of NewsNation, the former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly and Eliana Johnson of the Washington Free Beacon.Mr. DeSantis, whose super PAC has been caught in a cycle of turmoil, has been aggressively seeking more opportunities in the national spotlight, including an unusual debate last week on Fox News with the Democratic governor of California, Gavin Newsom. And in a recent appearance on Newsmax, Mr. DeSantis said that network should get a debate. “Maybe as we go forward, maybe there will be more freewheeling debates,” he said.Asked about the R.N.C.’s potential rules change, Andrew Romeo, a spokesman for Mr. DeSantis, said in a text message, “Ron DeSantis wants to debate Donald Trump and/or Nikki Haley in the early states regardless of who sponsors it.”Ms. Haley’s team was more circumspect.A spokeswoman for her campaign, Olivia Perez-Cubas, said in a statement: “Everyone knows Nikki Haley has shined in all the debates. We look forward to debating Donald Trump.”It’s not clear that Mr. Trump will be debating anyone anytime soon, coasting on his polling dominance despite four criminal indictments and 91 felony counts.The former president has boycotted all of the debates to date, arguing that it makes little sense for him to give rivals who are so far behind him any platform to hit him. Even as his campaign hopes for as many debates as possible in a general election against President Biden, he and his team have publicly called for the Republican Party to cancel its remaining debates, targeting the potential Iowa one in particular.Previously, the party has squashed efforts for candidates to debate one another. At one point, Mr. Christie and Mr. Ramaswamy scheduled a debate on Fox News to gin up interest in their candidacies, but the party said it would violate the pledge.“Trump allies in the RNC put an end to it,” Mr. Christie complained on social media. “Nothing new… Party bosses doing everything possible to keep Trump in power.”Mr. Ramaswamy, meanwhile, used the last debate to attack Ms. McDaniel, the party chairwoman, and later circulated a petition to fire her. “Where is the accountability for years of losing: 2018, 2020, 2022 and now 2023?” he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.His post did not mention Mr. Trump, who has been the face of the party during all of those elections. Mr. Ramaswamy has lavished praise on the former president even while running against him.The criteria to make the party debates have significantly ratcheted up since August. The minimum threshold is now 6 percent in national or early-state polling, as well as 80,000 donors. The first debate required only 1 percent support.Mr. Trump has been particularly keen on ending the debates before Iowa. The driver of his concerns isn’t clear. But Iowa was a particularly thorny state for him in early 2016, when he lost the caucuses after boycotting a debate in the state hosted by Fox News.Citing Mr. Trump’s substantial polling lead, Steven Cheung, a campaign spokesman, said, “He’s going to be the nominee, so it’s time for everyone to get behind him.” More

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      Some Republicans Have a Message for Chris Christie: Drop Out

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      Several anti-Trump Republican donors and strategists are pushing Mr. Christie to end his presidential campaign and back Nikki Haley.Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, has traveled the world in his quest to stop Donald J. Trump’s march to the Republican nomination. In New Hampshire living rooms as well as the charred homes of Israeli families killed by Hamas, he has assailed the former president as being unfit to lead, antidemocratic and an aspiring dictator.But now, six months into Mr. Christie’s presidential primary bid, Republicans who share his goal of defeating Mr. Trump are suggesting an entirely different approach for the long-shot candidate.Quitting.Republican donors, strategists and pundits are publicly pressuring Mr. Christie to follow the lead of Tim Scott and Mike Pence and formally end his campaign. Many would like him to throw his support behind Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who has risen in the polls in early-voting states in recent weeks.The focus on Mr. Christie’s bid reflects the anxiety that has consumed anti-Trump Republicans as the race moves into the final weeks before the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 15. Despite three debates, tens of millions of dollars and many months of campaigning, none of the six candidates still challenging Mr. Trump have made much of a dent in his double-digit lead. And they are rapidly running out of time.“The people who are supporting Chris are not supporting him because they love Chris Christie — they want someone to take on Trump,” said Rick Santorum, the former Pennsylvania senator who dropped out of the presidential race in 2012 after failing to gain enough traction to win the nomination. “He has a really important decision to make as to whether to back out and let his votes go to somebody else, or whether he’s going to actually improve Trump’s chances by staying in.”But the dynamic this year reminds other Republicans of 2016, when Mr. Trump benefited from the large field, allowing him to divide the voters who preferred other candidates. Mr. Christie remained in that race until he finished sixth in the New Hampshire primary. He endorsed Mr. Trump 17 days later.“Time is a flat circle, and everyone insists we relive, beat for beat, the 2016 election,” said Sarah Longwell, a Republican strategist who has spent years working to defeat Mr. Trump. “The main thing that Christie could do to make a difference this time is to drop out.”Mr. Christie views that race differently, saying the candidates running against Mr. Trump — including himself — failed to take the threat of his candidacy seriously enough.“We all thought, ‘well, at some point he’ll drop out or at some point fade away.’ And we all waited. Hope is not a strategy,” he said, in an interview on Fox News on Monday. “If you want to beat someone, you need to go out and tell people why he’s not right for the job and why you are.”Yet in a race in which Mr. Trump has maintained an expansive lead, Mr. Christie’s small foothold on the New Hampshire electorate may not make that great a difference.Patrick Murray, a New Jersey pollster who is the director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute, said his data indicated that only about half of Mr. Christie’s support in New Hampshire would go to Ms. Haley, while the rest would be distributed among the other candidates. The five or six points that Ms. Haley would earn would not be enough for her to come close to Mr. Trump, who leads New Hampshire by nearly 30 points.“It would help her be a closer second-place finisher,” Mr. Murray said. “It’s just not big enough to make the difference.”Surrogates for Ms. Haley have been more hesitant to call on Mr. Christie to drop out. Katon Dawson, a former chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party who now serves as an adviser to the Haley campaign in the state, said that decision would be solely “up to Chris Christie.”“We can’t control what Chris Christie does after New Hampshire or before New Hampshire,” he said. “We can’t control what Ron DeSantis does. All we can do is watch who is raising the money and Nikki Haley is raising money.”Don Bolduc, a retired Army general who unsuccessfully ran for the Senate in 2022 and has warmed up crowds for Ms. Haley at town halls in New Hampshire, was more blunt when posed the question. “I think it’s time for all of them to drop out and just let Nikki have the passing lane and just go right into the presidency,” he said.Mr. Christie’s advisers argue that he is playing an important role by being the only candidate willing to take direct and frequent shots at Mr. Trump. Mike DuHaime, one of Mr. Christie’s top strategists, said a case could be made for any of the candidates other than Mr. Trump to drop out, given that none have been able to break the 20 percent mark in polling.“Whatever case people make to you about Christie, the other two have no path either,” Mr. DuHaime said, referring to Ms. Haley and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida. “Should everybody just drop out, or should we try to beat the guy?”Mr. Christie has been more direct in his criticism of former President Donald J. Trump than Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis.Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesMr. Christie has run a relatively low-budget campaign, powered by a small staff and frequent television appearances. He has largely ignored Iowa to burrow into New Hampshire, a state where independent voters can cast ballots in the primary. Mr. Christie has made an aggressive push for those voters, who are more open to his anti-Trump message. This fall, organizations aligned with his campaign ran ads urging Democrats in the state to become “undeclared” voters and back his bid.But as the deadline to switch party registration has passed, Mr. Christie has shown signs of weakness. In recent weeks, he has barely cracked 10 percent in polling in New Hampshire. It remains unclear whether he will be on the ballot in every state. Last week, officials said he had failed to collect enough signatures to qualify to be on the ballot in Maine. Mr. Christie plans to appeal the ruling.Campaigning in New Hampshire, Mr. Christie said his path to the nomination would involve winning the state and then focusing on Michigan, which holds its primary in late February. He pointed to Mr. McCain’s 2008 campaign in New Hampshire as the model for victory. “All he did was come to New Hampshire, get in a Suburban and went from town to town to town, into town hall meetings, and he went on to win,” he said.As Mr. Christie cracked jokes and took questions from voters, he remained adamant that he was in the race to win the nomination. The other candidates, he said, were “battling like animals to be in second place” — a line that drew chuckles from the crowd gathered in a packed reception room at a small restaurant in Concord.“You know what we call second place in New Jersey? The first loser,” Mr. Christie said, as voters shouted out the answer in unison with him. “If you want to win, you got to beat the guy who’s in front of you.”His appeal won support from some independent New Hampshire voters and even Trump Republicans. “He’s the only one that shows, in my mind, the strength and fortitude needed to run this country,” said Ralph Mecheau, 69, an independent voter who met Mr. Christie at a gathering of a state employees’ union. “If you can’t stand up to Trump, then how are you going to stand up to others?”Gary Morrison, a 27-year-old Trump voter, who is a member of the state employee union, said he came out of the union town hall as a Christie supporter, and liked Mr. Christie’s policies on gun violence that focused on enforcement of laws already on the books and increased support for mental health care instead of adding more gun control laws.“The way I look at it is just making sure that they can’t just take away stuff,” Mr. Morrison said. Mr. Christie said that if he failed to notch a big victory in New Hampshire he would rethink his pledge to keep his campaign going until the Republican convention in July.That’s far too long for some strategists, who said they wanted Mr. Christie to consider a much shorter timetable.“He probably has the toughest path to the nomination, and you just have to face that reality sooner than later,” said Kevin Madden, a Republican strategist who worked on Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. “Ideally, it would have been facing that reality yesterday, or a month or two months ago.”Jazmine Ulloa More

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      R.F.K. Jr. Allies Say They’ll Spend Over $10 Million on Ballot Access

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      A super PAC backing Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s independent presidential candidacy is leading the costly and legally complex effort, which the Democratic establishment is trying to fight.A super PAC backing the independent presidential candidacy of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is planning to spend $10 million to $15 million to get Mr. Kennedy on the ballot in 10 states, a substantial effort that, even if partly successful, could heighten Democratic concerns about his potential to play the role of spoiler in 2024.The hefty sum underscores the challenge facing Mr. Kennedy, an environmental lawyer and prominent purveyor of conspiracy theories, as he pursues his long-shot White House bid. It also shows the substantial financial support he has generated so far.The super PAC, American Values 2024, has raised at least $28 million. (The group last disclosed its unofficial fund-raising haul in early October, but has not filed official records since mandatory midyear reports with the Federal Election Commission in July, when it had $9.8 million on hand.) The group was planning to announce the strategy on Monday, according to a draft announcement reviewed by The New York Times.The states, which include several battlegrounds, are among the country’s most populous and carry, between them, 210 Electoral College votes — Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada, New York and Texas.Mr. Kennedy’s campaign, as well as efforts from No Labels, the Green Party and other independent candidates, have worried President Biden’s campaign and its Democratic allies. They fear that such campaigns could siphon votes away from Mr. Biden and tilt the election toward his likely Republican opponent, former President Donald J. Trump.States make their own rules governing ballot access. Independent candidates must navigate a labyrinthine network governing signature collections and financial reporting requirements. The effort is time-consuming and expensive.Tony Lyons, the super PAC’s co-founder, said that the goal was to get Mr. Kennedy on the ballot in every state, but that the group was focusing on the 10 states where it expected the most difficulty, particularly in terms of expensive legal challenges. “That’s where we believe we can have the most impact,” he said.He said the campaign was working on its own ballot access efforts — the campaign’s website includes a sign-up for people who would like to be contacted by volunteers.In an interview this year, Ralph Nader, who twice ran for the presidency as the Green Party’s candidate, estimated that it would cost at least $5 million simply to collect signatures to qualify for ballots. The inevitable legal fights to defend ballot access, he said, would require many more millions of dollars.Marc Elias, one of the Democratic Party’s leading election lawyers, has been retained by the super PAC American Bridge to vet third-party and independent candidates’ ballot access in battleground states where such candidates could damage Mr. Biden.Mr. Elias said in an interview last month that he would work to make sure that any candidate who might be a threat to Mr. Biden followed the precise letter of the law when it comes to qualifying for the ballot.“The law is the law. The law requires candidates to get on the ballot in a certain way,” Mr. Elias said. “Once you have the rules you have for ballot access, you have to meet them and there’s no exception to it.”Mr. Kennedy entered the presidential race in April as a Democratic challenger to Mr. Biden, but ended his bid for the party’s nomination in October, arguing that Democrats’ primary system was rigged against him.From the outset, Mr. Kennedy has drawn support from disaffected Democrats, Republicans and independents, some of whom have been drawn to his anti-establishment message. A poll from The New York Times and Siena College that was released last month found that unfavorable opinions of Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump left an opening for independent candidates like Mr. Kennedy.Democrats are not alone in their concerns about Mr. Kennedy’s candidacy. The Republican National Committee, on the day he announced his independent bid, sent out an email titled “23 Reasons to Oppose RFK Jr.,” listing ways in which he has been aligned with Democrats in the past. More

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      Talk About Abortion, Don’t Talk About Trump: Governors Give Biden Advice

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      At an annual gathering in Arizona, Democratic governors offered a series of explanations for the president’s political struggles and suggested ideas for selling voters on his re-election.America’s Democratic governors brag about booming local economies, preside over ribbon-cuttings of projects paid for with new federal legislation and have successfully framed themselves as defenders of abortion rights and democracy.Almost all of them are far more popular in their home states than the Democratic president they hope to re-elect next year.While President Biden is mired in the political doldrums of low approval ratings and a national economy that voters are sour on, Democratic governors are riding high, having won re-election in red-state Kentucky last month and holding office in five of the seven most important presidential battleground states.The governors, like nearly all prominent Democrats, are publicly projecting confidence: In interviews and conversations with eight governors at their annual winter gathering at the Arizona Biltmore in Phoenix over the weekend, they expressed on-the-record optimism that Mr. Biden would win re-election.But also like many Democrats, some privately acknowledged fears that former President Donald J. Trump could win a rematch with Mr. Biden. They also said that Mr. Biden, at 81 years old, might not compare well with a younger Republican like Nikki Haley, the former United Nations ambassador, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida or even former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey.The governors offered a series of explanations for Mr. Biden’s political struggles and supplied free advice. Here are six ways they believe he can raise his standing ahead of next year’s election.Talk more about abortion.Mr. Biden barely says the word abortion in his public statements, a fact that frustrates fellow governors hoping he can, as many of them have, use anger over the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade to improve his political fortunes.“We should talk about all the threats to women’s health care, including abortion, and use that word specifically,” said Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan. “We should be talking about it like that because Americans are awake. They are angry that this right could be stripped away and we are the only ones fighting for it.”On abortion politics, Gov. Phil Murphy of New Jersey acknowledged that “it’s widely known that this is probably an uncomfortable reality for him,” given that Mr. Biden, a practicing Catholic, once voted in the Senate to let states overturn Roe v. Wade and his stance on abortion rights has evolved over the years.Mr. Murphy said Mr. Biden must be forthright about discussing the likelihood that Republicans would aim to enact new abortion restrictions if they win control of the federal government in 2024 and emphasizing the Democratic position that decisions about abortion should be left to women and their doctors.“That has to be laid out in a much more crystal-clear, explicit, affirmative way,” he said.Stop talking about Trump.The governors broadly agreed that Mr. Trump would be the Republican nominee. They don’t love Mr. Biden’s recent turn to focus more attention on his predecessor.“You’ve got to run for something and not against someone,” said Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky. That is easy for Mr. Beshear to say — he is among the nation’s most popular governors and just won re-election in a deep-red state.Gov. Laura Kelly of Kansas urged the president to stop talking about Mr. Trump altogether. Be positive, she said, and let others carry the fight to Mr. Trump.“If I were in Biden’s shoes, I would not talk about Trump,” she said. “I would let other people talk about Trump.”Appeal to moderate Republicans and independents.Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota also said Mr. Biden needed to adopt some of Mr. Trump’s penchant for bragging.“He’s been modest for so long, to watch him do it now feels a little uncomfortable,” Mr. Walz said.Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina said his constituents were hoping Republicans would nominate someone other than Mr. Trump.Mr. Murphy said hopefully that Republicans supporting someone else in their primary might stay home or wind up voting for Mr. Biden next year.“What if Trump is the nominee? What’s the behavior pattern among the Haley, DeSantis and Chris Christie supporters? Where do they go?” Mr. Murphy said. “I find it hard to believe that a majority of them are going to Trump.”Tell people what Biden’s done.Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, fresh off a prime-time Fox News debate against Mr. DeSantis that seemed meant in part to elevate the ambitious Mr. Newsom to the role of Mr. Biden’s leading defender, lamented “the gap between performance and perception.”He was one of several governors who said their constituents felt good about their lives but were pessimistic about the state of the country.“People feel pretty good about their states, feel pretty good about their communities, even their own lived lives,” Mr. Newsom said. “You ask, ‘How are you doing?’ They say, ‘We’re doing great, but this country’s going to hell.’”Mr. Newsom said Mr. Biden’s biggest problem was that he had not been able to communicate to voters that he is responsible for improvements in their lives.“People just don’t know the record,” he said. “They don’t hear it. They never see it.”In North Carolina, which last week became the 40th state to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, Mr. Cooper said people who are newly eligible for health care were not likely to credit Mr. Biden or White House policies.“The people who are getting it don’t really associate it with anybody other than finally being able to get health care for themselves,” he said.Focus more attention on legislative achievements.The governors all seemed to agree that they would like to see Mr. Biden spend more time cutting ribbons and attending groundbreakings for new projects paid for by infrastructure, climate and semiconductor funding he signed into law.“I would be doing those morning, noon and night,” Mr. Murphy said.Ms. Kelly of Kansas, who won her red state twice, said Mr. Biden should announce the opening of new projects and factories because she said it would focus attention away from his age.“I would spend a lot of time doing those just because they’re relatively easy and they are energizing,” she said.And Mr. Walz, whom his fellow governors voted the new chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, said Mr. Biden’s challenge would be explaining to people the future benefits of investments being made now.“The problem is going to be, it’s going to take us 20 years to build all this infrastructure out,” Mr. Walz said. “Whether they see it within the next 11 months or not, that’s what we need to tell the story.”Find some Democrats with enthusiasm.No governor at the Phoenix gathering expressed more desire to give Mr. Biden another term in the White House than Mr. Newsom, who used a 40-minute chat with reporters to take a victory lap from his debate with Mr. DeSantis, a ratings bonanza for the Fox News host Sean Hannity that doubled as the largest audience of the California governor’s political career.Mr. Newsom, who since the middle of last year has evolved from a friendly critic of Mr. Biden’s political messaging to one of his most enthusiastic supporters, said his fellow governors needed to perform like old-school politicians who could deliver a constituency for an ally through force of will by activating supporters to follow political commands.“We, the Democratic Party, need to get out there on behalf of the leader of the Democratic Party, Joe Biden, and make the case and do it with pride,” Mr. Newsom said. “We’ve got to wind this thing up.”The task may be difficult. Mr. Cooper described “a general malaise and frustration” that has Americans blaming Mr. Biden for forces often beyond his control.But Mr. Newsom said that if others were wary of carrying the torch for Mr. Biden in the next year, he was not afraid to do so all by himself.“If no one’s showing up doing stuff, I’m going to show up,” he said. “I can’t take it. I can’t take the alternative. I can’t even conceive it.” More

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      Nikki Haley’s Views on Social Security

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      More from our inbox:A Climate Protest at the OperaMore Trump Coverage? Brian Snyder/ReutersTo the Editor:Re “Haley Is Coming for Your Retirement,” by Paul Krugman (column, Nov. 28):Mr. Krugman is right in pointing out the inequality connected to proposals to raise the age at which one becomes eligible for Social Security. As he points out, the proposals are, “in effect, saying that the aging janitors must keep working (or be cast into extreme poverty) because rich bankers are living longer.”But it’s even worse than that. The problem of an impending shortfall of the Social Security Trust Fund is in significant part a consequence of our rising economic inequality. High-income people pay a smaller share of their income into Social Security because salary over $160,200 — the so-called “tax max” — is not subject to the Social Security tax.Also, there is no Social Security tax on income from capital (including dividends, interest, capital gains and rents), which tends to go to wealthy people. Consequently, as a larger and larger part of our national income goes to the rich, the share collected by the Social Security tax declines.The solution is not hard to envision: Raise the “tax max” and tax income from capital. Better yet, adopt a set of policies that would move us toward a more equal distribution of income.Arthur MacEwanCambridge, Mass.The writer is professor emeritus of economics at the University of Massachusetts Boston.To the Editor:As a member of Gen Z, I commend Nikki Haley for suggesting ideas to keep Social Security solvent. Raising the retirement age is not a pleasant thought, but tough times require tough decisions. Our national debt is at a record high, and interest repayments are reaching worrying levels. Changes have to be made if the country’s finances are to stay healthy. Numbers don’t lie.I, for one, do not expect to ever be able to collect Social Security, despite having paid 6.2 percent of my income into it over my entire working life. I would rather get rid of the tax altogether than continue to pretend that Social Security will still be around when I retire.I have absolutely zero faith that members of Congress will fix this problem; they have been kicking this can down the road for longer than I’ve been alive.Eric FuquaAtlantaTo the Editor:Paul Krugman’s piece on Nikki Haley makes it quite clear that she is far from the perfect candidate, but what it does not address is the critical role that she may play.The Economist recently described Donald Trump as the gravest danger to the world in 2024, and considering viable alternatives, apart from Nikki Haley, there is only one 81-year-old man with major failings of his own standing in Donald Trump’s way.Even with all her shortcomings, there are strong reasons to support Nikki Haley, as she may be best positioned to save our democracy and the world from Donald Trump.Jon LandauPhiladelphiaA Climate Protest at the OperaThe Metropolitan Opera House, center, at Lincoln Center.Kathy Willens/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Climate Protesters Interrupt Met Performance of Wagner’s ‘Tannhäuser’” (news article, nytimes.com, Dec. 1):The recent climate protest at the opera made my heart sink.I’m a climate activist. I’ve marched, I’ve lobbied, I’ve contacted legislators. I’m co-leader of a local chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby, a grass-roots organization that believes that effective change will come about through respectful dialogue — and the sheer force of numbers.I’m also a professional singer and an operagoer. And I cringe when I see protesters disrupt the arts to make their point. The very people who might be inclined to help contribute to the urgent cause of fighting global warming may well be sitting in that opera house. But these protesters chose to alienate them. How in the world is that productive?The most effective path toward change is to work with others, not against them. We need dedicated, respectful activists who do their work by finding common ground and then gently but insistently nudging all of us forward.What we don’t need is this kind of spectacle, which gives the rest of us climate activists a bad name, and serves as an affront to the music and art we all need to inspire us in a troubled world.Francesca Huemer KellyHighland Park, Ill.More Trump Coverage?For years, President Biden and Democrats have been happy to mostly ignore Donald J. Trump. But now their thinking appears to be changing as the 2024 election season begins to ramp up.Sophie Park for The New York Times, Doug Mills/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Democrats Want Trump Plastered All Over the News” (news article, Nov. 22):How soon we forget. Think back to Wednesday morning, Nov. 9, 2016. Whether you supported and voted for Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, you were likely shocked when you heard the final results.Now, Democrats are hoping that heavy media coverage of Mr. Trump, assuming he is the nominee, will remind Americans of his flawed character, his lies, his legal troubles and his hate-filled rhetoric, and this will repel them.But back in 2015 and 2016, Mr. Trump was far from invisible, enjoying plenty of media coverage: as a failed TV star and businessman, as a clown and an entertainer, not to be taken seriously. The polls at the time were suggesting that Mrs. Clinton was the heavy favorite, so many Americans either stayed home or voted for Mr. Trump as a joke or an anti-Hillary statement.Why would we think next year’s coverage won’t still focus on Mr. Trump’s entertainment value as much as on his lies, his threats and his crimes?Democrats may ask for more news coverage, but we should be careful what we wish for.Betsy FrankMattituck, N.Y. More

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      Doug Burgum, Wealthy North Dakota Governor, Ends White House Run

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      The little-known former software executive had hoped his business acumen and relentless focus on the economy, energy and foreign policy would lift his campaign. It didn’t.Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota, the wealthy former software executive who entered the presidential campaign in June hoping a back-to-basics appeal on the economy would propel him forward, dropped out of the race for the Republican nomination on Monday.Though his personal fortune could have kept his campaign afloat, Mr. Burgum’s mild demeanor and resolute focus on three issues, the economy, energy and foreign policy, never caught on with a G.O.P. electorate steeped in the pugilistic flash of Donald J. Trump and the more visceral appeal of social issues.Mr. Burgum claimed on Monday that he had shifted the conversation on the campaign trail from divisive social issues to energy and foreign policy. He blamed media inattention and Republican Party rules for his poor showing.“Our decision to run for president came from a place of caring deeply about every American and a mission to re-establish trust in America’s leadership and our institutions of democracy,” he said in a statement announcing he was suspending his campaign. “While this primary process has shaken my trust in many media organizations and political party institutions, it has only strengthened my trust in America.”Mr. Burgum’s base in tiny, remote North Dakota and a short political résumé had given him almost no name recognition when he began the campaign, leaving even his home-state constituents wondering how he might rise in a crowded field laboring in the shadow of the former president and prohibitive front-runner, Mr. Trump.But Mr. Burgum believed there was a market for his business acumen — he sold his software company to Microsoft for $1 billion — and a kitchen-table focus that resolutely avoided confrontation with Mr. Trump or anybody else in the field.He was wrong, never polling above the low single digits. But he may have made an impression on Mr. Trump. Advisers in the former president’s orbit have put out word that Mr. Burgum’s looks and money made him “central casting” for a second Trump term.Mr. Burgum’s departure technically narrows the field of Republican hopefuls, as Mr. Trump’s critics, such as Senator Mitt Romney of Utah and the commentator George F. Will, issue calls for candidates not named Trump to consolidate around a single alternative. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, former Vice President Mike Pence, the former Texas congressman Will Hurd and Larry Elder, a conservative talk radio host, have also left the race.That pressure is now on Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, who has shown no sign of traction with Republican voters nationally but whose relatively strong polling in New Hampshire is preventing Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor, or Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida from consolidating the anti-Trump vote.Mr. Burgum’s short-lived presidential run did make some impact in Republican circles, even if it didn’t with Republican voters. To muster the 40,000 individual donors he needed to qualify for the first debate in August, he offered $20 gift cards to the first 50,000 people who donated at least $1 to his campaign.Just before that debate, he tore his Achilles’ tendon and had to sit during commercial breaks. In the second debate, he largely faded into the background. When he made his presence known, it was to plead with the moderators to let him answer any of the questions that he could make about energy, ostensibly a strong suit in oil-rich North Dakota. More

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      There Are Politicians Who Lie More Than Is Strictly Necessary

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      Gail Collins: Bret, this may sound a bit strange, but I’ve decided to be grateful for all the political debates going on around us. While the real world can get kinda depressing, the debate world is always ready to just chatter away.I want to hear your predictions on the Republican set-to coming this week. But first, did you watch the governors go at it? Gavin Newsom versus Ron DeSantis? What did you think?Bret Stephens: The idea for the governors’ debate was first mooted when it looked like DeSantis could be the Republican presidential nominee. Now he seems slightly less relevant than the moderator, Sean Hannity, as well as slightly more obnoxious. Which is … saying something.But I still think DeSantis got the better of Newsom on the substance of their arguments. What did you think?Gail: Thought DeSantis won in the sense that he sounded somewhat less dim than many of us expected.Bret: I never thought of DeSantis as a dummy. Just a jerk.Gail: Although having Sean Hannity continually tossing him softball questions helped.Bret: True.Gail: Newsom was quicker, and his answers were smarter. As to which state works better, Californians do have to spend a lot to live there, when it comes to housing, food, gas, etc., but Florida ranks 14th on those basics and that’s a whole lot closer to the top than DeSantis seemed to be claiming.Florida’s taxes are lower but way more regressive — heavy on sales and property taxes that burden the middle and working classes with very little of the social services California dedicates to the poor.Bret: Since Newsom became governor in 2019, roughly 2.3 million Californians have left the state, but fewer than 1.4 million have arrived, a net loss of close to a million people. This is a phrase that gets tossed around a lot, but in this case it’s literally true: People are voting with their feet. And they are going to red states like Florida and Texas, in part because California ranks last in the country in terms of affordability, violent crime rates are way above the national average and the state has the largest homeless population in the country.I’m no fan of DeSantis when it comes to his views about abortion or his petty battles with Disney. But as blue states go, the Golden State ain’t exactly a role model for Democratic governance.Gail: One thing I was thinking while watching the two of them have at it was that the whole scene was a good promotion for your version of conservatism. Whenever the conversation turned to social issues like abortion, DeSantis was toast. When the questions were about public spending, Newsom had to work a whole lot harder.Bret: It would have been better to have a Democrat from a purple state, like Kentucky’s Andy Beshear or North Carolina’s Roy Cooper, provide the Democratic counter to DeSantis’s extremism.Gail: Well, I’ll bet a whole bunch of other governors are out there waving their arms to volunteer if Fox News wants to go down this road again.Bret: I hope someone smart and sane like Chris Wallace can moderate the next one. And speaking of smart and sane, we lost Sandra Day O’Connor last week. Ruth Bader Ginsburg was often treated like a feminist saint, but as a pioneer for women and a legal powerhouse, O’Connor deserves more of the accolades.Gail: Super happy to applaud Sandra Day O’Connor, but Bret, I think she’d prefer if you celebrate her without dissing another female pioneer.Bret: Sorry, that came out wrong. Point taken.Gail: One of my favorite O’Connor stories was when William French Smith, Ronald Reagan’s attorney general at the time, called to interview her for the Supreme Court post. She cheerfully reminded him that she’d applied to his law firm when she graduated from Stanford Law, and the only job she was offered was secretary.O’Connor then served Smith and her other visitors a salmon mousse she prepared and answered all their questions brilliantly without mentioning that she was recovering from a hysterectomy at the time they dropped by.Bret: I’ll raise a toast to both O’Connor and Ginsburg for helping ensure that my daughters’ generation won’t have to put up with much of the sexism my mother’s generation had to suffer.Gail: Amen!Bret: And, more specifically to O’Connor, to salute her for helping save abortion rights for a generation with her vote in the Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision, as well as for her impassioned and correct dissent in Kelo v. New London, in which she denounced the use of eminent domain to suit the needs of private developers over poorer private homeowners. She was a conservative who could speak up for the vulnerable. Also, a good reminder that it was a conservative president, Reagan, who nominated her to the court. History will remember them both well.Another historic figure we lost last week was Henry Kissinger. I’m guessing you weren’t a big fan?Gail: Well, Bret, I was a student during the Vietnam War era, and I can’t say I was ever a fan. I realize Kissinger’s approach to the war was much more complicated than we gave him credit for at the time. But still not feeling any compulsion to mourn.Bret: I knew Kissinger personally and once had a spectacularly, almost hilariously, unfriendly interview with him on the subject of China, in which he refused to answer most of my questions. I also disagreed with him about many things, though my criticisms were from the right, not the left. Arms control deals with the Kremlin, for instance, were always a mistake, since the Soviets could never be trusted to keep their word.Yet I couldn’t help but admire him. His books, especially “Diplomacy,” are guideposts for my thinking about foreign policy. He came to this country as a refugee, served it as a soldier, rose to the pinnacle of influence and had a concept about husbanding American power through what he called our “disastrous oscillations between overcommitment and isolation.” I think it’s better to learn from him than just to castigate him.Gail: Almost always a smart approach.Bret: Let’s talk about someone less controversial. How about Elon Musk telling the companies that won’t advertise on Twitter — sorry, X — to, er, go do something or other with themselves?Gail: Never claimed to be an expert on any twittery issues, but I do have a strong impression that Musk is one of those guys who had one great moment, capitalism-and-market-wise. But it turned out that was absolutely all he had, and once he took his billions down other paths, it was a disaster.Sorta scary he’s one of the richest guys on the planet. Your thoughts?Bret: I once called Musk “the Donald Trump of Silicon Valley,” because I thought he was basically a BS artist making a living off misdirected government subsidies for electric vehicles. That was unfair, especially considering the achievements of Tesla and SpaceX. He’s more like the Howard Hughes of Boca Chica — a technological and entrepreneurial visionary whose increasingly self-destructive behavior suggests he should probably lay off the drugs or whatever else he’s on.And then there’s his efforts to meddle in foreign policy and his endorsement of antisemitic conspiracy theories — which may make him more comparable to Henry Ford. Maybe I’ve been too soft on opinionated billionaires.Gail: Yeah, maybe what we need to do more of this holiday season is forget about Musk and Take a Lonely Billionaire Out to Lunch.Bret: Unless you’d prefer to take lonely George Santos out to lunch.Gail: Think anybody would give us a reservation? Can’t remember when a politician collected so many enemies for stuff that stupid. He’s going to spend the rest of his life known as the Campaign Contributions for Botox guy.Bret: Or as the Politician Who Lied More Than Is Strictly Necessary.Gail: Onward and upward. Bret, I promised we’d come back to this, so here goes: There’s another Republican debate coming up on Wednesday night. Might only be three people in it — your fave Nikki Haley, our friend DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy the, um, entrepreneur.I’m hoping Chris Christie might somehow manage to qualify. If we have to watch a quarreling batch of Republicans who will not get the presidential nomination, I’d at least like it to be diverting.Any predictions?Bret: Gary Lineker once described soccer as a game in which “22 men chase a ball for 90 minutes and at the end, the Germans win.” That feels a bit like this Republican debate: Three or four adults chase the political football across the stage and at the end, Trump wins.I hope I’m wrong. But with Trump’s primary lead looking increasingly insurmountable, isn’t it time for you Democrats to, uh, panic?Gail: Joe Biden is the inevitable nominee, if he wants to run for another four years. No way you can dump a guy who’s done a really good overall job as president, who has a fine character and no scandals more pressing than the thing with his son, which many American voters find totally boring.Of course, we want someone younger than 81, but there’s no non-insulting way to rip the nomination away from him. And he’ll almost certainly be running against Trump, who we note every single week is almost as old and in way worse shape. And while Biden is certainly given to garbling his messages, he seldom comes up with total misstatements and lies.Plus we’re going to have a campaign in which one of the candidates is facing more felony indictments than most of America’s Most Wanted. Call me sad, but not panicked.Bret: Gail? I’m panicked.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, Instagram, TikTok, X and Threads. More

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      Republicans Are Finding Out That ‘Pro-Life’ Means a Lot of Things to a Lot of People

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      Electoral results since the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision should tell a lot of people in the Republican Party something they absolutely do not want to hear: Even rank-and-file G.O.P. voters are not as pro-life as we might have thought when Roe v. Wade was the law of the land.That trend was confirmed last month in Ohio — the latest sign that the Republican Party needs to figure out a new way of addressing abortion.Many conservatives may call themselves pro-life, but in practice, that may be a more aspirational statement than an accurate reflection of hard policy views. Perhaps by figuring out what it now means to be pro-life — and recognizing that pro-life policy is easiest to sell only when it amounts to a ban on abortions later in pregnancy — Republicans can come up with a new approach to the politics of the issue.Before Roe was overturned, the term “pro-life” covered a lot of ground — which was useful over decades in galvanizing a broad coalition willing to use abortion as a political cudgel. As Republicans are finding out today, “pro-life” means many things to many people.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