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      As Midterm Campaign Norms Erode, Even Debates Are Under Debate

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      Candidates for senator or governor routinely used to participate in two or three debates. Now some are skipping them altogether. Retail politicking at diners and state fairs is no longer the cliché it was for generations. And town-hall-style meetings, where citizens get to question their elected leaders and those running to replace them, have given way to the online echo chamber.In midterm campaigns across the country, direct political engagement has been falling away, victim to security concerns, pandemic-era workarounds and Republican hostility to the mainstream media.Many candidates are sticking instead to safer spaces: partisan news outlets, fund-raisers with supporters, friendly local crowds. The result is a profound shift in the long traditions of American campaigns that is both a symptom of and a contributor to the ills afflicting the country’s politics.Campaigning used to force candidates to engage up close with the public, exposing them not only to supporters but to those who might disagree with them. Avoiding those tougher interactions cuts down on the opportunities for candidates’ characters and limitations to be revealed, and for elected officials to be held accountable to those who elected them. For the politicians, it creates an artificial environment where their positions appear uniformly popular and opposing views are angrily denounced, making compromise seem risky.“They run these campaigns in bubbles to these voters who are in bubbles,” said former Representative Tom Davis, a moderate Republican who won seven terms in Congress in a Northern Virginia district and headed his party’s congressional campaign committee.Mr. Davis said he felt “a duty” as a lawmaker to participate in debates and town-hall meetings. “People don’t feel that duty anymore,” he added. “When they say, ‘I went home and talked to my constituents,’ they are talking to their base.”Nowhere is the trend clearer than on the country’s shrinking debate stage. Candidates in 10 of the most competitive contests for Senate and governor have agreed to just one debate, where voters not long ago could have expected to watch two or three. Those debates have already happened in Senate races in Arizona, North Carolina, Ohio, Georgia and Wisconsin and in the Texas and Wisconsin governor’s races.Only in five contests — the Senate race in Ohio and governor’s races in Georgia, Kansas, Maine and Oregon — have the candidates agreed to multiple meetings.In at least four other competitive contests, the candidates failed to agree to any debates at all.In Arizona, Katie Hobbs, the Democrat running for governor, flatly declines to debate her Republican opponent. In Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano, the far-right Republican nominee for governor, has rejected debates run by news organizations, citing what he called their “hidden partisan agenda.” In Missouri, the Republican nominee for Senate, Eric Schmitt, accused his opponent of refusing to debate. Ten days later, he failed to show for the first general election matchup.And in Nevada, the major-party candidates for Senate agreed in principle to a televised face-off, but none has happened, because they couldn’t agree on the forum.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries over, both parties are shifting their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.The Final Stretch: With elections next month, a Times/Siena poll shows that independents, especially women, are swinging toward the G.O.P. despite Democrats’ focus on abortion rights as voters worry about the economy.Georgia Governor’s Race: A debate between Gov. Brian Kemp and Stacey Abrams produced a substantive hour of policy discussion. Here are five takeaways.Aggressive Tactics: Right-wing leaders are calling on election activists to monitor voting in the midterm elections in search of evidence to confirm unfounded theories of election fraud.Jill Biden: The first lady, who has become a lifeline for Democratic candidates trying to draw attention and money in the midterms, is the most popular surrogate in the Biden administration.“It was almost inconceivable that we would not have a series of debates,” said Sig Rogich, a longtime Republican political consultant in Nevada and a former aide to Paul Laxalt, the grandfather of the current Republican Senate candidate, Adam Laxalt. “It used to be three, then it went to two and now it’s down to one. And pretty soon it will be none, and I don’t think that’s healthy.”It’s not just debates. Town halls and other events that offered opportunities to interact with voters — stump speeches in sweaty high school gymnasiums, town square meet-and-greets, barnstorming bus tours — have become less common, and those that are still held are often more restricted than in the past. Campaign schedules that used to be blasted to email inboxes are kept private, leaving reporters to dig like detectives just to figure out where a candidate will show up.The shift reflects a drop in the number of competitive House districts and a polarized environment in which swing voters are disappearing, so candidates see little advantage in trying to win them over.It all amounts to an erosion of fundamental American traditions that date back to the earliest years of the Republic: forums in 17th-century New England meeting houses, Abraham Lincoln’s travels across Illinois to debate slavery with Stephen A. Douglas, and packs of reporters surrounding candidates in crowded church basements and veterans’ halls.Pushing Away Reporters, LiterallyWhen Mr. Mastriano, the Republican running for governor in Pennsylvania, appeared in Philadelphia last month, the event had some of the trappings of a traditional campaign stop. It was open to the news media, the candidate sounded standard Republican themes about crime and he emphasized the need for his party to engage Latino voters.A Texas debate with Gov. Greg Abbott and his Democratic challenger, former Representative Beto O’Rourke, featured no audience and no livestream on C-SPAN.Tamir Kalifa for The New York TimesBut just off-camera, little was as it might have seemed. Mr. Mastriano took no questions from journalists. And, as they often have during his campaign, aides muscled reporters away from the candidate, throwing arms or blocking those who tried to approach with questions.In Atlanta earlier this month, reporters were not allowed into a “worship and luncheon” held for Herschel Walker, the Republican Senate nominee, who had just been accused of paying for an ex-girlfriend’s abortion. Police officers and a security guard even shooed journalists out of the parking lot..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.For some Republicans, declining debates and shunning nonpartisan news outlets is a way to cast themselves in the image of former President Donald J. Trump, who frequently breaks with political norms. His attacks on reporters energized a conservative base that rewards Republican politicians for viewing the mainstream media as the enemy, leaving many strategists to see skipping debates and interviews as a way not only to protect their candidates from unforced errors but to rally support.The irony of that approach is that while Mr. Trump often attacks mainstream journalists, he can’t quit them, either.“You have these candidates saying, ‘I’m Trump-like, so I’m not going to talk to media or debate’ — meanwhile, that’s all he does,” said Christopher Nicholas, a Republican consultant in the battleground state of Pennsylvania who is involved with organizing political debates there.A Republican Stance That SpreadWhile the trend of avoiding the public was initially driven by Republicans, it has seeped across party lines. In-person congressional town-hall meetings have fallen to record lows, according to Indivisible, a liberal grass-roots group that formed after the 2016 election. In 2017, the group counted 1,875 town-hall events by members of Congress. The number spiked to nearly 3,000 in 2019.This year is not on pace to return to prepandemic levels. The group has tracked just 408 through the first half of the year. (Those numbers, the organization said, may fail to account for events announced abruptly on partisan social media.)Dr. Mehmet Oz checked Nikki Haley’s blood pressure during a town-hall-style event last month. These kinds of public political forums have become less common.Hannah Beier for The New York TimesBradford Fitch, president of the Congressional Management Foundation, which advises lawmakers on issues like running their offices and communicating with constituents, said he now urged members not to hold open public meetings because of security concerns.In Democratic circles, candidates have skipped debates by saying their opponents’ actions suggest that any forums between them will not amount to a productive exchange of ideas.Campaign aides to Ms. Hobbs, the Democratic nominee for governor in Arizona, cited the raucous Republican primary debates in their state as a reason for avoiding a general election face-off against her Republican opponent, Kari Lake, a former newscaster who has molded herself after Mr. Trump and his election lies.Mr. Trump benefited immensely in 2016 from primary debates, where he dominated a large field. Four years later, as the pandemic raged and he recovered from Covid, he refused to hold virtual events, leading to the cancellation of the second scheduled presidential debate.A sparsely attended town-hall event this month in Atlanta featured Gov. Brian Kemp, Stacey Abrams and Senator Raphael Warnock.Nicole Craine for The New York TimesThe Strategy Favoring DebatesFor decades, debates about debates were driven by political strategy. A candidate in a strong position didn’t want to risk a misstep, and strategists grumbled that the hours of preparation could be better used for fund-raising or other events. Those trailing in the polls would push for more face-offs in hopes of a game-changing moment.Such moments are rare, but they do happen.In October 2016, Senator Kelly Ayotte, a Republican from New Hampshire, said that, “absolutely,” Mr. Trump could be a role model for young children. She spent weeks explaining the remark before losing by about 1,000 votes.That same month in 2016, in the Nevada Senate race, Catherine Cortez Masto, a Democrat, delivered a strong performance in a debate against a Republican who struggled to explain why he had backed away from his endorsement of Mr. Trump. She won narrowly and now is trying to pressure Mr. Laxalt onto the debate stage in hopes of gaining momentum in her re-election race.Kari Lake supporters last month during a Latinos for Lake rally. Instead of debates, candidates prefer speaking to their supporters.Rebecca Noble for The New York TimesMr. Nicholas, the Republican strategist in Pennsylvania, said the lighter debate schedule this year was a far cry from the three debates that his old boss, former Senator Arlen Specter, always participated in.“In normal times, we would have done three to five debates in the Senate race,” Mr. Nichols said. “Now, it looks like of all of the big Pennsylvania races, there’s only going to be one debate in one race.”There is little sign that debates will return in two years. The Republican National Committee has told the Commission on Presidential Debates that its 2024 presidential candidate will not participate in commission-sponsored debates unless it changes its rules on dates and moderators.“The constructive collision of ideas that used to be the hallmark of our democracy is becoming a distant memory,” said Jason Grumet, president of the Bipartisan Policy Center.Representative Lauren Boebert, the Colorado Republican, debated her Democratic opponent, Adam Frisch, last month, but attendance was sparse.William Woody for The New York TimesKatie Glueck More

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      Rubio and Demings Have Their First and Only Debate

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      Follow our live coverage of Marco Rubio and Val Demings’s debate for Senate in Florida.Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, and his Democratic challenger, Representative Val Demings, will face off on Tuesday evening in a debate in Lake Worth Beach, Fla.It is the only scheduled debate in the Senate race in Florida, where polls have consistently shown Mr. Rubio ahead. Florida has trended to the right in the past few years, transforming from the nation’s most famous swing state to fairly reliable Republican turf. But with Mr. Rubio’s leads in the single digits, Democrats are holding out hope for an upset.Mr. Rubio, a onetime presidential candidate who is seeking a third term in the Senate, has focused heavily on crime and on economic issues like inflation that polls show are drawing swing voters toward Republicans.Ms. Demings, who was elected to Congress in 2016 after being the first woman to lead the Orlando Police Department, has not shied away from the issue of public safety but has also emphasized abortion and, in a state recently devastated by Hurricane Ian, climate change. A livestream of the debate will be available from WPBF-TV in Florida.According to Federal Election Commission filings, Ms. Demings has raised $65.5 million for her campaign, significantly more than Mr. Rubio’s $44.5 million. But Mr. Rubio has more money on hand for the final weeks of the campaign. More

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      ‘El voto latino’: 10 votantes hispanos conversan

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      En septiembre, reunimos a un grupo de 10 votantes latinos de Texas, Florida y Arizona, una combinación de demócratas, republicanos y electores independientes que planeaban votar o estaban dispuestos a votar por candidatos republicanos en las elecciones de mitad de mandato de Estados Unidos de este año.

      “¿Creen que el Partido Republicano hace algo que desanima a los votantes latinos?”, preguntó la moderadora. “¿Hay algo en la forma en que los demócratas se dirigen a la comunidad latina o hablan de ella que desanime a los votantes latinos?”.

      “Cuando Trump dijo que los mexicanos eran violadores —aunque tal vez no se refería a todos— me dejó un mal sabor de boca. Digo, mucha gente le aplaudió eso. Y yo pensaba: ‘Ah, así son las cosas’”, dijo uno de los participantes.

      “Cuando la primera dama dijo que nosotros éramos tan singulares como los tacos del desayuno, eso se me quedó grabado”, dijo otra participante, refiriéndose a los comentarios de Jill Biden en una conferencia de este año para UnidosUS, un grupo latino de derechos civiles.

      Varias de las personas que conversaron en este debate dijeron que ninguno de los partidos realmente les habló de manera personal e informada. Una parte del problema es que no hay una sola forma de hablar con los votantes latinos porque, como nos recordaron los participantes, no hay un votante latino típico. “Hay todo un espectro de hispanos”, dijo un participante. Y tal vez no se debería hacer la distinción entre votantes latinos y otros votantes: “Primero somos estadounidenses”, dijo otro participante.

      Lo que está claro es que ambos partidos tienen la oportunidad de vincularse con electores como los que hablamos, tanto para fortalecer su apoyo como para aclarar conceptos erróneos. Nuestros participantes pensaron que los republicanos eran más sólidos en una variedad de temas, como el crimen y la seguridad, el control de armas, la seguridad nacional, la inmigración y la economía. Pero sobre el tema del aborto, la mayoría favoreció a los demócratas. Un participante pensó que los demócratas en general apoyaban la desfinanciación de la policía, y otra participante se refirió a los comentarios de Donald Trump sobre los mexicanos como: “Siento que solo dijo lo que otros piensan”.

      En este punto es un cliché decir que los votantes latinos son poderosos políticamente, que a menudo tienen posturas políticas complejas, que no es un hecho que votarán por los demócratas. Lo que sigue después de estos clichés solo se aclarará en las próximas semanas, meses y años, a medida que los políticos, los medios de comunicación y el país presten más atención a votantes como quienes participaron en esta discusión.

      Lenin

      33 años, Texas, independiente, vendedor de seguros

      Orlando

      53 años, Florida, independiente, dibujante de diseño asistido por computadora

      Lourdes

      42 años, Texas, se inclina por los demócratas, recepcionista

      Sally

      60 años, Texas, republicana, asistente de una aerolínea

      Christina

      43 años, Texas, se inclina por los republicanos, ama de casa

      Kelly

      38 años, Texas, independiente, reclutadora

      Jerry

      22 años, Florida, republicano, banquero

      José

      39 años, Florida, se inclina por los demócratas, financiero

      John

      58 años, Arizona, republicano, fotógrafo

      Cindy

      35 años, Florida, se inclina por los republicanos, administradora de casos financieros More

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      In Kansas, Gov. Laura Kelly Tests if Any Politics Is Still Local

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      FORT SCOTT, Kan. — Two months ago, Kansas became the unlikely toast of the Democratic Party after voters here overwhelmingly affirmed their support for protecting abortion rights in the State Constitution, a result that electrified national Democrats and revived their hopes of surviving the midterm elections across the country.Locked in her own re-election battle, the state’s Democratic governor, Laura Kelly, was not focused on electrifying anyone as she arrived in this small city in a deeply Republican corner of Kansas to dispense local highway grants — part of a bipartisan initiative, she noted about 30 seconds into her remarks.Ms. Kelly’s relentless talk about working with Republicans, her understated, no-nonsense style and her emphasis on education funding and economic development help explain why she enjoys strong approval ratings in a state that former President Donald J. Trump won by nearly 15 percentage points, and why, as the only Democratic governor seeking re-election in a state Mr. Trump won in 2020, she has narrowly led in some limited recent polling.Traditionally, candidates for governor — from Kansas to Massachusetts — have separated from their parties more successfully than contenders for federal office have, even as the nation’s politics have grown ever more tribal. Now, amid signs of a worsening environment for Democrats, the final stretch of the Kansas campaign is testing how much protection a strong local, personal brand still affords in governor’s races against gale-force political headwinds.“People can and often do distinguish governor’s races and look at them differently,” said Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina, the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, who also acknowledged the difficulties of the “tough environment.” “They want people who are competent and pragmatic.”Ms. Kelly, center, and Mr. Schmidt, right, at their debate in Overland Park this month. She has sought to tie him to former Gov. Sam Brownback, an unpopular Republican, while he has tried to link her with President Biden.Evert Nelson/The Topeka Capital-Journal, via Associated PressThat is Ms. Kelly’s argument, both on defense and on offense: As she runs against Derek Schmidt, the attorney general of Kansas, she is linking him not to far-right national Republicans but to former Gov. Sam Brownback, whose tax-cutting experiment led to spending cuts in education and other programs that ignited a bipartisan revolt several years ago. In turn, Mr. Schmidt is seeking to tie Ms. Kelly closely to President Biden.Ms. Kelly, who built an early fund-raising edge, has gone to significant lengths to distance herself from her party. She filmed a campaign ad from the middle of a road, saying, “Like most Kansans, I’m not too far right or too far left.”In an interview last week, she declined to say whether she wanted Mr. Biden to be the 2024 Democratic nominee. And she did not directly answer whether Americans were better off with Mr. Trump out of the White House, sidestepping to discuss her tenure instead.“I’ll deal with the national issues when I need to and when Kansas needs something,” Ms. Kelly said. “But otherwise I stay focused like a laser” on the state.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries over, both parties are shifting their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.The Final Stretch: With elections next month, a Times/Siena poll shows that independents, especially women, are swinging toward the G.O.P. despite Democrats’ focus on abortion rights as voters worry about the economy.Georgia Governor Race: A debate between Gov. Brian Kemp and Stacey Abrams produced a substantive hour of policy discussion. Here are five takeaways.Aggressive Tactics: Right-wing leaders are calling on election activists to monitor voting in the midterm elections in search of evidence to confirm unfounded theories of election fraud.Jill Biden: The first lady, who has become a lifeline for Democratic candidates trying to draw attention and money in the midterms, is the most popular surrogate in the Biden administration.She suggested she had worked productively with Mr. Trump on pandemic management, and noted her disagreement with Mr. Biden over coronavirus vaccine mandates, as well as her support for the infrastructure spending package passed by Congress with bipartisan backing.She has also plainly benefited from the power of incumbency, allowing her to focus on less ideological economic matters. A month before Election Day, she joined representatives from Pratt Industries for an opening of a corrugated-box plant near Wichita, and earlier this year she announced a large deal for a Panasonic factory in De Soto, which has faced scrutiny but seems to have resonated with some voters, judging from interviews.Ms. Kelly has been endorsed by several moderates who served as Republican officials in Kansas, including former Gov. Bill Graves, former Senator Nancy L. Kassebaum and Carla Stovall, a former state attorney general. (Mr. Schmidt had stints working with all of them.)Matthew Wells, a Republican city commissioner in Fort Scott, Kan., predicted that many voters would stick with a straight G.O.P. ticket.Chase Castor for The New York TimesThat was significant to Matthew Wells, a Republican city commissioner in Fort Scott who said he was inclined to back Ms. Kelly, though he said he doubted she was connecting with many others in his conservative community.“The use of divisive political rhetoric that has driven a wedge between the two parties — I believe, especially in our area, it has become much worse,” he said, predicting that many voters would stick with a straight Republican ticket.But in more than a dozen interviews just over an hour north, in suburban Kansas City, voters indicated significant willingness to cross party lines..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.“She’s a good fighter for our state,” said Nancy Kenyon, 60, of Overland Park, Kan., who said she typically voted Republican but was considering backing Ms. Kelly.Ms. Kenyon was shopping at an upscale complex in politically crucial Johnson County. Like many other bedroom communities home to educated professionals, Johnson County was once a moderate Republican bastion but swung toward Democrats during the Trump era. Representative Sharice Davids, a Democrat, serves the area in the House.Ms. Kelly will need strong margins there to offset more conservative parts of the state. Mr. Schmidt does not need to win Johnson County, but he cannot afford to lose in a blowout.Private Republican polling conducted this month found Mr. Schmidt trailing Ms. Kelly by double digits in the Kansas City suburbs and surrounding areas. Roughly 70 percent of voters in Johnson County also opposed the anti-abortion rights ballot question this summer, which Mr. Schmidt supported. In an interview, Mr. Schmidt said the result of the August referendum “has to be respected” and vowed to focus on defending abortion restrictions that are already in place.Ms. Kelly is not making abortion rights a focal point of her campaign, in contrast to many other Democrats, but she is not running from the issue, either.“There will be a bill in the Kansas Legislature, no doubt, to impose greater restrictions,” she said in the interview. “If I’m in office, it can be vetoed. If my opponent is in office, it’ll become law.”Like other states, Kansas had a surge in women registering to vote after Roe v. Wade was overturned, and the abortion rights vote in August drew extraordinary turnout.Stephanie Sharp, a Republican former state representative who is now a political strategist in Johnson County backing Ms. Kelly, worried aloud about whether that energy was translating into enthusiasm about November.Fort Scott, where Ms. Kelly recently appeared, is in a deeply Republican area of eastern Kansas.Chase Castor for The New York Times“I just think those Aug. 2 voters aren’t continuing to be as engaged,” said Ms. Sharp, who said she saw Ms. Kelly at a fund-raiser with Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota in suburban Kansas City last week.Ms. Sharp said she wished she “could just take all of those Democrats and unaffiliated voters from August by the lapels, and just shake them and say, ‘Do you realize the power you have?’”Mr. Schmidt was recently outside a local Republican office in Wichita, in Sedgwick County, which Ms. Kelly won in 2018, rallying with Republicans who had no doubts about their voters’ enthusiasm.“I’ve never seen Kansans so angry,” said Senator Roger Marshall, a Kansas Republican.While a state senator, Dennis Pyle, is challenging Mr. Schmidt from the right with an independent bid, Mr. Schmidt is no centrist. He signed on to a baseless effort to challenge the 2020 election results and has embraced cultural battles over education and barring transgender athletes from participating in women’s and girls’ sports.Stylistically, though, Mr. Schmidt is more low-key than lightning rod. He sounds traditional Republican notes about valuing “personal liberty, freedom and fiscal responsibility” over an “overreaching, big-government mentality,” and has emphasized public safety and the economy.Mr. Schmidt, who received Mr. Trump’s endorsement but dodged when asked whether he wanted Mr. Trump to be the 2024 Republican nominee, has secured the backing of some groups that either supported Ms. Kelly or stayed neutral last time, as well as her first budget director, who previously served as a Republican state lawmaker.The Republican Governors Association has continued to invest in the race; former Vice President Mike Pence is slated to campaign for Mr. Schmidt on Friday; and Robin Dole, the daughter of Bob Dole, the former Senate majority leader from Kansas, recently wrote an op-ed article in support of Mr. Schmidt, noting he received her father’s final political endorsement.Still, Mr. Schmidt’s candidacy has given some national Republicans heartburn. Ms. Kelly and Democratic allies started advertising on television in April; he waited until nearly September. In late summer, national Republican strategists made clear to Mr. Schmidt and his campaign that they wanted to see sharper lines of attack against Ms. Kelly, and a more affirmative case for his candidacy, according to a person with direct knowledge of the conversations.“We have run a very strong campaign, and I am very pleased to have a wide range of support,” Mr. Schmidt said when asked about some of that angst.Nancy Kenyon of Overland Park said she typically voted Republican but was considering casting a ballot for Ms. Kelly.Chase Castor for The New York TimesOn air, Mr. Schmidt has been pummeled as an acolyte of Mr. Brownback. And at Mr. Schmidt’s stop in Wichita, the final event on a statewide bus tour, it was easy to see why. Melinda Pore, 66, a Trump voter who backed Ms. Kelly in 2018, arrived at the gathering saying she was undecided, but she was clearly bothered by memories of the former governor.“If you know anything about Brownback, there’s a lot not to like,” she said.Mr. Schmidt has scoffed at the comparisons, saying Ms. Kelly has “spent a lot of time and money talking about somebody who’s not on the ballot.”Asked to name the biggest difference between himself and Mr. Brownback, Mr. Schmidt did not exert himself: “I’m a candidate this year who’s focused on where we’re headed,” he said. In other venues, he has distanced himself in more detail.Then again, Mr. Schmidt, too, is highlighting someone who is not on this year’s ballot.“We have a Biden Democrat in this governor’s office,” Mr. Schmidt told his audience in Wichita. “This election is about correcting that problem.”For Ms. Pore, that may be reason enough to give him her vote.“There are so many things that I don’t like that President Biden’s doing,” she said after Mr. Schmidt spoke. “I think I’m just going to vote straight ticket. And I usually don’t do that.” More

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      Siena Poll Shows Zeldin Gaining on Hochul in NY Governor’s Race

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      Representative Lee Zeldin has cut into Gov. Kathy Hochul’s lead in the race for governor of New York, narrowing the margin to 11 percentage points, down from 17 points last month, according to a Siena College poll released on Tuesday.The survey suggested that Ms. Hochul, a Democrat, still possesses a healthy lead over Mr. Zeldin, a Republican, in a liberal-leaning state where no Republican has won a statewide race since 2002.But with Election Day just three weeks away, the diminished gap between the two suggested that New York voters were growing more concerned about the state’s direction — much as recent polling nationwide has indicated that the flailing economy and stubborn inflation remain top-of-mind concerns, as Republicans have expanded their edge over Democrats ahead of November’s midterm elections.While 61 percent of Democrats said that New York was on the right track, 87 percent of Republicans and a majority of independent voters said the state was headed in the wrong direction, according to the poll.In particular, Ms. Hochul lost support among white voters, who appear to be evenly divided between the candidates after favoring Ms. Hochul by 10 percentage points in September, the poll found.The results from the Siena poll tracked closely with a separate survey from Marist College last week that showed Ms. Hochul leading Mr. Zeldin by 10 percentage points among registered voters and eight percentage points among likely voters. Ms. Hochul appears to have a roughly 12-point lead, according to an average of nearly a dozen polls compiled by FiveThirtyEight, an opinion poll analysis website that takes into account a poll’s quality and partisan lean.Ms. Hochul and Mr. Zeldin have both sharpened their attacks in the final stretch, casting each other as members of their party’s most extreme wings and doubling down on the overarching themes that have defined the race. Ms. Hochul has continued to portray Mr. Zeldin as a threat to the state’s strict abortion protections, while Mr. Zeldin has blamed the governor’s policies for contributing to crime and rising costs in New York.The contest received a jolt over the weekend when former President Donald J. Trump formally endorsed Mr. Zeldin, who was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters in Congress. Mr. Trump, who previously raised money for Mr. Zeldin, praised the candidate as “great and brilliant” in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social.Democrats in New York, where Mr. Trump remains deeply unpopular, quickly moved to capitalize on the endorsement, releasing an ad trumpeting Mr. Zeldin’s close ties to the former president, including his vote against certifying the 2020 election.But the congressman, who is vying to make inroads among moderate voters and disaffected Democrats, played down Mr. Trump’s formal backing, saying on Monday that it “shouldn’t have been news.”The Siena poll, which surveyed over 700 likely voters last week and has a margin of error of 4.9 percentage points, showed Ms. Hochul and Mr. Zeldin with a tight hold over voters from their respective parties. Mr. Zeldin, however, increased his lead among independent voters by six percentage points (49 percent to 40 percent over Ms. Hochul).The governor continues to have a commanding lead in New York City, where she is beating Mr. Zeldin 70 percent to 23 percent, and among women as well as Black and Latino voters, according to the poll.Mr. Zeldin, for his part, gained the lead in the city’s suburbs, where he is now beating Ms. Hochul 49 percent to 45 percent, after trailing her by one percentage point last month. He also increased his margin in upstate New York to four percentage points, up from one percentage point in the last poll. He has improved his name recognition, even if most voters continue to have an unfavorable view of him.Despite the modest gains, Mr. Zeldin would have to make much larger inroads across the map to cobble together a winning coalition. The state’s electoral landscape is stacked against him: Democratic voters outnumber Republicans two to one in New York.And though Mr. Zeldin is receiving significant support from Republican-backed super PACs pumping money into the race, he appears unlikely to surpass Ms. Hochul’s sizable fund-raising advantage.The governor has maintained an aggressive fund-raising schedule to help bankroll the multimillion-dollar barrage of television ads she has deployed to attack Mr. Zeldin.But Ms. Hochul, until very recently, has mostly avoided overtly political events such as rallies and other retail politics in which she personally engages with voters. Mr. Zeldin, in contrast, has deployed an ambitious ground game, touring the state in a truck festooned with his name and a “Save our State” slogan. More

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      Poll Shows Voters See Democracy in Peril, but Saving It Isn’t a Priority

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      Voters overwhelmingly believe American democracy is under threat, but seem remarkably apathetic about that danger, with few calling it the nation’s most pressing problem, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll.In fact, more than a third of independent voters and a smaller but noteworthy contingent of Democrats said they were open to supporting candidates who reject the legitimacy of the 2020 election, as they assigned greater urgency to their concerns about the economy than to fears about the fate of the country’s political system.Voters who are open to candidates who reject 2020 election resultsThinking about a candidate for political office who you agree with on most positions, how comfortable would you be voting for that candidate if they say they think the 2020 election was stolen? More

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      5 Takeaways From the Utah Senate Debate

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      Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah, and his independent challenger, Evan McMullin, a former C.I.A. officer, met Monday evening for their only debate, a largely genteel affair that showed flashes of tension mainly around Mr. Lee’s role in the effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election and keep Donald J. Trump in the presidency.Here are five takeaways from an unusual debate in an unusual Senate race.Jan. 6 remains center stage.No race in the country has spotlighted the events after the 2020 election quite so much as the Senate contest in Utah. In part, that’s because Mr. McMullin and Mr. Lee agree on so many other issues. But it’s primarily because of the prominent role Mr. Lee played in cheerleading various efforts to use legal battles to keep Mr. Trump in power. Much of that cheerleading surfaced in text messages the senator sent to to the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows.Mr. McMullin called Mr. Lee’s actions “the most egregious betrayal of our nation’s constitution in its history by a U.S. senator,” adding: “It will be your legacy.”Mr. Lee did ultimately vote to affirm President Biden’s election, and he fell back on the language that many Republicans have used when asked if the president was fairly elected. “Joe Biden is our president,” he said. “He was chosen in the only election that matters, the election held by the Electoral College.”But he strongly denied any wrongdoing before his vote to certify the election, saying his discussions about a search for “alternative” electors who would deny the election result was merely an exploration of rumors of such electors — rumors, he said, that proved to be untrue. He accused Mr. McMullin of “a cavalier, reckless disregard for the truth” and demanded an apology.The advantage of independence.Mr. McMullin took full advantage of his status as an independent running in a conservative state, agreeing with his Republican opponent on limiting abortion, castigating Mr. Biden for stoking inflation and saying the White House’s student debt relief program would only worsen inflation. And he vowed that he would not be a “bootlicker” for Mr. Biden or Mr. Trump.That caught Mr. Lee’s ear: “The suggestion that I’m beholden to either party, that I’ve been a bootlicker for either party, is folly,” he protested.The State of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsWith the primaries over, both parties are shifting their focus to the general election on Nov. 8.The Final Stretch: With elections next month, a Times/Siena poll shows that independents, especially women, are swinging toward the G.O.P. despite Democrats’ focus on abortion rights as voters worry about the economy.Questioning 2020: Hundreds of Republicans on the ballot this November have cast doubt on the 2020 election, a Times analysis found. Many of these candidates are favored to win their races.Georgia Senate Race: The contest, which could determine whether Democrats keep control of the Senate, has become increasingly focused on the private life and alleged hypocrisy of Herschel Walker, the Republican nominee.Jill Biden: The first lady, who has become a lifeline for Democratic candidates trying to draw attention and money in the midterms, is the most popular surrogate in the Biden administration.Mr. McMullin was also free to embrace the most popular elements of the Democrats’ achievements, like allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices.He portrayed Mr. Lee — largely accurately — as an outlier in the Senate for his consistent votes against bills, even those with broad bipartisan support, and put himself forward as a problem-solver in the mold of the Utahn he hopes to join in the Senate, Mitt Romney.“If we prevail, it will make Utah the most influential state in the nation, because nothing will get through the Senate without Utah’s support,” Mr. McMullin said..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.But there is a problem with his vow to be a true independent who would not caucus with either party: Without choosing sides at all, he might not be able to get any committee assignments, severely limiting his ability to wield influence.Mr. Lee was cutting in his dismissal of his opponent’s independent bid: “Supporting an opportunistic gadfly who is supported by the Democrat Party might make for interesting dinner party conversation,” he argued, but in such trying times, it made no sense for the people of Utah.Searching for distinctions on abortion.In virtually every other contested race this year, the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade has elevated abortion to the top of the agenda, especially for the Democrat in the race. The Senate contest in Utah has no Democrat, and no abortion-rights candidate.In conservative Utah, that allowed Mr. Lee to openly proclaim his joy over the end of Roe v. Wade and his support for allowing the states to decide whether abortion should be legal. “Roe v. Wade,” Mr. Lee said, “was a legal fiction.”Mr. McMullin said he, too, was “pro-life” and struggled to distinguish himself from his opponent, saying he opposed politicians at the extremes of both parties on the issue, those who would ban all abortions without exceptions and those who oppose all restrictions. But he did not say when he thought abortion should be legal or at what point in a pregnancy his opposition to abortion would kick in.Russia, Russia, Russia.Given Mr. McMullin’s C.I.A. background, Russia seemed like a fruitful avenue to pursue his prosecution of Mr. Lee as an extremist outlier, even in right-leaning Utah. He said the senator was the only member of Utah’s all-Republican congressional delegation not to be blacklisted by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, and he castigated Mr. Lee for going to Moscow in 2019 to discuss relaxing some sanctions on the Putin regime.But Mr. Lee deftly eluded the attack, saying he had gone to Russia at the invitation of the nation’s ambassador to Moscow at the time, Jon Huntsman Jr. — a popular former Utah governor.Closing the gap? Not likely.Mr. McMullin has waged a surprisingly effective campaign against Mr. Lee in a state that gave Mr. Trump 58 percent of the vote in 2020. But to beat Mr. Lee, he must win over the state’s Democrats, most of its independents and every disaffected Republican he can find. And no one is sure such a coalition will add up to 50 percent of the vote.It is also not clear Monday night’s debate will advance Mr. McMullin’s cause. The audience was stacked with supporters of Mr. Lee, who booed Mr. McMullin’s jabs, especially about Jan. 6 and the 2020 election, and cheered on the incumbent. At times, Mr. McMullin seemed flustered that he was not getting traction with his most practiced lines of attack, especially his appeals to the Mormon faithful whose ancestors “trekked across the plains and the Rockies to achieve freedom here.”“I think about all the men and women, the 14 generations of Americans who have sacrificed for this grand experiment in freedom,” he said. “They trusted you, we trusted you, and with that trust and with your knowledge of the Constitution, Senator Lee, you sought to find a weakness in our system” to “overturn the will of the people.”But the Utahns who Hillary Clinton thought would recoil in 2016 from Mr. Trump’s immoralities did not come to her aid. And they were even less in evidence for Mr. Biden in 2020.Ultimately, Mr. Lee may have had the most effective attack line, one he used often: Mr. McMullin voted for Mr. Biden. More

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      The Fall of Liz Cheney and the Rise of Marjorie Taylor Greene

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      The Jan. 6 committee, which held its ninth and likely final hearing last Thursday, has lionized the figure of the Decent Republican.Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the committee, was its obvious star, imbued with moral authority by the fact that she’d sacrificed her position in Republican leadership, and possibly her political career, to stand up to Donald Trump. But there were many others.Rusty Bowers, the Trump-supporting speaker of the Arizona House who refused to help the former president subvert his state’s election results, was a portrait of rectitude, reading from his journal, “I will not play with laws I swore allegiance to.” Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Trump’s chief of staff, defied attempts at intimidation to describe a president at once calculating and berserk.“When you look back at what has come out through this committee’s work, the most striking fact is that all this evidence comes almost entirely from Republicans,” the committee’s Democratic chairman, Bennie Thompson, said on Thursday.This attempt to separate Trump from the Republican Party made political sense. The committee was trying to reach beyond committed Democratic voters who were already appalled by Trump, and the Republicans who testified had the credibility that comes with acting against their own political interest. But the emphasis on Republican valor meant that the story the committee told, while compelling, was incomplete. Going forward, the threat to the American experiment comes not just from Trump but from the Republican base, which is making the figure of the Decent Republican a quaint curiosity.The problem for Decent Republicans is that their party’s internal democracy makes a commitment to democracy writ large impossible. For decades, prominent right-wing politicians, pastors and pundits — Cheney very much included — cultivated in their base the belief that Democrats represent totalitarian evil. Not surprisingly, the base came to see Democratic victories as intolerable, and rejected candidates who would respect the results of general elections. As The Washington Post reported, a majority of Republican nominees for House, Senate and important statewide offices either doubt or deny that Joe Biden won in 2020.Liz CheneyMark Peterson for The New York TimesQueen of the election deniers is Marjorie Taylor Greene. In his engrossing new book “Weapons of Mass Delusion,” Robert Draper chronicles Greene’s rise in parallel with Cheney’s fall. (An adapted excerpt was just published by The Times Magazine.)Plenty of Republican officials, and ex-officials, wish it were the reverse. Draper has a detailed re-creation of the Feb. 3, 2021, meeting where House Republicans first voted on removing Cheney from her position as Republican conference chair, a vote she survived. “How is it going to look if we kick out Liz Cheney and keep Marjorie Taylor Greene?” asked Tom Reed, a moderate Republican from upstate New York.Initially, Kevin McCarthy, House minority leader, persuaded the party to close ranks behind both Cheney and Greene. “I’m not letting Dems pick us off one by one,” he said, adding: “You elected me leader. Let. Me. Lead.”But McCarthy is, fundamentally, a follower. By May, Draper writes, House Republicans were telling him that “Cheney was becoming a major distraction and a problem for their voters back home.” Greene, meanwhile, had a deep connection to those voters, who considered Democrats demonic and the elections they win fake. This gave her power that McCarthy deferred to.According to Draper, McCarthy invited Greene “to high-level conferences in his office, making a show of sitting next to her and soliciting her opinions.” Last year Democrats stripped Greene of her committee assignments for promoting conspiracy theories and suggesting that the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, should be executed. If Republicans win the House, McCarthy has promised to put Greene on more powerful committees than she was on before. A source told Draper that McCarthy even offered Greene a leadership position.The truth is, if Republicans win — a recent New York Times/Siena College poll shows them ahead by three points among likely voters — Greene will be a leader no matter what McCarthy does. Chances are she’ll be at the forefront of an expanding MAGA squad, with at least one Republican who was at the Capitol on Jan. 6, and maybe more. A Georgia Republican who has promised to be a “great teammate” for Greene, Mike Collins, has a campaign video in which he shoots a gun at what looks like a garbage can full of explosives marked “Voting Machine.”It goes without saying that these Republicans will disband the Jan. 6 committee and impeach Joe Biden. They’ll probably seek vengeance for Greene — and Paul Gosar, who lost his committee assignments for tweeting an anime video altered to show him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — by stripping Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives of their committee assignments. Expect them to shut down the government more than once and to launch investigations into the Department of Justice over its investigation of Trump. If the 2024 election is disputed, they’ll do all they can to swing it to Republicans. It’s what their voters are sending them to Congress to do.“Our institutions only hold when men and women of good faith make them hold, regardless of the political cost,” Cheney said at the most recent Jan. 6 hearing. “We have no guarantee that these men and women will be in place next time.” Indeed, we have a guarantee that many of them won’t be.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