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      The Republican Alternatives to Trump

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      More from our inbox:Whatever Happened to Civil Presidential Debates?Questions for HamasQuestions for IsraelAdvice for These Fraught TimesAntipsychotic Drugs and Weight GainThe presidential hopefuls seemed content to aim for second place behind former President Donald J. Trump and deliver digs at President Biden.Maansi Srivastava/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “If You’re Going to Win the Nomination, Here’s Step 1,” by Kristen Soltis Anderson (Opinion guest essay, Nov. 8):Ms. Anderson says that many Republicans are open to opponents of Donald Trump who can articulate a new direction for the party, but that those candidates are running out of time to make their case.Ms. Anderson mentions the former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley as a viable alternative to Mr. Trump. But in terms of good fiscal governance and foreign policy, I believe that Ms. Haley is even more misguided than Mr. Trump.For example, she has recommended ending the federal gas tax, enacting a new middle-class tax cut and extending the 2017 Trump administration tax cut. While such policies might attract some voters to Ms. Haley, they would greatly diminish the revenue needed to pay for essential services, not to mention blowing up the national debt.As for international affairs, she has recommended sending special forces to “take out the cartels” in Mexico. Imagine how Mexico and other countries might react to such an invasion.Serious Republicans don’t need to look far to find a better presidential candidate than Ms. Haley.Eric MurchisonVienna, Va.To the Editor:Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley and the other G.O.P. candidates must know that the most likely path to a nomination for them is if Donald Trump is convicted or forced to drop out of the race. In that scenario, many Republican voters are likely to be very angry, and they will rally behind the candidate who can most compellingly channel their indignation. Anyone who has been seen as significantly anti-Trump will be out of the running.It is strategically savvy of them not to level any direct harsh criticism at Mr. Trump. If the time comes that Mr. Trump is forced out of the race, the last thing his competitors will do in that situation is suggest that the charges against him are anything other than politically motivated.William ShermanHuntington, N.Y.To the Editor:This guest essay suggested that the candidates explain why they are running against Donald Trump, which in fact was one of the questions asked during Wednesday’s debate. Perhaps the reason they have not yet done so convincingly is that they are not running “against” Mr. Trump.Several of them are likely running for vice president, and that would preclude discussing their differences.Carolyn BrossBloomingdale, N.J.Whatever Happened to Civil Presidential Debates? To the Editor:Re “From Substance to Shouting: The Demise of Political Debate in America” (Opinion video, nytimes.com, Nov. 7):Our view of politics has shifted dramatically from the days when presidential debates were respectful discussions of platforms and ideologies. I am a high school junior, and my classmates and I are worried about the future of the American presidency.Presidential debates, once characterized by thoughtful discussions, have transformed into heated contests where candidates pick one another apart in hopes of winning a few more percentage points. Genuine discourse is rare, and recap videos showcase the biggest insults or the funniest moments.How does it affect our country’s future when presidential candidates can’t engage in respectful discussion? What does it mean for American society when our ideology divides us completely? A president’s priority should be to represent the people and work toward the betterment of our nation. We cannot afford to lower this standard.As the future generation of voters and leaders, it falls on us young people to advocate a return to civil and meaningful discussion in our political debates. The strength of our democracy depends on it, and young voices need to be part of the solution.Maia DietzSan Jose, Calif.Questions for Hamas Ronen Bergman/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Hamas’s Goal for Oct. 7: A Permanent State of War; Group’s Leaders Say Carnage Was Needed to Restore Focus on Palestinians” (front page, Nov. 9):After reading your interviews with Hamas leaders, one wonders:1. Are the Palestinian citizens of Gaza OK with a permanent state of war?2. Where is that permanent state of war supposed to lead?3. What cause was “slipping away”? Certainly not peace or a two-state solution; so what is left?4. If the cause and the policy of permanent war mean the destruction of Israel, are all those chanting “Free Palestine” or “From the river to the sea” supportive of that?Scott BenardeWest Palm Beach, Fla.Questions for IsraelTo the Editor:Israel’s stated war objective, repeated often by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is to “destroy Hamas.” Hamas is a movement, a political-military organization with the backing of Iran and other entities.Might one ask what exactly does “destroy Hamas” look like? Is it every member of Hamas surrendering, or is it the death of the leadership, much of which does not even live in Gaza? How does one measure success when the stated aim is impossible to measure, let alone manage?I think that if we are paying for the arming of Israel — and make no mistake, we are — we are entitled to a straight answer.Geoffrey D. BatrouneyRye Brook, N.Y.Advice for These Fraught Times Photo illustration by The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “How to Stay Sane in Brutalizing Times,” by David Brooks (column, Nov. 5):What amazing advice from Mr. Brooks on how people can stay sane in these perilous times. His emphasis on humility, prudence and caution is inspiring. I would add just one thing: self-compassion. Today public leaders need to be kind to themselves for the nearly impossible jobs they are often called on to do.Jerome T. MurphyCambridge, Mass.The writer is a retired Harvard professor and dean who taught courses on leadership.To the Editor:David Brooks reaches back thousands of years, integrating diverse cultures and quoting appropriate phrases from several authors, to emphasize the vast depth of his subject matter. Yet after all that, he does not cite the one that summarizes the entire concept: “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”Mary Ann McGinleyWilmette, Ill.Antipsychotic Drugs and Weight Gain Derek AbellaTo the Editor:Re “Psychiatric Drugs Add Pounds. Some See Solution in Ozempic” (front page, Nov. 6):Like other clinical psychiatrists, I use a simple, low-tech solution for my patients who gain weight on their antipsychotic drugs. In consultation with our patients, we find another antipsychotic, one that doesn’t cause weight gain. There are many to choose from.Together with our patients, we look for the most effective drug with the least side effects, at the lowest possible dose. To be on the safe side, we weigh our patients at each visit to guard against weight gain.Of course, this requires continuing follow-up visits with our patients, to form a trusting relationship and a common goal of healing. But with a new patient it’s essential to provide such close attention.Some might object that such frequent office visits for follow-up care are too expensive. But compared with the monthly cost of Ozempic, good care is a bargain.Alice FellerBerkeley, Calif. More

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      Winners and Losers From the Third Republican Debate

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      Welcome to Opinion’s commentary for the third Republican presidential debate, held in Miami on Wednesday night. In this special feature, Times Opinion writers and contributors rate the candidates on a scale of 0 to 10: 0 means the candidate probably didn’t belong on the stage and should have dropped out before the debate even started; […] More

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      Third Republican Debate: Key Takeaways

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      Nikki Haley staked out a clear, hawkish vision. Ron DeSantis avoided risks. And the night’s glaring absentee, Donald Trump, again emerged untouched.It was the undercard that underwhelmed.The third straight Republican presidential debate that former President Donald J. Trump has skipped — choosing instead to rally with supporters a few miles away — represented a critical and shrinking chance for his rivals to close his chasm of a polling advantage.And with only five candidates on the stage for the first time — Chris Christie, Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy and Tim Scott — they all had far more time to speak.Yet they had precious little to say about Mr. Trump, even when given the chance just over two months before the Iowa caucuses.They sparred in a substantive debate that dissected disagreements over aid to Ukraine, Social Security, confronting China, banning TikTok and how to approach abortion less than 24 hours after Republicans suffered their latest electoral setbacks driven by the fall of Roe v. Wade.But there was something surreal about such detailed discussions unfolding among candidates who seem so far from the Oval Office — even Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley, who asserted themselves as the leaders of the non-Trump pack.Here are six takeaways from a debate in Miami that may best be remembered for Ms. Haley snapping at Mr. Ramaswamy, “You’re just scum.”Haley came out swinging.Ms. Haley, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said that there would be no Hamas without Iran.Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesNikki Haley emerged as a power center on the debate stage, giving a forceful performance that took advantage of the night’s focus on foreign policy to present a clear and hawkish vision of America’s role in the world.Leaning into her experience as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, she staked out expansive, interventionist positions that cut against Mr. Trump’s “America First” foreign policy vision.She backed Ukraine to the hilt. She said she would support military strikes against Iran. And she said the United States needed to support Israel with “whatever they need and whenever they need it.”Most of the other candidates gave versions of the same responses — but Ms. Haley had the edge of having represented the United States on the world stage.When the candidates were asked what they would urge Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to do at this moment, Mr. DeSantis said he “would be telling” him to eliminate Hamas. Ms. Haley said she did, in fact, tell Mr. Netanyahu to “finish them.”As Ms. Haley vies with Mr. DeSantis to establish herself as the field’s Trump alternative, some of the party’s biggest donors were closely watching her performance as they weighed whether to spend millions on her behalf in a desperate final effort to beat Mr. Trump.Ms. Haley’s competitors recognized her rising status by taking aim at her.DeSantis is still playing it safe in a game he’s losing.The Florida governor criticized Donald Trump’s absence from the debate stage.Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesIt seemed, for a moment, as if this would be a different kind of debate for Mr. DeSantis. His opening answer affirmatively outlined how he would be better than Mr. Trump.“He should explain why he didn’t have Mexico pay for the border wall,” Mr. DeSantis began. “He should explain why he racked up so much debt. He should explain why he didn’t drain the swamp.” He went on to say that Mr. Trump promised “winning” only to have his party endure years of “losing,” including on Tuesday.“In Florida, I showed how it’s done,” Mr. DeSantis declared, trying to take hometown advantage of a debate held in Miami.But then he mostly left Mr. Trump untouched, satisfied to prosecute his own case and push back on rivals like Ms. Haley. It was the same strategy he used in the first two debates, with little traction gained.Mr. DeSantis is plainly more comfortable than in the first debate. Yet he surprisingly left unsaid a development that his campaign has advertised as a game changer: the endorsement this week of Gov. Kim Reynolds of Iowa.You can’t debate someone who isn’t there.Chris Christie took the sharpest aim at Mr. Trump, but in his absence the five contenders were left to tear one another down, with varying levels of nastiness.Maansi Srivastava/The New York TimesThe candidates again did little to aggressively contrast themselves with Mr. Trump, who has made himself unavailable for direct sparring by refusing to stand onstage with his rivals or, for the most part, appear with them at multicandidate gatherings on the campaign trail.Without Mr. Trump present, the five contenders were left to tear one another down, with varying levels of nastiness.The first question to the candidates was the fundamental one most of them have struggled to answer to Republican voters: why they, and not Mr. Trump, should be the nominee.Mr. Christie, as expected, was the sharpest in his attack, arguing that someone who faces Mr. Trump’s criminal charges “cannot lead this party or this country.”But Mr. DeSantis took only a brief swipe. Ms. Haley praised Mr. Trump’s presidency, then criticized him, saying that he had gone “weak in the knees” on Ukraine and that his time had passed. Mr. Ramaswamy defended Mr. Trump in passing. And Mr. Scott talked about himself.Nikki Haley said that she doesn’t believe Trump is the “right president now.”NBC NewsThat was almost the extent of efforts to chip away at the runaway front-runner. Nearby, Mr. Trump held a rally in Hialeah, Fla., remarking at one point that his rivals were “not watchable.”For months, the candidates have struggled to find a way to force him into the ring with them, with Mr. Christie threatening to follow him on the campaign trail and Mr. DeSantis, in recent days, lobbing crass responses to Mr. Trump’s brutal taunts. In the third debate, none of them figured out how to make it work.This debate got personal.Vivek Ramaswamy fought with the NBC moderators and the head of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, whom he urged to resign.Maansi Srivastava/The New York TimesAfter three debates, this much is clear: Some of the candidates onstage really don’t like one another.The most loathed appears to be Mr. Ramaswamy, who from the start fought not just with the rivals flanking him but also with the NBC moderators and the head of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, whom he urged to resign in his opening statement.At times, Mr. Ramaswamy almost seemed to be doing Mr. Trump’s bidding, attacking NBC’s past coverage of the former president’s scandals.He made acidic attacks on Ms. Haley, mocking her foreign policy and calling her “Dick Cheney in three-inch heels.” He slipped in a crack about Mr. DeSantis’s footwear, suggesting that the Florida governor, too, was wearing lifts. Mr. DeSantis ignored him. Ms. Haley said hers were five inches and “for ammunition.”When Mr. Ramaswamy later invoked her daughter’s use of TikTok, she demanded, “Leave my daughter out of your voice,” and then added in almost disbelief about the exchange, “You’re just scum.”During a confrontation over TikTok, Nikki Haley snapped at Vivek Ramaswamy after he scolded Ms. Haley over her daughter’s use of the app.Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesAbortion remains a Republican quagmire.The crowd at Wednesday’s debate.Maansi Srivastava/The New York TimesAfter Tuesday’s defeats, the Republican candidates knew they would face questions about the way forward on abortion. But they mostly seemed uncertain what to say.“We’re better off when we can promote a culture of life,” said Mr. DeSantis, who signed a six-week ban in his state. He said little at all about what his party should do or what he would do as president. “At the same time, I understand that some of these states are doing it a little bit different.”Ms. Haley described herself as opposed to abortion, but said that passing national restrictions would be virtually impossible, arguing that it’s crucial to be “honest” with the public. At times, Ms. Haley seemed to be trying to appeal to general-election voters. “I don’t judge anyone for being pro-choice,” she said. It was the kind of line that makes Democratic strategists worry about her strength if she were to win the nomination — but also one that the G.O.P. base is unlikely to welcome.It all amounted to a reminder that Republicans, after decades of campaigning against abortion rights, have yet to figure out what to say after finally getting their wish through a Supreme Court that Mr. Trump — who also won’t say where he stands on a national ban — reshaped.Was this Tim Scott’s swan song?Tim Scott said “diplomacy only“ in the Israel-Hamas war was “a weak strategy.“Scott McIntyre for The New York TimesMr. Scott qualified for this debate by the narrowest of margins, with only a single poll — the legitimacy of which some of his rivals have privately disputed — ensuring his spot. But the thresholds will be higher for the next debate in December, and Mr. Scott’s allies acknowledge that he needs to something, anything, just to remain a factor.It’s hard to imagine that he did anything on Wednesday night to change his trajectory. He stuck to the same messages he has been hitting throughout the campaign. He described an America in need of spiritual healing and a return to Judeo-Christian values.He received more attention for what he did after the debate than for anything he said during it. Mr. Scott, 58, has never been married, and entire newspaper stories have been dedicated to a mysterious girlfriend who had never been seen with him in public.Until he brought her onstage.Michael Gold More

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      Tim Scott Appears With Girlfriend Onstage After Republican Debate

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      Senator Tim Scott’s most viral debate moment didn’t actually happen during the debate. It came shortly afterward.Mr. Scott, the affable yet awkward South Carolina lawmaker, has been pressed during his campaign with questions about his unmarried status, as he has focused on his faith and his commitment to conservative family values.He has repeatedly given vague answers about being in a relationship with a woman, but a significant other had not campaigned with him.On Wednesday night when the Republican presidential debate ended — a time when candidates are regularly greeted onstage by spouses and other relatives — Mr. Scott stunned observers when he appeared arm-in-arm with a longhaired blonde woman in a gray pantsuit who smiled widely as they posed for photos.She was later identified by a person close to the campaign as Mindy Noce, Mr. Scott’s girlfriend and a design and renovations manager for a real estate company in the Charleston, S.C., area. In the spin room after the debate, a tight-lipped Mr. Scott confirmed that the mystery woman was his girlfriend and that they had been seeing each other for “about a year or so.”The moment grabbed more attention than anything Mr. Scott said during the debate did, an unfortunate metaphor for his presidential run. Even the pictures taken at his debate lectern with his girlfriend had the feel of being the final souvenirs from a stalled campaign.Mr. Scott entered the race as an underdog, but had proven to be a strong fund-raiser with the party’s base of online, small-dollar donors. His Sunday-school style of conservatism has yet to resonate even with evangelicals in Iowa, home of the party’s first nominating contest. Still, Mr. Scott, who champions himself as a “happy warrior,” remains an optimist. When asked by NBC News if this was his last debate, he referred to the next debate in December in Alabama, saying, “Thirty days from now in Alabama, we’ll be hanging out having a conversation. I’ll be on the stage.”The emergence of Mr. Scott’s companion onstage, like her emergence in the campaign itself, took a while.Immediately after the debate concluded and other candidates were joined by their spouses, Mr. Scott put his arm around his mother, Frances Scott, and posed for a picture behind the lectern he had used during the debate.He walked along the edge of the stage and squatted for selfies with fans in the audience. He chatted with supporters. He stood and stared out into the crowd, seeming to take in the moment.He took more pictures with his nephew, Ben Scott.Finally, after most of his rivals and their families had left the stage, Mr. Scott was joined at his lectern by Ms. Noce.Mr. Scott pointed out a step, taking care that she did not trip. They stood side by side, wrapped their arms around one another’s back and smiled for pictures.Mr. Scott held onto her hand as she turned to walk offstage, as if he did not want to let go.Nicholas Nehamas More

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      Ramaswamy Seemed to Call Zelensky a Nazi. His Campaign Says That’s Not What He Meant.

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      Vivek Ramaswamy drew shock and criticism online on Wednesday when he appeared to accuse the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, who is Jewish, of being a Nazi — but Mr. Ramaswamy’s campaign insisted that wasn’t what he meant.The remark came in response to a question about Mr. Zelensky’s recent plea for more American aid toward Ukraine’s war with Russia, a request several of the Republican presidential candidates have said that they support. Mr. Ramaswamy, however, has opposed giving further assistance to Ukraine. Congress has approved about $113 billion so far.“Ukraine is not a paragon of democracy,” Mr. Ramaswamy said, reeling off a litany of critiques, including: “It has celebrated a Nazi in its ranks. A comedian in cargo pants. The man called Zelensky. That is not democratic.”The statement raised eyebrows both in the room in Miami and on the internet, where hundreds of stunned viewers made posts on social media. One such post, from the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump Republican group, called Mr. Ramaswamy an “unserious candidate.”Mr. Zelensky, who is Jewish, lost family members in the Holocaust.A spokeswoman for Mr. Ramaswamy, Tricia McLaughlin, said that he had not called Mr. Zelensky a Nazi. Instead, Ms. McLaughlin said, he was referring to an event in September in which Mr. Zelensky visited Canada’s Parliament and joined a standing ovation honoring a 98-year-old Ukrainian Canadian war veteran. The problem, it turned out, was that the veteran, Yaroslav Hunka, had served in a division that was under Nazi control during World War II.The ovation was widely condemned by Jewish groups, which called it “beyond outrageous.” Ms. McLaughlin said that Mr. Ramaswamy was referring to Mr. Zelensky’s joining in the applause and waving to Mr. Hunka.But she acknowledged that, without context, the remark could be easily misunderstood. “He was talking quickly and kind of oscillated in his words,” she said. More

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      Ramaswamy Compares Republican Rivals to Dick Cheney ‘in Heels’

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      Forget tax-cut pledges and RINO accusations. Heels, of all things, are the new political cudgel in Republican politics.For weeks, the question of whether Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida wears heel lifts in his cowboy boots has been the subject of attacks from former President Donald J. Trump and others.The bizarre meme found its way into the Republican presidential debate on Wednesday, when Vivek Ramaswamy used it to go after both Mr. DeSantis and former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina, the only woman on the stage in Miami.Mr. Ramaswamy compared his two Republican rivals to “Dick Cheney in three-inch heels.”The moment came during an exchange over the U.S. role in the war between Israel and Hamas. Mr. Ramaswamy, the youngest of five Republican presidential candidates at the debate, attempted to separate himself from Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley, both of whom said they would urge Israel to completely eliminate Hamas.Mr. Ramaswamy said Israel had the right to defend itself, but he wanted to “be careful to avoid making the mistakes from the establishment of the past.”He asked: “Do you want a leader from a different generation who’s going to put this country first, or do you want Dick Cheney in three-inch heels? In which case, we’ve got two of them onstage tonight.”Ms. Haley addressed the barb a few minutes later, saying that Mr. Ramaswamy was wrong about her footwear.“They’re five-inch heels,” she said. “And I don’t wear them unless you can run in them. The second thing I will say is, I wear heels. They’re not for a fashion statement. They’re for ammunition.”The debate was still going, but Mr. DeSantis had so far not discussed the particulars of his boots. More

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      Ending 40-Year Hiatus, GOP Wins a NYC Council Seat in the Bronx

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      Although Democrats won contentious races all across New York, losses in the Bronx and throughout Long Island gave Republicans hope.The last time voters in the Bronx were represented by a Republican on the City Council, Mayor Ed Koch was still asking voters “How’m I doin’,” Ronald Reagan was president and hip-hop music was mostly a local phenomenon.The idea that voters in the Bronx, one of the most deeply Democratic counties in the country, might send a Republican representative to the City Council would be nothing less than a “national embarrassment,” Representative Ritchie Torres said at a recent rally for the Democratic incumbent, Marjorie Velázquez.On Wednesday, that political ignominy came to fruition.With less than a thousand votes to spare, Kristy Marmorato, a conservative Republican candidate, was declared the winner by The Associated Press of the tightest City Council contest in the city, roughly 15 hours after the polls had closed.Ms. Marmorato had sparred with Ms. Velázquez about crime and her support of a rezoning that would bring affordable housing to the neighborhood in District 13 in the northeast Bronx. The area had shown signs of tipping to the right: In 2021, the Republican candidate for mayor, Curtis Sliwa, won more votes in the district than the Democrat, Eric Adams.Sensing a rare opportunity to flip a seat, the Bronx Republican Party went all in on the contest. The party sent 20,000 text messages to their base; made 40,000 robocalls in English, Albanian and Arabic; and made 10,000 live calls.“We threw everything and the kitchen sink at her,” said Michael Rendino, the chairman of the Bronx Republican Party who is also Ms. Marmorato’s brother. “It’s a wake up call to the Democratic Party.”Ms. Velázquez’s defeat still sends chills through the city’s Democratic establishment and gives hope to Republicans. Both parties are closely watching a smattering of off-year suburban contests across New York as bellwethers for 2024, when a half dozen key congressional races in the state could tip the balance of power in the House of Representatives.But for the most part, the potential rightward shift driven by changing ethnic demographics did not materialize in New York City, where all 51 City Council seats were up for re-election because of a once-in-a-decade redistricting process.In southern Brooklyn, Justin Brannan, the chairman of the finance committee and one of the most powerful members of the Council, scored a resounding victory against Ari Kagan, a Democrat-turned-Republican who quickly adopted his party’s views on issues like crime and abortion.Councilman Justin Brannan, center right, repelled a challenge from a fellow Council member, Ari Kagan, in a heated contest in southern Brooklyn.Paul Frangipane for The New York TimesIn a neighboring district, Susan Zhuang, a moderate Democrat, defeated Ying Tan, a Republican, in a district created to recognize the growth of the city’s Asian American population.The story was different on Long Island, where Republicans routed Democrats. Their dominance harkened back to the 1970s, when its suburban towns were a Republican stronghold, and suggested that concerns about crime, the cost of living and the state’s unfolding migrant crisis might be doing long-term damage to Democrats’ image in an otherwise hospitable state, where abortion rights are generally seen as safe.After Ed Romaine’s 15-point victory in the race for Suffolk County executive, Republicans have now flipped nearly every major office on Long Island since 2020. They also notched key victories in Long Beach and North Hempstead in Nassau County, traditionally Democratic areas included in the must-win districts of Republican Representatives Anthony D’Esposito and George Santos.The results left Democrats, who have lost three straight election cycles in the area, in a near panic.“The conventional wisdom is that the road to a Democratic majority of the House runs through New York,” said Representative Steve Israel, a former New York congressman who once ran Democrats’ campaign arm. “But there’s nothing but yellow lights blinking for Democrats, especially on Long Island, suggesting they are not getting the traction they need.”He said he had seen a “perception about crime and disorder and lawlessness that is hitting the anxieties of suburban voters,” with little sign of abating.However, the party notched much stronger performances north of New York City, where voters in the suburban towns that hug the Hudson River and in the state’s western reaches behaved much more like their counterparts in Virginia or Ohio.Democrats won key local races in Westchester and Rockland Counties, where Representative Mike Lawler, a Republican, faces one of the toughest re-election fights in the country next year. They appeared to be on track to win a trio of competitive district attorney contests in Ulster, Dutchess and Columbia Counties, a hotly contested territory where Representatives Pat Ryan, a Democrat, and Marc Molinaro, a Republican, will be defending key swing seats next year.And in Erie County, which includes Buffalo and its suburbs, Mark Poloncarz won a record fourth term as county executive. Republicans had pummeled Mr. Poloncarz over his handling of the state’s migrant crisis, but voters paid little mind, handing the Democrat a nearly 20-point victory.Jason Weingartner, the executive director of the state Republican Party, conceded upstate counties had lessons to learn from Long Island, particularly convincing voters to go to the polls early.Ms. Velázquez’s support for more affordable housing in the district displeased some voters.Anna Watts for The New York TimesEven though Ms. Velázquez won the June Democratic primary by almost 50 percentage points, the fault lines in that election showed that she was vulnerable on both crime and her decision to support the rezoning of Bruckner Boulevard to bring affordable housing to the neighborhood, Mr. Rendino said. Ms. Velázquez had opposed the project for months before changing her mind.Ms. Velázquez was elected as a progressive in 2021 but soon joined more than a dozen other Democrats in leaving the Progressive Caucus after they were asked to sign a statement of principles that called for “the size and scope” of the New York Police Department to be reduced. During the Democratic primary, Ms. Velázquez emphasized that she was a moderate.“I’ve heard that you’re socialist because you’re like A.O.C., and it’s like, no, I’m not,” Ms. Velázquez said in June, referring to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a democratic socialist.Ms. Marmorato, an X-ray technician and a married mother of an elementary aged daughter, has said that she was driven to run for office because she opposed plans to build mid-rise housing in an area of mostly single-family homes as part of the Bruckner rezoning and a proposal for supportive housing for people released from prison at a former Jacobi Medical Center building near her home.Speaking on NY1, she said that people wanted change. She called for more police officers.“They feel like there’s no more local control in our community,” she said. “They don’t have a say in what’s going on in their neighborhood and they’re just fed up with it.”Neither Ms. Velázquez nor her campaign responded to multiple requests to comment on Wednesday. Camille Rivera, a Democratic political consultant at New Deal Strategies, said the concerns raised about the Bruckner rezoning relied on “coded language” and racial fear mongering. Joseph Savino Jr. was the last Republican member of the City Council from the Bronx. He served as Councilman at Large from 1977 to 1983 before the position was abolished. In 1985 he was convicted of illegally possessing a machine gun and then pleaded guilty to tax evasion for failing to report $300,000 in income.Jamaal Bailey, a state senator who is the chairman of the Bronx Democratic Party, called Ms. Velázquez’s loss a local issue that would have little bearing on next year.“Taking a stand to make sure that more people have a place to live is a principled stance,” Mr. Bailey said, “and one that I believe that she’s proud of and one that we should be proud of as Democrats, especially in a housing crisis.”On Wednesday morning, Mr. Torres, one of Ms. Velázquez’s closest allies, described his “national embarrassment” remark as hyperbole meant to motivate supporters before an important election.“All politics is local, and nowhere are those words more true than in the East Bronx, where the racial and class politics of a rezoning can be treacherous,” Mr. Torres said. “A perfect storm put the seat in Republican hands.” More

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      Who Are the Moderators for Wednesday’s Republican Debate?

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      Three experienced moderators will lead Wednesday’s meeting in Miami of the remaining Republican presidential candidates, although former President Donald J. Trump will again be absent.Lester Holt and Kristen Welker, two lead anchors at NBC News, which is overseeing the debate’s production and editorial process, will serve alongside Hugh Hewitt, a conservative radio host who works for a co-sponsor of the debate, Salem Media Group.Mr. Holt, the anchor of “NBC Nightly News,” was the sole moderator of Mr. Trump’s first general-election debate with Hillary Clinton, in September 2016. That event was watched by 84 million Americans, a record audience. Mr. Holt took a minimalist approach that evening, sometimes allowing the candidates to argue between themselves, although his lack of interruption granted viewers an unfiltered view of the candidates’ rhetorical styles.Ms. Welker, the host of “Meet the Press,” was the sole moderator of Mr. Trump’s final debate against Joseph R. Biden Jr., in October 2020. She was the first Black woman to moderate a general-election presidential matchup since Carole Simpson in 1992, and won praise for her efforts to retain civility and for urging the candidates to avoid any extended harangues.Mr. Hewitt used to appear frequently on NBC News and MSNBC. He helped moderate three Republican primary debates in the 2016 campaign. Salem Media Group, which distributes Mr. Hewitt’s radio show, works with several Trump loyalists, including Sebastian Gorka and Jenna Ellis, a former Trump lawyer who pleaded guilty last month to a felony related to false claims of election fraud in Georgia. Mr. Hewitt is considered more moderate in his views and writes a column for The Washington Post. More