Russian Invasion of Ukraine (2022)

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Emmanuel Macron Inaugurated for a 2nd Term as France President

      by

      “Rarely has our world and our country confronted such a combination of challenges,” Mr. Macron said, promising to govern France more inclusively.PARIS — Beneath the chandeliers of the Elysée Palace, Emmanuel Macron was inaugurated on Saturday for a second five-year term as president of France, vowing to lead more inclusively and to “act first to avoid any escalation following the Russian aggression in Ukraine.”In a sober speech lasting less than ten minutes, remarkably short for a leader given to prolixity in his first term, Mr. Macron seemed determined to project a new humility and a break from a sometimes abrasive style. “Rarely has our world and our country confronted such a combination of challenges,” he said.Mr. Macron, 44, held off the far-right nationalist leader Marine Le Pen to win re-election two weeks ago with 58.55 percent of the vote. It was a more decisive victory than polls had suggested but it also left no doubt of the anger and social fracture he will now confront.Where other countries had ceded to “nationalist temptation and nostalgia for the past,” and to ideologies “we thought left behind in the last century,” France had chosen “a republican and European project, a project of independence in a destabilized world,” Mr. Macron said.In a sober speech lasting less than ten minutes, Mr. Macron projected a new humility and a break from a sometimes abrasive style.Ludovic Marin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHe has spent a lot of time in recent months attempting to address that instability, provoked above all by Russia’s war in Ukraine. His overtures have borne little fruit. Still, Mr. Macron made clear that he would fight so that “democracy and courage prevail” in the struggle for a “a new European peace and a new autonomy on our continent.”The president is an ardent proponent of greater “strategic autonomy,” sovereignty and independence for Europe, which he sees as a precondition for relevancy in the 21st century. This quest has brought some friction with the United States, largely overcome during the war in Ukraine, even if Mr. Macron seems to have more faith in negotiating with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia than President Biden has.Understand France’s Presidential ElectionThe reelection of Emmanuel Macron on April 24 marked the end of a presidential campaign that pitted his promise for stability against extremist views.Presidential Election: Mr. Macron triumphed over Marine Le Pen, his far-right challenger, after a campaign where his promise of stability prevailed. Growing Disillusionment: The election was marked by record levels of abstention, a sign of people’s frustration with the political establishment. Signs of Trouble: Despite Mr. Macron’s victory, the low turnout and Ms. Le Pen’s strong showing offered warning signs for Western democracies. Political Parties: France’s mainstream left and right-wing parties used to have it all, but fared poorly in the presidential election. What went wrong?Mr. Macron gave his trademark wink to his wife Brigitte, 69, as he arrived in the reception hall of the presidential palace, where about 500 people, including former Presidents François Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy, were gathered.Laurent Fabius, the president of the Constitutional Council, formally announced the results of the election. A general presented Mr. Macron with the elaborate necklace of Grandmaster of the Legion of Honor, France’s highest distinction.Guests came from all walks of life, ranging from the military to the theater. But in a sign of the distance France has to travel in its quest for greater political diversity, the attendees included a lot of white men in dark blue suits and ties, the near universal uniform of the products of the country’s elite schools.At the ceremony, Mr. Macron received the necklace of a Grandmaster of the Legion of Honor, France’s highest distinction.Pool photo by Gonzalo FuentesThe president then went out to the gardens, where he listened to a 21-gun salute fired from the Invalides on the other side of the Seine. No drive down the Avenue des Champs-Élysées followed, in line with the ceremony for the last re-elected president, Jacques Chirac, two decades ago.Mr. Macron will travel to Strasbourg on Monday to celebrate “Europe Day,” commemorating the end of World War II in Europe, which in contrast to Mr. Putin’s May 9 “Victory Day” is dedicated to the concept of peace through unity on the Continent.Addressing the European Parliament, Mr. Macron will set out plans for the 27-nation European Union to become an effective, credible and cohesive power. He will then travel to Berlin that evening to meet German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, in a sign of the paramount importance of Franco-German relations.Sometimes referred to as the “president of the rich” because of the free-market reforms that initiated his presidency (and despite the state’s “whatever-it-takes” support for furloughed workers during the pandemic), Mr. Macron promised a “new method” of governing, symbolized by renaming his centrist party “Renaissance.”Dismissing the idea that his election was a prolongation of his first term, Mr. Macron said “a new people, different from five years ago, has entrusted a new president with a new mandate.”He vowed to govern in conjunction with labor unions and all representatives of the cultural, economic, social and political worlds. This would stand in contrast to the top-down presidential style he favored in his first term that often seemed to turn Parliament into a sideshow. The institutions of the Fifth Republic, as favored by Charles de Gaulle in 1958, tilt heavily toward presidential authority.Mr. Macron greeted two of his presidential predecessors, Nicolas Sarkozy, center, and François Hollande.Pool photo by Gonzalo FuentesMs. Le Pen’s strong showing revealed a country angry over falling purchasing power, rising inflation, high gasoline prices, and a sense, in blighted urban projects and ill-served rural areas, of abandonment. Mr. Macron was slow to wake up to this reality and now appears determined to make amends. He has promised several measures, including indexing pensions to inflation beginning this summer, to demonstrate his commitment.However, Mr. Macron’s plan to raise the retirement age to 65 from 62, albeit in gradual stages, appears almost certain to provoke social unrest in a country where the left is proposing that people be allowed to retire at 60.“Let us act to make our country a great ecological power through a radical transformation of our means of production, of our way of traveling, of our lives,” Mr. Macron declared. During his first term, his approach to leading France toward a post-carbon economy was often hesitant, infuriating the left.This month, left-wing forces struck a deal to unite for next month’s parliamentary election under the leadership of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a hard-left politician who came just short of beating out Ms. Le Pen for a spot in the presidential election runoff. Mr. Mélenchon has made no secret of his ambition to become prime minister, and Mr. Macron no secret of his doubts about this prospect.The bloc — including Mr. Mélenchon’s France Unbowed Party, the Communist Party, the Socialist Party and the Greens — represents an unusual feat for France’s chronically fractured left and a new challenge to Mr. Macron. He will be weakened if he cannot renew his current clear majority in Parliament.A crowd from all walks of life, ranging from the military to the theater, at the Elysée Palace.Ludovic Marin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe creation of the new Renaissance Party and an agreement announced on Friday with small centrist parties constituted Mr. Macron’s initial answer to this changed political reality.Mr. Macron’s first major political decision will likely be the choice of a new prime minister to replace Jean Castex, the incumbent. The president is said to favor the appointment of a woman to lead the government into the legislative elections.However, he will not make the decision until after his second term formally begins on next Saturday, after the first term expires at midnight.Constant Méheut More

    • 50 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Your Thursday Evening Briefing

      by

      Here’s what you need to know at the end of the day.(Want to get this newsletter in your inbox? Here’s the sign-up.)Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Thursday.Mifepristone, the first of two drugs typically taken for a medication abortion, is authorized for patients up to 10 weeks pregnant.Michelle Mishina-Kunz for The New York Times1. Senate Democrats planned a surely doomed vote on Roe. The Senate’s majority leader, Chuck Schumer, said he will introduce a bill next week that codifies abortion rights into federal law, following the leaked Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade. The bill will almost certainly fall short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster or even obtain a simple majority.Still, Schumer called the vote one of “the most important we ever take,” framing it as a reminder to voters of the party’s stance. A majority of Americans support some form of abortion. If the Court overturns Roe, medication abortions, which account for more than half of recent abortions, will be the next battleground. A senior official said that the Biden administration is looking for further steps to increase access to all types of abortion, including the pill method.In other fallout, a stark divide has grown between Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justice Samuel Alito Jr., author of the leaked decision. A Russian tank stuck in mud outside the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times2. The U.S. shared intelligence that helped Ukraine kill Russian generals. About 12 have died, according to Ukrainian officials, an astonishingly high number.The Biden administration’s help is part of a classified effort to give Ukraine real-time battlefield intelligence. Officials wouldn’t specify how many of the generals were killed with U.S. assistance and denied that the intelligence is provided with the intent to kill Russian generals.“Heavy, bloody battles” were fought at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, the city’s last pocket of resistance, after Russian forces breached the perimeter. Seizing Mariupol would let President Vladimir Putin claim a major victory before Moscow’s Victory Day celebration on May 9.Fighting raged across the eastern front, from Mariupol to the northern Donetsk area. “The front is swinging this way and that,” a Ukrainian medic told The Times.The W.H.O. estimated roughly 930,000 more people than normal died in the U.S. by the end of 2021.Kirsten Luce for The New York Times3. Nearly 15 million more people died during the first two years of the pandemic than would have been expected during normal times.That estimate, which came from a panel of experts the World Health Organization assembled, offered a startling glimpse of how drastically the death counts reported by many governments have understated the pandemic’s toll.Most of the deaths were from Covid, the experts said, but some people died because the pandemic made it more difficult to get medical care for ailments such as heart attacks. The previous toll, based solely on death counts reported by countries, was six million.In other virus news, BA.2.12.1, a subvariant of the BA.2 Omicron subvariant, is likely to soon become the dominant form of the virus in the U.S. There’s no indication yet that it causes more severe disease.A Modoc National Forest firefighter used a drip torch to ignite a prescribed burn in Alturas, Calif., last year.Max Whittaker for The New York Times4. Fire season has arrived earlier than ever.Enormous wildfires have already consumed landscapes in Arizona and Nebraska. More than a dozen wildfires are raging this month across the Southwest. Summer is still more than a month and a half away.A time-lapse image from space shows the scope of the Western catastrophe: Smoke from fires in New Mexico can be seen on a collision course with a huge dust storm in Colorado. Both are examples of natural disasters made more severe and frequent by climate change, which has also made a vital tool for controlling wildfires — intentional burns — much riskier.The country’s largest active blaze, a megafire of more than 160,000 acres in northern New Mexico, has grown with such ferocity that it has threatened a multigenerational culture that has endured for centuries.A polling station in Shipley, England, where local elections could decide Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s fate.Mary Turner for The New York Times5. Britain is holding local elections in a big test for Prime Minister Boris Johnson.His scandal-prone leadership is again on the line, with Conservatives trailing the Labour Party in polls and his own lawmakers mulling a no-confidence motion that could evict him from Downing Street. A poor election result could tip them over the edge.One thing that has saved Johnson so far is his reputation as an election winner and his strength in the so-called red wall regions of the north and middle of England, which have traditionally voted Labour. Many voters are skeptical that the opposition can solve issues such as soaring prices.Elon Musk’s recent purchase of Twitter has left users and investors unsure of how the site will change. Joshua Lott/Getty Images6. Elon Musk has brought in 18 new investors and $7 billion for his Twitter deal.Among them are Larry Ellison, who put in $1 billion; Fidelity; and the venture capital firm Sequoia Capital. Musk is paying $21 billion from his own very deep pocket, and an investment firm analyst called Musk’s move a smart deal. In 2019, Musk tweeted “I hate advertising,” — but ads account for about 90 percent of Twitter revenue. Some agencies already say Twitter ads aren’t targeted well. Now, numerous advertising executives say they’re willing to move their money elsewhere, especially if he removes the safeguards that allowed Twitter to remove racist rants and conspiracy theories. Musk has mentioned potentially charging some users.Two of our colleagues, John Eligon and Lynsey Chutel, interviewed friends and relatives — including Musk’s estranged father — in South Africa, where he grew up, to better understand the mysterious entrepreneur.Russia-Ukraine War: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 4In Mariupol. More

    • 100 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Tucker Carlson’s Influence on America and Its Media

      by

      More from our inbox:J.D. Vance’s Victory, With an Assist From TrumpU.S. Help in Targeting Russian Generals in UkraineIf Madison Were Omar … To the Editor:Re “How Tucker Carlson Stoked White Fear to Conquer Cable News” and “Tucker Carlson Reshaped Fox News, and Became Trump’s Heir” (“American Nationalist” series, front page, May 1 and 2):Congratulations to The New York Times for an exceptional piece of journalism exposing Tucker Carlson for what he is — an insidious infection coursing through the veins of America.It’s been said that the demise of America will come not from without but from within. We have survived Father Coughlin, Joseph McCarthy and others like them.Fortunately there are more people in America like Mister Rogers than Tucker Carlson.Aaron R. EshmanSanta Monica, Calif.To the Editor:Has The Times learned nothing at all from the election of the former guy? The amount of free publicity given to him by The Times as well as other mainstream media helped propel him to the presidency. Now you are giving free publicity to a Fox News host.Have you never heard the saying “There’s no such thing as bad publicity”? I haven’t read a word of any of your articles about Tucker Carlson because I won’t spend a moment of my life to learn more about this awful person. Stop offering him what he wants more than anything: attention.Deborah WeeksNorristown, Pa.To the Editor:Is Tucker Carlson the problem, or is it the number of insecure Americans willing to accept and act upon his divisive, hate-filled and false commentaries?Glenn P. EisenHastings-on-Hudson, N.Y.To the Editor:I tuned in when “Tucker Carlson Tonight” premiered on Fox, in November 2016. And I have watched him ever since. This man is a breath of fresh air. He just says out loud what millions and millions of people are feeling. “Tucker Carlson Tonight” is my one hour of sanity.He is not going away. He will only get stronger.Mary D. BrownKirkland, Wash.To the Editor:Tucker Carlson: laughing all the way to the bank. His audience: cheering like never before. Fox: loving it. Republicans in Congress: Tucker for president. Vladimir Putin to his P.R. goons: Write down everything Tucker says.Earth to The New York Times and my fellow blue state people: Stop whining. We know he’s an evil genius, a master of propaganda, a liar and a con man. There’s a word for that. It’s called politics.The issue is not how awful this guy is. It’s what the Democrats are going to do to respond in kind with their own evil geniuses.Marc BloomPrinceton, N.J.To the Editor:Tucker Carlson is smart, he’s funny and he speaks in compound sentences. That’s why he has more than three million viewers. You just gave him another million.Antonia TamplinBronxTo the Editor:On Sunday I was surprised to see a front-page story on Tucker Carlson. I was stunned that it continued inside for several pages, with an additional exhaustive feature on his show’s content. Surprisingly, I read it all. I almost never watch Fox News, so I attributed my attention to the know-thine-enemy factor.I just opened Monday’s Times. There he is again. Yikes! Tuckered out, I’m flipping straight to Sports.Sandy TreadwellOjai, Calif.J.D. Vance’s Victory, With an Assist From TrumpJ.D. Vance on stage in Cincinnati after winning the Ohio Republican Senate primary.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “With Trump’s Nod, Vance Rallies to Win Senate Primary in Ohio” (front page, May 4):Donald Trump and his minions have turned our political system into a twisted version of “The Apprentice,” where the path to elected office begins with a trip to Mar-a-Lago to kiss Mr. Trump’s ring.In Ohio, J.D. Vance is the latest beneficiary of this deranged process, despite his previous “Never Trump” position. We know that many Republicans privately view Mr. Trump with contempt and understand the danger of his norm-busting antics, yet they continue to sacrifice their values to worship at the altar of Trump. Republicans appear willing to do and say anything to grab and hold onto power, no matter the costs to the country.Who could have imagined some Republicans praising Russia’s aggression, or railing against free trade, a generation ago? We are well on our way to minority rule in this country, and Democrats still play by rules that don’t seem to apply to Republicans any longer. It’s time to get rid of the filibuster so Democrats can make the most of what little power they have left.Dorothy SuppSycamore Township, OhioU.S. Help in Targeting Russian Generals in UkrainePresident Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Gen. Valery Gerasimov, Russia’s highest-ranking uniformed officer. Ukrainians struck a location where General Gerasimov had visited, acting on their intelligence.Sergei Guneyev/Sputnik, via Agence France-PresseTo the Editor:Re “U.S. Helped Kyiv in Targeting Russian Generals” (front page, May 5):I can’t help but think that the newsworthiness of this information pales in comparison to the potential harm that its disclosure will cause.The U.S. is trying very hard to avoid direct involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war and the repercussions that Vladimir Putin would insist on enacting against it. Helping cause the deaths of Russian generals could certainly be perceived as having crossed that line.Does The New York Times take that into consideration when releasing such information?Neil RauchBaltimoreIf Madison Were Omar …Madison Cawthorn was previously fined for trying to bring a gun through airport security in February 2021.Cooper Neill for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Police Accuse Lawmaker of Trying to Fly With Gun” (news article, April 27), about Representative Madison Cawthorn trying to bring a gun through airport security:Instead of this ultraright white man, imagine this story being about another professional American man, this one with swarthy skin and named Omar, who was twice caught trying to bring a loaded gun onto a commercial flight. Wouldn’t that guy be put on the no-fly list?Faith FrankelBoonton, N.J. More

    • 150 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      Macron’s Win Is Also a Blow to Orban’s Nationalist Crusade in Europe

      by

      The Hungarian leader had cast his own victory as the start of a nationalist wave in Europe — one that Marine Le Pen would have joined. Instead, Mr. Macron’s victory in France is a win for the European Union’s approach.BRUSSELS — There were sighs of relief throughout the European Union after President Emmanuel Macron beat back a serious challenge in France from the populist far-right champion Marine Le Pen.Then another populist went down, in Slovenia, where the country’s three-time prime minister, Janez Jansa, lost to a loose coalition of centrist rivals in parliamentary elections on Sunday.Those two defeats were widely seen as a reprieve for the European Union and its fundamental principles, including judicial independence, shared sovereignty and the supremacy of European law. That is because they dealt a blow to the ambitions and worldview of Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, who avidly supported both Ms. Le Pen and Mr. Jansa in an effort to create a coalition of more nationalist, religious and anti-immigration politics that could undermine the authority of the European Union itself.“Europe can breathe,” said Jean-Dominique Giuliani, chairman of the Robert Schuman Foundation, a pro-European research center.After his own electoral victory earlier this month, Mr. Orban declared: “The whole world has seen tonight in Budapest that Christian democratic politics, conservative civic politics and patriotic politics have won. We are telling Europe that this is not the past: This is the future. This will be our common European future.”Not yet, it seems.With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Mr. Orban, who has been close to both former President Donald J. Trump and Vladimir V. Putin, Russia’s president, is more isolated in Europe than in many years. He has been a model for the Polish government of the Law and Justice party, which has also challenged what it considers the liberal politics and the overbearing bureaucratic and judicial influence of Brussels. But Law and Justice is deeply anti-Putin, a mood sharpened by the war.Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary in Szekesfehervar during his party’s final rally before the election this month.Nanna Heitmann for The New York Times“The international environment for Orban has never been so dire,” said Peter Kreko, director of Political Capital, a Budapest-based research institution.Mr. Orban found support from Mr. Trump, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, and from the Italian populist leader and former Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini. But they are all gone, as Mr. Jansa is expected to be, and now Mr. Orban “has fewer friends in the world,” Mr. Kreko said.Ms. Le Pen’s party was given a 10.7 million euro loan in March to help fund her campaign from Hungary’s MKB bank, whose major shareholders are considered close to Mr. Orban. And Hungarian media and social media openly supported both Ms. Le Pen and Mr. Jansa.Ms. Le Pen’s strong showing was a reminder that populism — on both the right and the left — remains a vibrant force in a Europe, with high voter dissatisfaction over rising inflation, soaring energy prices, slow growth, immigration and the bureaucracy emanating from E.U. headquarters in Brussels.But now Mr. Macron, as the first French president to be re-elected in 20 years, has new authority to press his ideas for more European responsibility and collective defense.Marine Le Pen conceding to Mr. Macron on Sunday.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesAfter the retirement late last year of Angela Merkel, the former chancellor of Germany, Mr. Macron will inevitably be seen as the de facto leader of the European Union, with a stronger voice and standing to push issues he cares about. Those include a more robust European pillar in defense and security, economic reform and fighting climate change.“He is going to want to go further and faster,” said Georgina Wright, an analyst at the Institut Montaigne in Paris.But Ms. Wright and other analysts say he must also learn lessons from his first term and try to consult more widely. His penchant for announcing proposals rather than building coalitions at times annoyed his European counterparts, leaving him portrayed as a vanguard of one, leading with no followers.“Europe is central to his policy and will be in his second term, too,” said Jeremy Shapiro, research director for the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin. “In the first term, he underachieved relative to his expectations on Europe — he had a lot of grand plans but failed to create the coalitions he needed, with Germany and the Central European states, to implement them.”The Dutch, too, as the Netherlands and Germany together lead Europe’s “frugal” nations, are skeptical about Mr. Macron’s penchant to spend more of their money on European projects.Mr. Macron “knows that lesson and is making some efforts in the context of the Russian war against Ukraine,” Mr. Shapiro said. “But he’s still Emmanuel Macron.”In his second term, Mr. Macron “will double down” on the ideas for Europe that he presented in his speech to the Sorbonne in 2017, “especially the idea of European sovereignty,” said Alexandra de Hoop Scheffer, director of the Paris office of the German Marshall Fund.But in his second term, she predicted, he will be more pragmatic, building “coalitions of the willing and able” even if he cannot find unanimity among the other 26 Union members.Prime Minister Janez Jansa of Slovenia on Sunday, hours before the announcement that his party had lost to a centrist coalition.Jure Makovec/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFrance holds the rotating presidency of the bloc until the end of June, and one of Mr. Macron’s priorities will be to push forward an oil embargo on Russia, Ms. de Hoop Scheffer said, a move that has been complicated by the fact that many in the bloc are dependent on Moscow for energy.The climate agenda is important for him, especially if he wants to reach out to the angry left and the Greens in France. And to get much done in Europe, he will need to restore and strengthen the Franco-German relationship with a new, very different and divided German government.“That relationship is not easy, and when you look at the Franco-German couple, not a lot keeps us together,” Ms. de Hoop Scheffer said.There are differences over Mr. Macron’s desire for more collective debt for another European recovery plan, given the effects of war. There is also a lack of consensus over how to manage the response to Russia’s aggression, she said — how much to keep lines open to Mr. Putin, and what kinds of military support should be provided to Ukraine in the face of German hesitancy to supply heavy weapons.Germany is much happier to work in wartime within NATO under American leadership than to spend much time on Mr. Macron’s concept of European strategic autonomy, she noted. And Poland and the other frontline states bordering Russia have never had much confidence in Mr. Macron’s goal of strategic autonomy or his promise to do nothing to undermine NATO, a feeling underscored by the current war.If Mr. Macron is clever, “French leadership in Europe will not be followership by the other E.U. countries, but their empowerment, by their commitment to a new European vision,” said Nicholas Dungan, a senior fellow of the Atlantic Council. “Macron can do this.”Campaign posters for the presidential runoff candidates in Paris last week.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times More

    • 88 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      In France, a Victory and a Warning

      by

      More from our inbox:Church Support of the ‘Big Lie’When Tragedy Strikes, Grandma and Grandpa Are ThereReturning to AustraliaRussian Disinformation, Then and NowHandwritten Archives, to Capture HistoryCampaign posters featuring Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, in the French town of Roye, where two out of three voters backed Ms. Le Pen.James Hill for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “In France, Macron Defeats Le Pen for Presidency” (front page, April 25):That the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen came as close as she did to defeating Emmanuel Macron in France is further confirmation that extremists are successfully normalizing autocrat-friendly nationalist messaging.Ms. Le Pen, a longtime sympathizer of President Vladimir Putin of Russia, said in her concession speech, “The ideas we stand for are reaching new heights,” Le Monde reported.As chilling as that sounds, she’s correct, and the world should pay closer attention. But for now, those in the West who embrace free thinking, democracy and even just a scintilla of globalism can breathe a very brief sigh of relief.Cody LyonBrooklynTo the Editor:My dear French friends, you may have won a battle by re-electing Emmanuel Macron, but you are losing the war. So long as the reach of the bigoted right wing grows, France is losing.When in the midst of a gunfight, and with the other side getting stronger, dodging one bullet is no reason to celebrate.Peter MailleLa Grande, Ore.To the Editor:Has anyone noticed that Marine Le Pen, the loser, has actually accepted the results of the election and conceded? What a novel idea!And Vive la France!Irene Bernstein-PechmèzeQueensTo the Editor:I recall an earlier election when another Le Pen made it to the second round. In 2002, Marine’s father, Jean-Marie, was crushed 82 percent to 18 percent by the conservative Jacques Chirac. Leftist voters did their republican duty, voting against those who would put an end to democracy itself.The French do not like Emmanuel Macron. But they remember fascism. Perhaps if Americans had such memories, they would better defend the democracy that they are losing, bit by bit, every day.Bob NelsonYuma, Ariz.Church Support of the ‘Big Lie’ Dustin Chambers for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “The Stolen-Election Falsehood Goes to Church” (front page, April 25):You report that some evangelical pastors are hosting events dedicated to Donald Trump’s false claim that the 2020 election was stolen and promoting the cause to their congregations.To the extent that such a charge is true, do these churches still retain any semblance of a religious exemption from federal and state taxes, which prohibits political campaign activity? Just wondering.Michael PeskoeMiami BeachTo the Editor:How do church leaders who preach from the new King James Version of the Bible — “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free,” John 8:32 — perpetuate a lie?Talk about cognitive dissonance.Harriet VinesChapel Hill, N.C.To the Editor:Of all the scary articles in The Times about Ukraine, Russia, wildfires, climate change, Marine Le Pen, Ron DeSantis and more, I found the one about evangelical pastors by far the scariest.Ellen SchafferPalm Coast, Fla.When Tragedy Strikes, Grandma and Grandpa Are ThereMia Scala, 6, hugs her grandfather Angelo Conti, 74, while waiting for a Girl Scouts meeting to start.Todd Heisler/The New York TimesTo the Editor:“When Parents Are Lost to Covid, Grandparents Step In,” by Paula Span (news article, April 14), not only recognizes the role that grandparents are playing in the wake of Covid, it also acknowledges that “extended family has always been the first line of defense in the wake of such tragedies.”For my book on the history of American grandmothers, many of the 75 women I interviewed told about a 1950s grandmother who stepped up — took the grandchildren into her home or went to live in the grandchild’s home — when things fell apart because of parents’ death, divorce or illness.None of the grandmothers had anticipated this refilling of their empty nests, all of them struggled with the responsibility, and all of their granddaughters-turned-grandmothers now look back with awe at what their grandmothers did for them.One notable change from then to now: Grandfathers in the 1950s were not active in their care the way older men are today, another example of how feminism has improved family life.Engagement with grandchildren is not just a delightful extra in family life, it is also a serious form of insurance. Should a tragedy mean that grandchildren must live with grandparents, that painful transition is eased if the elders and the kids have experience with one another aside from holidays and have built trust over time.No grandparent wants the custodial job, but every grandparent should consider time with grandchildren as an investment in their security.Victoria Bissell BrownHavertown, Pa.The writer, a retired professor of American history at Grinnell College, is working on a book titled “The Nana Project.”Returning to AustraliaFamilies reuniting at the Sydney International Airport.To the Editor:Re “A Post-Lockout Reunion of Yearning and Dread,” by Isabella Kwai (Sydney Dispatch, April 10):The last time I had been home to Australia to see my entire family was in May 2019. At one point, over Zoom, my sister told me that it was as if I had flown to the moon and never returned.The plane home in January was completely full of anxious expats and earnest American grandparents eager to see newly minted Aussie grandbabies. All the arrival hugs were tighter and longer than they had ever been. The smiles were wider and the welcomes longer — even from the custom officials! And maybe the accents were even broader!And … yes … if I could have bottled the dawn laughter from the troop of cheeky kookaburras camped outside my Brisbane window just days before I returned to the U.S., I would have.Patricia RyanWest Lafayette, Ind.Russian Disinformation, Then and NowTo the Editor:The state-sponsored disinformation spread to the Russian people is an old game. In the 1930s my father traveled to Russia. As was required, he had an Intourist guide with him at all times. As they became more friendly, she started to ask him about life in the U.S.“You live in New York,” she said. “Tell me about the skyscrapers that fall down.” He could not convince her that such things were not happening. She told him that all Russians knew about the frequently falling skyscrapers and was disappointed that he couldn’t be more candid with her about it.The acceptance of such nonsense appears to be embedded by a long history, though the current pernicious version is surprising in an era of greater access to outside information.Ty DillardSanta Fe, N.M.Handwritten Archives, to Capture HistoryTo the Editor:Re “Preserving a Couple’s ’60s Insights,” by Douglas Brinkley (Arts pages, April 19):Doris Kearns Goodwin sums up the special role of archives in the last lines of this excellent and informative article:“Oh, how I love old handwritten letters and diaries. I feel as if I’m looking over the shoulder of the writer. History comes alive!”How sad that in today’s world of computers and “no paper,” the progression from draft to final speech or report will no longer exist in many cases. The “delete” key has replaced crossing out, rewriting by hand and literally cutting and pasting.Some of us fear that using only the computer means that there will be no file of marked-up notes or previous drafts for historians to see and then give us that looking-over-the-shoulder feeling. That will keep history from coming alive.Sally DorstNew YorkThe writer is a retired magazine editor. More

    • 88 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Putin Congratulates Macron on French Election Victory

      by

      President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia congratulated Emmanuel Macron on Monday for his re-election as France’s president after defeating Marine Le Pen, a far-right candidate many in Russia favored as a potential game-changing option for the Kremlin amid the threat of new sanctions and in the midst of the war in Ukraine.“I sincerely wish you success in your state activities, as well as good health and well-being,” Mr. Putin said in a congratulatory note to Mr. Macron, published by the Kremlin.Mr. Macron has been one of the few Western politicians willing to engage with Mr. Putin, relentlessly trying to push the Russian leader toward diplomacy. Since the start of the war on Feb. 24, the two presidents have had nine telephone conversations, according to the Kremlin.However, Mr. Macron has been bound by the French commitment to the trans-Atlantic unity, something that Ms. Le Pen, his rival, was willing to weaken. Ms. Le Pen, whose National Rally party borrowed millions from a Russian bank over the past decade, said rapprochement with Russia would be her foreign-policy priority once the fighting in Ukraine stopped.A victory by Ms. Le Pen would have been seen as a great triumph for Mr. Putin, who has risked his country’s long-term economic well-being for the sake of territorial gain in Ukraine.For some commentators in Russia, however, it wasn’t Ms. Le Pen’s far-right or pro-Moscow stance that prevented her from getting elected, but that she did not go far enough in endorsing the Kremlin.Zakhar Prilepin, a conservative Russian writer and politician, said on social media that instead of “trying to get glued together with Macron into one undistinguishable ball,” Ms. Le Pen “had to say that she supports the special operation, would quit NATO, and send the Foreign Legion, Algerian special forces and her own security detail to Belgorod for drills.” More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      American Voters Haven’t Been Afraid Like This in a Long Time

      by

      In a rare convergence, America’s voters are not merely unhappy with their political leadership, but awash in fears about economic security, border security, international security and even physical security. Without a U-turn by the Biden administration, this fear will generate a wave election like those in 1994 and 2010, setting off a chain reaction that could flip the House and the Senate to Republican control in November, and ultimately the presidency in 2024.Take the economy, so often the harbinger of election results. From late 2017 until the pandemic, a majority of Americans believed that the economy was strong, and from 2014 until the pandemic at least a plurality believed their personal economic situation was improving. Covid-19 cut sharply into that feeling of well-being; this was initially seen as temporary, though, and trillions of dollars flowed into keeping people afloat. But then near-double-digit inflation hit consumers for the first time in 40 years; 60 percent of voters now see the economy as weak and 48 percent say their financial situation is worsening, according to a Harris Poll conducted April 20-21. Many Americans under 60 have relatively little experience with anything but comparatively low fuel costs, negligible interest rates and stable prices. Virtually overnight these assumptions have been shaken. Only 35 percent approve of President Biden’s handling of inflation.These economic blows are just one element in a cascading set of problems all hitting at the same time. It combines the nuclear anxieties of the 1950s and ’60s with the inflation threat of the ’70s, the crime wave of the ’80s and ’90s and the tensions over illegal immigration in the 2000s and beyond. This electorate is not experiencing a malaise, as President Jimmy Carter was once apocryphally said to have proclaimed, but has instead formed into a deep national fissure ready to blow like a geyser in the next election if leadership does not move to relieve the pressure.The return of fear about crime is especially worrisome for Democrats, who spent years trying to take over Republican ground on the issue. In 1991, the homicide rate was 9.71 per hundred thousand. Mr. Biden, when he was a senator, penned the key federal bipartisan anti-crime bill widely credited then with reducing violence in America, but under criticism today by those who argue it led to inequitable rates of incarceration, particularly in communities of color. The homicide rate would decline to a low of 4.44 per 100,000 in 2014. Worries about walking the streets and riding the subway were less acute among new generations, and yet today those same streets and mass transit are once again hobbled by fear; even the head of the New York-area Metropolitan Transportation Authority argued that fear of crime and homelessness were behind a 36 percent drop in ridership between December 2021 and January 2022.Immigration was used effectively by President Donald Trump as a wedge issue to win working class voters. According to the April Harris poll, under Mr. Biden, 59 percent of voters believe that we have “effectively” open borders and, looking back, many even support some of Mr. Trump’s immigration policies. Mr. Biden receives only 38 percent approval for his immigration policy, a troublingly low rating for a Democrat (President Barack Obama was at 29 percent approval on immigration policy before the 2010 midterm wipeout).Migrants seeking asylum in the U.S., standing near the border fence while waiting to be processed after crossing the border from Mexico at Yuma, Arizona.Go Nakamura/ReutersNational security had become less salient for most Americans compared to the years of the Cold War and after 9/11. Foreign policy was barely discussed in the limited presidential debates of 2020. Today, fear of a great power conflict and nuclear weapons has emerged in ways not seen since the Cold War. With the invasion of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin, fresh ballistic missile tests, and Mr. Putin’s explicit reference to the use of nuclear weapons and “unpredictable” consequences of opposing him, fear of nuclear weapons has been thrust front and center, as a recent focus group of Americans by Times Opinion found as well. Fear of nuclear weapons now ranks second in issues that worry voters, behind the effects of inflation.To combat the drag that fear has on the electorate — what I call a “fear index” — Mr. Biden will have to move in some big and bold ways. Faced with runaway spending in the 1990s, President Bill Clinton proposed a balanced budget, a policy still favored by 80 percent of the electorate, according to April’s Harris poll, but he did it in a way that still managed to finance entitlements like Social Security. Pushing a big, seven-year policy plan like that would mean finding budget cuts elsewhere to pay for a permanent child tax credit, rather than raising taxes, and deficit spending, which would most likely cause costs to fall on the average American through inflation. Balancing the budget would change the conversation about the economy and show Americans that Mr. Biden was serious about getting our fiscal house in order.Continuing to let gas prices surge will hurt Democrats on the ballot in the fall; the party needs a new, tempered energy policy that includes a more gradual transition to alternative fuels and an appreciation of energy independence. In the presidential debates, Mr. Biden promised a “transition” to “renewable energy over time,” though noting he would not attempt to ban fracking. But in his first flurry of executive orders, Biden gave the public the impression he was far more aggressive in favoring climate change policies, though he has since angered activists by reversing a promise to prevent new drilling on public lands. He will need to shift to an “all of the above” energy approach and green-light the Keystone pipeline, which is currently favored by nearly 80 percent of the electorate, according to the Harris Poll.The Biden administration is also losing in swing areas on immigration, as evidenced by the nine Senate Democrats and the House’s bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus that have expressed reservations about its plan to lift Title 42, the Trump administration’s Covid-era policy of intercepting and returning migrants without due process. The answer is to keep in place the Covid-related border restrictions and revive trying to find a real compromise with at least 10 Republican senators on immigration that would adopt tougher barrier and enforcement measures to close the border, but also open up legal immigration and a path to citizenship for at least DACA recipients.With rising crime as an issue, the favorable rating of the Department of Justice has sunk to just 51 percent under Merrick Garland, according to the Harris Poll. Mr. Biden needs to shake up his top law-enforcement officials and back legislation that combines police reform with funding for hundreds of thousands of new community police officers, greater federal involvement in stopping violent crime syndicates and gangs, and wider discretion for judges to take violent criminals off the streets. The administration needs to consider interceding on behalf of victims in circumstances in which district attorneys are not prosecuting violent criminals to the full extent of the law, especially when they waive “enhancements” for gang-related crimes. One of our first campaign ads in 1996 established President Clinton as both against assault-weapons and for more cops and crime-fighting measures; he kept that message up during his re-election bid, and Republicans never effectively stoked fears about crime.Finally, Mr. Biden cannot let Mr. Putin win in Ukraine, and needs to continue to send whatever weapons are necessary, including jets, to prevent such a victory. The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan precipitated a decline in his administration’s approval rates. Ukraine’s loss would compound the view among some voters that he is too weak.According to reports, Mr. Biden now says he is running for re-election in 2024. But he is facing limited enthusiasm in his own party for a second run and loses even to Mr. Trump in hypothetical matchups, according to the Harris Poll. Sticking to the high-priced Build Back Better legislation or variants of it on the basis of narrow party-line votes has not been successful.People are afraid of being walloped financially, being injured or menaced by criminals, being in a country without strong borders or Covid protections for immigrants, and being under threat of nuclear weapons. If Mr. Biden and Democratic leaders cannot effectively address these fears, the wave election will hit them in November, and the president will then face a sobering choice of either passing the baton to another candidate in 2024 or finding the bold leadership necessary to reconcile his drive for more progressive policies with the realities of economics, politics and a more dangerous world.Mark Penn was a pollster and adviser to President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton from 1995 to 2008. He is chairman of the Harris Poll and C.E.O. of Stagwell Inc.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

    • 150 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Emmanuel Macron Defeats Marine Le Pen for Second Term as French President

      by

      The result was a relief to allies in Europe and Washington wary of a far-right challenger who was hostile to the European Union and NATO.PARIS — Emmanuel Macron won a second term as president of France, triumphing on Sunday over Marine Le Pen, his far-right challenger, after a campaign where his promise of stability prevailed over the temptation of an extremist lurch.Projections at the close of voting, which are generally reliable, showed Mr. Macron, a centrist, gaining 58.5 percent of the vote to Ms. Le Pen’s 41.5 percent. His victory was much narrower than in 2017, when the margin was 66.1 percent to 33.9 percent for Ms. Le Pen, but wider than appeared likely two weeks ago.Speaking to a crowd massed on the Champ de Mars in front of a twinkling Eiffel Tower, a solemn Mr. Macron said his was a victory for “a more independent France and a stronger Europe.” He added: “Our country is riddled with so many doubts, so many divisions. We will have to be strong, but nobody will be left by the side of the road.”Ms. Le Pen conceded defeat in her third attempt to become president, but bitterly criticized the “brutal and violent methods” of Mr. Macron, without explaining what she meant. She vowed to fight on to secure a large number of representatives in legislative elections in June, declaring that “French people have this evening shown their desire for a strong counter power to Emmanuel Macron.”Mr. Macron addressed supporters in front of the Eiffel Tower after his victory.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesAt a critical moment in Europe, with fighting raging in Ukraine after the Russian invasion, France rejected a candidate hostile to NATO, to the European Union, to the United States, and to its fundamental values that hold that no French citizens should be discriminated against because they are Muslim.Jean-Yves Le Drian, the foreign minister, said the result reflected “the mobilization of French people for the maintenance of their values and against a narrow vision of France.”The French do not generally love their presidents, and none had succeeded in being re-elected since 2002, let alone by a 17-point margin. Mr. Macron’s unusual achievement in securing five more years in power reflects his effective stewardship over the Covid-19 crisis, his rekindling of the economy, and his political agility in occupying the entire center of the political spectrum.Ms. Le Pen, softening her image if not her anti-immigrant nationalist program, rode a wave of alienation and disenchantment to bring the extreme right closer to power than at any time since 1944. Her National Rally party has joined the mainstream, even if at the last minute many French people clearly voted for Mr. Macron to ensure that France not succumb to the xenophobic vitriol of the darker passages of its history.Ms. Le Pen is a longtime sympathizer with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, whom she visited at the Kremlin during her last campaign in 2017. She would almost certainly have pursued policies that weakened the united allied front to save Ukraine from Russia’s assault; offered Mr. Putin a breach to exploit in Europe; and undermined the European Union, whose engine has always been a joint Franco-German commitment to it.Marine Le Pen conceded to Mr. Macron, but bitterly criticized his “brutal and violent methods” without explaining what she meant.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesIf Brexit was a blow to unity, a French nationalist quasi-exit, as set out in Ms. Le Pen’s proposals, would have left the European Union on life support. That, in turn, would have crippled an essential guarantor of peace on the continent in a volatile moment.Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, declared that Mr. Macron’s win was “a vote of confidence in Europe.” Boris Johnson, the British prime minister, congratulated the French leader and called France “one of our closest and most important allies.”Mr. Scholz and two other European leaders had taken the unusual step last week of making clear the importance of a vote against Ms. Le Pen in an opinion article in the daily newspaper Le Monde. The letter was a reflection of the anxiety in European capitals and Washington that preceded the vote.“It is the choice between a democratic candidate, who believes that France is stronger in a powerful and autonomous European Union, and a far-right candidate, who openly sides with those who attack our freedom and our democracy,” they wrote.Mr. Macron’s second victory felt different from his first. Five years ago, he was a 39-year-old wunderkind bursting on the French political scene with a promise to bury sterile left-right divisions and build a more just, equal, open and dynamic society. He organized a massive celebration in the main courtyard of the Louvre to mark the dawn of a new political era in France.Sunday night, given the war in Europe, he asked for sobriety from his supporters. As Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy,” the European hymn, played (but much more softly than in 2017), he walked onto the Champ de Mars holding the hand of his wife, Brigitte. Children surrounded the couple; the choreography conveyed simplicity and humility.Supporters of Mr. Macron celebrated on the Champ de Mars.Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York TimesMr. Macron has often been criticized for an aloofness bordering on arrogance during his first term.“We avoided a certain form of violence. I am relieved,” said Eric Maus, 64, a Macron supporter. “But I feel like I am handing my daughter an uncertain world where the extreme right scores so high.”Mr. Macron succeeded in spurring growth, slashing unemployment and instilling a start-up tech culture, but was unable to address growing inequality or simmering anger among the alienated and the struggling in areas of urban blight and rural remoteness. Societal divisions sharpened as incomes stagnated, prices rose and factories moved abroad.As a result, Mr. Macron’s political capital is more limited, even if his clear victory has saved France from a dangerous tilt toward xenophobic nationalism and given him momentum ahead of the June legislative elections.Still, many of the 7.7 million voters who had supported the left-wing candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the first round of the presidential election on April 10 voted only reluctantly for Mr. Macron to keep Ms. Le Pen from power. Assina Channa, a Muslim of Algerian descent voting in the suburb of Saint-Denis north of Paris, said, “Nothing is going to change but I had no choice.”Ms. Le Pen had proposed a ban on the Muslim head scarf and has regularly equated Islam with violence in the country with the largest Muslim community in western Europe. “At least he doesn’t threaten us like she does,” Ms. Channa said.A polling station in Saint-Denis.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesMr. Macron acknowledged that “many of our compatriots voted for me today not to support my ideas but to form a dam against the extreme right.” He thanked them and said “I am now entrusted with their sense of duty, their attachment to the Republic and their respect for the differences expressed these past weeks.”Some 28 percent of the electorate abstained, three percentage points higher than in 2017, and it appeared that more than 13 million people had voted for Ms. Le Pen and the extreme right. “The anger and the disagreements that led my compatriots to vote for this project must also find an answer,” Mr. Macron said.It was a speech not of soaring rhetoric but of sober realism, almost at times contrition, reflecting his recognition of a starkly divided France and perhaps also his inattention to those for whom life has been hardest.The dreams of radical change of 2017 have been supplanted by fears of political confrontation over the summer, in part because the dislike of Mr. Macron among his opponents is strong, and in part because the legislative elections in June could result in a National Assembly less pliant to his will.Constantly adjusting his positions, extending the circle of his allies and refining his ideas, Mr. Macron has proved himself a consummate politician, suffocating any would-be moderate challengers. He engineered the near total demise of the center-left Socialist Party and the center-right Republicans, the two political forces at the heart of postwar French politics. It was a remarkable feat.Supporters of Mr. Macron celebrating in Paris on Sunday.Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York TimesBut there was a price to pay for all this. The old structure of French politics has collapsed, and it is less clear how the violent conflicts of society can be mediated.Those conflicts have become more acute as anger has grown in the parts of France that have felt neglected, even forgotten, by the elites in major cities. By addressing these concerns, and promising a series of tax cuts to help people cope with rising prices for gas and electricity, Ms. Le Pen built an effective campaign.Her message, for some voters, was that she would care for and protect them while their president seemed to have other concerns. But her nationalist message also resonated among people angered by undocumented immigrants entering the country and seeking scapegoats for the country’s problems.The president’s problems have reflected both his personality and political choices. His highly personalized top-down style of government owed more to Bonaparte than to the democratic opening he had said he would bring to the French presidential system. His attempts to force march Europe toward a vision of “strategic autonomy” backed by its own integrated military has met resistance in the countries like Poland that are most attached to America as a European power.Emerging from the moderate left of the political system, and supported by many Socialists five years ago, Mr. Macron veered to the right both in his initial economic policy and in a much-criticized decision to confront what he called “Islamist separatism” by shutting down several mosques and Islamic associations — often on flimsy legal grounds.He judged that he had more to gain on the right than to fear on the fragmented left of the political spectrum in a country whose psyche has been deeply marked by several Islamist terrorist attacks since 2015. In a sense, his victory proved him correct, the master of a broad web of adjustable allegiances that left his opponents floundering.Aida Alami More