Storming of the US Capitol (Jan, 2021)

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      Hundreds of Jan. 6 Cases

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      At the heart of the Jan. 6 investigation are the cases against the riot suspects.Nineteen months after the Jan. 6 attack, hundreds of criminal cases that stem from it are playing out in court. They have been getting less attention than the Justice Department’s scrutiny of Donald Trump, but my colleague Alan Feuer has spent hours and hours watching these trials. This morning, he offers you a glimpse of them.Ian: Who are the Jan. 6 defendants, and what are they charged with?Alan: It’s a wide range. People from all 50 states have been prosecuted. Most are white men from middle- or working-class backgrounds, but there are also women, Hispanic people, Black people. A lot have military backgrounds. There are also professional people, which is unusual for an event involving far-right extremism: doctors, a State Department aide, business owners, people who flew there on a private jet.Most have been charged with misdemeanors and have gotten little to no prison time. Others have been charged with assaulting police officers or damaging government property. And a few hundred people have been charged with obstructing Congress’ certification that day of the Electoral College vote. About 350 defendants have pleaded guilty, and more than 200 have been sentenced. About half a dozen have gotten four years or more, and two have gotten more than seven years.The government is still arresting people, and prosecutors estimate around 2,000 could ultimately face charges.The hearings open windows into defendants’ lives, many of which seem quite dysfunctional. You covered the trial of a defendant named Guy Reffitt, a Texas militia member whose own son turned him in to the F.B.I. and testified against him.If someone is being criminally prosecuted, there’s often some dysfunction in their past. But I’ve been struck by how trauma rests at the center of so many of the Jan. 6 defendants’ lives, whether it’s poverty, addiction or deep family dysfunction. You also see defendants say things to the judge like, I’ve lost everything because of what I did on Jan. 6. My job has been taken from me. My neighbors no longer talk to me. My church has essentially excommunicated me. Please don’t send me to prison as well.Hundreds of defendants are being prosecuted, all in federal court in Washington. How do you keep up?Covid restrictions enabled remote access, which lets me jump from courtroom to courtroom with the push of a button and listen to multiple hearings over the phone in a day.The big exception is trials. I’ve covered two in Washington in person — the Reffitt trial and the case against Dustin Thompson, an unemployed Ohio exterminator. Two seditious conspiracy cases — against members of the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, two far-right groups — will likely go to trial later this year, and I’ll almost certainly be in the courtroom for those. I prefer the courtroom. You pick up on body language and facial expressions that aren’t available when you’re just listening in.How many Jan. 6 hearings have you listened to?Hundreds. It’s not really countable at this point.How did you become the reporter who covers these hearings?I’ve covered courts and crime for over 20 years: murders, mafia and police corruption trials and the trial of Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo. I’ve also spent a lot of time covering far-right extremist groups. As I watched the Jan. 6 attack on TV, I actually recognized people in the crowd. As people started getting arrested, I did what I’ve always done: track documents and set up a database of the now 850-plus cases.Pro-Trump protesters storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesHow are these cases different from other criminal proceedings?On one level, the process is the same: Defendants get charged. Some plead guilty, some go to trial. People are acquitted or convicted. But the context is very different. Jan. 6 was a political action that became a federal crime, and politics infuses these cases. Some defendants have argued that they’re being persecuted for their political beliefs. Thompson’s defense was that Trump authorized him to go into the Capitol that day and that he was merely following Trump’s orders. That did not fly in front of a jury. I’ve never covered anything that’s taken place in an atmosphere as polarized as this one.Trump seems to have motivated not only some Jan. 6 defendants to commit violence, but also people who have threatened the F.B.I. after agents searched his home, Mar-a-Lago, this month. Do you see parallels between the groups?The Ohio man who attacked the F.B.I. field office in Cincinnati this month was, in fact, outside the Capitol on Jan. 6. The F.B.I. investigated his role in the riot but never arrested him. In a larger sense, one researcher has found that 15 to 20 million Americans think violence would be justified to return Trump to office. We’ve seen this in the reaction to the Mar-a-Lago raid, but I’m also concerned about what a potential criminal prosecution of Trump could bring. What will the reaction be if Trump is indicted? What will happen on the day he appears in court? What will happen if he goes to trial and is convicted? There may be moments when the risk of violence in defense of Trump is high.As threats of violence become more widespread, it can create an atmosphere in which the threshold for committing actual violence is lowered. When violent rhetoric becomes pervasive, people willing to commit violence feel justified. They feel like there’s community support. It enables them. That’s a reality we all have to start grappling with.More about Alan: Before becoming a reporter, he worked for a private detective agency run by two former New York City police officers. He later spent three years as a stringer for The Times, covering fires, murders and other middle-of-the-night stories in New York before joining the staff in 1999. In 2020, he published a book about El Chapo.For moreIn his final days in office, Trump had done little to leave the White House — but he had packed papers instead of sending them to the National Archives.An associate sought a pardon for Rudolph Giuliani just after the Jan. 6 attack, but the request was intercepted before it reached Trump.NEWSInternationalDestroyed Russian armored vehicles were paraded yesterday in Kyiv.Jim Huylebroek for The New York TimesUkrainian attacks in Crimea, including a drone assault yesterday, appeared on Russian social media, putting domestic pressure on the Kremlin.Mexico’s former attorney general was arrested in connection with the abduction and likely massacre of 43 students in 2014.Two pilots for Africa’s largest airline fell asleep and missed their scheduled window to land in Ethiopia.Other Big StoriesAn influx of migrants has strained New York City’s social safety net.Republican candidates are invoking “the American dream” in a pessimistic tone.UPS drivers, whose trucks lack air conditioning, say heat waves are endangering them.The actor Gary Busey was charged with criminal sexual contact and harassment related to an encounter at a fan convention in New Jersey.FROM OPINIONIf the Justice Department goes after Trump, it can’t afford to miss, Ross Douthat says. Damon Linker thinks voters, not prosecutors, should take down Trump.The dream of a secular, liberal Indian democracy is receding, Maya Jasanoff argues.Let’s skip the “Game of Thrones” prequel, says Scott Woods.The Sunday question: How will Democrats’ legislative successes affect the midterm elections?Democrats’ achievements on climate and gun control could energize base voters and blunt the losses the president’s party typically suffers, New York Magazine’s Ed Kilgore writes. But consumer confidence and Biden’s job approval remain low, and voters overall tend not to reward big policy victories, The Cook Political Report’s Amy Walter notes.MORNING READSJoyce Lee for The New York TimesWeed drinks: They’re becoming widely available, but doctors know little about the effects.Sunday routine: A wine writer plays folk music and visits wine bars.Pickleball: Its popularity is growing rapidly. So is the injury count.A Times classic: The best way to cool your space.Advice from Wirecutter: How to pick the right computer for your kid.BOOKSRead your way through Reykjavik: Iceland has a reputation for having more authors per capita than any country.By the Book: When Frances Mayes discovers that the author of a good book has written others, “that’s bliss.”Our editors’ picks: “Picasso’s War,” a narrative of how modern art came to be celebrated in the U.S., and 10 other books.Times best sellers: Rinker Buck shares his adventures on a wooden flatboat in “Life On The Mississippi,” a nonfiction best seller. See all our lists.THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINEPhilip Montgomery for The New York TimesOn the cover: Willie Nelson’s long encore.Recommendation: Write fan mail to artists you admire.Diagnosis: She couldn’t stand still without pain. What was wrong?Eat: Late summer tomatoes are perfect for Spaghetti al Pomodoro.Read the full issue.THE WEEK AHEADWhat to Watch ForA detective tied to the fatal Breonna Taylor raid is expected to enter a guilty plea on Monday. She would be the first officer convicted in the case.Florida and New York will hold primary elections on Tuesday.Senator Lindsey Graham was ordered to testify before a grand jury on Tuesday in a Georgia investigation into Republican efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s election loss.Wednesday marks six months since Russia invaded Ukraine, as well as Ukraine’s Independence Day.New jobless claims will be announced on Thursday.So-called trigger bans on abortion in Idaho, Tennessee and Texas will go into effect on Thursday.The college football season kicks off on Saturday.What to Cook This WeekKarsten Moran for The New York TimesMussels seem luxurious, but they are among the most budget-friendly seafood options, Tanya Sichynsky writes. Her weeknight dinner recommendations include steamed mussels with garlic and parsley, sheet-pan gnocchi with mushrooms and spinach and linguine with lemon sauce.NOW TIME TO PLAYHere’s a clue from the Sunday crossword:72-Across: Pharmaceutical company whose Nasdaq symbol is MRNATake the news quiz to see how well you followed the week’s headlines.Here’s today’s Spelling Bee. Here’s today’s Wordle. After, use our bot to get better.Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times.Matthew Cullen, Claire Moses, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      Giuliani Associate Sought Pardon for Him After Jan. 6, Book Says

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      The letter, which also requested that Rudolph W. Giuliani be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, was intercepted before reaching President Donald J. Trump.An associate of Rudolph W. Giuliani, President Donald J. Trump’s personal lawyer, tried to pass a message to Mr. Trump asking him to grant Mr. Giuliani a “general pardon” and the Presidential Medal of Freedom just after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, according to a new book.The associate, Maria Ryan, also pleaded for Mr. Giuliani to be paid for his services and sent a different note seeking tens of thousands of dollars for herself, according to the book, “Giuliani: The Rise and Tragic Fall of America’s Mayor,” by Andrew Kirtzman, who had covered Mr. Giuliani as a journalist. The New York Times obtained an advance copy of the book, which is set to be released next month.Bernard B. Kerik, Mr. Giuliani’s close adviser and the New York City police commissioner for part of his time as mayor, stopped the letter from getting to Mr. Trump. And it is unclear if Mr. Giuliani, who helped lead the efforts to overturn the 2020 election but has repeatedly insisted he did not seek a pardon shielding him from potential charges, was involved in the request.But the letter adds another layer to the complex picture now swirling around Mr. Giuliani as he faces legal fallout from his efforts to try to help Mr. Trump cling to power, including being notified that he is a target in at least one investigation.“Dear Mr. President,” Ms. Ryan wrote in the letter, dated Jan. 10, 2021, according to the book, “I tried to call you yesterday to talk about business. The honorable Rudy Giuliani has worked 24/7 on the voter fraud issues. He has led a team of lawyers, data analysts and investigators.”Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsCard 1 of 9Key Revelations From the Jan. 6 HearingsMaking a case against Trump. More

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      Doug Mastriano Gets Pennsylvania Republicans to Close Ranks Behind Him

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      STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Before Pennsylvania’s primary, much of the state’s Republican establishment agreed that Doug Mastriano would be a disaster as the nominee for governor.Andy Reilly, the state’s Republican national committeeman, had joined a stop-Mastriano effort by rival candidates, who feared that the far-right state senator and prolific spreader of election conspiracy theories would squander an otherwise winnable race.Yet on a warm evening last month, Mr. Reilly opened his suburban Philadelphia home for a backyard fund-raiser for Mr. Mastriano, who won his primary in May. Guests chipped in $150 for ribs and pulled pork and listened to Mr. Mastriano, fresh from an uproar over his presence on Gab, a social media site that is a haven for hate speech.Mr. Reilly later defended Mr. Mastriano as the better choice to lead Pennsylvania over his Democratic opponent, Josh Shapiro. “The question is can Doug Mastriano keep the Republican Party base and all the factions together?” Mr. Reilly said.In one of the most closely watched governor’s races of the year, Pennsylvania Republican officials who had warned that Mr. Mastriano was unelectable have largely closed ranks behind him, after he proved to be the overwhelming choice of base Republicans. On Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida plans to headline a rally with Mr. Mastriano in Pittsburgh, a bearhug from one of the party’s most popular national figures.Mr. Shapiro, the state attorney general, has used a huge fund-raising advantage to batter Mr. Mastriano in TV attack ads as an extremist on abortion and on the 2020 election, opening a double-digit lead in polls. Still, Democrats remain anxious they could lose to Mr. Mastriano because of the free-floating anger of the electorate this year, with most voters worried primarily about the economy.Josh Shapiro, with supporters in Lock Haven, Pa., has battered Mr. Mastriano in TV attack ads as an extremist.Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York TimesWhether the recent run of Democratic successes nationally — including the climate and drug-pricing legislative package and the resounding defeat of an anti-abortion measure in Kansas — can shift the fundamental midterm equation remains unclear.“The environment that Joe Biden has created for Josh Shapiro makes this year probably the only year that a Mastriano-type candidate could win in a purple state like Pennsylvania,” said Matt Brouillette, the head of a conservative political group in the state that opposed Mr. Mastriano in the primary. “While the Democrats want to focus on Jan. 6 and Roe v. Wade, the electorate is focused on putting food on their table and filling up the tanks in their cars.”The Democratic anxiety was on display recently at a party picnic in liberal State College, the home of Pennsylvania State University. At Mr. Shapiro’s mention of Mr. Mastriano during a speech, a woman shouted, “You better win!”More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid. But her mission to thwart Donald J. Trump presents challenges.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.There was nervous laughter. The worry reflects the alarm of Democrats that if Mr. Mastriano, 58, becomes governor, he would sign severe abortion restrictions and would have the power to subvert the 2024 presidential election in the swing state in favor of the G.O.P. nominee.A Shapiro campaign event in State College. Democrats in Pennsylvania are worried about Mr. Mastriano’s positions on abortion and voting.Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York Times“I hear it every single day,” Mr. Shapiro told the crowd. “They’re worried about their rights being ripped away from them.”Mr. Mastriano, a retired Army officer who led Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the election in Pennsylvania, marched on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, passing police barricades breached by other marchers. He has boasted that as governor, “I get to decertify any or all machines in the state.” He has called for compelling all nine million registered voters in the state to re-register, which experts say would violate federal law.“These are dangerous, extreme positions he’s taken, and these are things I know the people of Pennsylvania reject,” Mr. Shapiro, 49, said in an interview.Mr. Shapiro compared the unusually high turnout in deep-red Kansas in favor of abortion rights to how the issue is motivating his own supporters. “We have seen incredible intensity in our campaign post-Dobbs,” he said, referring to the Supreme Court decision leaving it to states to protect or deny abortion access.Many women who attended his events agreed, saying that abortion is their most important issue. “I was the generation that was young when Roe vs. Wade became the law of the land, and I’ve known women whose health was ruined because of an illegal abortion,” said Bonnie Hannis, 80, who came to hear Mr. Shapiro in rural Clinton County.“I’m excited to defend my reproductive rights,” said Gianna Renzo, 19, who grew up in the county and is now a student at Princeton. “I see women my age who are typically from Republican families, and they’re going to come over to the Democratic side” because of abortion.Mr. Mastriano, the sponsor in the State Legislature of a six-week abortion ban with no exceptions, has appeared to modulate that position lately, saying lawmakers will write whatever bill they choose and “my personal views are irrelevant.”But there are few signs that he has broadened his appeal to independent and swing voters, especially in the suburbs, who have played a pivotal role in recent Pennsylvania elections. He was supported by 82 percent of Republicans in a Fox News poll in late July, but independents preferred Mr. Shapiro by 28 points.It remains to be seen if Mr. Mastriano can broaden his appeal to independent and swing voters.Dustin Franz for The New York TimesMr. Mastriano declined to comment for this article.He has routinely snubbed the state’s TV news outlets and newspapers that might help him reach a broader audience. It is a purposeful strategy aimed at exciting conservatives who believe that Democrats have “the media in their pockets,” as he recently put it.This week, he said he would not participate in traditional debates run by independent news organizations because of what he called their “hidden partisan agenda.” He proposed debates in which each candidate names a moderator — a nonstarter for the Shapiro campaign, which called the idea an “obvious stunt.”Mr. Mastriano speaks almost exclusively to far-right podcasters like Stephen K. Bannon, conservative talk radio hosts and Fox News. On a recent swing through northwest Pennsylvania, he brushed off a Pittsburgh TV station that sought to interview him, and even the small-circulation Meadville Tribune.One result of that approach is that he seldom has to field tough questions. And his poor fund-raising — he ended the primary season with just $400,000 in his campaign account, compared with $13.4 million for Mr. Shapiro — has left him unable to run TV ads all summer to counter a barrage of attacks from his opponent.The Shapiro ads use Mr. Mastriano’s words to paint him as outside the mainstream, not just on abortion and election denial, but on gay marriage, which he has said should “absolutely not” be legal, and on global warming, which he called “fake science.”“You’ve basically got a one-person governor’s race right now in terms of voter contact,” said Christopher Nicholas, a Republican consultant in the state. “All the folks who listen to those far-right podcasts, I think he maxed out his vote potential. He has to move past his base.”At a recent appearance by Mr. Mastriano at the York County Fair, there were no signs on the sprawling fairgrounds directing potential voters his way. Outside the hall where he was to appear, a large crowd on bleachers at the appointed hour turned out to be waiting for the Hot Dog Pig Races.Mr. Mastriano showed up inside at the county Republican booth. He did not give a speech, but shook hands and posed for pictures with several dozen supporters.Donna VanDyne, an insurance agent, supported a no-exceptions abortion ban, claiming that victims of rape or incest who give birth adjust. “When they have their baby, they have each other and become support systems for one another,” she said.Dawn Smith, an aspiring teacher’s aide, repeated a debunked conspiracy theory Mr. Mastriano had spread about voting machines. “They switched President Trump’s votes to Joe Biden’s votes with the Dominion machines,” she claimed.Wayne Liek, a retired truck driver, recalling prayers he said in school in the 1960s, agreed with Mr. Mastriano that the Constitutional separation of church and state was, as Mr. Mastriano described it, “a myth.”A core of Mr. Mastriano’s popularity with Republicans is his embrace of views associated with Christian nationalism, the belief that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, and often intertwined with far-right conspiratorial thinking.Mr. Mastriano, the sponsor in the legislature of a six-week abortion ban with no exceptions, has appeared to modulate that position lately.Dustin Franz for The New York TimesFew attendees seemed aware of the furor over Mr. Mastriano’s presence on Gab. His campaign had paid $5,000 to broaden his support with users of the social media site, which is known as a haven for white nationalists. A post by Mr. Mastriano in July criticizing Democratic policies drew dozens of replies that were antisemitic insults of Mr. Shapiro.Gab’s founder, Andrew Torba, defended Mr. Mastriano in videos laced with antisemitic vitriol. Mr. Mastriano distanced himself from Mr. Torba on July 28, saying that he rejected “antisemitism in any form.’’At a later appearance where he did give a speech, in Cochranton, Mr. Mastriano said: “It’s funny, they want to call us extremists. They’re the extremists.’’He attacked Mr. Shapiro for suing, as attorney general, to keep a mask mandate in schools and to uphold Gov. Tom Wolf’s shutdown of nonessential businesses early in the pandemic. Mr. Mastriano first gained a following for leading protests against restrictions to prevent the spread of Covid. Fury at those orders lingers for many conservatives.Asked about the suits, Mr. Shapiro said that he personally opposes mandates for masks and vaccines, but as the state’s top lawyer he was required to represent the governor and executive branch in litigation. He prevailed in both cases.Before he campaigned in State College, a blue island in a sea of red in central Pennsylvania, Mr. Shapiro had visited Lock Haven in nearby Clinton County.Mike Hanna Sr., a retired Democratic state lawmaker from the area, said Mr. Mastriano “has a strong base here, just like Trump.” But Mr. Hanna said the former president had lost support since inciting the mob that attacked the Capitol.“I hunt with a bunch of veterans, and they just shake their heads,” Mr. Hanna said. “Trump has done a lot to erode his standing with his base, and Mastriano’s participation in all that, and the extreme positions he’s taken, have done the same thing.”“It’d be a lot scarier for us,” Mr. Hanna said, “if the Republicans had selected a moderate.” More

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      After Loss, Liz Cheney Begins Difficult Mission of Thwarting Trump

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      JACKSON, Wyo. — Hours after her landslide loss, Representative Liz Cheney wasted no time Wednesday taking her first steps toward what she says is now her singular goal: blocking Donald J. Trump from returning to power.Ms. Cheney announced that her newly rebranded political organization, the Great Task, would be dedicated to mobilizing opposition to Mr. Trump. And in an early morning television interview, she for the first time acknowledged what many have suspected: She is “thinking” about running for president in 2024, she said on NBC’s “Today Show,” and would decide in the “coming months.”Despite the effort to shift quickly from her defeat to her future, Ms. Cheney and her advisers remained vague about precisely how the congresswoman, who lost to a Trump-backed primary challenger by 37 points in Wyoming on Tuesday, planned to build a movement that could thwart a figure with a strong hold on many of his party’s voters and a set of imposing advantages.Allies, advisers and Ms. Cheney herself insist there are no detailed plans prepared for her mission. Her focus remains on the panel investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, they said. (As if to underscore the point, Ms. Cheney on Wednesday jetted from Wyoming back to Washington, where Congress is in recess for the summer.)But Ms. Cheney’s every move will be watched closely by a pocket of the political class that has been increasingly agitating for a third party that they argue could not only block Mr. Trump, but ease the rising political polarization.“The amount of money that is available for Liz Cheney to continue her work to keep Trump from terrorizing us depends on how good her plans are,” said Dmitri Mehlhorn, an adviser to several major Democratic donors, including Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn. “If she has really good plans, then the amount of money available to her is definitely in the double-digit millions.”For the moment, Ms. Cheney’s infrastructure is not much bigger than her family and a handful of aides in her congressional office. But she had over $7.4 million in the bank last month, money she can transfer to the new entity she’s forming.Ms. Cheney’s options may be obvious, but there’s no clear path ahead — and she faces the risk of inadvertently aiding Mr. Trump’s comeback.A policy wonk with no great enthusiasm for retail politics, she could build a political operation dedicated to defeating Republicans who endorse Mr. Trump’s false claims of winning the 2020 election. That would inevitably mean openly supporting Democrats, something she has yet to commit to. On Wednesday, when asked if she believes the country would be better off under Democratic control in Washington, she dodged.“I think we have to make sure that we are fighting against every single election denier,” she said. “The election deniers, right now, are Republicans. And I think that it shouldn’t matter what party you are. Nobody should be voting for those people, supporting them or backing them.”More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid, a prospect that would test the national viability of a conservative, anti-Trump platform.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.Ms. Cheney also could focus on laying the groundwork for her own candidacy for president — either as a Republican or as an independent. The latter effort risks peeling away votes from Democrats and ultimately helping Mr. Trump win if he runs, as is widely expected.If she runs as an expressly anti-Trump candidate in the 2024 Republican primary, harnessing the media attention that would come with even a long-shot bid, it may only serve to fracture the share of the G.O.P. electorate eager for a Trump alternative. Ms. Cheney needs no reminding that the former president claimed the 2016 nomination with pluralities in many early nominating states, as he had no single, formidable opponent.Former Vice President Mike Pence, campaigning in New Hampshire on Wednesday for local Republicans, called on Donald Trump’s defenders to halt their attacks on the F.B.I.CJ Gunther/EPA, via ShutterstockIt’s clear Ms. Cheney would have competition for the anybody-but-Trump vote in a Republican primary. On Wednesday, Vice President Mike Pence was in first-in-the-nation New Hampshire, offering his critique of the former president and his most ardent defenders. Mr. Pence declared that Republicans’ “attacks on the F.B.I. must stop” and likened calls to defund the F.B.I. after the bureau’s recent search of Mr. Trump’s home to retrieve classified documents to left-wing calls to defund the police. More

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      Republicans Are America’s Problem

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      Tuesday’s primary in Wyoming delivered Liz Cheney a resounding defeat. She is one of the few Republicans in Congress willing to resist Donald Trump’s election lies, and Republican voters punished her for it.First, let me say, I have no intention of contributing to the hagiography of Liz Cheney. She is a rock-ribbed Republican who supported Trump’s legislative positions 93 percent of the time. It is on the insurrection and election lies where she diverged.In a way, she is the Elvis of politics: She took something — in this case a position — that others had held all along and made it cross over. She mainstreamed a political principle that many liberals had held all along.Excuse me if I temper my enthusiasm for a person who presents herself as a great champion of democracy but votes against the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.Situational morality is better than none, I suppose, but I see it for what it is, and I am minimally moved.However, her loss does crystallize something for us that many had already known: that the bar to clear in the modern Republican Party isn’t being sufficiently conservative but rather being sufficiently obedient to Donald Trump and his quest to deny and destroy democracy.We must stop thinking it hyperbolic to say that the Republican Party itself is now a threat to our democracy. I understand the queasiness about labeling many of our fellow Americans in that way. I understand that it sounds extreme and overreaching.But how else are we to describe what we are seeing?Of the 10 Republicans in the House who voted to impeach Donald Trump for his role in fomenting the insurrection, four didn’t seek re-election and four lost their primaries. Only two have advanced to the general election, and those two were running in states that allow voters to vote in any primary, regardless of their party affiliation.Polls have consistently shown that only a small fraction of Republicans believe Joe Biden was legitimately elected. He was, of course. (That fact apparently can’t be repeated often enough.)And in fact, according to a Washington Post analysis published this week, in battleground states, nearly two-thirds of the Republican nominees for the state and federal offices with sway over elections believe the last election was stolen.This is only getting worse. Last month, a CNN poll found that Republicans are now less likely to believe that democracy is under attack than they were earlier in the year, before the Jan. 6 committee began unveiling its explosive revelations. Thirty-three percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said the party should be very accepting of candidates who say the election was stolen; 39 percent more said the party should be somewhat accepting of those candidates.Furthermore, a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll published in January found that the percentage of Republicans who say that violence against the government can sometimes be justified had climbed to 40 percent, compared with just 23 percent of Democrats. It should also be noted that 40 percent of white people said that violence could be justified compared with just 18 percent of Black people.We have to stop saying that all these people are duped and led astray, that they are somehow under the spell of Trump and programmed by Fox News.Propaganda and disinformation are real and insidious, but I believe that to a large degree, Republicans’ radicalization is willful.Republicans have searched for multiple election cycles for the right vehicle and packaging for their white nationalism, religious nationalism, nativism, craven capitalism and sexism.There was a time when they believed that it would need to be packaged in politeness — compassionate conservatism — and the party would eventually recommend a more moderate approach intended to branch out and broaden its appeal — in its autopsy after Mitt Romney’s 2012 loss.But Trump offered them an alternative, and they took it: Instead of running away from their bigotries, intolerances and oppression, they would run headlong into them. They would unapologetically embrace them.This, to many Republicans, felt good. They no longer needed to hide. They could live their truths, no matter how reprehensible. They could come out of the closet, wrapped in their cruelty.But the only way to make this strategy work and viable, since neither party dominates American life, was to back a strategy of minority rule and to disavow democracy.A Pew Research Center poll found that between 2018 and 2021, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents gradually came to support more voting restrictions.In a December NPR/Ipsos poll, a majority of Democrats, independents and Republicans all thought that American democracy, and America itself, was in crisis, but no group believed it more than Republicans.But this is a scenario in which different people look at the same issue from different directions and interpret it differently.Republicans are the threat to our democracy because their own preferred form of democracy — one that excludes and suppresses, giving Republicans a fighting chance of maintaining control — is in danger.For modern Republicans, democracy only works — and is only worth it — when and if they win.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 and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and Instagram. More

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      Liz Cheney Lost in Wyoming, but Won in All the Ways That Count

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      Jordan Gale for The New York TimesI know what the numbers say. I can read the returns. By those hard, cold, simplistic measures, Liz Cheney was defeated overwhelmingly in her House Republican primary in Wyoming on Tuesday night, and her time in Congress is winding down.But it’s impossible for me to say that she lost.She got many, many fewer votes than her opponent, an unscrupulous shape shifter unfit to shine her shoes, because she chose the tough world of truth over Donald Trump’s underworld of lies. That’s a moral victory.She was spurned by conservatives in Wyoming because she had the cleareyed vision to see Trump for what he is and — unlike Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, whose titles perversely include the word “leader” — she wouldn’t don a blindfold. That makes her a champion in the ways that count most.Come January, she will no longer be Representative Cheney because she represents steadfast principle in an era with a devastating deficit of it. History will smile on her for that. It will remember the likes of McConnell and McCarthy for different, darker reasons. You tell me who’s the winner in this crowd.I don’t mean to idealize her too much — easy to do, given the cowardice of so many others in her party. She’s not some paragon of altruism, and a few conservatives I respect rolled their eyes when she first separated herself from the House pack to denounce Trump in the most sweeping terms possible. They sensed that she had inherited Dick Cheney’s arrogance. They suspected that her motives included grandstanding. They rightly augured that she’d become more of a political celebrity in exile than she would by playing along, and they guessed that she was making that calculation.But there could be no dispute, at least not among honest and sensible patriots, about the correctness of her positions on Trump, on her party’s fealty to him and on the peril that he poses to the future of American democracy.And there’s no question at this point about her genuineness. You can’t endure and survive the kind of nastiness that she has if you don’t believe in what you’re doing. You can’t radiate the calm and conviction that she has as the vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee if you’re not confident that you’re on the side of the angels.Additionally, she didn’t do what more than a few other Never Trumpers did and essentially morph into a Democrat, tweaking and twisting long-held positions so that she could still belong somewhere. She simply and importantly made cause with Democrats, which didn’t erase her past, had greater authenticity and was enough.I was sad and angry when she celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, because I think she’s wrong: An embryo doesn’t take precedence over a woman, who should not have to become a fugitive from her state to exercise control over her own body. But I grudgingly respected Cheney’s fidelity to her beliefs and readiness to alienate her newest fans.She’s a cantankerous sort — like father, like daughter — and heroes are as messy as villains. But a hero she is, because she models independent-mindedness for a country in which too many people fall into tribal line.She’s not going away. She was clear about her determination to hold on to her megaphone and continue fighting Trump in her Tuesday night concession speech, which was less concession than vow — and an extravagant vow at that. It invoked and put her in the company of Abraham Lincoln, who, she noted, “was defeated in elections for the Senate and the House before he won the most important election of all.” She’s alert to the past and perhaps inherited that from Lynne Cheney, who writes serious books on the country’s political history. Like mother, like daughter.Was her Lincoln reference an indication that she’ll run for president in 2024? Political observers wonder. They’re right to. We’ll find out soon enough. But we know this much now: The losers on Tuesday night were the Republican Party, which needs her more than she needs it, and the United States, which needs rescue from its ruinous indulgence of Trump. Cheney has made that case as forcefully as anyone, holding on to the greatest prize of all: her dignity. More

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      What Liz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss Says About the State of the G.O.P.

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      Representative Liz Cheney’s martyr-like quest to stop Donald J. Trump has ensured her place in Republican Party history. But her lopsided defeat in Wyoming on Tuesday also exposed the remarkable degree to which the former president still controls the party’s present — and its near future.Ten House Republicans voted to impeach Mr. Trump in early 2021 for his role inciting the mob that stormed the Capitol. Only two have survived the 2022 Republican primaries, a breathtaking run of losses and forced retirements in a chamber where incumbents typically prevail with ease.No single defeat was as freighted with significance as Ms. Cheney’s, or as revealing of the party’s realignment.The sheer scope of her loss — the daughter of a former vice president was defeated in a landslide — may have only strengthened Mr. Trump’s hand as he asserts his grip over the Republican Party, by revealing the futility among Republican voters of even the most vigorous prosecution of the case against him.Casting her mission of combating election denialism as a moral imperative and her work as just beginning, Ms. Cheney pledged to “do whatever it takes” to prevent a second Trump presidency. “Freedom must not, cannot and will not die here,” she declared in her concession speech on Tuesday night in Jackson.Not long ago, Ms. Cheney had been seen as a rising Republican star, even a potential House speaker-in-waiting. Now, after becoming her party’s most dogged Trump detractor — turning the Jan. 6 committee hearings into a bullhorn with which to warn of the dangers Mr. Trump and his enablers posed to the party, the country and even democracy itself — she is soon to be out of her job.Ms. Cheney had hoped the Jan. 6 riot would be a turning point for Republicans. It did prove to be a dividing line. But it was those who crossed Mr. Trump who have suffered the electoral consequences.“She may have been fighting for principles,” said Taylor Budowich, a spokesman and adviser to Mr. Trump. “But they are not the principles of the Republican Party.”Ms. Cheney made clear she was more than willing to lose her House seat, and she hinted broadly at a 2024 presidential campaign of her own, invoking Abraham Lincoln’s failed bids for lesser offices before he sought and won the presidency. On Wednesday, she formed a new political action committee, the Great Task, whose name nods to Lincoln and which will be filled with leftover campaign cash, and said she was “thinking” of running for president.But the outcome in Wyoming showed that while anti-Trump Republicans can count on ample money and media attention, the actual Republican constituency for them is far more limited. Indeed, one of Ms. Cheney’s last gasps was an effort to get Democrats to switch parties to vote in the G.O.P. primary.While anti-Trump Republicans may garner media attention, Mr. Trump is tightening his grip on the party.Emil Lippe for The New York TimesHer loss was also the latest sign that the central organizing principles of today’s Republican Party are tethered less to specific policies — she was a reliable vote for much of the Trump agenda — than to whatever Mr. Trump wants at any given time.Most recently, that has meant lashing out at federal law enforcement authorities over the search of Mr. Trump’s Florida home for missing materials with classified markings. More broadly, it has meant embracing his obsession with denying his 2020 defeat and amplifying his false claims of election fraud, regardless of the bloody fallout nearly 20 months ago or its destabilizing effect on the nation.More Coverage of the 2022 Midterm ElectionsLiz Cheney’s Lopsided Loss: The Republican congresswoman’s defeat in Wyoming exposed the degree to which former President Donald J. Trump still controls the party’s present — and its near future.2024 Hint: Hours after her loss, Ms. Cheney acknowledged that she was “thinking” about a White House bid, a prospect that would test the national viability of a conservative, anti-Trump platform.The ‘Impeachment 10’: With Ms. Cheney’s defeat, only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump remain.Alaska Races: Senator Lisa Murkowski and Sarah Palin appeared to be on divergent paths following contests that offered a glimpse at the state’s independent streak.“You could write the history of the modern Republican Party over the last two years, and what does Jan. 6 look like? A hiccup,” said William Kristol, the neoconservative writer who co-founded Republican Voters Against Trump, a group spending millions of dollars to oppose Trump-backed election deniers. “The price of admission to today’s Republican Party is turning a blind eye to Jan. 6.”That was the experience of Representative Peter Meijer of Michigan, who voted for Mr. Trump’s impeachment weeks after taking office and lost his re-election primary this month. He said his constituents asked him about his impeachment vote 10 times as much as about anything else.“Policy is not policy toward improving government,” Mr. Meijer explained. “It’s policy as a signifier of whether you’re part of the in group or the out group.”Refusing to repeat the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, he said, put Mr. Meijer squarely in the “out group.”In Michigan, Representative Peter Meijer, who voted for impeachment, lost his primary to a Trump-backed rival. Brittany Greeson for The New York Times“I can’t tell you the number of times somebody said, ‘You don’t have to believe the election is stolen, the important thing isn’t believing it, it’s saying it,’” Mr. Meijer recalled in an interview. “That is what a Republican is supposed to do right now.”If a series of primary setbacks this spring had showed that Mr. Trump was not invincible, then races in August have showcased his enduring influence.Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington State, another Republican vote for impeachment, was ousted by a Trump supporter. A Trump-backed candidate, Tim Michels, who has entertained trying to overturn the 2020 election, won the Republican nomination for governor of Wisconsin. And Mr. Trump’s preferred candidates swept the nominations in Arizona for Senate, governor, attorney general and secretary of state. All embraced his election denialism. More

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      The Party of Trump

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      A look at the latest results from last night’s primaries, and their larger meaning for the Republican Party.Last night offered the latest evidence of Donald Trump’s continued influence over the Republican Party. In today’s newsletter, we’ll give you the results and also offer some larger perspective on the overall success rate of Trump’s endorsements this year.First, here are the main results:Liz Cheney — Trump’s highest-profile critic within the party — resoundingly lost her primary race for Wyoming’s lone House seat. Cheney received 29 percent of the vote, compared with 66 percent for Harriet Hageman, the Trump-endorsed candidate who has not held elected office before. (Here’s a Times profile of Hageman, and an analysis about what Cheney’s loss means for the G.O.P.)In Wyoming’s Republican primary for secretary of state, the office that oversees elections, the winner was Chuck Gray, a state legislator whom Trump endorsed. Gray, like Trump, has falsely claimed that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent.In Alaska, Sarah Palin, the state’s former governor whom Trump endorsed, and two rivals — Mary Peltola, a Democrat, and Nick Begich, a Republican — advanced to the November election for Alaska’s open House seat to replace Don Young, who died in March.Alaska also held a Senate primary, but its results are unlikely to matter much. The state uses open primaries in which the top four vote getters advance to the general election. Both the incumbent — Lisa Murkowski, who voted to convict Trump in his impeachment trial for the Capitol attack — and Trump’s preferred candidate, Kelly Tshibaka, advanced. Alaska uses ranked-choice voting, which may favor a moderate like Murkowski.Here are the latest vote counts from Alaska and Wyoming.Trump’s 2022 recordThe 2022 primary schedule is winding down, with only six states yet to hold elections, including Florida next week. The full picture of Trump’s influence is becoming clear.He has become the rare defeated president to wield enormous sway over his party, with the ability to end careers (like Cheney’s, perhaps) and to turn once-obscure candidates into winners. Trump even persuaded other top Republicans, like Representative Kevin McCarthy and Senator Ted Cruz, to endorse Cheney’s opponent.But Trump’s influence is not complete. The success rate of his endorsements in competitive elections hovers around 80 percent, and some incumbents (like Murkowski, perhaps) have proven strong enough to overcome his criticism of them.The Times’s Maggie Haberman notes that Trump sometimes makes endorsements without thinking them through, including in multicandidate races with more than one candidate who supports his agenda. “Trump tends to treat politics like a scoreboard, as opposed to a strategic effort,” Maggie said.This chart, by our colleague Ashley Wu, summarizes Trump’s record in the 2022 primaries so far.Primary election outcomes for Trump-endorsed 2022 midterm candidates More