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      Trump Team Creates Legal-Defense Fund to Cover His Allies’ Bills

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      With investigations and legal fees piling up, a fund is planned to help witnesses and defendants. The former president’s legal bills are not expected to be included, however.Former President Donald J. Trump’s team is creating a legal-defense fund to handle some of the crush of legal bills stemming from the investigations and criminal indictments involving him and a number of employees and associates, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.The fund, which is expected to be called the Patriot Legal Defense Fund Inc., will be led by Michael Glassner, a longtime Trump political adviser, according to the people familiar with the planning, who were not authorized to discuss it publicly. Another Trump aide who worked at the Trump Organization and then in Mr. Trump’s administration, Lynne Patton, will also be involved, the people said.It is unclear how broad a group of people the legal-defense fund will cover, but one person said it was not expected to cover Mr. Trump’s own legal bills. In recent months Mr. Trump’s political action committee has paid legal bills for him and several witnesses, spending over $40 million on lawyers in the first half of 2023.But a wide swath of people have become entangled in the various Trump-related criminal investigations, both as witnesses — of which there are many who work for Mr. Trump personally or did in the White House — as well as defendants.A spokesman for Mr. Trump, Steven Cheung, said that the Justice Department had “targeted innocent Americans associated with President Trump,” and that “to combat these heinous actions” and “protect these innocent people from financial ruin and prevent their lives from being completely destroyed, a new legal defense fund will help pay for their legal fees to ensure they have representation against unlawful harassment.”Mr. Trump’s PAC, Save America, has been a focus of one of the investigations by the special counsel Jack Smith, who has had at least two grand juries looking at Mr. Trump and his allies and advisers. Mr. Smith’s team has questioned why some lawyers for specific witnesses are being paid, as well as whether aides to Mr. Trump and Republicans knew Mr. Trump had lost the election but continued to raise money off his debunked claims.The creation of the legal-defense fund could ease some of the financial pressure on Save America, which was severe enough that it requested a refund of the $60 million it had transferred to a pro-Trump super PAC late last year. Michael Glassner, a longtime Trump political adviser, will lead what is expected to be called the Patriot Legal Defense Fund Inc.Andrew Harnik/Associated PressMr. Trump now has two co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, in the federal investigation into his retention of reams of presidential material and classified documents after he left office. Both men work for Mr. Trump; Mr. Nauta works for the Trump campaign, and Mr. De Oliveira is the property manager at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club.Last month, Mr. Trump appeared at a fund-raiser at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J., for a group that assists those arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 riot and their families. “I’m going to make a contribution,” Mr. Trump told them, according to a video of his remarks. That group’s name, the Patriot Freedom Project, echoes the new name of Mr. Trump’s legal fund.Mr. Trump had long resisted such an entity. For years, he told people that only guilty people have legal-defense funds.Mr. Trump, a wealthy businessman, has been using money parked in Save America to pay legal bills for himself and a number of witnesses in the four criminal investigations into his actions in and out of office. Save America was created to house the more than $100 million that Mr. Trump raised shortly after the November 2020 election, as he claimed he needed his supporters’ help to combat widespread voter fraud.No such widespread fraud was ever proved, but Mr. Trump had tens of millions of dollars at his disposal. He cannot spend the money directly on his 2024 presidential candidacy, but has been using it for legal bills. Last year, he made the $60 million transfer to the super PAC that is backing him, well before the refund request was made.In 2021 and 2022, Save America paid for Mr. Trump’s political operation while he was out of office and not an official candidate, paying for staff members and rallies. It also picked up $16 million in legal fees. Mr. Trump’s rivals have been using the Save America legal payments as an attack on him. And he appears to have recognized it as a potential weak point: On Saturday evening, at a rally in Erie, Pa., he said he would put whatever money he needs to put into his campaign, if it comes to that. More

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      DeSantis Jabs at Trump’s Legal Trouble as He Resets His Campaign

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      Ron DeSantis’s remarks to a voter in New Hampshire suggest he may step up his attacks against the man who leads him in national polls by a wide margin.Two days after former President Donald J. Trump used a demeaning nickname to describe Ron DeSantis to a packed hall of Iowa Republican activists, Mr. DeSantis pointedly invoked the federal indictment against his chief rival, saying that if Mr. Trump had “drained the swamp like he promised,” then he probably “wouldn’t be in the mess that he’s in right now.”Speaking to reporters on Sunday after a campaign event in New Hampshire, Mr. DeSantis, the governor of Florida, added that Mr. Trump’s use of “juvenile insults” served as a reminder of “why there are so many millions of voters who will never vote for him going forward.”Mr. DeSantis has generally not used Mr. Trump’s legal troubles against him, and has instead focused on criticizing the Biden administration for what he terms the “weaponization” of federal law enforcement.But as Mr. DeSantis seeks to reset his ailing campaign by cutting staff and organizing more informal events in the face of a fund-raising shortfall, his comments suggest he may be taking a less timid approach against the man who leads him in national polls by a wide margin. Even allies have said that his campaign has lacked a coherent message about why voters should choose him over Mr. Trump.Part of the shift may also be a result of how Mr. DeSantis has changed his campaign tactics in the past week. Whereas he previously engaged with voters in more controlled environments, and kept the press at arm’s length, he is now regularly taking questions from both everyday Americans and reporters — meaning that he will be asked more often about Mr. Trump, who is dominating the Republican primary race.Mr. DeSantis’s campaign reboot took him on a bus tour through rural Iowa last week. On Friday, he and a dozen other Republican presidential candidates, including the former president, took turns addressing a dinner hosted by the Republican Party of Iowa. With Mr. DeSantis ensconced in a hospitality suite not far from the main stage, Mr. Trump mockingly referred to his rival as “DeSanctis” (short for “DeSanctimonious”) and bragged about his lead in the polls.On Sunday, Mr. DeSantis appeared at a barbecue in Rye, N.H., co-hosted by former Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts, who served as an ambassador in the Trump administration. Mr. Brown, who is staying neutral in the race for now, is hosting similar events for several Republican candidates, although Mr. Trump’s camp has not yet reached out about attending, Mr. Brown said.As is his normal practice, Mr. DeSantis did not mention Mr. Trump in his stump speech. But in a question-and-answer session afterward, one voter asked the governor, “Given Trump’s stronghold on what seems to be a majority of the party, what’s your strategy to show Trump supporters that you’re a better alternative?”Mr. DeSantis responded by saying he believed many Republicans were open to nominating someone other than Mr. Trump.“I think with me, you know, I’m the candidate that’s more likely to beat Biden,” he said. “I’m more reliable on policy. I think you’ve seen my record in Florida, and I’m much more likely to actually get all this stuff done.”“We ended the presidency with Fauci running the government,” Mr. DeSantis continued, referring to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the federal government’s former top infectious disease expert, who is deeply unpopular with Republican voters. “That’s not draining the swamp.”Hank Bivins, the voter who asked the question, said the response left him somewhat underwhelmed.“He has to differentiate himself more,” said Mr. Bivins, 53, who is still undecided. “He’s going to have to fine-tune that answer.”Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Mr. Trump, accused Mr. DeSantis of being “nothing more than an off-brand, bootleg version of America First.”“No matter how much time he spends cosplaying as President Trump, he will never be him or achieve a hundredth of what was achieved during the Trump administration,” Mr. Cheung said in a statement.A recent University of New Hampshire poll showed Mr. Trump leading the field in the state with 37 percent of the vote, followed by Mr. DeSantis with 23 percent.But Mr. Brown said Mr. DeSantis was doing the right things to close the gap, saying that of all the candidates in the race, only field workers representing Mr. DeSantis had knocked on his door so far.And he said that Mr. DeSantis had improved noticeably as a retail politician since he last saw the governor campaign in New Hampshire in June.“I see him today and he’s way better,” Mr. Brown said. “And he’s connecting better.” More

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      Climate Activists and Steve King Unlikely Allies in Iowa Pipeline Fight

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      Liberal environmentalists and conservative landowners, led by the former congressman Steve King, are pressuring Republican candidates to oppose three Midwestern pipelines.Emma Schmidt, a lifelong environmental activist in Rockwell City, Iowa, had long searched for potent allies in her fight against a massive carbon dioxide pipeline planned for her state.But she never expected to find herself at former Representative Steve King’s house, making her case as she stared up at a pistol in the paw of a taxidermied raccoon in his home office.That meeting in June between a liberal Democrat and a conservative Republican who lost his seat in Congress in 2020 after incendiary racist comments was the beginning of a left-right alliance that is trying to push the debate of the pipeline to the forefront of the heated G.O.P. presidential caucuses.“We’re putting in a whole lot of money into pipelines that are not necessary, that bulldoze their way through some of the richest farmlands in the world, to sequester CO2,” said an incredulous Mr. King on Tuesday.Steve King, a former member of Congress who lost his seat after a series of racist comments, is an unlikely ally for liberal climate activists in Iowa. Joshua Lott/Getty ImagesThe $4.5 billion Summit, $3 billion Navigator and $630 million Wolf Carbon pipelines may not be front and center next month at the first Republican presidential debate. They probably won’t be featured in super PAC advertising or mentioned during Fox News appearances. But the pipelines capture a national debate with local consequences, and they will give candidates a chance to showcase their understanding of Iowa, the first state to weigh in on the Republican nominating fight — if they can navigate the issue.The Summit, Navigator and Wolf pipelines, fueled by federal tax credits embraced by both parties, would draw carbon dioxide from the factories that turn Iowa corn into ethanol. They would snake through 3,300 miles of farmland in Iowa and other Midwestern states, then pump the planet-warming gas into the bedrock beneath Illinois and North Dakota. And they are pitched as a climate protection measure, though some experts and environmentalists say it is only a partial solution at best.Earlier this month, an Iowa woman seemed to stump the front-runner, former President Donald J. Trump, when she asked how he would “help us in Iowa save our farmland from the CO2 pipelines.”Mr. Trump stammered that he was “working on that” and that he “had a plan to totally, uh, it’s such a ridiculous situation,” before reassuring the crowd, “if we win, that’s going to be taken care of.”The moment has been laughed off as a show of Mr. Trump’s ability to bluster his way through anything, but the issue is tricky: Several of the Republican candidates have cast doubt on the established climate science and would seem disinclined to back a project aimed at reducing carbon emissions. But opposing the pipeline also means opposing Iowa’s all-important ethanol industry.The state’s popular Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, has avoided taking a public position. Opponents believe she supports the deal, which is backed by some of her biggest political contributors, including Bruce Rastetter, founder of the Summit Agricultural Group. Ms. Reynolds’s office did not respond to requests for comment.The state’s popular Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, has avoided taking a public position on the pipeline, which is backed by one of her biggest political contributors. Kelsey Kremer/The Des Moines Register, via Associated PressPowerful figures from both parties have signed with the pipeline companies, including Terry Branstad, Ms. Reynolds’s predecessor, and Jess Vilsack, the son of another former Iowa governor and the current Democratic secretary of agriculture, Tom Vilsack. Agriculture giants like John Deere and A.D.M. have invested in the efforts.Presidential candidates have tried to skirt the issue; most campaigns declined to comment, including Mr. Trump’s. But campaign aides said this week that they knew a time for choosing was coming. The first public hearings on the Summit pipeline will begin on Aug. 22 in Fort Dodge, Iowa.Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida is expecting questions later this week in a swing through the state, according to people familiar with the campaign.The left-right alliance is giving voice to Iowa landowners infuriated by the prospect that their land could be seized by eminent domain for the pipelines. Tim Baughman, who farms 330 acres with his sister in Crawford County, Iowa, brought his anti-pipeline sign to a Vivek Ramaswamy event in Dennison, eliciting a promise from the Republican entrepreneur to oppose the projects.“I’m fighting this to the end,” vowed Dan Wahl, who grows corn, soybeans and alfalfa on 160 acres near Spirit Lake, Iowa, and recently chased Summit surveyors off his land.The left-right alliance is giving voice to Iowa landowners concerned about the prospect that their land could be seized by eminent domain for the pipelines. Walker Pickering for The New York TimesSupporters — including agribusiness conglomerates and oil and gas tycoons — see the projects as a way to persuade liberal states like California it is possible to both continue ethanol production and fight global warming. If it works, so-called carbon capture and sequestration, the practice of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, could be expanded to oil and gas, extending the life of the fossil fuel economy.Dean Ferguson, president of the Canada-based Wolf Carbon Solutions’s American subsidiary, said in a statement that he was hopeful that the pipeline planned from Iowa to Illinois would be built through voluntary easements.“Our approach is to build lasting relationships with landowners, so we can work together for years to come,” he said.In a statement, Summit Carbon Solutions said 75 percent of Iowa landowners along the project route had signed voluntary easements “and more are signing every day.”To opponents, the pipelines are dangerous, taxpayer-subsidized boondoggles that will destroy farmland and do nothing to curb global warming. A carbon dioxide pipeline ruptured in tiny Satartia, Miss., in 2020, sending 40 people to the hospital, forcing the evacuation of more than 300 others and releasing more than 31,000 barrels of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.“Climate change money should be spent on things that are proven to actually work,” said Jessica Mazour, the conservation program coordinator of the Sierra Club in Iowa, who is helping to unite environmental activists with conservative farmers who doubt climate change is real.The unusual alliance can be strained. Sherri Webb, 73, who owns 40 acres of farmland in Shelby County, Iowa, said she had her doubts about climate change: “I don’t believe it’s as bad as some people are thinking.” If anything, she added, she worries more about taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and away from her crops.But it was the threat of eminent domain that got her involved in the fight against the Summit pipeline. Summit Carbon Solutions says the pipeline on her land would be buried four feet deep, covered with top soil and reseeded. But her climate-friendly, no-till farm has been in her family for 123 years and hasn’t had the soil turned in decades. The pipeline digging, she said, will bring heavy diesel-powered equipment onto her property, and may cause erosion and crop loss for years. .Sherri Webb, who owns 40 acres of farmland in Shelby County, Iowa, says it was worries about losing land to eminent domain that got her involved in the fight against the pipeline. Walker Pickering for The New York TimesMs. Schmidt is fine with climate skepticism. “A key tenet for change,” she said, “is to meet people where they’re at.”Mr. King was first ousted from his committee assignments, then defeated in a primary challenge, after a series of racist comments culminated in an interview with The New York Times in which he asked, “White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?”But Ms. Schmidt said that Mr. King, after 18 years in Congress, remained influential in conservative western Iowa.“I certainly never thought we’d be in a position to have a meeting where you have incredibly liberal socialists teaming with very right-wing QAnon believers,” she continued. “People have to open their minds a little bit, and sometimes they have to shut their mouths.”How Republican presidential candidates respond is, at this point, anyone’s guess. Despite Mr. Trump’s more recent comments, when he was president, his administration said it had no plan to stop the pipelines. In fact, a tax credit created in 2008 to incentivize carbon capture programs like Summit, Navigator and Wolf was expanded by a budget law in 2018 that Mr. Trump signed, and expanded again by a tax bill signed by Mr. Trump in 2020. The credit was expanded yet again by President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.Mr. Rastetter has donated around $10,000 to Mr. Trump’s campaigns since 2016, along with the hundreds of thousands he has donated to national and state Republican interests over the past 15 years.Officials at Navigator declined to comment.Critics say Mr. Trump has every reason to oppose the pipeline now. He has called climate change a “hoax” devised by China, so the pipelines are billed as a solution to a problem he does not recognize. Even better, he could use his stated opposition to continue a feud with Ms. Reynolds, whom he has blasted for refusing to endorse him, said Jane Kleeb, a Nebraska Democrat and anti-pipeline activist who has been pressing Mr. Trump to get involved.“There’s no downside for him,” she said.When Mr. Ramaswamy, who has called climate activism a cult, was asked about the issue last month in Davenport, Iowa, he dismissed the pipelines as a solution in search of a problem.But in an interview this week, Mr. Ramaswamy did not blame economic and political interests in Iowa. They are merely responding to incentives set by the federal government, large states like California, and even climate-conscious European nations, he said.“The debate in Iowa is just collateral damage,” he said.Other candidates might have a tougher time threading that needle. The companies backing the pipelines frame them as a salvation for ethanol, which Iowa corn farmers depend on, in a world increasingly hostile to internal combustion engines. One candidate, Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota, does not have the luxury of silence. He has already championed the Summit pipeline, which would end in his state, telling The Bismarck Tribune in May that two carbon dioxide pipelines have operated safely in the state for years.“And then now it’s like these are the most dangerous things in the world,” he scoffed. More

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      How Trump Could Wreck Things for Republicans in 2024

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      Things just got a whole lot more interesting in New Hampshire politics. Just below the presidential churn, the governor’s race in the politically quirky Granite State has some superjuicy drama percolating — the kind that offers a vivid reminder of just how much trouble Donald Trump stands to cause for his party in 2024.Gov. Chris Sununu, currently enjoying his fourth two-year term, recently announced that he would not run for re-election next year. This instantly gave Democrats their best shot at flipping a governorship from red to blue in 2024, and the race is now rated as a tossup. Quick as a bunny, Republican contenders began hopping into the field, and both parties started gearing up for a brawl.Of the candidates so far, the best known is the former senator Kelly Ayotte. Like Mr. Sununu, Ms. Ayotte is from the more moderate, pragmatic, bipartisan end of the Republican spectrum — as you might expect in this staunchly independent, politically purple state. Elected to the Senate in 2010, she was considered a serious up-and-comer in the party until, with a little help from Mr. Trump’s lousy coattails, she narrowly lost her 2016 re-election race against the Democrat Maggie Hassan.It’s hard to know precisely how much of a drag Mr. Trump, who also lost New Hampshire that year, exerted on Ms. Ayotte. But the senator’s wild waffling over Mr. Trump’s fitness for office surely didn’t help: Did she see as him a role model? “Absolutely.” Oops, make that no! Would she endorse his candidacy? Um, not really. Did she personally support him? Yes. Wait, no!The voters of New Hampshire were unimpressed.Seven years later, Ms. Ayotte is looking to make a comeback. Unfortunately for her, so is Mr. Trump, who may be popular in deep red states but will be a source of agita for Ms. Ayotte and other Republicans in swing states who might have to share the ticket with him. Republicans are hopeful about picking up Senate, House and governors’ seats in 2024, but they have barely started to contend with how the once-and-aspiring president could complicate things for down-ballot candidates.Nowhere is this clearer than in New Hampshire, a key presidential battleground. The state’s Trump-infected political landscape looks even more treacherous in 2024 than it did in 2016. Not just because of the former president’s latest campaign, which is shaping up to be even nastier and more divisive than his first two, but also because of Mr. Sununu’s high-profile crusade to tank that campaign.One of the nation’s most popular governors and one of his party’s most prominent Trump critics, Mr. Sununu has grown increasingly adamant that his party must move beyond the 45th president, and he has publicly pledged to work against Mr. Trump’s nomination. If Mr. Trump is the nominee in 2024, “Republicans will lose again. Just as we did in 2018, 2020 and 2022. This is indisputable, and I am not willing to let it happen without a fight,” Mr. Sununu wrote in The Washington Post last month.This move may burnish Mr. Sununu’s independent rep nationwide. (He is seen as a future presidential player.) But it only complicates life for many down-ballot Republicans in the state. Especially ones, like Ms. Ayotte, who have a somewhat … troubled history with the fealty-obsessed Mr. Trump.For the G.O.P., the New Hampshire governor’s office is one of the shrinking number of outposts where a pragmatic, old-school breed of Republican leader has been able to thrive in the midst of the party’s MAGAfication. Republicans felt confident Mr. Sununu had the juice to win, no matter who topped the ticket next year. Any other Republican is a shakier bet for winning the independent and crossover votes needed to win statewide in New Hampshire. The governor’s departure is being talked about as yet another step in the party’s ideological constriction.Although broadly popular, Mr. Sununu is not beloved in New Hampshire’s conservative circles. His anti-Trump mission will do nothing to improve this. “I think Sununu is trying to dance the same tightrope I am and a lot of us are: being very forceful about the fact that we need a new nominee and yet trying not to take too big of a dump on the former president,” said Jason Osborne, the Republican leader of the state House and one of Ms. Ayotte’s early endorsers.Fancy footwork aside, the Trumpnunu rift is going to make it harder for the governor’s aspiring successors to avoid getting sucked into the Trump vortex — the dangers of which Ms. Ayotte knows too well. She is already trying to get out ahead of the issue, asserting that she will support whoever winds up the party’s standard-bearer.“I do wonder whether she’s going to hold to that line of, ‘Hey, that’s between Sununu and Trump,’” said Dante Scala, a professor of political science at the University of New Hampshire. “She may be able to do that for some time.”But as campaign season heats up, look for Ayotte et al. to be increasingly pressed to clarify their views on the whole mess. (Trust me: Intraparty feuding is catnip for political journalists.) Staying out of the muck will very likely require elaborate tap dancing on a tightrope while juggling hot potatoes.The situation will be even thornier for whomever Mr. Sununu decides to endorse — which, at this point, is expected to be Ms. Ayotte. Sure, a popular governor’s nod in the race to succeed him will serve as a vote of confidence in the eyes of many. But it could also “fire up the conservative base even more” to undermine his pick, said Mike Dennehy, a G.O.P. strategist in the state. The territory is “more complicated than in 2016,” he asserted. And some think it would be best for the governor to delay endorsing until much later in the game.All of this, mind you, is piled on top of Ms. Ayotte’s specific challenges as a candidate. (Pro-life in a pro-choice state post-Dobbs? Oof.) And the basic political disposition of New Hampshire. “In general, it has become a slightly uphill battle to beat Democrats,” observed Mr. Scala.Stay tuned. As with so much in Mr. Trump’s Republican Party, this promises to be quite the show.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

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      Trump Says Republicans Should Investigate Democrats or Risk Losing Their Seats

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      Casting Republicans as meek, former President Donald J. Trump said members of his party should pursue investigations against Democrats — or risk losing their seats.Former President Donald J. Trump lashed out at Republicans in Congress while campaigning in Pennsylvania on Saturday, threatening members of his party who do not share his appetite for pursuing corruption investigations against President Biden and his family — and for retribution.In a litany of grievances about his deepening legal woes and the direction of the country, the twice-indicted former president cast G.O.P. holdouts as meek during a rally in Erie, Pa., criticizing their response to what he described as politically motivated prosecutions against him.“The Republicans are very high class,” he said. “You’ve got to get a little bit lower class.”And then Mr. Trump, the overwhelming front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, put party members on notice.“Any Republican that doesn’t act on Democratic fraud should be immediately primaried,” said Mr. Trump, to the roaring approval of several thousand supporters at the Erie Insurance Arena. Throughout the night he referenced the case against Hunter Biden and accused the president of complicity in his son’s troubles.It was the first solo campaign event and the second public appearance for Mr. Trump since the Justice Department added charges against him in connection with his mishandling of classified documents after leaving office.In a superseding indictment filed on Thursday in U.S. District Court in Florida, federal prosecutors presented evidence that Mr. Trump told the property manager of Mar-a-Lago, his private club and residence in Florida, that he wanted security camera footage there to be deleted.Prosecutors also charged him, along with one of his personal aides, with conspiring to obstruct the government’s repeated attempts to reclaim the classified material.On the same day that the additional charges were announced, Mr. Trump’s lawyers met with federal prosecutors to discuss another expected indictment, one centering on Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.Mr. Trump’s rally on Saturday was his first solo campaign event since the Justice Department added new charges against him in the documents case.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesTo Mr. Trump’s unflinching supporters gathered inside the arena, the cascade of indictments was a punchline — if not a badge of honor.Edward X. Young, 63, a debt consolidation company consultant and part-time actor who was dressed like Elvis Presley, wore a T-shirt with a mock-up mug shot of Mr. Trump. He said he had driven 10 hours from Point Pleasant, N.J., to attend Mr. Trump’s rally, his 59th.“I think he’s being persecuted,” he said of the former president. Ruth Jenkins, 61, a Republican from Rochester, N.Y., who works for a Wegmans grocery store, said that she did not believe that Mr. Trump had been motivated to run for president to avoid criminal liability.“Well, who wouldn’t want to be kept out of prison?” she said, claiming that the latest charges against Mr. Trump were the latest attempt to shift attention away from the case against the president’s son.As Mr. Trump prepared to take the stage, campaign workers helped fill in an empty section near the back of the arena, which had been configured to seat 8,000.The playlist for the rally featured “Try That in a Small Town,” the Jason Aldean hit that was filmed at the site of a lynching and pulled from Country Music Television amid criticism.With Mr. Trump as its standard-bearer, the Republican Party has watched Democrats in Pennsylvania secure high-profile victories in the last year, including flipping a U.S. Senate seat, holding on to the governor’s office and gaining control of the statehouse.In 2020, Mr. Trump lost the battleground state by nearly 82,000 votes to Mr. Biden, who was born there.Despite several courts rejecting his election lawsuits in Pennsylvania, Mr. Trump has continued to cling to falsehoods about results, including on Saturday.“We got screwed,” he said, baselessly claiming that news outlets had delayed their race calls because he had been ahead. “I said, ‘Why aren’t they calling Pennsylvania?’”Mr. Trump, who spoke for more than 100 minutes, said that he still had not decided whether he would take part in the first Republican presidential debate, which will take place on Aug. 23 and be televised by Fox News.Mr. Trump said that there appeared to be little upside to debating on a “hostile” network — Fox News began to fall out of favor with the former president after it became the first major outlet to call Arizona for Mr. Biden in 2020 — and noted his commanding polling lead over his G.O.P. opponents. His nearest competitor, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, trailed him by about 30 percentage points in national polls.“If I don’t go to the debate, they say — I’m not saying this — they say the ratings are going to be very bad,” he said. “Should I do it or not?”The crowd’s answer was resounding: “No.” More

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      Trump PAC Requested Refund for Legal Fees

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      The situation signals a potential money crisis as the former president runs a campaign while under indictment in two jurisdictions and, soon, potentially a third.The political action committee that former President Donald J. Trump is using to pay his legal bills faced such staggering costs this year that it requested a refund on a $60 million contribution it made to another group supporting the Republican front-runner, according to two people familiar with the matter.The decision signals a potential money crisis for Mr. Trump, who has so far refused to pay his own voluminous bills directly and has also avoided creating a legal-defense fund for himself and people who have become entangled in the various investigations related to him.It comes as Mr. Trump runs a campaign while under indictment in two jurisdictions and, soon, potentially a third, while also paying the legal fees of a number of witnesses who are close to him or who work for him.It is unclear how much money was refunded.But the refund was sought as the political action committee, Save America, spent more than $40 million in legal fees incurred by Mr. Trump and witnesses in various legal cases related to him this year alone, according to another person familiar with the matter.The numbers will be part of the Save America Federal Election Commission filing that is expected to be made public late on Monday.That $40 million was in addition to $16 million that Save America spent in the previous two years on legal fees. Since then, Mr. Trump has been indicted twice and has expanded the size of his legal team, and his two co-defendants in the case related to his retention of classified material work for him. The total legal spending is roughly $56 million.The $40 million figure was reported earlier by The Washington Post.The PAC was the entity in which Mr. Trump had parked the more than $100 million raised when he sought small-dollar donations after losing the 2020 election. Mr. Trump claimed he needed the support to fight widespread fraud in the race. Officials, including some with his campaign, turned up no evidence of widespread fraud.Mr. Trump used some of that $100 million for other politicians and political activities in 2022, but he also used it to pay more than $16 million in legal fees, most of them related to investigations into him, and at least $10 million of which was for his own personal fees.Save America began 2023 with just $18 million in cash on hand, which is less than half of what was spent on legal bills this year.Campaign finance experts are divided on whether Mr. Trump is even able to continue to use the PAC to pay for his personal legal bills, as he became a candidate last November.Mr. Trump has long told associates that lawyers and other people contracted to work for him should do so for free, because they get free publicity. And he has told several associates that legal-defense funds are organized only by people who are guilty of crimes, according to people who have heard the remarks.Earlier this year, Mr. Trump began diverting a larger percentage of every dollar he raised online away from his campaign and into his PAC, which he has used to pay for his lawyers. At the start of the 2024 campaign, Mr. Trump had devoted 99 cents of every dollar raised online to his campaign. But he shifted that formula to now give only 90 cents to the campaign and 10 cents to the PAC, which has served as a sort of de facto legal fund.The move drew sharp criticism from some of his rivals. Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, called it “disgraceful” on CNN during an interview in June.“He’s going to middle class men and women in this country and they’re donating $15, $25, $50, $100 because they believe in Donald Trump and they want him to be president again,” Mr. Christie said. “They’re not giving that money so he can pay his personal legal fees.”Yet that increased amount diverted from Mr. Trump’s campaign couldn’t possibly begin to cover the high costs of legal fees that the candidate and his associates have incurred. And whatever money the super PAC returned to the political action committee to cover legal bills in theory means less money being spent in support of Mr. Trump’s candidacy.A spokesman for Mr. Trump’s campaign, Steven Cheung, would not comment on the refund request. But regarding the overall spending on lawyers, he said, “The weaponized Department of Justice has continued to go after innocent Americans because they worked for President Trump and they know they have no legitimate case.”He characterized the legal actions against Mr. Trump and his allies as “heinous actions by Joe Biden’s cronies” and said the PAC had contributed to covering legal costs to “protect these innocent people from financial ruin and prevent their lives from being completely destroyed.”A spokesman for the super PAC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Despite having his political action committee pay his legal fees, Mr. Trump, a wealthy businessman and celebrity, insisted on Saturday at a rally in Erie, Pa., that he would spend his own money on his campaign if he had to. More

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      Trump and DeSantis Collide for First Time in Iowa, as Fortunes Diverge

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      A contest once viewed as a two-man race between Donald J. Trump and Ron DeSantis has settled into a new dynamic: Mr. Trump versus everyone else.When former President Donald J. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida shared the same stage at an Iowa Republican Party dinner on Friday, their appearances seemed to capture the basic dynamics of the 2024 presidential primary.Mr. Trump played headliner. Mr. DeSantis was reduced to an opening act.Even as Mr. Trump has been hit with two criminal indictments, with more possibly coming, he has only consolidated support in recent months, flashing the same resilience in Iowa that he has nationally.Mr. Trump’s rivals have long circled Iowa as the early state where Mr. Trump, who finished a disappointing second in the 2016 Iowa caucuses, might be most vulnerable in 2024. But although some influential leaders have signaled their eagerness for an alternative, Mr. Trump arrived on Friday for one of his episodic visits as the undisputed front-runner, as Republicans look past his political and legal liabilities.His mere appearance generated some of the evening’s loudest applause. Like the 12 other candidates who spoke, he entered to snippets of “Only in America” by Brooks & Dunn. The lyrics that blared as he took the stage were:One could end up going to prison. One just might be president.Mr. DeSantis arrived in Des Moines after a two-day bus tour that was aimed at stabilizing his campaign amid two successive rounds of staff cutbacks and demonstrating his investment in the state, which comes first on the nominating calendar. There were public displays of humility — small-town stops, shopping for snacks at a gas station (he bought a protein bar), taking questions from voters and reporters — that were previously missing from the governor’s once higher-flying campaign.Gov. Ron DeSantis, Republican of Florida, speaking at the dinner on Friday night after a more humble bus tour of Iowa.Jordan Gale for The New York Times“Six months ago, you would have said there were two tiers: Trump and DeSantis, and then everyone else,” Craig Robinson, an Iowa Republican strategist, said. Now, he said, “you have Donald Trump in a tier by himself and you have everyone else trying to be the alternative to Trump.”While Mr. DeSantis is stuck trying to reset his campaign, former Vice President Mike Pence is facing the possibility of not even qualifying for the first debate next month. The rest of the field is straining for voters to pay any attention at all.Mr. Trump has certainly provided openings for his rivals in Iowa. Against his own team’s wishes, he criticized the popular Republican governor of Iowa, Kim Reynolds, this month. (He did not mention her on Friday.) And in a state that has often rewarded frequent visits, Mr. Trump has campaigned only sporadically.On Friday, Mr. Trump stayed for an hour after his speech to shake hands and take pictures with supporters. Mr. DeSantis mingled with a crowd down the hall with a Coors Light in hand.Mr. Trump’s growing strength in national polling — he has surged above 50 percent in many surveys — has reinforced an emerging dynamic in which he is being treated as the de facto incumbent, both by party insiders with years of reluctantly falling into line under their belt and by risk-averse donors, according to interviews with numerous Republican strategists and officials.Mr. Trump greeting supporters at his new Iowa campaign headquarters on Friday.Christopher Smith for The New York TimesThe first primary debate, scheduled for late August, is widely viewed as the critical next date for Mr. DeSantis or anyone else to upend the current dynamic, even if Mr. Trump does not attend.For now, outside groups looking to slow down Mr. Trump have focused on Iowa. The new political action committee Win It Back, which is tied to the Club for Growth, has run negative television ads worth $3.5 million this month in Iowa and South Carolina.The ads themselves reveal much about the current state of the race. Each features testimonials from Republican voters describing both their affection for the former president and their interest in moving on.“I love what he did,” the narrator in one ad says. “He definitely was the right man in 2016,” the narrator in another says, before pivoting, “It’s just time for new blood.”Mr. Trump’s enduring popularity with the Republican base has meant that even his competitors often sandwich the gentlest of criticism with praise. Few of his rivals mentioned his name on Friday, while Mr. Trump repeatedly used a derisive nickname for Mr. DeSantis. “I wouldn’t take a chance on that one,” he said.One rival who addressed Mr. Trump directly was Will Hurd, a former Texas congressman running a long-shot campaign. He declared that Mr. Trump was running for president again to avoid prison. He was booed as he exited the stage.Former Representative Will Hurd was booed as he left the stage for suggesting that Mr. Trump was running for president again just to avoid prison.Jordan Gale for The New York TimesMr. DeSantis himself has generally avoided direct criticism of Mr. Trump.He did not say the former president’s name on Friday, and when he was asked about the criminal charges facing Mr. Trump in an interview with CBS News on Thursday, Mr. DeSantis answered with only a vague generality: “I think voters have to make this decision on that.”Some prominent Trump critics have questioned such a delicate approach, especially as his criminal problems have mounted.“If you’re down 20 points in the polls to anybody, you’ve got to be able to hit them,” said Gov. Chris Sununu of New Hampshire, who decided against a 2024 run for president but attended the dinner in Iowa.Mr. Trump has been indicted by the Manhattan district attorney and a Justice Department special counsel already this year, and he may face another special counsel indictment for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. A separate investigation into efforts to interfere with the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia could result in yet another charge.Many Republicans who are leery of entering another turbulent cycle with Mr. Trump atop the ticket remain intrigued by the Florida governor but not yet sold.“I think people are just waiting for DeSantis to close the deal for them,” said David Kerr, a DeSantis supporter who attended an event in Osceola with the governor at a distillery this week.Mr. DeSantis during a stop at a center for wounded and disabled veterans in Albia, Iowa, on his bus tour on Friday.Christopher Smith for The New York TimesMr. DeSantis has now committed to visiting all 99 of Iowa’s counties (he is at 17, according to a campaign aide), an arduous task for a candidate who is trying to compete across all the early states and must travel the country to fund-raise for a campaign supported heavily by big-money bundlers.“This caucus demands that you earn it,” Mr. DeSantis said on Friday. Mr. Trump has mostly focused on visiting more populous areas rather than every county.For Mr. DeSantis, the goal is to come in first — or a strong enough second to prove that Mr. Trump can be beat and narrow the contest to a two-person race. But some of Mr. DeSantis’s allies worry that the heavy emphasis on Iowa could prove a self-inflicted knockout punch — that after investing so much, his campaign will have a less than compelling case to carry on if he falters badly in the opening state.Kathy Kooiker, a Republican activist in Clark County, Iowa, had a Trump flag in her yard for years but said she had folded it folded up and put it away. She is trying to explore the other candidates to decide whom to support instead of Mr. Trump, and she went to the DeSantis event in Osceola.“He hasn’t been in Iowa as much as the other candidates, so I’m glad to see — I think it’s a mistake not to do that,” Ms. Kooiker said.Republicans in Iowa, both those who support Mr. Trump and those who oppose him, see the race there as at least slightly more competitive than national polls would suggest.Amy Sinclair, the president of the Iowa State Senate, who has endorsed Mr. DeSantis, acknowledged, “it’s a tough uphill battle to fight against a machine like Donald Trump.”But she said Mr. Trump’s swipe at Ms. Reynolds had damaged him. “He’s not doing himself any favors if he wants to win Iowa behaving that way,” she said. “You don’t insult our family.”Ryan Rhodes, who served as Iowa state director for Ben Carson’s presidential campaign in 2016, agreed that the episode had broken through among conservative activists.“Trump needs to get out there and talk to Iowans again,” Mr. Rhodes said.Mr. Trump may not yet have personally worked aggressively for votes in Iowa, but he has professionalized what in 2016 was a scattershot political operation. His campaign had secured its keynote slot on Friday night by being the fastest to confirm its attendance with the state party. More

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      Videos of Dianne Feinstein and Mitch McConnell Resurface Questions About Age

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      Two troubling moments involving Senators Dianne Feinstein and Mitch McConnell thrust questions about aging in office out of Congress and into the national conversation.After a series of troubling moments this week, an uncomfortable question has become unavoidable, leaving voters, strategists and even politicians themselves wondering: Just how old is too old to serve in public office?For years, like so many children of aging parents across America, politicians and their advisers in Washington tried to skirt that difficult conversation, wrapping concerns about their octogenarian leaders in a cone of silence. The omertà was enabled by the traditions of a city that arms public figures with a battalion of aides, who manage nearly all of their professional and personal lives.“I don’t know what the magic number is, but I do think that as a general rule, my goodness, when you get into the 80s, it’s time to think about a little relaxation,” said Trent Lott, 81, a former Senate majority leader who retired at the spry age of 67 to start his own lobbying firm. “The problem is, you get elected to a six-year term, you’re in pretty good shape, but four years later you may not be so good.”Two closely scrutinized episodes this week thrust questions about aging with dignity in public office out of the halls of Congress and into the national conversation.On Wednesday, video of Senator Mitch McConnell, 81, freezing for 20 seconds in front of television cameras reverberated across the internet and newscasts. Less than 24 hours later, another clip surfaced of Senator Dianne Feinstein, 90, appearing confused when asked to vote in committee.A political discussion on the issue of age has been building for months, as the country faces the possibility of a presidential contest between the oldest candidates in American history. President Biden, 80, already the oldest president to sit in the White House, is vying for a second term, and Donald J. Trump, 77, is leading the Republican primary race.“When I say we need to pass the baton to younger generations, I’m not talking about youthful generations,” said Representative Dean Phillips of Minnesota, 54, the only Democrat in Congress to say that Ms. Feinstein should step down and that Mr. Biden should not seek re-election. “I’m talking about simply a reasonably less aged generation.”Mr. McConnell’s stumble created a fresh opening for younger contenders to raise the issue more aggressively. On Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, 44, a top Republican presidential candidate, took a jab at the country’s political gerontocracy.“You used to serve in your prime and then pass the baton to the next generation, and I think this generation has not really been as willing to do that,” Mr. DeSantis told the right-leaning commentator Megyn Kelly, noting that Mr. Biden became a senator in 1973 — five years before Mr. DeSantis was born.Notably, Mr. Trump, who would be 82 at the end of a second term, has defended Mr. Biden, saying that the president should not be discounted because of his age. “He is not an old man,” Mr. Trump posted this month on Truth Social, his social media platform. “In actuality, life begins at 80!”Doctors for Mr. Biden have said he is in good health. Less is known about Mr. Trump’s health since he left the White House.After Mr. Biden was captured tripping over a sandbag in June, White House aides have grown increasingly sensitive to any insinuation that he is physically diminished.He now regularly uses a shorter set of stairs to board Air Force One, an observation noted in a report by Politico that prompted aides to circulate 13 photos of his predecessors using stairs that appear to be of a similar length. He has not gone out to get his beloved ice cream, or dropped into any other business for an impromptu visit with voters, since early May. The White House says Mr. Biden’s crowded travel schedule has not allowed for such stops this summer.Some top advisers to Mr. Biden argue that his campaign should directly embrace his age as a political asset — and undeniable reality — rather than avoid the issue.“Age is in fact a superpower,” said Jeffrey Katzenberg, 72, the Hollywood mogul whom Mr. Biden named as a co-chairman of his campaign. “You can’t run from it because you’re 80 years old, right? There’s no denying it. I’ve been of the camp that believes strongly this is one of his greatest assets.”Surveys indicate that voters disagree, with many Democratic voters worrying about Mr. Biden’s age amid Republican attacks. In polling conducted by YouGov last year, a majority of Americans supported age limits for elected officials but were split over the precise cutoff. A cap at age 60 would bar 71 percent of the Senate from holding office, while a limit of 70 would render 30 percent ineligible, an analysis by the firm found.In North Dakota, a conservative activist this week began circulating petitions to force a statewide referendum next year that would prohibit anyone who would turn 81 by the end of their term from being elected or appointed to congressional seats.When asked, Mr. Biden dismisses worries about his age with jokes and boasts about his political experience. Mr. McConnell took a similar approach, telling reporters that he joked with the president about his health scare by saying that he had been “sandbagged” — a reference to how Mr. Biden laughed off his fall.Of course, even a good quip can’t stop the realities of growing older. After Mr. McConnell’s freeze, reports raised additional questions about his health since he missed weeks of work for a concussion in March.For her part, Ms. Feinstein, who has struggled with memory problems and a long absence from the Senate while she recovered from shingles, has appeared at times unable to respond to questions about her condition.Part of the problem, former aides say, is the interdependent relationship between politicians and their staffs. If a senator retires, his or her entire office — several dozen employees — can be suddenly out of work.And who wants to tell the boss that they are, perhaps, past their prime? It can be smoother to simply paper over the challenges by having aides craft policy, limit access to reporters and try to avoid unscripted moments.“The Senate is such a warm, comforting place that you can live inside that bubble,” said Jim Manley, 62, who worked for Senators Ted Kennedy and Harry Reid. “You have staff at beck and call, people opening doors for you all the time.”While other industries have mandatory retirement ages, including some publicly traded companies and airlines, members of Congress have shown little desire for policies that would amount to voting themselves out of a job. Even voters can’t seem to agree on when enough is enough, remaining divided when asked to back a specific age limit.The decision to leave a defining and powerful post is difficult, but the alternative — aging in the public eye — might be worse, former senators warned.“It’s heartbreaking, embarrassing, but it’s up to the individual to come to grips with reality,” said Chuck Hagel, 77, a former Nebraska senator who left office in 2009. “The reality is we are not going backwards; we’re all getting old. At 77, versus 62 when I left the Senate, I have pains now that I didn’t even know I should have.” More