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      Here’s the Status of the Four Criminal Investigations Into Donald Trump

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      The revelations from grand jury proceedings in Georgia are the latest signs that federal and local inquiries into the former president could reach key decision points in coming months.When the forewoman of a Georgia grand jury investigating allegations of election interference by former President Donald J. Trump and his advisers gave a series of highly public — and highly unusual — interviews this week, she suggested that the case might soon be headed toward indictment.Three other criminal inquiries involving Mr. Trump have also been progressing relatively quickly — if not quite as fast — in recent months, with the Justice Department pressing forward in Washington and a local prosecutor moving ahead in New York.No former president has ever confronted the barrage of legal threats that Mr. Trump now faces, all of which appear to be heading toward decision points by the authorities in coming months. Heightening the stakes, the inquiries have intensified just as Mr. Trump has started ramping up his third campaign for the White House.Beyond the Georgia case, Mr. Trump is under investigation by a special counsel in Washington for his role in seeking to overturn the results of the 2020 election and for his potential mishandling of classified documents. At the same time, local authorities in New York are looking into whether Mr. Trump authorized and was involved in falsely accounting for hush money payments to a pornographic film actress who said she had an affair with him.Even though much about the inquiries seems straightforward — “It’s not rocket science,” the forewoman in Georgia, Emily Kohrs, told The New York Times — each of the cases is layered with its own array of legal complexities that make predicting an outcome difficult. And that is to say nothing about the potential complications of bringing charges in the midst of a presidential campaign against a pugnacious figure like Mr. Trump, who has long assailed attempts by the authorities to hold him accountable as hoaxes and politically motivated witch hunts.Here is a look at the status of each of the criminal investigations confronting Mr. Trump.In Georgia, the Fulton County district attorney, Fani T. Willis, is looking at a variety of possible charges related to Mr. Trump’s efforts to reverse his 2020 election loss in the state.Lynsey Weatherspoon for The New York TimesGeorgia: Election InterferenceThe Georgia investigation presents two areas of exposure for Mr. Trump.One is his direct involvement in recruiting a slate of alternate presidential electors, even after Georgia’s results were recertified by the state’s Republican leadership. “We definitely talked about the alternate electors a fair amount,” Ms. Kohrs said. The other centers on phone calls Mr. Trump made to pressure state officials after the election, including one in which he told Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s secretary of state, that he needed to “find” 11,780 votes — one more than Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s margin of victory in the state.The decision about whether to charge Mr. Trump will ultimately be made by the Fulton County district attorney, Fani T. Willis, who has been investigating the case for the last two years. Ms. Willis’s office has said it is considering everything from conspiracy and racketeering to narrower charges, such as criminal solicitation to commit election fraud.The special grand jury that Ms. Kohrs served on produced a report last month after hearing testimony since last June, but most of the report has been kept secret. In an interview this week, Ms. Kohrs said the grand jurors had recommended that several people be indicted on a range of charges, but declined to provide names before the full report was released.Understand the Events on Jan. 6Timeline: On Jan. 6, 2021, 64 days after Election Day 2020, a mob of supporters of President Donald J. Trump raided the Capitol. Here is a close look at how the attack unfolded.A Day of Rage: Using thousands of videos and police radio communications, a Times investigation reconstructed in detail what happened — and why.Lost Lives: A bipartisan Senate report found that at least seven people died in connection with the attack.Jan. 6 Attendees: To many of those who attended the Trump rally but never breached the Capitol, that date wasn’t a dark day for the nation. It was a new start.In the small portion of the report that was released, the jurors said they saw potential evidence of perjury by “one or more” witnesses. But Ms. Kohrs said the jurors appended eight pages of criminal code citations to their report, hinting at its breadth.A number of legal experts have said Mr. Trump faces significant jeopardy in the Georgia inquiry.“His risk of being charged was already substantial even before the grand jury report excerpts,” said Norman Eisen, a lawyer who served as special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during Mr. Trump’s first impeachment trial. “The foreperson’s comments make that virtually certain.”Special Counsel: Overturning the ElectionThe Justice Department has been asking questions for more than a year about Mr. Trump’s sprawling efforts to overturn the election and whether he committed any crimes in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The investigation — one of two inherited in November by the special counsel, Jack Smith — has used a variety of methods and has gathered an enormous amount of information.Federal agents have seized cellphones and other devices from pro-Trump lawyers like John Eastman and Jeffrey Clark — as well as from one of Mr. Trump’s chief congressional allies, Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania.Prosecutors have issued grand jury subpoenas to several state Republican officials and to dozens of Trump administration lawyers and officials. Those include people like Mark Meadows, Mr. Trump’s onetime chief of staff, and former Vice President Mike Pence, who presumably have knowledge of the former president’s thoughts and behavior in weeks leading up to Jan. 6. In the most recent sign the investigation is continuing apace, Mr. Smith has issued subpoenas to Mr. Trump’s daughter Ivanka and his son-in-law Jared Kushner..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.Investigators have also been poring over thousands of pages of interviews conducted by the House select committee investigating Jan. 6, which recommended that Mr. Trump be prosecuted for crimes including inciting insurrection, conspiracy to defraud the United States, and the obstruction of a proceeding before Congress.One of the chief strands of the inquiry has focused on the plan to create false slates of pro-Trump electors in swing states actually won by Mr. Biden, mirroring one element of the Georgia investigation. Federal investigators have also been scrutinizing the broad claims by Mr. Trump and his allies that the election was marred by fraud, and a series of payments made by Save America PAC, Mr. Trump’s chief postelection fund-raising vehicle.Mr. Smith’s office has been tight-lipped about his plans, although several people familiar with the investigation have said that prosecutors could complete their work by spring or early summer. The process has often been slowed by time-consuming litigation as witnesses like Mr. Pence have sought to avoid or limit their grand jury testimony with various legal arguments.It remains unclear if Mr. Smith will ultimately indict Mr. Trump. But several legal experts — including Timothy J. Heaphy, a former U.S. attorney who led the House’s Jan. 6 investigation — have said that the key to bringing charges is obtaining clear-cut evidence that Mr. Trump intended to break the law.“When we started to see intentional conduct, specific steps that appear to be designed to disrupt the joint session of Congress, that’s where it starts to sound criminal,” Mr. Heaphy told The Times this week. “The whole key for the special counsel is intent.”Last August, the F.B.I. searched Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club and residence, and found more than 100 classified documents, after one of his lawyers had attested that no more were there.Marco Bello/ReutersSpecial Counsel: Classified DocumentsThe investigation into Mr. Trump’s handling of classified documents began in earnest last May with a subpoena. It sought the return of any classified material still in his possession, after he had voluntarily handed over an initial batch of records that turned out to include almost 200 classified documents.Within a month, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, M. Evan Corcoran, gave investigators more than 30 additional documents in response to the subpoena. Around the same time, another lawyer, Christina Bobb, asserted that a “diligent search” had been conducted at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club and residence in Florida, assuring prosecutors there were no more documents with classification markings.But the inquiry took a dramatic turn in August when acting on a search warrant, the F.B.I. descended on Mar-a-Lago and discovered more than 100 additional classified documents. The affidavit submitted by the Justice Department in seeking the search warrant said that investigators had “probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction” would be discovered.Mr. Pence and President Biden have also faced scrutiny for having classified materials in their possession — in Mr. Biden’s case, a separate special counsel investigation is underway. In the case of Mr. Trump, prosecutors have focused on a few key questions: Did Mr. Trump knowingly remove the sensitive records from the White House and did he willfully hold on to them in violation of the Espionage Act? Moreover, did he try to hinder investigators from figuring out why or where he kept them?To answer those questions, prosecutors have interviewed several junior aides to Mr. Trump and compelled grand jury testimony from more senior aides like Kash Patel.They have also sought to force Mr. Corcoran to testify fully in front of the grand jury. Mr. Corcoran tried to avoid answering questions by asserting attorney-client privilege on behalf of Mr. Trump. But the prosecutors have sought to pierce that privilege with the so-called crime-fraud exception, which can be invoked when there is evidence that legal advice or services have been used in furthering a crime.It remains unclear whether Mr. Smith will bring charges in this inquiry either. While no evidence exists at this point that Mr. Biden or Mr. Pence have sought to obstruct investigations into their own handling of documents — both brought their possession of the documents to the attention of the Justice Department — the parallel probes have complicated the political landscape and could give Mr. Trump a reason to cry foul if he is charged and the others are not.Manhattan District Attorney: Stormy DanielsThe investigation into Mr. Trump’s role in paying hush money to the porn actress Stormy Daniels has spanned five years, two Manhattan district attorneys and multiple grand juries.But recently, prosecutors under the current district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, appear to have moved closer than ever to indicting the former president. Last month, they began presenting evidence to a newly seated grand jury, which has heard from several witnesses as the office lays the groundwork for potential charges against Mr. Trump.The case would likely center on whether Mr. Trump and his company falsified business records to hide the payments to Ms. Daniels in the days before the 2016 election. But an indictment — let alone a conviction — is hardly assured.Any prosecution of the case would rely on testimony from Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer, who made the payment to Ms. Daniels and who pleaded guilty himself in 2018 to federal charges. Mr. Trump reimbursed Mr. Cohen for the $130,000 he paid out, and according to court papers in Mr. Cohen’s case, Mr. Trump’s company falsely identified the reimbursements as legal expenses.In New York, it is a misdemeanor to falsify business records. To make it a felony, prosecutors would need to show that Mr. Trump falsified the records to help commit or conceal a second crime — in this case, violating New York State election law, a legal theory that has not been tested. Mr. Trump has denied all wrongdoing and lashed out at the prosecutors for leading what he calls a partisan witch hunt against him. He has also denied having an affair with Ms. Daniels.Under Mr. Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the district attorney’s office had begun presenting evidence to an earlier grand jury about a far broader case focused on Mr. Trump’s business practices, including whether he fraudulently inflated the value of his assets by billions of dollars to secure favorable loans and other benefits.But in the early weeks of his tenure last year, Mr. Bragg developed concerns about the strength of that case and halted the grand jury presentation, prompting the resignations of two senior prosecutors leading the investigation.Jonah E. Bromwich More

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      Trump Spent $10 Million From His PAC on His Legal Bills Last Year

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      Now that the former president is a declared candidate again, there are questions about whether he can continue using donor funds to pay his lawyers.Former President Donald J. Trump, who throughout his business career had a reputation for not paying lawyers, spent roughly $10 million from his political action committee on his own legal fees last year, federal election filings show.The money that went to Mr. Trump’s legal bills was part of more than $16 million that Mr. Trump’s PAC, Save America, spent for legal-related payments in 2021 and 2022, the filings show.Some of the $16 million appears to have been for lawyers representing witnesses in investigations related to Mr. Trump’s efforts to cling to power. But the majority of it — about $10 million — went to firms directly representing Mr. Trump in a string of investigations and lawsuits, including some related to his company, the filings showed.Mr. Trump was well-known in New York City before winning the presidency in 2016 for refusing to pay his bills to a wide range of service providers and contractors. Lawyers were no exception, with Mr. Trump often saying people got free advertising by being involved with him.The recent spending related to Mr. Trump is notable not just for the sheer volume — it represented about 19 percent of the PAC’s total expenditures outside of transfers to one of his other political committees and those backing other candidates — but also because Mr. Trump is now a declared candidate for president again.Some campaign finance experts are raising questions about whether, as a candidate, Mr. Trump can continue to use the PAC to pay for his personal legal bills. Those questions are arising as he faces legal challenges on various fronts as well as intense scrutiny by the Justice Department and prosecutors in Georgia and New York.According to some campaign finance experts, having the PAC continue to pay his legal bills now that he is a candidate would be seen as a contribution to him, and therefore be subject to legal limits.“Payments by a PAC that exceed the contribution limit are contributions to the candidate and are unlawful,” said Jason Torchinsky, a campaign finance expert and lawyer with the firm Holtzman Vogel, referring to the limit on individual donations to candidates, which is set at $3,300 for the current two-year political cycle.Adav Noti, of the Campaign Legal Center, a group that has called on the Federal Election Commission to more strictly enforce the rules on personal use of campaign donations, called what is permissible a “gray area.” The Federal Election Commission has yet to provide the guidance on the issue that campaign finance experts have sought.The vast majority of Mr. Trump’s PAC money was raised before he officially entered the 2024 presidential race on Nov. 15. At the end of last year, the PAC had just over $18 million in cash on hand, its federal filings show.The Justice Department has been subpoenaing documents from vendors paid by the PAC, including law firms, in an effort to determine what they were being paid for..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.A spokesman for Mr. Trump did not respond to an email asking if Mr. Trump would still use Save America for his personal legal bills. Mr. Trump’s PAC was formed in late 2020 after the November election, as Mr. Trump was raising massive sums of money by vowing to fight what he claimed was widespread election fraud.Mr. Trump spent some of the money on fruitless efforts to show widespread election fraud. He also used it to defend against various matters related to the attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, 2021. The PAC that Mr. Trump’s advisers set up allowed for general use of the money so long as it did not directly support a future candidacy.The single biggest payment that Mr. Trump made from the PAC money to a law firm last year — $3 million — went to the Florida-based law firm Critton, Luttier and Coleman, which is affiliated with Christopher M. Kise, a former solicitor general of Florida. Mr. Kise joined Mr. Trump’s team initially to take on the Mar-a-Lago documents case and he is now involved in defending Mr. Trump and his company in a fraud suit filed by the New York attorney general, Letitia James.An additional $930,000 went to Continental, a law firm at which Mr. Kise is of counsel, the filings show.Another $1.3 million went to Silverman Thompson Slutkin and White, the firm of Evan Corcoran, a lawyer who began working with Mr. Trump last spring. Mr. Corcoran was brought into Mr. Trump’s orbit by Boris Epshteyn, a strategist who has played a coordinating role with some of the lawyers in cases involving Mr. Trump, as the investigation related to the Mar-a-Lago documents was heating up. (Mr. Epshteyn’s company was paid $195,000, but for broader strategic consulting, not legal consulting specifically.)The Justice Department recently filed a motion to compel Mr. Corcoran, who has appeared before a federal grand jury investigating Mr. Trump’s handling of classified documents, to give additional testimony, citing the crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege. The request means that prosecutors have reason to believe that legal advice or legal services may have been used by Mr. Trump or one of his allies in furthering a crime.Another roughly $1.2 million was paid to Ifrah Law, the firm of Jim Trusty, a former federal prosecutor who Mr. Trump saw on television and decided to hire.Roughly $1.3 million went to the law firm of Michael van der Veen. Mr. van der Veen represented Mr. Trump in his second impeachment trial and last year represented the Trump Organization in a tax fraud prosecution brought by the Manhattan district attorney. Mr. Trump’s company lost on all 17 counts.Another roughly $2 million was paid to the firm of Alina Habba, who represents Mr. Trump in a number of suits, including the New York attorney general suit and two suits brought by E. Jean Carroll, a New York writer who says Mr. Trump raped her in a department store changing room in the 1990s. Ms. Habba is also representing Mr. Trump in a suit against The New York Times for its reporting on Mr. Trump’s tax returns, a defamation case in Pennsylvania, and in a case against Mr. Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen.There have been various smaller payments for a constellation of other lawyers who have worked with Mr. Trump on issues including the investigation in Fulton County, Ga., into possible violations of election law and the subpoena he received from the House Jan. 6 committee. Those lawyers include Jesse Binnall, Harmeet Dhillon and Tim Parlatore, as well as the firms Earth and Water, Level Law, Weber Crabb and Wein and Wilenchik and Bartness.Some of those firms also represent or advise other witnesses in the investigations related to Mr. Trump, such as the former White House adviser Peter Navarro.One person for whom the money has not been used is Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer. Mr. Trump told aides in late 2020 that he did not want Mr. Giuliani paid for his work on Mr. Trump’s behalf unless he succeeded in undoing the election results, and Mr. Giuliani’s own legal fees have not been covered by Save America.The questions of which lawyers and vendors have been paid, and for what, intensified after the House select committee investigating Mr. Trump’s efforts to cling to power told the Justice Department that it had evidence that a lawyer representing a witness had tried to coach her testimony in ways that would be favorable to Mr. Trump. The witness in question was later identified by people familiar with the committee’s work as Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House aide.Her lawyer at the time, Stefan Passantino, was a former White House deputy counsel under Mr. Trump and was paid through Save America. He has denied the allegations and has said he represented her “honorably, ethically and fully consistent with her sole interests as she communicated them to me.” More

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      Who’s Running for President in 2024?

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      Three Republicans have entered the race President Biden is expected to run Likely to run Republicans Democrats Williamson Four years after a historically large number of candidates ran for president, the field for the 2024 campaign is starting out small and looks like it will be headlined by the same two aging men who ran […] More

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      Jury in Georgia Trump Inquiry Recommended Multiple Indictments, Forewoman Says

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      She would not discuss specific indictments in the special grand jury’s report but noted that its recommendations were “not going to be some giant plot twist.”A special grand jury that investigated election interference by former President Donald J. Trump and his allies in Georgia recommended indictments for multiple people on a range of charges in its final report, most of which remains sealed, the forewoman of the jury said on Tuesday.“It is not a short list,” the forewoman, Emily Kohrs, said in an interview.Ms. Kohrs, 30, declined to name the people recommended for indictment, since the judge handling the case decided to keep those details secret when he made public a few sections of the report last week. But seven sections that are still under wraps deal with indictment recommendations, Ms. Kohrs said.Special grand juries in Georgia do not have indictment powers. Fani T. Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County, Ga., has led the investigation and will decide what charges to bring before a regular grand jury.Asked whether the jurors had recommended indicting Mr. Trump, Ms. Kohrs would not answer directly but said: “You’re not going to be shocked. It’s not rocket science.” In the slim portions of the report that were released last week, the jurors said they saw possible evidence of perjury by “one or more” witnesses who testified before them.“It is not going to be some giant plot twist,” she added. “You probably have a fair idea of what may be in there. I’m trying very hard to say that delicately.”The investigation in Atlanta has been seen as one of the most significant legal threats to Mr. Trump as he begins another run for the presidency. In November, the Justice Department named a special counsel, Jack Smith, to oversee two Trump-related criminal investigations. And last month, the Manhattan district attorney’s office began presenting evidence to a grand jury on whether Mr. Trump paid hush money to a porn star during his 2016 presidential campaign, laying the groundwork for potential criminal charges against the former president in the coming months.A focal point of the Atlanta inquiry is a call that Mr. Trump made on Jan. 2, 2021, to Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, in which he pressed Mr. Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, to recalculate the results and “find” 11,780 votes, or enough to overturn his loss in the state.Understand Georgia’s Investigation of Election InterferenceCard 1 of 5A legal threat to Trump. More

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      When Students With Disabilities Are Removed From the Classroom

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      More from our inbox:Old People in Japan, and in AmericaHow Trump Will Campaign in 2024 Ricardo Nagaoka for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Students With Disabilities Are Secretly Removed From School” (front page, Feb. 10), about “off the book” suspensions of these students:We are all too happy to reprimand school personnel for informal removals, but we fail to recognize the root cause of the issue.First, a classroom with one teacher responsible for about 25 kids does not work for everyone. Many students with disabilities need more support. Even if the practice of informal removals ends, as it should, those kids will still go back to classrooms that are not fit to serve their needs.Second, to create general and special education classrooms that set these students up for success costs money.Schools need more money for special education services, such as aides, behavior interventionists, school psychologists and counselors. Teachers and school personnel need to be paid more, so schools can attract and retain quality educators.Most teachers and principals are doing what they can within the reality of their circumstances. Instead of criticizing the individuals, we need to look at the system.More funding is the only possible solution.Lauren BrauckmannSomerville, Mass.The writer is a former elementary school teacher.To the Editor:The informal removal of students points to insufficient teacher training and cracks in the overburdened school system. Educators are teaching an increasingly neurodiverse student population. According to recent statistics, 89 percent of educators have at least one student with an individualized education plan in their classrooms.Students with disabilities often learn alongside their general education peers. While this is a win for special educators, who have long championed the academic and social benefits of inclusion for both general and special education students, teacher training has not kept up with these increases. All educators need and deserve comprehensive, systemwide training models that support them. We need to foster learning environments in which students feel an authentic sense of belonging.Some of the most effective training models are university-public school partnerships and professional development supports that offer educators the opportunity to learn about how best to support their neurodivergent students from the true experts: those with lived experience.The problem isn’t the student. The problem — and the opportunity for growth — lies in how we’re training and supporting that educator.Kristie K. PattenLauren Hough WilliamsNew YorkDr. Patten is a vice dean and professor at the N.Y.U. Steinhardt School of Culture Education and Human Development. Ms. Hough Williams is the executive director of the university’s Program for Inclusion and Neurodiversity Education.To the Editor:I teach high school science at a public school. Students with disabilities absolutely deserve a free and public education, like everyone else. But when the needs of these students aren’t met in a regular classroom, some can be disruptive or violent, and teaching them alongside regular education students becomes impossible.Why should the educational experience be ruined for 25 kids because one student became disruptive? Why should I be forced to educate all of these kids together when they clearly have different needs, and therefore I can meet none of them? These issues are so severe that teachers are quitting in droves and public schools are failing.In spite of this crisis, The Times chose to publish an article blaming teachers for something we have little control over. As a teacher, all I can do is show up and do my best with what I have and with who is in my classroom. Administrators have the power to remove students or dole out accommodations — not I.Jessica FlemingHoustonTo the Editor:I worked for many years in a private school in Boston that served disabled students. It was one of the best work experiences of my life.Although the students came to the school with cognitive, social and communicative difficulties, their greatest obstacle was clearly a sense of low self-worth. After years of failing both academically and socially in regular school settings, they were finally placed in our program, which met their most fundamental needs and grew their positive self-esteem.Not everyone is verbally and academically gifted. Integrating disabled students in general education is certainly important, but not at the cost of damaging a child’s sense of self-worth.Theodore MarkusStuart, Fla.The writer is a retired speech language pathologist.Old People in Japan, and in AmericaYusuke Narita, wearing his signature eyeglasses with one round and one square lens. He said his comments about mass suicide and the elderly had been “taken out of context.”Bea Oyster for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Scholar Suggests Mass Suicide for Japan’s Old. Does He Mean It?” (front page, Feb. 13):Japan needs to overhaul its laws about how to treat elderly patients who are terminally ill or brain-dead and on life support, so they can die with dignity.At the moment, it may be considered murder if a doctor decides to take a patient off life support (the family cannot make these decisions), and doctors have been prosecuted for doing so. Advanced directives are meaningless since they are not accepted if the outcome of refusal of treatment ends in death.Inherent in Japanese culture is the hierarchical structure of respecting elders and pride in longevity. These societal values are at odds with the practical, medical and emotional needs that the elderly and their families find themselves in when they are faced with situations that offer no recovery.The comments about mass suicide by Yusuke Narita, an assistant professor of economics at Yale, may be extreme, but I believe that he is attempting to initiate a discussion among the Japanese, particularly the legal and political establishments that have been unwilling to resolve the crisis facing the elderly in that country.Shirley KanedaNew YorkTo the Editor:While the comments quoted in your article are extreme, I do believe that older people should have the ability to end their life painlessly and on their own terms.Prove illness, explain your reasons and get help. Do not become someone waiting to die or lying in bed with unremitting pain, no longer enjoying life and taking away from others.I am a healthy, financially stable 80-year-old citizen and would be relieved to know that I would have that option. My family agrees.Myra LevyRockville Centre, N.Y.How Trump Will Campaign in 2024 Damon Winter/The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Will Trump and Biden Gang Up on DeSantis?” by Ross Douthat (column, Feb. 12):Mr. Douthat’s preview of Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign strategy argues that he will emphasize his Republican opponents’ unpopular past policy positions when running against them.But this analysis gives far more credit to Mr. Trump than he deserves. While those policy shortcomings and differences clearly exist, when has he ever focused on policy issues?His style is to make personal aspersions and to launch fabricated assaults on his foes and their family members. He’s not about to change that modus operandi, as reflected in his insinuation the other day that Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida preyed on teenage girls years ago when he was a teacher.Just as leopards don’t change their spots, our former president is not going to be spotted highlighting policy differences when he can take the low road that so naturally suits him.Marshall H. TanickMinneapolis More

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      Here’s What the Other Republican Candidates Should Say to Trump

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      Bret Stephens: Hi, Gail. I know you’re keen to handicap — figuratively, but maybe also literally — the emerging field of Republican presidential hopefuls. First Donald Trump, now Nikki Haley, and soon, possibly, her fellow Palmetto State Republican, Senator Tim Scott. That’s on top of probable runs by Ron DeSantis, Mike Pompeo, Mike Pence, and possibly Brian Kemp of Georgia, Glenn Youngkin of Virginia, Kristi Noem of South Dakota and Chris Christie of … New Jersey.Who worries you the most — or repels you the least?Gail Collins: Well gee, Bret. Have to admit I have a tad of sympathy for Mike Pence, and maybe Brian Kemp, since they at least had the backbone to stand up for the idea that, um, this is a democracy where the winners of elections … win.Bret: With you on Kemp, who successfully fended off two election deniers: Trump and Stacey Abrams. Can’t say I feel much sympathy for Pence. You don’t get bonus points for doing the most basic part of your job, much less for standing up for democracy and the rule of law at the last possible minute.Gail: All of them are more or less opposed to abortion and sensible gun regulation, and many of them are in favor of tax cuts for the rich that would cut back on resources for the needy. And given Haley’s first campaign week, I’d predict that as we go along, all of them will be veering off to Crazy Town in order to compete with Trump.Hey, why are we worried about what I think? You’re in charge of Republicans. Tell me — which of these folks would you vote for against Joe Biden?Bret: A lot will depend on who is, or isn’t, willing to bend the knee to Trump. I’m waiting for one of them to say something along the following lines:“Donald, Republicans placed their faith in you when it seemed as if, for all of your flaws, you could still be a gust of fresh air for our party and the country. You turned out to be a Category 5 hurricane, leaving a wake of political destruction everywhere you went ….”Gail: Loving this scenario …Bret: “You destroyed our majority in the House of Representatives in 2018. You destroyed our hold on the White House in 2020. Your reckless, stupid, un-American and transparently false claims about the election helped cost us Georgia’s two Senate seats in 2021. Your garbage taste in primary candidates, based pretty much entirely on their willingness to suck up to you and regurgitate your lies, cost us the Senate again in the midterms along with the governorship of Arizona. You shame us with your dinner invitations to antisemites like Kanye West. And your petulant attacks on fellow Republicans — usually the ones who stand a chance of winning a general election — keep playing into the hands of Democrats.”Gail: Keep going!Bret: “Other than your usual lackeys, not to mention Lindsey Graham, there’s not a single Republican who has worked closely with you who has a good word to say about you in private, though some of them still flatter you in public. If, heaven forbid, you’re the Republican nominee next year, you’ll only be guaranteeing Joe Biden and Kamala Harris a second term. You’re a loser, Donald: a sore loser, a serial loser, a selfish loser. You’re the biggest loser — except, of course, when it comes to your waistline. As was once said to Neville Chamberlain after he had put Britain in mortal danger, so I say to you: ‘In the name of God, go.’”I’ll struggle to vote for a candidate who can’t say something along these lines. If they can’t stand up to a bully in their own house, how can we expect them to stand up to Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping?Gail: I believe I am hearing that you’re going to vote for Joe Biden.Bret: Hmm. Hopefully not. Most of my policy instincts are pretty much in line with people like Haley, Youngkin, Christie and even DeSantis, at least on his good days. I probably just won’t vote if no Republican can pass the decency test.Gail: Also trying to imagine the things that might happen on the Biden front that might reduce your openness to the Democratic option. Privately thinking: presidential health problems and Kamala Harris. But too early to talk about that now.Bret: Is it? OK, go on ….Gail: If we’re going to talk health, let’s go back to Senator John Fetterman, now hospitalized with depression. It seems at this point as if breaking in as a new senator and recovering from a stroke is too much of a to-do list. I remember recently, when we were on this topic, you were way more worried than I was about his condition. Did you have some advance knowledge he was in trouble or just a well-educated guess?Bret: Maybe a little bit of advance knowledge, plus personal experience. My father had a cerebral hemorrhage when he was 53, the same age Fetterman is now. He recovered physically but, like many survivors of brain injuries, suffered a crushing depression that was out of character with his sunny temperament. The book that helped him get through it was William Styron’s memoir of his own depression, “Darkness Visible.” The good news for my dad, who lived for 21 years after the hemorrhage, was that the darkness eventually lifted and he went on to better years, as I sincerely hope will be the case for the senator.Gail: Of course. Also hoping this will publicize the importance of getting professional treatment when depression strikes.Bret: Gail, returning to the Biden presidency again, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office just reported that the federal government will take on nearly $19 trillion in new debt over the next decade. Doesn’t that, er, alarm you?Gail: Sure, and I hear it as a clarion call for tax reform — raising rates on the people who can afford to pay more. Don’t see any reason, for instance, that someone making a million dollars a year is only paying Social Security tax on the first $160,200.I suspect you’re hearing a somewhat different trumpet.Bret: Just a tad different!First thing, we need to turbocharge economic growth so that the debt will be a smaller fraction of the overall economy. Top of my list would be immigration reform to ease labor shortages and regulatory reform to make life easier for small businesses, like doing away with needless permitting requirements. Second, spending restraint, particularly when it comes to dumb subsidies like the ones for ethanol or tax credits for buying Teslas. Third, entitlement reform by way of gradually pushing up the retirement age for today’s younger workers.What am I missing — I mean, other than one or two screws?Gail: Bret, I have never accused you of a screw shortage, although there are some issues on which I’ve suggested some tightening might be nice.Bret: My mother says the same.Gail: We’re in agreement on opening the door to more immigration, so let’s move on to the rest, one by one.Reducing permit requirements for new businesses — you’d certainly be able to come up with some examples of overregulation there, but I’ll bet if somebody decides your neighborhood would be a good place to open a distillery in an old warehouse, you’d want to make sure there were some serious controls in place.Bret: Only for quality ingredients, flavor, complexity, age and smoothness.Gail: Tax credits for electric vehicles help move the country away from carbon-emitting gas guzzlers, and that’s great for the environment. Yeah, I wish it didn’t mean more money for Elon Musk, but if we want to eliminate all laws that benefit irritating rich guys, there’d be a lot of better places to start.Bret: On your earlier point, Gail, do you know you are supposed to complete a 250-hour training program to become a licensed manicurist in New York? That’s the kind of enterprise-defeating regulation I had in mind. As for electric vehicles, I can’t wait for someone to start fully tallying the environmental impact of, say, the lithium mines needed to produce their batteries. There’s just no such thing as “clean” energy.Gail: Of course you’re right that nothing is easy and we’re going to have to come back to energy issues a lot. But in the meantime, your suggestion for entitlement reform: It’s basically about raising the age for Social Security eligibility, right? Currently 67 for most workers, although you can qualify for a more modest package at 62. There’s nothing magic about 67, but I can think of a lot of jobs that’d be tough for people that age to keep doing.Bret: True.Gail: Looking out my window right now I see a bunch of guys climbing around the 12th story outside wall of an apartment building, refurbishing the stones and concrete so nothing falls down and bops a pedestrian. I’m sure some people in their late-60s would be great at the job, but I wouldn’t want them forced to take it on.Bret: Agree, and there’s no reason we can’t put together a reform of Social Security that allows people who make their living in physically demanding jobs to retire on the earlier side. It’s those of us who sit at desks most of the day whom I mainly have in mind.By the way, Gail, before we go, I can’t fail to mention the exceptional reporting by our news-side colleagues Jeremy Peters and Katie Robertson. It concerns the lawsuit against Fox News by Dominion Voting Systems, and what it has uncovered — namely, that people like Tucker Carlson and other talking heads at the network knew perfectly well that Trump’s claims of a stolen election were bunk, but tried their damnedest to sow doubts about the election anyway. There’s a word for that: vile. There ought to be a circle in hell for it, too.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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      Biden Drawing Up a 2024 Playbook That Looks a Lot Like 2020’s

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      President Biden’s strategy is to frame the race as a contest between a seasoned leader and a conspiracy-minded opposition, while batting away concerns about his age.WASHINGTON — Forget the Wilmington basement. This time he will have a Rose Garden. And Air Force One and a big white mansion and all the other advantages of incumbency in a year when he is not forced by a pandemic to stick to streaming from downstairs.But as President Biden prepares to run for a second term, his team is mapping out a strategy for 2024 that in many other ways resembles that of 2020. Whether he ultimately faces Donald J. Trump again or another Republican trying to be like Mr. Trump, the president plans a campaign message that still boils down to three words: Competent beats crazy.Whether he can sell that theme again represents a singular challenge given surveys showing that the public has not exactly rallied behind him and harbors deep doubts about his age. When Mr. Biden kicks off his re-election campaign this spring, as is widely expected, he will be the oldest president in history but one of the lowest-rated in the modern period, presiding over an economy that is improving but unsettled and leading a party publicly behind him but privately angst-ridden. And rather than Mr. Trump, he may yet face a Republican challenger closer to the age of his son.The goal, according to interviews with White House officials, outside advisers, key allies and party strategists, is to frame the race as a contest, not a referendum on Mr. Biden. On one side, in this narrative, will be a mature, seasoned leader with a raft of legislation on his record aimed at winning back working-class Democrats. On the other will be an ideologically driven, conspiracy-minded opposition consumed by its own internal power struggles and tethered to a leader facing multiple investigations for trying to overturn a democratic election.“It’s incumbent on the president and his team to make sure the election is a choice,” said Lis Smith, a senior adviser to Pete Buttigieg during the 2020 Democratic primary campaign. “It’s not going to be Joe Biden versus some mythical Democratic candidate. It’s going to be between Joe Biden and whoever the Republican nominee is.”Whit Ayres, a veteran Republican pollster, said a rematch between Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump would be the best scenario for the president. “At this point, President Biden just needs to seem like he is still very much with it and able to do the job and at that point his fate is largely out of his hands,” Mr. Ayres said. “He’s got to pray the Republicans blow themselves up again.”Lis Smith, a senior adviser to Pete Buttigieg during the 2020 Democratic primary campaign, in Keene, N.H., in 2019.Elizabeth Frantz for The New York TimesMr. Biden previewed his approach in his State of the Union address this month when he baited Republicans into a debate over Social Security and Medicare, then pressed his argument during appearances in Wisconsin and Florida. He used the nationally televised speech before Congress to highlight his legislative successes while focusing on pocketbook issues to reach out to voters upset at him over inflation.The trips that followed illustrated one important difference from 2020. No longer tied to the basement of his home in Delaware, the way he was by Covid-19 in 2020, Mr. Biden will travel frequently this year to deliver his message, aides said. As projects from the 2021 infrastructure package break ground, the president intends to cut a lot of ribbons around the country to take credit.Republican strategists are gambling that the physical toll of a full-scale, nonpandemic campaign effort will wear on an 80-year-old president. They plan to portray him as an aging, failed leader and a big-spending captive of the political left who drove up inflation and did little to defend the border against a record wave of illegal immigration.Which Republicans Are Eyeing the 2024 Presidential Election?Card 1 of 6The G.O.P. primary begins. More

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      Haley Walks Treacherous Road for G.O.P. Women

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      EXETER, N.H. — According to Nikki Haley, bullies are best subdued by a counter kick — in heels. Achieving a new vision for the country requires the leadership of a “tough-as-nails woman.” And generational change starts with putting a “badass woman in the White House.”In ways both overt and subtle, Ms. Haley, the former United Nations ambassador and South Carolina governor, is setting up her 2024 presidential bid as the latest test of the Republican Party’s attitudes about female leaders. No woman has ever won a state Republican presidential primary, let alone the party’s nomination — and Ms. Haley is the first one to mount a bid since former President Donald J. Trump, who regularly attacked women in extraordinarily graphic and vulgar terms, rose to the head of the party.The early days of Ms. Haley’s campaign, which she announced on Tuesday, quickly illustrated the challenges facing Republican women. For decades, female leaders in both parties have struggled with what political scientists call the double bind — the difficulty of proving one’s strength and competence, while meeting voters’ expectations of warmth, or of being “likable enough,” as former President Barack Obama once said of Hillary Clinton during a 2008 primary debate.But for Republican women, that double bind comes with a twist. There are conservative voters who harbor traditional views about femininity while expecting their candidates to seem “tough.” Several strategists suggested Republican primary voters would have little patience if a female candidate were to level accusations of sexism toward another Republican. And Mr. Trump, who remains a powerful figure in the party and is running again, has already attacked Ms. Haley with criticism some view as gendered.Strategists say Ms. Haley must try to win over conservatives who have traditional views of femininity but also expect candidates to appear tough.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesEven before she entered the race, Mr. Trump dismissed Ms. Haley as “overly ambitious,” which struck some observers as sexist. And soon after her official announcement, he suggested her appointment as U.N. ambassador was less a reflection of her credentials than of his desire to see her male lieutenant governor take over as governor. She also confronted a male CNN anchor, who asserted that Ms. Haley and women her age — 51, decades younger than Mr. Trump or President Biden — were past their “prime.”Ms. Haley, who could be joined by other female contenders, including Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, is operating within a G.O.P. that has often dismissed debate about identity as the purview of the left, and has, in many corners, increasingly lambasted discussions of gender and race as “wokeness.”During her campaign trail debut this past week, Ms. Haley played into this trend, promoting a country that is “strong and proud, not weak and woke.” And while she winked at the history-making potential of her candidacy — “I will simply say this: May the best woman win” — she was quick to distance herself from “identity politics.”“I don’t believe in that. And I don’t believe in glass ceilings, either. I believe in creating a country where anyone can do anything,” she said Wednesday while campaigning in Charleston, S.C.Ms. Haley faces many hurdles that have nothing to do with gender. Mr. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is generally seen as Mr. Trump’s strongest potential adversary, lead her significantly in early polling. And her occasional criticisms of Mr. Trump, after serving in his administration and often heaping praise on him, may leave her ill-defined in the eyes of voters.Many prominent women in the party — including Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia — have risen by emulating Mr. Trump’s hard-right politics.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesMany of the most prominent women in the party — Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a conspiracy theory-minded Republican from Georgia; Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee; Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, the chair of the House Republican conference — have risen by emulating or embracing Mr. Trump’s hard-right politics, not by challenging him.“If you want to know, what do you have to do to be an influential woman in the G.O.P. today, compare Marjorie Taylor Greene to Liz Cheney,” said Jennifer Horn, the former chair of the New Hampshire Republican Party who now considers herself an independent. “Which one of them actually brings gravitas and experience and genuine commitment to democracy to the table? And which one of them is currently serving in Congress?”Which Republicans Are Eyeing the 2024 Presidential Election?Card 1 of 6The G.O.P. primary begins. More