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      When Will Democrats Learn to Say No?

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      When Donald Trump held a rally in the Bronx in May, critics scoffed that there was no way he could win New York State. Yet as a strategic matter, asking the question “What would it take for a Republican to win New York?” leads to the answer, “It would take overperforming with Black, Hispanic and working-class voters.”Mr. Trump didn’t win New York, of course, but his gains with nonwhite voters helped him sweep all seven battleground states.Unlike Democrats, Mr. Trump engaged in what I call supermajority thinking: envisioning what it would take to achieve an electoral realignment and working from there.Supermajority thinking is urgently needed at this moment. We have been conditioned to think of our era of polarization as a stable arrangement of rough parity between the parties that will last indefinitely, but history teaches us that such periods usually give way to electoral realignments. Last week, Mr. Trump showed us what a conservative realignment can look like. Unless Democrats want to be consigned to minority status and be locked out of the Senate for the foreseeable future, they need to counter by building a supermajority of their own.That starts with picking an ambitious electoral goal — say, the 365 electoral votes Barack Obama won in 2008 — and thinking clearly about what Democrats need to do to achieve it.Democrats cannot do this as long as they remain crippled by a fetish for putting coalition management over a real desire for power. Whereas Mr. Trump has crafted an image as a different kind of Republican by routinely making claims that break with the party line on issues ranging from protecting Social Security and Medicare to mandating insurance coverage of in vitro fertilization, Democrats remain stuck trying to please all of their interest groups while watching voters of all races desert them over the very stances that these groups impose on the party.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The ‘Diploma Divide’ and the 2024 Election

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      Readers discuss a David Brooks column about how the less educated are being left behind.To the Editor:Re “Voters to Elites: Do You See Me Now?,” by David Brooks (column, Nov. 8):Mr. Brooks is exactly right, but he doesn’t carry his line of reasoning to its logical conclusion. Yes, Donald Trump won the election because of a strong showing by the non-college-educated population. And yes, that segment is disadvantaged in many ways.But why did that segment vote for Mr. Trump? I would suggest there is a reason that people go to college. And contrary to what many believe, it is not just to get a better job. It is to become a better and more informed citizen, and to learn to distinguish truth from falsehood. And that is not easy when confronted with constant disinformation and outright lies.Partly as a result, the non-college-educated do not see that they have been duped. They have voted for a man and a party that have consistently worked to keep them suppressed, that have been against universal health care, against efforts to control global warming, against monopolistic practices, etc., etc.Democrats should stop flagellating themselves for having done something wrong. It is not they who have betrayed the non-college-educated. As global warming, hurricanes and flooding increase; as privatized health care grows more expensive, and epidemics again kill thousands because of vaccine skeptics; as inflation shoots up from tariffs and tax reduction, the non-college-educated will suffer disproportionately.Let them look to their elected Republicans. They have broken it, and now they own it.Robert H. PalmerNew YorkTo the Editor:Trying to blame the Democrats’ loss on their supposed disrespect of voters and behaving like elites is old and tired.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Kennedy’s Views Mix Mistrust of Business With Bizarre Health Claims

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      Seven years after Americans celebrated the licensing of Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine, President John F. Kennedy called on Congress to finance a nationwide vaccination program to stamp out what he called the “ancient enemies of our children”: infectious disease.Now Kennedy’s nephew, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is the nation’s chief critic of vaccines — a public health intervention that has saved millions of lives — and President-elect Donald J. Trump’s pick to become the next secretary of health and human services. Mr. Kennedy calls himself a vaccine safety activist. The press calls him a vaccine skeptic. His detractors call him an anti-vaxxer and a conspiracy theorist.Whatever one calls him, Mr. Kennedy is a polarizing choice whose views on certain public health matters beyond vaccination are far outside the mainstream. He opposes fluoride in water. He favors raw milk, which the Food and Drug Administration deems risky. And he has promoted unproven therapies like hydroxychloroquine for Covid-19. His own relatives called his presidential bid “dangerous for our country.”If there is a through line to Mr. Kennedy’s thinking, it appears to be a deep mistrust of corporate influence on health and medicine. In some cases, that has led him to support positions that are also embraced by public health professionals, including his push to get ultra-processed foods, which have been linked to obesity, off grocery store shelves. His disdain for profit-seeking pharmaceutical manufacturers and food companies drew applause on the campaign trail.People close to him say his commitment to “make America healthy again” is heartfelt.“This is his life’s mission,” said Brian Festa, a founder of We the Patriots U.S.A., a “medical freedom” group that has pushed back on vaccine mandates, who said he has known Mr. Kennedy for years.But like Mr. Trump, Mr. Kennedy also has a tendency to float wild theories based on scanty evidence. And he has hinted at taking actions, like prosecuting leading medical journals, that have unnerved the medical community. On Friday, many leading public health experts reacted to his nomination with alarm.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Golden Holds Off Challenge in Maine, Denying House G.O.P. a Key Pickup

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      Representative Jared Golden, a three-term Democrat from Maine, has defeated his Republican challenger, Austin Theriault, a former NASCAR driver and northern Maine native, The Associated Press declared on Friday.Mr. Golden’s narrow victory in his largely white, rural and working-class district — one of five Democratic-held districts that Donald J. Trump won in 2020 — was a bright spot for Democrats and will help ensure that the Republicans’ House majority in the next Congress remains exceedingly narrow.Mr. Golden toiled throughout the campaign to distance himself from other Democrats, declining to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris or even say whether he would vote for her. Instead, with the hope of defying political gravity and overcoming party polarization, the congressman emphasized a hyperlocal and nonpartisan message aimed at working-class people of all political stripes. He campaigned as a potential governing partner with Mr. Trump, saying he could work with whoever won the White House.For House Republicans, Mr. Theriault’s loss underlined Mr. Golden’s status as one of the Democrats’ most battle-tested members. A native of Fort Kent, a town on the northernmost border of the state, Mr. Theriault, 30, portrayed himself as a “true Mainer” — his typical outfit includes jeans, a baseball cap and a puffer vest over a button-down shirt — and small-business owner who was approachable. He had the full-throated support of Mr. Trump as well as Speaker Mike Johnson, who headlined a rally with Mr. Theriault for an office opening in August.Mr. Golden and his campaign worked to portray Mr. Theriault as a rubber stamp for the House Republicans’ agenda, which Mr. Golden argued was too extreme for Mainers. To make up for his thin political résumé, Mr. Theriault, a first-term state representative, avoided committing to specific policies and instead centered his bid on the assertion that Mr. Golden had “gone Washington” and lost touch with his district.Mr. Theriault also sought to make gun rights an issue in the race. After a mass shooting last year in his hometown of Lewiston, Mr. Golden — one of the few Democrats in Congress who has routinely broken with his party to oppose gun control measures — changed course and endorsed an assault weapons ban. He lost the backing of the National Rifle Association, and Mr. Theriault argued that Mr. Golden’s change of heart on guns showed that he was out of step with his district. More

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      Ex-N.F.L. Linebacker Hit and Pushed Police During Jan. 6 Riot, U.S. Says

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      Antwione Williams, who played a season with the Detroit Lions, is charged with assaulting officers at the U.S. Capitol.A former N.F.L. linebacker was arrested in Georgia on Thursday on charges that he hit and pushed law enforcement officers during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, one of the first insurrection-related arrests since President-elect Donald J. Trump won re-election, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said.The former player, Leander Antwione Williams, 31, of Savannah, Ga., who played one season for the Detroit Lions, was among the first rioters to breach a police barricade that had been set up on the northwest side of the U.S. Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, according to a complaint and arrest warrant prepared by Brad Fisk, a special agent with the F.B.I.In addition to a felony count of assaulting officers and obstruction of law enforcement during a civil disorder, Mr. Williams faces several misdemeanors relating to disruptive conduct at the Capitol.Footage from the afternoon of Jan. 6, 2021, showed Mr. Williams near the front of a crowd a short distance from the U.S. Capitol.The crowd’s efforts to approach the Capitol were temporarily stymied by a line of police barricades and several law enforcement officers, according to photos included in Mr. Fisk’s report. Then, just after 1 p.m., Mr. Williams was seen again near the front of the crowd, pushing through metal barricades as law enforcement officers retreated.As he and the crowd continued to push toward the Capitol, Mr. Williams “grabbed and pushed two officers,” Mr. Fisk wrote.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Bernie Sanders on the Democratic Party’s Future, on “The Daily”

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      “There was no appreciation — no appreciation — of the struggling and the suffering of millions and millions of working-class people,” the senator said.As the Democratic Party grapples with its sweeping electoral loss and a new political reality, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont has been resolute about his diagnosis of where the party went wrong.“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” he said in a statement after the 2024 presidential election.This week — when Republicans cemented their control of the House, giving President-elect Donald J. Trump a unified Congress to enact his agenda — Senator Sanders spoke to Michael Barbaro, host of the New York Times podcast “The Daily,” about his take. The two discussed the fallout of the election and where Mr. Sanders sees the Democratic Party going from here.Below are takeaways from their conversation, with excerpts edited for length and clarity. You can listen to their full conversation on “The Daily.”Bernie Sanders Says Democrats Have Lost Their WayAn interview with the Vermont senator on the fallout of the election defeat.Sanders is in a fighting mood, but he may be willing to work with Trump.When asked how he felt about being in the minority with Trump poised to bring an aggressive agenda to Congress, Mr. Sanders said, “Our job is to rally the American people to make it clear, especially to working people, that we need an economy and a government that works for all and to expose as best we can what Trump and his administration are doing.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Turns to His Personal Lawyers to Stock Top Ranks of Justice Dept.

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      For more than two years, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s lawyers did the job they were hired to do, defending him against a barrage of criminal charges with an aggressive strategy of confrontation and delay.But in working for Mr. Trump, they also used the tools of their trade — their legal briefs and courtroom hearings — to advance a political message that ultimately helped their client get back into the White House.Now, after fighting for Mr. Trump in case after case that they helped turn into a form of political theater, some of those lawyers are being rewarded again for their work. Mr. Trump has said he intends to nominate them to high-ranking posts in the Justice Department, which he has made clear he wants to operate as a legal arm of the White House rather than with the quasi-independence that has been the post-Watergate norm.After the president-elect’s announcement this week that he wants Matt Gaetz, the controversial former Florida congressman and a longtime ally, to be his attorney general, he named Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, two experienced former federal prosecutors who took the lead in defending Mr. Trump at his state trial in Manhattan and against two federal indictments, to fill the No. 2 and No. 3 positions in the department.A third lawyer, D. John Sauer, who was the Missouri solicitor general and oversaw Mr. Trump’s appellate battles, was chosen to represent the department in front of the Supreme Court as the U.S. solicitor general.Another lawyer, Stanley Woodward Jr., who defended several people in Mr. Trump’s orbit and helped in the process of vetting his vice-presidential pick, has also been mentioned for a top legal job, though it remains unclear if he will actually receive a role.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Los nombramientos temerarios de Trump

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      Donald Trump ha demostrado de innumerables maneras que no es apto para la presidencia, pero una de las más claras es la compañía con la que se rodea: figuras marginales, teóricos de la conspiración y aduladores que anteponen lealtad a él por encima de todo. Esta semana, una serie de nombramientos para el gabinete por parte de Trump mostraron de la forma más cruda posible los peligros potenciales que entraña su dependencia a su círculo de allegados.Para tres de los puestos más importantes y de mayor rango del país, Trump dijo que nombraría a leales sin cualificaciones discernibles para sus trabajos, personas manifiestamente inapropiadas para puestos cruciales de liderazgo en la aplicación de la ley y la seguridad nacional.Lo más irresponsable fue su elección para fiscal general. Para ocupar el puesto de máximo responsable de la aplicación de la ley del país, el presidente electo dijo que nombraría al representante por Florida Matt Gaetz.Sí, ese Matt Gaetz.El mismo que pidió la abolición del FBI y de todo el Departamento de Justicia si no dejaban de investigar a Trump. El que estuvo entre las voces más audibles del Congreso en negar los resultados de las elecciones de 2020, quien dijo que estaba “orgulloso del trabajo” que él y otros negacionistas hicieron el 6 de enero de 2021, y quien elogió a los alborotadores del Capitolio como “estadounidenses patriotas” que no tenían intención de cometer actos de violencia. Aquel cuya maniobra para desbancar al presidente de la Cámara de Representantes, Kevin McCarthy, en 2023 paralizó el liderazgo de su propio partido en la Cámara durante casi un mes.Gaetz, quien presentó su carta de renuncia al Congreso el miércoles después de que se anunciara su nominación, fue objeto de una investigación federal sobre tráfico sexual que duró años y que condujo a una condena de 11 años de prisión para uno de sus socios, aunque él negó cualquier participación. El Departamento de Justicia cerró esa investigación, pero el Comité de Ética de la Cámara de Representantes sigue investigando las acusaciones de conducta sexual inapropiada, consumo de drogas ilícitas, aceptación indebida de regalos y obstrucción de las investigaciones gubernamentales sobre su conducta. McCarthy, el expresidente de la Cámara, culpó a Gaetz por su destitución, con el argumento de que Gaetz “quería que detuviera una denuncia de ética porque tuvo relaciones con una joven de 17 años”.

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