United States Politics and Government

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      At a Trump Rally in the Bronx, Chants of ‘Build the Wall’

      by

      Nearing the end of the criminal trial that has kept him in New York City for much of the last five weeks, former President Donald J. Trump held a rally in the Bronx on Thursday, where he made a litany of promises to improve New York, railed against the Biden administration and made overtures to Black and Latino voters.Speaking to a more diverse crowd than is typical of his rallies, Mr. Trump lamented the surge of migrants across the southern border and criticized President Biden’s economic policies as disproportionately hurting people of color, whose support he is eager to win from Democrats.“African Americans are getting slaughtered. Hispanic Americans are getting slaughtered,” Mr. Trump said to a crowd with large numbers of Black and Hispanic voters.As he has before, he insisted that the migrant influx, which has prompted a crisis in New York, was disproportionately hurting “our Black population and our Hispanic population, who are losing their jobs, losing their housing, losing everything they can lose.”The Trump rally drew at least a thousand people to Crotona Park in the South Bronx.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesMr. Trump’s screeds against those crossing the border illegally and his vow to conduct the “largest deportation operation” in U.S. history — both staples of his campaign rallies — were met with cheers.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

    • 113 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Elise Stefanik Has Gained Widespread Attention in Antisemitism Hearings

      by

      Representative Elise Stefanik of New York may not be a committee chair, but perhaps no single Republican lawmaker has more forcefully clashed with elite university leaders over how they are handling antisemitism on campus.Her line of questioning at a December hearing helped push the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania out of their jobs. Last month, she put Columbia’s president in the uncomfortable position of negotiating faculty administrative decisions from the witness stand.If past patterns hold, Ms. Stefanik will now have a chance to question the leaders of a fresh batch of major universities.Ms. Stefanik, 39, was already a rising star within her party before the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war turbocharged concerns about antisemitic incidents in American education. A Harvard graduate herself, she is the top-ranking woman in Republican House leadership and is considered a potential presidential running mate.But her exchanges with the leaders of Harvard and Penn attracted enormous attention and won some rare plaudits from grudging liberals. In April, she was named one of Time’s 100 most influential people of 2024.Ms. Stefanik struggled to land a clear blow in a hearing with the president of Columbia, Nemat Shafik, in April. But she still elicited some of the most memorable testimony, demanding that Dr. Shafik remove from an academic leadership position a professor who used the word “awesome” when describing Hamas’s deadly Oct. 7 attack.Ms. Stefanik later called for Dr. Shafik to resign anyway.When Ms. Stefanik first won her seat in 2014, she was the youngest woman ever elected to the House. She beat a centrist Democrat, and in the early days of her career, she took on more moderate stances.These days, she describes herself as “ultra MAGA” and “proud of it.” Democrats particularly detest her close embrace of former President Donald J. Trump and his lies about the 2020 election. More

    • 125 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Ohio Elections Official Threatens to Exclude Biden From the Ballot

      by

      The Ohio General Assembly adjourned on Wednesday without addressing an issue that the state’s top elections official said would prevent President Biden from being placed on the ballot there, escalating a partisan clash that could result in the president not being on the ballot in all 50 states in November.Frank LaRose, the Republican secretary of state, has said that he plans to exclude Mr. Biden from the ballot because he will be officially nominated after a deadline for certifying presidential nominees on the ballot. This is usually a minor procedural issue, and states have almost always offered a quick solution to ensure that major presidential candidates remain on the ballot.The Biden campaign is considering suing the state in order to ensure Mr. Biden is on the ballot, while also searching for some other way to resolve the issue without moving the date of the nominating convention, according to a person with knowledge of the deliberations.A legal fight could be expensive and arduous. The Supreme Court recently ruled that states could not bar Mr. Trump from running for another term under a constitutional provision, Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, that prohibits insurrectionists from holding office. But it took six months of legal wrangling before the court put that issue to bed.Ohio is not considered a swing state — Mr. Trump won there with an eight-point edge in 2020 — but the Biden campaign could be drawn into a monthslong legal battle to ensure that the president is on the ballot in all 50 states.A legislative fix, which would have pushed back the certification deadline to accommodate the late date of the Democratic National Convention, stalled out this month as Republicans in the Ohio Senate tacked on a partisan measure that would ban foreign donations to state ballot initiatives. Mr. LaRose has previously said that passing the ban is the price that Democrats must pay to ensure that Mr. Biden is on the ballot, and that he would otherwise enforce the law as written.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

    • 163 Shares109 Views

      in Elections

      Doug Emhoff Calls Trump a ‘Known Antisemite’ as Biden Team Steps Up Attacks

      by

      Doug Emhoff, the husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, called former President Donald J. Trump “a known antisemite” in a video released on Tuesday, a notable escalation of attacks by President Biden’s campaign against Mr. Trump over his language about Jews.Mr. Emhoff’s remarks came in an afternoon social media post by the Biden campaign with the anodyne title “Second Gentleman @DouglasEmhoff responds to Trump attacking Jewish Americans.”“The last person I’m going to take advice from as a Jewish person is a known antisemite who’s had dinner with antisemites, who said there was ‘good people on both sides’ after Charlottesville,” Mr. Emhoff says in the video, after he apparently watches a weeks-old video of Mr. Trump proclaiming that Jews who vote for Mr. Biden “have to have their head examined.”Mr. Emhoff adds for emphasis, “He’s the last person I’m going to take advice from.”The Biden campaign has been seeking to extend a news cycle that began this week when Mr. Trump posted, then later took down, a video on social media that included old-time newspaper headlines saying a victory by him in November would bring about a “unified Reich.” Mr. Biden, in a video released by his campaign, accused Mr. Trump of using “Hitler’s language.”The Biden campaign and its surrogates have previously condemned Mr. Trump for using antisemitic language. Two weeks ago, a Biden campaign spokesman, Charles Lutvak, blasted Mr. Trump for employing “patronizing antisemitic shtick” after the former president said Jews who voted for Mr. Biden “should be ashamed of themselves.”Mr. Trump has long flirted with antisemitic language and imagery, and shown support for far-right backers who are openly antisemitic.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

    • 150 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      House G.O.P. Moves to Crack Down on Noncitizen Voting, Sowing False Narrative

      by

      The bills under consideration have virtually no chance of becoming law, but Republicans are using them to amplify Donald Trump’s false claims of widespread illegal voting by noncitizens.Republicans are pushing legislation to crack down on voting by noncitizens, which happens rarely and is already illegal in federal elections, in a move that reinforces former President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to delegitimize the 2024 results if he loses.This week, House Republicans plan to vote on a bill that would roll back a District of Columbia law allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections, which they contend is needed to prevent Democrats from expanding the practice to other jurisdictions. And they are advancing another measure that would require states to obtain proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when registering a person to vote.The legislation has virtually no chance of becoming law, but it serves to amplify one of Mr. Trump’s favorite pre-emptive claims of election fraud. It also underscores Republicans’ embrace of a groundless narrative — one that echoes the racist “great replacement” conspiracy theory — that Democrats are intentionally allowing migrants to stream into the United States illegally in order to dilute the voting power of American citizens and lock in electoral victories for themselves.Speaker Mike Johnson recently appeared alongside Mr. Trump at Mar-a-Lago, the former president’s Florida resort and residence, to announce a pledge to get tough on migrants flowing across the border, suggesting with no evidence that they were coming in unchecked as part of a plot to vote for President Biden.“There is currently an unprecedented and a clear and present danger to the integrity of our election system — and that is the threat of noncitizens and illegal aliens voting in our elections,” Mr. Johnson warned during a news conference on the steps of the Capitol this month.But he conceded that he had no evidence to support that assertion.“We all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections, but it’s not been something that is easily provable,” Mr. Johnson said. “We don’t have that number.”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

    • 100 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Georgia Supreme Court Justice Andrew Pinson Wins Re-election

      by

      The incumbent in the lone competitive race for a seat on the Georgia Supreme Court won re-election on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, fending off a challenge from a former Democratic congressman who had built his campaign in the nonpartisan contest on protecting abortion rights.Elections for the Supreme Court in Georgia are typically subdued affairs, drawing little attention, much less stirring controversy, as justices rarely face any serious opposition. Such was the case for the three other justices on the ballot on Tuesday, whose elections were uncontested.But Justice Andrew A. Pinson was in the unusual position of having to fight to defend his seat after John Barrow, who represented Georgia in Congress as a Democrat from 2005 to 2015, entered the race.During the campaign, Mr. Barrow said that Georgia’s Constitution guaranteed the right to an abortion, which, he argued, was not a political position but simply his interpretation of the law. Last year, the State Supreme Court upheld Georgia’s law banning abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, though a legal fight is ongoing.The challenge from Mr. Barrow pushed Justice Pinson and his supporters to mobilize an effort that was costly and high-profile, at least by the standards of a State Supreme Court race. Justice Pinson sought to portray Mr. Barrow as a threat to an independent judiciary, arguing that voting for his opponent was tantamount to endorsing “a system of partisan politicians in black robes.”“I have upheld my oath to defend our Constitution,” Justice Pinson said in a news conference on Monday. “I have approached every case that comes before us with an open mind, fairly and impartially,” he added. “And I’ve applied the law as it’s written, not as it should be, not as we want it to be.”Justice Pinson was appointed to the court by Gov. Brian Kemp in 2022 to serve out the remainder of his predecessor’s term, and he has now won his own six-year term. Before he joined the State Supreme Court, Justice Pinson served on the State Court of Appeals, and was also appointed to that post by Mr. Kemp, a Republican.He had been the state’s solicitor general and worked for Attorney General Christopher M. Carr, a Republican. Earlier in his career, Justice Pinson was a U.S. Supreme Court clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas.Mr. Barrow challenged the depiction of him as a partisan operator, noting that Justice Pinson had surrounded himself with Republican elected officials, like Mr. Kemp, and conservative political groups in his re-election effort.“It’s not a partisan race, so I have not sought the endorsement of partisan politicians,” Mr. Barrow told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Though I see that doesn’t apply to my opponent. He is obviously trying to make it a partisan race.” More

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Here’s Why Republicans Are Focusing on Voting by Noncitizens

      by

      House Republicans are pushing legislation to crack down on voting by noncitizens, which is allowed in some local elections but illegal — and exceedingly rare — at the federal level.House Republicans are pushing legislation to crack down on voting by noncitizens, part of an effort to sow doubts about the election outcome and take aim at immigrants who they say have no business participating in elections in the United States.They are planning to push through a bill this week that would roll back a Washington, D.C., law allowing noncitizen residents of the nation’s capital to vote in local elections. And they are pushing legislation that would require states to obtain proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, in person when registering an individual to vote and require states to remove noncitizens from voter rolls.Neither is likely to pass the Democratic-led Senate or be signed by President Biden, but both are ways for Republicans to call attention to their false claims of widespread illegal voting by noncitizens.Former President Donald J. Trump has long claimed in the face of evidence to the contrary that presidential and congressional elections are susceptible to widespread voter fraud and illegal voting by undocumented immigrants who have skewed the outcomes in favor of Democrats — a charge that House Republicans have echoed.Here are the facts about noncitizen voting and the false claims that foreign nationals swing close elections in one party’s favor.More than a dozen cities and towns across the country allow noncitizens to vote in local elections.There has long been a policy debate in the United States about whether voting rights should be afforded at the municipal level to foreign nationals regardless of immigration status, as most of them pay comparable levels of taxes to U.S. citizens, contribute to their local economies and send their children to local schools.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

    • 150 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s First Campaign Manager, Is Brought Back for G.O.P. Convention

      by

      Corey Lewandowski, former President Donald J. Trump’s first campaign manager, who was ousted from that campaign in 2016 and then from a pro-Trump super PAC in 2021, has been hired as an adviser for the Republican Party’s nominating convention in July, a person familiar with the decision said.Mr. Lewandowski, a longtime political adviser to Mr. Trump, was pushed out of a pro-Trump super PAC that he had helped lead — Make America Great Again Action — in 2021 after the wife of a donor accused him of making unwanted sexual advances. A spokesman for Mr. Trump said at the time that Mr. Lewandowski would “no longer be associated with Trump World.” His hiring for the Republican National Convention, which will be held in mid-July in Milwaukee, represents his return to Mr. Trump’s circle of political advisers.The hiring was first reported by National Review, and Chris LaCivita, a top official in the Trump campaign, told the conservative outlet that Mr. Lewandowski was “very helpful to me, and he’s helpful to the R.N.C., and he’s helpful to the president.”This month, Paul Manafort, who replaced Mr. Lewandowski as Mr. Trump’s campaign manager in 2016, stepped down from a similar role advising the nominating convention, saying that “the media wants to use me as a distraction to try and harm President Trump and his campaign.” Mr. Manafort was convicted of a range of financial crimes and conspiracy to obstruct justice and spent nearly two years in prison before Mr. Trump pardoned him in December 2020.Mr. Lewandowski was the campaign manager for Mr. Trump when he first jumped into the presidential race in June 2015. Mr. Trump fired him in June 2016 at the urging of allies and his adult children as Mr. Lewandowski faced negative headlines that had overshadowed his boss, including being arrested and charged with misdemeanor battery — a charge later dropped — after he was accused of grabbing a reporter as she approached Mr. Trump. The next year, a pop singer accused Mr. Lewandowski of slapping her twice on the buttocks at a party in Washington.A spokesman for the Democratic National Committee highlighted the allegations against Mr. Lewandowski and said the Trump campaign was “scraping the bottom of the MAGA barrel” by hiring him.Mr. Lewandowski had considered running for a Senate seat in 2020 in New Hampshire, but ultimately backed out of the race. More