More stories

  • in

    How Jack Smith Quickly Brought Two Indictments Against Trump

    Last fall, a largely unknown former prosecutor with a beard and a brisk gait flew unnoticed to Washington from The Hague after being summoned to a secret meeting by Attorney General Merrick B. Garland.Jack Smith’s job interview would remain unknown to all but a handful of department officials until hours before he was appointed special counsel to oversee two investigations into former President Donald J. Trump in mid-November.Over the past few months of frenetic activity, Mr. Smith’s anonymity has vanished. He has now indicted Mr. Trump twice: in June, for risking national security secrets by taking classified documents from the White House, and on Tuesday, in connection with his widespread efforts to subvert democracy and overturn an election in 2020 he clearly lost.And he has taken these actions with remarkable speed, aggressiveness and apparent indifference to collateral political consequences.Mr. Smith has now indicted former President Donald J. Trump twice.Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times“He’s going at a very fast clip — not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good — to the point that I sometimes worry they might be going a little too fast and haven’t buttoned everything up,” said Ryan Goodman, a professor at the New York University School of Law, before the release of the indictment in the election case.Mr. Smith told reporters that the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was “fueled by lies” — Mr. Trump’s lies — during brief remarks on Tuesday, after a jury in Washington indicted the former president on four counts.Mr. Smith is not the first special counsel to investigate Mr. Trump. From 2017 to 2019, Robert S. Mueller III examined ties between Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia. In his final report, he laid out a frantic effort by Mr. Trump to thwart a federal inquiry but ultimately cited a Justice Department policy in not making a determination on whether the sitting president had committed a crime. Mr. Smith, by contrast, faces no such limits, given that Mr. Trump is no longer in office.But where Mr. Mueller took two years to conclude his investigations into Mr. Trump, Mr. Smith — who took over investigations into Mr. Trump that were several months old — delivered his basic assessment in two criminal investigations in a little over eight months.Beyond the contrast in circumstances and timing, there are undeniable differences between the two men, rooted in their respective ages, experiences, management styles and prosecutorial philosophies, that have shaped their divergent charging decisions.“His disposition, compared to Mueller, seems very different — he’s working against the clock, Mueller moved a lot more slowly,” said Mr. Goodman, who is a co-founder of Just Security, an online publication that has closely monitored the Trump investigations.Mr. Trump and congressional Republicans have accused Mr. Smith, without evidence, of pursuing a politically motivated investigation intended to destroy Mr. Trump’s chances of retaking the White House, including by leaking details of the case. But department officials have said Mr. Smith is committed to conducting a fair investigation, and he has defended his own lawyers against attacks from the Trump team, who accuse them of using unethical tactics.The former president has taken to calling Mr. Smith “deranged,” and some of his supporters have threatened the special counsel, his family and his team — prompting the U.S. Marshals to spend $1.9 million to provide protection for those who have been targeted, according to federal expense reports that cover the first four months of his tenure. Mr. Smith was flanked by a three-person security detail inside his own building when he delivered remarks to reporters on Tuesday.Mr. Mueller was an established and trusted national figure when he was appointed special counsel, unlike Mr. Smith, who was virtually unknown outside the department and drew a mixed record during his tenure. Mr. Mueller had already solidified a reputation as the most important F.B.I. director since J. Edgar Hoover, after protecting and reshaping the bureau at a time when some were calling for breaking it up following the intelligence failures that preceded the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.Robert S. Mueller III, the former special counsel, was an established and trusted national figure when he was appointed.Anna Moneymaker/The New York TimesBut there was, at times, a gap between the perception of Mr. Mueller and his ability to execute a difficult job under fire. Already in his mid-70s, he struck many of those who working with him as a notably diminished figure who, in testifying before Congress at the end of the investigation, was not entirely in command of the facts of his complex investigation.By comparison, Mr. Smith is someone who rose to the upper echelons of the Justice Department but is not well known outside of law enforcement circles. At 54, Mr. Smith, a lifelong prosecutor, is leading the investigation at the height of his career, not at the end of it.Mr. Smith is fresh off a stint as a war crimes prosecutor in The Hague and took over two investigations that were already well down the road. Mr. Smith sees himself as a ground-level prosecutor paid to make a series of fast decisions. He is determined to do everything he can to quickly strengthen a case (or end it) — by squeezing witnesses and using prosecutorial tools, such as summoning potential targets of prosecution before a grand jury to emphasize the seriousness of his inquiries, people close to him have said.When Mr. Smith took over as chief of the Justice Department’s public integrity unit in 2010, the unit was reeling from the collapse of a criminal case against former Senator Ted Stevens, Republican of Alaska. In his first few months on the job, he closed several prominent investigations into members of Congress without charges.At the time, Mr. Smith brushed off the suggestion that he had lost his nerve. “If I were the sort of person who could be cowed,” he said, “I would find another line of work.”Among his more notable corruption cases was a conviction of Robert McDonnell, the Republican former governor of Virginia, that was later overturned by the Supreme Court, and a conviction of former Representative Rick Renzi, Republican of Arizona, whom Mr. Trump pardoned during his final hours as president.Mr. Smith appears to be somewhat more involved than Mr. Mueller in the granular details of his investigations. Even so, he seldom sits in personally on witness interviews — and spoke only sparingly during two meetings with Mr. Trump’s defense lawyers, delegating the discussions to subordinates, according to people familiar with the situation.Mr. Smith’s stony style, intentional or not, has the effect of sowing considerable unease across a conference table or courtroom.James Trusty, who quit the former president’s defense team a day after meeting with Mr. Smith’s team in June, worked for years with Mr. Smith as a senior criminal prosecutor at Justice Department headquarters and told associates he was a “serious” adversary not to be underestimated. Other lawyers said Mr. Smith’s team has fed the sense of mystery by describing him in veiled or cryptic terms, with one calling him “the man behind the curtain.”He has been more public-facing than Mr. Mueller in one critical respect — delivering short, sober statements to the news media after each grand jury indictment.Mr. Mueller said little when faced with a barrage of falsehoods pushed publicly by Mr. Trump and his allies about him and his investigative team. But at a news conference after Mr. Trump was indicted in the documents case, Mr. Smith seemed to be speaking with an added purpose: to rebut claims that one of his prosecutors, Jay I. Bratt, had inappropriately pressured a defense lawyer representing one of Mr. Trump’s co-defendants, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.“The prosecutors in my office are among the most talented and experienced in the Department of Justice,” he said. “They have investigated this case hewing to the highest ethical standards.”While much attention has centered on Mr. Smith, most of the day-to-day work on critical elements of the case has been done by several prosecutors known for their aggressive approaches.One of them is J.P. Cooney, the former leader of the public corruption division of the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington. Mr. Cooney has worked on several politically fraught trials and investigations that drew the ire of Republicans and Democrats alike.He unsuccessfully prosecuted two Democrats — Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Greg Craig, a former White House counsel during the Obama administration — and investigated Andrew G. McCabe, the former F.B.I. deputy director, who was vilified by Mr. Trump for the bureau’s Russia investigation. (Mr. McCabe was never prosecuted.)More recently, Mr. Cooney oversaw the lawyers prosecuting Roger J. Stone Jr., a longtime political adviser to Mr. Trump. The lawyers quit in protest after the Justice Department under William P. Barr intervened in his sentencing. (Mr. Cooney was deeply upset by the intervention, but he said the case was “not the hill worth dying on” according to Aaron Zelinsky, a career prosecutor, who testified before the House Oversight Committee in 2020.)A second key player is Thomas P. Windom, who was brought in nearly a year before Mr. Smith’s appointment to coordinate the complicated Jan. 6 investigation that had once been seated in the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington.Mr. Smith had a stint as a war crimes prosecutor at The Hague, in the Netherlands.Pool photo by Peter DejongMr. Smith has relied on F.B.I. agents to perform investigative tasks, which is not uncommon for special counsels. But the F.B.I. is not walled off from Mr. Smith’s investigation, unlike the agents who were detailed to work for John H. Durham, a special counsel who investigated the origins of the F.B.I.’s Russia investigation.In a letter to House Republicans in June, Carlos F. Uriarte, the Justice Department’s legislative affairs director, disclosed that Mr. Smith employed about 26 special agents, with additional agents being brought on from “time to time” for specific tasks related to the investigations.Mr. Smith, unlike many previous special counsels, did not hire most of the staff: He inherited two existing Trump investigations and moved them from Justice Department headquarters to his new office across town. Some of the investigative legwork was also done by investigators with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and agents with the Justice Department’s inspector general working alongside Mr. Windom at one point.He has, however, exerted direct control over both inquiries, trying to keep even the most quotidian information about his efforts away from the news media, and been present, if sotto voce, at the most critical moments.During Mr. Trump’s arraignment in Miami in June, Mr. Smith sat in the gallery, closely watching the proceedings. Some in the courtroom suggested he stared at Mr. Trump for much of the hearing, sizing him up.But that was not really the case. He listened intently to the lawyers on both sides, at times leaning in toward a colleague to make a whispered comment or ask a question.Alan Feuer More

  • in

    After Indictment, DeSantis Suggests Trump Can’t Get a Fair Trial in D.C.

    Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida raced to respond to news that former President Donald J. Trump had been indicted a third time not by opining one way or the other on the new federal charges, but by leveling an unusual attack at residents of the District of Columbia, where the case is being prosecuted.Suggesting that Mr. Trump could not get a fair trial if the jurors were residents of the nation’s capital, an overwhelmingly Democratic city, Mr. DeSantis called for enacting reforms to let Americans have the right to remove cases from Washington, D.C. to their home districts.“Washington, D.C. is a ‘swamp’ and it is unfair to have to stand trial before a jury that is reflective of the swamp mentality,” Mr. DeSantis wrote on Twitter. “One of the reasons our country is in decline is the politicization of the rule of law. No more excuses — I will end the weaponization of the federal government.”The judge assigned to Mr. Trump, who was indicted on charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, is Tanya S. Chutkan, a D.C. District Court judge who has routinely issued harsh penalties in Jan. 6-related cases against people who stormed the Capitol.The Republican candidates, who have sought to overtake the former president’s substantial lead in early polls with little success, have campaigned amid a backdrop of Mr. Trump’s legal battles that have sucked up valuable airtime and dominated media coverage. Here’s what the others said on Tuesday: Former Vice President Mike Pence, who was present at the Capitol during the Jan. 6 attack and was the target of some rioters — and whom the indictment describes as a key target of Mr. Trump’s pressure campaign to overturn the 2020 election — said that the indictment “serves as an important reminder: Anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States.”Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, in a statement to The Times, echoed a common refrain among Republicans: that the Justice Department, under the Biden administration, had been weaponized against Mr. Biden’s political opponents. He referenced the case against Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s son, and said, “We’re watching Biden’s D.O.J. continue to hunt Republicans while protecting Democrats.”Vivek Ramaswamy, a tech entrepreneur and one of Mr. Trump’s most vocal defenders in the 2024 field, called the indictment “un-American.” He sought to absolve Mr. Trump of any responsibility for the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and reiterated his previous promise that, if elected, he would pardon Mr. Trump. “The corrupt federal police just won’t stop until they’ve achieved their mission: eliminate Trump,” he said, and added: “Trump isn’t responsible for what happened on Jan 6. The real cause was systematic and pervasive censorship of citizens in the year leading up to it.”Former Representative Will Hurd of Texas, who has refused to pledge his support to Mr. Trump if he is the eventual nominee, was the first candidate to respond to the new indictment. “Let me be crystal clear: Trump’s presidential bid is driven by an attempt to stay out of prison and scam his supporters into footing his legal bills,” Mr. Hurd wrote. “His denial of the 2020 election results and actions on Jan. 6 show he’s unfit for office.”Former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, who is running an explicitly anti-Trump campaign, reiterated his earlier calls for Mr. Trump to quit his campaign, calling him “morally responsible for the attack on our democracy.” Mr. Hutchinson said that if Mr. Trump does not drop out of the race, “voters must choose a different path.” More

  • in

    Here Are the Charges Trump Faces in the Jan. 6 Case

    The newly unsealed indictment of former President Donald J. Trump on Tuesday leveled four criminal counts against him over his efforts to stay in power after the 2020 election: a conspiracy to violate civil rights, a conspiracy to defraud the government, the corrupt obstruction of an official proceeding and a conspiracy to carry out such obstruction.Here is a closer look at the charges.One of the charges, a conspiracy to violate rights, is Section 241 of Title 18 of the United States Code. A conviction on this charge is punishable by up to five years in prison.Congress enacted what is now Section 241 after the Civil War to go after white Americans in the South, including members of the Ku Klux Klan, who used terrorism to prevent formerly enslaved African Americans from voting. But in a series of cases in the 20th century, the Supreme Court upheld expanding use of the statute to election-fraud conspiracies, like ballot-box stuffing.In invoking the statute, the indictment frames it as “a conspiracy against the right to vote and to have one’s vote counted.” Essentially, Mr. Smith has accused Mr. Trump of trying to rig the outcome of the election to falsely claim victory.“The purpose of the conspiracy was to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election by using knowingly false claims of election fraud to obstruct the federal government function by which those results are collected, counted and certified,” the indictment said.The indictment cites five means by which Mr. Trump and his accused co-conspirators sought to reverse the results of the election, including pushing state legislators and election officials to change electoral votes won by his opponent, Joseph R. Biden Jr., in his favor instead.“That is, on the pretext of baseless fraud claims, the defendant pushed officials in certain states to ignore the popular vote; disenfranchise millions of voters; dismiss legitimate electors; and ultimately, cause the ascertainment of and voting by illegitimate electors in favor of the defendant,” the indictment said.It also cited the recruitment of fake electors in swing states Mr. Biden won, trying to wield the power of the Justice Department to fuel lies about election conspiracy, and pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to delay the certification of the election or reject legitimate electors.The special counsel has accused Mr. Trump of trying to rig the outcome of the 2020 election to falsely claim victory.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesAnd when all that failed, it said, Mr. Trump and his co-conspirators “exploited” the violent disruption of the riot on Jan. 6, 2021, by “redoubling efforts to levy false claims of election fraud and convince members of Congress to further delay the certification based on those claims.”The indictment, which recounts each of those episodes in detail, relies on the same basic facts for the other counts against Mr. Trump.One of those, conspiracy to defraud the United States, involves Section 371. Any conviction on this charge is also punishable by up to five years in prison.The possibility of this charge has long been part of public discussion of the investigation. In March 2022, for example, a federal judge ruled that emails of John Eastman, a lawyer who advised Mr. Trump in the effort, were most likely involved in that crime and qualified for an exemption from attorney-client privilege.And the House select committee investigating Jan. 6 recommended in its final report in December 2022 that the Justice Department charge Mr. Trump and others with this offense.The third and fourth counts are closely related: corrupt obstruction of an official proceeding and conspiracy to commit that crime. Both are provisions of Section 1512. Any conviction under that statute is punishable by up to 20 years in prison.Prosecutors have used this law to charge hundreds of people who participated in the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6, accusing them of obstructing the joint session of Congress to certify Mr. Biden’s victory.In April, a federal appeals court upheld the viability of applying that charge in relation to the Capitol attack, but using it against Mr. Trump may raise different issues since he did not personally participate in the riot. More

  • in

    Donald Trump es acusado de cuatro cargos

    El expresidente, que está en campaña para regresar a la Casa Blanca, ha sido imputado por sus intentos de usar los mecanismos del Estado para permanecer en el poder.El expresidente Donald Trump fue imputado el martes por sus esfuerzos generalizados de revertir las elecciones de 2020, luego de una amplia investigación federal sobre su intento de aferrarse al poder después de perder la presidencia ante Joseph Biden.La imputación la presentó el fiscal especial Jack Smith en la Corte Federal de Distrito en Washington.Se acusa a Trump de tres conspiraciones: una para defraudar a Estados Unidos, otra para obstruir un procedimiento oficial del gobierno y una tercera para privar al pueblo de derechos civiles previstos en la ley federal o la Constitución.“Cada una de estas conspiraciones, que se aprovechaban de la desconfianza generalizada que el acusado creaba a través de mentiras generalizadas y desestabilizadoras sobre el fraude electoral, atacaban una función esencial del gobierno federal de Estados Unidos: el proceso nacional de recolección, conteo y certificación de resultados de las elecciones presidenciales”, decía la acusación.También se indicó que Trump tuvo seis conspiradores pero no los nombró.Los cargos representan un momento extraordinario en la historia estadounidense: un expresidente, que está en campaña para regresar a la Casa Blanca, ha sido imputado por sus intentos de usar los mecanismos del poder gubernamental con el fin de trastocar la democracia y quedarse en el cargo contra la voluntad de los votantes.La acusación se produjo más de dos años y medio después de que una turba favorable a Trump —alentada por los discursos incendiarios del exmandatario y sus aliados— irrumpieron en el Capitolio el 6 de enero de 2021, en el peor ataque contra la sede del Congreso desde la Guerra de 1812.Un gran jurado federal devolvió la acusación unos ocho meses después de que el procurador general Merrick Garland nombrara a Smith, un fiscal federal de carrera, para que supervisara dos investigaciones contra Trump, una sobre el manejo de documentos clasificados y la otra sobre la manipulación de las elecciones. Sucedió un año después de que la Cámara de Representantes realizó audiencias de alto nivel sobre el ataque del 6 de enero y sus causas que dieron como resultado pruebas extensas de los esfuerzos de Trump por revertir los resultados electorales.Garland procedió a nombrar a Smith como fiscal especial unos días después de que Trump declarara que volvía a postularse.El expresidente enfrenta dos acusaciones federales distintas. En junio, Smith presentó cargos en Florida acusando a Trump —el principal contendiente a la nominación republicana a la presidencia para 2024— de retener de manera ilegal un conjunto de documentos de defensa nacional muy delicados y luego obstaculizar los intentos del gobierno para recuperarlos. Se espera que ese caso llegue a juicio en mayo.El esquema que Smith imputó el martes en el caso de la elección se desarrolló sobre todo en los dos meses transcurridos entre el Día de las Elecciones en noviembre de 2020 y el ataque al Capitolio. En ese tiempo. Trump participó en un amplio repertorio de esfuerzos para permanecer en el poder, a pesar de haber perdido frente a Biden en la contienda presidencial.Trump también enfrenta dificultades legales en las cortes estatales, además de los cargos a nivel federal en los casos de los documentos y las elecciones.La oficina del fiscal de distrito de Manhattan lo acusó en un caso enfocado en pagos hechos a la estrella porno Stormy Daniels con el fin de acallarla antes de las elecciones de 2016.Los esfuerzos de Trump y sus aliados para revertir su derrota electoral también son motivo de otra investigación a cargo del fiscal de distrito del Condado de Fulton, Georgia. Parece ser que esa indagatoria podría formular cargos este mes.Alan Feuer cubre los tribunales y la justicia penal para la sección Metro. Ha escrito sobre mafiosos, cárceles, mala conducta policial, condenas injustas, corrupción gubernamental y El Chapo, el jefe encarcelado del cártel de Sinaloa. Se unió al Times en 1999.Maggie Haberman es corresponsal de la Casa Blanca. Se unió al Times en 2015 como corresponsal de campaña y fue parte del equipo que ganó un premio Pulitzer en 2018 por informar sobre los asesores del presidente Trump y sus conexiones con Rusia. More

  • in

    The Republicans Who Could Qualify for the First Presidential Debate

    At least seven candidates appear to have made the cut so far for the first Republican presidential debate on Aug. 23. Trump(may not attend) Trump(may not attend) The latest polling and fund-raising data show that the playing field is narrowing for the Republican presidential debate scheduled for later this month. Although former President Donald J. […] More

  • in

    Matt DePerno, Trump Meddler in Michigan, Is Charged in Election Breach

    A key figure in a multistate effort to overturn the 2020 election, Mr. DePerno lost his race for Michigan attorney general in 2022. He later finished second to lead the state’s Republican Party.Matthew DePerno, a key orchestrator of efforts to help former President Donald J. Trump try to overturn the 2020 election in Michigan and an unsuccessful candidate for state attorney general last year, was arraigned on four felony charges on Tuesday, according to documents released by D.J. Hilson, the special prosecutor handling the investigation.The charges against Mr. DePerno, which include undue possession of a voting machine and a conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to a computer or computer system, come after a nearly yearlong investigation in one of the battleground states that cemented the election of Joseph R. Biden Jr. as president.Former State Representative Daire Rendon was also charged with two crimes, including a conspiracy to illegally obtain a voting machine and false pretenses.Both Mr. DePerno and Ms. Rendon were arraigned remotely on Tuesday before Chief Judge Jeffery Matis, according to Richard Lynch, the court administrator for Oakland County’s Sixth Circuit, and remained free on bond.The charges were first reported by The Detroit News.Mr. DePerno denied any wrongdoing and said that his efforts “uncovered significant security flaws” in a statement from his lawyer, Paul Stablein.“He maintains his innocence and firmly believes that these charges are not based upon any actual truth and are motivated primarily by politics rather than evidence,” Mr. Stablein said.The criminal inquiry in Michigan has largely been overshadowed by developments in Georgia, where a grand jury is weighing charges against Mr. Trump for trying to subvert the election, but both are part of the ongoing reckoning over the conspiracy theories about election machines promoted by Mr. Trump and his allies.The efforts to legitimize the falsehoods and conspiracy theories promoted widely by Mr. Trump and his allies continued long after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and after Mr. Biden took office. In Arizona, such efforts included the discredited election audit of Maricopa County led by Republicans in the state legislature.In a statement, Mr. Hilson said, “Although our office made no recommendations to the grand jury as to whether an indictment should be issued or not, we support the grand jury’s decision and we will prosecute each of the cases as they have directed in the sole interests of justice.”Dana Nessel, Michigan’s attorney general and a Democrat who went on to defeat Mr. DePerno in the November election, has not been involved in the investigation since the appointment of a special prosecutor in August last year. In a statement on Tuesday, Ms. Nessel said that the allegations “caused undeniable harm to our democracy” and issued a warning for the future.“The 2024 presidential election will soon be upon us. The lies espoused by attorneys involved in this matter, and those who worked in concert with them across the nation, wreaked havoc and sowed distrust within our democratic institutions and processes,” Ms. Nessel said. “We hope for swift justice in the courts.”The charges stemmed from a bizarre plot hatched by a group of conservative activists in early 2021 to pick apart voting machines in at least three Michigan counties, in some cases taking them to hotels and Airbnb rentals as they hunted for evidence of election fraud.In the weeks after the 2020 election, he drew widespread attention and the admiration of Mr. Trump when he filed a lawsuit challenging the vote tallies in Antrim County, a rural area in Northern Michigan where a minor clerical error fueled conspiracy theories.He falsely claimed that voting machines there had been rigged, a premise that was rejected as “idiotic” by William P. Barr, an attorney general under Mr. Trump, and “demonstrably false” by Republicans in the Michigan Senate.Mr. Hilson, the prosecutor in Muskegon County appointed as special prosecutor, had initially delayed bringing charges, asking a state judge to determine whether it was against state law to take possession of a voting machine without the secretary of state’s permission or a court order. A judge determined last month that doing so was against the law, clearing the way for charges.Democrats swept the governor’s race and other statewide contests last fall, in addition to flipping the full Legislature for the first time in decades. Mr. DePerno, who was endorsed by Mr. Trump, lost the attorney general’s race by eight percentage points.This year, Mr. DePerno had been a front-runner to lead the Michigan Republican Party after its disappointing showing in last year’s midterm election, but he finished second to another election-denier: Kristina Karamo.In his campaign to lead the G.O.P. in Michigan, Mr. DePerno had vowed to pack the party’s leadership ranks with Trump loyalists, close primaries to just Republicans and ratchet up the distribution of absentee ballot applications to party members — despite what he said was lingering opposition to voting by mail within the party’s ranks.His candidacy was supported by Mike Lindell, the MyPillow chief executive who has spread conspiracy theories about election fraud and appeared at a fund-raising reception for Mr. DePerno in Lansing on the night before the chairmanship vote.Mr. DePerno lost to Ms. Karamo after three rounds of balloting at the state party convention, a process that was slowed for several hours by the use of paper ballots and hand counting.Danny Hakim More

  • in

    ¿Dónde está Melania Trump y qué papel tendrá en la campaña de 2024?

    Mientras su marido busca regresar a la Casa Blanca y se enfrenta a un riesgo legal cada vez mayor, la ex primera dama ha decidido mantenerse fuera del ojo público.Desde que salió de la Casa Blanca, el mundo de Melania Trump se ha hecho más pequeño.Tal como a ella le gusta.Resguardada tras las puertas cerradas de sus tres casas, su mundo se limita a un pequeño círculo: su hijo, sus padres ya mayores y un puñado de viejos amigos. Visita a sus peluqueros, consulta a Hervé Pierre, su estilista de toda la vida, y a veces se reúne con su marido para cenar los viernes por la noche en sus clubes. Pero su objetivo máximo es una campaña personal: ayudar a su hijo Barron, de 17 años, en su búsqueda de universidad.Lo que no ha hecho, a pesar de las invitaciones de su marido, es aparecer en la campaña electoral. Tampoco ha estado a su lado en ninguna de sus comparecencias ante los tribunales.Así pasa los días Melania Trump, ex primera dama, actual cónyuge de un candidato en campaña y esposa de una de las figuras más divisorias de la vida pública estadounidense. A diferencia de sus predecesoras, no hay planes para una gira de conferencias, un libro o una gran expansión de sus actividades de beneficencia, la mayoría de las cuales, dicen personas cercanas a los Trump, no son del todo visibles para el público. En su vida después de ser primera dama, quiere lo que no pudo conseguir en la Casa Blanca: una sensación de privacidad.Esos intentos de retirarse de la vida pública se han visto obstaculizados por su marido, que la ha convertido de nuevo en la esposa de un candidato. Mientras Donald Trump se enfrenta a una posible tercera acusación formal, ella ha guardado un silencio inquebrantable sobre su creciente riesgo judicial.Aunque apoya su candidatura presidencial, Melania Trump no se ha dejado ver en público desde que Trump anunció su campaña en noviembre y no fue sino hasta mayo que habló de eso, cuando manifestó su apoyo en una entrevista con Fox News Digital.“Tiene mi apoyo y esperamos devolver la esperanza por el futuro y gobernar Estados Unidos con amor y fortaleza”, declaró.Su ausencia marca una notable diferencia con el inicio de la primera campaña de Trump, cuando Melania Trump, con un vestido blanco sin tirantes, descendió por la escalera mecánica dorada delante de su marido en el arranque de su campaña en la Torre Trump.Melania Trump mantiene el contacto y la amistad con un reducido grupo de personas de su época en la Casa Blanca, entre ellas la diseñadora Rachel Roy y Hilary Geary Ross, la destacada relacionista de Palm Beach y esposa de Wilbur L. Ross, ex secretario de Comercio de Trump. Sigue muy unida a sus padres, que tienen un apartamento en la Torre Trump de Manhattan y han sido vistos en eventos de Trump en Mar-a-Lago, el club privado y residencia de los Trump.“Desde su punto de vista y el de sus amigos, ha pasado por muchas cosas, que la han convertido en una mujer fuerte e independiente”, dijo R. Couri Hay, publicista que conoció a Melania Trump en Nueva York antes de que se fuera a Washington. “Ha aprendido a cerrar puertas y persianas y a permanecer en privado. No vemos mucho, no oímos mucho”.Melania Trump declinó una solicitud de entrevista. Este relato se basa en una decena de entrevistas con asociados, ayudantes de campaña y amigos, la mayoría de los cuales hablaron bajo condición de anonimato porque no estaban autorizados a discutir los detalles privados de su vida.Personas cercanas a la familia afirman que la falta de apoyo público de Melania Trump no debe confundirse con desaprobación o indiferencia. Ella sigue defendiendo a su marido y comparte su creencia de que su familia está siendo atacada injustamente. Desconfía mucho de los principales medios de comunicación y es una ávida lectora del Daily Mail en internet, en el que sigue la cobertura de Trump que hace el tabloide conservador británico.Melania Trump muestra un particular escepticismo ante el caso de E. Jean Carroll, quien obtuvo 5 millones de dólares por daños y perjuicios en un juicio en el que acusó a Trump de abusos sexuales en la década de 1990 y de difamación después de que dejara la Casa Blanca, según dos personas familiarizadas con sus declaraciones. Cuando Melania Trump vio la cobertura de la declaración de su marido en el caso, se enfureció con su equipo legal por no haber hecho más para plantear objeciones. También ha cuestionado en privado por qué Carroll no podía recordar la fecha exacta de la supuesta agresión.A pesar de ello, Melania Trump cree que, a pesar de los riesgos judiciales, Trump podría regresar a la Casa Blanca el año próximo. En privado, ha mostrado curiosidad por Casey DeSantis, la esposa de Ron DeSantis, el gobernador de Florida y principal rival de Trump. Casey DeSantis es una asesora cercana de su marido, una presencia habitual en sus eventos y ha empezado a aparecer por su cuenta en actos de campaña a favor de él. En una de sus escasas entrevistas, Melania Trump reflexionó en Fox News sobre la posibilidad de volver a ser primera dama y afirmó que, de tener una segunda oportunidad en el cargo, “priorizaría el bienestar y el desarrollo de los niños”.Melania Trump ha mostrado curiosidad en privado por Casey DeSantis, quien ha pasado tiempo haciendo campaña junto a su marido, Ron DeSantis.Rachel Mummey para The New York TimesPero aún no le ha dado prioridad a la campaña. Aunque se ha mostrado dispuesta a participar en eventos para su marido el año que viene, hasta ahora ha rechazado sus invitaciones a los actos de campaña.“No creo que vaya a ser nada parecido a lo que hemos visto con Casey DeSantis”, dijo Stephanie Grisham, una exasistente de Trump que renunció el 6 de enero. “No va a dejarse ver en jeans ni a caminar en desfiles”.Kellyanne Conway, asesora de Trump desde hace años y cercana a Melania Trump, dijo que la ex primera dama apoya “por completo” la candidatura de su marido y seguía siendo su “consejera de mayor confianza y más transparente”. Comentó que el matrimonio ha discutido en privado las “prioridades” de un segundo mandato.“Conozco pocas personas tan seguras de sí mismas como Melania Trump”, dijo Conway, quien no trabaja para la campaña. “Ella sabe quién es y mantiene sus prioridades bajo control. Melania los mantiene a la expectativa y siguen interpretándola mal”.Ese aire de misterio se extiende a las comunidades cerradas de los clubes de su esposo. En Palm Beach, Melania Trump no forma parte del circuito social, afirmó Lore Smith, una agente de bienes raíces de Palm Beach desde hace mucho tiempo, la cual visita con frecuencia el club.A diferencia de sus predecesoras modernas, que asistían a clases de gimnasia o de spinning, a Melania Trump no se le ve en el gimnasio y no se tiene información de que tenga un entrenador, según otros asiduos del club y exayudantes. Durante mucho tiempo ha sido fanática de los días que pasa en el spa, pero casi nunca se le ve afuera en la piscina en Mar-a-Lago o Bedminster, el campo de golf y resort de Trump en Nueva Jersey. De vez en cuando, hace breves apariciones en eventos de caridad en Mar-a-Lago junto a su esposo.“Son muy reservados detrás de los confines de Mar-a-Lago”, dijo Smith.Melania Trump no forma parte del circuito social en Mar-a-Lago, el club privado de su esposo. Se dice que prefiere Nueva York.Saul Martinez para The New York TimesMelania Trump sigue muy involucrada con la educación de Barron. Su hijo está inscrito en una escuela privada en West Palm Beach y está empezando a buscar universidades en Nueva York.Se dice que Melania Trump prefiere la ciudad a Mar-a-Lago o Bedminster. Se le ha visto yendo a su peluquero y entrando y saliendo de la Torre Trump, lo cual hace a través de una entrada lateral especial y un ascensor privado.Fuera de las residencias familiares, la agenda pública de Melania Trump ha sido limitada. Ha participado en un puñado de eventos, incluida la recaudación de 500.000 dólares en tarifas el año pasado de Log Cabin Republicans, un grupo conservador que apoya los derechos de la comunidad LGBT, y Fix California, una organización electoral fundada por Richard Grenell, ex alto funcionario del gobierno de Trump. Grenell se negó a comentar sobre la aparición de la ex primera dama en los eventos.En febrero de 2022, Melania Trump inició “Fostering the Future”, un programa de becas para niños de acogida que ya están a punto de cumplir la edad máxima para pertenecer al sistema. Una persona familiarizada con el programa, que habló bajo condición de anonimato, no ofreció detalles ni reveló cuántas becas se otorgaron, y solo afirmó que fueron “más de dos”. No existe ninguna organización benéfica con el nombre “Fostering the Future” o “Be Best” registrada en Florida o Nueva York.Michael Weitzman, el primer beneficiario de una de las becas, dijo que recibió financiación durante cuatro años en la Universidad Oral Roberts a través de un mentor, que conocía a un amigo relacionado con los Trump. “Me preguntó si ir a la universidad todavía era un sueño para mí”, contó Weitzman, quien pasó su infancia viviendo en 12 hogares de acogida. “Dijo que podría conocer a alguien realmente rico que podría querer pagar para que yo fuera”.Weitzman no llenó ningún tipo de solicitud, pero un día después de que el mentor le planteó la idea, recibió un correo electrónico del equipo de relaciones públicas de Melania Trump, preguntándole si estaba dispuesto a participar en una entrevista de Fox News con la ex primera dama, la primera desde que dejó la Casa Blanca. La beca se anunció durante la entrevista de mayo de 2022, con la participación de Weitzman a través de Zoom. Weitzman, de 26 años, dijo que no había tenido ninguna interacción con Melania Trump desde entonces.“No la he conocido en persona. A menudo me preguntaba si lo haría y me encantaría”, dijo. “Estoy más que agradecido. No hay ninguna razón por la que alguien tendría que haber hecho esto por mí”.Los asistentes de Melania Trump se negaron a discutir los detalles de sus planes de campaña, sus emprendimientos benéficos y comerciales y sus puntos de vista sobre los problemas legales de su esposo. Los voceros de la campaña de Donald Trump se negaron a comentar.Melania Trump y Barron Trump asistieron al lanzamiento de la campaña de Donald Trump en noviembre. Desde entonces, la ex primera dama ha dicho poco sobre la campaña de su esposo para la Casa Blanca.Andrew Harnik/Associated PressEn muchos sentidos, la vida de Melania Trump posterior a la Casa Blanca es una extensión de su estilo como primera dama.Desde el comienzo del mandato de su esposo, cuando no se mudó de inmediato a la Casa Blanca, Melania Trump constantemente vaciló entre dos extremos: aceptar de lleno su papel o desafiar todas las expectativas asociadas con él.Uno de sus momentos más memorables se realizó a través de una declaración de moda. Cuando regresaba de una visita a un pueblo fronterizo de Texas para encontrarse con niños migrantes detenidos, vistió una chaqueta estampada con la frase: “Realmente no me importa. ¿Y a ti?Gran parte de su experiencia en la Casa Blanca estuvo marcada por lo que personas cercanas a ella describieron como decepción y traición por parte de amigos, ayudantes e incluso miembros de la familia Trump. En ocasiones, su relación con Ivanka Trump y Jared Kushner, la hija y el yerno de Trump, fue tensa, según exasesores. Desde entonces, su exsecretaria de prensa, Grisham, y una exayudante y amiga, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, han escrito libros reveladores que la describen como fría y desconectada de su cargo.Esas experiencias empujaron a Melania Trump a ocultarse aún más del ojo público, aseguraron personas vinculadas con la familia.Melania Trump es “la primera dama más francamente desconocida”, dijo la autora de un libro sobre el tema. “Hay algo radical en ello”.Doug Mills/The New York TimesPero esa privacidad puede ser difícil de mantener bajo el escrutinio de unas contenciosas primarias presidenciales y las investigaciones legales.Recientemente, Chris Christie criticó a ambos Trump por un pago de 155.000 dólares a Melania Trump de parte de un comité de acción política alineado con la campaña de su esposo. Un representante del comité dijo que Melania Trump fue contratada en 2021 para “consultoría de diseño”, incluida la elección de vajillas, distribución de asientos y arreglos florales.“Existe la estafa y luego existe la estafa al estilo de los Trump”, escribió Christie, el exgobernador de Nueva Jersey y el crítico más abierto de Trump en el campo de las primarias republicanas de 2024, en Twitter. “Son los campeones indiscutibles”.La mayor parte de su perfil público, realizado casi siempre a través de sus cuentas de redes sociales, se centra en la venta de una variedad de cromos virtuales. Sus NFT, o tokens no fungibles, incluyen dibujos digitales de sus ojos, un sombrero de ala ancha que usó durante una visita de estado, adornos navideños de la Casa Blanca y una rosa azul destinada a conmemorar el Mes Nacional del Programa de Acogida.La mayoría de sus tuits y publicaciones de Instagram promocionan directamente los NFT o una empresa llamada USA Memorabilia, que los vende. Un día después de que su esposo anunciara en su red social, Truth Social, que había recibido una notificación de la investigación federal sobre sus esfuerzos para frustrar la transferencia de poder en 2020, el único comentario público de Melania Trump fue el anuncio de una nueva colección de NFT: “Hombre en la Luna”.Una parte de sus ganancias se destina a donaciones, aunque sus asistentes no proporcionaron detalles sobre la cantidad ni especificaron a qué organización benéfica.Si bien las primeras damas a menudo sacan provecho de la fama que viene con el cargo, la empresa lucrativa de Trump es diferente de la de sus predecesores, dijo Kate Andersen Brower, autora del libro First Women: The Grace and Power of America’s Modern First Ladies.Según los informes, a Michelle Obama se le pagó más de 60 millones de dólares en un acuerdo de libro conjunto con su esposo, además de recibir cientos de miles de dólares por discursos y firmar un lucrativo acuerdo de producción con Netflix. Laura Bush y Hillary Clinton también vendieron sus memorias por millones. Sus memorias y discursos pagados requerían que las ex primeras damas compartieran algunos detalles sobre sí mismas, sus puntos de vista y sus vidas en la Casa Blanca.Simplemente vendiendo imágenes, Melania Trump no tiene que revelar nada.Eso es exactamente lo que prefiere, dijo Brower.“Ella es la primera dama más francamente desconocida”, dijo sobre la personalidad pública de Melania Trump. “Hay algo radical al respecto. Se espera que las primeras damas quieran complacer a la gente y no estoy seguro de que eso a ella realmente le importe”.Maggie Haberman More

  • in

    Biden and Trump Are Tied in a Possible 2024 Rematch, Poll Finds

    A Times/Siena poll suggests a slight Biden edge among voters who don’t like either candidate.Will they stick with the same candidates in 2024?Tamir Kalifa for The New York TimesAfter Democrats fared well against MAGA candidates in the midterms last year, it might have been reasonable to think that President Biden would have a clear advantage in a rematch against Donald J. Trump.Yet despite the stop-the-steal movement, the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the numerous investigations facing Mr. Trump, Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump are still tied, each at 43 percent, among registered voters in our first Times/Siena poll of the 2024 election cycle.The possibility that criminal indictments haven’t crippled Mr. Trump’s general election chances might come as a surprise or even a shock, but the result is worth taking seriously. It does not seem to be a fluke: Our Times/Siena polls last fall — which were notably accurate — also showed a very close race in a possible presidential rematch, including a one-point lead for Mr. Trump among registered voters in our final October survey.Mr. Trump’s resilience is not necessarily an indication of his strength. In most respects, he appears to be a badly wounded general election candidate. Just 41 percent of registered voters say they have a favorable view of him, while a majority believe he committed serious federal crimes and say his conduct after the last election went so far that it threatened American democracy.But Mr. Biden shows little strength of his own. His favorability rating is only two points higher than Mr. Trump’s. And despite an improving economy, his approval rating is only 39 percent — a mere two points higher than it was in our poll in October, before the midterm election. At least for now, he seems unable to capitalize on his opponent’s profound vulnerability.Democrats can’t necessarily assume the race will snap back into a clear Biden lead once people tune into the race, either. The 14 percent of voters who didn’t back Mr. Biden or Mr. Trump consisted mostly of people who volunteered — even though it wasn’t provided as an option in the poll — that they would vote for someone else or simply wouldn’t vote if those were the candidates. They know the candidates; they just don’t want either of them.As I mentioned to my colleague David Leonhardt for The Morning newsletter, it’s reasonable to believe that Mr. Biden has the better path to winning over more of these voters. They dislike Mr. Trump more than they dislike Mr. Biden, and the political environment, including promising economic news, seems increasingly favorable to Mr. Biden. But it hasn’t happened yet.And the upside for Mr. Biden among the dissenting 14 percent of voters isn’t necessarily as great as it might look. He leads by a mere two points — 47 percent to 45 percent — if we reassign these voters to Mr. Trump or Mr. Biden based on how they say they voted in the 2020 election. And Mr. Biden still leads by two points, 49-47, if we further restrict the poll to those who actually voted in 2020 or 2022.A two-point edge is certainly better for Mr. Biden than a tie, but it’s not exactly a commanding advantage. It’s closer than his 4.5-point popular vote win in 2020, and it’s well within a range in which Mr. Trump can win in the key battleground states, where he has usually done better than he has nationwide.The survey suggests that the electorate remains deeply divided along the demographic fault lines of the 2020 presidential election, with Mr. Trump commanding a wide lead among white voters without a college degree, while Mr. Biden counters with an advantage among nonwhite voters and white college graduates.To the extent the survey suggests a slightly closer race than four years ago, it appears mostly attributable to modest Trump gains among Black, Hispanic, male and low-income voters. The sample sizes of these subgroups are relatively small, but we’ve seen signs of Trump strength among these groups before. In some cases, like Hispanic and lower-income voters, they’re groups that have already trended toward Republicans during the Trump era. It would hardly be a surprise if those trends continued. Here again, it’s a story worth taking seriously.Of course, this doesn’t mean it’s “predictive” of the final result, certainly not with 15 months to go. What it means, however, is that Mr. Trump doesn’t appear to have sustained disqualifying damage — at least when matched against a president with a 39 percent approval rating. For now, it suggests that the Biden campaign can’t necessarily count on anti-Trump sentiment alone; it may need to do some work to reassemble and mobilize a winning coalition. More