Voter Fraud (Election Fraud)

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      Voting Battles of 2022 Take Shape as G.O.P. Crafts New Election Bills

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      Republicans plan to carry their push to reshape the nation’s electoral system into next year, with Democrats vowing to oppose them but holding few options in G.O.P.-led states.A new wave of Republican legislation to reshape the nation’s electoral system is coming in 2022, as the G.O.P. puts forward proposals ranging from a requirement that ballots be hand-counted in New Hampshire to the creation of a law enforcement unit in Florida to investigate allegations of voting fraud.The Republican drive, motivated in part by a widespread denial of former President Donald J. Trump’s defeat last year, includes both voting restrictions and measures that could sow public confusion or undermine confidence in fair elections, and will significantly raise the stakes of the 2022 midterms.After passing 33 laws of voting limits in 19 states this year, Republicans in at least five states — Florida, Tennessee, South Carolina, Oklahoma and New Hampshire — have filed bills before the next legislative sessions have even started that seek to restrict voting in some way, including by limiting mail voting. In over 20 states, more than 245 similar bills put forward this year could be carried into 2022, according to Voting Rights Lab, a group that works to expand access to the ballot.In many places, Democrats will be largely powerless to push back at the state level, where they remain overmatched in Republican-controlled legislatures. G.O.P. state lawmakers across the country have enacted wide-ranging cutbacks to voting access this year and have used aggressive gerrymandering to lock in the party’s statehouse power for the next decade.Both parties are preparing to use the issue of voting to energize their bases. Democratic leaders, especially Stacey Abrams, the newly announced candidate for governor of Georgia and a voting rights champion for her party, promise to put the issue front and center.But the left remains short of options, leaving many candidates, voters and activists worried about the potential effects in 2022 and beyond, and increasingly frustrated with Democrats’ inability to pass federal voting protections in Washington.“What we are facing now is a very real and acute case of democratic subversion,” Ms. Abrams said in an interview, adding that the country needed a Senate willing to “protect our democracy regardless of the partisanship of those who would oppose it.”Democrats and voting rights groups say some of the Republican measures will suppress voting, especially by people of color. They warn that other bills will increase the influence of politicians and other partisans in what had been relatively routine election administration. Some measures, they argue, raise the prospect of elections being thrown into chaos or even overturned.Republicans say the bills are needed to preserve what they call election integrity, though electoral fraud remains exceedingly rare in American elections.“This is going to be one of the big political issues for at least the next year,” said Jason Snead, the executive director of the Honest Elections Project, a conservative group that has helped craft voting legislation. He said the group wanted lawmakers to “stop thinking of election-related policies as something that only comes up once in a blue moon,” adding that “it should instead be something that comes up in every legislative session — that you take what you just learned from the last election.”G.O.P. lawmakers in at least five states have put forward legislation to review the 2020 election and institute new procedures for investigating the results of future elections.Many of the other bills are similar to those passed this year, which aim to limit access to mail-in voting; reduce the use of drop boxes; enact harsher penalties for election officials who are found to have broken rules; expand the authority of partisan poll watchers; and shift oversight of elections from independent officials and commissions to state legislatures.It remains unclear how new voting bills might affect turnout, and some election experts say that any measures designed to suppress voting carry the potential to backfire by energizing voters of the opposing party.Gov. Ron DeSantis is pushing for Florida to create an election law enforcement unit that would “have the ability to investigate any crimes involving the election.”Eve Edelheit for The New York TimesIn Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, is pushing for changes to election laws that build on the major bill his party passed this year, including a special force to investigate voting crimes. In New Hampshire, Republicans are proposing to require that all ballots be counted by hand and may try to tighten residency requirements. In Georgia, G.O.P. lawmakers are trying to restructure the Democratic-led government of the state’s most diverse county.The biggest potential changes to voting could come in Florida, which had just one prosecuted case of voter fraud in the 2020 election.Mr. DeSantis, who had been facing pressure from conservatives to greenlight a review of the 2020 election results in the state, has urged state lawmakers to send new election measures to his desk. One proposal would increase the penalty for the collection of more than two ballots by a third party from a misdemeanor to a third-degree felony. Another calls for more routine maintenance of voter rolls, which voting rights advocates say would lead to more “purges” of eligible voters.The governor said last month that the prospective election law enforcement unit would “have the ability to investigate any crimes involving the election” and would include sworn law enforcement officers, investigators and a statewide prosecutor. Critics argued that such a unit could intimidate voters and be prone to abuse by politicians.In New Hampshire, where Senator Maggie Hassan, a Democrat, faces a potentially challenging re-election bid, Republicans have proposed to scrap the ballot-scanning machines that the state has used for decades in favor of hand-counting.That bill — introduced by Mark Alliegro, a Republican state representative who declined to comment about it — has drawn opposition from Democrats, who say that a lengthy delay between Election Day and the results would create an opening for those who want to challenge the election’s legitimacy.“Republicans are trying to sow distrust and discord in the process,” said Matt Wilhelm, a Democratic state representative. “If they’ve got an additional window of time of hours, days, weeks when Granite Staters don’t know the results of the election that they just participated in, that’s going to cast doubt on our democratic institutions.”A separate G.O.P. bill in New Hampshire introduced in the legislature’s prefiling portal contained a brief description: “Provide that only residents of the state may vote in elections.”Republicans have long tried to tighten residency requirements in New Hampshire, whose small population means that the elimination of even relatively small numbers of college students from the voter rolls could help give the G.O.P. an edge in close elections. This year, the state’s Supreme Court unanimously rejected a 2017 state law requiring proof of residence to vote.A spokeswoman for Regina Birdsell, the Republican state senator who introduced the bill, said that it was “currently in draft form” and that Ms. Birdsell would not comment until the language had been finalized.Ballot-counting machines used in New Hampshire’s 2020 election were transported in May for a review of the results. A Republican proposal would scrap the machines in favor of hand-counting.Josh Reynolds/Associated PressIn Georgia, a plan by Republicans in the state legislature to restructure the government of Gwinnett County would effectively undercut the voting power of people of color in an increasingly Democratic area.Gwinnett, which includes northeastern suburbs of Atlanta, has swung from full Republican control to full Democratic control over four years, culminating last year with the selection of the first Black woman to oversee the county commission. President Biden carried the county by 18 percentage points last year.But last month, Clint Dixon, a Republican state senator, filed two bills that would allow the G.O.P.-led legislature to roughly double the size of the county’s Democratic-led board of commissioners and redraw new districts for the school board — moves that Democrats and civil rights leaders said would essentially go over the heads of voters who elected those officials.The changes would keep the county in Democratic control, but would most likely guarantee multiple safe Republican districts, including some that would be predominantly white despite the county’s diversity.After an outcry on the left, Republicans pushed the bills to the January session.Nicole Hendrickson, the Democratic chairwoman of the county’s board of commissioners, said the proposal “removes our voice as a board of commissioners and disenfranchises our citizens who did not have a say in any of this.”Mr. Dixon defended the bills, asserting that with more commissioners, voters would have more representation and elected leaders would be more accountable.“I don’t see any kind of swing back to a Republican majority; it has nothing to do with a power grab,” he said in an interview. “I think at that local level, local governance is intended at lower populations.”Investigating the 2020 election also remains a focus of many Republican state lawmakers.At least five states are pursuing partisan reviews of the 2020 election, and Republicans in states including Oklahoma, Tennessee and Florida have introduced bills to begin new ones next year.“There was suspiciously high voter turnout that broke all projections,” said Nathan Dahm, a Republican state senator in Oklahoma who sponsored a bill to review the results. “That alone is not enough to say that there absolutely was fraud, but it was suspicious enough to say that maybe there are some questions there.”Lawmakers will be aided in writing new voting bills by conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation, which helped craft some of the 2020 legislation. A spokeswoman for the group said it would continue to push for measures including more maintenance of voting rolls; increased authority for poll watchers; reductions in the use of absentee ballots; more power for state legislatures in the election process; and additional voter identification regulations.Republicans around the country have highlighted polling that shows broad bipartisan support for some voter identification requirements.Jay Ashcroft, the Republican secretary of state of Missouri, has called for the state’s legislature to pass a bill that would require a state or federal photo ID to vote.“The idea that the voters of my state are too stupid to follow a simple photo ID requirement like this is ridiculous and ludicrous,” he said in an interview.Mr. Ashcroft noted that the Missouri bill would not ban people without IDs from voting; they would be allowed to vote provisionally and their ballots would be validated through signature matching.Voting rights leaders like Ms. Abrams, meanwhile, have sought to frame the issue as one that should transcend politics.“This isn’t simply about who wins or loses an election,” she said. “It is about what type of nation we intend to be. And are there consequences for undermining and breaking our system of government?” More

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      The Trump Conspiracy Is Hiding in Plain Sight

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      Antebellum pro-slavery radicals spoke freely of secession and violence; Democratic Party paramilitaries planned their attacks on Reconstruction governments in public view; and the men who codified segregation into Jim Crow did so in the open. Bad actors, in other words, do not always make their plans in secret.When people plot to do wrong, they often do so in plain sight. To the extent that they succeed, it is at least partly because no one took them as seriously as they should have.And so it goes with the plot to restore Donald Trump to power over and against the will of the voters. The first attempt, prefigured in Trump’s refusal in 2016 to say whether he would accept the results of the presidential election, culminated in an attack on the Capitol this year, broadcast on camera to the entire world. Since then, the former president and his allies have made no secret of their intent to run the same play a second time.Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser and White House official, hosts a popular far-right podcast where he has urged his listeners to seize control of local election administration. “It’s going to be a fight, but this is a fight that must be won, we don’t have an option,” he said in May. “We’re going to take this back village by village … precinct by precinct.”Those listeners were, well, listening. “Suddenly,” according to a recent ProPublica investigation, “people who had never before showed interest in party politics started calling the local G.O.P. headquarters or crowding into county conventions, eager to enlist as precinct officers. They showed up in states Trump won and in states he lost, in deep-red rural areas, in swing-voting suburbs and in populous cities.”Many of these new activists very much want to “stop the steal.” In Michigan, ProPublica notes, “one of the main organizers recruiting new precinct officers pushed for the ouster of the state party’s executive director, who contradicted Trump’s claim that the election was stolen and who later resigned.” In Arizona, likewise, new Bannon-inspired precinct officers have “petitioned to unseat county officials who refused to cooperate with the State Senate Republicans’ ‘forensic audit’ of 2020 ballots.”The obvious point of all this is to eliminate resistance should the outcome of the 2024 presidential election come down, once again, to the fortitude of local officials. In his desperate fight to subvert the outcome of the 2020 election, Trump looked for and found the soft spots in our electoral system. His supporters are fighting to make them more vulnerable.In tandem with the fight to seize control of election administration is an effort to gerrymander battleground states into nearly permanent Republican legislative majorities. “In Texas, North Carolina, Ohio and Georgia,” according to my colleagues in the newsroom, “Republican state lawmakers have either created supermajorities capable of overriding a governor’s veto or whittled down competitive districts so significantly that Republicans’ advantage is virtually impenetrable — leaving voters in narrowly divided states powerless to change the leadership of their legislatures.”In these states, Democrats could win a narrow majority of voters but gain fewer than half of the seats in the state legislature, while Republicans could win with that same majority and gain far more than half the seats. It’s an affront to the ideal of political equality, to say nothing of the “one person, one vote” standard enshrined in the 1964 Supreme Court decision in Reynolds v. Sims. A system in which some voters are worth much more than others — and where popular majorities are locked out of power if they contain the wrong kinds of people — is many things, but it isn’t a democracy (or, if you prefer, a “republic”).These impenetrable supermajorities serve a purpose beyond simple partisan advantage. The belief that Trump actually won the 2020 election is backed by the belief that elections are less about persuasion and more about rigging the process and controlling the ballots. And in the swing states that Trump lost, his strongest allies have pushed the radical idea that state legislatures have plenary authority over presidential elections even after voters have cast their ballots. Trump may lose the vote in Arizona, but under this theory, the legislature could still give him the state’s electoral votes, provided there is some pretext (like “voter fraud,” for example). What this would mean, in practice, is that these legislatures could simply hand their state’s electoral votes to Trump even if he were defeated at the ballot box.It’s with this in mind that we should look to Wisconsin, where Republicans are fighting to seize control of federal elections in the state now that they’ve gerrymandered themselves into an almost permanent legislative majority. (The Wisconsin Republican Party, along with the one in North Carolina, has been at the vanguard of the authoritarian turn in the national party.)Last month, Senator Ron Johnson said that lawmakers in his state could take control of federal elections even if Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, stood in opposition. “The State Legislature has to reassert its constitutional role, assert its constitutional responsibility, to set the times, place and manner of the election, not continue to outsource it through the Wisconsin Elections Commission,” Johnson said, in reference to the bipartisan commission Republicans had established to manage elections. “The Constitution never mentions a governor.”And of course, Trump is taking an active role in all of this. From his perch in Mar-a-Lago, he has endorsed candidates for state legislative elections in Michigan with the clear hope that they would help him subvert the election, should he run as the Republican nominee for president in 2024. “Michigan needs a new legislature,” Trump wrote last month in one such endorsement. “The cowards there now are too spineless to investigate Election Fraud.”Increasingly untethered from any commitment to electoral democracy, large and influential parts of the Republican Party are working to put Trump back in power by any means necessary. Republicans could win without these tactics — they did so in Virginia last month — but there’s no reason to think that the party will pull itself off this road.Every incentive driving the Republican Party, from Fox News to the former president, points away from sober engagement with the realities of American politics and toward the outrageous, the antisocial and the authoritarian.None of this is happening behind closed doors. We are headed for a crisis of some sort. When it comes, we can be shocked that it is actually happening, but we shouldn’t be surprised.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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      Wisconsin Republicans Push to Take Over the State’s Elections

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      Led by Senator Ron Johnson, G.O.P. officials want to eliminate a bipartisan elections agency — and maybe send its members to jail.Republicans in Wisconsin are engaged in an all-out assault on the state’s election system, building off their attempts to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential race by pressing to give themselves full control over voting in the state.The Republican effort — broader and more forceful than that in any other state where allies of former President Donald J. Trump are trying to overhaul elections — takes direct aim at the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission, an agency Republicans created half a decade ago that has been under attack since the chaotic aftermath of last year’s election.The onslaught picked up late last month after a long-awaited report on the 2020 results that was ordered by Republican state legislators found no evidence of fraud but made dozens of suggestions for the election commission and the G.O.P.-led Legislature, fueling Republican demands for more control of elections.Then the Trump-aligned sheriff of Racine County, the state’s fifth most populous county, recommended felony charges against five of the six members of the election commission for guidance they had given to municipal clerks early in the pandemic. The Republican majority leader of the State Senate later seemed to give a green light to that proposal, saying that “prosecutors around the state” should determine whether to bring charges.And last week, Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican, said that G.O.P. state lawmakers should unilaterally assert control of federal elections, claiming that they had the authority to do so even if Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, stood in their way — an extraordinary legal argument debunked by a 1932 Supreme Court decision and a 1964 ruling from the Wisconsin Supreme Court. His suggestion was nonetheless echoed by Michael Gableman, a conservative former State Supreme Court justice who is conducting the Legislature’s election inquiry.Republican control of Wisconsin elections is necessary, Mr. Johnson said in an interview on Wednesday, because he believes Democrats cheat.“Do I expect Democrats to follow the rules?” said the senator, who over the past year has promoted fringe theories on topics like the Capitol riot and Covid vaccines. “Unfortunately, I probably don’t expect them to follow the rules. And other people don’t either, and that’s the problem.”Senator Ron Johnson said that Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin should unilaterally assert control of federal elections.Sarahbeth Maney/The New York TimesThe uproar over election administration in Wisconsin — where the last two presidential contests have been decided by fewer than 23,000 votes each — is heightened by the state’s deep divisions and its pivotal place in American politics.Some top Republican officials in Wisconsin privately acknowledge that their colleagues are playing to the party’s base by calling for state election officials to be charged with felonies or for their authority to be usurped by lawmakers.Adding to the uncertainty, Mr. Johnson’s proposal has not yet been written into legislation in Madison. Mr. Evers has vowed to stop it.“The outrageous statements and ideas Wisconsin Republicans have embraced aren’t about making our elections stronger, they’re about making it more difficult for people to participate in the democratic process,” Mr. Evers said Thursday. The G.O.P.’s election proposals, he added, “are nothing more than a partisan power grab.”Yet there is no guarantee that the Republican push will fall short legally or politically. The party’s lawmakers in other states have made similar moves to gain more control over election apparatus. And since the G.O.P. won control of the Wisconsin Legislature in 2010, the state has served as an incubator for conservative ideas exported to other places.“In Wisconsin we’re heading toward a showdown over the meaning of the clause that says state legislatures should set the time, manner and place of elections,” said Kevin J. Kennedy, who spent 34 years as Wisconsin’s chief election officer before Republicans eliminated his agency and replaced it with the elections commission in 2016. “If not in Wisconsin, in some other state they’re going to push this and try to get a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on this.”Next year, Wisconsin will host critical elections for Mr. Johnson’s Senate seat and for statewide offices, including the governor. Rebecca Kleefisch, the leading Republican in the race to challenge Mr. Evers, is running on a platform of eliminating the state election commission. (On Monday, she filed a lawsuit against the agency asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to declare that the commission’s guidance violates state law.)The Republican anger at the Wisconsin Elections Commission, a body of three Democrats and three Republicans that G.O.P. lawmakers created in part to eliminate the investigatory powers of its predecessor agency, comes nearly 20 months after commissioners issued guidance to local election clerks on how to deal with the coronavirus pandemic.Republicans have seized in particular on a March 2020 commission vote lifting a rule that required special voting deputies — trained and dispatched by municipal clerks’ offices — to visit nursing homes twice before issuing absentee ballots to residents. The special voting deputies, like most other visitors, were barred from entering nursing homes early in the pandemic, and the commission reasoned that there was not enough time before the April primary election to require them to be turned away before mailing absentee ballots.The vote was relatively uncontroversial at the time: No lawsuits from Republicans or anyone else challenged the guidance. The procedure remained in place for the general election in November.But after Joseph R. Biden Jr. won Wisconsin by 20,682 votes out of 3.3 million cast, Republicans began making evidence-free claims of fraudulent votes cast from nursing homes across the state. Sheriff Christopher Schmaling of Racine County said the five state election commissioners who had voted to allow clerks to mail absentee ballots to nursing homes without the visit by special voting deputies — as is prescribed by state law — should face felony charges for election fraud and misconduct in office.Robin Vos, the Republican speaker of the State Assembly, who represents Racine County, quickly concurred, saying that the five commissioners — including his own appointee to the panel — should “probably” face felony charges.The commissioners have insisted they broke no laws.Ann Jacobs, a Democrat who is the commission’s chairwoman, said she had no regrets about making voting easier during the pandemic and added that “even my Republican colleagues” were afraid about the future of fair elections in the state.“We did everything we could during the pandemic to help people vote,” she said. Mr. Johnson — a two-term senator who said he would announce a decision on whether to seek re-election “in the next few weeks” — is lobbying Republican state legislators, with whom he met last week at the State Capitol, to take over federal elections.“The State Legislature has to reassert its constitutional role, assert its constitutional responsibility, to set the times, place and manner of the election, not continue to outsource it through the Wisconsin Elections Commission,” Mr. Johnson said. “The Constitution never mentions a governor.”Mr. Johnson acknowledged that his proposal could leave the state with dueling sets of election regulations, one from the Wisconsin Elections Commission and another from the Legislature.“I suppose some counties will handle it one way and other counties will handle it another,” he said.Trump’s Bid to Subvert the ElectionCard 1 of 6A monthslong campaign. More

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      Chris Christie Wants the Post-Trump G.O.P. to Move Past 2020

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      In a new book and in an interview, Mr. Christie says that if the former president wants to be a positive force, “he’s got to let this other stuff go.”Chris Christie wants to be very clear about something: The election of 2020 was not stolen.“An election for president was held on November 3, 2020. Joe Biden won. Donald Trump did not,” Mr. Christie writes in his new book, “Republican Rescue: Saving the Party From Truth Deniers, Conspiracy Theorists, and the Dangerous Policies of Joe Biden.”“That is the truth. Any claim to the contrary is untrue,” Mr. Christie says.It is not a popular view in the Republican Party right now, as Mr. Trump has promoted his baseless claims of widespread election fraud for more than a year, and as many Republicans have either echoed those claims or averted their gaze.But it’s a view that Mr. Christie has been repeating since Election Day, as he urges the G.O.P. — and Mr. Trump — to move on from looking backward.“It’s not a book about him,” Mr. Christie said in a recent interview about the book, which will be released on Wednesday. “It’s a book about where we go from here and why it is important for us to let go of the past.”Of Mr. Trump, Mr. Christie was blunt: “If he wants to be a positive force in the future, he’s got to let this other stuff go. If he doesn’t, I don’t think he can be.”Mr. Christie pointed to the Virginia governor’s race and Glenn Youngkin, the Republican who won the state party convention without Mr. Trump’s endorsement and then kept him at bay during the general election. Mr. Youngkin ultimately defeated his Democratic opponent, Terry McAuliffe.Mr. Christie said the Youngkin victory knocks down “this idea that if you don’t agree with Donald Trump on everything, and pledge unfettered fealty to him, then you can’t win because his voters quote unquote won’t come out to vote,” Mr. Christie said. “No candidate owns voters. They don’t.”He described Mr. Trump’s conduct in the year since he left office — and the anxiety felt by lawmakers who worry about crossing him — in stark terms. “Donald Trump’s own conduct is meant to instill fear,” he said.Mr. Christie is a former governor of New Jersey, a former presidential candidate and a possible future one. He was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters in 2016 after he ended his own national candidacy, was a potential vice-presidential candidate, led Mr. Trump’s transition effort until he was fired from that role and helped lead Mr. Trump’s opioids commission.He was with Mr. Trump throughout a tumultuous presidency, a fact that Mr. Christie’s critics say makes his critiques too late to be meaningful. Mr. Christie argues that his support for Mr. Trump, and their 15-year friendship before that, makes him a credible critic.“I think it was really important for people to understand why I did support the president for so long,” Mr. Christie said. “And the reason was, because I generally agreed with the policies that he was pursuing.” When they would argue over the years, he added, “it was rarely over policy.”Mr. Christie was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters in 2016.Cooper Neill for The New York TimesThe arguments were generally over how things were handled, Mr. Christie added, citing Mr. Trump’s throwing of “bouquets” at President Xi Jinping of China as an example. Being generous with Mr. Xi when the Chinese government was withholding information about the coronavirus was “unacceptable,” Mr. Christie said.Mr. Christie does not blame Mr. Trump’s speech on Jan. 6 for the violence that followed at the Capitol by his supporters. He said instead that it was the months of Mr. Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen from him that instilled anger in those who believed him.The responsibility for what happened “was months long in coming,” he said. “As a leader, you need to know that there are consequences to the words you use. And that those consequences at times can be stuff that you may not even be able to anticipate. I don’t believe he anticipated that people would cause violence up on Capitol Hill. But I don’t think he thought about it, either.”Mr. Christie began road-testing his themes in a speech at the Reagan presidential library in September, during which he didn’t name Mr. Trump. When he spoke again at the Republican Jewish Coalition conference in Nevada last weekend, Mr. Trump took notice, and delivered a broadside that his aides intended as a warning shot.Mr. Christie “was just absolutely massacred by his statements that Republicans have to move on from the past, meaning the 2020 Election Fraud,” Mr. Trump said in a statement that also attacked Mr. Christie for a low approval rating, which Mr. Trump mischaracterized by half.Mr. Christie said that Mr. Trump should focus less on “personal vendetta,” and added, “I just think if he wants to have that kind of conversation about me then I’m going to point out that I got 60 percent of the vote in a blue state with 51 percent of the Hispanic vote.”Mr. Christie said he would not make a decision about running for president in 2024 until after the midterm elections in 2022. He said that Mr. Trump would not factor into his thinking and that he would not rule out supporting the former president if he saw no path for himself.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Chris Christie Wants the Post-Trump G.O.P. to Move Past Trump

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      In a new book and in an interview, Mr. Christie says that if the former president wants to be a positive force, “he’s got to let this other stuff go.”Chris Christie wants to be very clear about something: The election of 2020 was not stolen.“An election for president was held on November 3, 2020. Joe Biden won. Donald Trump did not,” Mr. Christie writes in his new book, “Republican Rescue: Saving the Party From Truth Deniers, Conspiracy Theorists, and the Dangerous Policies of Joe Biden.”“That is the truth. Any claim to the contrary is untrue,” Mr. Christie says.It is not a popular view in the Republican Party right now, as Mr. Trump has promoted his baseless claims of widespread election fraud for more than a year, and as many Republicans have either echoed those claims or averted their gaze.But it’s a view that Mr. Christie has been repeating since Election Day, as he urges the G.O.P. — and Mr. Trump — to move on from looking backward.“It’s not a book about him,” Mr. Christie said in a recent interview about the book, which will be released on Wednesday. “It’s a book about where we go from here and why it is important for us to let go of the past.”Of Mr. Trump, Mr. Christie was blunt: “If he wants to be a positive force in the future, he’s got to let this other stuff go. If he doesn’t, I don’t think he can be.”Mr. Christie pointed to the Virginia governor’s race and Glenn Youngkin, the Republican who won the state party convention without Mr. Trump’s endorsement and then kept him at bay during the general election. Mr. Youngkin ultimately defeated his Democratic opponent, Terry McAuliffe.Mr. Christie said the Youngkin victory knocks down “this idea that if you don’t agree with Donald Trump on everything, and pledge unfettered fealty to him, then you can’t win because his voters quote unquote won’t come out to vote,” Mr. Christie said. “No candidate owns voters. They don’t.”He described Mr. Trump’s conduct in the year since he left office — and the anxiety felt by lawmakers who worry about crossing him — in stark terms. “Donald Trump’s own conduct is meant to instill fear,” he said.Mr. Christie is a former governor of New Jersey, a former presidential candidate and a possible future one. He was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters in 2016 after he ended his own national candidacy, was a potential vice-presidential candidate, led Mr. Trump’s transition effort until he was fired from that role and helped lead Mr. Trump’s opioids commission.He was with Mr. Trump throughout a tumultuous presidency, a fact that Mr. Christie’s critics say makes his critiques too late to be meaningful. Mr. Christie argues that his support for Mr. Trump, and their 15-year friendship before that, makes him a credible critic.“I think it was really important for people to understand why I did support the president for so long,” Mr. Christie said. “And the reason was, because I generally agreed with the policies that he was pursuing.” When they would argue over the years, he added, “it was rarely over policy.”Mr. Christie was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters in 2016.Cooper Neill for The New York TimesThe arguments were generally over how things were handled, Mr. Christie added, citing Mr. Trump’s throwing of “bouquets” at President Xi Jinping of China as an example. Being generous with Mr. Xi when the Chinese government was withholding information about the coronavirus was “unacceptable,” Mr. Christie said.Mr. Christie does not blame Mr. Trump’s speech on Jan. 6 for the violence that followed at the Capitol by his supporters. He said instead that it was the months of Mr. Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen from him that instilled anger in those who believed him.The responsibility for what happened “was months long in coming,” he said. “As a leader, you need to know that there are consequences to the words you use. And that those consequences at times can be stuff that you may not even be able to anticipate. I don’t believe he anticipated that people would cause violence up on Capitol Hill. But I don’t think he thought about it, either.”Mr. Christie began road-testing his themes in a speech at the Reagan presidential library in September, during which he didn’t name Mr. Trump. When he spoke again at the Republican Jewish Coalition conference in Nevada last weekend, Mr. Trump took notice, and delivered a broadside that his aides intended as a warning shot.Mr. Christie “was just absolutely massacred by his statements that Republicans have to move on from the past, meaning the 2020 Election Fraud,” Mr. Trump said in a statement that also attacked Mr. Christie for a low approval rating, which Mr. Trump mischaracterized by half.Mr. Christie said that Mr. Trump should focus less on “personal vendetta,” and added, “I just think if he wants to have that kind of conversation about me then I’m going to point out that I got 60 percent of the vote in a blue state with 51 percent of the Hispanic vote.”Mr. Christie said he would not make a decision about running for president in 2024 until after the midterm elections in 2022. He said that Mr. Trump would not factor into his thinking and that he would not rule out supporting the former president if he saw no path for himself.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Los aliados de Trump ayudan a sembrar dudas en Brasil

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      Ante la caída de sus números en las encuestas, el presidente Jair Bolsonaro se queja de un supuesto fraude en las elecciones del próximo año. Y, desde Estados Unidos, lo están asesorando.BRASILIA — La sala de conferencias estaba repleta, con más de 1000 personas vitoreando los ataques contra la prensa, los liberales y lo políticamente correcto. Donald Trump Jr. estaba presente y advertía que los chinos podrían entrometerse en las elecciones, también asistió un congresista de Tennessee que votó en contra de certificar las elecciones de 2020 y el presidente, quien se quejaba sobre el fraude electoral.En muchos sentidos, el evento de septiembre se parecía al CPAC, la conferencia política conservadora, durante la era Trump. Pero estaba ocurriendo en Brasil, la mayor parte era en portugués y el mandatario que estaba en el escenario era el líder populista de extrema derecha del país, Jair Bolsonaro.Recién salido de su asalto a los resultados de las elecciones presidenciales de 2020 en Estados Unidos, el expresidente Donald Trump y sus aliados están exportando su estrategia a la mayor democracia de América Latina, trabajando para apoyar la candidatura de Bolsonaro a la reelección el próximo año, y ayudando a sembrar dudas en el proceso electoral en caso de que pierda.Están tachando a sus rivales políticos de criminales y comunistas, construyendo nuevas redes sociales en las que pueda evitar las reglas de Silicon Valley contra la desinformación y amplificando sus afirmaciones de que las elecciones en Brasil estarán amañadas.Simpatizantes de Bolsonaro en Brasilia, en septiembreDado Galdieri para The New York TimesPara los ideólogos estadounidenses que impulsan un movimiento nacionalista de derecha, Brasil es una de las piezas más importantes del tablero mundial. Con 212 millones de habitantes, es la sexta nación más grande del mundo, la fuerza dominante en América del Sur y el hogar de una población abrumadoramente cristiana que sigue desplazándose hacia la derecha.Brasil también presenta una rica oportunidad económica, con abundantes recursos naturales que se han hecho más accesibles gracias al retroceso de las regulaciones de Bolsonaro, y un mercado cautivo para las nuevas redes sociales de derecha dirigidas por Trump y otros líderes.Para el presidente brasileño, que se encuentra cada vez más aislado en la escena mundial y es impopular en su país, el apoyo estadounidense es un impulso. El nombre de Trump es un grito de guerra para la nueva derecha brasileña y sus esfuerzos por socavar el sistema electoral estadounidense parecen haber inspirado y envalentonado a Bolsonaro y sus partidarios.Pero Brasil es un país profundamente dividido donde las instituciones que salvaguardan la democracia son más vulnerables a los ataques. La adopción de los métodos de Trump está añadiendo combustible a un polvorín político y podría desestabilizar al país, que cuenta con una historia de violencia política y gobiernos militares.“Bolsonaro ya está metiendo en la cabeza de la gente que no aceptará el resultado de las elecciones si pierde”, dijo David Nemer, un profesor brasileño que enseña en la Universidad de Virginia y estudia la extrema derecha del país. “En Brasil, eso se puede ir de las manos”.Steve Bannon, quien fue el principal estratega de Trump, ha dicho que el presidente Bolsonaro solo perderá si “las máquinas” roban las elecciones. Mark Green, representante republicano por Tennessee que ha impulsado leyes para combatir el fraude electoral, se reunió con legisladores en Brasil para discutir sobre las “políticas de integridad del voto”.Y uno de los hijos del presidente Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro, dio quizás su presentación más elaborada sobre lo que dijo que eran elecciones brasileñas manipuladas en Sioux Falls, Dakota del Sur. En agosto, asistió a un evento organizado por Mike Lindell, el empresario de almohadas que está siendo demandado por difamar a los fabricantes de máquinas de votación.El hijo del presidente Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro, durante las celebraciones del Día de la Independencia en São PauloVictor Moriyama para The New York TimesLas autoridades, incluyendo académicos, funcionarios electorales de Brasil y el gobierno de Estados Unidos, han dicho que no ha habido fraude en las elecciones de Brasil. Eduardo Bolsonaro ha insistido en que lo hubo. “Ellos dicen que no puedo probar que hubo fraude”, dijo en Dakota del Sur. “Así que, OK, no pueden demostrar que no lo hubo”.El círculo de Trump se ha acercado a otros líderes populistas de extrema derecha, incluso en Hungría, Polonia y Filipinas, y ha tratado de impulsar a los populistas de otros lugares. Pero los lazos son más fuertes, y lo que está en juego podría ser de una magnitud mayor, en Brasil.Los grupos de WhatsApp de los partidarios de Bolsonaro comenzaron a circular recientemente el tráiler de una nueva serie de Tucker Carlson, un presentador de Fox News que simpatiza con los disturbios del 6 de enero en el Capitolio, dijo Nemer. Estados Unidos, que es una democracia desde hace 245 años, resistió ese ataque. Brasil aprobó su constitución en 1988, tras dos décadas de dictadura militar.“Lo que me preocupa es la fragilidad de nuestras instituciones democráticas”, expresó Nemer.El interés estadounidense en Brasil no solo es político. Dos redes sociales conservadoras dirigidas por aliados de Trump, Gettr y Parler, están creciendo rápidamente aquí apoyándose en el miedo a la censura de las grandes empresas tecnológicas y convenciendo al presidente Bolsonaro para que publique en esas plataformas, lo que lo convierte en el único líder mundial que ha participado en esas redes. La propia red social de Trump, anunciada el mes pasado, está parcialmente financiada por un congresista brasileño alineado con el presidente Bolsonaro.Más allá de la tecnología, muchas otras empresas estadounidenses se han beneficiado de la apertura al comercio del presidente Bolsonaro, incluidas las de defensa, agricultura, espacio y energía.“Estamos convirtiendo la afinidad ideológica en intereses económicos”, dijo Ernesto Araujo, ministro de Relaciones Exteriores del presidente Bolsonaro hasta marzo.Los Trump, los Bolsonaro y Bannon no respondieron a las repetidas solicitudes de comentarios.El entonces presidente Trump recibió al presidente brasileño Jair Bolsonaro en una cena en Mar-a-Lago en marzo de 2020.T.J. Kirkpatrick para The New York TimesLas afirmaciones de fraude de Bolsonaro han preocupado a los funcionarios del gobierno de Biden, según dos funcionarios estadounidenses que hablaron bajo condición de anonimato. En agosto, Jake Sullivan, asesor de seguridad nacional del presidente Biden, viajó a Brasil y aconsejó al presidente Bolsonaro que respetara el proceso democrático.En octubre, 64 miembros del Congreso le pidieron al presidente Biden un reajuste en la relación de Estados Unidos con Brasil, citando el empeño de Bolsonaro en políticas que amenazan el régimen democrático. En respuesta, el embajador de Brasil en Estados Unidos defendió al presidente Bolsonaro, diciendo que el debate sobre la seguridad electoral es normal en las democracias. “Brasil es y seguirá siendo uno de los países más libres del mundo”, dijo.Para el presidente Bolsonaro, el apoyo de los miembros del partido Republicano llega en un momento crucial. La pandemia ha ocasionado el fallecimiento de más de 610.000 brasileños, solo superada por las 758.000 muertes en Estados Unidos. El desempleo y la inflación han aumentado. Lleva dos años sin partido político. Y el Supremo Tribunal Federal y el Congreso de Brasil están llegando a conclusiones en investigaciones sobre él, sus hijos y sus aliados.A fines del mes pasado, una comisión del Congreso de Brasil recomendó que el presidente Bolsonaro fuera acusado de “crímenes contra la humanidad”, afirmando que dejó intencionadamente que el coronavirus arrasara en Brasil con el fin de lograr la inmunidad de rebaño. El panel culpó a su gobierno de más de 100.000 muertes.Minutos después de la votación, Trump emitió su apoyo. “Brasil tiene suerte de tener a un hombre como Jair Bolsonaro trabajando para ellos”, dijo en un comunicado. “¡Es un gran presidente y nunca defraudará a la gente de su gran país!”.Para el presidente brasileño, que cada vez está más aislado en la escena mundial y que lidia con la impopularidad en su país, el apoyo estadounidense es un impulso.Victor Moriyama para The New York Times‘El Donald Trump de Sudamérica’En 2018, el presidente Bolsonaro logró la victoria gracias a la misma ola populista que impulsó a Trump. Las comparaciones entre Bolsonaro, un paracaidista retirado del ejército con una inclinación por los insultos y los tuits fuera de lugar, y Trump fueron instantáneas.“Dicen que es el Donald Trump de Sudamérica”, dijo Trump en 2019. “Me cae bien”.Para muchos otros, Bolsonaro era alarmante. Como congresista y candidato, se había puesto poético con la dictadura militar de Brasil, que torturaba a sus rivales políticos. Dijo que sería incapaz de amar a un hijo gay. Y que una diputada rival era demasiado fea para ser violada.A los tres meses de su mandato, Bolsonaro visitó Washington. En su cena de bienvenida, la embajada brasileña lo sentó junto a Bannon. Más tarde, en la Casa Blanca, Trump y Bolsonaro llegaron a acuerdos que permitirían al gobierno brasileño gastar más con la industria de defensa de Estados Unidos y a las empresas estadounidenses lanzar cohetes desde Brasil.Junto al presidente Bolsonaro estaba su hijo, Eduardo. Diputado y ex policía, Eduardo Bolsonaro ya llevaba gorras de Trump y posaba con rifles de asalto en Facebook. Luego surgió como el principal enlace de Brasil con la derecha estadounidense, visitando Estados Unidos varias veces al año para reunirse con Trump, Jared Kushner, los principales senadores republicanos y un cuadro de expertos de extrema derecha y teóricos de la conspiración.Unas semanas después de que su padre fuera elegido, Eduardo Bolsonaro fue a la fiesta de cumpleaños de Bannon y fue tratado como “el invitado de honor”, dijo Márcio Coimbra, un consultor político brasileño que también estuvo allí.Dos meses más tarde, Bannon anunció que Eduardo Bolsonaro representaría a América del Sur en The Movement, un grupo nacionalista y populista que Bannon imaginaba haciéndose cargo del mundo occidental. En el comunicado de prensa, Bolsonaro dijo que iban a “reclamar la soberanía de las fuerzas elitistas globalistas progresistas”.Camioneros y otros partidarios de Bolsonaro en BrasiliaDado Galdieri para The New York Times‘No podemos permitir que nos silencien’Antes de la pandemia, el presidente Bolsonaro ya era un gran aliado de los negocios estadounidenses.Los gobiernos de Trump y Bolsonaro firmaron pactos para aumentar el comercio. Los inversores estadounidenses invirtieron miles de millones de dólares en empresas brasileñas. Y Brasil gastó más en importaciones estadounidenses, incluyendo combustible, plásticos y aviones.Ahora a una nueva clase de empresas se le hace agua la boca por Brasil: las redes sociales conservadoras.Gettr y Parler, dos clones de Twitter, han crecido rápidamente en Brasil prometiendo un enfoque de no intervención a las personas que creen que Silicon Valley está censurando las voces conservadoras. Uno de sus reclutas más destacados es el presidente Bolsonaro.El director ejecutivo de Gettr, Jason Miller, es el antiguo portavoz de Trump. Dijo que la actividad de Bolsonaro y sus hijos en su sitio ha sido un gran impulso para el negocio. La aplicación, que tiene cuatro meses de vida, ya cuenta con cerca de 500.000 usuarios en Brasil, o el 15 por ciento de su base, su segundo mayor mercado después de Estados Unidos. Gettr se anuncia en canales brasileños conservadores de YouTube. “Tenía a Brasil identificado desde el primer día”, dijo.Jason Miller, en el centro, con Steve Bannon y Raheem Kassam durante la grabación de un programa de radio en 2019Justin T. Gellerson para The New York TimesParler dijo que Brasil también es su segundo mercado más grande. Ambas empresas patrocinaron el CPAC en Brasil. “No podemos permitir que nos silencien”, dijo Candace Owens, una comentarista conservadora, en un video en el que presentaba a Parler en la CPAC.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Trump Allies Help Bolsonaro Sow Doubt in Brazil's Elections

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      With his poll numbers falling, President Jair Bolsonaro is already questioning the legitimacy of next year’s election. He has help from the United States.BRASÍLIA — The conference hall was packed, with a crowd of more than 1,000 cheering attacks on the press, the liberals and the politically correct. There was Donald Trump Jr. warning that the Chinese could meddle in the election, a Tennessee congressman who voted against certifying the 2020 vote, and the president complaining about voter fraud.In many ways, the September gathering looked like just another CPAC, the conservative political conference. But it was happening in Brazil, most of it was in Portuguese and the president at the lectern was Jair Bolsonaro, the country’s right-wing leader.Fresh from their assault on the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, former President Donald J. Trump and his allies are exporting their strategy to Latin America’s largest democracy, working to support Mr. Bolsonaro’s bid for re-election next year — and helping sow doubt in the electoral process in the event that he loses.They are branding his political rivals as criminals and communists, building new social networks where he can avoid Silicon Valley’s rules against misinformation and amplifying his claims that the election in Brazil will be rigged.Supporters of Mr. Bolsonaro in Brasília in September.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesFor the American ideologues pushing a right-wing, nationalist movement, Brazil is one of the most important pieces on the global chess board. With 212 million people, it is the world’s sixth-largest nation, the dominant force in South America, and home to an overwhelmingly Christian population that continues to shift to the right.Brazil also presents a rich economic opportunity, with abundant natural resources made more available by Mr. Bolsonaro’s rollback of regulations, and a captive market for the new right-wing social networks run by Mr. Trump and others.For the Brazilian president, who finds himself increasingly isolated on the world stage and unpopular at home, the American support is a welcome boost. The Trump name is a rallying cry for Brazil’s new right and his efforts to undermine the U.S. electoral system appear to have inspired and emboldened Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters.But Brazil is a deeply divided nation where the institutions safeguarding democracy are more vulnerable to attack. The adoption of Mr. Trump’s methods is adding fuel to a political tinderbox and could prove destabilizing in a country with a history of political violence and military rule.“Bolsonaro is already putting it into people’s heads that he won’t accept the election if he loses,” said David Nemer, a University of Virginia professor from Brazil who studies the country’s far right. “In Brazil, this can get out of hand.”Steve Bannon, Mr. Trump’s former chief strategist, has said President Bolsonaro will only lose if “the machines” steal the election. Representative Mark Green, a Tennessee Republican who has pushed laws combating voter fraud, met with lawmakers in Brazil to discuss “voting integrity policies.”And President Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, gave perhaps his most elaborate presentation on what he said were manipulated Brazilian elections in Sioux Falls, S.D. He was at an August event hosted by Mike Lindell, the pillow executive being sued for defaming voting-machine makers.President Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, during Independence Day celebrations in São Paulo.Victor Moriyama for The New York TimesAuthorities, including academics, Brazil’s electoral officials and the U.S. government, all have said that there has not been fraud in Brazil’s elections. Eduardo Bolsonaro has insisted there was. “I can’t prove — they say — that I have fraud,” he said in South Dakota. “So, OK, you can’t prove that you don’t.”Mr. Trump’s circle has cozied up to other far-right leaders, including in Hungary, Poland and the Philippines, and tried to boost rising nationalist politicians elsewhere. But the ties are the strongest, and the stakes perhaps the highest, in Brazil.WhatsApp groups for Bolsonaro supporters recently began circulating the trailer for a new series from Fox News host Tucker Carlson that sympathizes with the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Mr. Nemer said. The United States, which has been a democracy for 245 years, withstood that attack. Brazil passed its constitution in 1988 after two decades under a military dictatorship.“What concerns me is how fragile our democratic institutions are,” Mr. Nemer said.The American interest in Brazil is not only political. Two conservative social networks run by allies of Mr. Trump, Gettr and Parler, are growing rapidly here by leaning into fears of Big Tech censorship and by persuading President Bolsonaro to post on their sites — the only world leader to do so. Mr. Trump’s own new social network, announced last month, is partially financed by a Brazilian congressman aligned with President Bolsonaro.Beyond tech, many other American companies have benefited from President Bolsonaro’s opening to trade, including those in defense, agriculture, space and energy.“We’re turning ideological affinity into economic interests,” said Ernesto Araújo, President Bolsonaro’s foreign minister until March.The Trumps, the Bolsonaros, Mr. Green and Mr. Bannon did not respond to repeated requests for comment.President Trump hosted Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro at a dinner at Mar-a-Lago in March of 2020.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesPresident Bolsonaro’s fraud claims have worried officials in the Biden administration, according to two U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. In August, Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, traveled to Brazil and advised President Bolsonaro to respect the democratic process.In October, 64 members of Congress asked President Biden for a reset in the United States’ relationship with Brazil, citing President Bolsonaro’s pursuit of policies that threaten democratic rule. In response, Brazil’s ambassador to the United States defended President Bolsonaro, saying debate over election security is normal in democracies. “Brazil is and will continue to be one of the world’s freest countries,” he said.For President Bolsonaro, the Republicans’ support comes at a crucial moment. The pandemic has killed more than 610,000 Brazilians, second to only the 758,000 deaths in the United States. Unemployment and inflation have risen. He has been operating without a political party for two years. And Brazil’s Supreme Court and Congress are closing in on investigations into him, his sons and his allies.Late last month, a Brazil congressional panel recommended that President Bolsonaro be charged with “crimes against humanity,” asserting that he intentionally let the coronavirus tear through Brazil in a bid for herd immunity. The panel blamed his administration for more than 100,000 deaths.Minutes after the panel voted, Mr. Trump issued his endorsement. “Brazil is lucky to have a man such as Jair Bolsonaro working for them,” he said in a statement. “He is a great president and will never let the people of his great country down!”For the Brazilian president, who finds himself increasingly isolated on the world stage and unpopular at home, American support is a welcome boost. Victor Moriyama for The New York Times‘The Donald Trump of South America’In 2018, President Bolsonaro was carried to victory by the same populist wave that buoyed Mr. Trump. The comparisons between Mr. Bolsonaro, a former Army paratrooper with a penchant for insults and off-the-cuff tweets, and Mr. Trump were instant.“They say he’s the Donald Trump of South America,” Mr. Trump said in 2019. “I like him.”To many others, Mr. Bolsonaro was alarming. As a congressman and candidate, he had waxed poetic about Brazil’s military dictatorship, which tortured its political rivals. He said he would be incapable of loving a gay son. And he said a rival congresswoman was too ugly to be raped.Three months into his term, President Bolsonaro went to Washington. At his welcome dinner, the Brazilian embassy sat him next to Mr. Bannon. At the White House later, Mr. Trump and Mr. Bolsonaro made deals that would allow the Brazilian government to spend more with the U.S. defense industry and American companies to launch rockets from Brazil.Joining President Bolsonaro in Washington was his son, Eduardo. A congressman and former police officer, Eduardo Bolsonaro already was wearing Trump hats and posing with assault rifles on Facebook. He then emerged as Brazil’s chief liaison with the American right, visiting the United States several times a year to meet with Mr. Trump, Jared Kushner, top Republican senators and a cadre of far-right pundits and conspiracy theorists.A few weeks after his father was elected, Eduardo Bolsonaro went to Mr. Bannon’s birthday party and was treated as “the guest of honor,” said Márcio Coimbra, a Brazilian political consultant who was also there.Two months later, Mr. Bannon announced Eduardo Bolsonaro would represent South America in The Movement, a right-wing, nationalist group that Mr. Bannon envisioned taking over the Western world. In the news release, Eduardo Bolsonaro said they would “reclaim sovereignty from progressive globalist elitist forces.”Truck drivers and other supporters of Mr. Bolsonaro in Brasília.Dado Galdieri for The New York Times‘We cannot allow them to silence us’Before the pandemic, President Bolsonaro had been good for American business.The Trump and Bolsonaro administrations signed pacts to increase commerce. American investors plowed billions of dollars into Brazilian companies. And Brazil spent more on American imports, including fuel, plastics and aircraft.Now a new class of companies is salivating over Brazil: conservative social networks.Gettr and Parler, two Twitter clones, have grown rapidly in Brazil by promising a hands-off approach to people who believe Silicon Valley is censoring conservative voices. One of their most high-profile recruits is President Bolsonaro.Gettr’s chief executive, Jason Miller, is Mr. Trump’s former spokesman. He said that President Bolsonaro and his sons’ activity on his site has been a major boost for business. The four-month-old app already has nearly 500,000 users in Brazil, or 15 percent of its user base, its second-largest market after the United States. Gettr is now advertising on conservative Brazilian YouTube channels. “I had Brazil identified from day one,” he said.Jason Miller, center, with Steve Bannon and Raheem Kassam during the recording of a radio show in 2019.Justin T. Gellerson for The New York TimesParler said Brazil is also its No. 2 market. Both companies sponsored CPAC in Brazil. “We cannot allow them to silence us,” Candace Owens, the conservative pundit, said in a video pitching Parler at CPAC.Gettr is partly funded by Guo Wengui, an exiled Chinese billionaire who is close with Mr. Bannon. (When Mr. Bannon was arrested on fraud charges, he was on Mr. Guo’s yacht.) Parler is funded by Rebekah Mercer, the American conservative megadonor who was Mr. Bannon’s previous benefactor.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Republicans, Basking in Tuesday’s Victories, Diverge on What Comes Next

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      Looming over a gathering of Jewish conservatives in Las Vegas were questions about whether former President Donald J. Trump should remain the face of the party.LAS VEGAS — Two strikingly divergent visions of Republican political strength played out over the weekend at a conference of Jewish conservatives, the first major gathering of G.O.P. leaders since the party’s sweeping success in Tuesday’s elections. There were displays of blustery confidence. And there were calls for caution and restraint as party leaders tried to process their drastic gains.Looming over it all, and mostly addressed gingerly, was the uncertainty about whether Republicans could replicate their decisive gains with suburban voters, especially women, if former President Donald J. Trump remained the face of the party.Although a majority of the speakers at the annual conference of the Republican Jewish Coalition were effusive with their praise of the former president and spent much of the two-day gathering citing his administration’s most conservative policy achievements, others warned that Republicans who continued to give cover to his baseless claims about fraud in the 2020 election were jeopardizing the party’s recent success.The most notable Trump skeptic was former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who urged Republicans to promote a “plan for tomorrow, not a grievance about yesterday,” and said that the party would be making a grave mistake if it did not recommit itself to truth-telling.“Winning campaigns are always the campaigns that look forward, not backwards,” Mr. Christie said, earning only a smattering of applause from the crowd. Noting the less-than-enthusiastic response, Mr. Christie implored the audience: “That deserves applause. Because if we don’t get it, we are going to lose.”The 2020 election, Mr. Christie said, “is over.”The most notable Trump skeptic was former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who urged Republicans to promote a “plan for tomorrow, not a grievance about yesterday.” Caroline Brehman/EPA, via ShutterstockBut that was not the message delivered by most other speakers — a group that included more than a half dozen of the current and former governors and senators who are considered possible presidential contenders and leaders-in-waiting whenever Mr. Trump recedes from the spotlight.They offered much different interpretations of the results on Election Day last week, which delivered wins for Republicans in Democratic strongholds up and down the ballot — from Virginia, where they won the governor’s race for the first time since 2009, to Washington State, where a candidate running on a message of law and order prevailed in the contest for city attorney in Seattle. Republicans also picked up seats in municipal races across New York City and Long Island and came close to pulling off a colossal upset in the governor’s race in New Jersey.“The trend is unmistakable,” said Representative Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader who hopes to lead his party back into the majority next year. “A Republican wave is underway.”A year into the Biden administration, polling data, history and Tuesday’s results indicate the political climate has become highly unfavorable to Democrats, who have proved that they can beat Mr. Trump but have not convinced enough Americans that they can govern effectively.The election results last week only boosted the optimism of Republicans who already believed they were likely to win the small number of seats they needed to win control of the House next year and were in a strong position to win a majority in the Senate as well.That confidence was irrepressible at their gathering in Las Vegas this weekend, as Republicans predicted not only big gains in the 2022 midterm elections, but in 2024 as well.Senator Ted Cruz of Texas said the results last week foreshadowed a victory in the House and the Senate. He also praised the “extraordinary courage” and “steel backbone” that Mr. Trump displayed as president.Mr. Cruz giddily described the despondency he said he witnessed among his Democratic colleagues on Capitol Hill over the election last week and vowed that the 2022 midterms would bring about the day when “Nancy’s going to get on her broom” and “fly back to California.” That remark, referring to the first woman to hold the position of speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, drew a round of hearty laughter from the audience.Speaking with reporters after his speech on Friday night, Mr. Cruz pointed to how suburban mothers were “coming home to the Republican Party” as a hopeful sign of the party’s fortunes. “I think there are a lot of people across this country, including some soccer moms in Virginia who may have voted for Joe Biden, and looked at this past year and were horrified.”But he twice declined to say whether the G.O.P. could again expect similar results if Mr. Trump — who repelled suburban men and women in such high numbers in 2020 that it cost him several swing states — resumed his role as his party’s standard-bearer.Still, like many other top Republicans who have offered their analysis of the country’s suddenly jolted political landscape, Mr. Cruz indicated that he believed the poor public perceptions of President Biden and the Democratic Party were enough to guarantee Republican success.Ron DeSantis talked up his work as governor of Florida putting into effect policies that borrow from former President Donald Trump’s agenda.Caroline Brehman/EPA, via ShutterstockGov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is frequently mentioned as a top contender for the Republican 2024 presidential nomination should Mr. Trump decide not to run, thundered against what he called a “Fauchian dystopia,” a reference to the government’s leading infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is a proponent of the kinds of public health mandates and restrictions on everyday activity that many Republicans have opposed.Trump’s Bid to Subvert the ElectionCard 1 of 6A monthslong campaign. More