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    Early Voting Numbers in Georgia Senate Races Put G.O.P. on Edge

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    border-right: 1px solid #ccc;
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    font-size: 1.0625rem;
    line-height: 1.25rem;
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    border-right: 1px solid #E2E2E2;
    height: 45px;
    margin: 0 1.4em;
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    align-items: baseline;
    justify-content: center;
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    flex-shrink: 0;
    font-size: 0.8125rem;
    line-height: 0.8125rem;
    font-weight: 600;
    padding: 1em 0;
    }

    #nytslm .nytslm_li a {
    color: #121212;
    text-decoration: none;
    }

    #nytslm .nytsmenu_li_current,
    #nytslm .nytslm_li a:hover,
    #nytslm .nytslm_li a:active,
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    border-bottom: 2px solid #121212;
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    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
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    border: 1px solid #d0021b;
    color: #d0021b;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 6px 2px 6px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
    }

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    .nytslm_li_loud a:focus {
    border-bottom: 2px solid;
    padding-bottom: 2px;
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    .nytslm_li_updated {
    color: #777;
    }

    #masthead-bar-one {
    display: none;
    }

    .electionNavbar__logoSvg {
    width: 80px;
    align-self: center;
    display: flex;
    }

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    .electionNavbar__logoSvg {
    width: 100px;
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    letter-spacing: 0.02em;
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    font-weight: 600;
    color: #121212;
    display: flex;
    align-items: center;
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    .nytslm_notification_headline {
    font-size: 0.875rem;
    line-height: 1.0625rem;
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    max-width: 75px;
    margin-left: 10px;
    flex-shrink: 0;
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    max-width: 100%;
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    .nytslm_notification_image_live_bug {
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    text-transform: uppercase;
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    left: 2px;

    font-size: 0.5rem;
    background-color: #d0021b;
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    font-weight: 700;
    margin-right: 2px;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
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    .Hybrid .nytslm_li_loud a:hover {
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    Electoral College Results

    Election Disinformation

    Full Results

    Biden Transition Updates

    “),e+=””+b+””,e+=””,d&&(e+=””,e+=””,e+=”Live”,e+=””),e+=””,e}function getVariant(){var a=window.NYTD&&window.NYTD.Abra&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync(“STYLN_elections_notifications”);// Only actually have control situation in prd and stg
    return[“www.nytimes.com”,”www.stg.nytimes.com”].includes(window.location.hostname)||(a=”STYLN_elections_notifications”),a||”0_control”}function reportData(){if(window.dataLayer){var a;try{a=dataLayer.find(function(a){return!!a.user}).user}catch(a){}var b={abtest:{test:”styln-elections-notifications”,variant:getVariant()},module:{name:”styln-elections-notifications”,label:getVariant(),region:”TOP_BANNER”},user:a};window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”ab-alloc”})),window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”ab-expose”})),window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”impression”}))}}function insertNotification(a,b){// Bail here if the user is in control
    if(reportData(),”0_control”!==getVariant()){// Remove menu bar items or previous notification
    var c=document.querySelector(“.nytslm_innerContainer”);if(c&&1 30 * 60 * 1000) return restoreMenuIfNecessary();
    // Do not update DOM if the content won’t change
    if(currentNotificationContents!==a.text&&window.localStorage.getItem(“stylnelecs”)!==a.timestamp)// Do not show if user has interacted with this link
    // if (Cookie.get(‘stylnelecs’) === data.timestamp) return;
    {expireLocalStorage(“stylnelecs”),currentNotificationContents=a.text;// Construct URL for tracking
    var b=a.link.split(“#”),c=b[0]+”?action=click&pgtype=Article&state=default&module=styln-elections-notifications&variant=1_election_notifications&region=TOP_BANNER&context=Menu#”+b[1],d=formatNotification(c,a.text,a.kicker,a.image);insertNotification(d,function(){var b=document.querySelector(“.nytslm_notification_link”);return b?void(b.onclick=function(){window.localStorage.setItem(“stylnelecs”,a.timestamp)}):null})}})}(function(){navigator.userAgent.includes(“nytios”)||navigator.userAgent.includes(“nyt_android”)||window.stylnelecsHasLoaded||(// setInterval(getUpdate, 5000);
    window.stylnelecsHasLoaded=!0)})(),function(){try{if(navigator.userAgent.includes(“nytios”)||navigator.userAgent.includes(“nyt_android”)){var a=document.getElementsByClassName(“nytslm_title”)[0];a.style.pointerEvents=”none”}}catch(a){}}(); More

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    The Surprising Places in NYC Where Trump’s Support Grew

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    -webkit-overflow-scrolling: touch;
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    .nytslm_outerContainer {
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    align-items: center;
    /* Fixes IE */
    overflow-x: auto;
    box-shadow: -6px 0 white, 6px 0 white, 1px 3px 6px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15);
    padding: 10px 1.25em 10px;
    transition: all 250ms;
    -ms-overflow-style: none;
    /* IE 10+ */
    scrollbar-width: none;
    /* Firefox */
    background: white;
    margin-bottom: 20px;
    z-index: 1000;
    }

    @media (min-width: 1024px) {
    .nytslm_outerContainer {
    margin-bottom: 0px;
    padding: 13px 1.25em 10px;
    }
    }

    .nytslm::-webkit-scrollbar {
    display: none;
    /* Safari and Chrome */
    }

    .nytslm_innerContainer {
    margin: unset;
    display: flex;
    align-items: center;
    }

    @media (min-width: 600px) {
    .nytslm_innerContainer {
    margin: auto;
    min-width: 600px;
    }
    }

    .nytslm_title {
    padding-right: 1em;
    border-right: 1px solid #ccc;
    }

    @media (min-width: 740px) {
    .nytslm_title {
    max-width: none;
    font-size: 1.0625rem;
    line-height: 1.25rem;
    }
    }

    .nytslm_spacer {
    width: 0;
    border-right: 1px solid #E2E2E2;
    height: 45px;
    margin: 0 1.4em;
    }

    .nytslm_list {
    font-family: nyt-franklin, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
    display: flex;
    width: auto;
    list-style: none;
    padding-left: 1em;
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    align-items: baseline;
    justify-content: center;
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    .nytslm_li {
    margin-right: 1.4em;
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    content: ‘LIVE’
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    color: white;
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    padding: 4px 6px 2px 6px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
    }

    .nytslm_li_upcoming_loud {
    border: 1px solid #d0021b;
    color: #d0021b;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 6px 2px 6px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
    }

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    content: ‘Upcoming’
    }

    .nytslm_li_loud a:hover,
    .nytslm_li_loud a:active,
    .nytslm_li_loud a:focus {
    border-bottom: 2px solid;
    padding-bottom: 2px;
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    color: #777;
    }

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    display: none;
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    width: 80px;
    align-self: center;
    display: flex;
    }

    @media(min-width: 600px) {
    .electionNavbar__logoSvg {
    width: 100px;
    }
    }

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    border-left: 1px solid #ccc;
    font-family: nyt-franklin, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
    padding-left: 1em;
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    .nytslm_notification_label {
    color: #D0021B;
    text-transform: uppercase;
    font-weight: 700;
    font-size: 0.6875rem;
    margin-bottom: 0.2em;
    letter-spacing: 0.02em;
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    .nytslm_notification_link {
    font-weight: 600;
    color: #121212;
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    align-items: center;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_headline {
    font-size: 0.875rem;
    line-height: 1.0625rem;
    }

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    position: relative;
    max-width: 75px;
    margin-left: 10px;
    flex-shrink: 0;
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    max-width: 100%;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_image_live_bug {
    position: absolute;
    text-transform: uppercase;
    bottom: 7px;
    left: 2px;

    font-size: 0.5rem;
    background-color: #d0021b;
    color: white;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 4px 2px 4px;
    font-weight: 700;
    margin-right: 2px;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
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    /* No hover state on in app */
    .Hybrid .nytslm_li a:hover,
    .Hybrid .nytslm_li_loud a:hover {
    border-bottom: none;
    padding-bottom: 0;
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    .Hybrid #TOP_BANNER_REGION {
    display: none;
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    .nytslm_st0 {
    fill: #f4564a;
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    .nytslm_st1 {
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    .nytslm_st2 {
    fill: #2b8ad8;
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    Electoral College Results

    Election Disinformation

    Full Results

    Biden Transition Updates

    “),e+=””+b+””,e+=””,d&&(e+=””,e+=””,e+=”Live”,e+=””),e+=””,e}function getVariant(){var a=window.NYTD&&window.NYTD.Abra&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync(“STYLN_elections_notifications”);// Only actually have control situation in prd and stg
    return[“www.nytimes.com”,”www.stg.nytimes.com”].includes(window.location.hostname)||(a=”STYLN_elections_notifications”),a||”0_control”}function reportData(){if(window.dataLayer){var a;try{a=dataLayer.find(function(a){return!!a.user}).user}catch(a){}var b={abtest:{test:”styln-elections-notifications”,variant:getVariant()},module:{name:”styln-elections-notifications”,label:getVariant(),region:”TOP_BANNER”},user:a};window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”ab-alloc”})),window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”ab-expose”})),window.dataLayer.push(Object.assign({},b,{event:”impression”}))}}function insertNotification(a,b){// Bail here if the user is in control
    if(reportData(),”0_control”!==getVariant()){// Remove menu bar items or previous notification
    var c=document.querySelector(“.nytslm_innerContainer”);if(c&&1 30 * 60 * 1000) return restoreMenuIfNecessary();
    // Do not update DOM if the content won’t change
    if(currentNotificationContents!==a.text&&window.localStorage.getItem(“stylnelecs”)!==a.timestamp)// Do not show if user has interacted with this link
    // if (Cookie.get(‘stylnelecs’) === data.timestamp) return;
    {expireLocalStorage(“stylnelecs”),currentNotificationContents=a.text;// Construct URL for tracking
    var b=a.link.split(“#”),c=b[0]+”?action=click&pgtype=Article&state=default&module=styln-elections-notifications&variant=1_election_notifications&region=TOP_BANNER&context=Menu#”+b[1],d=formatNotification(c,a.text,a.kicker,a.image);insertNotification(d,function(){var b=document.querySelector(“.nytslm_notification_link”);return b?void(b.onclick=function(){window.localStorage.setItem(“stylnelecs”,a.timestamp)}):null})}})}(function(){navigator.userAgent.includes(“nytios”)||navigator.userAgent.includes(“nyt_android”)||window.stylnelecsHasLoaded||(// setInterval(getUpdate, 5000);
    window.stylnelecsHasLoaded=!0)})(),function(){try{if(navigator.userAgent.includes(“nytios”)||navigator.userAgent.includes(“nyt_android”)){var a=document.getElementsByClassName(“nytslm_title”)[0];a.style.pointerEvents=”none”}}catch(a){}}(); More

  • in

    The Surprising Places in New York City Where Trump’s Support Grew

    @media (pointer: coarse) {
    .nytslm_outerContainer {
    overflow-x: scroll;
    -webkit-overflow-scrolling: touch;
    }
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    align-items: center;
    /* Fixes IE */
    overflow-x: auto;
    box-shadow: -6px 0 white, 6px 0 white, 1px 3px 6px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15);
    padding: 10px 1.25em 10px;
    transition: all 250ms;
    -ms-overflow-style: none;
    /* IE 10+ */
    scrollbar-width: none;
    /* Firefox */
    background: white;
    margin-bottom: 20px;
    z-index: 1000;
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    @media (min-width: 1024px) {
    .nytslm_outerContainer {
    margin-bottom: 0px;
    padding: 13px 1.25em 10px;
    }
    }

    .nytslm::-webkit-scrollbar {
    display: none;
    /* Safari and Chrome */
    }

    .nytslm_innerContainer {
    margin: unset;
    display: flex;
    align-items: center;
    }

    @media (min-width: 600px) {
    .nytslm_innerContainer {
    margin: auto;
    min-width: 600px;
    }
    }

    .nytslm_title {
    padding-right: 1em;
    border-right: 1px solid #ccc;
    }

    @media (min-width: 740px) {
    .nytslm_title {
    max-width: none;
    font-size: 1.0625rem;
    line-height: 1.25rem;
    }
    }

    .nytslm_spacer {
    width: 0;
    border-right: 1px solid #E2E2E2;
    height: 45px;
    margin: 0 1.4em;
    }

    .nytslm_list {
    font-family: nyt-franklin, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
    display: flex;
    width: auto;
    list-style: none;
    padding-left: 1em;
    flex-shrink: 0;
    align-items: baseline;
    justify-content: center;
    }

    .nytslm_li {
    margin-right: 1.4em;
    flex-shrink: 0;
    font-size: 0.8125rem;
    line-height: 0.8125rem;
    font-weight: 600;
    padding: 1em 0;
    }

    #nytslm .nytslm_li a {
    color: #121212;
    text-decoration: none;
    }

    #nytslm .nytsmenu_li_current,
    #nytslm .nytslm_li a:hover,
    #nytslm .nytslm_li a:active,
    #nytslm .nytslm_li a:focus {
    color: #121212;
    border-bottom: 2px solid #121212;
    padding-bottom: 2px;
    }

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    content: ‘LIVE’
    }

    .nytslm_li_live_loud {
    background-color: #d0021b;
    color: white;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 6px 2px 6px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
    }

    .nytslm_li_upcoming_loud {
    border: 1px solid #d0021b;
    color: #d0021b;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 6px 2px 6px;
    margin-right: 2px;
    display: inline-block;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    font-weight: 700;
    }

    .nytslm_li_upcoming_loud:before {
    content: ‘Upcoming’
    }

    .nytslm_li_loud a:hover,
    .nytslm_li_loud a:active,
    .nytslm_li_loud a:focus {
    border-bottom: 2px solid;
    padding-bottom: 2px;
    }

    .nytslm_li_updated {
    color: #777;
    }

    #masthead-bar-one {
    display: none;
    }

    .electionNavbar__logoSvg {
    width: 80px;
    align-self: center;
    display: flex;
    }

    @media(min-width: 600px) {
    .electionNavbar__logoSvg {
    width: 100px;
    }
    }

    .nytslm_notification {
    border-left: 1px solid #ccc;
    font-family: nyt-franklin, helvetica, arial, sans-serif;
    padding-left: 1em;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_label {
    color: #D0021B;
    text-transform: uppercase;
    font-weight: 700;
    font-size: 0.6875rem;
    margin-bottom: 0.2em;
    letter-spacing: 0.02em;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_link {
    font-weight: 600;
    color: #121212;
    display: flex;
    align-items: center;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_headline {
    font-size: 0.875rem;
    line-height: 1.0625rem;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_image_wrapper {
    position: relative;
    max-width: 75px;
    margin-left: 10px;
    flex-shrink: 0;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_image {
    max-width: 100%;
    }

    .nytslm_notification_image_live_bug {
    position: absolute;
    text-transform: uppercase;
    bottom: 7px;
    left: 2px;

    font-size: 0.5rem;
    background-color: #d0021b;
    color: white;
    border-radius: 3px;
    padding: 4px 4px 2px 4px;
    font-weight: 700;
    margin-right: 2px;
    letter-spacing: 0.03rem;
    }

    /* No hover state on in app */
    .Hybrid .nytslm_li a:hover,
    .Hybrid .nytslm_li_loud a:hover {
    border-bottom: none;
    padding-bottom: 0;
    }

    .Hybrid #TOP_BANNER_REGION {
    display: none;
    }

    .nytslm_st0 {
    fill: #f4564a;
    }

    .nytslm_st1 {
    fill: #ffffff;
    }

    .nytslm_st2 {
    fill: #2b8ad8;
    }

    Electoral College Results

    Election Disinformation

    Full Results

    Biden Transition Updates

    “),e+=””+b+””,e+=””,d&&(e+=””,e+=””,e+=”Live”,e+=””),e+=””,e}function getVariant(){var a=window.NYTD&&window.NYTD.Abra&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync&&window.NYTD.Abra.getAbraSync(“STYLN_elections_notifications”);// Only actually have control situation in prd and stg
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    Israeli Election, Take Four: Conservatives vs. Conservatives

    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Coronavirus OutbreakliveLatest UpdatesMaps and CasesThe Stimulus DealThe Latest Vaccine InformationF.A.Q.AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyNews analysisIsraeli Election, Take Four: Conservatives vs. ConservativesAfter the center-left failed in three elections to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the fourth one is shaping up into a contest among right-wing leaders.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has survived three electoral challenges in a row from the center-left. Now he faces two challengers from the right.Credit…Pool photo by Yonatan SindelDec. 23, 2020, 6:28 p.m. ETJERUSALEM — For three elections in a row, Israel’s conservative prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has managed to stave off challenges from the center-left.Now, as Israel moves to an unprecedented fourth early election in two years, the center-left has imploded and Mr. Netanyahu faces a challenge from his own former allies on the right.The election, set for March 23 after a fragile, fractious unity coalition disintegrated on Tuesday, is shaping up as a battle of conservatives versus conservatives, an intramural contest for the leadership of the roughly half of Israeli voters who consider themselves right-of-center.“It will be a right-wing government,” said Gadi Wolfsfeld, a veteran analyst of Israeli elections. “The question is who will lead it, and how right-wing will it be?”Leading the charge against Mr. Netanyahu, the longtime premier and leader of the conservative Likud party, are two former protégés-turned-rivals: Naftali Bennett, a former education and defense minister who leads the religious-right Yamina party, and Gideon Saar, a popular former education and interior minister.Mr. Bennett, 48, sitting in the opposition, elevated his stature and his standing in the polls this year by assailing Mr. Netanyahu’s handling of the coronavirus. He toured the country’s hospitals, courted business owners suffering repeated lockdowns and published a book-length list of recommendations on contact tracing, testing and more, a number of which the government adopted.Naftali Bennett, right, a former education and defense minister, leads the religious-right Yamina party.Credit…Dan Balilty for The New York TimesBut it was the defection this month of Mr. Saar, 54, from Likud to form a breakaway right-wing party called “New Hope” that catapulted him into contention overnight. His move has invigorated critics of the prime minister, known to Israelis as Bibi, raising hopes that this election could be the one that sends Mr. Netanyahu, 71, into retirement.“For the first time, the fight is on the right side of the map,” said Karine Nahon, a political scientist at the Interdisciplinary Center-Herzliya. “Usually it fell in behind Bibi without any questions. Now, two parties are actually challenging the hegemony of the Likud.”Mr. Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, will scarcely be at a disadvantage heading into the March contest: He is already trumpeting Israel’s speedy start to vaccinations and its historic normalization deals with four Arab states. And he is a master of controlling the news cycle, among the many benefits of incumbency.Still, the pandemic has thrown a million Israelis out of work, business leaders warn that tens of thousands of companies could be wiped out, and yet another lockdown is looming to remind voters of the government’s inability to curb the virus.But Mr. Netanyahu’s biggest liability could emerge in February, when testimony is to begin in his trial on felony corruption charges, including bribery and breach of trust. A key reason that Israel is being subjected to yet another election, analysts say, is Mr. Netanyahu’s burning desire to bolster his support in Parliament for a possible move to mitigate his legal exposure, defer prosecution or even have the case tossed altogether.The Coronavirus Outbreak More

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    Georgia Senate Runoff Targeted by Misinformation 'Superspreaders'

    AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyMisinformation Amplifiers Target Georgia Senate RacesThe conservative social media personalities who spread baseless rumors of election fraud are starting to focus on the races that will decide control of the Senate.Dropping off an absentee ballot for the Georgia Senate runoff in Marietta, Ga.Credit…Audra Melton for The New York TimesSheera Frenkel and Dec. 22, 2020Updated 5:40 p.m. ETTwo weeks ago, the conservative media personalities Diamond and Silk falsely claimed on their Facebook page that people who were not eligible to vote were receiving ballots in Georgia’s special elections next month. Their post was shared more than 300 times.A week later, the right-wing commentator Mark Levin shared a post on his Facebook page falsely suggesting that the Rev. Raphael Warnock, one of the two Democrats running in the Georgia Senate runoffs, once welcomed Fidel Castro to his church. The misleading claim was shared more than 3,000 times.At the same time, a drumbeat of misinformation about the presidential election count in Georgia droned on. Lara Trump, President Trump’s daughter-in-law, and the Hodgetwins, a bodybuilding duo who have turned to pro-Trump political comedy, shared several false stories on their Instagram and Facebook pages that claimed suitcases filled with ballots were pulled out from under tables during the November vote count. Tens of thousands of people shared their posts.As Georgia prepares to hold special elections that will determine which party will control the U.S. Senate, the state has become the focus of a misinformation campaign that is aimed at discrediting the results of the November elections and convincing voters that Democrats are trying to steal the upcoming vote.A small group of “superspreaders” is responsible for the vast majority of that misinformation, according to new research by Avaaz, a global human rights group. Not only are those accounts responsible for most of the misinformation swirling around the vote, they are drowning out accurate reporting by mainstream media outlets on Facebook and Instagram.The research indicates that, despite efforts by social media companies to curtail misinformation, the viral nature of false news continues to take advantage of the algorithms that gin up what people see on those platforms. The algorithms often reward outrage over accuracy, and telling people what they want to hear or what gets them angry can easily overwhelm the truth.Americans are “being drowned in misinformation in Georgia by these superspreaders,” said Fadi Quran, a director at Avaaz.The Avaaz study also calls into question Facebook’s recent decision to roll back a change that elevated news from authoritative outlets over hyperpartisan sources. The change, which the company said was intended to be temporary, had resulted in an increase in Facebook traffic for mainstream news publishers including CNN, NPR and The New York Times, while partisan sites like Breitbart and Occupy Democrats saw their numbers fall.Many of the “superspreaders” have previously been named by researchers as playing central roles in spreading misinformation about voter fraud in the November presidential elections.“Facebook has gotten a lot of pressure over claims that they are censoring the right or conservatives, but what the data shows is that they may be favoring these actors,” Mr. Quran said. “These accounts regularly spread misinformation. The question is: Why doesn’t Facebook demote their reach per their policies?”Other misinformation spreaders included Eric Trump, the president’s son, and Sebastian Gorka, the president’s former deputy assistant. President Trump also continued his barrage of misinformation about Georgia’s elections, according to the research by Avaaz.The Hodgetwins, a bodybuilding duo who have turned to pro-Trump political comedy, wrongly claimed there was evidence proving wrongdoing in Georgia’s elections.The top 20 Facebook and Instagram accounts spreading false claims aimed at swaying voters in Georgia accounted for more interactions than mainstream media outlets. Using CrowdTangle, a Facebook-owned research tool, Avaaz examined social media posts between Nov. 8, when most news outlets called the election for President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., and Friday. They found that the top 20 “superspreaders” averaged 5,500 interactions on their Facebook posts, while the 20 largest news outlets averaged 4,100 interactions per post.These users saw more people interacting with their posts, despite having fewer followers on Facebook than the mainstream news outlets. Combined, the news outlets had more than 208 million followers, while the top “superspreaders” had 85 million followers.Business & EconomyLatest UpdatesUpdated Dec. 22, 2020, 6:42 p.m. ETNew Labor Department rule would let employers distribute tips more widely.France reopens border with Britain to trucks, requiring rapid Covid-19 tests for drivers.Covid comments get a tech C.E.O. in hot water, again.Mr. Quran said the numbers showed how Facebook’s algorithms favored the sensational, and often false, posts.A Facebook spokesman, Kevin McAlister, said the company was still cracking down on misinformation, despite the recent rollback.“We’re taking every opportunity to connect people to reliable information about the election,” Mr. McAlister said. He said the company was also “deploying the teams and technology we used in the general elections to fight voter suppression, misinformation and interference in the Georgia runoff elections.”None of the top misinformation spreaders responded to requests for comment.Their claims ran the gamut from insults — that the Democratic Senate candidates, Mr. Warnock and Jon Ossoff, are corrupt — to the often-repeated false claim that voting machines that run on software from the company Dominion Voting Systems flipped votes from President Trump to Mr. Biden.Mr. Quran said the accounts also appeared to be “professionalized” in how they spread misinformation.“We see them regularly testing new narratives to see where they can hit a certain nerve, and then acting on it,” he said. Misinformation that successfully targeted Latino voters during the November presidential election, for example, was also being repurposed for Georgia, he said.One claim, that Mr. Warnock, a pastor in an Atlanta church where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once preached, “celebrated Fidel Castro and welcomed him to his church” was not accurate. The claim refers to Mr. Castro’s appearance at a New York City church where Mr. Warnock was a pastor 25 years ago, and there is no evidence that Mr. Warnock was involved in arranging the visit. There is also no evidence that he welcomed Mr. Castro.It was a variation of claims that circulated in Florida during the presidential election that linked Democratic candidates to the Communist Party in Cuba. Some of those claims have also been translated into Spanish to target the more than 300,000 voters with Latino backgrounds in Georgia, Mr. Quran said.Voters in Georgia are also being targeted with misleading information by new media start-ups. A conservative local news network, Star News group, which already runs news sites in Tennessee, Virginia and Minnesota, announced in November that it was opening a venture called the Georgia Star News, according to the liberal media watchdog group Media Matters for America. Since then, the website has published misleading news about the presidential election and the coming runoff election, according to an assessment by NewsGuard, a start-up that examines false stories. The Georgia Star News said in a response that NewsGuard’s assessment included “subjective, nonspecific generalizations that lack any meaningful context” and that it “rejected their assessment as baseless”A Dec. 5 headline promised a “bombshell” story, reprinting an allegation that an audit of election results in a Georgia county revealed that Dominion voting machines flipped ballots from Mr. Trump to Mr. Biden, in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.The article was shared more than 2,000 times on Facebook, according to CrowdTangle data, reaching up to 650,000 people on the social network.Kevin Roose contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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    Where Immigrant Neighborhoods Swung Right in the Election

    Across the United States, many areas with large populations of Latinos and residents of Asian descent, including ones with the highest numbers of immigrants, had something in common this election: a surge in turnout and a shift to the right, often a sizable one. The pattern was evident in big cities like Chicago and New […] More

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    The Electoral College Shouldn't Matter More Than the Majority's Votes

    AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyWhy Getting the Most Votes MattersMajority rule shapes our lives — except when it comes to electing the president.Mr. Wegman is a member of the editorial board.Dec. 13, 2020, 3:10 p.m. ETCredit…Tamir Kalifa for The New York TimesAs the 538 members of the Electoral College gather on Monday to carry out their constitutional duty and officially elect Joe Biden as the nation’s 46th president and Kamala Harris as his vice president, we are confronted again with the jarring reminder that it could easily have gone the other way. We came within a hairbreadth of re-electing a man who finished more than seven million votes behind his opponent — and we nearly repeated the shock of 2016, when Donald Trump took office after coming in a distant second in the balloting.No other election in the country is run like this. But why not? That question has been nagging at me for the past few years, particularly in the weeks since Election Day, as I’ve watched with morbid fascination the ludicrous effort by Mr. Trump and his allies to use the Electoral College to subvert the will of the majority of American voters and overturn an election that he lost.The obvious answer is that, for the most part, we abide by the principle of majority rule. From the time we are old enough to count, we are taught that the bigger number beats the smaller number. It is the essence of fairness. It dictates outcomes in all areas of life, from politics to sports to cattle auctions. It’s decisive even in institutions whose purpose is to serve as a buffer against the majority.“Take the Supreme Court,” said Akhil Amar, a constitutional scholar at Yale Law School. “No one thinks that when it’s 5 to 4, the four win and the five lose. Everyone understands that five beats four. It goes without saying.”But the principle is especially important in elections. Why? Boil it down to three pillars of democratic self-governance: equality, legitimacy and accountability. We ignore them at our peril. And yet they are being ignored right now by millions of Americans, not to mention hundreds of high-ranking elected officials of one of our two major political parties.It occurred to me that in this moment, a defense of the concept of majority rule can no longer go without saying.First, and most fundamental: Majority rule is the only rule that treats all people as political equals. “That’s actually enormously important,” said Richard Primus, a professor at the University of Michigan law school. Any other rule inevitably treats certain votes as worth more than others. Sometimes that’s what we want, as when we require criminal juries to be unanimous in voting to convict. In that case, “there is one error that we prefer to the other error,” Mr. Primus said. “We want to make false convictions very difficult, much more rare than false acquittals.”But in an election for the president, he said, there is no “morally relevant criterion” for departing from majority rule. Voters in one part of the country are no wiser or more worthy than voters in another. And yet the votes of those in certain states always matter more. “What could possibly justify that?” Mr. Primus asked.This is not just an abstract numerical concern. When people’s votes are treated as unequal, it’s a short jump to treating people as unequal. Put another way, it’s not enough to say that we’re all equal before the law; we also must be able to have an equal say in the choice of the representatives who make and enforce the laws.There is a second reason majority rule is critical: It bestows legitimacy on the system. A representative government only works when its citizens see the electoral process as fair. When that legitimacy is absent, when people perceive — often accurately — that their vote doesn’t matter, they will eventually reject the system.“If we’re going to rule ourselves, we’re going to be ruled by majorities,” said Astra Taylor, an author and democracy activist. “There’s a stability in that idea. There’s a sense of the people deciding for themselves and buying in. That stability is incredibly valuable. The alternative is one in which we’re being ruled by something which is outside of us, whether a dictator or a technocracy or an algorithm.”Finally, majority rule ensures electoral accountability. As the economist Amartya Sen put it, democracies don’t have famines. A government that doesn’t have to earn the support of a majority of its citizens, or at least a plurality, is not truly accountable to them, and has no incentive to represent their interests or provide for their needs. This opens the door to neglect, corruption and abuse of power. (Talk to the millions of Californians ignored by President Trump during wildfire season.) “If someone has to run for re-election, they have to put attention into running things well,” Mr. Amar said. “If they don’t, they will lose elections.”The benefits of majority rule aren’t just a preoccupation for liberals like me, still stewing over the elections of 2000 and 2016. On election night 2012, when it appeared briefly that Mitt Romney might win the national popular vote but not the Electoral College, Donald Trump tweeted, “The electoral college is a disaster for a democracy.” A little while later, he tweeted, “More votes equals a loss … revolution!”He deleted that second one, but he needn’t have. He was only expressing a gut feeling everyone can recognize: The person who gets the most votes should win. If you doubt that, consider that the essence of the case Mr. Trump and his backers are making in every state where they are challenging the result is that the president won more votes than Mr. Biden.Mr. Trump made the same argument in 2016, when he lost the popular vote by nearly three million, yet insisted that he had actually won it “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”That both claims are laughably false is beside the point. Mr. Trump knows that in a democracy, real legitimacy comes from winning more votes than the other guy (or woman).Of course, everyone is a fan of majority rule until they realize they can win without it. In the last 20 years, Republicans have been gifted the White House while losing the popular vote twice, and it came distressingly close to happening for a third time this year. So it’s no surprise that in that period, the commitment of Republicans to majority rule, along with other democratic norms, has plummeted. A report by an international team of political scientists found a steep drop in Republican support for things like free and fair elections, and the respectful treatment of political opponents. The party’s rhetoric “is closer to authoritarian parties” in Eastern Europe, the report found.For modern Republicans, democracy has become a foreign language. “We’re not a democracy,” Senator Mike Lee of Utah tweeted in October, in what has become a disturbingly common refrain among conservatives. “Democracy isn’t the objective; liberty, peace, and prospefity are. We want the human condition to flourish. Rank democracy can thwart that.”Notice how, in Mr. Lee’s telling, “democracy” morphs into “rank democracy.” What does he mean by “rank democracy”? Presumably, what James Madison referred to as direct or “pure” democracy, the form of self-rule in which people vote directly on the laws that govern them. But there is no such thing as “rank democracy” when it comes to elections. The term is nothing more than a modern Republican euphemism for majority rule.Speaking of the founders, Republicans love to invoke them in support of their stiff-arming of democracy. Perhaps they forgot what those founders actually said.“The fundamental maxim of republican government,” Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist No. 22, “requires that the sense of the majority should prevail.”James Madison, who is often cited for his warnings about the threats of popular majorities, changed his tune after spending several decades watching the American system of government he designed play out in practice. “No government of human device and human administration can be perfect,” Madison wrote in 1834. But republican government is “the best of all governments, because the least imperfect,” and “the vital principle of republican government is … the will of the majority.”Thomas Jefferson, in his first Inaugural Address, said the “sacred principle” is that “the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail.” In the same breath he emphasized that political minorities also have rights that require protection. Those protections exist in the design of our government and in the guarantees of the Constitution, as applied by the courts. The point is that minorities can be protected at the same time that majorities elect leaders to represent us in the first place.Joe Biden will be the next president because he won the Electoral College. But he should really have the job because he won the most votes.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.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More