Category: Politics

What Trump’s Victory in Iowa Reveals

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Sign up for The Decision, a newsletter featuring our 2024 election coverage. Donald Trump’s victory in the Iowa caucus was as dominant as expected, underscoring the exceedingly narrow path available to any of the Republican forces hoping to prevent his third consecutive nomination. And yet, for all Trump’s strength within the party, the results also hinted at some of the risks the GOP will face if it nominates him again. Based on Trump’s overwhelming lead in the poll conducted of voters on their way into the voting, the cable networks…

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Ron DeSantis’s Cold, Hard Reality

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Sign up for The Decision, a newsletter featuring our 2024 election coverage. Updated at 4:40 p.m. ET on January 16, 2024 Even before the caucus began, Matt Wells was working the room. The 43-year-old wore an autographed Ron DeSantis trucker hat as he strolled up and down the aisles of the Washington High School auditorium in rural southeast Iowa, greeting neighbors and passing out DeSantis flyers. When it was time for three-minute speeches, Wells spoke from the podium without notes, his voice quivering with emotion. DeSantis “always backs up his…

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Amending the Constitution Is Impossible Until Suddenly It’s Not

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The American experiment with constitutional democracy is in grave peril. If Donald Trump becomes president again, fighting to preserve U.S. constitutional democracy through his second term will require the courage, commitment, and creativity of a broad prodemocracy coalition. But the problem is not merely Trump. The U.S. Constitution itself contributes to the country’s crisis. As David Frum observed in a recent issue of The Atlantic, “If Trump is elected, it very likely won’t be with a majority of the popular vote” but rather because our system for selecting the president…

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The House Republicans Who Have Had Enough

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House Republicans didn’t exactly have a banner year in 2023. They made history for all the wrong reasons. Last January, they presided over the most protracted election for speaker in a century, and nine months later, for good measure, lawmakers ejected their leader, Kevin McCarthy, for the first time ever. Last month, the House expelled one of its own, George Santos, for only the sixth time. The rest of the year wasn’t any more productive. Thanks in part to Republican discord, the House passed fewer bills that became laws than…

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Trump Insists He Hasn’t Read Mein Kampf

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This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here. A little more than halfway into his speech in Waterloo, Iowa, last night, former President Donald Trump returned to his new favorite line. “They’re destroying the blood of our country,” Trump said, complaining that immigrants are arriving from Africa, Asia, South America, and “all over the world.” He said that unnamed individuals (presumably his advisers) do not like it when he uses these sorts of phrases. During this section of his speech, the…

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Anti-abortion Conservatives’ First Target If Trump Returns

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The Supreme Court’s upcoming decision about the most common pharmaceutical used for medication abortions may be just the beginning of the political battle over the drug. Earlier this month, the Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal of lower-court rulings that would severely reduce access to mifepristone. The Court’s acceptance of the case marked a crucial juncture in the legal maneuvering over the medication. But however the high court rules, pressure is mounting inside the GOP coalition for the next Republican president to broadly use executive authority at the Food…

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