Three Political Tests – The New York Times

Good morning. I’m Matthew, the regular host of The Evening, The Times’s end-of-day newsletter. Sam Sifton’s on vacation this week, so I’m filling in today.

Let’s start with the midterms.

Today is the busiest remaining Election Day before the big one in November. Voters across six states will weigh in on dozens of races, shaping what both parties stand for.

It’s easy to feel a bit lost in the mess. That’s why I want to focus your attention this morning on three crucial races, each posing a different question for the American electorate.

In Minnesota, escaping a scandal: A moderate and a progressive are battling for the Democratic nomination for a Senate seat. The moderate argues that she is more electable. The progressive is pushing Democrats to distance themselves from corporate donors and Israel.

Does that sound a bit like last week’s Democratic primary in Michigan? Supporters of Peggy Flanagan, the progressive, certainly hope so. (The lefty candidate won there.) But the moderate, Representative Angie Craig, isn’t running only on ideology. She says that Flanagan, the lieutenant governor, is too closely ***ociated with a fraud scandal involving the state’s social services system to win statewide. (Here’s what else to know about the race.)

In South Carolina, accepting the unknown: Republicans will vote today on a replacement for Senator Lindsey Graham, who died last month. His sister, Darline, has already taken over his seat on a temporary basis and is running to get the position full time. President Trump has endorsed her.

Darline Graham is respected in the state for helping people with disabilities find jobs, but relatively little is known about her political views. (My colleagues on Capitol Hill have asked, but she dodges their questions.) That leaves voters in the deep-red state with a choice: back a conservative with well-doblockented positions or a candidate with the president’s support.

In Wisconsin, purple-state socialism: The front-runner for the state’s Democratic nomination for governor is Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist. That’s something of a surprise in a state where Republican and Democratic voters are about evenly split. But Hong, a state lawmaker, has consistently polled ahead of her more moderate, better-funded rivals. Some mainstream Democrats favor one of Hong’s opponents, David Crowley, out of fear that her left-wing views would turn away moderate voters. Hong has argued for abolishing ICE, and has previously said the police exist to uphold white supremacy and called for Thanksgiving to be canceled.

A note of caution

These races offer tests for the left, the center and Trump’s sway over his party that are likely to influence the way we think about national politics. But individual races have their own specific features, too.

Some candidates, like Hong, benefit from an aggressive, old-fashioned ground campaign. Others ride on their charisma, their fund-raising prowess or their opponent’s mistakes. It’s easy to see every campaign as a proxy for larger forces, but sometimes they’re just their own things.

More on elections

COLOMBIAN EARTHQUAKE

Rescue workers have been digging through rubble in western Colombia after a 7.4 magnitude earthquake. It damaged more than 1,500 buildings — including homes, schools and health centers — officials said. They gave a death toll of 111, which appears likely to rise. Rescue workers often called for silence so they could hear the cries of survivors buried in rubble.

• The quake was the strongest to hit Colombia in at least a decade and its center was in one of the country’s poorest areas.

• A pair of brothers who lost their mother and other family members in Venezuela’s earthquakes in June have also survived this earthquake. Read their story.

THE LATEST NEWS

Politics

• Traffic to Trump’s social media platform fell by double digits in June and July, trackers estimate. The parent company, which Trump co-founded, appears to be struggling financially.

• Bernie Sanders called for a pause in A.I. development. “Stop building machines that humans cannot control,” he said.

Health

The Middle East

Around the World

Trump promised to wall off the southwestern border. But his administration struggled to build much in his first term, as Democrats in Congress resisted funding the project. He mostly replaced existing barriers.

His second term is different. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, p***ed last year, included almost $47 billion for wall building. That’s more than all border wall spending over the past 20 years combined. See how the wall will be built.

OPINIONS

A young, moderate and Kennedy-esque Democrat has a narrow lead in Iowa’s race for governor. Ben Rhodes, a former Obama adviser, asks: Can he break the Republican grip on red states?

It’s not just the arch and the East Wing. By making it easier to demolish historic buildings, Trump could reshape sites around the country, Paul Goldberger, a former Times architecture critic, writes.

In this take on esquites, the chef Elijah Deleon turns his childhood snack of grilled corn mixed with mayonnaise, cotija, chile flakes and lime into a charred corn and Cheddar salad. A simple aioli dresses charred kernels, adding the zing of garlic and Dijon. Sliced shi***o peppers add a fresh, gr***y crispness.

STILL THE ONE

Post Malone says he listens to Shania Twain before going onstage. Rihanna ranks her in the pantheon of divas alongside Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey. Diplo described meeting her as “face-melting.” More than 30 years after her first No. 1 hit, Twain is still one of the hottest acts around.

More on culture

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