Politics

States with early contests play a major role in determining the nominee because White House hopefuls struggling to raise money or gain political traction often drop out before visiting states outside the first five. Media attention and policy debates concentrate in those areas, too.

Georgia would vote fourth on Feb. 13, followed by Michigan on Feb. 27, with much of the rest of the nation set to vote on Super Tuesday in early March.

“The Democratic Party looks like America and so does this proposal,” said DNC chair Jaime Harrison, a South Carolinian. The change “continues to make us stronger and elevates the backbone of our party,” he said.

Biden wrote the DNC rules committee in December, saying, “We must ensure that voters of color have a voice in choosing our nominee much earlier in the process and throughout the entire early window.” That committee approved the new lineup, setting up Saturday’s vote.

The move remakes the current calendar, which saw Iowa start with its caucus, followed by New Hampshire and then Nevada and South Carolina. The Republican Party has voted not to change its 2024 primary order, meaning the campaign has already began in Iowa.

“The DNC has decided to break a half-century precedent and cause chaos by altering their primary process, and ultimately abandoning millions of Americans in Iowa and New Hampshire,” Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel said in a statement Saturday.

Four of the first five new states under Democrats’ new plan are battlegrounds, meaning the eventual party winner would be able to lay groundwork in important general election spots. That’s especially true for Michigan and Georgia, both of which voted for Republican Donald Trump in 2016 before flipping to Biden in 2020.

The exception is South Carolina, which hasn’t backed a Democrat in a presidential race since 1976, leading some to argue that the party shouldn’t be concentrating so many early primary resources there. But the state’s population is nearly 27% Black, and African American voters represent Democrats’ most consistent base of support. Iowa and New Hampshire are each more than 90% white.

The revamped calendar could be largely meaningless for 2024 because Biden is expected to run for a second term without a major primary challenge. Also, the DNC has already pledged to revisit the voting calendar before the 2028 presidential election.

Still, this year’s changes could establish precedent, just as a new lineup that moved Nevada and South Carolina into the first states to vote did when the DNC approved a new primary calendar before the 2008 presidential election.

“These things may be symbolic, but they’re realistic,” South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, assistant Democratic leader in the House and a close Biden ally, told The Associated Press.

Democrats have worked on overhauling their primary lineup for months. On Saturday, nearly an hour of final debate turned raw at times.

Some Black members of the DNC said those arguing to abide by tradition could be seen as implying that states with larger African American populations were incapable of handling the responsibility of going early in the primary.

“If we’re really a family, it means some of y’all got to shift to make room at the table for others,” said Leah Daughtry, a DNC rules committee member from New York.

Iowa Democratic Party chair Rita Hart argued that Republicans in her state were already accusing Democrats of “have turned their back on Iowa and on rural America.” But Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell, to sustained applause, countered: “No one state should have a lock on going first.”

Despite the approval, the final slate is not yet set. South Carolina, Nevada and Michigan have met party requirements to join the party’s new top five. But in Georgia may not change its Democratic primary calendar date without the Republicans also doing so.

Iowa argued that continued uncertainty could cause other states to try and jump ahead of the new DNC calendar, as happened before the 2008 presidential race. The new rules include penalties for states trying to move up without permission, including possibly losing delegates to the party’s national convention.

New Hampshire has a state law mandating that it hold the nation’s first presidential primary, which Iowa circumvented since 1972 by holding a caucus. New Hampshire Democrats have joined with top state Republicans in pledging to go forward with the nation’s first presidential primary next year regardless of the DNC calendar.

No major challenger has yet emerged from his own party to run against Biden for president next year. Still, top New Hampshire Democrats have warned that another Democrat could run in an unsanctioned primary the state stages and, if Biden skips it in accordance with party rules, could win and embarrass the president — prolonging a primary process that wasn’t supposed to be competitive.

“Respecting our state law and lifting up diverse voices need not be mutually exclusive,” said Joanne Dowdell, a DNC rules committee member from New Hampshire.

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INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Republicans in some heavily conservative states won their campaigns for secretary of state last year after claiming they would make sweeping changes aimed at keeping fraud out of elections.

So far, their efforts to make good on their promises are mixed, in some cases because their rhetoric has bumped up against skepticism from members of their own party.

Voters in politically pivotal swing states such as Arizona, Michigan and Nevada rejected candidates seeking to oversee elections who had echoed former President Donald Trump’s false claims about the 2020 presidential election. But newly elected secretaries of state in Alabama, Indiana and Wyoming who had questioned the legitimacy of that election won easily in those Republican-dominated states.

They are now facing the task of backing up their campaign pledges in states where Republicans have already set strict election laws.

In Indiana, Secretary of State Diego Morales has been relatively quiet. He has not been making the rounds at the Statehouse trying to persuade lawmakers to embrace the wide-ranging tightening of voting rules he promoted as a candidate.

After defeating the incumbent secretary of state for the Republican nomination last summer, Morales dialed back his description of Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election as a “scam” and his calls for tighter voting laws. That push included cutting Indiana’s 28-day early voting period in half and requiring new voters to prove their U.S. citizenship when registering.

No bills for such steps were introduced for this year’s legislative session. Morales, who was an aide to Mike Pence when the former vice president was governor, also did not seek any money in his budget request to lawmakers for creating an “election task force,” which he had discussed as a candidate, that would investigate voting “shenanigans” around the state.

A concept backed by Morales for requiring voters to include a copy of their driver’s license with a mail-in ballot application is being sponsored by a Republican lawmaker, but he said he wasn’t working with Morales on the proposal.

Morales’ office has declined interview requests from The Associated Press since he took office Jan. 1. Kegan Prentice, the office’s legislative director, said Morales was “currently focused on the ongoing transition.”

During remarks at an early January inaugural ceremony, Morales continued his campaign theme of promoting “election integrity” without giving specifics.

“My priority is to make Indiana a national model for election confidence and integrity,” he said.

Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston, also a Republican, said recently he had talked with Morales and told him he was “comfortable” with the state’s election laws.

“I think our election laws are as good as any in the country,” Huston said.

Morales was among the otherwise unsuccessful candidates associated with the America First Secretary of State Coalition, which called for large-scale changes to elections with candidates aligned with Trump’s views. The group supported losing candidates in several battleground states.

They claimed widespread fraud and manipulation of voting machines, but there has been no evidence of either as exhaustive reviews in states lost by Trump have not revealed wrongdoing. That hasn’t stopped Republican candidates, particularly in contested primaries, from parroting the false claims that have taken hold among the party’s supporters.

A large segment of Republicans, 58%, still believe Biden’s 2020 victory was not legitimate, according to an October poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

While Alabama’s Wes Allen and Wyoming’s Chuck Gray were not on the America First coalition’s candidate list, they also raised doubts about the 2020 vote.

Allen repeated a debunked claim calling the 31-state Electronic Registration Information Center organization a “Soros-funded, leftist group,” a reference to liberal billionaire George Soros. The voter registration data-sharing partnership is designed to maintain accurate voter rolls by identifying people who have moved or died. It’s funded by states after receiving initial startup support from The Pew Charitable Trusts.

Allen’s first official act was to withdraw Alabama from the group, citing privacy concerns. Indiana and Wyoming weren’t part of the organization.

Even though Wyoming gave Trump his widest victory margins in 2016 and 2020, Gray’s election denials worried some of his fellow Republicans. The former state legislator and right-wing radio host often showed “2000 Mules,” a film that made unsubstantiated claims about ballot fraud, during his campaign events last year. He solidly beat a fellow Republican lawmaker who said the 2020 presidential outcome wasn’t in doubt.

A few Republicans questioned whether Gray should be stripped of his election oversight role given his views, but that idea has received little support. Instead, he has received a warm welcome from Wyoming lawmakers considering several election bills that are moving ahead.

One would prohibit “ballot harvesting,” or gathering others’ completed ballots for delivery, while another would implement new requirements for voting machines that would, in part, ensure they could not be connected to the internet.

But so far there is no legislation to follow through on Gray’s campaign proposals to ban ballot drop boxes or electronic voting machines, which despite mainly paper balloting in Wyoming are available in every county to help voters with disabilities.

That reflects the reality of trying to implement the most far-reaching election campaign promises in a heavily Republican state.

In January, Gov. Mark Gordon made a point in his state of the state speech of saying that Wyoming counts on election integrity because of its “professional and dedicated” county clerks.

But going off-script, Gordon hinted at Gray’s challenges ahead: “And I’m thrilled that our secretary of state takes that charge very seriously.”

___

Cassidy reported from Atlanta and Gruver from Cheyenne, Wyoming. Associated Press writer Kim Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama, contributed to this report.

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The 218-211 vote, along party lines, came after a heated, voices-raised debate in which Democrats accused the GOP of targeting Omar based on her race. Omar defended herself on the House floor, asking if anyone was surprised she was being targeted, “because when you push power, power pushes back.” Democratic colleagues hugged and embraced their colleague during the vote.

“My voice will get louder and stronger, and my leadership will be celebrated around the world,” Omar said in a closing speech.

Republicans focused on six statements Omar has made that “under the totality of the circumstances, disqualify her from serving on the Committee of Foreign Affairs,” said Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss.

“All members, both Republicans and Democrats alike who seek to serve on Foreign Affairs, should be held to the highest standard of conduct due to the international sensitivity and national security concerns under the jurisdiction of this committee,” Guest said.

The resolution proposed by Rep. Max Miller, R-Ohio, a former official in the Trump administration, declared, “Omar’s comments have brought dishonor to the House of Representatives.”

Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said Omar has at times “made mistakes” and used antisemitic tropes that were condemned by House Democrats four years ago. But that’s not what Thursday’s vote was about, he said.

“It’s not about accountability, it’s about political revenge,” Jeffries said.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, went took it one step further, saying that the GOP’s action was one of the “disgusting legacies after 9/11,” a reference to he Sept. 11, 2001, attack — “the targeting and racism against Muslim-Americans throughout the United States of America. And this is an extension of that legacy.”

She added, “This is about targeting women of color.”

Omar is one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress. She is also the first to wear a hijab in the House chamber after floor rules were changed to allow members to wear head coverings for religious reasons.

She quickly generated controversy after entering Congress in 2019 with a pair of tweets that suggested lawmakers who supported Israel were motivated by money.

In the first, she criticized the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. “It’s all about the Benjamins baby,” she wrote, invoking slang about $100 bills.

Asked on Twitter who she though was paying members of Congress to support Israel, Omar responded, “AIPAC!”

The comments sparked a public rebuke from then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats who made clear that Omar had overstepped.

She soon apologized.

“We have to always be willing to step back and think through criticism, just as I expect people to hear me when others attack me about my identity,” Omar tweeted. “This is why I unequivocally apologize.”

Democrats rallied in a fiery defense of Omar and the experiences she brings to the Congress.

Black, Latino and progressive lawmakers in particular spoke of her unique voice in the House and criticized Republicans for what they called a racist attack.

“Racist gaslighting,” said Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo. A “revenge resolution,” said Rep. Primila Jayapal of Washington, the chair of the progressive caucus.

“It’s so painful to watch,” said Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., who joined Congress with Omar in 2019 the first two female Muslims elected to the House.

“To Congresswoman Omar, I am so sorry that our country is failing you today through this chamber,” Tlaib said through tears. “You belong on that committee.”

Omar’s previous comments were among several remarks highlighted in the resolutions seeking her removal from the Foreign Affairs Committee.

The chairman of the committee, Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, argued for excluding Omar from the panel during a recent closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans.

“It’s just that her worldview of Israel is so diametrically opposed to the committee’s,” McCaul told reporters in describing his stance. “I don’t mind having differences of opinion, but this goes beyond that.”

Several Republicans skeptical of removing Omar wanted “due process” for lawmakers who face removal. McCarthy said he told them he would work with Democrats on creating a due process system, but acknowledged it’s still a work in progress.

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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden delivered a message of unity at the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday.

“In our politics and in our lives, we too often see each other as opponents and not competitors. We see each other as enemies, not neighbors,” Biden said. “And as tough as these times have been, if we look closer, we see the strength, the determination that has long defined America.”

The breakfast was held at the Capitol’s visitor center, and the auditorium’s 450 seats were packed with members of Congress, government officials and others.

Every president since Dwight D. Eisenhower has spoken at the breakfast.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi endorsed fellow Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff on Thursday in his 2024 bid for the seat now held by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, providing the long-serving incumbent doesn’t seek a seventh term.

The public blessing of Schiff’s candidacy, though conditional, was significant. Feinstein has said she will make a decision about her future in the next couple of months. But Pelosi’s announcement represented the strongest signal to date that it’s unlikely Feinstein — at 89 the oldest member of Congress — will run again.

The endorsement gives the Southern California congressman the support of one of the most powerful Democrats in the country in what is expected to be a highly competitive race, and signals to Pelosi’s vast donor network that he is her choice for the job.

Neighbors in San Francisco, Pelosi and Feinstein are personally close and have worked together for decades in Washington, suggesting her decision to back Schiff early in the campaign also carried with it a tacit nod from the senator.

If Feinstein decides to seek re-election “she has my whole-hearted support,” Pelosi said in a statement. If not, she said she will support Schiff, who rose to national prominence as the lead prosecutor in President Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial.

Schiff “knows well the nexus between a strong democracy and a strong economy,” said Pelosi, who tapped him for the impeachment position.

It also was unusual to see Pelosi pick sides in a contest expected to draw a crowd of rival candidates from within her own party. Democratic Rep. Katie Porter entered the race for the safe Democratic seat last month. Other possible contenders include Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Feinstein’s reticence about her future has created a publicly awkward dynamic — the Senate race to replace her is unfolding, even as the senator remains unclear about her intentions.

In recent years, questions have arisen about her cognitive health and memory, though she has defended her effectiveness in representing a state that is home to nearly 40 million people.

Pelosi’s support for Schiff was not surprising. They have worked together for years and are close. Porter, a leader in the party’s progressive wing who was first elected in 2018, ran as an outsider looking to shake up the Washington status quo. She has had occasional breaks with Democratic leadership, including her opposition to the revival of so-called earmarks, or spending for legislators’ home-district projects.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A week after bitter divisions dominated a national Republican gathering, Democrats holding their own meeting are eager to showcase just how much they agree on.

There will be no party chair fight since Jaime Harrison isn’t up for reelection until 2025. There is no candidate jostling for a White House bid since President Joe Biden is expected to seek a second term. And there is no national reckoning after a surprisingly strong midterm showing.

The only real point of contention for the Democratic National Committee’s winter meeting in Philadelphia this weekend is a proposed overhaul of the 2024 presidential primary calendar, which has angered top party leaders in New Hampshire. But even that is largely moot since Biden isn’t expected to face a major challenge for the nomination.

The DNC on Saturday is expected to approve a new lineup for the party’s presidential primaries, deferring to Biden, who has championed South Carolina’s primary opening voting on Feb. 3. New Hampshire and Nevada would jointly follow three days later, on Feb. 6, with Georgia coming next on Feb. 13 and Michigan two weeks after that.

The president has argued that replacing the party’s leadoff caucuses in Iowa, a majority white state, with a presidential primary in South Carolina, where nearly 27% of the population is Black, would empower the voters of color whom Democrats rely on but have taken for granted.

The party is solidly behind Biden seeking a second term despite his being the oldest president in U.S. history and revelations that he may have mishandled official documents. Unity remains its mantra after Republicans took 15 ballots last month just to elect a House speaker, with GOP members nearly coming to blows on the House floor.

“We’re fending off a Republican House that’s crazy and actually defending our gains from the first years. So it just doesn’t make sense to be saber-rattling right now about a future race when we’re all just sort of in the fight together,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which backed Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, rather than Biden, in Democrats’ 2020 presidential primary.

Warren, like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and other major 2020 Democratic presidential candidates, say they expect Biden to run again and will support him when he makes a bid official.

Sanders is instead urging the DNC to ban accepting funding from super PACs and other outside political groups during future Democratic primaries. That’s an idea some Democratic elders have opposed, arguing that Republican candidates will continue to accept such financial support and that their party shouldn’t “unilaterally disarm.”

Still, most top progressive organizations and grassroots activist groups have also shied away from suggesting Biden could face a major primary challenge. President Jimmy Carter’s loss to Republican Ronald Reagan in the 1980 election followed a strong primary challenge from Sen. Edward M. Kennedy.

Harrison, who rose to national prominence with an unsuccessful 2020 bid against South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, will remain chair until after next year’s presidential race. That’s in stark contrast to Ronna McDaniel, who won another term as head of the Republican National Committee during a contentious meeting last week in California. Members openly questioned the GOP’s midterm performance and former President Donald Trump’s continued hold on the party.

Harrison teared up during a December party rules committee meeting when Democrats’ new primary calendar was first approved and predicts he may get emotional again this weekend. He recalled going to vote with his grandfather before his death in 2004 and how the U.S. Constitution once counted his Black ancestors in South Carolina as three-fifths of a person.

“They didn’t always think I was a whole man in this state,” Harrison remembered his grandfather saying, before urging him, “Never let anyone tell you that you don’t matter.”

“That this president would step into the tradition of the Democratic Party — go into Iowa, go into New Hampshire to say, you know what, it is now time that we elevate the voices of people like my grandfather, like my grandmother, to allow them to get a say in determining who should be president of the United States,” Harrison added. “For me, I was emotional because of that.”

But the new lineup has its detractors. New Hampshire, already a general election battleground state, has a law that mandates holding the nation’s first presidential primary, which Iowa only circumvented with its caucus. Its Democrats have joined with top state Republicans in vowing to hold the nation’s first presidential primary next year regardless of the DNC calendar.

That raises the possibility that, if Biden were to bypass a rogue New Hampshire primary, he could lose the state to a challenger who campaigns there unopposed.

Such a scenario may trigger “potential embarrassment” for Biden that creates “an opening for an insurgent candidate — serious or not — who can garner media attention and capitalize on Granite Staters’ anger about being passed over,” New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley wrote to the DNC rules committee.

DNC rules committee member Joanne Dowdell of New Hampshire seized on the same theme, noting, “This is not how any of us would like to kick off a reelection campaign.”

That’s unlikely to keep the DNC from approving the new primary calendar. But the proposal has drawn some opposition beyond New Hampshire.

Matt Hughes, a DNC member who is second vice chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, was the first signature on a letter released Thursday to DNC members from local officials in his state, as well as Nevada, Michigan and Georgia.

It urged the party to choose the first primary state from a competitive state like those four — arguing that doing so would allow Democrats to concentrate campaign resources on areas that are more competitive in the general election than deeply Republican South Carolina.

Hughes said such calls shouldn’t be seen as defying Biden. Instead, he said, the party having an incumbent president who won’t face primary opposition is the perfect time to make changes that shape future cycles.

“What we should be thinking about is absolutely the long-term impact. In 2024, it makes a lot of sense. This is relatively low impact,” Hughes said. “This is the perfect opportunity to talk about the lineup of states without regard to possible candidates in the field, who benefits and who losses.”

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BEIJING (AP) — Secretary of State Antony Blinken has postponed a planned high-stakes weekend diplomatic trip to China as the Biden administration weighs a broader response to the discovery of a high-altitude Chinese balloon flying over sensitive sites in the western United States, a U.S. official said Friday.

The abrupt decision comes despite China’s claim that the balloon was a weather research satellite that had blown off course. The U.S. has described it as a surveillance satellite.

The decision came just hours before Blinken had been due to depart Washington for Beijing and marked a new blow to already strained U.S.-Chinese relations. Officials said Blinken and President Joe Biden determined it was best not to proceed with the trip at this time.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.

The Pentagon decided not to shoot down the balloon, which was potentially flying over sensitive sites, because of concerns of hurting people on the ground.

The U.S. had no immediate response to the Chinese explanation, which came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was expected to make his first trip to Beijing this weekend. The visit has not been formally announced, and it was unclear if the balloon’s discovery would affect his travel plans.

In a statement late Friday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said the balloon was a civilian airship used mainly for meteorological research. The ministry said the airship has limited “self-steering” capabilities and “deviated far from its planned course” because of winds.

“The Chinese side regrets the unintended entry of the airship into U.S. airspace due to force majeure,” the statement said, citing a legal term used to refer to events beyond one’s control.

On Thursday, a senior American defense official told Pentagon reporters that the U.S. has “very high confidence” that the object spotted over U.S. airspace in recent days was a Chinese high-altitude balloon and that it was flying over sensitive sites to collect information. One of the places the balloon was spotted was Montana, which is home to one of the nation’s three nuclear missile silo fields at Malmstrom Air Force Base. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.

The defense official said the U.S. has assessed that the balloon has “limited” value in terms of providing intelligence that couldn’t be obtained by other technologies, such as spy satellites.

It was unclear what will happen with the balloon if it isn’t brought down.

Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder said Thursday that similar balloon activity has been seen in the past several years and the government has taken steps to ensure no sensitive information was stolen.

He said the balloon was traveling well above the height at which commercial aircraft fly and didn’t present a threat to people on the ground.

Biden was briefed and asked the military to present options, according to a senior administration official, who was also not authorized to publicly discuss sensitive information. The senior defense official said the U.S. prepared fighter jets, including F-22s, to shoot down the balloon if ordered.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, advised against taking “kinetic action” because of risks to the safety of people on the ground. Biden, a Democrat, accepted that recommendation.

Even though the balloon was over a sparsely populated area of Montana, its size would create a debris field large enough that it could have put people at risk.

The defense official would not specify the size of the balloon but said commercial pilots could spot it from their cockpits.

The balloon was first reported by NBC News.

A photograph of a large white balloon lingering over the area was captured by The Billings Gazette. It could be seen drifting in and out of clouds and had what appeared to be a solar array hanging from the bottom, Gazette photographer Larry Mayer said.

“China’s brazen disregard for U.S. sovereignty is a destabilizing action that must be addressed,” Republican Party House Speaker Kevin McCarthy tweeted.

Twenty of those aircraft crossed the central line in the Taiwan Strait that has long been an unofficial buffer zone between the two sides, which separated during a civil war in 1949.

Beijing has also increased preparations for a potential blockade or military action against Taiwan, which has stirred increasing concern among military leaders, diplomats and elected officials in the U.S., Taiwan’s key ally.

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DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis may be months away from publicly declaring his presidential intentions, but his potential rivals aren’t holding back.

No fewer than a half dozen Republicans eyeing the White House have begun actively courting top political operatives in states like New Hampshire and Iowa, which traditionally host the opening presidential primary contests. At the same time, former President Donald Trump, the only announced candidate in the race, is launching regular attacks against DeSantis — and others — while locking down key staff and endorsements in early voting South Carolina.

For now, DeSantis is plowing forward with a fiery “anti-woke” agenda in the legislature before a presidential announcement in late spring or early summer. His team is beginning to hold informal conversations with a handful of prospective campaign staff in key states, according to those involved in the discussions. But compared with would-be rivals, the Florida governor, famous for crafting his own political strategy, appears to be stepping into the 2024 presidential primary season much more deliberately.

“They understand they are in kind of a sweet spot now. They can feel the demand building and they don’t really have to show any leg yet,” said David Kochel, a veteran Republican operative who has been in touch with DeSantis’ team to relay interest from activists. “I just don’t think there’s any urgency yet to start putting things in place.”

For voters, it may seem early in the 2024 presidential election season. But by historical standards, it is not. The GOP’s opening presidential primary debates are just six months away, expected in late July or early August when the Republican National Committee holds its summer meeting in Milwaukee.

Already, Trump has been in the race for more than two months. The former president on Saturday released a list of high-profile supporters in South Carolina, including Gov. Henry McMaster and Sen. Lindsay Graham. And on Feb. 15, Nikki Haley, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is set to launch her own White House bid in South Carolina, followed by immediate appearances in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Haley is among a half dozen Republican prospects in various levels of conversations with political operatives in New Hampshire and Iowa about job openings, according to people involved with the discussions who requested anonymity to discuss internal planning. Beyond Haley, they include former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson.

Hogan, a term-limited governor who left office only two weeks ago, talked up his executive experience in multiple New Hampshire radio interviews on Thursday. He told The Associated Press he was launching a multi-day fundraising tour beginning this weekend in DeSantis’ Florida.

“There’s plenty of room for Trump and DeSantis and me in the same state,” Hogan said with a laugh. “Everybody says it’s Donald Trump or Ron DeSantis. But I think it might be somebody that nobody’s talking about right now, which is what usually happens. … My argument is the frontrunners almost never win.”

Indeed, recent political history is littered with tales of seemingly strong early contenders who ultimately failed. They include the likes of former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who looked like a frontrunner in 2015 and was forced out of the race before the first voting contest. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush then emerged as the strong favorite before being overtaken by Trump.

Veteran Republican strategist Ari Fleischer recalled the 2000 presidential campaign when his then-boss, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, successfully waited until mid-June to enter the Republican presidential primary. In the months before the announcement, Bush aggressively worked behind the scenes to line up donors, staff and endorsements.

For DeSantis to adopt a similar winning playbook, Fleischer said, it’s critical to work now to assemble a strong campaign apparatus in private. He likened a successful strategy at this phase to a duck, who appears calm but is paddling hard just below the water’s surface.

“So long as (DeSantis) is paddling furiously underwater like a duck, he can afford to wait,” Fleischer said. “The amount of work it takes to build a presidential campaign is phenomenal. I don’t think people understand what’s involved unless they’ve done it. It’s brutal. … And if you don’t put the labor into it quietly, privately, it falls apart.”

DeSantis’ team declined to comment on his 2024 plans publicly, but the Florida governor’s allies expect him to enter the race in late June or early July.

In the short-term, he’s preparing to promote his upcoming book, “The Courage to be Free,” set for release on Feb. 28. And he’ll spend much of the coming months stacking up legislative victories in the Florida statehouse, where the Republican supermajority stands ready to deliver a bevy of measures sure to entice the most conservative voters in a GOP presidential primary.

In recent days, DeSantis said he’s backing new laws that would ban abortions after 6 weeks of conception, ease restrictions for those wishing to carry concealed firearms and end the state’s unanimous jury requirement for death penalty cases. He released a plan to end sales taxes on gas stoves, picking up on a false claim circulating on the right that the Biden administration plans to ban the appliance.

DeSantis is also asking the state legislature for an additional $12 million to relocate unwanted migrants, signaling a continued focus on illegal immigration after spending millions in Florida taxpayer dollars to fly migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard last year.

And he’s zeroing in on issues related to race and education. He installed a conservative majority on the board of trustees at a small liberal arts school and has debuted a proposal to block programs on diversity, education and inclusion from state colleges. At the same institutions, he would also ban programs on critical race theory, which centers on the idea that racism is systemic in the nation’s institutions, which function to maintain the dominance of white people in society.

In the coming days, DeSantis is expected to declare victory in his battle against Disney, the state’s largest employer, which drew the governor’s ire after opposing the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law. State lawmakers are expected to meet for a special session as soon as next week to complete a takeover of a self-governing district Disney controls over its properties in Florida, all at DeSantis’ request.

As DeSantis focuses on Florida’s statehouse, Trump has dramatically escalated his attacks on the man he and his aides see as, by far, his most concerning rival. But as other Republicans prepare to enter the race, Trump is also attacking them.

For example, in a Thursday interview with conservative commentator Hugh Hewitt, Trump described Haley in sexist terms as “overly ambitious,” noting that she once vowed not to seek the presidency in 2024 if Trump was also running.

“She’s a very ambitious person. She just couldn’t stay in her seat,” Trump said.

In the same interview, he also criticized DeSantis, claiming he cried while asking for Trump’s endorsement during the 2018 governor’s race.

“DeSantis got elected because of me. You remember he had nothing. He was dead. He was leaving the race. He came over and he begged me, begged me for an endorsement,” Trump said. “He said, ‘If you endorse me, I’ll win.’ And there were tears coming down from his eyes.”

DeSantis has largely avoided responding to Trump’s digs. And without a campaign apparatus, he doesn’t have a rapid response team or surrogate operation designed to engage with 2024-related fire.

But earlier this week, he seemed to be knocking Trump — at least, indirectly — when asked about the former governor’s repeated attacks.

“The good thing is, is that the people are able to render a judgment on that whether they re-elect you or not,” DeSantis said when asked about Trump, who lost his 2020 reelection.

___ Peoples reported from New York. Izaguirre reported from Tallahassee, Florida. AP writers Jill Colvin in New York and Meg Kinnard in Columbia, South Carolina contributed.

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A newly released audio recording offers a behind-the-scenes look at how former President Donald Trump’s campaign team in a pivotal battleground state knew they had been outflanked by Democrats in the 2020 presidential election. But even as they acknowledged defeat, they pivoted to allegations of widespread fraud that were ultimately debunked — repeatedly — by elections officials and the courts.

The audio from Nov. 5, 2020, two days after the election, is surfacing as Trump again seeks the White House while continuing to lie about the legitimacy of the outcome and Democrat Joe Biden’s win.

The Wisconsin political operatives in the strategy session even praised Democratic turnout efforts in the state’s largest counties and appeared to joke about their efforts to engage Black voters, according to the recording obtained Thursday by The Associated Press. The audio centers on Andrew Iverson, who was the head of Trump’s campaign in the state.

“Here’s the drill: Comms is going to continue to fan the flame and get the word out about Democrats trying to steal this election. We’ll do whatever they need (inaudible) help with. Just be on standby in case there’s any stunts we need to pull,” Iverson said.

Iverson is now the Midwest regional director for the Republican National Committee. He deferred questions about the meeting to the RNC, whose spokesperson, Keith Schipper, declined comment because he had not heard the recording.

The former campaign official and Republican operative who provided a copy of the recording to the AP was in the meeting and recorded it. The operative is not authorized to speak publicly about what was discussed and did not want to be identified out of concern for personal and professional retaliation, but said they came forward because Trump is mounting a third attempt for the White House.

In response to questions about the audio, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said: “The 2024 campaign is focused on competing in every state and winning in a dominating fashion. That is why President Trump is leading by wide margins in poll after poll.”

Wisconsin was a big part of Trump’s victory in 2016, when he smashed through the Democrats’ so-called “Blue Wall” in the upper Midwest, and his campaign fought hard to keep the swing state in his column four years later before his loss to Biden.

Biden defeated Trump by nearly 21,000 votes in Wisconsin in 2020, a result that has withstood independent and partisan audits and reviews, as well as lawsuits and recounts in the state’s two largest and Democratic-leaning counties.

Yet, two days after the election, there was no discussion of Trump having won the state during the meeting of Republican campaign operatives.

Instead, parts of the meeting focus on discussions about packing up campaign offices and writing final reports about how the campaign unfolded. At one point on the recording, Iverson is heard praising the GOP’s efforts while admitting the margin of Trump’s defeat in the state.

“At the end of the day, this operation received more votes than any other Republican in Wisconsin history,” Iverson said. “Say what you want, our operation turned out Republican or DJT supporters. Democrats just got 20,000 more than us, out of Dane County and other shenanigans in Milwaukee, Green Bay and Dane. There’s a lot that people can learn from this campaign.”

The meeting showcases another juxtaposition of what Republican officials knew about the election results and what Trump and his closest allies were saying publicly as they pushed the lie of a stolen election. Trump was told by his own attorney general there was no sign of widespread fraud, and many within his own administration told the former president there was no substance to various claims of fraud or manipulation — advice Trump repeatedly ignored.

In the weeks after the election, Trump and his allies would file dozens of lawsuits, convene fake electors and pressure election officials in an attempt to overturn the will of the voters and keep Trump in office.

It’s unclear whether the staff in Wisconsin coordinated their message directly with campaign officials in Washington.

Parts of the Nov. 5 meeting also center on Republican outreach efforts to the state’s Black community.

At one point, the operatives laugh over needing “more Black voices for Trump.” Iverson also references their efforts to engage with Black voters.

“We ever talk to Black people before? I don’t think so,” he said, eliciting laughter from others in the room.

Another speaker on the recording with Iverson is identified by the source as GOP operative Clayton Henson. At the time, Henson was a regional director for the RNC in charge of Wisconsin and other Midwestern states. They give a postmortem of sorts on the election, praising Republican turnout and campaign efforts while acknowledging the Democrats’ robust turn-out-the-vote campaign.

Henson specifically references Democratic turnout in Dane County, which includes Madison, the state capital, and is a liberal stronghold in the state. A record-high 80% of the voting-age population cast ballots in 2020 in the county, which Biden won with 76% of the vote.

“Hats off to them for what they did in Dane County. You gotta respect that,” Henson said. “There’s going to be another election in a couple years. So remember the lessons you learned and be ready to punch back.”

Henson, reached by phone Thursday, said, “No thank you” when asked to comment about the meeting.

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This story has been corrected to show Iverson said “drill,” not “deal.”

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DETROIT (AP) — Two men who began their careers on factory floors are competing to lead the 373,000 members of the United Auto Workers, a union that helps set standards for wages across the nation’s manufacturing sector.

It will be the first-ever direct election of a UAW president in the union’s 88-year history.

The election pits the 57-year-old incumbent, Ray Curry, who started his career on the assembly line at a Freightliner truck plant in North Carolina, against Shawn Fain, 54, who began as an electrician at a Chrysler metal casting plant in Kokomo, Indiana.

Curry and Fain were the top two finishers in a five-candidate race held in December for a four-year term as UAW president. Because neither man won more than 50% of the vote, they were placed in a runoff election, with ballot counting to start March 1. Separate runoff races are being held for two other UAW positions — a vice president and a regional director.

Until this year, the leaders of the UAW had always been chosen by delegates to a convention rather than by rank-and-file union members. But in the aftermath of a bribery-and-embezzlement scandal involving union officials, members voted to hold a direct election this time.

Candidates who have positioned themselves in opposition to the established union leadership won six of 14 seats on the International Executive Board and could end up capturing as many as eight seats.

Under Curry’s leadership for the past 19 months, the UAW has taken a more aggressive stance in labor talks, having gone on strike against Volvo Trucks, John Deere, the University of California and CNHI, a maker of agricultural and construction equipment.

In forthcoming contract negotiations, Curry and Fain have each said they would seek to restore traditional pensions, which, beginning in 2007, were replaced by a 401(k)-style defined contribution plan for new hires. Both also want cost-of-living and general pay raises and an end to differing tiers of wages and benefits for workers doing the same jobs, depending on their length of service.

Here’s where the candidates stand on some of the issues, edited for length and clarity:

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE, OR WOULD YOU DO, TO CHANGE THE UNION AFTER THE SCANDAL?

FAIN: Let’s look at the reform of this union. The Curry slate didn’t want every member to have a right to vote in this election. They want to keep the same tired system where the International Executive Board controls the convention, and they control the election. We’ve been a one-party state for longer than I’ve been alive. A true reformist would want the membership to have a right to vote in the election. These guys still ascribe to the company-union philosophy (where company and union are business partners). The company continually violates our agreements. There’s no action taken to stop it. They are not reformers.

CURRY: I came off the assembly floor. I’ve had an opportunity to serve on a staff in a 12-state region in the South. I bring a wealth of knowledge and experience, having served as secretary-treasurer, leading reforms that started in 2019. I was the one who put in place the request for proposals with vendors for top-to-bottom reviews. We were responsive to the membership. We’ve offered training. We want to have the members fully engaged. All those pieces are transparent and will move us forward. We’re not just changing policies and rules. We’re also listening to their voice and going to give them a forum to have discussion with the leadership.

WHAT DO YOU WANT IN CONTRACT TALKS WITH DETROIT AUTOMAKERS?

CURRY: Members would like to maintain current provisions, but they want improvements. Those include wage increases. We’ve got to have buying power that’s greater than 2019 in 2023. We’re also looking at reinstatement of cost-of-living allowance. We got that in the truck, defense and aerospace sectors. Our members are really demanding it. In a number of other sectors, we have seen pension increases back for active and retired. We’d also like to talk about those who are post-2007 (hiring date) in the auto sector who do not have a pension. They’ve got traditional 401(k) and savings plans. When we talk about tiers, there’s levels of health insurance, levels of retirement, post-retirement benefits that we believe need to be level for all employees.

FAIN: Go back to bankruptcy. The government basically mandated “these were the cuts.” Those weren’t to be forever. They were for companies to get back on their feet. The companies got back, and they’ve done amazing ever since. But our workers have been still going like this (motioning horizontally). When those two things don’t go hand-in-hand, there’s a problem, and the workers are fed up. Ending tiers is an issue everywhere in our union. People that have pensions. That don’t have post-retirement health care. It’s taking care of retirees who have been neglected for the last 15 years. Our active workers. With the cost of living rising, we have to do better. Look at what ending pensions has done. We used to set the standard.

WILL THERE BE MORE STRIKES IF YOU’RE ELECTED?

FAIN: That’s up to the companies. Our job is to fight for our members. It’s not to fight for the International Executive Board. It’s to prepare our members for whatever action we have to take to protect job security. Job security comes first. Would we strike? Yes, we would. But that’s going to be up to the companies if they don’t treat our workers fairly.

CURRY: I see that happening when the members’ demands aren’t being met. We’re going to be rational in our conversation. We will utilize all the meeting time up to whatever contractual deadline that we have. But when the members believe that the process isn’t moving forward in their best interest, I will be supportive of authorizing strikes.

STELLANTIS WANTS TO CLOSE THE BELVIDERE, ILLINOIS, PLANT. CAN IT BE SAVED?

CURRY: I wasn’t involved early in the process because of not having the assignment and not being president at the time. But when the announcement came about, we immediately started having conversations with the corporation. We also started raising awareness nationally. I had a chance to talk to (Stellantis CEO) Carlos Tavares. I alerted (President Joe Biden) that we had a product in a U.S. state, and the future-generation product for 2023 was to be built in Mexico. We believe we’re making a good business case why Belvidere survives. We’re going to keep fighting.

FAIN: That’s the problem with our leadership: They’re too reactive instead of being proactive in addressing these things up front. When you know that three years ago, and there’s product coming, the leadership should have taken action to secure that work, and they failed to do so. We have language in our contract that says the companies will not spin off, split off, sell or close or idle any plant. And there’s only a couple exceptions, which are an act of God, a severe economic downturn. That’s not the case. A strike is not the only option.

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