🕷️ Crawler Inspector

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1. Shard Calculation

Query:

Response:

Calculated Shard: 84 (from laksa039)

2. Crawled Status Check

Query:

curl -X POST \
  'http://laksa084.int.ahrefs:8124/' \
  -H 'Content-Type: text/plain' \
  -H 'X-ClickHouse-Database: crawler3' \
  -H 'Authorization: Basic YXBpOg==' \
  -d 'SELECT getAhrefsURLFromUnparsed(src_unparsed) AS found_url, ifNull(toUnixTimestamp(download_stamp), 0) AS crawl_time, ifNull(toUnixTimestamp(props_url_first_seen), 0) AS first_indexed_time, download_http_code AS http_code, src_unparsed AS src_unparsed, src_root_hash AS src_root_hash, history_drop_reason AS history_drop_reason, meta_title AS meta_title, meta_descriptions AS meta_descriptions, attrs_boilerpipe_text AS attrs_boilerpipe_text, attrs_markdown AS attrs_markdown, attrs_readable_markdown AS attrs_readable_markdown, meta_canonical AS meta_canonical FROM crawler3.page_info_local FINAL PREWHERE (src_root_hash, src_unparsed) IN ((getAhrefsRootHashFromUnparsed(getAhrefsUnparsedNoserviceFromURL(\'https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html\')), getAhrefsUnparsedNoserviceFromURL(\'https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html\'))) FORMAT JSONEachRow'

Response:

{"found_url":"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html","crawl_time":1773107157,"first_indexed_time":1642032193,"http_code":200,"src_unparsed":"com,nytimes!www,\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html s443","src_root_hash":"4566504020376537684","history_drop_reason":null,"meta_title":"How the 'Let's Go, Brandon' Meme Became a Campaign Ad - The New York Times","meta_descriptions":["How an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses."],"attrs_boilerpipe_text":"Advertisement\nSKIP ADVERTISEMENT\nThe On Politics Newsletter\nHow an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses.\nThe “Let’s go, Brandon” phrase originated on Oct. 2, 2021. People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with  Brandon Brown, the race’s winner.\nCredit...\nBrian Lawdermilk\/Getty Images\nJan. 12, 2022\nIt began last fall as an\nironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race\n. Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads.\nJim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has\na new television advertisement\nthat employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending $1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship.\nAs far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters.\nFor those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote\na good explainer on the phrase’s origins\nback in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans.\nThe phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of\nMr. Biden and the first lady\n, while they fielded a few calls to the\nNORAD Santa Tracker\nin what has become an annual White House tradition.\nAt the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.”\n“I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”\nThe ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad\nIn Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend $50 million of his money.\nEven though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention.\nThus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.”\n“Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?”\nIt’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s\ngauzy biography ad\n, which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship.\nThe new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson.\nTrump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature\na number of prominent election deniers\n.\n“Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.”\nMore chucks\nLamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona.\nIn mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race,\nposted a video of himself twirling nunchucks\n. “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says.\nThe display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for\nnot doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020\n— leaving the race wide open.\nIn November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced\na video of his own\nthat drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights.\nIn that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.”\nClad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background.\n“If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country.\n“What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.”\nHarnessing the backlash\nThe\n50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates.\n“What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.”\nHe noted that when he was working on\nhis biographical ad\n, introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead.\n“Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.”\nThe Trump factor\nSenator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be\na formidable and well-funded opponent\nfor whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election.\nO’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot.\nBut Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right.\n“The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.”\nMike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.”\nBut, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.”\nWhat to read\nDavid McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has\nfiled paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race\n.\nThe congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has\nasked Representative Kevin McCarthy\n, the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports.\nConsumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982,\ngrowing at a 7 percent clip in the last year\n, Ana Swanson reports. An\nAP-NORC poll published this week\nfound that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern.\nIn a\nnews analysis\n, Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.”\nTrump\nabruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep\nwhen the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network\npublished a full transcript\nof the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.”\nPULSE\nImage\nThe approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November.\nCredit...\nDoug Mills\/The New York Times\nNo New Year bump for Biden\nQuinnipiac University\nreleased a poll\ntoday that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s\naverage approval rating\nis higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538.\nAnother finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.”\nImage\nIs there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at\nonpolitics@nytimes.com\n.\nBlake Hounshell\nis the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico.\nLeah Askarinam\nis co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline.\nRelated Content\nThe On Politics Newsletter\nIt's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond.\nSign up for the On Politics newsletter.\nArash Khamooshi for The New York Times\nTamir Kalifa for The New York Times\nTamir Kalifa for The New York Times\nMore in Politics\nBrenda BazáN\/Associated Press\nTierney L. Cross\/The New York Times\nEric Lee for The New York Times\nEditors’ Picks\nDaniel Stea\nIllustration by Tomi Um\nTrending in The Times\nAdam Gray for The New York Times\nJason Mowry\/Getty Images\nOntario Provincial Police\nSuzanne Saroff\nFrederic J. Brown\/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images\nCourtesy of the brands\nUnited Archives, via Getty Images\nPhilip Lindeman\nDave Hunt\/Australian Associated Press, via Reuters\nAdvertisement\nSKIP ADVERTISEMENT","attrs_markdown":"[Skip to content](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#site-content)[Skip to site index](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#site-index)\n\nSearch & Section Navigation\n\nSection Navigation\n\nSearch\n\n[Politics](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/politics)\n\n[Log in](https:\/\/myaccount.nytimes.com\/auth\/login?response_type=cookie&client_id=vi&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2Fsubscription%2Fonboarding-offer%3FcampaignId%3D7JFJX%26EXIT_URI%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.nytimes.com%252F2022%252F01%252F12%252Fus%252Fpolitics%252Flets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html&asset=masthead)\n\nMonday, March 9, 2026\n\n[Today’s Paper](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/todayspaper)\n\nTrump Administration\n\n- live[Updates](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/trump-news)\n- live[War in the Middle East](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/world\/iran-war-israel-trump-oil)\n  \n  March 9, 2026, 9:41 p.m. ET4m ago\n- [Job Losses](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/business\/economy\/what-to-know-about-the-report.html)\n- [Firing of Kristi Noem](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/05\/us\/politics\/kristi-noem-dhs-timeline.html)\n- [Resignation of F.D.A Regulator](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/health\/fda-prasad-resigns.html)\n- [Approval Rating](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/polls\/donald-trump-approval-rating-polls.html)\n\nAdvertisement\n\n[SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-top)\n\nSupported by\n\n[SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-sponsor)\n\nThe On Politics Newsletter\n\n# ‘Let’s Go, Brandon’ Zooms From Vulgar Meme to Campaign Ad\nHow an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses.\n\n- Share full article\n\n![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/12on-politics-newsletter\/merlin_195710445_c1e8a8ed-3c35-4efb-ba82-3a5f78a490a7-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n\nThe “Let’s go, Brandon” phrase originated on Oct. 2, 2021. People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with Brandon Brown, the race’s winner.Credit...Brian Lawdermilk\/Getty Images\n\n[![Blake Hounshell](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/01\/01\/us\/politics\/blake-hounshell\/blake-hounshell-thumbLarge-v2.png)](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/blake-hounshell)[![Leah Askarinam](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2021\/01\/01\/us\/politics\/Leah-Askarinam\/Leah-Askarinam-thumbLarge-v2.png)](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/leah-askarinam)\n\nBy [Blake Hounshell](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/blake-hounshell) and [Leah Askarinam](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/leah-askarinam)\n\nJan. 12, 2022\n\nIt began last fall as an [ironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/12\/19\/business\/brandon-brown-lets-go-brandon.html). Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads.\n\nJim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has [a new television advertisement](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=z3kzAL_vw8s) that employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending \\$1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship.\n\nAs far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters.\n\nFor those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote [a good explainer on the phrase’s origins](https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/lets-go-brandon-what-does-it-mean-republicans-joe-biden-ab13db212067928455a3dba07756a160) back in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans.\n\nThe phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of [Mr. Biden and the first lady](https:\/\/people.com\/politics\/father-who-told-joe-biden-lets-go-brandon-christmas-eve-says-attacked-innocent-jest\/), while they fielded a few calls to the [NORAD Santa Tracker](https:\/\/www.noradsanta.org\/en\/) in what has become an annual White House tradition.\n\nAt the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.”\n\n“I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”\n\n### **The ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad**\nIn Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend \\$50 million of his money.\n\nEven though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention.\n\n## Editors’ Picks\n[![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/03\/travel\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub-thumbLarge.jpg)How to Prepare for Your First River Cruise](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/travel\/how-to-prepare-for-your-first-river-cruise.html)\n\n[![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/05\/multimedia\/05FD-20-MINUTE-SOUPS-topart-pestochickpeasoup-pvhm\/05FD-20-MINUTE-SOUPS-topart-pestochickpeasoup-pvhm-thumbLarge.jpg)Pasta e Fagioli, Kimchi Ramen and More of Our Best 25-Minute Soups](https:\/\/cooking.nytimes.com\/article\/quick-soup-recipes)\n\n[![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/08\/multimedia\/08ST-MISS-J-QA-01-cpbh\/08ST-MISS-J-QA-01-cpbh-thumbLarge.jpg)After a Stroke, Working a Runway Without Walking](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/style\/miss-j-americas-next-top-model.html)\n\nAdvertisement\n\n[SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-pp_edpick)\n\nThus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.”\n\n“Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?”\n\nIt’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s [gauzy biography ad](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=LS3g851LpKc), which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship.\n\nThe new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson.\n\nTrump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature [a number of prominent election deniers](https:\/\/www.axios.com\/trump-election-deniers-arizona-rally-9f34e5bc-17cc-49cf-8b2a-faee5b99cc2d.html).\n\n“Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.”\n\n## [Trump Administration: Live Updates](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/trump-news)\nUpdated\n\nMarch 9, 2026, 3:53 p.m. ET6 hours ago\n\n- [Two teenage mariachi musicians have been released from ICE custody.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/trump-news#mariachi-teens-immigration)\n- [A judge halts a Trump administration move to restrict immigration appeals.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/trump-news#judge-trump-immigration-appeals)\n- [A new lawsuit challenges Rubio’s threats against foreign tech regulators.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/live\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/trump-news#lawsuit-rubio-social-media)\n### **More chucks**\nLamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona.\n\nIn mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race, [posted a video of himself twirling nunchucks](https:\/\/twitter.com\/generalbrnovich\/status\/1449001368258179090). “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says.\n\nThe display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for [not doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020](https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2021\/06\/10\/arizona-attorney-general-mark-brnovich-493245) — leaving the race wide open.\n\nIn November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced [a video of his own](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=s588GF_UfGw) that drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights.\n\nIn that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.”\n\nClad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background.\n\n“If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country.\n\n“What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.”\n\n### **Harnessing the backlash**\nThe50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates.\n\n“What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.”\n\nHe noted that when he was working on [his biographical ad](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4yxTYEJ2lBQ&t=7s), introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead.\n\n“Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.”\n\n### **The Trump factor**\nSenator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be [a formidable and well-funded opponent](https:\/\/www.azcentral.com\/story\/opinion\/op-ed\/elviadiaz\/2022\/01\/07\/sen-mark-kelly-raises-9-million-more-than-republican-rivals\/9134757002\/) for whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election.\n\nO’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot.\n\nBut Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right.\n\n“The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.”\n\nMike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.”\n\nBut, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.”\n\n## What to read\n- David McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has [filed paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/elections\/david-mccormick-pennsylvania-senate.html).\n- The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has [asked Representative Kevin McCarthy](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/kevin-mccarthy-jan-6-committee.html), the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports.\n- Consumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982, [growing at a 7 percent clip in the last year](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/business\/inflation-supply-chain.html), Ana Swanson reports. An [AP-NORC poll published this week](https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/coronavirus-pandemic-joe-biden-business-health-elections-bb16c5c52e2bf719ec8a0c5415aaf66c) found that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern.\n- In a [news analysis](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/biden-voting-rights-speech-election-subversion.html), Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.”\n- Trump [abruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/donald-trump-npr-interview.html) when the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network [published a full transcript](https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2022\/01\/12\/1072176709\/transcript-full-npr-interview-former-president-donald-trump) of the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.”\n\nPULSE\n\nImage\n\n![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/12onpolitics-pm-newsletter-2\/merlin_199922334_8ea1abf9-1824-4365-af02-c444f2405a12-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n\nThe approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November.Credit...Doug Mills\/The New York Times\n\n## No New Year bump for Biden\nQuinnipiac University [released a poll](https:\/\/poll.qu.edu\/poll-release?releaseid=3831) today that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s [average approval rating](https:\/\/projects.fivethirtyeight.com\/biden-approval-rating\/) is higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538.\n\nAnother finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.”\n\nImage\n\n![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2020\/04\/21\/multimedia\/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK\/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n\n*Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at* [*onpolitics@nytimes.com*](mailto:onpolitics@nytimes.com)*.*\n\n[Blake Hounshell](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/blake-hounshell) is the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico.\n\n[Leah Askarinam](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/leah-askarinam) is co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline.\n\nSee more on: [U.S. Politics](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/politics), [Republican Party](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/topic\/organization\/republican-party), [Joe Biden](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/spotlight\/joe-biden), [Donald Trump](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/spotlight\/donald-trump), [Mark Brnovich](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/topic\/mark-brnovich), [Mark E Kelly](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/topic\/mark-e-kelly)\n\n- Share full article\n\n***\n## The Latest on the Trump Administration\n***\n- **War in the Middle East:** American employees of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Saudi Arabia have been [told to leave the country](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/world\/middleeast\/state-department-diplomats-saudi-arabia-departure.html) under mandatory departure orders issued by the State Department, according to current and former U.S. officials. And [Democrats seized on a surge in oil prices](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/world\/middleeast\/democrats-republicans-trump-oil-prices-midterms.html), arguing that it was a consequence of the war that would inflame an affordability crisis, as Republicans sought to downplay the data.\n- **The Pentagon, Anthropic and OpenAI:** The fight over Pentagon contracts shows how the leaders of Silicon Valley’s two most important A.I. start-ups are [feuding over the future of the tech industry](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/07\/technology\/openai-anthropic-pentagon-rivalry.html). The negotiations, threats and amended contracts have left plenty of questions. [Here are some answers](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/07\/technology\/anthropic-openai-pentagon-dario-amodei-sam-altman.html).\n- **Boat Strikes:** The Defense Department said that it had [blown up a boat in the eastern Pacific Ocean](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/us\/politics\/boat-strike-eastern-pacific-six-killed.html), killing six people. The strike raised the death toll in the campaign by the United States against people it accuses of smuggling drugs at sea to at least 156.\n- **National Transportation Safety Board:** J. Todd Inman, a Republican member of the N.T.S.B. who was prominent in the investigation of a fatal midair collision in Washington last year, has been [fired by the White House](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/us\/politics\/todd-inman-fired-national-transportation-safety-board.html), the second member of the five-seat panel to have been removed in the last year.\n- **Kennedy Center:** As President Trump prepares to close Washington’s premier performing arts venue for two years, [loyal patrons wonder where they’ll get their cultural fix](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/arts\/kennedy-center-closing-reactions.html).\n***\n**How We Report on the Trump Administration**\n\nHundreds of readers asked about our coverage of the president. Times editors and reporters [responded to some of the most common questions](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/06\/insider\/how-the-new-york-times-reports-on-trump.html).\n\n## Related Content\n### [The On Politics Newsletter](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/spotlight\/on-politics)\nIt's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond. [Sign up for the On Politics newsletter.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/newsletters\/politics)\n\n- [The Iran War (for Now) Dominates the Midterm Conversation](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/politics\/iran-war-midterm-election-economy.html)\n  \n  ![An explosion after an airstrike in Tehran on Saturday.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/newsletter-1-hfct\/newsletter-1-hfct-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times\n- [Will Talarico’s Long Online Paper Trail Haunt Him?](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/us\/politics\/talarico-social-media-democrats-jobs-report.html)\n  \n  ![James Talarico, the state representative from Texas who is now the Democratic nominee for Senate in the state.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt\/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times\n- [Four Questions About What’s Next in Texas](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/04\/us\/politics\/trump-texas-paxton-talarico-house-runoff.html)\n  \n  Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times\n\n### [More in Politics](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/politics)\n- [A Sex Scandal and ‘Mein Kampf’ Give Democrats Hope in West Texas Race](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/us\/politics\/texas-democrats-brandon-herrera-youtube.html)\n  \n  ![Brandon Herrera had forced a run-off with the incumbent, the Republican Tony Gonzales, before Mr. Gonzales ended his re-election bid.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl\/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Brenda BazáN\/Associated Press\n- [From 1994: Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Dies of Cancer at 64](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/us\/politics\/jacqueline-kennedy-onassis-dead.html)\n  \n  ![Mrs. Onassis in an undated photo in New York City.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh\/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n- [Kristi Noem Survived Many Crises. Then She Crossed a Trump Red Line.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/06\/us\/politics\/trump-noem.html)\n  \n  ![Kristi Noem testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, where her comments led the president to fire her later in the week.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc\/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Tierney L. Cross\/The New York Times\n- [A Republican’s Stand Against the Iran War Stirs Up a Heated Kentucky Primary](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/us\/politics\/massie-republicans-trump-iran-war-midterms.html)\n  \n  ![Representative Thomas Massie finds himself in a lonely spot in his party. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/08\/multimedia\/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj\/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Eric Lee for The New York Times\n\n### Editors’ Picks\n- [\\$1.9 Million Homes in California](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/realestate\/oakland-foster-city-glendale-california-home-sales.html)\n  \n  ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/realestate\/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02\/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02-square640-v2.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Daniel Stea\n- [My Sister’s Crime Shattered Our Family. Do I Have to Help Her?](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/07\/magazine\/sisters-crime-family-ethics.html)\n  \n  ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/14\/magazine\/14mag-ethicist\/14mag-ethicist-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Illustration by Tomi Um\n\n### Trending in The Times\n- [Lawmakers Pressure Hochul to Raise Taxes in New York](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/nyregion\/tax-the-rich-albany.html)\n  \n  ![Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani have become allies, but she has resisted his calls to raise taxes on the rich.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/10\/multimedia\/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq\/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Adam Gray for The New York Times\n- [Ohio State President Resigns Over ‘Inappropriate Relationship’](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/ohio-state-president-resigns.html)\n  \n  ![Ohio State University president Walter Carter Jr. at Ohio Stadium in Columbus last year.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09nat-osu-lqzt\/09nat-osu-lqzt-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Jason Mowry\/Getty Images\n- [First, They Were Just Fishing. Then the Ice Started Moving.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/world\/canada\/fishermen-ice-shelf-rescue-canada.html)\n  \n  ![Nearly two dozen people were rescued after they were stranded on breakaway ice by Georgian Bay, north of Toronto, on Sunday.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09xp-fishing1\/09xp-fishing-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Ontario Provincial Police\n- [How Healthy Is Cabbage?](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/well\/eat\/cabbage-health-benefits-recipes.html)\n  \n  ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/well\/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1\/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Suzanne Saroff\n- [How Did the Naked Dressing Trend Start?](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/fashion\/naked-dressing-red-carpet.html)\n  \n  ![Jennifer Lawrence at the Golden Globes in a Givenchy gown strategically embroidered with flowers.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/05\/multimedia\/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq\/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Frederic J. Brown\/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images\n- [Forget Florida. They Got Older and Moved to New York.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/07\/nyregion\/older-adults-nyc-move.html)\n  \n  ![Bob Krinsky, 65, moved to a two-bedroom apartment with sweeping, 47th-floor views of the Manhattan skyline to be closer to his two grown sons after his 30-year marriage ended. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/07\/multimedia\/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw\/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n- [Trade Your Smartphone for an ’80s-Style Digital Watch](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/t-magazine\/digital-watches-favorites.html)\n  \n  ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/t-magazine\/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ\/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Courtesy of the brands\n- [Country Joe McDonald, Whose Antiwar Song Became an Anthem, Dies at 84](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/08\/arts\/music\/country-joe-mcdonald-dead.html)\n  \n  ![Country Joe McDonald in 1981. The tone of the politics and social commentary in his songs could range from whimsical to snarky. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/08Mcdonald1\/08Mcdonald1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  United Archives, via Getty Images\n- [How to Prepare for Your First River Cruise](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/travel\/how-to-prepare-for-your-first-river-cruise.html)\n  \n  ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/03\/travel\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Philip Lindeman\n- [After Turning Away Refugees, Trump Presses to Protect Iranian Soccer Team](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/03\/09\/us\/politics\/iran-womens-soccer-team-asylum-trump.html)\n  \n  ![Members of the Iranian women’s soccer team after a match on Australia’s Gold Coast on Sunday. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv\/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Dave Hunt\/Australian Associated Press, via Reuters\n\nAdvertisement\n\n[SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-bottom)\n\n## Site Index\n[Go to Home Page »](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/)\n\nNews\n\n- [Home Page](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/)\n- [U.S.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/us)\n- [World](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/world)\n- [Politics](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/politics)\n- [New York](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/nyregion)\n- [Education](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/education)\n- [Sports](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/sports)\n- [Business](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/business)\n- [Tech](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/technology)\n- 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People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with Brandon Brown, the race’s winner.Credit...Brian Lawdermilk\/Getty Images\n\nJan. 12, 2022\n\nIt began last fall as an [ironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/12\/19\/business\/brandon-brown-lets-go-brandon.html). Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads.\n\nJim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has [a new television advertisement](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=z3kzAL_vw8s) that employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending \\$1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship.\n\nAs far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters.\n\nFor those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote [a good explainer on the phrase’s origins](https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/lets-go-brandon-what-does-it-mean-republicans-joe-biden-ab13db212067928455a3dba07756a160) back in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans.\n\nThe phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of [Mr. Biden and the first lady](https:\/\/people.com\/politics\/father-who-told-joe-biden-lets-go-brandon-christmas-eve-says-attacked-innocent-jest\/), while they fielded a few calls to the [NORAD Santa Tracker](https:\/\/www.noradsanta.org\/en\/) in what has become an annual White House tradition.\n\nAt the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.”\n\n“I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”\n\n### **The ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad**\nIn Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend \\$50 million of his money.\n\nEven though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention.\n\nThus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.”\n\n“Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?”\n\nIt’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s [gauzy biography ad](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=LS3g851LpKc), which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship.\n\nThe new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson.\n\nTrump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature [a number of prominent election deniers](https:\/\/www.axios.com\/trump-election-deniers-arizona-rally-9f34e5bc-17cc-49cf-8b2a-faee5b99cc2d.html).\n\n“Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.”\n\n### **More chucks**\nLamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona.\n\nIn mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race, [posted a video of himself twirling nunchucks](https:\/\/twitter.com\/generalbrnovich\/status\/1449001368258179090). “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says.\n\nThe display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for [not doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020](https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2021\/06\/10\/arizona-attorney-general-mark-brnovich-493245) — leaving the race wide open.\n\nIn November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced [a video of his own](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=s588GF_UfGw) that drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights.\n\nIn that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.”\n\nClad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background.\n\n“If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country.\n\n“What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.”\n\n### **Harnessing the backlash**\nThe50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates.\n\n“What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.”\n\nHe noted that when he was working on [his biographical ad](https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4yxTYEJ2lBQ&t=7s), introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead.\n\n“Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.”\n\n### **The Trump factor**\nSenator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be [a formidable and well-funded opponent](https:\/\/www.azcentral.com\/story\/opinion\/op-ed\/elviadiaz\/2022\/01\/07\/sen-mark-kelly-raises-9-million-more-than-republican-rivals\/9134757002\/) for whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election.\n\nO’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot.\n\nBut Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right.\n\n“The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.”\n\nMike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.”\n\nBut, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.”\n\n## What to read\n- David McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has [filed paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/elections\/david-mccormick-pennsylvania-senate.html).\n- The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has [asked Representative Kevin McCarthy](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/kevin-mccarthy-jan-6-committee.html), the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports.\n- Consumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982, [growing at a 7 percent clip in the last year](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/business\/inflation-supply-chain.html), Ana Swanson reports. An [AP-NORC poll published this week](https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/coronavirus-pandemic-joe-biden-business-health-elections-bb16c5c52e2bf719ec8a0c5415aaf66c) found that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern.\n- In a [news analysis](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/biden-voting-rights-speech-election-subversion.html), Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.”\n- Trump [abruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/donald-trump-npr-interview.html) when the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network [published a full transcript](https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2022\/01\/12\/1072176709\/transcript-full-npr-interview-former-president-donald-trump) of the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.”\n\nPULSE\n\nImage\n\n![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/12onpolitics-pm-newsletter-2\/merlin_199922334_8ea1abf9-1824-4365-af02-c444f2405a12-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n\nThe approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November.Credit...Doug Mills\/The New York Times\n\n## No New Year bump for Biden\nQuinnipiac University [released a poll](https:\/\/poll.qu.edu\/poll-release?releaseid=3831) today that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s [average approval rating](https:\/\/projects.fivethirtyeight.com\/biden-approval-rating\/) is higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538.\n\nAnother finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.”\n\nImage\n\n![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2020\/04\/21\/multimedia\/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK\/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n\n*Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at* [*onpolitics@nytimes.com*](mailto:onpolitics@nytimes.com)*.*\n\n[Blake Hounshell](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/blake-hounshell) is the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico.\n\n[Leah Askarinam](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/by\/leah-askarinam) is co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline.\n\n## Related Content\n[The On Politics Newsletter](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/spotlight\/on-politics)\n\nIt's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond. [Sign up for the On Politics newsletter.](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/newsletters\/politics)\n\n- ![An explosion after an airstrike in Tehran on Saturday.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/newsletter-1-hfct\/newsletter-1-hfct-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times\n- ![James Talarico, the state representative from Texas who is now the Democratic nominee for Senate in the state.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt\/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times\n- Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times\n\n[More in Politics](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/section\/politics)\n\n- ![Brandon Herrera had forced a run-off with the incumbent, the Republican Tony Gonzales, before Mr. Gonzales ended his re-election bid.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl\/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Brenda BazáN\/Associated Press\n- ![Mrs. Onassis in an undated photo in New York City.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh\/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n- ![Kristi Noem testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, where her comments led the president to fire her later in the week.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/06\/multimedia\/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc\/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Tierney L. Cross\/The New York Times\n- ![Representative Thomas Massie finds himself in a lonely spot in his party. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/08\/multimedia\/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj\/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Eric Lee for The New York Times\n\nEditors’ Picks\n\n- ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/realestate\/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02\/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02-square640-v2.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Daniel Stea\n- ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/14\/magazine\/14mag-ethicist\/14mag-ethicist-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)\n  \n  Illustration by Tomi Um\n\nTrending in The Times\n\n- ![Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani have become allies, but she has resisted his calls to raise taxes on the rich.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/10\/multimedia\/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq\/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Adam Gray for The New York Times\n- ![Ohio State University president Walter Carter Jr. at Ohio Stadium in Columbus last year.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09nat-osu-lqzt\/09nat-osu-lqzt-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Jason Mowry\/Getty Images\n- ![Nearly two dozen people were rescued after they were stranded on breakaway ice by Georgian Bay, north of Toronto, on Sunday.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09xp-fishing1\/09xp-fishing-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Ontario Provincial Police\n- ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/well\/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1\/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Suzanne Saroff\n- ![Jennifer Lawrence at the Golden Globes in a Givenchy gown strategically embroidered with flowers.](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/05\/multimedia\/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq\/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Frederic J. Brown\/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images\n- ![Bob Krinsky, 65, moved to a two-bedroom apartment with sweeping, 47th-floor views of the Manhattan skyline to be closer to his two grown sons after his 30-year marriage ended. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/07\/multimedia\/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw\/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n- ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/t-magazine\/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ\/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Courtesy of the brands\n- ![Country Joe McDonald in 1981. The tone of the politics and social commentary in his songs could range from whimsical to snarky. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/08Mcdonald1\/08Mcdonald1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  United Archives, via Getty Images\n- ![](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/03\/travel\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub\/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Philip Lindeman\n- ![Members of the Iranian women’s soccer team after a match on Australia’s Gold Coast on Sunday. ](https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2026\/03\/09\/multimedia\/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv\/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350)\n  \n  Dave Hunt\/Australian Associated Press, via Reuters\n\nAdvertisement\n\n[SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2022\/01\/12\/us\/politics\/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-bottom)","meta_canonical":null}

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Boilerpipe Text	Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT The On Politics Newsletter How an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses. The “Let’s go, Brandon” phrase originated on Oct. 2, 2021. People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with Brandon Brown, the race’s winner. Credit... Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images Jan. 12, 2022 It began last fall as an ironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race . Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads. Jim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has a new television advertisement that employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending $1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship. As far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters. For those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote a good explainer on the phrase’s origins back in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans. The phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of Mr. Biden and the first lady , while they fielded a few calls to the NORAD Santa Tracker in what has become an annual White House tradition. At the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.” “I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’” The ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad In Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend $50 million of his money. Even though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention. Thus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.” “Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?” It’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s gauzy biography ad , which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship. The new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson. Trump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature a number of prominent election deniers . “Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.” More chucks Lamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona. In mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race, posted a video of himself twirling nunchucks . “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says. The display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for not doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020 — leaving the race wide open. In November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced a video of his own that drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights. In that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.” Clad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background. “If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country. “What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.” Harnessing the backlash The 50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates. “What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.” He noted that when he was working on his biographical ad , introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead. “Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.” The Trump factor Senator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be a formidable and well-funded opponent for whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election. O’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot. But Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right. “The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.” Mike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.” But, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.” What to read David McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has filed paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race . The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has asked Representative Kevin McCarthy , the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports. Consumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982, growing at a 7 percent clip in the last year , Ana Swanson reports. An AP-NORC poll published this week found that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern. In a news analysis , Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.” Trump abruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep when the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network published a full transcript of the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.” PULSE Image The approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November. Credit... Doug Mills/The New York Times No New Year bump for Biden Quinnipiac University released a poll today that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s average approval rating is higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538. Another finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.” Image Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com . Blake Hounshell is the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico. Leah Askarinam is co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline. Related Content The On Politics Newsletter It's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond. Sign up for the On Politics newsletter. Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times More in Politics Brenda BazáN/Associated Press Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times Eric Lee for The New York Times Editors’ Picks Daniel Stea Illustration by Tomi Um Trending in The Times Adam Gray for The New York Times Jason Mowry/Getty Images Ontario Provincial Police Suzanne Saroff Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Courtesy of the brands United Archives, via Getty Images Philip Lindeman Dave Hunt/Australian Associated Press, via Reuters Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
Markdown	[Skip to content](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#site-content)[Skip to site index](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#site-index) Search & Section Navigation Section Navigation Search [Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/section/politics) [Log in](https://myaccount.nytimes.com/auth/login?response_type=cookie&client_id=vi&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2Fsubscription%2Fonboarding-offer%3FcampaignId%3D7JFJX%26EXIT_URI%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.nytimes.com%252F2022%252F01%252F12%252Fus%252Fpolitics%252Flets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html&asset=masthead) Monday, March 9, 2026 [Today’s Paper](https://www.nytimes.com/section/todayspaper) Trump Administration - live[Updates](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/us/trump-news) - live[War in the Middle East](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/world/iran-war-israel-trump-oil) March 9, 2026, 9:41 p.m. ET4m ago - [Job Losses](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/business/economy/what-to-know-about-the-report.html) - [Firing of Kristi Noem](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/05/us/politics/kristi-noem-dhs-timeline.html) - [Resignation of F.D.A Regulator](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/health/fda-prasad-resigns.html) - [Approval Rating](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/polls/donald-trump-approval-rating-polls.html) Advertisement [SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-top) Supported by [SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-sponsor) The On Politics Newsletter # ‘Let’s Go, Brandon’ Zooms From Vulgar Meme to Campaign Ad How an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses. - Share full article ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/01/12/us/politics/12on-politics-newsletter/merlin_195710445_c1e8a8ed-3c35-4efb-ba82-3a5f78a490a7-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) The “Let’s go, Brandon” phrase originated on Oct. 2, 2021. People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with Brandon Brown, the race’s winner.Credit...Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images [![Blake Hounshell](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/01/01/us/politics/blake-hounshell/blake-hounshell-thumbLarge-v2.png)](https://www.nytimes.com/by/blake-hounshell)[![Leah Askarinam](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2021/01/01/us/politics/Leah-Askarinam/Leah-Askarinam-thumbLarge-v2.png)](https://www.nytimes.com/by/leah-askarinam) By [Blake Hounshell](https://www.nytimes.com/by/blake-hounshell) and [Leah Askarinam](https://www.nytimes.com/by/leah-askarinam) Jan. 12, 2022 It began last fall as an [ironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/19/business/brandon-brown-lets-go-brandon.html). Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads. Jim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has [a new television advertisement](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3kzAL_vw8s) that employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending \$1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship. As far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters. For those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote [a good explainer on the phrase’s origins](https://apnews.com/article/lets-go-brandon-what-does-it-mean-republicans-joe-biden-ab13db212067928455a3dba07756a160) back in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans. The phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of [Mr. Biden and the first lady](https://people.com/politics/father-who-told-joe-biden-lets-go-brandon-christmas-eve-says-attacked-innocent-jest/), while they fielded a few calls to the [NORAD Santa Tracker](https://www.noradsanta.org/en/) in what has become an annual White House tradition. At the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.” “I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’” ### The ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad In Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend \$50 million of his money. Even though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention. ## Editors’ Picks [![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/03/travel/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub-thumbLarge.jpg)How to Prepare for Your First River Cruise](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/09/travel/how-to-prepare-for-your-first-river-cruise.html) [![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/05/multimedia/05FD-20-MINUTE-SOUPS-topart-pestochickpeasoup-pvhm/05FD-20-MINUTE-SOUPS-topart-pestochickpeasoup-pvhm-thumbLarge.jpg)Pasta e Fagioli, Kimchi Ramen and More of Our Best 25-Minute Soups](https://cooking.nytimes.com/article/quick-soup-recipes) [![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/08/multimedia/08ST-MISS-J-QA-01-cpbh/08ST-MISS-J-QA-01-cpbh-thumbLarge.jpg)After a Stroke, Working a Runway Without Walking](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/style/miss-j-americas-next-top-model.html) Advertisement [SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-pp_edpick) Thus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.” “Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?” It’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s [gauzy biography ad](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS3g851LpKc), which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship. The new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson. Trump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature [a number of prominent election deniers](https://www.axios.com/trump-election-deniers-arizona-rally-9f34e5bc-17cc-49cf-8b2a-faee5b99cc2d.html). “Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.” ## [Trump Administration: Live Updates](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/us/trump-news) Updated March 9, 2026, 3:53 p.m. ET6 hours ago - [Two teenage mariachi musicians have been released from ICE custody.](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/us/trump-news#mariachi-teens-immigration) - [A judge halts a Trump administration move to restrict immigration appeals.](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/us/trump-news#judge-trump-immigration-appeals) - [A new lawsuit challenges Rubio’s threats against foreign tech regulators.](https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03/09/us/trump-news#lawsuit-rubio-social-media) ### More chucks Lamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona. In mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race, [posted a video of himself twirling nunchucks](https://twitter.com/generalbrnovich/status/1449001368258179090). “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says. The display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for [not doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020](https://www.politico.com/news/2021/06/10/arizona-attorney-general-mark-brnovich-493245) — leaving the race wide open. In November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced [a video of his own](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s588GF_UfGw) that drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights. In that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.” Clad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background. “If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country. “What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.” ### Harnessing the backlash The50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates. “What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.” He noted that when he was working on [his biographical ad](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yxTYEJ2lBQ&t=7s), introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead. “Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.” ### The Trump factor Senator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be [a formidable and well-funded opponent](https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/elviadiaz/2022/01/07/sen-mark-kelly-raises-9-million-more-than-republican-rivals/9134757002/) for whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election. O’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot. But Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right. “The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.” Mike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.” But, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.” ## What to read - David McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has [filed paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/elections/david-mccormick-pennsylvania-senate.html). - The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has [asked Representative Kevin McCarthy](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/kevin-mccarthy-jan-6-committee.html), the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports. - Consumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982, [growing at a 7 percent clip in the last year](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/business/inflation-supply-chain.html), Ana Swanson reports. An [AP-NORC poll published this week](https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-joe-biden-business-health-elections-bb16c5c52e2bf719ec8a0c5415aaf66c) found that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern. - In a [news analysis](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/biden-voting-rights-speech-election-subversion.html), Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.” - Trump [abruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/donald-trump-npr-interview.html) when the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network [published a full transcript](https://www.npr.org/2022/01/12/1072176709/transcript-full-npr-interview-former-president-donald-trump) of the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.” PULSE Image ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/01/12/us/politics/12onpolitics-pm-newsletter-2/merlin_199922334_8ea1abf9-1824-4365-af02-c444f2405a12-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) The approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November.Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times ## No New Year bump for Biden Quinnipiac University [released a poll](https://poll.qu.edu/poll-release?releaseid=3831) today that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s [average approval rating](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/) is higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538. Another finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.” Image ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2020/04/21/multimedia/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at [onpolitics@nytimes.com](mailto:onpolitics@nytimes.com). [Blake Hounshell](https://www.nytimes.com/by/blake-hounshell) is the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico. [Leah Askarinam](https://www.nytimes.com/by/leah-askarinam) is co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline. See more on: [U.S. Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/section/politics), [Republican Party](https://www.nytimes.com/topic/organization/republican-party), [Joe Biden](https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/joe-biden), [Donald Trump](https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/donald-trump), [Mark Brnovich](https://www.nytimes.com/topic/mark-brnovich), [Mark E Kelly](https://www.nytimes.com/topic/mark-e-kelly) - Share full article * ## The Latest on the Trump Administration * - War in the Middle East: American employees of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Saudi Arabia have been [told to leave the country](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/world/middleeast/state-department-diplomats-saudi-arabia-departure.html) under mandatory departure orders issued by the State Department, according to current and former U.S. officials. And [Democrats seized on a surge in oil prices](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/world/middleeast/democrats-republicans-trump-oil-prices-midterms.html), arguing that it was a consequence of the war that would inflame an affordability crisis, as Republicans sought to downplay the data. - The Pentagon, Anthropic and OpenAI: The fight over Pentagon contracts shows how the leaders of Silicon Valley’s two most important A.I. start-ups are [feuding over the future of the tech industry](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/07/technology/openai-anthropic-pentagon-rivalry.html). The negotiations, threats and amended contracts have left plenty of questions. [Here are some answers](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/07/technology/anthropic-openai-pentagon-dario-amodei-sam-altman.html). - Boat Strikes: The Defense Department said that it had [blown up a boat in the eastern Pacific Ocean](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/us/politics/boat-strike-eastern-pacific-six-killed.html), killing six people. The strike raised the death toll in the campaign by the United States against people it accuses of smuggling drugs at sea to at least 156. - National Transportation Safety Board: J. Todd Inman, a Republican member of the N.T.S.B. who was prominent in the investigation of a fatal midair collision in Washington last year, has been [fired by the White House](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/us/politics/todd-inman-fired-national-transportation-safety-board.html), the second member of the five-seat panel to have been removed in the last year. - Kennedy Center: As President Trump prepares to close Washington’s premier performing arts venue for two years, [loyal patrons wonder where they’ll get their cultural fix](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/09/arts/kennedy-center-closing-reactions.html). * How We Report on the Trump Administration** Hundreds of readers asked about our coverage of the president. Times editors and reporters [responded to some of the most common questions](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/06/insider/how-the-new-york-times-reports-on-trump.html). ## Related Content ### [The On Politics Newsletter](https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/on-politics) It's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond. [Sign up for the On Politics newsletter.](https://www.nytimes.com/newsletters/politics) - [The Iran War (for Now) Dominates the Midterm Conversation](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/09/us/politics/iran-war-midterm-election-economy.html) ![An explosion after an airstrike in Tehran on Saturday.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/newsletter-1-hfct/newsletter-1-hfct-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times - [Will Talarico’s Long Online Paper Trail Haunt Him?](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/us/politics/talarico-social-media-democrats-jobs-report.html) ![James Talarico, the state representative from Texas who is now the Democratic nominee for Senate in the state.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times - [Four Questions About What’s Next in Texas](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/04/us/politics/trump-texas-paxton-talarico-house-runoff.html) Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times ### [More in Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/section/politics) - [A Sex Scandal and ‘Mein Kampf’ Give Democrats Hope in West Texas Race](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/us/politics/texas-democrats-brandon-herrera-youtube.html) ![Brandon Herrera had forced a run-off with the incumbent, the Republican Tony Gonzales, before Mr. Gonzales ended his re-election bid.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Brenda BazáN/Associated Press - [From 1994: Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Dies of Cancer at 64](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/us/politics/jacqueline-kennedy-onassis-dead.html) ![Mrs. Onassis in an undated photo in New York City.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) - [Kristi Noem Survived Many Crises. Then She Crossed a Trump Red Line.](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/us/politics/trump-noem.html) ![Kristi Noem testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, where her comments led the president to fire her later in the week.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Tierney L. 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Readable Markdown	Advertisement [SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-top) The On Politics Newsletter How an inside joke among Republicans became one candidate’s tactic for reaching the G.O.P. masses. ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/01/12/us/politics/12on-politics-newsletter/merlin_195710445_c1e8a8ed-3c35-4efb-ba82-3a5f78a490a7-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) The “Let’s go, Brandon” phrase originated on Oct. 2, 2021. People in the stands at the Talladega Superspeedway chanted the name of President Biden, preceded by an expletive during a broadcast interview with Brandon Brown, the race’s winner.Credit...Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images Jan. 12, 2022 It began last fall as an [ironic, profane joke after a NASCAR race](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/19/business/brandon-brown-lets-go-brandon.html). Now, it’s showing up in campaign ads. Jim Lamon, a Republican candidate for Senate in Arizona, has [a new television advertisement](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3kzAL_vw8s) that employs the slogan “Let’s go, Brandon.” His campaign says it is spending \$1 million to air the ad, including during local broadcasts of Monday night’s college football championship. As far as we can tell, it’s the first instance of this three-word catchphrase being used in a campaign spot, and that makes it worth unpacking. It says something important about what Republican politicians think animates their primary voters. For those unfamiliar, “Let’s go, Brandon” is code for an insult to President Biden, in place of a four-letter expletive. Colleen Long of the A.P. wrote [a good explainer on the phrase’s origins](https://apnews.com/article/lets-go-brandon-what-does-it-mean-republicans-joe-biden-ab13db212067928455a3dba07756a160) back in October, when it was becoming a widespread in-joke among Republicans. The phrase was even used for a bit of Christmas Eve trolling of [Mr. Biden and the first lady](https://people.com/politics/father-who-told-joe-biden-lets-go-brandon-christmas-eve-says-attacked-innocent-jest/), while they fielded a few calls to the [NORAD Santa Tracker](https://www.noradsanta.org/en/) in what has become an annual White House tradition. At the end of an otherwise cordial call with a father of four from Oregon, President Biden said, “I hope you have a wonderful Christmas.” “I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas as well,” replied the caller, later identified as Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter. He added: “Merry Christmas and ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’” ### The ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ ad In Arizona, Lamon, a businessman who is running in a crowded primary field, has pledged to spend \$50 million of his money. Even though money can purchase many things in politics — chartered jets, campaign staff, polling and data wizardry, yard signs — there’s one precious commodity it can’t buy: attention. Thus the new ad. “If you are pissed off about the direction of our country, let’s go,” Lamon begins, as action-movie-style music plays in the background. “If you’re ready to secure the border and stop the invasion, let’s go. If you want to keep corrupt politicians from rigging elections, let’s go.” “Let’s take the fight to Joe Biden, and show him we the people put America first,” Lamon continues, deadly serious in tone. “The time is now. Let’s go, Brandon. Are you with me?” It’s a marked contrast from Lamon’s [gauzy biography ad](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS3g851LpKc), which introduces him as a genial military veteran who was able to go to college thanks to an R.O.T.C. scholarship. The new ad comes days ahead of a much-anticipated rally by Donald Trump in Florence, Ariz., a town of 25,000 people between Phoenix and Tucson. Trump has yet to back a candidate, but his imprimatur could be decisive. He has all but made embracing his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen an explicit condition for his endorsement, and Saturday’s rally will feature [a number of prominent election deniers](https://www.axios.com/trump-election-deniers-arizona-rally-9f34e5bc-17cc-49cf-8b2a-faee5b99cc2d.html). “Everybody is running to the right and trying to express their fealty to Donald Trump,” Mike O’Neil, an Arizona political analyst, said of the new Lamon ad. “This is his attempt to break through.” ### More chucks Lamon’s ad isn’t even the most striking video of the Senate primary in Arizona. In mid-October, the state attorney general, Mark Brnovich, the closest thing to an establishment candidate in the Senate race, [posted a video of himself twirling nunchucks](https://twitter.com/generalbrnovich/status/1449001368258179090). “People, you want more chucks, you got more chucks,” Brnovich says. The display was widely ridiculed as a desperate plea for attention. Brnovich has struggled to capture the imagination of primary voters — many of whom fault him for [not doing enough to prevent Biden’s win in Arizona in 2020](https://www.politico.com/news/2021/06/10/arizona-attorney-general-mark-brnovich-493245) — leaving the race wide open. In November, Blake Masters, a 35-year-old, Stanford-educated lawyer and venture capitalist backed by Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire close to Trump, introduced [a video of his own](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s588GF_UfGw) that drew national attention for its unusually stark advocacy of Second Amendment rights. In that ad, Masters squints into the camera while cradling a futuristic-looking gun called the “Honey Badger.” “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he intones. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.” Clad in a long-sleeve black T-shirt emblazoned with the word “DROPOUT,” Masters goes on to explain his reasoning, as ominous-sounding music plays in the background. “If you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one,” he says. “The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It’s about protecting your family and your country. “What’s the first thing the Taliban did when Joe Biden handed them Afghanistan?” Masters continues, before lowering his voice to barely more than a whisper. “They took away people’s guns. That’s how it works.” ### Harnessing the backlash The50-second Masters spot did not run on TV, but was viewed at least 1.5 million times on Twitter, generating media coverage and buzz on the right for its unapologetic defense of a weapon that is seen as especially dangerous by gun control advocates. “What was more interesting, in a way, was how much it freaks the left out,” Masters said in an interview, reflecting on the reaction to the ad among liberals. He said he welcomed the opprobrium: “Bring it on.” He noted that when he was working on [his biographical ad](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yxTYEJ2lBQ&t=7s), introducing himself as an Arizona native, he decided not to lean too heavily on his record as an entrepreneur, and to talk about his values instead. “Dude, nobody cares,” he said. “Nobody cares about your solar company.” ### The Trump factor Senator Mark Kelly, the Democratic incumbent, will be [a formidable and well-funded opponent](https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/elviadiaz/2022/01/07/sen-mark-kelly-raises-9-million-more-than-republican-rivals/9134757002/) for whoever wins the G.O.P. primary, which is not until August. And Trump’s support could become a liability in a general election. O’Neil noted that many conservative women in the suburbs voted for Biden in 2020 but opted for Republican candidates elsewhere on the ballot. But Masters argued that there’s no downside to running to the right. “The way you win a swing state in Arizona is not by focus-grouping,” he said. “It’s by truly being conservative, and being bold by articulating conservative ideas.” Mike Murphy, a prominent Trump critic and longtime adviser to John McCain, the deceased Arizona senator, said the Lamon ad was a “sign of the sad times in U.S. politics.” But, he quipped, “in the G.O.P. primary electorate this year, who the Brandon knows.” ## What to read - David McCormick, the former chief executive of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates and a former Treasury Department official, has [filed paperwork to enter the Pennsylvania Senate race](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/elections/david-mccormick-pennsylvania-senate.html). - The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol has [asked Representative Kevin McCarthy](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/kevin-mccarthy-jan-6-committee.html), the House’s top Republican, for a voluntary interview, Luke Broadwater reports. - Consumer prices rose in December at the fastest rate since 1982, [growing at a 7 percent clip in the last year](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/business/inflation-supply-chain.html), Ana Swanson reports. An [AP-NORC poll published this week](https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-joe-biden-business-health-elections-bb16c5c52e2bf719ec8a0c5415aaf66c) found that 68 percent of Americans ranked the economy as their top concern. - In a [news analysis](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/biden-voting-rights-speech-election-subversion.html), Nate Cohn writes that Democrats “still seem nowhere close to enacting robust safeguards against another attempt to overturn a presidential election.” - Trump [abruptly ended an interview with Steve Inskeep](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/donald-trump-npr-interview.html) when the NPR host pressed him on his false claims of a stolen election in 2022. The radio network [published a full transcript](https://www.npr.org/2022/01/12/1072176709/transcript-full-npr-interview-former-president-donald-trump) of the encounter, which ended with Inskeep saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, I have one more question. … He’s gone. OK.” PULSE Image ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/01/12/us/politics/12onpolitics-pm-newsletter-2/merlin_199922334_8ea1abf9-1824-4365-af02-c444f2405a12-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) The approval rating for President Biden is at 33 percent. That’s down from 36 percent in November.Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times ## No New Year bump for Biden Quinnipiac University [released a poll](https://poll.qu.edu/poll-release?releaseid=3831) today that showed President Biden’s approval rating at just 33 percent, while 53 percent of respondents gave him a negative rating. That’s down from 36 percent in November. It’s just one poll, but it’s a sign that Biden’s image isn’t on the rebound. The president’s [average approval rating](https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/) is higher, but still just 42.2 percent, according to 538. Another finding that stood out from the Quinnipiac poll: 76 percent of respondents said that political instability within the United States posed a greater threat than the country’s adversaries. A majority, 58 percent, agreed that American democracy is “in danger of collapse.” Image ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2020/04/21/multimedia/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK/THE-MORNING-SECTION-BREAK-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at [onpolitics@nytimes.com](mailto:onpolitics@nytimes.com). [Blake Hounshell](https://www.nytimes.com/by/blake-hounshell) is the editor of the On Politics newsletter. He previously was managing editor for Washington and politics at Politico. [Leah Askarinam](https://www.nytimes.com/by/leah-askarinam) is co-author of the On Politics newsletter. She was previously editor in chief of National Journal's Hotline. ## Related Content [The On Politics Newsletter](https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/on-politics) It's a pivotal moment for American politics. Join us for 2026 and beyond. [Sign up for the On Politics newsletter.](https://www.nytimes.com/newsletters/politics) - ![An explosion after an airstrike in Tehran on Saturday.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/newsletter-1-hfct/newsletter-1-hfct-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times - ![James Talarico, the state representative from Texas who is now the Democratic nominee for Senate in the state.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt/06pol-on-politics-newsletter-talarico-cvpt-thumbLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times - Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times [More in Politics](https://www.nytimes.com/section/politics) - ![Brandon Herrera had forced a run-off with the incumbent, the Republican Tony Gonzales, before Mr. Gonzales ended his re-election bid.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl/06nat-AKguy-tx-kgvl-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Brenda BazáN/Associated Press - ![Mrs. Onassis in an undated photo in New York City.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh/06WHM-Kennedy-Obit-lwmh-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) - ![Kristi Noem testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, where her comments led the president to fire her later in the week.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/06/multimedia/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc/06dc-trump-noem-gmpc-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times - ![Representative Thomas Massie finds himself in a lonely spot in his party. ](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/08/multimedia/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj/08Pol-Massie-Iran-Primary-wtqj-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Eric Lee for The New York Times Editors’ Picks - ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/realestate/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02/09re-WYG-CA-Oakland-02-square640-v2.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Daniel Stea - ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/14/magazine/14mag-ethicist/14mag-ethicist-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale) Illustration by Tomi Um Trending in The Times - ![Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani have become allies, but she has resisted his calls to raise taxes on the rich.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/10/multimedia/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq/10met-taxes-albany-ptfq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Adam Gray for The New York Times - ![Ohio State University president Walter Carter Jr. at Ohio Stadium in Columbus last year.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/09nat-osu-lqzt/09nat-osu-lqzt-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Jason Mowry/Getty Images - ![Nearly two dozen people were rescued after they were stranded on breakaway ice by Georgian Bay, north of Toronto, on Sunday.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/09xp-fishing1/09xp-fishing-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Ontario Provincial Police - ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/well/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1/09WELL-HEALTHY-CABBAGE1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Suzanne Saroff - ![Jennifer Lawrence at the Golden Globes in a Givenchy gown strategically embroidered with flowers.](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/05/multimedia/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq/05openthread-askvanessa-wkpq-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images - ![Bob Krinsky, 65, moved to a two-bedroom apartment with sweeping, 47th-floor views of the Manhattan skyline to be closer to his two grown sons after his 30-year marriage ended. ](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/07/multimedia/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw/07met-older-new-yorkers-vhqw-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) - ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/t-magazine/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ/03tmag-watches-slide-K9DJ-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Courtesy of the brands - ![Country Joe McDonald in 1981. The tone of the politics and social commentary in his songs could range from whimsical to snarky. ](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/08Mcdonald1/08Mcdonald1-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) United Archives, via Getty Images - ![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/03/travel/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub/00trav-rivercruise-illo-sub-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Philip Lindeman - ![Members of the Iranian women’s soccer team after a match on Australia’s Gold Coast on Sunday. ](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2026/03/09/multimedia/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv/09dc-trump-asylum-zmcv-square640.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale&width=350) Dave Hunt/Australian Associated Press, via Reuters Advertisement [SKIP ADVERTISEMENT](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/12/us/politics/lets-go-brandon-meme-gop.html#after-bottom)
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