Islamist Morsi Wins Egyptian Presidential Vote - Wall Street Journal

Cheers erupt in Cairo's Tahrir Square, after Islamist Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood is declared Egypt's first democratically elected president. (Video:Reuters/Photo:Getty Images).

CAIRO—Egypt erupted into celebrations after an election commission named Mohammed Morsi the first democratically elected president in Egyptian history and the first elected Islamist head of state in the Arab world, marking a pivotal moment in a chaotic regional shift toward democracy.

See events in Egypt's regime change.

The election of an Islamist introduces a moment of anxiety for secular-minded Egyptians, Western governments and Egypt's powerful neighbors.

It also marks the symbolic beginning of the end for an old order of Arab leaders.

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images Egyptians celebrating in Cairo's Tahrir Square on Sunday after Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Morsi, on poster, was declared the winner of the presidential vote.

The election of a politician aligned with the once illegal Muslim Brotherhood to lead the Arab world's most-populous nation will send shock waves through a region that for decades has been dominated by Western-backed, secular-minded autocrats.

"It is a revolution against the very nature of the Arab state that is not accountable to its people," said Khaled Fahmy, a history professor at the American University in Cairo. "For the first time, we have the people in the largest Arab country having and dictating their say despite ferocious opposition."

Mr. Morsi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood's political party, won 51.7% in runoff presidential elections held a week earlier, said Justice Farouq Sultan, the chairman of the election commission, narrowly defeating former air-force general and former regime loyalist Ahmed Shafiq, who took 48.3%.

Reuters Supporters of Mohammed Morsi celebrate his victory at the election in Cairo's Tahrir Square on Sunday.

In a nod to the new beginnings, Justice Sultan saluted Mr. Morsi as the new president of Egypt's "second republic."

The election results begin a new diplomatic phase for the Western governments that for decades relied on a compliant President Hosni Mubarak as a bulwark against the powerful Islamists he and other autocrats so often suppressed.

A Morsi presidency threatens to upset a fragile U.S.-backed diplomatic balance.

Along with the U.S., the oil-rich Gulf states helped underwrite Mr. Mubarak's military-backed, secular rule that safeguarded a decades-old peace treaty between Egypt and Israel and ensured a measure of stability in the volatile region.

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images Mohammed Morsi waving to a crowd during a campaign rally in Cairo last month.

Still, the sight of Mr. Morsi preparing to assume the highest office in the Arab world's most populous nation will likely galvanize the violent uprisings in Syria and Bahrain and buoy the continuing democratic transitions in Yemen, Libya and Tunisia.

The mood in Egypt's capital Sunday recalled the day of Mr. Mubarak's own departure more than a year ago. Public squares throughout the country filled with throngs of Egyptians pressing for fundamental political changes that have so far proven elusive.

They erupted in thunderous cheers when the election commission announced Mr. Morsi's victory.

Mr. Morsi will assume a presidency crippled by military-imposed constitutional changes that have stripped the office of most of its powers. The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which has ruled Egypt since Mr. Mubarak stepped down in February 2011, has promised to hand over power to the incoming presidency by the end of the month. Much of the military's writ, however, will remain largely in place. The military assumed legislative authority 10 days ago after a high constitutional court ruled to dissolve an Islamist-dominated parliament that until Sunday had been the most tangible achievement of Egypt's democratic transition.

Shortly after polls closed Sunday a week ago, the military enraged Islamists and many secular-minded Egyptians by issuing a constitutional declaration that cut short the powers of the presidency. In the past two weeks, the military has also awarded itself expanded law-enforcement capabilities that some analysts said amounted to a return to military rule.

Thousands of demonstrators, most of whom are aligned with Mr. Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood, have spent the past week in Tahrir Square protesting what some politicians have called a military coup.

Delays in the announcement of results kept Egyptians on tenterhooks throughout the week. Hotels in downtown Cairo on Sunday boarded up their doors and windows in preparation for a violent reaction as military helicopters circled overhead. Rumors circulated that the generals were holding the presidency hostage until the Brotherhood agreed to accept their constitutional restrictions.

Mohammed Morsi is Egypt's newest president. On Sunday afternoon, Egypt's electoral commission announced that the Muslim Brotherhood's backup candidate beat out Hosni Mubarak's last Prime Minister Ahmed Shafik. (Video:Reuters/Photo:Getty Images)

But confrontation between Mr. Morsi's Brotherhood and the military regime seemed far from Egyptians' minds later Sunday. In a news conference at the Brotherhood's campaign headquarters, cheering Morsi supporters shouted praise at a military regime with which they have spent much of the past several months in open confrontation.

Shortly after the results were announced, Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi phoned Mr. Morsi to congratulate him on his win.

Even amid the celebrations, the confrontation between the military and protesters looked set to continue. In a television interview after the results, Mohamed Al Baltagi, a senior member of the Brotherhood, said the group had "learned their lesson" and wouldn't leave the square until the military transferred power to Mr. Morsi.

The mood at Mr. Shafiq's headquarters across the Nile River, however, abruptly turned against the generals to whom Mr. Shafiq had once sworn loyalty.

Mr. Shafiq's supporters have accused the Brotherhood of defrauding the vote in their favor and holding the election commission hostage by releasing their own vote tallies a week ahead of official results.

Immediately after the commission announced its numbers, dozens of supporters gathered outside Mr. Shafiq's headquarters in an upper-class Cairo suburb began wailing and screaming in anger.

Mr. Shafiq rode a wave of frustration to the runoff vote by promising to impose law and order over a political transition that has delivered little to the Egyptian public other than rising prices, a spike in violent crime and anxiety over their country's future.

Hysterical, weeping Shafiq supporters screamed "fraud" and spoke of the military selling out to the "godless" Brotherhood.

Getty Images A supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, overcome by emotion, is carried onto a stage in Cairo's Tahrir Square on Sunday as Egyptians celebrated the announcement that Mohammed Morsi had been elected their new president, with 51.7% of the votes cast in the runoff.

A group of young men went to the nearby traffic circle and threw stones at a billboard bearing Mr. Morsi's portrait while others alternated between chants of "the people demand the fall of the military regime" and "the people demand the execution of the field marshal," a pointed and unusual slogan for the Shafiq constituency.

The billboard was eventually torn down and set aflame.

The wider Arab world is greeting Mr. Morsi's victory with a mixture of enthusiasm and dismay.

Officials in the oil-rich Arab states of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates view the Muslim Brotherhood as a threat to their rule second only to the Shiite-led Islamic Republic of Iran because of the group's criticism of their traditional authoritarian rule.

These countries quietly applauded the Egyptian military's orders last week that dismissed the Muslim Brotherhood-led parliament and neutered the powers of the presidency.

However, Mr. Morsi is likely to receive a boost of support from natural-gas powerhouse Qatar, which has hosted exiled Muslim Brotherhood leaders for years and given the group a powerful platform on its government-financed al-Jazeera Arab news network.

Since the start of the Egyptian uprising last year, Qatar has already promised $500 million in financial aid to Cairo. Qatari investors have also promised more than $10 billion in investments in Egyptian infrastructure projects.

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office responded with a statement saying, "Israel appreciates the democratic process in Egypt and respects the results of the presidential election. Israel looks forward to continuing cooperation with the Egyptian government on the basis of the peace treaty between the two countries, which is in the joint interest of both peoples and contributes to regional stability."

—Margaret Coker, Joshua Mitnick and Lara El-Gibaly
contributed to this article.

Write to Matt Bradley at matt.bradley@dowjones.com, Charles Levinson at charles.levinson@wsj.com and Tamer El-Ghobashy at tamer.el-ghobashy@wsj.com

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Supreme Court moves to center of presidential race - Albany Times Union

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court, suddenly at the heart of presidential politics, is preparing what could be blockbuster rulings on health care and immigration shortly before the fall election.

The court, sometimes an afterthought in presidential elections, is throwing a new element of uncertainty into the campaign taking shape between President Barack Obama and presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney.

Sharply divided between four conservatives, four liberals and one conservative-leaning swing justice, the court already is viewed as being nearly as partisan as Congress. Within weeks it will rule on the contentious 2010 Democratic-crafted health care overhaul and a Republican-backed Arizona law that's seen as a model for cracking down on illegal immigrants.

Obama sometimes seems to be running against the court, or at least its conservative members. Whether that will sway voters in November is unclear. The public receives far less information and visual imagery of the Supreme Court than it does of the White House and Congress.

An anti-court strategy by Obama "will fire up his base, but I doubt it will make any bigger impact on swing voters," said Republican consultant John Feehery.

Meanwhile, strategists in both parties are hoping they can turn the upcoming decisions to their advantage — for instance, possibly boosting Democratic turnout among Hispanic voters unhappy with GOP immigration policies or emboldening the Republican base if Obama's landmark health care law is ruled unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court already has played a huge and direct role in U.S. presidential politics. Its 5-4 ruling in Bush v. Gore settled the bitter 2000 contest by barring a Florida ballot recount, which Democrats hoped would prevent George W. Bush's election.

And the 2010 Citizens United case, also decided 5-4, greatly eased political spending restrictions on corporations and unions. It gave birth to the "super PACs" that are reshaping campaigns by raising millions of anonymously donated dollars for TV ads attacking Obama, Romney and targeted congressional candidates.

By holding well-publicized hearings on the health care and immigration cases — and now writing keenly awaited decisions — the court is stirring passions on key issues in this year's elections. Less clear, however, is how the politics might play out.

Many court-watchers expect the justices to throw out most or all of the health law, which Republicans derisively call "Obamacare." During public oral arguments, the most conservative justices questioned Congress' authority to require all Americans to obtain health insurance.

Romney may be poorly positioned to exploit such a ruling, however. The similar "individual mandate" that he successfully pushed as Massachusetts governor was a model for Obama's federal plan.

"I don't think the Romney campaign will want to make health care a major issue," said Democratic strategist Doug Hattaway. "Every time Romney criticizes the president's health care reform, he opens himself up to the Etch A Sketch attack."

Hattaway was referring to claims that Romney switches back and forth on important policies, erasing and redrawing pages when convenient.

Republican strategist Terry Holt said a court decision overturning the health care law would be an unmistakable setback for Obama.

"It repudiates the singular achievement of this administration," Holt said.

Feehery agreed, saying such a ruling would make Obama "look like a weak president."

But it might help other Democrats, Feehery said. "It takes away a law that is unpopular," he said, "but puts health care back on the agenda for the Democrats, which has been a winning issue in the past."

In the immigration case, the Obama administration opposes Arizona's requirement that police check the legal status of people they stop for other reasons.

The law, pushed by a Republican governor and Legislature, has angered some voters, including Hispanics, in battleground states such as Florida, New Mexico and Colorado.

A number of court analysts predict the justices will uphold parts of the Arizona law but may overturn others. That could energize Americans who want tougher sanctions, including deportation, against millions of illegal immigrants in the country.

"This could prove problematic for Romney," Feehery said, because it would pit his conservative base against much-needed Hispanic voters in targeted states. "If Romney handles it right, by largely ignoring it, it could take out a major source of irritation for Hispanics and maybe help a portion of them see the good side of Romney," Feehery said.

Earlier this month, Obama, a former constitutional law professor, delivered what some considered a misleading warning to the court regarding the health care law.

"I'm confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress," the president said. "And I'd just remind conservative commentators that for years what we've heard is, the biggest problem on the bench was judicial activism or a lack of judicial restraint — that an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law. Well, this is a good example."

White House spokesmen tried to explain that Obama recognizes the court's power to review laws passed by Congress. His point, said spokesman Jay Carney, is that the Supreme Court traditionally has "deferred to Congress' authority in matters of national economic importance."

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Sen. Rubio: Let vice presidential process play out - Wall Street Journal

WASHINGTON — Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has heard all the talk about joining a ticket with likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

Rubio says that until now, the talk about picking a running mate has been theoretical. But now that Romney's path is clear, Rubio says "it'd be wise for all Republicans to kind of respect that process, myself included."

The Cuban-American and freshman lawmaker says Romney has made good decisions in his business and political career and "he's going to make a great choice" for a running mate.

Rubio tells CNN's "State of the Union" that he's not going to discuss the search any more. He says the last thing Romney needs is to have "us in the peanut gallery ... saying what we would or would not do."

—Copyright 2012 Associated Press

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