Members phkrause Posted January 7 Author Members Posted January 7 January 7, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Catie Edmondson explains the divisions within Congress. We’re also covering Donald Trump, Justin Trudeau and 52 Places to Go in 2025. —David Leonhardt A joint session of Congress. Eric Lee/The New York Times A House divided By Catie Edmondson I cover Congress. Congress certified President-elect Donald Trump’s victory yesterday. Now that Republicans will hold the coveted “trifecta” — the White House, the Senate and the House — they’ll have their way in Washington, right? Maybe. The success of the Trump administration will hinge on congressional Republicans’ ability to stay united. It won’t be easy. In the House, Speaker Mike Johnson, who was re-elected on Friday, will have the smallest majority in history: 217 to 215. That means every bill Republicans pass will need nearly unanimous support from his famously fractious conference. In today’s newsletter, I’ll break down some of the disagreements that could define the new Congress — and potentially derail Trump’s agenda. Funding the government Mike Johnson Kent Nishimura for The New York Times Spending is the issue that most divided House Republicans in recent years. Many of them say they came to Congress to cut federal spending and rein in the nation’s debt. So, unable to unite his conference around a spending plan, Johnson has instead relied on Democratic votes to pass important measures, from stopgap bills to avert government shutdowns to the aid package lawmakers approved for Ukraine. He argued such an approach was justified because he was dealing with a Democratic Senate and White House. No longer. Because Democrats are unlikely to vote for the Republican majority’s bills, Johnson will need to bring his whole conference along. But any measure that wins over the most anti-spending Republicans could alienate more centrist Republicans — and vice versa. The lines can be fuzzy. Most House Republicans believe that the government should spend less. But they split over which programs should be slashed. Every state delegation has its own prerogatives to protect: New York Republicans, for example, resist cuts to Amtrak, while Iowa Republicans reject G.O.P. efforts to cut biofuel tax credits. Then there are ideological differences between hard-liners in safe seats who want to shutter entire agencies and the pragmatists in swing districts who view those plans as politically toxic. Events will test intraparty comity almost immediately. The nation is set to default on its debt as early as January unless lawmakers raise or suspend the borrowing limit, a move ultraconservatives refused to support in December despite Trump’s urging. After that, Congress will hit another government funding deadline in March. Even if House Republicans find a compromise, they must win approval in the Senate. Republicans there — especially centrists like Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, who will chair the Appropriations Committee — have less appetite for giant spending cuts. One solution could be for House leaders to accept the higher spending levels set by the Senate and try to get Democrats to supply some votes. That would most likely infuriate the hard-right Republicans. The reconciliation bill Senator Rick Scott, flanked by House and Senate Republicans. Kent Nishimura/Getty Images The big marquee fight this year is going to be Republicans’ drive to reshape the nation’s tax, budget and immigration policies through a process called reconciliation. It allows the Senate to pass bills with a simple majority, rather than the filibuster-proof 60 votes often needed for other measures. Congressional Republicans believe that this is their best chance to ram through much of Trump’s agenda. They are eyeing one mammoth bill that would increase the nation’s borrowing limit, extend Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, cut federal spending and impose a wide-ranging immigration crackdown. That is a lot of pressure to put on a single piece of legislation. And the reconciliation process is unwieldy. Some members of the House Freedom Caucus, the ultraconservative clutch of lawmakers, have said they won’t support a reconciliation bill that ends up costing money. That means expensive measures will need to be offset by huge spending cuts. Extending the Trump tax cuts alone would cost roughly $4 trillion over a decade, for instance. But moderate Republicans in both chambers aren’t interested in crippling programs like Medicaid and SNAP, two frequent G.O.P. targets. And Republicans will have to agree on immigration policies that have bitterly divided them since the election. One wing of the party wants to recruit high-skilled workers to keep America competitive. The other thinks those workers take Americans’ jobs. How will Johnson face these problems with a one-vote margin? He deadpanned in a news conference in December that he’d had a lot of practice working with a tiny majority: “That’s our custom.” THE LATEST NEWS Trump Transition Kamala Harris and Mike Johnson. Eric Lee/The New York Times Congress certified Trump’s victory in an uneventful ceremony — a stark difference from four years ago, when Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol to disrupt the vote. Trump lawyers asked the Justice Department and a federal judge to block Jack Smith from releasing his report on the classified documents investigation. A judge denied Trump’s latest attempt to postpone his criminal sentencing, scheduled for Friday in New York. Trump could escalate his effort to a New York appeals court. The judge has indicated that Trump will not get jail time. Absent any real penalties, the jury verdict is its own form of punishment for Trump, Maggie Haberman writes. More on Politics The Biden administration has moved to ban medical debt from credit reports. The future of the rule is uncertain with Trump assuming office later this month. A federal judge held Rudy Giuliani in contempt of court for failing to turn over his personal assets to two Georgia poll workers who won a defamation lawsuit against him. The Pentagon has reached a settlement with tens of thousands of people who were dismissed from the military because of their sexuality. Jimmy Carter’s body will arrive in Washington today for three days of tributes. He will lie in state at the Capitol ahead of a formal state funeral on Thursday. Canada Justin Trudeau Cole Burston for The New York Times Justin Trudeau resigned as the leader of Canada’s Liberal Party, and plans to step down as prime minister once his party finds a new leader. Trudeau’s popularity fell sharply last year as housing prices rose and Canada’s health system faltered. Members of his own party had called on him to step aside. Canada is set to hold a national election before October. Polls show the Conservative Party with a double-digit lead. Trudeau became a global figure of liberalism when he took office in 2015. See a timeline of his career. Middle East The U.S. will allow humanitarian groups to help provide basic services in Syria, including electricity and sanitation, without running afoul of sanctions. Syria’s interim government has moved quickly to change school textbooks, removing references to the Assad regime and images of pre-Islamic gods. A top U.S. envoy said Israel would fully withdraw from southern Lebanon, as called for in cease-fire agreement. More International News A 7.1-magnitude earthquake struck a region near one of Tibet’s holiest cities, killing at least 93 people, according to Chinese state media. Pope Francis appointed a nun to lead the department that oversees Catholic religious orders. She is the first woman to hold a top spot in a Vatican office. Other Big Stories In Washington, D.C. Eric Lee/The New York Times A winter storm left a trail of heavy snow from Kansas to Washington, D.C., disrupting flights and knocking out power. (See photos from the storm.) A person with severe bird flu died in Louisiana, the first human death from the virus in the U.S. The patient was infected through exposure to birds, not from another person, officials said. The U.S. released 11 Guantánamo prisoners to a rehabilitation program in Oman. Just 15 men remain in the camp’s prison. U.S. Steel and Japan’s Nippon Steel sued the U.S. in a last-ditch attempt to revive their merger, which President Biden blocked last week. A group of about 200 editorial workers at The Athletic, The Times’s sports news website, asked The Times to recognize them as part of the newspaper’s union. Opinions Syria and Iran have long had a grip on Lebanese politics. With Assad gone and Hezbollah weakened, Lebanon has a chance to embrace a modern, diverse democracy, Michel Helou writes. Biden’s signature climate bill focused too much on companies. The U.S. needs climate programs that benefit the working class — like cheaper clean energy and more mass transit, Daniel Aldana Cohen and Thea Riofrancos argue. Here is a column by Michelle Goldberg on Elon Musk’s intervention in British politics. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS Maurizio Cattelan and Pierpaolo Ferrari for The New York Times FOOD, MORE, NOW: Some dog owners think their pets can speak to them using “talking buttons.” Scientists are less convinced. Danger: Poisonous snakes bite millions of people each year. In rural areas where anti-venom is hard to find, many of those bites prove fatal. Ask Well: “Can estrogen cream reverse skin aging?” Pollution: Exposure to lead from mining probably lowered I.Q. levels in the Roman Empire. Lives Lived: Friedrich St. Florian’s design for the World War II Memorial on the National Mall in Washington inspired criticism as well as praise. He died at 91. SPORTS N.F.L.: Multiple coaching vacancies have opened since the regular season ended on Sunday. Read about the coaching carousel. College football: North Dakota State won the F.C.S. national championship in a 35-32 thriller against previously undefeated Montana State. ARTS AND IDEAS Where will you travel this year? The Times has published 52 Places to Go, an annual feature that highlights destinations across the U.S. and around the globe. Some made the list because of anniversaries, like southwest England, which is celebrating the 250th birthday of Jane Austen. Others are newly accessible, like the Nangma Valley of Pakistan, which now features an easy camping-based trekking route through its Yosemite-like granite peaks. You can explore the full list here. More on culture What do movie producers actually do? Bad Bunny, the world-conquering Latin superstar, discusses why his new album is filled with traditional sounds and rhythms from his homeland. “It’s like making your ex D.J. your wedding,” Jimmy Kimmel said of Kamala Harris presiding over the certification of Trump’s win. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Gentl and Hyers for The New York Times Boil and blitz kale with fried garlic, Parmesan and olive oil for a silky pasta sauce. Hit peak fitness after 40. Write in a journal, and keep at it, with these tips. Buy an affordable Android phone. Replace these household essentials. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was femininity. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 8 Author Members Posted January 8 January 8, 2025 Good morning. Today, we’re covering breaking news about the wildfires spreading uncontained across parts of Southern California. Then, my colleague Steven Lee Myers explains a change in our social media feeds. —David Leonhardt. A burning home in Pacific Palisades. Philip Cheung for The New York Times An inferno By the staff of The Morning Wildfires are raging out of control across parts of Los Angeles. A fierce windstorm is fanning embers, billowing dangerous smoke across the city and turning the sky an apocalyptic red. At least four blazes are spreading in Southern California, near the scenic coast, in Malibu and the Pacific Palisades, as well as further inland. Firefighters are struggling to work in the wind, and the fires are uncontained. At least 30,000 people have fled. Some abandoned their cars and escaped on foot to avoid roads jammed with traffic. Residents of one nursing home evacuated on gurneys, officials said. Homes, landmarks and places of worship have been destroyed, and officials warned more destruction is coming. Follow the latest news here. See photos and maps of the fires. Jason Henry for The New York Times Truth social By Steven Lee Myers I cover misinformation and disinformation. Policing the truth on social media is a Sisyphean challenge. The volume of content — billions of posts in hundreds of languages — makes it impossible for the platforms to identify all the errors or lies that people post, let alone to remove them. Yesterday, Meta — the owner of Facebook, Instagram and Threads — effectively stopped trying. The company said independent fact-checkers would no longer police content on its sites. The announcement punctuated an industrywide retreat in the fight against falsehoods that poison public discourse online. Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, said the new policy would mean fewer instances when the platforms “accidentally” take down posts wrongly flagged as false. The trade-off, he acknowledged, is that more “bad stuff” will pollute the content we scroll through. That’s not just an annoyance when you open Facebook on your phone. It also corrodes our civic life. Social media apps — where the average American spends more than two hours per day — are making it so that truth, especially in politics, is simply a matter of toxic and inconclusive debate online. Meta’s conundrum It easy to see why Meta made the change. With Donald Trump about to begin his second term, Zuckerberg seems to have decided that alienating half the country is bad business. Only four years ago, Facebook suspended Trump’s account after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, though Zuckerberg had misgivings at the time about deplatforming a sitting president. Since then, Republicans in Congress and in the courts have cast decisions by social media platforms to remove posts as an extension of government censorship. Officials in Washington had urged the companies to remove some posts about election fraud and Covid vaccines. The Supreme Court took up a case about Facebook’s removals last year but dismissed it on technical grounds. Mark Zuckerberg Anna Rose Layden for The New York Times Even so, the debate has clearly worried Zuckerberg. In August he wrote a mea culpa to the Republican congressman spearheading the charge against the platforms. He said Meta should have spoken out against what he called “government pressure” to remove some content. Yesterday, the company went further to court the G.O.P. Meta’s new policy chief, a former Republican operative, told Fox News that there was “too much political bias” in the fact-checking program. Zuckerberg even plans to move the trust and safety teams — those responsible for policing all kinds of content — from California to Texas to “remove the concern that biased employees are overly censoring content.” The company appointed Dana White, a close Trump ally, to its board. The new town square Meta is not entirely abdicating responsibility for what appears on its platforms. It will still take down posts with illegal activity, hate speech and pornography, for example. But like other platforms, it is leaving the political space in order to maintain market share. Elon Musk purchased Twitter (which is now called X) with a promise of unfettered free speech. He also invited back users banned for bad behavior. And he replaced content moderation teams with crowdsourced “community notes” below disputed content. YouTube made a similar change last year. Now Meta is adopting the model, too. Numerous studies have shown the proliferation of hateful, tendentious content on X. Antisemitic, racist and misogynistic posts there rose sharply after Musk’s takeover, as did disinformation about climate change. Users spent more time liking and reposting items from authoritarian governments and terrorist groups, including the Islamic State and Hamas. Musk himself regularly peddles conspiratorial ideas about political issues like migration and gender to his 211 million followers. Letting users weigh in on the validity of a post — say, one claiming that vaccines cause autism or that nobody was hurt in the Jan. 6 attack — has promise, researchers say. Today, when enough people speak up on X, a note appears below the contested material. But that process takes time and is susceptible to manipulation. By then, the lie may have gone viral, and the damage is done. Perhaps people still crave something more reliable. That is the promise of upstarts like Bluesky. What happened at X could be a warning. Users and, more important, advertisers have fled. It’s also possible that people value entertainment and views they agree with over strict adherence to the truth. If so, the internet may be a place where it is even harder to separate fact from fiction. For more: Zuckerberg, fed up with criticism, has stepped away from his apologetic approach to problems on his platforms. Read about Zuckerberg’s political transformation. THE LATEST NEWS Trump’s Press Conference Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago. Doug Mills/The New York Times Trump said the U.S. should control Greenland and the Panama Canal. He wants to buy Greenland, and did not rule out using military force in Panama. Trump refused to say whether he would pardon Jan. 6 rioters, and instead used the question to spread a false conspiracy theory that the F.B.I. was responsible for the riot. He said that Hamas must free the hostages it is holding in Gaza. “If they’re not back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East,” he said. Trump also pledged that no new wind turbines would be built during his presidency. The press conference at Mar-a-Lago ran for more than an hour and signaled the return of the chaotic stream-of-consciousness presidency, David Sanger writes. More on Politics At the Capitol Rotunda. Kent Nishimura for The New York Times Jimmy Carter is lying in state today in the Capitol. The pomp of his memorials is an odd match for a man who never fit in with Washington’s elites, Peter Baker writes. In the first elections since Trump’s win, Democrats held two legislative seats in Virginia, keeping control of the state legislature, and the Republicans retained a State Senate seat. Forty-eight House Democrats joined Republicans to pass a bill that would deport more migrants charged with nonviolent crimes. Two prisoners whose sentences President Biden reduced last month asked a judge to block their commutations, arguing his decision could jeopardize their appeals. The federal judge who handled Trump’s classified documents case barred the special counsel, Jack Smith, from releasing the final report on his investigation, which could contain new evidence of misdeeds. A Republican candidate for North Carolina’s Supreme Court challenged the narrow win of an incumbent Democrat, leaving that same court to decide whether to overturn the vote. International Sudanese refugees in Chad. Ivor Prickett for The New York Times The U.S. accused a Sudanese paramilitary group and its proxies of committing genocide. Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founding father of France’s modern far right, died at 96. He built a half-century career on rants of barely disguised racism and antisemitism. After an earthquake in Tibet, rescuers worked in subzero conditions to find survivors. At least 126 people have died. Other Big Stories Schools are preparing teachers and parents for what to do if immigration agents show up to carry out deportations. The Washington Post, after large financial losses in recent years, is laying off about 4 percent of its work force. The man charged with burning a woman to death on the New York subway told investigators that he did not remember the incident because he was drunk at the time. Opinions Three Times Opinion columnists discuss the biggest risks and challenges facing America. Enough with the land acknowledgments: Performative sensitivity for Native peoples does little good, Kathleen DuVal writes. Here are columns by Bret Stephens on Biden’s legacy of deception and Thomas Edsall on civil society’s Trump-related failures. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS On Lake Gatún in Panama. Charlie Cordero for The New York Times Intruders: The Panama Canal got wider to accommodate larger ships. Then the saltwater fish invaded. Letter of Recommendation: Sign language can help us all communicate better. Have 5 minutes to spare? Listen here to fall in love with jazz guitar. Lives Lived: Pippa Garner was an art provocateur whose modified consumer goods — like a midriff-baring men’s “Half Suit” and a ’59 Chevy with its chassis reversed — offered witty commentary on gender, bodies and the boundaries of fine art. She died at 82. SPORTS N.B.A.: The league’s two best teams, Cleveland and Oklahoma City, play each other tonight in a possible finals preview. At 31-4, Cleveland are winning at a record pace. N.F.L.: Las Vegas fired its coach Antonio Pierce after just one full season. Possible candidates for his replacement include the former Raiders coach Jon Gruden. College basketball: No. 1 Tennessee, previously the last unbeaten men’s team, suffered a 73-43 rout against No. 6 Florida. ARTS AND IDEAS This slice is in Minneapolis. Drew Anthony Smith for The New York Times You can get New York-style pizza in Rexburg, Idaho, that’s so good you’d swear you were in Greenwich Village. It’s a sign that the New York slice has become an object of food-nerd fascination far beyond the city. More on culture Peter Yarrow, of the 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, died at 86. The singer Thandiswa Mazwai is the voice of South Africa’s first post-apartheid generation. “My calling is to sing the people’s joy, to sing the people’s sadness,” she told The Times. “It’s going to be a long four years,” Stephen Colbert said after Trump promised to rename the Gulf of Mexico “the Gulf of America.” THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Kerri Brewer for The New York Times Simmer a lemony Greek chicken, spinach and potato stew. Keep pets safe in the cold. Improve your meal prep. Make a cashmere sweater last longer. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was wedlock. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Correction: Yesterday’s newsletter described incorrectly snakes whose bites pose a risk to humans. They are venomous, not poisonous. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 10 Author Members Posted January 10 January 9, 2025 By the staff of The Morning Good morning. We’re covering the wildfires across Los Angeles, as well as the Supreme Court, the French far right and Cameo politicians. In Pacific Palisades. Loren Elliott for The New York Times Uncontained Los Angeles is surrounded by fire. The city’s major wildfires have spread, and a new one started overnight in Hollywood Hills. It threatened a wealthy neighborhood and landmarks synonymous with America’s self-image — the Hollywood sign, the Walk of Fame. Streets near Hollywood filled with traffic as helicopters raced through the sky. (Track the fires with these maps.) The wildfires have killed at least five people; forced tens of thousands to evacuate; and charred entire neighborhoods of every socioeconomic status, from the scenic West Coast to the inland suburbs. “It wasn’t just that the place was in flames. It was that it seemed to be in flames everywhere at once,” The Times’s Shawn Hubler wrote of the city. Below, we explain how these fires became a major crisis so quickly. What makes these fires different While Southern Californians are used to wildfire, these blazes are a shock in three key ways: Location: Wildfires are normally contained to Southern California’s dry hills. These fires have burned out of control and spread into the city, and two are the most destructive in Los Angeles’s history. The flames are visible for miles down the city’s famous coastline, a half-moon crescent of sand that is usually domed by blue sky. “I’ve lived here my whole life and never seen anything like this,” a 71-year-old resident said. Extreme winds: Intense winds, known as Santa Anas, have spread these fires into the city. The winds also made it unsafe for aircraft to douse the flames from above, which slowed firefighting. Santa Anas are notorious for aiding California wildfires in the fall, after the landscape dries in the summer. But the impact is often less dramatic by winter, when the hills are more moist from rain. That hasn’t been true this year. Dry conditions: It hasn’t rained much in Los Angeles for months. As a result, the fires spread more quickly across a dry landscape. Water supplies were also limited. Firefighters sprayed water faster than tanks could be refilled, and hydrants ran dry. Some residents stood and watched as their homes burned away. On Sunset Boulevard, one man fell to his knees and begged firefighters to save his house. Without water, they were helpless to stop the flames. The response In Altadena, Calif. Kyle Grillot for The New York Times Firefighters are continuing their battle, but more destruction is expected. President Biden canceled a trip to Italy, in which he was supposed to meet the Pope, to coordinate the federal response to the wildfires. The White House said it had arranged for Navy helicopters to join the firefighting effort. Biden also appeared alongside Gavin Newsom, California’s governor, at a fire station in Santa Monica. “We’re prepared to do anything and everything, as long as it takes, to contain these fires and help reconstruct, make sure we get back to normal,” Biden said. Forecasters warned that extreme fire danger would continue for at least another day, and millions of people in Southern California remain under fire warnings — which have heightened anxiety across the region. The fires have “merged into a kind of mega-catastrophe for Southern Californians,” Shawn wrote. “Ash, smoke, wind and flames carried the heart-stinging realization, which spread like a contagion, that a new and less manageable landscape was on the horizon.” Follow the latest news here. More on the fires If you live in Southern California, here are steps you can take to stay safe. And here’s where to find shelters. Officials have warned residents of Pasadena and Pacific Palisades about unsafe drinking water. Pet rescues and shelters are straining to care for hundreds of animals left behind as people fled. The fires destroyed several Los Angeles landmarks, including several popular restaurants. Paris Hilton and Adam Brody are among the celebrities who have lost their homes, the BBC reports. An N.H.L. game between the Los Angeles Kings and Calgary Flames was postponed last night. So were the Critics Choice Awards, which had been scheduled for Sunday. Listen to The Daily podcast explain the fires. THE LATEST NEWS Trump Transition Donald Trump Eric Lee/The New York Times The Justice Department will delay releasing the special counsel’s report on Donald Trump’s handling of classified documents. That likely means Trump will bury it when he takes office. Trump asked the Supreme Court to halt sentencing in his New York criminal case, which is scheduled for tomorrow. Not long before Trump’s filing, Justice Samuel Alito spoke with the president-elect. Alito said the call was a job reference for one of his former clerks. Trump has raised a record amount of money for his inauguration, a haul so big that some seven-figure donors will not receive V.I.P. tickets. Fani Willis has asked the Georgia Supreme Court to review a decision that disqualified her from prosecuting Trump’s election interference case. More on Politics Biden told USA Today that he might issue pre-emptive pardons for political figures Trump has attacked. Jimmy Carter’s state funeral will take place today, bringing together all five living presidents. Biden will give a eulogy. Daniel Lurie, an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune, was inaugurated as San Francisco’s mayor. In his speech, he detailed an emergency plan for the city’s fentanyl crisis. Tim Walz endorsed Ken Martin, a fellow Minnesotan, to lead the Democratic National Committee. International In Giza, Egypt. Heba Khamis for The New York Times Egypt says refugees from Sudan, Syria and Gaza are straining its resources. It has tightened its immigration policies, hoping for Western support. The Israeli military said it found the body of a hostage in a tunnel in Gaza. Iran released an Italian journalist after arresting her on vague charges last month. National Rally, the French far-right party, spent years trying to distance itself from its founding father, Jean-Marie Le Pen. After his death this week, it hailed him as a visionary. Russia bombed the city of Zaporizhzhia in southeastern Ukraine, killing at least 13 people. Ukraine had attacked an oil depot deep inside Russia hours earlier. The Chinese government is separating Tibetan children from their families and placing them in boarding schools, where they are indoctrinated in loyalty to Beijing. Other Big Stories Dockworkers outside the Port of New Orleans. Annie Flanagan for The New York Times The dockworkers’ union on the East and Gulf coasts reached a tentative deal with employers, averting a potentially damaging strike. TikTok, which faces a possible ban in the U.S., is also waging legal battles in at least 20 other countries. America’s efforts to cut pollution stalled last year, with greenhouse emissions dropping just a fraction. Demand for electricity surged, in large part because of a hot summer. Opinions The TikTok law doesn’t ban content — it bans Chinese control of that content, David French argues. Here are columns by Charles Blow on drinking culture and Nicholas Kristof’s “win a trip” winner on the benefits of breastfeeding. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS Mike Ellis Personal health: Do your genes matter more for longevity than your lifestyle? It depends how long you hope to live. Social Qs: “My brother and sister-in-law no longer want to put me up. I’m hurt!” Risks: Middle-aged Americans are outdrinking younger adults — and suffering the consequences. Space: Pluto may have captured its biggest moon after an ancient dance and kiss. Lives Lived: Carole Wilbourn was a self-described cat therapist, known for her skill in decoding the emotional lives of misbehaving pets. She died at 84. SPORTS College football: Penn State and Notre Dame meet tonight in the semifinals of the first 12-team Playoff. Both teams have reputations on the line. N.B.A.: Cleveland outlasted Oklahoma City, 129-122, in a matchup of the league’s best teams. N.F.L.: The Chicago Bears will interview the Iowa State coach Matt Campbell for their head-coaching vacancy. The Raiders got a rebuff from the former Patriots coach Bill Belichick, currently at North Carolina. ARTS AND IDEAS Photo illustration by Joan Wong Cameo, a website where celebrities sell personalized videos, has become a haven for out-of-work Republican politicians. Both George Santos, who charges $400 a video, and Matt Gaetz are using the platform to monetize their notoriety, and they appear to be having fun. More on culture The house in Albuquerque that played Walter White’s on “Breaking Bad” is on sale for nearly $4 million. Jamie Lee Curtis became teary while talking about the Pacific Palisades fires on “The Tonight Show.” THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Bake oatmeal for a satisfying breakfast. Eat better with these tips. Declutter your fridge. Organize your pantry. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was impartial. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 11 Author Members Posted January 11 January 10, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. Today, we’re covering the TikTok arguments at the Supreme Court this morning — as well as a new fire in Los Angeles and Jimmy Carter’s funeral. Influencing. Callaghan O'Hare for The New York Times Unavoidable tensions Free speech and national security can often conflict. During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln prevented newspapers from publishing pro-Confederate material. During later wars, the federal government suppressed criticism. After the 9/11 attacks, Congress made it a crime to provide even human rights advice to extremist groups. In each case, government officials argued that they needed to restrict speech to protect Americans. And in each case, free speech advocates argued that the government had gone too far and undermined the country’s values. The same is true about the latest conflict between speech and security — involving TikTok, the social media platform owned by a Chinese company. In response to concerns that China can use the platform to spy on Americans and spread propaganda, Congress last year passed a law requiring TikTok’s parent company to sell it to a non-Chinese owner. TikTok and the parent company, ByteDance, then sued to block the law. This morning, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case. In today’s newsletter, I’ll lay out each side’s best arguments. Whatever your own views, I encourage you to recognize that there is no perfect solution, just as there was no perfect solution to the earlier conflicts between national security and free speech. Prioritizing one probably means compromising the other. TikTok as speech The argument to leave TikTok alone starts with its popularity. About 170 million Americans, equal to half the country’s population, use the app. They entertain themselves, communicate with friends, follow the news, go shopping and operate businesses. Critics of the law say that shutting down TikTok — as the government would do if ByteDance refused to sell it — would be an unprecedented infringement on Americans’ speech: Never before has the government eliminated a platform used so widely for communication and commerce. Supporters of TikTok on Capitol Hill last year. Kent Nishimura for The New York Times Critics also argue that Congress has failed to show that China uses TikTok to manipulate Americans; the law is instead based on the worry that China might one day do so. The law’s effect is “to substitute definite manipulation by our own government for feared manipulation by China,” Jameel Jaffer and Genevieve Lakier, two First Amendment experts, wrote in a Times Opinion essay. Donald Trump now seems to be on TikTok’s side, too. In a brief last month, he and his lawyers argued that the Supreme Court should let him resolve the issue after becoming president. (The deadline for ByteDance to sell TikTok is Jan. 19.) Trump originally supported a forced sale but changed his position last year, evidently after speaking with a Republican Party donor who’s a TikTok investor. TikTok as a threat The argument in favor of the law revolves around the Chinese government’s recent actions and future ambitions. China treats companies as extensions of the state. If executives disobey orders, they can be fired or sent to prison. China has also made extensive efforts to spy on the U.S. and influence American politics. Already, videos on some subjects, including Taiwan and Tibet, can be hard to find on TikTok, independent research has found. The same is true of pro-Ukraine and pro-Israel videos. (China has become increasingly allied with Russia and Iran.) These patterns suggest that TikTok suppresses material that the Chinese Communist Party doesn’t like. Perhaps the simplest argument for the law is that the U.S. would not have allowed the Soviet Union to own NBC, Life magazine or a company that collected Americans’ personal information. “Limits on foreign ownership have been a part of federal communications policy for more than a century,” the legal scholar Zephyr Teachout wrote in The Atlantic. Supporters say that this history helps explain why Congress passed the law overwhelmingly, with bipartisan support, and why both liberal and conservative appeals court judges voted to uphold the law last month. What’s next Supreme Court justices. Doug Mills/The New York Times Today’s oral arguments will offer a clearer sense of how the justices might rule. My colleague Adam Liptak, who’s a lawyer by training and covers the Supreme Court, says that recent history suggests TikTok may have the harder case to make. “The court will be reluctant to second-guess congressional judgments about national security even in the context of the First Amendment challenge,” Adam said. He pointed to a 2010 case that involved another clash between national security and free speech. In that ruling, the court upheld a provision in the 2001 Patriot Act that banned even nonviolent assistance to terrorist groups. Three of today’s justices (John Roberts, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas) were in the majority, and only one (Sonia Sotomayor) dissented. A fourth member of the current court (Elena Kagan) was the solicitor general in 2010 and defended the law during oral arguments. But Adam added that the court could also draw on older precedents, from the Cold War and Vietnam eras, in which the court rejected the government’s arguments that supposed threats to national security justified limits on speech. Related: Other countries are also cracking down on TikTok. THE LATEST NEWS Los Angeles Fires The Kenneth Fire, in the West Hills section of Los Angeles. Ethan Swope/Associated Press A new fire started in the West Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles. Over a just a few hours last night, it exploded to cover 1,000 acres. The two largest fires, Palisades and Eaton, continue to spread. They are among the top five most destructive in California’s history. The fires have killed 10 people and destroyed about 10,000 structures. Easing winds allowed helicopters and planes to douse fires from the skies, and firefighters were able to extinguish or contain several smaller blazes. (Read what it means for a fire to be “contained.”) But heavy winds could return over the weekend and next week. See the forecast. In Pacific Palisades. Kyle Grillot for The New York Times President Biden said the federal government would fund the region’s firefighting needs for the next 180 days. How did the hydrants run dry? When wildfires spread through residential neighborhoods, water systems often fail to keep up with firefighters’ needs. An N.F.L. playoff game between the Rams and Vikings, scheduled to be played Monday in the Los Angeles area, will instead be played in Arizona. Jimmy Carter’s Funeral President Biden eulogizing Jimmy Carter. Erin Schaff/The New York Times President Biden delivered a eulogy at the state funeral for Jimmy Carter. “Throughout his life, he showed us what it means to be a practitioner of good works, a good and faithful servant of God and of the people,” Biden said. Biden was joined at the funeral by the nation’s other four living presidents. The gathering presented a rare image of presidential unity. There were also eulogies by Walter Mondale, Carter’s vice president, and Gerald Ford, whom he defeated in 1976. Both men died years ago; their sons read the remarks. After the funeral, Carter’s coffin was flown to Plains, Ga., for a private service at his local church. He was buried next to his wife, Rosalynn, outside the ranch home they built in 1961. Carter’s grandson told a funny story about his grandfather, once a Navy nuclear engineer, struggling to use a cellphone. Carter accidentally called him while trying to take a photo. Watch the video here from MSNBC. Migration A makeshift migrant camp in El Paso, Texas. Ivan Pierre Aguirre for The New York Times Most Senate Democrats joined Republicans in advancing a bill that would expand deportations of migrants accused of crimes. Trump’s advisers have spent months searching for a disease that could serve as justification for closing the southern border, as Covid did in 2020. Politics Trump will face sentencing today in his hush-money trial in New York, after the Supreme Court denied his bid to block it. He is not likely to receive jail time. A federal judge struck down the Biden administration’s protections for transgender students. The court ruled that the change violated teachers’ rights by requiring them to use students’ preferred pronouns. The House passed a bill to impose sanctions on officials of the International Criminal Court, in response to war-crimes charges against Israeli leaders. The bill’s chances of becoming law are high. Other Big Stories 2024 was the hottest year in recorded history. It was also the year that the planet crossed a temperature threshold scientists had warned about. France indicted the founder of the website used by some of the men who raped Gisèle Pelicot. A federal analysis links high fluoride exposure to lower I.Q. in children. It drew on countries that put much more fluoride in drinking water than the U.S. does. A man convicted of firing a gun inside a Washington pizza restaurant in 2016, inspired by the “pizzagate” conspiracy theory, was fatally shot by the police in North Carolina. Opinions Immigration policy needs three shifts: deterrence of illegal migration, an expansion of legal migration and a path to citizenship for those who already live here, the Editorial Board writes. Big cities can be great places to live. New York should prove its greatness by reducing crime on the subway, Mara Gay writes. Here are columns by David Brooks on character building and Michelle Goldberg on Representative Ro Khanna. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS Shujun Wang Adam Pape for The New York Times Espionage: A Chinese American scholar pretended to be a democracy activist and an ally to dissidents in New York. He turned out to be a spy. Shop smarter: Can you spot ultraprocessed food? Take our grocery quiz. Lives Lived: Anita Bryant was a singer and former beauty queen who had a robust career in the 1960s and ’70s. But her opposition to gay rights — she called homosexuality “an abomination” — virtually destroyed her career. She died at 84. SPORTS College football: Notre Dame beat Penn State in a 27-24 thriller to earn a slot in the national title game. M.L.S.: The league apologized for publishing an article that identified the wrong player as having transferred to one of its clubs, Atlanta United. ARTS AND IDEAS The auction of Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi” in 2017. Christie's Images Ltd. 2024 Auction houses like Sotheby’s and Christies have been struggling in a market downturn. So they have expanded beyond art and are selling niche experiences and luxury goods, including real estate, classic cars, dinosaur fossils, designer handbags, jewelry, fine wines and game-worn N.B.A. jerseys. Read about the shift here. More on culture Hannah Yoon for The New York Times Hand-painted clothes are growing in popularity, slowly. Armia Khalil is a security guard at the Met. Now his work is showing there. Read his story. A Walmart knockoff of the Hermès Birkin bag has gone viral on TikTok, The Cut reports. Late night hosts joked about the guests at Carter’s funeral. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Roast shrimp and sweet potatoes coated in coconut milk. Care for your heart. Here are tips from doctors. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was offhanded. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. —David P.S. Thanks to a software glitch, you probably received yesterday’s edition of The Morning twice. Sorry about that. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 12 Author Members Posted January 12 January 11, 2025 By Melissa Kirsch Good morning. Reading alone is a deeply enjoyable activity. But being read to has its own irreplaceable allure. María Jesús Contreras Language arts The Harvard Sentences are hundreds of sentences that have been used for many decades to test technologies in which understanding speech is essential, like telephone systems and hearing aids. I came across the list recently and was charmed by it. Some sample sentences: It’s easy to tell the depth of a well. The hogs were fed chopped corn and garbage. Help the woman get back to her feet. The harder he tried the less he got done. It caught its hind paw in a rusty trap. Write a fond note to the friend you cherish. Most of the news is easy for us to hear. These sentences weren’t chosen for their meaning but for their “phonetic balance,” the way their frequency of sounds are similar to spoken language. They’re tools, not advice or koans. But reading them I felt moved as when reading a poem. I found a site where you can listen to people read the sentences in different accents and tried to see if it was possible to hear a series of lines aloud without them gathering meaning. These narrators were particularly skilled at reading without affect, but it’s impossible to listen to even the least emotive person recite: “The stray cat gave birth to kittens. The young girl gave no clear response. The meal was cooked before the bell rang. What joy there is in living,” and not detect some poetry. Is there a person on earth who doesn’t love to be read to? Children get storytime, nightly if they’re lucky, but once we know how to read we typically do it by ourselves. Last year I wrote about audiobooks as bedtime stories for adults, how they can tap into that desire that’s maybe dormant in all of us, the desire to have our sleep treated as a project worthy of coaxing and custodianship. Every few months I let Joseph Brodsky reading his poem “A Song” lull me to sleep. Recently a friend and I read each other portions of Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself.” Reading to someone is different from simply speaking to them. The words aren’t yours, so you don’t own the thoughts or meaning, only the communication. You’re free to interpret, to perform. It’s a process of co-discovery, intimate but, unlike conversation, the content comes from a third party. It’s about connecting and it’s also about consuming art together, whether that art is a poem or “The Polar Express” or a novel from which you and your sweetheart read alternating chapters to each other while cooking dinner. There are so many ways to be read to now, if that’s your thing. Audiobooks, articles narrated by people and by artificial intelligence, recordings of author appearances at bookstores, and yes, WAV files of curiously blasé people muttering Harvard Sentences into the void. There is little I like more than reading by myself, or listening to a book alone on a long car drive. But you might still make the effort to read and be read to by the people in your life. It’s cozy. It’s strange and exciting if you’ve grown accustomed to reading as a solo activity. You’re living in your head all the time with your own voice as the narrator. It’s so lovely to listen to someone else tell the stories for a change. For more “The language becomes a part of the body, which is why there is always a curious tenderness, almost an erotic quality, in those 18th- and 19th-century literary scenes where a book is being read aloud in mixed company.” Verlyn Klinkenborg, from 2009, on the pleasures of reading aloud. “Reading Aloud to My Daughter, From Prison.” From Gizmodo: “The ‘Harvard Sentences’ Secretly Shaped the Development of Audio Tech.” THE WEEK IN CULTURE Film Pamela Anderson in “The Last Showgirl.” Zoey Grossman/Roadside Attractions In “The Last Showgirl,” Pamela Anderson stars as a dancer at a Las Vegas revue. The director Gia Coppola tells the story with “an obvious appreciation for the affirming highs and bitter lows that age and beauty afford,” Manohla Dargis writes. At the movies, the character of the “older woman” — middle-aged and in a relationship with a younger man — has finally become the protagonist. Oscar nominations will be revealed next week. The Times’s awards columnist shared the nods he’d like to see, including “Challengers” for best original score. Perry, the miniature donkey who was used as a model for “Shrek” animators, died at 30. Television “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” and “Abbott Elementary” share a city, but their tones couldn’t be more different. Still, this week’s crossover episode was seamless. The director of a documentary about “The Jerry Springer Show” spoke to The Times about the talk show’s complex legacy. After 17 years, Hoda Kotb anchored the “Today” show for the final time. Music Bob Czaykowski, known as Nitebob, working a soundboard. Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times Many of the music industry’s most respected — and consistently employed — rock ’n’ roll roadies are septuagenarians. Sam Moore, the tenor half of the scorching soul duo Sam & Dave — known for indelible hits like “Soul Man” — died at 89. The folk singer Peter Yarrow died this week at 86. With his trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, he eased folk music into the Top 10. More Culture Jenna Bush, the former first daughter and current literary influencer, is starting a publishing venture with Penguin Random House. “Show Boat” set a new standard for Broadway. Frequently revived, as in a new production called “Show/Boat: A River,” it endures because it has always said something important about America, our critic writes. Sara Mearns, a New York City Ballet star, discusses her recent return to the stage wearing hearing aids: “I want to hear the music that I’m dancing to.” The Mexican architect Frida Escobedo designed a new wing at the Met. She is the first woman to do so in the museum’s 154-year history. Read about her rise. THE LATEST NEWS California Fires The remains of a neighborhood in Pacific Palisades, Calif. Ariana Drehsler for The New York Times Firefighters have made little progress battling two huge fires in Los Angeles. The largest, the Palisades fire, expanded east last night, threatening an upscale area that includes the Getty Center. The fires have killed at least 11 people and destroyed or damaged thousands of buildings. (These maps show the scale of the destruction.) Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered an independent review to determine why firefighters ran out of water earlier this week. “Everywhere you look, everything’s on fire”: A mother knew she had to get her family out of Altadena, even if it meant losing all that they left behind. People who live through wildfires may experience anxiety, depression or psychological distress for years afterward, experts warned. Politics The judge in Donald Trump’s hush-money trial gave him a lenient sentence that carried no punishment. Still, it ensures that Trump will be a felon when he takes office. The Supreme Court seems poised to uphold a law that would ban TikTok unless the app’s parent company sells it. A federal judge held Rudy Giuliani in contempt of court for continuing to defame two Georgia election workers, the second such ruling against him this week. Other Big Stories U.S. employers added 256,000 jobs last month, a stronger-than-expected result. The U.S. imposed new sanctions targeting Russia’s so-called shadow fleet — dozens of tankers that Moscow uses to evade existing oil sanctions. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. CULTURE CALENDAR By Desiree Ibekwe 🎥 “Better Man” (out now): In Britain, Robbie Williams is something of a national treasure. The lyrics to his songs “Angels” and “Rock DJ” are etched in just about everyone’s brains, and his boy band, Take That, was so popular that when it broke up in the 1990s, a charity set up a help line to counsel distraught fans. Yet the press tour for this movie has revealed to me that many Americans do not know who he is. Get to know Williams’s story in “Better Man,” a biopic from the director of “The Greatest Showman,” in which Williams is rendered as a computer-generated primate. (Wild.) RECIPE OF THE WEEK Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times By Melissa Clark Chocolate Babka Some weekends are made for long, meditative cooking projects. If that’s what you’re seeking, look no further than my recipe for chocolate babka. Yes, it will take you all weekend, but that’s exactly the point. After all the kneading and rising, the rolling and filling, you’ll end up with two gorgeous, streusel-topped loaves — one for you, one to give away to anyone who needs some sweet cheer. Babka freezes well, too, meaning you could save some for future gratification of the fudgiest kind. REAL ESTATE A combined living room, dining room and kitchen. Anna Positano, Gaia Cambiaggi | Studio Campo Renovation: The second floor of a 12th-century palazzo in Genoa, Italy, had been sitting empty for decades. Two architects restored its glory. The Hunt: A London couple searched for a traditional Marrakesh riad for about $500,000. Which one did they choose? Play our game. What you get for $2.3 million: A Pueblo-style house in Miami, an 1890 townhouse in Hudson N.Y., or a midcentury-modern-style home in North Bethesda, Md. LIVING Hannah Yoon for The New York Times Not-so-fast fashion: Inside the slow growth of hand-painted clothes. Burlap & Barrel: The spice company sources directly from farms across the world and has become a secret ingredient used by celebrity chefs. Sick or injured abroad? Read what to know. Health: Take better care of your heart this year. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Replace your shower head Replacing a dribbly old shower head with a new, high-performing model is one of the simplest and most satisfying upgrades you can make to your home. Any good one is likely to be an upgrade over the one you inherited when you moved into your place — especially if it’s more than a decade old. And it doesn’t need to cost a lot. In Wirecutter’s quest to find the best shower head, our testing left us a little surprised. An inexpensive model grabbed our attention from the moment we tried it, and became our top pick for its easy installation, sleek design and fantastic flow. — Tim Heffernan GAME OF THE WEEK Jarrett Allen of the Cavaliers, left, and Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Sue Ogrocki/Associated Press Cleveland Cavaliers vs. Oklahoma City Thunder, N.B.A.: Cleveland has the league’s best offense. Oklahoma City has the best defense. Both have historically great records. What happens when they collide? This week, the Cavs outran the Thunder, 129-122, in a game that was hailed as the best of the N.B.A. season. (The Athletic’s Zach Harper called it “some of the best basketball you’ve seen in a decade.”) Lucky for fans, the rematch is just a few days away — this time in Oklahoma City. Thursday at 7:30 p.m. Eastern on TNT NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was multiply. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week’s headlines. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 12 Author Members Posted January 12 January 12, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Madison Malone Kircher writes about celebrity entrepreneurs. We’re also covering the California fires, Sudan and chronic pain. —David Leonhardt Selena Gomez Cindy Ord/Getty Images Celebrity, Inc. By Madison Malone Kircher I cover internet culture. “Please just keep in mind,” Nikki Glaser exhorted Hollywood’s A-list while hosting the Golden Globes last week: “The point of making art is not to win an award. The point of making art is to start a tequila brand so popular that you never have to make art again.” The stars arrayed before her chuckled. They were laughing at themselves. Among them was Selena Gomez. The actress, doubly nominated that evening for her roles in “Only Murders in the Building” and “Emilia Peréz,” has become a beauty tycoon with her popular makeup company, Rare Beauty. Ariana Grande, seated nearby, owns a cosmetics brand, too. Need a drink? Ryan Reynolds sells gin, and Brad Pitt has rosé. George Clooney, Kendall Jenner and Dwayne the Rock Johnson all founded tequila brands. Got kids? Jessica Alba’s Honest Company proffers diapers and baby stuff. Looking for workout gear? There’s Kate Hudson’s Fabletics. Menopause products? Try Naomi Watts’s offering, Stripes. These days it feels as if Hollywood’s entrepreneurs are dabbling in every part of the retail market. It’s not enough anymore for a celebrity to simply be a spokesperson for the brand. Now they’ve got to own it, too. This model offers more control — and potentially bigger profits. (Though that means bigger risks as well, naturally.) Extra cash Why is this happening? One reason is that a side hustle offers insurance against the fickle entertainment industry. It’s harder to score a big payday when streaming services pay a fixed price for a movie or a show, regardless of how many people watch it. And roles might dry up, but a successful brand can outlast someone’s good looks or the buzz they earned from their last prize nomination. It can offer “a very steady amount of money that can go on for years, after your acting career is over or diminished,” Bruno Maglione, the president for licensing at the talent agency IMG, previously told The Times. In some cases, actors can make much more from their stuff than they do from their film credits. Gomez is reportedly a billionaire these days. Celebrities aren’t going it alone, however. They work with experienced entrepreneurs. Gomez started her company with three alums from NYX Cosmetics, including her chief executive. Alba brought on the chief executive of a nonprofit focused on childhood health. She later recruited Brian Lee, a serial entrepreneur who co-founded Kim Kardashian’s company ShoeDazzle. Still, there are no guarantees. In 2024, the actor Blake Lively started a hair-care line, Blake Brown. The brand tanked alongside a reported smear campaign against Lively during the promotion of her film “It Ends With Us.” Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard’s Hello Bello — another diaper company — filed for bankruptcy in 2023. (They later sold it to a private equity fund.) It’s not enough for celebrities simply to put their face on a product. It’s about telling a story and convincing those of us who might buy their booze or bralette or blush that they actually embody the product. That they use it or, at the very least, like it. Jenner has been known to pop up at college bars pouring shots of her wares. Gomez stepped onto the red carpet at the Golden Globes wearing plenty of her own makeup products, which the brand later highlighted on social media. Not every celebrity has gone this route. Some still tread more traditional paths, lending their likeness for ad campaigns. Timothée Chalamet, who is drawing Oscar buzz for his portrayal of Bob Dylan in “A Complete Unknown,” hasn’t founded any companies, though he’s an “ambassador” for high-end brands like Chanel. Bob Dylan, on the other hand, would like to sell you a bottle of his whiskey. Yes, the real Bob Dylan. THE LATEST NEWS California Fires Fighting the Palisades fire. Loren Elliott for The New York Times Firefighters in Los Angeles are working to contain huge blazes as the death toll from wildfires rose to at least 16. A return of heavier desert winds could spread flames further. The Palisades fire, the biggest one, expanded even as firefighters made progress containing it in some areas. Canada and Mexico sent firefighters to help. Donald Trump criticized the officials handling the blazes. “The fires are still raging in L.A.,” he wrote on Truth Social. “The incompetent pols have no idea how to put them out.” The wildfires have destroyed mobile homes, leaving some residents’ dreams of building a middle-class life in ruins. “It looks like we’re in a war zone”: Residents of Pacific Palisades have begun sifting through the remains of their homes. Private firefighters are battling blazes for insurance companies and wealthy property owners, The Los Angeles Times reports. Politics Jack Smith, the special counsel who brought two failed federal prosecutions against Trump, has resigned. Elon Musk is helping to recruit billionaires and tech executives to unofficial government positions. Read about Musk’s plans for the Department of Government Efficiency. Sid Edwards was a high school football coach who had never run for office. Now, he’s the mayor of Baton Rouge, Louisiana’s second-largest city. President Biden awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom With Distinction to Pope Francis. Biden has turned to the pontiff for personal guidance. International In Cabo Delgado Province, Mozambique. Joao Silva/The New York Times Islamic State militants have rampaged across an area of northern Mozambique for more than seven years. The government says the situation has stabilized. Residents tell a different story. Sudan’s military recaptured a key city from a paramilitary group that the United States recently accused of genocide. Syria’s rebel alliance has vowed to prosecute senior Assad regime figures for crimes. Accountability will be hard to achieve in a divided and vulnerable nation. Criminal gangs in Brazil have run a lottery for decades. The rise of digital gambling is threatening it. Other Big Stories The Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 was not committed by an uncontrolled mob, but was the result of “a coordinated military-style attack,” a Justice Department report said. The airline industry is optimistic about 2025: Demand for tickets is strong and profits are rising. THE SUNDAY DEBATE Should we take Trump’s talk of territorial expansion seriously? Yes. Trump’s threats interfere with the affairs of American allies at a time when our adversaries mean to do us harm. “Now is not the time to tie down the American military in pointless imperialism,” The Kansas City Star’s David Mastio writes. Who knows? Trump’s strategy of inciting fear makes it impossible to know his real intentions. “This causes many problems, among them forcing people and governments to insulate themselves against the chaos, to the detriment of the chaos-creator,” The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s David Mills writes. FROM OPINION Vivek Ramaswamy wants the United States to reward the genius of skilled immigrants. But the American dream is about working hard, even if it’s not high-achieving, Ross Douthat writes. Democracy worldwide is being challenged, but it’s not facing extinction, Serge Schmemann writes. Studies suggest that some patients with severe brain injuries remain conscious even if they’re not responsive. Science needs to work to restore their ability to communicate, Daniela Lamas writes. Here are columns by Nicholas Kristof on contraceptive shots and Maureen Dowd on Jimmy Carter’s funeral. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS Marcus Schaefer for The New York Times Medical mystery: A writer suddenly began experiencing chronic pain. It made her realize how many others were, too. Spooky holidays: Does a giant skeleton in a tutu qualify as a Christmas decoration? A court in Tennessee will decide. Crossing the Atlantic: Why do so many stage shows that were hits in London bomb on Broadway? Most clicked: The maps of the Los Angeles fires were the most popular story in The Morning this week. See them here. Vows: They met more than 20 years ago as child actors in “School of Rock.” Now they’re married. Lives Lived: Charles Person was the youngest of the 13 original Freedom Riders who traveled to Birmingham, Ala., from Washington in 1961 in an effort to integrate interstate bus terminals across the South. He died at 82. BOOK OF THE WEEK By Elisabeth Egan “Fire Weather,” by John Vaillant: In this hair-raisingly prescient book — it could be shelved under “horror nonfiction” — Vaillant makes the case that the raging wildfire that consumed Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada, in May 2016 was a harbinger of catastrophes to come. He shows how the blaze flickered to life, then grew, fed by dry trees and hurricane-force winds, until it devoured more than 2,500 homes and other structures and 2,300 square miles of forest, not to be fully extinguished until August of the following year. “Vaillant anthropomorphizes the fire,” our reviewer wrote of “Fire Season,” which was selected as one of The Times’s 10 Best Books of 2023. “Not only does it grow and breathe and search for food; it strategizes. It hunts.” More on books In “We Tried to Tell Y’All,” Meredith Clark chronicles the heyday of Black Twitter. Thinking of keeping a journal? Writers, artists and a social worker weigh in on how, why and where to get started. THE INTERVIEW Ben Stiller Philip Montgomery for The New York Times By David Marchese This week’s subject for The Interview is Ben Stiller. The new season of “Severance” (Apple TV+), which he directs and executive produces, returns on Jan. 17. Stiller talked about the show, how comedy has changed and being Jewish in Hollywood. A project you had wanted to make for a long time was an adaptation of “What Makes Sammy Run?” the Budd Schulberg novel. It’s a story about a Jewish character named Sammy Glick who’s a conniving, amoral striver in Hollywood and his thirst to succeed. What was it about that book that resonated with you? I think Budd Schulberg saw it as a metaphor for anybody who wants to get to the top — that mind-set of, do whatever it takes. That’s why I think the novel resonates. There’s always been a resistance to it, and I can understand why. For a long time I was frustrated because I felt like this story should be made, but the flip side of it is it can be looked at as you’re shining a spotlight on a Jewish character who is the self-hating Jew who is willing to do whatever. That was the resistance to making it? Partly, I think so. It’s funny, I think about it now and I would love to see that story made. What I worry about is how people would interpret it on the outside — and that’s as a Jewish person. Are ways in which, after Oct. 7, being Jewish in Hollywood has been trickier to navigate? Have things felt different? I think just being a Jewish person feels different. I grew up in an incredibly sheltered Upper West Side environment. I never experienced antisemitism. So to start feeling that now, where other people have felt it their whole lives, and to see the rise in antisemitic violence, is something that I never thought I’d experience in my lifetime. The reality of it is frightening. Read more of the interview here. THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE Photo illustration by Maurizio Cattelan and Pierpaolo Ferrari Click the cover image above to read this week’s magazine. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Shop for groceries like a nutrition scientist. Stream these children’s movies. Try a countertop dishwasher. Check your pulse. MEAL PLAN Linda Xiao for The New York Times In this week’s Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter, Ali Slagle highlights recipes with three mighty ingredients: greens, beans and grains. Her recipe suggestions include a one-pot grains dish and a brussels sprouts salad with pomegranate and pistachios. NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was pompadour. Can you put eight historical events — including Woodstock, the invention of the typewriter, and the founding of Los Angeles — in chronological order? Take this week’s Flashback quiz. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 13 Author Members Posted January 13 January 13, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Francesca Paris writes about falling childhood vaccinations. We’re also covering California, Syria and TV show openings. —David Leonhardt Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Unvaxxed By Francesca Paris I’m a data reporter. After years of holding steady, American vaccination rates against once-common childhood diseases fell during the coronavirus pandemic and continued to drop for much of the past four years. Source: C.D.C. | By The New York Times Nationwide, less than 93 percent of kindergartners completed the measles vaccine last year, down from 95 percent, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Immunization rates against polio, whooping cough and chickenpox fell similarly. And there have been far more precipitous drops in some states, counties and school districts. Source: C.D.C. | Prepandemic figures are averages of the school years between 2017 and 2020, for states with available data in those years. | By The New York Times States, not the federal government, set vaccine mandates. But the incoming Trump administration could encourage anti-vaccine sentiment and undermine state programs. The president-elect’s pick for health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has spread the false theory that vaccines cause autism, among other misinformation. Already, falling vaccination rates have followed a partisan pattern. There are two ways vaccination rates can drop: More families can get an exemption, which gives them legal permission to skip vaccines; or more families can fail to vaccinate their children without permission. In states that supported Donald Trump for president, the number of children receiving exemptions rose. The story with noncompliance is more complex. It rose in both blue and red states, although more in red states. (An unknown amount of noncompliance reflects families that did vaccinate their children but didn’t file the paperwork verifying they’d done so.) Source: C.D.C. | Charts exclude Montana. Some states are missing data for certain years. | By The New York Times Surveys reveal a new and deep partisan division on this issue. In 2019, 67 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning voters told Gallup that childhood immunizations were “extremely important,” compared with 52 percent of their Republican counterparts. Five years later, the enthusiasm among the Democratic grouping had fallen only slightly, to 63 percent. For Republicans and G.O.P. leaners, it had plunged to 26 percent. Lawmakers in red states have tried to roll back school vaccine mandates, but most changes have been minor: Louisiana required schools to pair any mandate notifications with information about exemption laws; Idaho allowed 18-year-old students to exempt themselves; and Montana stopped collecting data from schools on immunizations. The decline in vaccination seems likely to have consequences. “Herd immunity,” in which unvaccinated children can’t easily spread measles because others are protected, requires about 92 percent inoculation. The further rates fall, the more likely an outbreak becomes. For children, measles and other once-common childhood diseases can lead to hospitalization and occasionally death. “It’s trouble waiting to happen,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt. There are thousands more schools with vaccination rates below 90 percent than there were just five years ago, according to a New York Times analysis of data from 22 states. Schools with falling rates can be found in red and blue states, in large urban districts and in small rural ones. You can see the change in states in the article we published today. For more Polio once paralyzed and killed thousands of people a year in the U.S. Lagging vaccination could lead to a resurgence. If immunizations continue to fall, experts say that adults — even those who are vaccinated — could be vulnerable to childhood diseases like measles, mumps and rubella. THE LATEST NEWS California Fires In Los Angeles. Max Whittaker for The New York Times Crews have made progress fighting the wildfires, but forecasters expect another round of strong winds to hit Los Angeles starting today. The two largest fires are still far from contained. See maps of them. At least 24 people have been killed. Read about the victims. Before taking office three years ago, L.A.’s mayor said she would not travel internationally in her role. She was traveling back from Ghana when the fires erupted. Gov. Gavin Newsom suspended California’s costly and time-consuming environmental review process for homeowners and businesses whose property was damaged or destroyed. Some wealthy people in Southern California are calling private firefighting crews from other states for help. Their services cost thousands of dollars a day. Through home cameras, residents have watched the fires consume their homes. Watch the videos. Trump Transition Pete Hegseth Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times Senate confirmation hearings are set this week for more than a dozen of Donald Trump’s cabinet picks. It will be a test of Trump’s hold on Senate Republicans. In Trump’s first term, the U.S. had a mostly harmonious relationship with the Gulf States. This time, they appear to diverge on issues including Israel and Iran. Elon Musk and Trump are wading into European politics. Europe seems ill-prepared for this new age of American interference, Katrin Bennhold writes. International Religious minorities in Syria are worried about their post-Assad future. Hamas, now under the leadership of Yahya Sinwar’s brother, is recruiting new fighters in Gaza, The Wall Street Journal reports. China’s trade surplus reached nearly $1 trillion last year. Other Big Stories Undocumented workers pay billions in taxes that help fund programs like Social Security. Tonight is the first full moon of the year. In some places, it will pass in front of a bright Mars. Opinions It’s Paul Offit’s job to be a vaccine skeptic — to ask pharmaceutical companies to prove that their products are safe. He argues that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. goes beyond skepticism and refuses to accept science. Rachel Feintzeig offers a guide for surviving January, which she believes is the worst month of the year. Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss the California wildfires and Trump’s sentencing. Here are columns by David French on Texas’s pornography ban and Pamela Paul on historians’ views on Israel. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS The Cantal area of France. Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York Times Restorations: Churches in France are struggling to pay for repairs. Raw truths: People are posting online about the benefits of drinking raw milk. Read what we know about the science. Work: Is H.R. really your friend? Don’t count on it. Metropolitan Diary: The octopus can’t come in. Lives Lived: Richard Hays was a methodist minister and leading New Testament theologian who sent a thunderclap into the evangelical world by asserting that a deeper reading of the Bible revealed that same-sex relationships are not sinful. He died at 76. SPORTS N.F.L.: The Washington Commanders won their first playoff game since the 2005 season with a 23-20 road victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. See the game-winning field goal. New England Patriots: The team hired Mike Vrabel, who won three Super Bowls with the franchise as a player, to be its next head coach. Women’s college basketball: Pittsburgh overcame a 32-point deficit to beat S.M.U., 72-59, the largest comeback (in regulation) in the sport’s history. ARTS AND IDEAS The opening titles for “The Last of Us.” Opening titles on TV have become intense. The intro for “The Last of Us” shows fungi responsible for turning humankind into zombies. The one for “Game of Thrones” presents a map that also looks like a medieval machine. In recent years, our critic James Poniewozik writes, TV openings meant to be distinctive have become awfully familiar. More on culture It’s time for a fashion revolution, and new designers at global brands should seize the opportunity, Vanessa Friedman writes. People are wearing grown-up versions of bonnets. Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, postponed the premiere of her new Netflix show because of the California wildfires. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times Velvet chicken to make it silky and tender, then stir-fry in a butter-soy sauce. Clean your plants. Go hiking with a hydration pack. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were participant and patrician. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. P.S. The New York Times Communities Fund, a charitable fund that distributes 100 percent of donations to vetted local, national and global nonprofits, wraps up its holiday campaign this week. Read about the effort, and donate, here. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 15 Author Members Posted January 15 January 14, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Raymond Zhong explains why the Los Angeles fires have been so hard to contain. We’re also covering a special counsel report, a potential cease-fire deal and 35 simple health tips. —David Leonhardt In Pacific Palisades. Loren Elliott for The New York Times The airborne flames By Raymond Zhong I’m a climate reporter. More howling, whipping, fire-stoking winds have arrived in Los Angeles. They are expected to strengthen by dawn and may blow up to 70 miles per hour. Some gusts could rekindle parts of the major blazes tearing through the city’s hills and suburbs. Others could start new fires. It may seem hard to understand why the combined resources of the federal government, California and Los Angeles haven’t been able to defeat the wildfires after a week of fighting them. The winds are a major reason. The gusts hurl embers across great distances, spreading fire quickly and thwarting efforts to pinch it off. Planes and helicopters that spray water and flame retardant can’t fly. Firefighters on the ground can’t battle the flames on streets and hillsides without fear they’ll be incinerated. At their peak, the winds have forced firefighters to focus on something else: evacuating residents. “You’re just trying to keep people alive,” Lenya Quinn-Davidson, a fire expert in Northern California, said. How to stop a fire When forests and grasslands ignite, crews follow a strategy called anchor and flank. They find a safe spot, or anchor point, upwind of the blaze. Then they attack from the edges: They douse the flames with hoses and remove anything flammable from the fire’s path. They use power tools to thin the vegetation or — for the bigger stuff — reduce it to ash with small controlled burns. That’s called a fire line. The advancing blaze stops when it reaches the fire line and finds nothing else to consume. Source: Cal Fire | Data is as of 2:00 a.m. Pacific time on Jan. 14. | By The New York Times Sources: Cal Fire; New York Times analysis | Data is as of 2:00 a.m. Pacific time on Jan. 14. | By The New York Times But it’s incredibly hard to anchor and flank in strong winds. Even a spot that seems safe won’t remain safe for long. Flying embers can soar miles away from the fire’s front, meaning the danger spreads too quickly for firefighters keep up. “Fires under these conditions — they’re not moving on the ground” as a normal fire would, said Hugh Safford, a fire ecologist at the University of California, Davis. “They’re moving in the air.” That’s why some wildfires in Southern California can’t be stopped until the desert winds, known as the Santa Anas, recede. Urban warfare The Los Angeles inferno adds another difficulty: an urban tinderbox. When embers float from home to home on a crowded street, there’s no way to create fire lines to interrupt the flames. “All of the things that we have in our houses — drapes, couches, carpet — all of a sudden that stuff can ignite really rapidly,” Rick Connell, an officer with the U.S. Forest Service, said. Hastings Ranch in Pasadena, Calif. Source: Nearmap | By The New York Times And winds don’t just ground firefighting aircraft. They also make the water and fire retardants they spray less effective. Gusts turn the liquid into mist by the time it hits the ground, where it does little to smother the blaze. Even in the best circumstances, retardants can do only so much. “If you’ve already got 100-foot flames, you’re just wasting money,” Connell said. Over the last week, Los Angeles deployed more firefighters and received additional air support, including from the military. “We’re absolutely better prepared,” the county’s fire chief told reporters on Monday. But the experts I interviewed said it would be unrealistic to expect fires of this size to be contained in just a week. For now, the best hope may be to wait until the current winds slow down. More on the fires In Pasadena, Calif. Isadora Kosofsky for The New York Times “It’s like being lost in a fog”: After fleeing their homes, residents are trying to carry on while living in shelters, friends’ homes and cars. See photos of the devastation and the latest maps of the fires. Investigators have determined the spot where the Palisades fire began, on a ridge near a hiking trail. But it’s still not clear what ignited it. A man and his son, who both used wheelchairs, called for help in evacuating the Eaton fire. They died in the blaze, and the family wants answers. Hollywood is debating whether the awards season should continue, The Washington Post reports. The fires complicate Los Angeles hosting the 2028 Olympics. THE LATEST NEWS Special Counsel Report Donald Trump Doug Mills/The New York Times Jack Smith, who indicted Donald Trump on charges of illegally trying to cling to power after the 2020 election, said in a report that there would have been sufficient evidence to convict Trump in a trial. Trump’s 2024 win made it impossible for the prosecution to continue. The report contained an extensive justification for pursuing the prosecution, given what Smith called Trump’s “unprecedented criminal effort to overturn the legitimate results of the election.” Read the report here. Hunter Biden Another special counsel, David Weiss, released the report on his investigation of Hunter Biden. In it, Weiss denounced President Biden for criticizing the inquiry and said that Biden threatened “the integrity of the justice system as a whole.” Confirmation Hearings Senators will question Pete Hegseth, Trump’s pick for defense secretary, this morning. Trump’s allies have pressured Republicans to support him. Democrats are likely to ask Hegseth about allegations of sexual assault and public drunkenness, as well as his comments about women in the military. Read what to expect. Several other confirmation hearings are scheduled for this week. Here’s how the process works. More on Politics The Education Department canceled student loans for thousands more borrowers. The loans of more than five million Americans have now been forgiven. The singer Carrie Underwood will perform at Trump’s inauguration. Elon Musk is expected to use office space in the White House complex, which will keep him close to Trump as he builds his Department of Government Efficiency. Steve Bannon, a longtime Trump adviser, is feuding with Musk: “He’s a truly evil person,” Bannon said. “Stopping him has become a personal issue for me.” International Israel and Hamas are said to be close to an agreement for a cease-fire in Gaza and the release of hostages, according to officials. Last summer, American intelligence officials learned of a Russian plot to detonate airline cargo in the U.S. So the White House sent a warning to the one man who could stop it: Vladimir Putin. Lebanon’s Parliament named Nawaf Salam, the head of the International Court of Justice, as prime minister. His selection is seen as a blow to Hezbollah. Business Rachel Maddow will return to nightly shows on MSNBC for Trump’s first 100 days in office. Texas sued Allstate, accusing the insurer of illegally tracking drivers through mobile phone apps. Other Big Stories National standards direct police officers to fire their Tasers only under threat. But in Mississippi, where the rules are lax, officers use the weapons with impunity. In the coming decades, as Americans live longer, dementia will become far more prominent, researchers say. A Texas man was charged with stalking Caitlin Clark, the W.N.B.A. star. Opinions In the House chamber. Mark Peterson for The New York Times To escape our two-party trap, we need a better system of electing people to Congress: proportional representation, Jesse Wegman and Lee Drutman argue. The Los Angeles wildfires burned down diverse, middle-class neighborhoods. Most people won’t be able to afford to rebuild, Héctor Tobar writes. Victims of the fires should channel their anger into support for the environment, Patti Davis writes. Here are columns by Michelle Goldberg on Democrats’ immigration cowardice and Thomas Edsall on Trump and revenge. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS Illustration by Lorena Spurio 35 simple tips: Health experts swear by these small things to improve your life. Hot fitness: Is a heated workout really better for you? No good spots: Some cities have cut parking requirements for real estate projects. Residents aren’t happy. Ask Well: “Do I need to worry about microplastics in tea bags?” Lives Lived: Oliviero Toscani was a photographer, art director and creative mastermind of Benetton’s advertising campaigns who used images of an AIDS patient and death row inmates to break the boundaries of fashion imagery. He died at 82. SPORTS N.F.L.: The Rams, displaced by the Los Angeles wildfires, upset the 14-win Vikings in the final wild-card playoff game, 27-9. M.L.B.: The Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki narrowed his possible free-agent destinations to three: the Dodgers, Padres and Blue Jays. ARTS AND IDEAS In New York. Yuvraj Khanna for The New York Times In New York City’s 24-hour diners, patrons of all backgrounds bump elbows over patty melts and pancakes. But the diners are endangered by rising costs and food delivery. Priya Krishna spent a Friday night at a diner in Brooklyn to appreciate the magic of a restaurant that never closes. More on culture On Broadway, mothers are usually either objects of devotion or monsters. A wave of multidimensional characters suggests things might be changing. Pope Francis’ autobiography, “Hope,” was released today. Jimmy Kimmel became emotional when discussing the California wildfires on his show. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times Add white chocolate and almond flour to this one-bowl olive oil and lemon cake. Try these egg substitutes. Keep your hands hydrated. Work with a portable second screen. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were bootjack and jackboot. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 16 Author Members Posted January 16 January 15, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We’re covering Biden’s legacy — as well as South Korea, Pete Hegseth and plays in Ukraine. In the Oval Office. Eric Lee/The New York Times Still a turning point? One-term presidents don’t usually leave big legacies on domestic policy. If anything, political parties move away from the ideas of presidents who fail to win a second term. It was true of Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush. It will be true of President Biden in some ways, too. Democrats have already abandoned Biden’s initial immigration policy, which contributed to a record surge at the southern border. But one major part of Biden’s agenda has a decent chance of surviving. It was the idea that animated much of the legislation he signed — namely, that the federal government should take a more active role in both assisting and regulating the private sector than it did for much of the previous half-century. This idea has yet to acquire a simple name. The historian Gary Gerstle has called it the end of the neoliberal order. Felicia Wong and her colleagues at the Roosevelt Institute, a liberal think tank, have used the term “a new economics.” Jake Sullivan, a top Biden adviser, has referred to it as a new consensus. I’ve described it as part of a new centrism. The philosophy didn’t originate with Biden, but he meaningfully shifted the country toward it, first as a candidate in 2020 and then as president. He moved the Democratic Party away from decades of support for trade liberalization and imposed tariffs on China. He pursued an industrial policy to build up sectors important to national security (like semiconductors) or future prosperity (like clean energy). And his administration was more aggressive about restraining corporate power than any in decades, blocking mergers, cracking down on “junk fees” and regulating drug prices. When Biden delivers his farewell address from the Oval Office tonight, he will emphasize these issues. Promises unmet The rationale for this new approach was simple enough: The previous consensus — the neoliberal order, in Gerstle’s terms — failed to deliver on its promises. For most of the past 50 years, the federal government moved toward a more laissez-faire approach to the economy. Tariffs and tax rates plunged. Regulators allowed corporations to grow larger. Presidents of both parties supported these changes, to differing degrees, and argued that the inevitable march of globalization demanded them. These same presidents often promised that the changes would bring more prosperity to American workers and more freedom to the rest of the world. “It didn’t turn out that way,” as Sullivan said in a 2023 speech explaining Biden’s approach. Democracy has retreated, and China and Russia are more authoritarian. In the U.S., incomes for most families have grown frustratingly slowly. Many measures of well-being — including life satisfaction, loneliness, marriage and birthrates — look grim. The United States today has the lowest life expectancy of any high-income country. Erin Schaff/The New York Times Biden failed to fix these problems, of course, and voters decided last year that they preferred Donald Trump’s approach to them. Trump will surely undo major parts of the Biden agenda, especially on climate change and some aspects of corporate regulation. In other ways, though, Trump is part of the shift away from neoliberalism. He romped through the 2016 Republican primaries partly because he was more hostile to trade, China and cuts to Medicare and Social Security than other Republican politicians. Some of Trump’s second-term nominees, including for labor secretary and head of the Justice Department’s antitrust division, are hardly small-government neoliberals. Neither is Vice President-elect JD Vance. The policies vs. the man One explanation is that most Americans have similar views on these issues. Polls show majority support for government action to reduce drug prices, regulate trade and prevent corporations from becoming too powerful. That’s also why the Biden shift on economic policy remains virtually a consensus within the Democratic Party. Moderate Democrats sometimes sound even more populist than progressives (as I described in a recent Morning). The disagreements between the party’s center and left tend to involve other issues, such as immigration, gender, crime and foreign policy. Politics is uncertain. There is obviously no guarantee that Biden’s big economic ideas will survive. One question is whether his investments in new technologies succeed in creating thriving companies and good jobs over the next several years. Another question is how much success the more laissez-faire members of Trump’s circle, like Elon Musk, have in shaping policy. The best way for Biden and Kamala Harris to protect their legacy would have been to win the election. But it’s possible that Biden’s presidency will nonetheless be part of a turning point in American economic policy. Some of his big ideas remain more popular than Biden himself. For more: In the final days of his presidency, Biden has issued a series of policy decisions on issues including environmental justice, immigration and prison reform. THE LATEST NEWS California Fires Mexican firefighters. Max Whittaker for The New York Times Firefighters in Southern California battled and extinguished new wildfires fueled by winds. The largest fires remain far from contained. The winds yesterday were weaker than expected, but more strong winds in the forecast could stoke blazes. A state insurance program designed to cover people without standard home insurance has less than $400 million available to pay claims. Losses are estimated in the billions. “It’s a loss of a culture”: The Eaton fire displaced entire neighborhoods of a historically Black enclave in Altadena. More Americans than ever are living in areas at risk of wildfires. Confirmation Hearings Pete Hegseth Kenny Holston/The New York Times Pete Hegseth, Trump’s pick for defense secretary, defended himself during a contentious Senate confirmation hearing against allegations of sexual assault and excessive drinking. Republicans appeared ready to confirm Hegseth. Read four takeaways. Hegseth told senators that women would have ground combat roles, provided they adhered to “the same high standards” as men. He had said in the past that women did not belong in combat. Senator Marco Rubio, Trump’s secretary of state pick, is expected to appear at a hearing today. He is expected to be confirmed later this month. Pam Bondi, Trump’s choice for attorney general, has a solid reputation as a prosecutor. At today’s hearing, she will be asked about her independence. More on Politics The House passed a bill to bar trans athletes from female school sports teams. It faces a challenge in the Senate. Michelle Obama will not attend Trump’s inauguration. She had also declined to attend Carter’s state funeral. Mike Johnson ordered that American flags at the Capitol be temporarily raised for the inauguration. Trump had complained that flags were scheduled to fly at half-staff, a symbol of mourning for Carter. South Korea Investigators in South Korea detained the president, Yoon Suk Yeol, for questioning on his recent declaration of martial law. Watch a video explaining the country’s political crisis. The arrest ended a tense standoff between the police and presidential bodyguards. Officers brought ladders in case they had to scale barricades to reach Yoon. War in Gaza In Gaza City. Omar Al-Qattaa/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Israel and Hamas are close to a cease-fire agreement in Gaza after months of failed attempts, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. Read what to know about the talks. The estimated death toll from the war in Gaza may have missed 25,000 deaths, a study found. More International News Syria’s interim government says it will punish senior Assad regime figures, but some are worried it will also attack low-level officials. Catherine, Princess of Wales, said her cancer was in remission. The world’s largest gathering, a Hindu festival called the Maha Kumbh Mela, began this week. Up to 400 million people are expected to attend. Business Chinese officials are considering whether Musk should be allowed to invest in or buy TikTok’s American operations to keep it running in the U.S., the DealBook newsletter reports. With the deadline for a TikTok sale looming, some Americans are moving to another Chinese app known as Red Note. The S.E.C. sued Musk and accused him of securing a large stock position in Twitter before he bought it without filing the proper notification. Federal regulators accused Capital One of cheating customers out of $2 billion by deliberately underpaying savings account interest. Other Big Stories Sewage sludge, which farmers use as inexpensive fertilizer, contains chemicals that pose health risks, the E.P.A. said. Drinking just one alcoholic beverage a day could raise health risks, according to a federal analysis. Opinions Pam Bondi’s challenges to the 2020 election result show she will enable Trump’s worst instincts, Elie Honig writes. Are we sleepwalking into an American autocracy? Kim Lane Scheppele and Norman Eisen look to Hungary and Poland for clues. Here’s a column by Bret Stephens on Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela. A subscription to match the variety of your interests. News. Games. Recipes. Product reviews. Sports reporting. A New York Times All Access subscription covers all of it and more. Subscribe today. MORNING READS In Kyiv. Oksana Parafeniuk for The New York Times Ukraine: Despite the war, these teenagers found hope in a summer acting course. Online therapy: Digital mental health platforms were supposed to expand access for the neediest patients. Researchers say that hasn’t happened. Letter of Recommendation: Fix your glutes. Fix your life. Training: One writer on the magic of swimming lessons in middle age. Lives Lived: For nearly five decades, Leslie Charleson played the role of Dr. Monica Quartermaine, a dedicated cardiologist and the matriarch of a wealthy family on the soap opera “General Hospital.” Charleson died at 79. SPORTS Olympics: The I.O.C. will send replica medals to the swimmer Gary Hall Jr., who lost all 10 of his original medals in the Los Angeles fires. Australian Open: No. 5 seed Zheng Qinwen lost in a second-round upset to Laura Siegemund. ARTS AND IDEAS Courtesy of William Morrow Karen Wynn Fonstad was a novice cartographer who spent more than two years exhaustively mapping J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth, the setting of “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings.” The resulting book, published in 1981, impressed Tolkien fans and scholars with its exquisite level of topographic detail. Her work continues to inspire fantasy mapmakers. More on culture The author Neil Gaiman denied allegations of sexual abuse and assault made against him by multiple women. People are laughing out loud more in movie theaters. Seth Meyers joked about Trump’s inauguration. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Ryan Liebe for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews. Make homemade Hamburger Helper all in one pot. Find a new book you can’t put down. Sleep on the perfect mattress. Protect your hearing with earplugs. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was dalmatian. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Editor’s note: In yesterday’s newsletter, there was a broken link on the article about a man charged with stalking Caitlin Clark. You can read the story here. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 17 Author Members Posted January 17 January 16, 2025 By German Lopez Good morning. We’re covering a cease-fire in Gaza. We’re also covering Biden’s farewell address, confirmation hearings and an A.I. boyfriend. In central Gaza. Abdel Kareem Hana/Associated Press A truce Almost as soon as the war in Gaza began, global leaders began working to stop it. Over 15 months, Israel and Hamas repeatedly rejected proposals for peace. In that time, tens of thousands of Palestinians died. Israeli families grieved for loved ones held as hostages in Gaza. And people around the world protested against the conflict. Yesterday, Israel and Hamas finally agreed to a truce. As part of a six-week cease-fire, Israel will withdraw from parts of Gaza and free hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. Hamas will release a third of the hostages it still holds. Officials hope the cease-fire will give way to a permanent peace, but that depends on whether both sides will work out thornier problems later. Israel’s government still must ratify the agreement, but officials are treating it as complete. “We’re handing off to the next team a real opportunity for a brighter future in the Middle East,” President Biden said, referring to Donald Trump’s incoming administration. “I hope they take it.” What’s in the deal? The truce will go into effect on Sunday. Hamas will release 33 hostages in waves over six weeks. They’ll include women, children, men over age 50 and sick or wounded people. About 100 hostages remain in Gaza, although about 35 are believed to be dead. In Tel Aviv. Avishag Shaar-Yashuv for The New York Times In exchange, Israel will release around 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. It will also have to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza. After a week, Israel will withdraw its forces from the most populated areas in the enclave. A major concern remains: Some of the details are vague. “To persuade both sides to sign on, mediators forged an arrangement that is worded so loosely that some of its components remain unresolved, meaning that it could easily collapse,” my colleague Patrick Kingsley, reporting from Jerusalem, wrote. Why now? An enduring cease-fire has remained elusive since fighting started on Oct. 7, 2023. (One truce lasted for a week in 2023.) Three main issues drove both sides to a deal now: 1. Israel’s successes: After nearly a year and a half of war, Israel has weakened its enemies in the region. It killed many of Hamas’s fighters and leaders, including the group’s longtime chief in Gaza. It destroyed much of Hezbollah in Lebanon. Iran, which supports Hamas and Hezbollah, has also suffered losses, particularly the fall of an allied regime in Syria. With those wins, another attack like the one on Oct. 7 is less likely, achieving one of Israel’s goals in the war. 2. Two presidents’ efforts: Biden and Trump have pressured Israel and Hamas to reach a deal before Biden’s term ends. Biden saw an armistice as an important part of his legacy. Trump wanted to avoid having to deal with such a difficult issue as president. Both presidents’ teams worked together in negotiations, and the final agreement broadly follows a framework Biden proposed in the spring. (My colleague Peter Baker wrote about the joint effort here.) 3. Domestic pressures: Within Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s critics say he has not done enough to free the hostages. Within Gaza, Palestinians have become frustrated with Hamas and demanded peace as the humanitarian crisis caused by the war has worsened. These pressures pushed Israeli and Palestinian leaders to negotiations. What’s next? Celebrations in Ramallah. Afif Amireh for The New York Times Israel’s government will most likely ratify the agreement today. After it takes effect on Sunday, both sides will have to live up to their promises. If they don’t, the cease-fire could fall apart and fighting could begin again. If the truce holds, negotiators plan to work out a more lasting peace deal in the next six weeks. The terms of a potential agreement remain unknown, although Israel’s support might depend on the release of all remaining hostages. Those negotiations will happen under Trump. For more The families of hostages expressed both joy about the deal and anxiety that their loved ones may not be released. Watch video of Palestinians celebrating the news from NBC and follow the latest updates on the cease-fire. “The Daily” podcast explains the cease-fire. THE LATEST NEWS Biden’s Farewell In the Oval Office. Doug Mills/The New York Times Biden, in his final Oval Office address, cautioned Americans that the concentration of power among a small group of wealthy people poses a threat to democracy. He also warned of a “tech-industrial complex” and of the dangers posed by unchecked misinformation on social media. Read a transcript. Here’s a look at the highs and lows from Biden’s time in office. Confirmation Hearings Pam Bondi Kenny Holston/The New York Times At her confirmation hearing, Pam Bondi, Trump’s pick for attorney general, cast herself as an independent prosecutor while also expressing loyalty to Trump. Democrats repeatedly asked Bondi about Kash Patel, Trump’s choice to lead the F.B.I., who has said he keeps a list of enemies to prosecute. Bondi said she was unaware of the list, Politico reports. Marco Rubio, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, called for an end to the war in Ukraine and voiced support for NATO at his hearing. Senators from both parties appeared almost certain to confirm him. Inauguration Mark Zuckerberg will host a party for Trump’s inauguration. The TikTok chief executive will attend the inauguration and has been invited to sit in a position of honor on the dais. In a letter, employees at The Washington Post asked to meet with Jeff Bezos, the company’s owner, when he is in town for the inauguration. The Post has been struggling. California Fires In Altadena. Max Whittaker for The New York Times Forecasters said the recent strong winds could be almost over. This would give the firefighters a chance to contain more of the fires. The fires have hurt the livelihoods of the many day-laborers who worked for wealthy families in neighborhoods across Los Angeles. The wildfires have taken 10 more buildings by noted architects. In a shelter, animals are waiting to be reconnected with their owners. Business The Blue Origin New Glenn rocket. Gregg Newton/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Bezos launched a rocket. The flight is seen as a crucial test of the company’s ability to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Consumer prices rose again last month, a sign that the Fed’s fight against inflation might have stalled. America’s big banks — including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs — reported stronger-than-expected annual profit. The federal government sued Southwest Airlines over two routes — between Chicago and Oakland, and between Baltimore and Cleveland — that were chronically delayed in 2022. Musk is said to have intervened to help free an Italian journalist from Iran. Other Big Stories The F.D.A. banned Red Dye No. 3, which for decades has given candies and drinks a vibrant red hue. It has been linked to cancer in rats. The Supreme Court appeared supportive of a Texas law that seeks to prevent minors from viewing online porn by requiring a user to show I.D. Black and Hispanic enrollment declined on average at many colleges after the U.S. ended affirmative action, The Times found. Many more students have stopped disclosing their race. The N.Y.P.D. barred officers from chasing drivers who break traffic laws or commit low-level offenses. A federal drug program was designed to give health-care providers access to affordable medications. Instead, one company has used it to make millions while sticking patients with big bills. Opinions Americans are able to ignore the costs of natural disasters caused by climate change because the government keeps insurance prices artificially low, Parinitha Sastry and Ishita Sen argue. Here are columns by Zeynep Tufekci on Zuckerberg and Pamela Paul on geriatricians. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Ayrin, who is in love with ChatGPT. Helen Orr for The New York Times Virtual love: Meet the 28-year-old woman who spends hours talking to her A.I. boyfriend. Sober: Conscious of the health risks of alcohol, more people are cutting back on drinking. Ask the therapist: In Well’s new column, a therapist helps a reader who is sick of being her mother’s dumping ground. Social Q’s: “Our only friends went away for the weekend without us. We’re hurt!” DNA analysis: An ancient cemetery reveals a Celtic tribe that was organized around maternal lineages. Lives Lived: After coaching the University of Colorado’s football team, Bill McCartney founded the Promise Keepers, a masculine revivalist group that drew millions of supporters. He died at 84. SPORTS College basketball: Women’s teams will now get paid for playing N.C.A.A. tournament games, just as men’s teams have for years. College football: Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers declared for the N.F.L. Draft. Soccer: Actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney are part of a group buying a Colombian soccer club, nearly five years after buying the lower-tier English club Wrexham. ARTS AND IDEAS Fitness was very different in the early 1970s: There were few gyms, and people who exercised for fun were regarded as kooky. Over the course of a decade, everything changed. Women embraced fitness via Jazzercise, and yoga found its way into homes across Middle America. Read about five workouts that changed the game. More on culture Drake sued Universal Music Group for defamation and harassment over the release of Kendrick Lamar’s diss track “Not Like Us.” Test your knowledge of controversial classic books. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Armando Rafael for The New York Times Top this chicken and red lentil soup with lemony yogurt. Download your TikTok videos in case the app goes away. Here’s a guide. Keep a multimedia journal. Sign up for a razor subscription service. Eat comforting instant noodles. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were deputize and deputized. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 18 Author Members Posted January 18 January 17, 2025 SUPPORTED BY APPLE TV+ Good morning. Today, my colleague Alexis Soloski writes about the loss of community in the Los Angeles fires. We’re also covering a Gaza cease-fire, RedNote and rocket debris. —David Leonhardt The aftermath of the Eaton Fire in Altadena. Kyle Grillot for The New York Times ‘It’s all gone’ By Alexis Soloski I grew up in Los Angeles. Even as the Los Angeles wildfires continue to burn, the real, material toll is already apparent. Homes and businesses are gone. So are schools, supermarkets and houses of worship. These fires have also robbed some Californians of something more intangible: a sense of community. What defines a community? Though often a physical space, it’s also more vibes-based and amorphous — the networks of feeling among its members and their environment, built and natural. Already, online and in conversation, Angelenos are memorializing what they lost in the blazes that incinerated the Pacific Palisades, on the coast, and Altadena, an East Side enclave with a thriving Black middle class. The fish tacos at the Reel Inn. The pancakes at Fox’s. A synagogue. The Bunny Museum. Hiking trails. A pet supply store that did a brisk trade in backyard chickens. The accounting is early and incomplete. These fires will likely smolder for weeks. New ones kindle every day. The destroyed Altadena Community Church. Philip Cheung for The New York Times The eulogies show how loss is both personal and collective. JJ Redick, the Lakers’ coach who had moved to the Palisades recently, captured this in an interview over the weekend. His rented home had burned along with all of his family’s possessions. But he was struggling most, he said, with the loss of the community. “All the churches, the schools, the library, it’s all gone,” he said. He put his head in his hand when he spoke of the recreation center where his children had played sports. “It just hurts to lose that,” he said. What is the Palisades without these spaces? What comes after First settled by Indigenous peoples, then a property of Spain, then of Mexico, Los Angeles incorporated in 1850, the same year that California became a state. Rangy urban sprawl and frequent natural disasters make it feel less fixed than most major American cities. It is always growing, changing, renovating, reforming. I grew up in the Palisades in the 1990s. I left at 17 for college, and nearly every time I came home, something I loved had disappeared — a nearby bookshop, a diner. Each loss was a pinprick. It was also a real-world example of the Ship of Theseus thought experiment: How much of a neighborhood can be replaced before it isn’t your neighborhood anymore, before it isn’t your home? Now the losses are happening all at once, not slowly over time. With them comes another comprehensive loss — a civic identity, uninsurable, nonreimbursable. The Pacific Palisades neighborhood. Loren Elliott for The New York Times Some have argued that these neighborhoods shouldn’t be rebuilt, or not in the same way. They point to a 1998 essay by the eco-critic Mike Davis, “The Case for Letting Malibu Burn.” But Malibu has burned often, and for better or worse it has always come back. Likewise, these neighborhoods will almost certainly return. There will be new schools, new churches, new recreation centers. As an Angeleno, you have to witness only so many natural disasters to recognize the city’s resilience. The next Palisades won’t be the same. Neither will a future Altadena. (Whether they will still be accessible to middle-class families remains an open and necessary question.) And it’s unlikely that they’ll feel the same. At least not for a very long time. But for now those communities live on in the people comforting one another, helping one another, remembering and recovering. With luck, adequate government funding and very hard work, these places might build back safer, better able to withstand what a changing climate will bring. For a century, Los Angeles has been a dream factory. Its residents, mindful of what they have lost, grateful for what they have retained, might dream something brighter. Now is a time to mourn and help and heal. Soon it will be a time to begin again. Los Angeles, after all, loves nothing more than a sequel. For more Winds have subsided in Los Angeles, which has let firefighters make progress containing the two largest wildfires. It could still be weeks before many displaced residents are allowed to return. Officials warned water is contaminated and urged some residents to rely on bottled water. Harmful chemicals could linger in the system for years. People tend to donate clothes after a natural disaster. Aid groups in Southern California say money is more helpful. An eighth grader started a donation drive for teenagers whose homes have burned. Ariana Grande and others have chipped in. A MESSAGE FROM APPLE TV+ Severance Season 2 New season of Severance, the Emmy®-winning thriller, now streaming on Apple TV+ Stream Now THE LATEST NEWS Gaza Cease-fire Israeli and Hamas negotiators resolved their remaining differences in the cease-fire deal. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a meeting of Israel’s security cabinet to vote on the deal. Netanyahu is facing a political crisis as he manages far-right opposition to the deal. Politics Doug Burgum Eric Lee/The New York Times Doug Burgum, Donald Trump’s pick for interior secretary, told senators at his confirmation hearing that he would focus on realizing America’s “energy dominance” — shorthand for increasing fossil fuel production. At another hearing, Scott Bessent, Trump’s choice for Treasury secretary, defended plans to cut taxes and raise tariffs. President Biden issued an executive order to improve cybersecurity. It will require software companies working with the government to prove their security features can thwart Chinese intelligence agencies. In the final days of his term, Biden has issued a series of policy decisions intended to cement his agenda. Eric Adams, New York City’s Democratic mayor, made a surprise visit to Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago. Adams, who faces federal corruption charges, has said he is open to receiving a pardon from Trump. How did your neighborhood vote in 2024? Look it up using our detailed map of election results. International Omdurman, Sudan. Ivor Prickett for The New York Times Sudan’s military has used chemical weapons at least twice against the paramilitary group it is battling, U.S. officials said. China’s population declined for the third straight year. Space Marcus Haworth, via Reuters The seventh test flight of SpaceX’s Starship rocket failed. Debris could be seen falling in the sky over the Caribbean. A home security camera filmed a meteorite landing in a front yard. See the video. Other Big Stories RedNote Adek Berry/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images TikTok users are migrating en masse to the Chinese app RedNote. Cancer rates are rising among young and middle-aged women. The Federal Trade Commission sued Greystar Real Estate Partners, the largest apartment landlord in the U.S., and accused it of charging tenants millions of dollars in hidden fees. Temperatures are expected to drop below freezing across most of the U.S. in the coming days. Opinions Trump’s return to office will discourage migrants from seeking health care. Doctors should make sure that migrants know they’re safe in their exam rooms, Danielle Ofri writes. De-gendering terms — like dropping “-ess” from “actress” — is a worthwhile language endeavor, John McWhorter writes. We deserve Pete Hegseth because we live in an unserious country, David Brooks writes. Here’s a column by Bret Stephens on the Gaza cease-fire deal. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Hideko Yamashita Noriko Hayashi for The New York Times Decluttering: Before Marie Kondo, Hideko Yamashita taught Japan the art of creating tidier spaces. City life: New York isn’t cheap. Here are 40 ideas to make it more affordable. Travel: Spend 36 hours in Barbados. Screenland: Luigi Mangione isn’t the first murder suspect America has loved. He won’t be the last. Overbooked flight? Here’s what to do if an airline bumps you. Lives Lived: Bob Uecker’s baseball career was nothing special, but it led him to his true calling: sportscasting. Uecker served as the voice of the Milwaukee Brewers for more than 50 years. He died at 90. SPORTS Danielle Collins at the Australian Open. Australian Open Tennis: The American Danielle Collins heard boos from the Australian Open crowd after her win, but said afterward the disdain only motivated her more to earn a “big fat paycheck.” Unrivaled: A new women’s 3-on-3 basketball league, featuring some of the world’s best players, begins today. N.F.L.: Tom Brady’s agent said the former quarterback plans to fulfill the rest of his 10-year broadcast deal at Fox despite his growing role as minority owner of the Raiders. A MESSAGE FROM APPLE TV+ Severance Season 2 New season of Severance, the Emmy®-winning thriller, now streaming on Apple TV+ Stream Now ARTS AND IDEAS Shane and Hannah Burcaw. Ryan Pfluger for The New York Times In a new essay collection, Shane and Hannah Burcaw, an influencer couple, explore “interabled” relationships, where one person has a disability and the other doesn’t. They say people are very curious about the caregiving aspects of their relationship, but they argue that is just a part of romantic love. More on culture David Lynch Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images David Lynch, whose strange, dreamlike creations included the TV series “Twin Peaks” and the film “Mulholland Drive,” died at 78. The actor Justin Baldoni is suing Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds for defamation. He claims they falsely accused him of sexual harassment and damaged his reputation. Restaurants are making wine lists shorter and less intimidating. The Apple TV+ dystopian thriller “Severance” is back for Season 2. Here’s where the first season left off. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times. Food Stylist; Hadas Smirnoff. Prop Stylist: Megan Hedgepeth. Marinate chicken in mayonnaise, ginger and lime zest, then cook for a 15-minute dinner. Revive your hair with dry shampoo. Sit on a supportive office chair. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was notably. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 20 Author Members Posted January 20 January 18, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We’re devoting the top of today’s Morning to the TikTok news. Melissa Kirsch will return next Saturday. The TikTok logo in Times Square Leonardo Munoz/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Big and bold It has become a cliché to lament that the U.S. government no longer does big, audacious things. But shutting down TikTok — a social media platform that roughly half of Americans use — would certainly qualify as big and audacious. That outcome became more likely yesterday, even if it is far from assured. The Supreme Court unanimously upheld a bill that Congress passed last year forcing ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns TikTok, to sell it. If ByteDance refuses, as Chinese officials have so far insisted, the app will no longer be available for downloads or updates in the U.S. as early as tomorrow. The potential shutdown of a media platform as large as TikTok has little precedent. It would create inconveniences and costs for millions of Americans. Many would have to alter their daily habits, and some would lose business opportunities. Yet allowing a Chinese company — and, by extension, the Chinese government — to control a U.S. communication platform and vast amounts of Americans’ personal data also has major downsides. Congress and the Supreme Court have decided that the risks are large enough to justify the disruption. It’s a sign of the intensity of the U.S.-China competition for global influence. Bipartisan worries Both the boldness of the TikTok law and its bipartisan nature wouldn’t have seemed so unusual decades ago. U.S. history is full of ambitious projects whose rationale was at least partly to confront foreign adversaries, including the space program, the Interstate Highway System, the post-Sputnik investment in scientific research, and the industrial mobilization during World War II. Forcing the sale of TikTok, or shutting it down, obviously doesn’t approach the scale of those projects. Still, it is far-reaching in its own way. It’s a big enough change that many Americans have found it hard to believe that the federal government will go through with it. And it is on the cusp of happening because a broad range of policymakers have decided the alternative is unacceptable. A demonstrator on Capitol Hill in 2023. Brendan Smialowski/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images During the oral arguments at the Supreme Court last week, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, a Republican appointee, talked about the possibility that China could use TikTok’s extensive data collection “to turn people, to blackmail people, people who, a generation from now, will be working in the F.B.I. or the C.I.A. or in the State Department.” Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a Democratic appointee, also worried aloud about potential spying. Justice Sonya Sotomayor, another Democratic appointee, said, “It’s about the data control.” TikTok claims that the Chinese government is unlikely to force the company to hand over sensitive information, such as users’ contacts. But that claim seems inconsistent with recent history, as the justices noted in their ruling. China “has engaged in extensive and yearslong efforts to accumulate structured datasets, in particular on U.S. persons, to support its intelligence and counterintelligence operations,” the ruling pointed out. The vote in Congress also showed deep, bipartisan concern. The bill passed 360 to 58 in the House and 78 to 18 in the Senate. In addition to data security, members of Congress worried that China would use TikTok to spread misinformation and propaganda. Independent research has found that the platform already seems to do so, making it hard to find videos sympathetic to Taiwan, Tibet, Ukraine and other causes to which the Chinese Communist Party is hostile. What’s next The biggest question now is what the incoming Trump administration will do. When he was president before, Donald Trump helped start the crackdown on TikTok, calling it a national security risk. He has since changed his position for reasons that remain unclear. A TikTok investor and Republican donor apparently lobbied Trump shortly before he came out against a ban. He also enjoys his popularity on the app. The Biden administration said yesterday that it would not enforce the ban in the brief window — 36 hours — after it takes effect and before Trump takes office. Trump is reportedly considering an executive order to delay the ban while his administration tries to help negotiate a sale to a non-Chinese owner. The Chinese government, for its part, insists that it will not allow ByteDance to sell TikTok. Beijing evidently considers TikTok too valuable. The range of outcomes over the next few weeks remains wide — including a shutdown, a sale or some version of the status quo combined with a continuing legal fight. Go inside the decision: To understand the Supreme Court’s reasoning, I recommend Adam Liptak’s article. More on TikTok TikTok said last night that it would go dark tomorrow unless the Biden administration assured other technology companies they would not be punished for delivering the app. Three Times reporters tell the story of how TikTok long evaded a ban — until now. Oracle, one of TikTok’s server providers, may determine the app’s future. Parents had mixed reactions to the ruling: Some said good riddance to an app that absorbed their kids’ attention; others were sad to lose a source of shared fun. Here’s a guide to downloading your videos before the app stops working. THE WEEK IN CULTURE Film and TV David Lynch, who died this week at 78, developed a style all his own. Watch five scenes that capture the “Lynchian” aesthetic. “Nickel Boys,” adapted from Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, uses nonlinear storytelling to capture a broad scope of Black life. Guy Pearce turned his back on Hollywood. At 57, he’s returned with a role in “The Brutalist.” “Her,” Spike Jonze’s drama about a romance between a man and his A.I. assistant, was set in 2025. Here’s what it got right about modern love. Season 2 of “Severance” makes its world bigger and stranger. Read our review. Art Can you tell the difference between a Monet and a Manet? Test your knowledge of the Impressionists with a quiz. An art collector said he lost about 30 works by Andy Warhol, as well as pieces by Keith Haring and Damien Hirst, in the Los Angeles wildfires. “Pictures of Belonging,” now at the Smithsonian, traces the careers of three female artists who flourished despite America’s imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II. More Culture How the failed N.B.A. player LiAngelo Ball made the first rap hit of the year. Nintendo announced that a successor to its Switch console, called the Switch 2, will arrive later this year. Conan O’Brien will receive the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor next month. THE LATEST NEWS Politics Preparations for the inauguration in the Capitol Rotunda. Kenny Holston/The New York Times Trump moved Monday’s inauguration ceremony inside the Capitol because of the cold. President Biden commuted the sentences of nearly 2,500 inmates who had committed nonviolent drug offenses. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asked the F.D.A. to halt the Covid vaccines in May 2021, six months after the shots were introduced, when they were helping pull the U.S. out of the pandemic. Biden’s inner circle recognized his frailty years ago but coordinated to protect him, a Times investigation found. Immigration Ten Senate Democrats joined Republicans to advance a bill that would require the deportation of undocumented migrants charged with burglary or assaulting a police officer, among other crimes. The vote exposed a Democratic Party rift on immigration. The Trump administration plans to begin immigration raids in Chicago on Tuesday, the day after the inauguration. Other Big Stories The Israeli government approved a cease-fire deal with Hamas that will halt fighting in Gaza and free dozens of hostages and hundreds of prisoners. The deal is set to take effect Sunday. A Justice Department investigation found that the Louisiana State Police engaged in a statewide pattern of excessive force during arrests. The Los Angeles fires reached farther into the city than many residents thought possible. That’s because the wildfires transformed into urban fires, in which homes ignited one after the other. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now CULTURE CALENDAR By Alexis Soloski 📺 “Prime Target” (Wednesday): Few of us thrill to a mathematical proof. A conspiracy-minded eight-episode series on AppleTV+ has other ideas. Leo Woodall (last seen in “The White Lotus” Season 2 doing bad things on yachts) stars as a Cambridge University numbers genius who makes a breakthrough — a formula that can pierce any digital security system. (Even two-factor authentication? Whoa.) What will nefarious government agents do to get their hands on it? Here, as occasionally in calculus, there are no limits. Quintessa Swindell (“Black Adam”) plays an N.S.A. agent with some dangerous equations of her own. RECIPE OF THE WEEK Romulo Yanes for The New York Times By Melissa Clark Croque-Monsieur Breakfast Casserole A three-day weekend is always a great excuse for having people over for a long, leisurely brunch — preferably one centered around a dish that can be made almost entirely in advance. Sarah Copeland’s croque-monsieur breakfast casserole is exactly that, a golden, custardy beauty filled with sliced baguettes, ham, and a melty cap of Gruyère cheese. It only takes about 15 minutes to assemble everything in the baking dish, which is easily done the night before. Then you can sip your morning coffee while the casserole bakes, and let its toasted, buttery scent be a warm welcome to greet your guests when they arrive. REAL ESTATE Katie Israel with her 4-year-old twins. William DeShazer for The New York Times The Hunt: After leaving prison, a single mother looked for a home in Tennessee where she could rebuild her life. Which did she choose? Play our game. Carrie’s brownstone: Fans flock to the real-life Manhattan stoop featured on “Sex and the City.” Will a gate keep them away? What you get for $400,000: A Greek Revival house in Milan, Ohio; a condo in Philadelphia; or a shotgun-style house in New Orleans. LIVING Jonny Carmack owns about 30 food stools. George Etheredge for The New York Times Do not eat: Furniture resembling food — a strawberry table, a burger stool — is all the rage online. Style sensation: A fashionable former educator, 79, has become an unlikely social media darling. Intimacy: The joy — and awkwardness — of sober sex. Dinner time: Plant-based “meat” is processed, but that doesn’t mean it’s unhealthy. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Revive your wooden spoons Wooden spoons are a great alternative to plastic ones. But they are finicky: They’re incompatible with dishwashers, they’re prone to warp, and they can get grimy if you don’t properly care for them. Fortunately, restoring wooden spoons to their full glory is simple. When they begin to look dry, coat them with food-grade mineral oil and let them sit overnight. Then use a paper towel to rub a dime-size dollop of beeswax across the surface — this helps lock in the moisture and keep the wood in tip-top condition. Well-hydrated spoons should last years, and maybe even a lifetime. — Maki Yazawa GAME OF THE WEEK Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love. Sam Navarro/USA Today Sports, via Reuters Notre Dame vs. Ohio State, college football championship: Notre Dame and Ohio State had the two best defenses in the country, in terms of points allowed, and each is tailored to stop the other’s offensive strength. Ohio State excels against the run; Notre Dame is great against the pass. The outcome might depend on which star breaks through: Notre Dame’s speedy running back Jeremiyah Love or Ohio State’s freshman wide receiver Jeremiah Smith. Monday at 7:30 p.m. Eastern on ESPN NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was inflect. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week’s headlines. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — David Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 20 Author Members Posted January 20 January 19, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Kevin Draper explains a major change in college football. We’re also covering Israel, TikTok and Trump. —David Leonhardt In Arlington, Texas. Jerome Miron/USA Today Sports, via Reuters Managing the chaos By Kevin Draper I’m an investigative reporter, with a focus on sports. Notre Dame and Ohio State will meet tomorrow in the college football national championship game. After the final whistle, the authors of the victory will be paraded across your television. You will hear from the head coach, the quarterback, maybe the athletic director. Who you probably won’t hear from, though, is the person who built the winning team: the general manager. General managers, once purely the domain of professional sports, are taking over college football. In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain why. Enter the G.M. Managing a roster of over 100 players, and a staff of dozens, was always a difficult job for a coach. Now it is impossible. That’s because the sport has changed drastically in the past few years. Players can be paid — for some, more than they would get in the N.F.L. — without sacrificing eligibility. And they can transfer to different schools between each season. “The job is too big for a college coach,” said Andrew Luck, the former Stanford quarterback who recently returned to his alma mater as its football general manager. “The role has changed. The system has changed so much and continues to change.” Luck, like most general managers, is largely responsible for securing money and signing players, many of whom announce they wish to change schools by entering the sport’s so-called transfer portal. The portal was most recently open from Dec. 9 to 28. Not only was that over the holidays, but it was also when dozens of teams were competing in bowl games. Without a general manager, a coach would have to prepare for a big game while also evaluating thousands of potential players to build next year’s roster. Andrew Luck Josie Lepe/Associated Press “The transfer portal was intense,” said Luck, a college football optimist who stayed at Stanford to finish his degree in 2011, even when he was projected to be the first pick in the N.F.L. draft. “If I had any romantic notion of the thing, the business side, it was lost there.” On the field The influence of general managers will be apparent tomorrow night: Both teams’ starting quarterbacks are transfers. Notre Dame will be led by Riley Leonard, who spent the past three seasons at Duke, and Ohio State will be led by Will Howard, who spent four seasons at Kansas State. Of course, not all players are transfers. A majority of players on both rosters were recruited straight from high school, as they have always been. One big difference for those players, however, is they were paid to be there. Ryan Day, Ohio State’s coach, said in 2022 that it would cost $13 million to keep his team together. Four months ago, Ohio State’s athletic director revised that figure upward and said $20 million was being spent on the team’s roster. Looking to the future Notre Dame and Ohio State are both powerhouses. But the College Football Playoff — the 12-team tournament that led to the championship game — also included relative upstarts like Boise State, Arizona State and Southern Methodist University. Will the changes to college football further entrench the dominance of the blue bloods, the few programs that can raise and spend $20 million or more on a roster? Or will they allow less prestigious teams to strategically spend the dollars they do have to poach players that otherwise might have gone to the big teams? Luck, whose Stanford Cardinal program hasn’t had a winning record for seven seasons, hopes it is the latter. “I still want to believe there is space for a broad college football landscape,” he said, “that if you hit enough of the right notes, every program has a chance to succeed and win championships.” For more: Read my story about how general managers have made the college game more appealing for some coaches, including Bill Belichick, the new head coach for the University of North Carolina. THE LATEST NEWS Gaza Cease-Fire In Gaza. Dawoud Abu Alkas/Reuters A cease-fire and hostage release agreement between Israel and Hamas took effect this morning. Israel delayed the cease-fire for nearly three hours until Hamas named the three hostages to be released today. Israel and Hamas have agreed to observe a 42-day truce, during which Hamas will release 33 of the roughly 100 hostages it still holds and Israel will free hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. After 15 months of war, Gazans spoke of the houses they would rebuild and the graves they would visit once they returned home. Some hostage families are picturing their loves ones’ return without knowing whether they have survived, The Wall Street Journal reports. TikTok TikTok shuttered service in the U.S. last night, hours before the government’s ban was set to take effect. The app showed users a message that read, in part, “We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution.” Before the platform went dark, users posted videos filled with sadness and silliness. “It’s like losing a relative,” one creator said. For an app with such devoted users, TikTok’s end came with a surprising lack of outrage, our tech columnist writes. Trump Transition Donald Trump Eric Lee/The New York Times Donald Trump promised to punish his adversaries. On the eve of his inauguration, many of them are preparing to become targets. In Washington, the defiance that marked the beginning of Trump’s first term has given way to deference, Peter Baker writes. Across the country, there are few signs of the mass protests that birthed “the resistance” eight years ago. Trump’s wealthy cabinet picks are moving to Washington, prompting a boom in the capital’s luxury real estate market. Fox News is preparing to cover an administration likely to be filled with former employees. Cryptocurrency, overseas real estate and merchandising: Here’s an illustrated guide to the web of conflicts in the new administration. How do Americans feel about the future? The Times asked people across the country. Hear responses from the hopeful and the fearful. Other Big Stories Strong winds are expected to create extreme fire risk in Southern California tomorrow. Poor planning and strained resources allowed firestorms to overrun Los Angeles. See a timeline. A winter storm is expected to bring at least six inches of snow to America’s Northeast. In Iran, an unidentified gunman killed two high-profile judges outside the Supreme Court. The authorities described it as a terrorist attack. THE SUNDAY DEBATE Should Trump enforce the TikTok law? Yes. If Trump doesn’t enforce the law, he’ll show weakness in national security. “His duty as President is to enforce the TikTok law, not ignore it in the hope of cutting a deal with China’s dictator,” The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board writes. No. TikTok is too important to our culture and politics. “A ban would dismantle a one-of-a-kind informational and cultural ecosystem, silencing millions in the process,” Senator Ed Markey writes for The Boston Globe. FROM OPINION “Hamilton” premiered 10 years ago, during an era of liberal optimism. Watching it now feels like a trip to a distant past, Ezekiel Kweku writes. Pico Iyer lost his home to a wildfire in 1990. It taught him to put less stock in material things, he writes. Here are columns by Maureen Dowd on Trump’s return to Washington and Nicholas Kristof on reasons to feel optimistic. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Julie Packard Ian C. Bates for The New York Times Under the sea: A conversation with the longtime leader of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, who loves giant kelp and the mola mola. The Ethicist: “Can I go to church when I don’t believe?” Wedding trends: Some couples are sharing their vows in private. Most clicked: The most popular link in The Morning this week covered 35 wellness tips that health experts swear by. Vows: She was immediately smitten. He took a while to notice. Lives Lived: André Soltner was a chef whose reverence for classic French cooking and the homey specialties of his native Alsace helped place New York’s Lutèce among the most celebrated restaurants in the U.S. He died at 92. BOOK OF THE WEEK President Gerald Ford’s son chats with White House staff in 1974. David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images By Elisabeth Egan “The Residence,” by Kate Andersen Brower: On the eve of the inauguration of the 47th president of the United States, why not take a breezy spin through the 132-room, 55,000 square foot building the first family calls home? Brower, who covered the Obama administration for Bloomberg News, takes readers behind the scenes with butlers, chefs, ushers, engineers, electricians, carpenters and florists as guides. One might wonder how, exactly, White House staff manage to switch out the furniture in a mere six hours on the first day of a new administration. They’re fueled by a combination of sweat, stress and teamwork, according to Brower, whose sources (gently) spill the tea on past residents and their furry friends. Fans of “The Residence” (2015) can look forward to the Netflix adaptation — a mystery drama starring Uzo Aduba and Giancarlo Esposito — this March. More on books Whether you’re looking for tales of marriages gone wrong or nail biters in hard-to-reach locations, let us help you find your next thriller. The novelist Adam Haslett’s shelves are lined with books on drug trafficking and Kant. THE INTERVIEW Curtis Yarvin Philip Montgomery for The New York Times By David Marchese This week’s subject for The Interview is the political blogger and computer engineer Curtis Yarvin. His aggressively antidemocratic ideas have found a receptive audience among powerful conservatives, including Vice President-elect JD Vance. So why is democracy so bad? It’s not even that democracy is bad; it’s just that it’s very weak. And the fact that it’s very weak is easily seen by the fact that very unpopular policies like mass immigration persist despite strong majorities being against them. The thing that you have not isolated is why having a strongman would be better for people’s lives. Can you answer that? Yes. I think that having an effective government and an efficient government is better for people’s lives. When I ask people to answer that question, I ask them to look around the room and point out everything in the room that was made by a monarchy, because these things that we call companies are actually little monarchies. You’re looking around, and you see, for example, a laptop, and that laptop was made by Apple, which is a monarchy. Why do you have such faith in the ability of C.E.O.s? Most start-ups fail. We can all point to C.E.O.s who have been ineffective. It seems like such a simplistic way of thinking. It’s not a simplistic way of thinking, and having worked inside the salt mines where C.E.O.s do their C.E.O.ing, and having been a C.E.O. myself, I think I have a better sense of it than most people. If you took any of the Fortune 500 C.E.O.s, just pick one at random and put him or her in charge of Washington. I think you’d get something much, much better than what’s there. It doesn’t have to be Elon Musk. Read more of the interview here. THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE Photograph by Marcus Schaefer for The New York Times Click the cover image above to read this week’s magazine. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Upgrade work lunches. Improve your sex life with an intimacy retreat. Transform a space with peel-and-stick wallpaper. Use a kitchen product to keep toilets stain free. MEAL PLAN Linda Xiao for The New York Times In this week’s Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter, Emily Weinstein lavishes praise on an affordable dinner warrior: chicken. She suggests making a 15-minute ginger-lime chicken and a sheet-pan fish tikka with spinach. NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was headlamp. Can you put eight historical events — including the revolt of Spartacus, the development of zero, and the creation of Jazzercise — in chronological order? Take this week’s Flashback quiz. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 21 Author Members Posted January 21 January 20, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We’re covering the start of Trump’s second term — as well as Biden’s final day, the Gaza cease-fire and longevity. Donald Trump at the Capital One Arena in Washington. Doug Mills/The New York Times Inauguration Day The second Trump administration becomes a reality at noon Eastern today. In today’s newsletter, my colleagues and I look at seven areas where Donald Trump is likely to make immediate changes to government policy. For each area, we’ll also highlight one big unknown that will start to become clear in coming weeks. 1. Immigration Trump will almost certainly impose strict border rules and begin deporting more undocumented immigrants. The administration may start deportation raids tomorrow, in Chicago. The unknown: Still, it remains unclear how far Trump will go. Will he focus deportations on distinct groups — such as people who entered the country recently, who already have an order to leave or who have been charged with a crime? Or will he also deport people who have been here for years and built stable lives? 2. Tariffs Trump campaigned on a promise to impose tariffs of up to 20 percent on any goods entering the U.S., and he is likely to enact some tariffs quickly. By making foreign goods more expensive, he hopes to help American companies even if the policy raises consumer prices. The unknown: There is a big difference between a sweeping tariff that applies to all goods and targeted tariffs that focus on specific products (like technology equipment) or countries (like China). Trump’s aides have sent mixed signals about which they will pursue, according to my colleague Ana Swanson, who covers trade. 3. China and TikTok The Trump administration is full of competing instincts on China policy, notes Edward Wong, a diplomatic correspondent for The Times. Several top advisers, like Marco Rubio, see China as a hostile power trying to weaken the U.S. Others in Trump’s orbit, like Elon Musk, see China primarily as a huge market. Trump himself frequently criticizes China but admires its autocratic president, Xi Jinping. The unknown: Trump’s China policy is among the most uncertain areas of the new administration. And it will require a quick decision — on TikTok. The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld a bipartisan law forcing TikTok’s Chinese owner to sell it or shut it down. Trump said over the weekend that he would likely decline to enforce the law for 90 days. Will he ultimately fold and allow China to continue controlling TikTok? Will he broker a sale? Or will he shut down TikTok if Xi refuses to allow a sale? (For more, I recommend Edward’s story analyzing America’s China policy.) 4. Abortion Trump understands that abortion has become a losing issue for the Republican Party, and he is unlikely to do as much as abortion opponents would like. But he will still probably take some steps to reduce access, my colleague Kate Zernike says. One possibility is that he’ll make it easier for states to deny abortions during medical emergencies. The unknown: Pills now account for about two-thirds of abortions, and pro-abortion activists have succeeded in making the pills available even in states with tight restrictions. Those efforts have mitigated the impact of the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade. Whether the Trump administration clamps down on the interstate mailing of pills is the biggest question about its abortion policy. 5. Ukraine Trump has less patience for Ukraine than President Biden and many Senate Republicans do. As a result, the flow of U.S. weapons and money will almost certainly decrease. But the extent of the change remains unclear. The unknown: Since winning the election, Trump has sent mixed signals. He recently predicted that ending the Russia-Ukraine war could take six months (rather than one day, as he claimed as a candidate). My colleague Eric Schmitt says there is a good chance Trump will provide Ukraine with some additional aid, either publicly or covertly, to pressure Vladimir Putin to agree to a truce this year. 6. Iran Trump is more hawkish on Iran than on any other foreign adversary, and Iran is weaker today than it has been in years, thanks to its struggling economy and Israel’s recent military successes. Trump is likely to place more pressure on Iran than Biden did, starting with sanctions. The unknown: Is the next step a peace deal or a military attack? In one scenario, Trump would pursue a deal with tough terms for Iran, including an end to its nuclear program and restrictions on its support for extremist groups like Hamas. In another scenario, Trump would sign off on an Israeli military attack against Iran’s nuclear facilities, with potential U.S. cooperation. 7. Climate Trump shows little concern about climate change and will reverse some major Biden policies. My colleague Coral Davenport expects Trump to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement, expand oil and gas drilling and loosen pollution regulations. The unknown: The fate of the clean-energy subsidies in Biden’s signature 2022 climate legislation is less clear. Many of these subsidies — for wind, solar and battery production, for example — flow to Republican House districts. Coral expects that some subsidies may be doomed (like the $7,500 consumer tax credit for electric vehicles) but that others may survive. What’s next The list here isn’t complete. It doesn’t include tax policy, because a bill will take months to wend through Congress. And it doesn’t include the question of how Trump will use presidential power to benefit his allies and potentially punish his political opponents. We’ll address those issues in future newsletters. (Here is a list of his pledges for changing American life.) We’ve focused today on major areas in which Trump can quickly shift policy. His executive actions will provide more clarity starting today. THE LATEST NEWS Trump’s Inauguration Donald Trump Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times Trump’s inauguration will be held today inside the Capitol Rotunda, to avoid the cold outside. He is completing a political comeback unlike any in American history, Peter Baker writes. He is also returning to the White House in a far stronger position than he was in last time. Trump’s supporters flew from around the world to see him take office. Many are disappointed they can’t watch the inauguration outside — and they are left out of Washington’s exclusive parties. Trump held a rare pre-inauguration rally at an arena. “Tomorrow at noon, the curtain closes on four long years of American decline,” he said in a speech. Trump wants to appear strong on Day 1 by signing many executive orders. Read what to expect today. More on Trump Today is also Martin Luther King Day. As Trump takes office, some people are questioning the state of civil rights in America. Trump plans to strip job protections for career civil servants in his first few days in office, according to the incoming deputy chief of staff. More Americans support Trump’s policies — such as mass deportations — than support Trump, a poll by The Times and Ipsos found. Mexico’s president has detained more migrants and seized more fentanyl ahead of Trump’s return. Trump targeted scientists in his first term. They have taken steps to limit political interference in their work this time. TikTok TikTok publicly thanked Trump for his support as it fights a ban in the U.S. It included a message in the app crediting him with its return. Trump’s solution may fall short, David Sanger explains. Biden Administration President Biden embracing Representative James Clyburn. Cheriss May for The New York Times Biden spent his final full day as president in South Carolina, where he revived his flailing campaign five years ago. “We must hold on to hope. We must stay engaged,” he told supporters during a visit to a historically Black church. Biden pardoned five activists and public servants, including a posthumous grant of clemency to the civil rights leader Marcus Garvey. Gaza Cease-Fire Emily Damari arrives at Sheba Hospital in Israel. Avishag Shaar-Yashuv for The New York Times Three hostages were freed in the first phase of the cease-fire agreement between Hamas and Israel. Hours later, Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners. Fighting may have halted in Gaza, but the war is not over: The initial deal is fragile, Steven Erlanger writes, and making it permanent will be difficult. As the cease-fire came into effect, Hamas fighters took to streets of Gaza in a show of force. “The weight on my chest has lifted”: The truce left Palestinians and Israelis elated and anxious all at once. California Wildfires People who fled the fires in Los Angeles have returned, only to find that smoke and ash have made their homes unbearable. Dangerous winds are expected in Southern California today as firefighters still work to fully contain the fires. Other Big Stories A winter storm hit parts of the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. The coldest air in years is expected descend across much of the U.S. today. The World Economic Forum will meet in Davos this week. On the agenda this year: the future of Ukraine and climate change. The C.I.A. has developed a chatbot that lets analysts talk with virtual versions of foreign leaders. Opinions How do you prevent a president from becoming a king? America’s founding fathers had no answer, Stacy Schiff writes. The U.S. is in an era of wildfires, and we need to learn how to live with them, Liz Koslov and Kathryn McConnell write. Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss Trump’s inauguration. Here are columns by Ezra Klein on Trump’s cultural victory and David French on religious freedom. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Jackie Kennedy at the inauguration in 1961. Paul Schutzer/The LIFE Picture Collection, via Shutterstock Political style: First ladies often make statements with their Inauguration Day outfits. See 80 years of first lady fashion. Travel: Never heard of Yogyakarta? It might be the center of the universe. Living forever: For centuries, men seeking to cheat death have mixed science with quackery. Metropolitan Diary: Looking good for 91. Lives Lived: Lynne Taylor-Corbett was a Tony Award-nominated choreographer and director whose career included commissions for New York City Ballet and the film “Footloose.” She died at 78. SPORTS N.F.L.: The Bills defeated the Ravens in Buffalo, 27-25, to advance to the A.F.C. title game. On the other side of the bracket, the Eagles took a spot in the N.F.C. championship after a 28-22 win over the Rams. N.H.L.: Connor McDavid, the Oilers star, is likely to receive a suspension after cross-checking Conor Garland, the Canucks winger. ARTS AND IDEAS Neon; A24; MGM Sex scenes are back, but they aren’t exactly sexy. In movies like “Anora” and “Babygirl,” the directors use intimate moments to explore complex power dynamics. Their aim is to engender discussion, not arousal. Esther Zuckerman highlights five scenes that do this especially well. More on culture “Mufasa: The Lion King,” which opened to weak ticket sales last month, has become a sleeper hit. The beloved children’s YouTuber Ms. Rachel (her real name is Rachel Accurso) announced a deal with Netflix. Her other ventures include toys, apparel and a publishing deal with Random House. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Jessica Emily Marx for The New York Times Honor the life of David Lynch with this “Twin Peaks” cherry pie. Keep your texts private. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was etymology. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. —David Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 21 Author Members Posted January 21 January 21, 2025 By German Lopez Good morning. We’re covering President Trump’s first day back in office, as well as Gaza, California and publishing in Africa. Inside the Capitol Rotunda. Kenny Holston/The New York Times Day 1 A president’s second swearing-in is sometimes a low-energy affair — a continuation of the norm. But President Trump signaled yesterday that he was returning with an agenda that is both more sweeping and better vetted than that of his first term. Consider his executive orders. When Trump took office in 2017, he signed one order on Inauguration Day. Yesterday, Trump signed dozens. That difference shows how Trump has transformed since his first term: He and his aides now understand the vast federal bureaucracy and how to use the presidency’s full powers. “I have learned a lot along the way,” Trump said, referring to the past eight years. Now he wants to get stuff done. In his Inaugural Address, Trump complained about his critics, the border and America’s treatment on the world stage. But he also focused — unusually so — on policy specifics. “Inaugural Addresses traditionally aspire to lofty and unifying themes and shy away from details on policies, leaving those for a later day,” my colleague Peter Baker wrote. The rest of today’s newsletter will cover Trump’s first day in office, including his pardons of the Jan. 6 Capitol rioters and the impact of his executive orders. Trump’s speech Donald Trump Kenny Holston/The New York Times Trump declared that “America’s decline is over” and that “the golden age of America begins right now.” He said a “radical and corrupt establishment has extracted power and wealth from our citizens, while the pillars of our society lay broken and seemingly in complete disrepair.” He vowed to fix the country. He promised swift action on the economy, immigration, national security and social issues. He said he would invoke an archaic federal law, the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, to eliminate “foreign gangs and criminal networks.” Trump repeated a pledge to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, eliciting a laugh from Hillary Clinton. And he said he would restore William McKinley’s name to the country’s tallest mountain. (The Obama administration renamed it Denali, which is what Alaska’s Native population calls it.) He said it was now government policy that there “are only two genders: male and female.” His tone was aggressive, a warning to domestic and foreign audiences that America under a more experienced Trump will not take no for an answer, David Sanger writes. Trump made false claims about the Panama Canal and the 2020 election. Here’s a fact-check of the speech. The ceremony Elon Musk, center, cheered on Trump during the ceremony. Kenny Holston/The New York Times Because of below-freezing temperatures in Washington, Trump’s inauguration took place inside the Capitol Rotunda. The podcaster Joe Rogan sat onstage, as did several tech executives including Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook. This graphic shows who was among Trump’s inner circle. “For the many billionaires who bought their way in, it was both a flex and act of public deference to be there,” Shawn McCreesh wrote. Read about the awkwardness onstage. Many guests — including Ron DeSantis and the YouTuber Logan Paul — had to sit in an overflow room and watch the ceremony on a screen. Melania Trump wore a black hat with a wide brim. “Whatever she was thinking was impossible to see — by design,” our fashion critic, Vanessa Friedman, wrote. The country singer Carrie Underwood performed an a cappella rendition of “America the Beautiful,” summoning the crowd to join her after the background music failed to play. Watch the video. See photos of the day’s events. Executive actions At the Capital One Arena in Washington. Doug Mills/The New York Times Trump signed a handful of executive actions onstage at a Washington arena as supporters cheered him on. He signed dozens more throughout the day. They covered a range of campaign issues: Immigration. Trump declared a national emergency over the U.S.-Mexico border, which unlocks federal funds to build the border wall and turn back more migrants. He also put restrictions on asylum and made border security a military priority. And he moved to end birthright citizenship, a right that the Constitution guarantees. Tariffs and trade. Trump directed federal agencies to investigate potentially unfair trade practices. He also called for an assessment of previous trade deals, particularly those with China, Mexico and Canada. And he moved to create a new agency, the External Revenue Service, to collect tariffs. Trump has not yet imposed new tariffs. Energy and the environment. Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris Agreement, an international climate pact. He declared a national energy emergency and eased regulations to allow more domestic oil and gas production. TikTok. Trump stalled enforcement of a ban on TikTok for at least 75 days, giving ByteDance, the app’s Chinese owner, more time to find a way to stay in the country. In the meantime, TikTok will stay online. Other issues. Trump ended remote work for federal employees and froze most federal hiring. And he withdrew the United States from the World Health Organization. Some of Trump’s actions are likely to invite the kinds of legal challenges that often stifled him during his first term. Already, the A.C.L.U. and immigrants’ rights groups have filed a lawsuit over the effort to end birthright citizenship. One question is whether his team is better prepared to defend his policies. You can find the full list of executive orders here. Jan. 6 pardons Trump granted clemency to all the nearly 1,600 people charged over the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. He pardoned Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys leader, and he commuted the sentence of Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the Oath Keepers militia. “An unspeakably joyous, happy day”: Dozens of people celebrated the pardons outside a jail in Washington. With the stroke of a pen, Trump erased the biggest and most complex investigation in Justice Department history, Glenn Thrush wrote. More coverage Hours before the end of his term, Joe Biden issued protective pardons for several people the Trump administration might prosecute. The list included Anthony Fauci, House members who investigated the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, and members of the Biden family. JD Vance, 40, took his oath as the youngest U.S. vice president in over 70 years. Trump has brought back his reality-show spectacle, our TV critic wrote. Trump’s supporters filled Washington’s streets with a sense of triumph and gloating. Vivek Ramaswamy quit as co-leader of what Trump has labeled the Department of Government Efficiency. He plans to run for governor of Ohio, and he also had tensions with Elon Musk. Jon Stewart and the other late night hosts discussed the inauguration. THE LATEST NEWS Gaza Cease-Fire In Jabaliya, Gaza. Abed Hajjar/Associated Press The cease-fire let Gazans return to their homes. Many are sifting through wreckage. Many Israelis feel conflicted about the cease-fire deal: More than 30 hostages will likely be freed, but Hamas could now remain in power in Gaza. Israel’s defense minister told the military to prevent mass celebrations in the West Bank as Palestinian prisoners are released. A senior Hamas official said the group was open to improving its relationship with the U.S. California Fires Southern California is braced for powerful winds. Officials say they are now better prepared for extreme fire danger. The lead content of Los Angeles’ air reached 100 times its normal level as the fires consumed old pipes and paint. One Altadena couple found help from a local expert to save their pets of 25 years: five koi fish. Other Big Stories Waiting to cross into Venezuela. Schneyder Mendoza/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images In Colombia, clashes between two rival armed groups have killed at least 80 people and forced thousands to flee. An Indian court gave a life sentence to a man convicted of raping and murdering a trainee doctor in Kolkata. Her killing inspired national outrage. A winter storm in the southeastern U.S. brought sleet and snow to the Gulf Coast. Opinions Trump’s talk of manifest destiny legitimizes a world order in which might makes right, Greg Grandin writes. The billionaire class’s alliance with Trump is likely to shift government policy to its narrow interests. The economy will suffer, Filipe Campante and Raymond Fisman argue. Here’s a column by Maureen Dowd on Trump’s Inaugural Address. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Partisan Coffee Shop in Paris. Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York Times Barista battle: Specialty coffee shops are competing with traditional cafes in Paris. Ask Vanessa: “How can I get out of my leggings rut?” Skin care: LED face masks are all over the internet. Do they actually work? Lives Lived: Cecile Richards was a former president of Planned Parenthood and among the nation’s best-known defenders of abortion rights. She died at 67. SPORTS Tennis: Coco Gauff is out of the Australian Open after an upset quarterfinal loss against Paula Badosa of Spain. College football: Ohio State beat Notre Dame, 34-23, and won its seventh national title. It is the first champion of the 12-team playoff era. N.F.L.: The Chicago Bears will hire the Detroit Lions’ offensive coordinator, Ben Johnson, as their head coach. ARTS AND IDEAS Zukiswa Wanner Brian Otieno for The New York Times For years, African writers had to look abroad for success, through a book deal in New York, London or Paris. But now, publishers, literary magazines and bookstores in Africa have created their own robust literary world. “The West is not discovering us,” said Zukiswa Wanner, a South African writer. “We are discovering us and then telling our stories and then saying to the West, ‘Well, this is us.’” More on culture The Nobel Laureate Han Kang’s latest novel is about a South Korean massacre. It explores why atrocities must be remembered. Two early drafts of Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man” sold at auction for more than $500,000. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Ryan Liebe for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Barrett Washburne. Prop Stylist: Megan Hedgpeth. Make a tasty, good-for-you green smoothie. Use a delicious floss. Boost work-from-home productivity. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was wildcat. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 23 Author Members Posted January 23 January 22, 2025 By German Lopez Good morning. We’re covering Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons — as well as the war in Ukraine, a winter storm and the nerd Super Bowl. The New York Times Rewriting Jan. 6 Before Inauguration Day, Donald Trump’s allies indicated that he’d limit clemency for Jan. 6 defendants to nonviolent offenders. “If you committed violence on that day, obviously you shouldn’t be pardoned,” JD Vance said this month. But President Trump’s pardons and commutations, signed on Monday, include people who assaulted police officers with baseball bats and chemical sprays. They include those who plotted to use violence to stop the peaceful transfer of power. Judges sentenced some of the defendants to prison for decades — a sign of their crimes’ severity. Trump thought his supporters had been unfairly persecuted. His pardons reflect that view. “To have done anything less would have been an admission that there was something wrong with what his supporters did on Jan. 6,” my colleagues Jonathan Swan, Maggie Haberman and Alan Feuer wrote. Today’s newsletter focuses on some of the Jan. 6 defendants and the crimes for which they now have impunity. The offenders Trump gave clemency to more than 1,500 people who participated in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Prosecutors had video and photographic evidence of their crimes. The offenders include: Stewart Rhodes and his far-right militia group, the Oath Keepers, helped orchestrate the riot. He and his followers said over text messages beforehand that Chinese agents had infiltrated the U.S. government and that Joe Biden might cede control of the country to the United Nations. Prosecutors said Rhodes had placed a “quick reaction force” of heavily armed Oath Keepers in a Virginia hotel — to rush into Washington with their weapons if called upon. A jury convicted him of seditious conspiracy, which requires proof of violent force against the government. A judge sentenced him to 18 years in prison. Julian Khater blasted chemical spray at a group of officers as the mob overran the police on the west side of the Capitol. One of the officers, Brian Sicknick, died the next day. A judge sentenced Khater to nearly seven years in prison. Albuquerque Cosper Head grabbed Officer Michael Fanone around the neck and told a crowd, “I got one!” Head then dragged Fanone down the Capitol steps and into the mob. Rioters beat, kicked and shot Fanone with a stun gun. A judge sentenced Head to seven and a half years in prison. Daniel Rodriguez fired the stun gun at Fanone’s neck, twice. He also sprayed a fire extinguisher at the police and shoved a wooden pole at a line of officers. A judge called him a “one-man army of hate” and sentenced him to more than 12 years in prison. David Dempsey punched and kicked police officers and attacked them with a flagpole, crutches, broken pieces of furniture and pepper spray. A judge sentenced him to 20 years in prison. Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the far-right Proud Boys, helped plan the attack. (He was not actually at the riot; officers arrested him days earlier for setting fire to a church’s Black Lives Matter banner.) A jury convicted him of seditious conspiracy, and a judge sentenced him to 22 years in prison. My colleague Alan Feuer detailed the defendants’ crimes, and the type of clemency they received, in this article. Some of the Jan. 6 defendants have shown no remorse. Days before his sentencing, Rhodes falsely claimed that the 2020 election was fraudulent and that the government was “coming after those on the political right.” At a court hearing, he declared, “I am a political prisoner.” Undeterred Trump won’t be able to act as unilaterally in many other areas as he did with these pardons. The president’s pardon powers are unique in that they are virtually unchecked by the Constitution. The same is not true for immigration, taxes, health care, tariffs or other topics that interest Trump. Congress, state governments and the courts will get a say — and they might not want to go as far as the president does. Yet Trump’s blanket clemency previews an important aspect of his second term: He feels unbound this time around. He believes that the public is behind his agenda, and he’s ready to push it by any means he can. More coverage “It’s a miscarriage of justice”: Many of the officers injured in the Jan. 6 riot said they felt betrayed. A few Republicans in Congress also criticized Trump’s pardons. “I just can’t agree,” Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina said. Trump also pardoned Ross Ulbricht, the creator of the online drug marketplace Silk Road. Ulbricht, a Bitcoin pioneer, is a cult hero in the cryptocurrency world. THE LATEST NEWS Trump’s Picks Marco Rubio and JD Vance Doug Mills/The New York Times Marco Rubio, the first member of Trump’s cabinet to be approved, was sworn in as secretary of state. The former sister-in-law of Pete Hegseth, Trump’s pick for defense secretary, told senators that Hegseth had been abusive to his ex-wife. Trump is moving quickly to appoint new leaders at U.S. attorney’s offices, a sign of how important prosecutors will be for his administration’s plans. More on the Administration The Trump administration fired the head of the Coast Guard, Adm. Linda Fagan, and said she had not done enough to stop drugs crossing the border. She was the first woman to lead a branch of the armed forces. Trump ordered federal agencies to place diversity, equity and inclusion officials on paid leave and to plan layoffs. He revoked Secret Service protection for John Bolton, his former national security adviser. Bolton said the U.S. had granted him security for life because Iran sought to kill him. Trump said he would impose a 10 percent tariff on Chinese imports from Feb. 1, describing the move as a response to fentanyl exports from China. The Trump administration, working with OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle, will invest at least $100 billion in A.I. infrastructure. Trump’s blizzard of executive orders asserts a muscular vision of presidential power, Charlie Savage writes. The president has promised to plant the American flag on Mars. That may be possible, but he left the specifics unclear. Immigration The Trump administration expanded immigration agents’ powers, allowing them to quickly deport certain undocumented immigrants. Attorneys general from 22 states sued to block Trump’s order attempting to limit birthright citizenship. Trump’s citizenship order conflicts with most scholars’ reading of the 14th Amendment, though at least one federal judge has appeared open to his interpretation. The order would also affect babies born to legal immigrants on student and work visas. At an inaugural prayer service, an Episcopal bishop asked Trump to show mercy to immigrants and L.G.B.T. children. The Trump and Vance families whispered and shook their heads. War in Ukraine Trump, who often praises Vladimir Putin, said Putin was “destroying Russia” by waging war in Ukraine. Ukraine detained three military commanders it blames for losing territory. “It feels like they specifically came here to die”: North Korean troops fighting alongside Russia use distinctive tactics with little room for retreat. Winter Storm In New Orleans. Kathleen Flynn for The New York Times A winter storm broke snowfall records across the Gulf Coast, where snow is so rare that most cities don’t own plows. Officials said the storm had killed at least 10 people and caused hundreds of car crashes. Airlines canceled thousands of flights. In cities like Houston and New Orleans, many residents spent the day reveling in the most snow they had ever seen. Frosty beaches and a snowball fight in the in the French Quarter: See photos from across the region. California Fires The worst of the winds in Southern California is over, but the high risk of fire will persist across Los Angeles and Ventura Counties. Forecasters expect rain this weekend. It may help contain the fires, but rain on burned land can also bring landslides. The 17 people who died in the Eaton fire lived in an area where evacuation orders came hours later than elsewhere. Other Big Stories Israel launched a military operation in Jenin, a city in the Israeli-occupied West Bank that is considered a hub of militancy. Shortly before the operation, Trump rescinded sanctions on Jewish settlers, and Jewish extremists attacked Palestinian villages. A fire at a ski resort hotel in Turkey killed at least 76 people. The cause was unclear. Prince Harry reached a settlement with Rupert Murdoch’s British tabloids over accusations of unlawful information gathering. “It took us a few minutes to accept that this pile of rubble was our home”: Here’s what one family found returning to their neighborhood in Gaza. More than a century after the Tulsa Race Massacre, the city is still debating what it owes to the victims’ descendants. Opinions America has never been the nation of immigrants it was promised to be. It could still be, Ana Raquel Minian writes. “I understand now that I cannot be in control”: Jake Halpern interviewed his mother-in-law about what she’s gained and lost with brain cancer. Here are columns by M. Gessen on Ukraine and Trump and Thomas Edsall on the conservative movement’s success. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS In Las Vegas. Mikayla Whitmore for The New York Times Nerd Super Bowl: At a Las Vegas arena, 12 finance guys competed for the title of world’s best spreadsheeter. Special signs: Human families share inside jokes and gestures. Chimp families do, too. Ask Well: “Are dental X-rays safe?” Lives Lived: Jules Feiffer took delight in skewering politics, relationships and human nature in his Village Voice comic strip, but his creative instincts could not be confined to one medium. He died at 95. SPORTS M.L.B.: Ichiro Suzuki was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. He was one shy of a unanimous vote. See the list of this year’s inductees. Women’s soccer: Chelsea agreed to pay $1 million to acquire Naomi Girma from the San Diego Wave, the first time a female soccer player has fetched seven figures on the transfer market. ARTS AND IDEAS Photo illustration by Christina Lee When Alex Park, a writer in California, is looking for an authentic experience on vacation, he turns to an unlikely location: a fast-food restaurant. Inside a KFC or a McDonald’s, one can glimpse everyday life and chat with local residents. More on culture Olympic medals designed by LVMH for the Paris Games are already deteriorating. Ronny Chieng of “The Daily Show” joked about Trump’s executive orders. “If you could put anything in front of him yesterday, he would have signed it,” he said. “Melania, now’s your chance to update the prenup.” THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times Bake a moist applesauce coffee cake with a generous layer of crumble. Try a nonstick pan. Monitor your blood pressure at home. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was flapping. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — German Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Sean Kawasaki-Culligan, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 24 Author Members Posted January 24 January 23, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We’re covering Trump’s deportation plans — as well as diversity programs, wildfires and same-sex marriage in Thailand. In Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. Paul Ratje for The New York Times A conflicted public There is a tension in U.S. public opinion about President Trump’s immigration plans. After the past four years of record immigration, much of it illegal, most Americans support mass deportations. In a recent Times-Ipsos poll, 55 percent of adults said they favored “deporting all immigrants who are here illegally.” Dissatisfaction with the Biden administration’s relatively open immigration policies — especially among working-class voters, across races — helped Trump win the election. Still, most Americans are uncomfortable with the specific policies that would be necessary to deport anywhere close to all undocumented immigrants. Only 38 percent of U.S. adults support using the military “to find and detain undocumented immigrants,” an Axios-Ipsos poll found this month. Only 34 percent said they supported separating families as part of rapid deportations. Source: Axios/Ipsos poll of 1,025 U.S. adults from Jan. 10-12, 2025 | Chart excludes those who said they didn’t know or didn’t answer. These crosscurrents will shape the reaction to Trump’s immigration policies — and may influence how far they go. In his first two days back in office, he has signaled an aggressive approach. Federal officials are preparing to conduct raids in Chicago and other cities that are home to many undocumented immigrants, and the Justice Department has ordered U.S. attorneys to prosecute local officials who refuse to cooperate. In today’s newsletter, I’ll help you understand how Americans are likely to react to Trump’s immigration agenda. Trump’s political vulnerability As you follow this story, I encourage you to avoid committing a common mistake: imagining that public opinion is closer to your own views than it is. Many Americans have strong views on immigration, either supportive or skeptical. And the conflicting signals in public opinion will tempt those on both sides to ignore inconvenient poll results and convince themselves that the public’s true views match their own. But the public’s views really are complicated. Most Americans support both a meaningful number of deportations and meaningful limits to them. (Public opinion follows a similar pattern on abortion access.) Trump and his aides will risk a public backlash if they wrongly believe that Americans will support almost any deportations. Many Americans will find it hard to accept the expulsion of undocumented immigrants who have lived here for many years and built stable lives. My colleague Eli Saslow profiled one of them: Jaime Cachua, who has lived in Rome, Georgia, since he was 1 and is married to an American woman, Jennifer, with whom he has two children. “I’ve never felt like a foreigner until now,” Cachua recently told his father-in-law, who voted for Trump. Building shelters for deportees in Chihuahua, Mexico. Paul Ratje for The New York Times Some of the biggest failures of Trump’s first term happened when he defied public sentiment. On immigration, an outcry caused him to reverse his family-separation policy in 2018. On health care, he suffered an embarrassing defeat when just enough congressional Republicans joined Democrats to protect to Barack Obama’s signature law. In both cases, his critics marshaled public opinion and grass-roots organizing to create political problems for him and other Republicans. It isn’t hard to imagine how the story may repeat itself if his administration begins rounding up otherwise law-abiding people whom American voters see as their neighbors, friends, colleagues and relatives. Popular deportations But Democrats and immigration advocates also risk misreading public opinion. Some are already arguing that the polling suggests that most Americans support deportation only in theory, not in practice. That seems incorrect. During Obama’s eight years as president, the federal government deported more than three million people. Progressive critics taunted Obama as “the deporter in chief,” but American voters liked his moderate immigration policy — which favored both a pathway to citizenship and tough border security — much more than they liked Biden’s. The Obama administration focused on two groups of undocumented immigrants: those with criminal records and those who entered the country recently. Those policies are still popular, the recent Times poll shows: Source: New York Times/Ipsos poll of 2,128 U.S. adults from Jan. 2-10, 2025 | Chart excludes those who said they didn’t know or didn’t answer. Their popularity helps explain why dozens of congressional Democrats joined Republicans this week to vote for the Laken Riley Act, which would require the deportation of undocumented immigrants charged with burglary, theft, assaulting a police officer or other crimes. The House passed the bill last night, after the Senate had done so Monday, setting it up to become the first law Trump will sign in his second term. The exact contours of Trump’s immigration crackdown remain unclear. But the most likely scenario seems to be a mix of deportation policies including some that most Americans support and others that most consider too extreme. More on immigration The U.S. canceled flights for thousands of refugees it had already approved to enter the country. The Pentagon plans to send 1,500 troops to the southern border by the end of the month. Mexico devised a plan — called “Mexico Embraces You” — to assist thousands of its citizens after U.S. deportations. Experts question whether the government is truly ready. The Biden administration deported more people than Trump did in his first term, in part because there were more arrivals. North African countries increased deportations of people from sub-Saharan Africa last year, part of a joint effort with the E.U. that has helped reduce migration to Europe. THE LATEST NEWS Diversity Programs President Trump Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times The Trump administration, as part of a purge of diversity programs, asked federal workers to report colleagues who keep such programs alive and threatened those who did not comply. In a related order, Trump revoked a 60-year-old rule banning discrimination at federal contractors. Some corporate leaders worry that the Trump administration might investigate them over their diversity policies. Costco and Microsoft said they would maintain diversity programs, even as other large companies retreat. Trump’s Picks. Trump picked Sean Curran, who led his security detail during the campaign, to be the Secret Service director. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made millions referring clients for lawsuits over Merck’s HPV vaccine. He plans to keep his financial stake in the suits if he becomes health secretary. Trump wants his cabinet nominees confirmed quickly. Senate Democrats are slowing the process. More on Trump The Justice Department halted new civil rights investigations and signaled that it might back out of agreements with local police departments to address misconduct. Elon Musk publicly questioned the financing of an A.I. initiative Trump announced with OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle. Trump said he would impose tariffs on products from Canada, Mexico and China beginning on Feb. 1. The Trump administration told federal health officials to pause public communications, including bird flu updates. Enrique Tarrio and Stewart Rhodes, the right-wing militia leaders Trump pardoned, called for retribution against those who investigated the Jan. 6 attacks. Trump’s retreat from clean energy makes the U.S. an outlier in the world and risks ceding a global market to China. Trump’s inaugural events have been filled with royal flourishes. They reflect his view of presidential power, Peter Baker writes. More on Politics House Republicans are considering tariffs and Medicaid cuts to pay for Trump’s tax cuts and immigration bill. Senate Democrats blocked a Republican bill that could subject some abortion providers to criminal penalties. International In Bangkok. Lauren DeCicca for The New York Times Couples in Thailand celebrated a law permitting same-sex marriage with a mass wedding at a mall in Bangkok. Families and a young swimmer: Read about the 79 people who died when fire tore through a hotel overnight at a Turkish ski resort. Since the cease-fire in Gaza, Hamas has tried to show that it’s still in control. Its police officers are back on patrol, and it is protecting aid trucks. A rash of antisemitic attacks has rattled Jews in Australia, which is home to many Holocaust survivors. Other Big Stories A new brush fire is raging in north Los Angeles, near Castaic Lake. It has forced tens of thousands to evacuate and has closed schools. When a Black-owned diner burned in Altadena, residents lost a cherished community hub. Freezing temperatures have kept parts of the South at a standstill after a winter storm. Here’s where it snowed the most. Opinions Trump wants to kill America’s green economy. China will be thrilled if he does, Jennifer Granholm, who was energy secretary under Joe Biden, writes. Here are columns by Pamela Paul on excessive enthusiasm and Jamelle Bouie on an American monarchist. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Made for walking: See video of how tiny mushroom corals move themselves. Detours and digital detoxes: Read about what to expect from travel in 2025. MAGA sons: For some liberal parents, their kids’ conservatism is a painful rejection. Social Q’s: “My son wants to pay for his sister to freeze her eggs. Too weird?” Lives Lived: José Jiménez was a street-wise Puerto Rican who in the late 1960s transformed a Chicago gang called the Young Lords into a militant voice for expanded social services, fair housing and education. He died at 76. SPORTS N.F.L.: The Jets hired the Lions’ defensive coordinator, Aaron Glenn — their first-round pick in 1994 — as head coach. Tennis: The American Ben Shelton criticized local media outlets at the Australian Open, accusing them of repeatedly being disrespectful to players. ARTS AND IDEAS Beach soccer in Rio and a calisthenic routine in Toyko. Ian Cheibub for The New York Times, Kosuke Okahara for The New York Times Only a quarter of Americans get enough physical activity, doctors say. In other countries, movement is more baked in to everyday life. Read free fitness lessons from Finland, Japan, Britain and Brazil. More on culture This winter, New Yorkers are countering dreary weather with playful fashion. The late night hosts commented on a bishop’s plea to Trump. “Bishop, please, all right? We don’t go to church to hear a lecture about having mercy on the less fortunate,” Ronny Chieng said. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Christopher Simpson for The New York Times Layer melted cheese and briny pickled jalapeños on top of tortilla chips. Play PC games with a controller. Clean your trash can. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was extinction. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David Correction: Yesterday’s newsletter misstated Ichiro Suzuki’s status in the Baseball Hall of Fame. He was elected on Tuesday, but he has not yet been inducted. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 25 Author Members Posted January 25 January 24, 2025 By David Leonhardt Good morning. We’re covering Trump’s slow tariff rollout — as well as immigration, abortion pills and podcasts. President Trump after signing executive orders in the Oval Office. Doug Mills/The New York Times Fast and slow Donald Trump’s second presidency is obviously off to a fast start. In almost every area that’s a priority for him and his advisers — immigration, energy, climate, race, gender and more — he has begun making major policy changes. But there is one notable exception: tariffs. Even though Trump has said that “the most beautiful word in the dictionary is ‘tariff,’” he has been cautious in his first week back in office. He has not imposed the universal 10 percent or 20 percent charge on all imports that he promised during the campaign. He has instead threatened to enact targeted tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China that wouldn’t take effect until Feb. 1. Trump’s aides have signaled that the threat is partly a negotiating tool to win other concessions from those countries. Trump has also directed government agencies to assess the feasibility of broader tariffs and report back on the findings, which is itself a sign of his caution. Feasibility assessments are not normally the modus operandi of Trumpism. Wall Street, which tends to oppose tariffs, has noticed the caution. The S&P 500 rose again yesterday, and market analysts said the slow movement on tariffs was one reason. “The worst fears have not been realized,” said David Kelly, chief global strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management. Why is Trump proceeding more tentatively on tariffs? That’s the subject of today’s newsletter. Internal worries The New York Stock Exchange yesterday. Timothy A. Clary/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Trump’s second administration is largely unified on most big issues, at least for now. His White House advisers and cabinet secretaries agree on the importance of expanding oil and gas production. They are dismissive of the risks and costs of climate change (despite the evidence). They oppose many diversity programs. Any disagreements tend to be about secondary questions. On immigration, for example, Trump and his team favor much tougher border rules and an acceleration of deportations. The main area of internal disagreement involves a more niche subject: how many highly skilled immigrants to admit through the H-1B visa program. On tariffs, the internal tensions run deeper. Nobody publicly opposes tariffs. But some senior officials were skeptical of tariffs before they entered Trump’s orbit. The corporate executives close to Trump are also wary, as is Wall Street. The stock market is one of the few traditional restraints that matter to Trump, as my colleagues Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman have noted. Trump sees stock prices as a report card on his presidency. And he knows that much of Wall Street worries that tariffs could hurt economic growth by raising prices in the U.S. and by sparking retaliatory tariffs elsewhere. Some new tariffs are still likely because of Trump’s passion for them. Trade policy is a rare issue on which he has expressed consistent views for decades. (Immigration is another.) The uncertainty involves the form that the tariffs will take. Three tariff goals A steel plant in Huaian, China. Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Ana Swanson, who covers trade for The Times, has a helpful way of framing the issue. She points out that during the confirmation hearing for Scott Bessent, the nominee for Treasury secretary, he encouraged people to think about the Trump tariffs as having three main goals: 1. Bring production home. Bessent said tariffs could play a role in “remedying unfair trade practices” by other countries and cited China as an example. If other countries are heavily subsidizing their own companies or keeping out foreign rivals, the U.S. can respond in kind to level the playing field. The broader goal is to rework the supply chain, Ana notes. The U.S. can use tariffs to encourage more production in this country, especially in industries that are growing or militarily sensitive, by increasing the cost of foreign goods. 2. Raise revenue: Bessent’s second category was “a more generalized tariff as a revenue raiser.” Trump has proposed a huge tax cut, and tariffs could replace the lost revenue to keep the deficit from soaring. The Republican majorities in Congress are so narrow that a tax cut without offsetting deficit reduction may not be able to pass. House Republicans have floated cuts to Medicaid for the same reason. 3. Gain leverage: Bessent’s third category was leverage with other countries: “Tariffs can be used for negotiations,” he said. Trump this week threatened Russia with tariffs unless it agreed to a reasonable cease-fire in Ukraine. His planned tariffs on Canada and Mexico are partly an attempt to force concessions on border policy and a trade deal. Speaking to political and business leaders in Davos yesterday, Trump vaguely threatened new tariffs on European countries. He has long criticized Europe for not buying more American products and not spending more on their militaries. They might be willing to make some changes if the alternative is economically damaging tariffs. What’s next The people in the administration who are wary of tariffs — you can think of them as the doves — seem to hope that this third category ends up being the dominant one. As Ana told me, “The dovish advisers want tariffs to be used as a negotiating tool that doesn’t actually go into effect, or even as a negotiating tool that could lead to more market opening.” The hawks are more focused on the first two categories and the actual enactment of tariffs. Trump himself is enough of a hawk that at least some tariffs probably will go into effect. Their scope may depend on what happens after that. If tariffs start to have the negative effects that their critics predict — higher inflation, lower profits and a trade war — Trump will likely pull back. If they seem to be working, or at least not failing, Trump may end up being a lot bolder than he has been in the past few days. THE LATEST NEWS Immigration Outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Chicago. Vincent Alban/Reuters The Trump administration is giving Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials the power to quickly deport migrants who were allowed into the United States temporarily under Biden-era programs. A federal judge temporarily blocked Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship. He called the order “blatantly unconstitutional.” Democrats are talking less about sanctuary cities, which many had once advertised with pride. Trump’s Personnel A procedural Senate vote to advance Pete Hegseth’s nomination for defense secretary passed, 51-49. Two Republicans — Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski — voted against it. The Trump administration revoked the security protection for Mike Pompeo, Trump’s former secretary of state. John Ratcliffe was confirmed as C.I.A. director. Kash Patel, Trump’s pick for F.B.I. chief, has embraced conspiracies — including the false theory that the agency he may soon lead helped instigate the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol. Abortion Instagram and Facebook blocked and hid abortion pill providers’ posts. The platforms suspended some accounts but later restored them. A new study suggests a possible alternative to the abortion pill. It includes the key ingredient in the morning-after pill. More on Politics In 1963, minutes before John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Bettmann Archive, via Getty Images Trump signed an order to declassify and release documents related to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. Trump is leading a global surge to the right. Populists in Europe are watching him closely. Before the election, Trump assured Libertarian voters that he would free Ross Ulbricht, the imprisoned creator of an online drug marketplace. This week, he did just that. Video shows how Jan. 6 rioters who were pardoned by Trump attacked the police. Watch the footage here. International The teenager who killed three young girls in a knife attack on a dance class in England was sentenced to life in prison. Russia has suffered twice as many deaths and injuries as Ukraine in the war, according to experts and journalists working to count the dead. But Russia is still winning. Trump restored the designation of Yemen’s Houthi rebels, who have fired on ships in the Red Sea in solidarity with Hamas, as a “foreign terrorist organization.” The Biden administration had weakened the designation. Business OpenAI introduced a new tool, called Operator, that can autonomously perform tasks on the internet, like buying groceries and booking restaurant reservations. CNN is cutting 200 jobs in its TV division as the company shifts its focus toward digital audiences. Police officers freed the founder of a French cryptocurrency company, Ledger, and his wife after they were kidnapped and held for ransom. Other Big Stories Near Castaic, Calif. Mark Abramson for The New York Times A wildfire burning northwest of Los Angeles has kept thousands of people away from their homes. People with A.D.H.D. are dying earlier than those without the disorder, according to a study. A major storm, with wind speeds of a Category 3 hurricane, is hitting Ireland and Britain. A third of Ireland is without power. Opinions After the devastating 1871 fire, Chicago rebuilt with stronger fire protections. Los Angeles should learn from its example, Carl Smith writes. Why don’t we have a cure for Alzheimer’s? Because fraud and misconduct have hampered research, writes Charles Piller, an investigative science journalist. Here are columns by David Brooks on 19th-century America and Michelle Goldberg on a crackdown on the academic left. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Javier Jaén Blood filter: A start-up claimed its device could cure cancer. Then patients began dying. Sleep: Read these six common misconceptions about sleep — and learn how to actually get a better rest. “Humanity’s Last Exam”: Researchers have created a 3,000-question quiz to test A.I. systems. The Ethicist: On the difference between noticing attractive women and ogling them. Quite a find: In Greece, a man discovered an ancient statue in the trash. Can’t afford a new house? Build one in the backyard. Lives Lived: Charles Phan was a self-taught chef whose family fled Vietnam when he was a teenager and whose sleek restaurant helped change America’s perception of Asian food. He died at 62. SPORTS Tennis: Novak Djokovic exited after just one set of his Australian Open semifinal match against Alexander Zverev. Djokovic had suffered a leg injury in his quarterfinal win. M.L.B.: The Athletic obtained audio of Ippei Mizuhara, the former translator for Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani, impersonating the baseball player while requesting a $200,000 wire transfer. Listen to it here. N.F.L.: Buccaneers offensive coordinator Liam Coen is expected to accept the Jaguars head-coaching job — just hours after the franchise parted ways with its general manager. ARTS AND IDEAS Jason Kelce at a taping for his new show. Hannah Yoon for The New York Times The former N.F.L. player Jason Kelce has been busy since retiring. He has built a career as an analyst and podcaster and appeared in commercials for Campbell’s soup, Marriott hotels, General Mills foods, YouTube TV, Buffalo Wild Wings and Tide. This month he will begin yet another job: ESPN late-night host. More on culture Zoe Saldaña in a scene from “Emilia Pérez.” Page 114 – Why Not Productions – Pathé Films – France 2 Cinéma/Netflix, via Associated Press The Oscar nominations were announced. “Emilia Perez,” “The Brutalist” “ and “Wicked” were nominated in many categories. See the list. Jimmy Kimmel mocked Trump before the president’s visit to Los Angeles. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Ryan Liebe for The New York Times Layer smashed beef kebab over cucumber yogurt. Tell us about the one who got away. Organize your closet. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was bookmobile. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 26 Author Members Posted January 26 January 25, 2025 By Melissa Kirsch Good morning. The artists and people we love are, despite their and our best efforts, always changing. But there’s part of all of us that’s impervious to external forces. María Jesús Contreras Changing tunes I loved reading about the 27-year-old French pianist Alexandre Kantorow, a rising star in the classical world who’s won major awards, played in the rain in the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics and is set to make his debut at the Los Angeles Philharmonic on Friday. What struck me about Kantorow is his commitment to keeping his life and his working practices the same, even as he seems destined for fame, even as fans crowd outside his performances holding signs begging for seats. “I don’t really like change, and unnecessary change in life,” Kantorow told The Times. He’s had the same manager and teacher since he was 16 and remains with his small record label. Resisting unnecessary change, what a concept! In the stock fantasy of fame, one imagines all the ways in which their life will transform, each upgrade bigger and flashier. I can’t pretend to know what it would feel like to be a musician on the precipice of stardom, but I’d guess the temptation to shed one’s old ways of working would be fierce. Listening to Kantorow’s latest album, a collection of Brahms and Schubert pieces, I wondered how a commitment to keeping things stable affects an artist’s output. Will the “intriguing tension between Kantorow’s lucid, pearly touch and the Romantic wildness of his music-making,” as the classical music critic Zachary Woolfe put it, be altered by the inevitable changes that accompany success? What about an artist is essential, impervious to any external forces? I recently rewatched “Shine a Light,” Martin Scorsese’s concert film of the Rolling Stones’s performances at the Beacon Theater in New York in 2006. The intimate way the film is shot makes you feel that you’re onstage, up close watching artists make art. You forget that you’re observing one of the most successful rock bands in history, that these people have played these songs a million times, that they are basically unknowable in their fame and riches and the way the world regards them. Instead they feel familiar, almost cozily accessible. The ways in which celebrity and fortune have changed them feel beside the point. The early 21st-century Mick Jagger of “Shine a Light” is to this fan essentially the same as the one strutting in 1970’s “Gimme Shelter,” the same one romancing the crowd during the Stones’ “Hackney Diamonds” tour last year. The idea of there being something fundamentally stable about an artist, independent of outside forces, makes sense. It’s what allows them to experiment with style and genre and persona and still be legible to their audiences. Of course, fans are well known to accuse the artists they love of abandoning their them-ness (see: Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival), of changing beyond recognition. As annoying as this must be for an artist, I wonder if there is something sort of wonderful about having a fan base that wants you to stay true, that so loves what they think is the elemental part of you that they want to help you safeguard it. We do this with the people we actually know all the time, provide them with a mirror that reflects back to them the person we love. The challenge, in art and life, is to allow people to morph and experiment while trusting that the essence we adore is basically indelible. It isn’t going anywhere, no matter how much change we opt for or resist. For more Alexandre Kantorow’s “Brahms and Schubert” was one of The Times’s best classical music albums of last year. “The sheer pleasure of making music that keens and growls like a pack of ravenous alley cats is obviously what keeps them going.” From 2008, a review of the Rolling Stones concert film, “Shine a Light.” THE WEEK IN CULTURE Film and TV Karla Sofía Gascón in “Emilia Pérez.” Pathé Films The Academy announced this year’s Oscar nominees. Demi Moore’s nod for best actress capped a career comeback, while Karla Sofía Gascón made history as the first openly trans actress to be nominated. See the full list. “Presence,” a horror film starring Lucy Liu and directed by Steven Soderberg, is one of six new movies our critics are talking about this week. Questlove spoke to The Times about sifting through five decades of musical performances for his film “Ladies & Gentlemen … 50 Years of ‘S.N.L.’ Music.” The time has come for a gay version of “The Bachelor,” Erik Piepenburg writes. Netflix ended 2024 with an annual operating income exceeding $10 billion for the first time in its history. Music The pop star Chappell Roan discusses the mechanics of modern fame in a new Hulu series. FKA twigs has long been an experimental artist. On her new album, “Eusexua,” she is testing her pop skills. The children’s brand Kidz Bop — known for its sanitized covers of pop songs — recently released its 50th album. More Culture At the inaugural balls, the gowns worn by Melania and Ivanka Trump and Usha Vance were pastiches of bygone eras. It may be a sign of what they hope the future looks like, Vanessa Friedman writes. Read these books before their adaptations hit screens this year. Apple and Google removed TikTok from their app stores. Phones with the app already downloaded are being listed for eye-watering sums. THE LATEST NEWS The Trump Administration Pete Hegseth arrived at the Capitol on Friday. Tom Brenner for The New York Times Hamas freed four female Israeli soldiers held hostage in Gaza in a carefully choreographed display. Israel is expected to release 200 Palestinian prisoners in exchange, as part of the cease-fire deal. The Senate approved Pete Hegseth to lead the Department of Defense. Vice President JD Vance broke a 50-50 tie after three Republicans voted against Hegseth: Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitch McConnell. President Trump, during a visit to hurricane-damaged areas of North Carolina, said states should take a greater role responding to disasters and suggested he might try to eliminate FEMA. Trump also traveled to California, where he and Gov. Gavin Newsom pledged to cooperate on wildfire recovery. But Trump has threatened to withhold aid unless the state imposes voter ID laws. Elon Musk said his DOGE program would reshape the federal work force. In its first week, the project’s scope appeared more limited. The Interior Department says the Gulf of Mexico is now, officially, the “Gulf of America.” Other Big Stories Israel accused Hezbollah of remaining active in southern Lebanon, an area both sides agreed to leave, and suggested it might keep its own troops there beyond the deadline for withdrawal. Bird flu, and efforts to prevent its spread, have killed off around 10 percent of the country’s egg-laying chickens in the past few months. Egg prices will likely keep rising. Joseph Lynskey survived being shoved in front of a subway train on New Year’s Eve. He described the ordeal to The Times. Madison Keys beat Aryna Sabalenka in the Australian Open women’s final, her first Grand Slam title. A popular TV host in Japan admitted trying to conceal a sexual assault complaint. Advertisers have abandoned the network that employed him. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now CULTURE CALENDAR 🎬 “Dog Man” (Friday): If you’ve got a grade schooler, it’s hard to avoid Dav Pilkey’s Dog Man series (it occupies six of the top 10 spots on The Times’s Graphic Books and Manga best-seller list). Dog Man — a spinoff of Pilkey’s other popular series, Captain Underpants — tells the story of a half-man, half-dog police officer who battles a villainous cat named Petey. After being adapted, improbably, into a successful musical, Dog Man now makes the leap to the big screen, with animation befitting the books’ kid-drawn art style. RECIPE OF THE WEEK David Malosh for The New York Times By Melissa Clark Vegetable Dumplings Lunar New Year is this Wednesday, ushering in the year of the wood snake with all its prudent intelligence. Eating dumplings is a time-honored way to celebrate, and Sue Li’s plush vegetable dumplings are a deeply flavorful option that happen to be vegan. Her trick is to bind the vegetables with tofu in place of the pork fat that’s more traditionally used. Homemade dumplings do take time to prepare, but they freeze well, meaning you can make them this weekend to cook up on Wednesday. And if making the wrappers from scratch seems like one step too many, fear not. Store-bought dumpling skins will work here, too. REAL ESTATE Heather Anderson and Chris Kinney Lisa Corson for The New York Times The Hunt: An engaged couple searched suburban New Jersey for a house that could handle four teenagers. Which home did they choose? Play our game. Close neighbors: In Toronto, where housing inventory is far below demand, residents are building homes for relatives in their backyards. What you get for $850,000: An adobe house in Santa Fe, N.M.; a Craftsman bungalow in Norfolk, Va.; or a Victorian-style house in Missoula, Mont. LIVING Cristina Spano Health: Ten gut myths, corrected by experts. Looks: In New York, clashing prints was the street trend of the week. Travel: Spend 36 hours in Quebec City. Dry January: Round the month with these fun and easy nonalcoholic drinks. ADVICE FROM WIRECUTTER Stellar instant noodles Ramen is shedding its reputation as college survival food. But if a basic pack is all you have on hand, you can still make it shine. My advice is to slice veggies thin so they cook quickly with the noodles. Bok choy and napa cabbage are my favorite additions. For protein, I love tofu, a poached egg or leftover roast chicken. It helps to start with great instant noodles: Wirecutter experts have tasted dozens of varieties, and we have a new lineup of spicy, zingy and flavorful recommendations. And for optimal slurping, these are the best chopsticks. — Marilyn Ong GAME OF THE WEEK Patrick Mahomes, left, and Josh Allen. David Dermer/Associated Press, Al Bello/Getty Images Buffalo Bills vs. Kansas City Chiefs, A.F.C. Championship: The Super Bowl will be the most watched game of the season. For N.F.L. fans, though, this is probably the most anticipated game. Patrick Mahomes has led the Chiefs to seven straight A.F.C. title games, and he’s beaten the Bills and their quarterback, Josh Allen, in all three of their playoff matchups. But Mahomes is not quite invincible. Of the 16 games he started this season, he lost just one — to Allen and the Bills. Tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. Eastern on CBS For more Bills fans have experienced a lifetime of heartbreak. Once again, they’re letting themselves believe. Allen is one of the league’s most thrilling players. Here are his teammates’ favorite plays of his from this season. N.F.L. coaches and executives offer predictions for both conference championship games. NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was contrary. Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week’s headlines. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 27 Author Members Posted January 27 January 26, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Peter Baker reflects on President Trump’s first week back in office. We’re also covering South Korea, the Covid lab leak theory and a parenting poem. —David Leonhardt President Trump in the Oval Office. Doug Mills/The New York Times Testing the limits By Peter Baker I’m the chief White House correspondent. On his first full day back in the White House, President Trump vowed to do what no president had ever done before. “We’re going to do things that people will be shocked at,” he declared. Of all the thousands of words that Trump uttered during his fact-challenged, talkathon-style opening days as the nation’s 47th president, those may have been the truest. Not so much because of the ideological swings that come with a party change in the White House, but because of the norm-shattering, democracy-testing assertions of personal power that defy the courts, the Congress and the ethical lines that constrained past presidents. Trump freed even the most violent of the rioters who assaulted the Capitol in his name four years ago. Out of pique over questions of loyalty, he stripped former advisers facing credible death threats of their security details. Disregarding a law passed with bipartisan support and upheld by the Supreme Court, he allowed the Chinese-owned app TikTok to operate despite national security concerns. Not satisfied just to eliminate diversity initiatives, he ordered government workers to snitch on anyone suspected of not going along. He fired at least a dozen inspectors general who monitored departments for corruption and abuse, ignoring the law that requires him to give Congress 30 days’ notice and provide specific reasons. Right out of the gate, Trump challenged the expectations of what a president can and should do, demonstrating a belief that the rules his predecessors largely followed were meant to be bent, bypassed or broken. Presidential maximalism It is broadly within a president’s power, say, to reverse the government’s approach to diversity programs, to pull out of an international climate agreement or to fire holdover political appointees. But as so often happens with Trump, he takes even those decisions one step further. Trump has never cared for the argument that he should do something because that is the way it has previously been done. Now he is determined to crash through obstacles and any supposed “deep state” that gets in his way. Ideas that establishment advisers talked him out of the last time around, he is pursuing this time with a new cast of more like-minded aides. Possibly the most staggering action last week was Trump’s decision to pardon or commute the sentences of violent rioters who beat police officers at the Capitol, despite assurances by his vice president, designated attorney general and House speaker that he wouldn’t. At the same time, Trump simply ignored the TikTok law. Instead, he declared he would not enforce it for 75 days to broker a deal in which China and the U.S. government would go into business together running the social media app. He also decided to rewrite the 14th Amendment to declare that it does not guarantee automatic citizenship to children born in the United States. It took just three days for a federal judge to step in and temporarily block the move. And unlike any president in modern times, Trump has tried to redraw the map of the world. He unilaterally declared that the Gulf of Mexico was now the Gulf of America. He sought to pressure Canada into becoming the 51st state. And he held out the possible use of force to take over Greenland and seize the Panama Canal. His antecedents Trump is hardly the first president to push the limits of presidential power, of course. Richard Nixon comes to mind, among others. Indeed, Trump’s allies see a more immediate precedent: President Biden, who spoke in favor of traditional standards even as he stretched his authority. Joe Biden Pete Marovich for The New York Times Biden issued pre-emptive pardons to members of his own family and other targets of Trump’s wrath, a first-of-its-kind move he described as a means to prevent political prosecutions. Trump has in fact made such threats, but even some Democrats objected to the pardons, describing them as self-serving and a terrible precedent. Biden also declared in his final days as president that the Equal Rights Amendment had met the requirements of ratification and was therefore now the 28th Amendment of the Constitution. In doing so, he disregarded time limits established by Congress that were exceeded. Some analysts asked how it was different for Biden to impose his interpretation of the Constitution in this way than for Trump to offer his own interpretation of the 14th Amendment. But Trump has proved more effective at squelching opposition than Biden was. He dominates his own party as no president has in generations and pushed on its members cabinet nominees who would not have passed muster in the past. He has forced technology billionaires, Wall Street tycoons, corporate executives and media owners who previously opposed him to show newfound deference and, in many cases, flood his political accounts with donations. Trump’s flex That leaves Trump as the single most important player in any decision he cares to involve himself in, whether it be who is the speaker of the House or what the fact-checking policies should be at Meta’s Facebook. Trump’s allies reject the notion that he has authoritarian aspirations. After all, he is still subject to the 22nd Amendment, which bars him from running in four years. Still, one House Republican was eager to get rid of even that guardrail. Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee, whose campaign finances, as it happens, are under investigation by the F.B.I., introduced a constitutional amendment last week to allow Trump to run again. It has no realistic chance of passing, but it did not hurt the congressman’s position with the president, who oversees the F.B.I. THE LATEST NEWS Trump Administration Trump in Las Vegas. Kenny Holston/The New York Times Trump, capping his first week in office, used a speech about ending taxes on tips as a victory lap. “I’m here to say thank you,” he told a crowd in a Las Vegas casino. Through executive orders, Trump has already shifted the direction of the country. Read how. Trump is trying to overhaul the federal bureaucracy. Workers are unsure how to implement his policies and worried about what they might mean for their careers. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth believes diversity has weakened the U.S. military. The Pentagon, however, views it as an asset. Some Democrats fear that voters may become numb if they push back at Trump’s every move and want to be more selective in their response to the administration, The Washington Post reports. “We were so close to bringing them to safety”: An executive order blocked a path to the U.S. for thousands of Afghans who supported the American mission in their country. Trump’s threat of mass deportations has caused uncertainty in India, which is the largest source of undocumented migrants outside Latin America. Middle East Displaced Palestinians in northern Gaza. Jehad Alshrafi/Associated Press Israeli troops prevented Palestinians from returning to their homes in northern Gaza today after Israel accused Hamas of violating the terms of the cease-fire agreement. Trump said that he told Jordan’s leader that he wants Jordan and Egypt to receive more Palestinians from Gaza. “Something has to happen,” Trump said. “It’s literally a demolition site right now.” In Lebanon, Israeli forces killed at least two people as the deadline for Hezbollah and Israel to withdraw from the south expired and thousands of displaced Lebanese tried to return to their homes, Lebanese officials said. Read what we know about the four Israeli hostages freed in the second hostage-for-prisoner swap of the Gaza cease-fire. More International News President Yoon Suk Yeol Pool photo by Jeon Heon-Kyun The authorities in South Korea indicted President Yoon Suk Yeol on charges of leading an insurrection when he briefly imposed martial law last month. Gang violence has closed schools in Haiti and left hundreds of thousands of children without formal education. Protesters in three Australian cities vandalized monuments on Australia Day, a holiday that commemorates the arrival of British ships and that some see as a symbol of oppression. In a rare display of public dissent in China, top doctors raised concerns about domestically produced drugs. They said the government was sacrificing quality to cut costs. California Fires Los Angeles is expecting rain that will help fire crews, but it also faces a small risk of flash floods and mudslides. After the fires, rents spiked past a legal limit in nearly 30 cities across Los Angeles County, The Washington Post found. Even before the fires, film and television production in Los Angeles was hitting a near-record low. Other Big Stories The C.I.A. said it now favors the theory that Covid emerged from a leak at a Wuhan research lab. It began the new assessment under Biden. Some drivers are spending less time in traffic after the introduction of congestion pricing in New York. But the results are mixed. THE SUNDAY DEBATE Is Trump’s mass deportation plan too extreme? Yes. The government doesn’t have the resources to expel the millions of unauthorized migrants living on U.S. soil. “Whatever is gained through mass deportation — and we are unconvinced anything will be — is it worth the costs?” The San Antonio Express-News’s editorial board writes. No. Deportation has long been a feature of U.S. immigration policy, under Democrats and Republicans. The Obama administration deported more than three million people. “The anti-Trump vitriol on illegal immigration is so strong, one would think he is the first president to take such a stand,” The Boston Herald’s editorial staff writes. FROM OPINION Syrians will continue to document atrocities and provide humanitarian aid. The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime means they can work in the open and get far more done, Alia Malek writes. Artificial intelligence can replace decisions based on hunches and faulty logic with decisions based on data and rationalism, Reid Hoffman, a Microsoft board member, writes. Antisemitism isn’t just a problem for Jews. It also threatens democracy and the rule of law, Deborah Lipstadt, a former Biden administration ambassador, writes. Here are columns by Ross Douthat on “King Trump” and Maureen Dowd on tech tycoons. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Victor Wembanyama James Hill for The New York Times Next generation: Victor Wembanyama is ready to be the new face of the N.B.A. Closer look: Our critic goes line by line through George Oppen’s “From a Photograph,” a short but vivid poem about parenting. Should sports be a college major? Nike thinks so. Private restaurants: Inside a luxury tower in New York, a chef toils in obscurity. Most clicked in The Morning last week: A story explaining who sat near Trump at the inauguration. See the annotated photo here. Vows: Acts of kindness as the L.A. wildfires rage. Lives Lived: Mike Hynson epitomized the image of the bronzed surf god in the hit 1966 documentary “The Endless Summer.” He died at 82. BOOK OF THE WEEK Entangled Publishing By Elisabeth Egan “Onyx Storm,” by Rebecca Yarros: “To the ones who don’t run with the popular crowd, the ones who get caught reading under their desks, the ones who feel like they never get invited, included or represented,” Rebecca Yarros writes in “Onyx Storm,” her hotly anticipated third installment in the Empryean series, “Get your leathers. We have dragons to ride.” And that’s just the dedication. Welcome to another edge-of-your-seat romantasy adventure set at a military college for dragon riders — one that has inspired countless TikToks, Reddit threads, midnight release parties and book cover-inspired manicures. If you haven’t read “Fourth Wing” and “Iron Flame,” you won’t have to look far to find someone who can fill you in on the details. More on Books Clay McLeod Chapman kept hearing friends say of their Fox News-watching parents, “It’s like they were possessed.” That’s what inspired his new horror novel. Sangu Mandanna, a best-selling romance author, recommends her favorite cozy romance novels. THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE The New York Times Click the cover image above to read this week’s magazine. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Try a 10-minute Pilates routine. Make your own tortillas. Take photos with a drone. MEAL PLAN Karsten Moran for The New York Times In this week’s Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter, Mia Leimkuhler highlights five meals that make for great leftovers, including sheet-pan scallion chicken, cauliflower adobo and a Japanese beef and potato stew. NOW TIME TO PLAY Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was megahit. Can you put eight historical events — including the first subway station, the writing of the Constitution and the debut of popcorn at the movies — in chronological order? Take this week’s Flashback quiz. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 27 Author Members Posted January 27 January 27, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Patricia Cohen covers the strength of the dollar. We’re also covering deportation flights, Gaza and Kobe Bryant. In Hong Kong. Kin Cheung/Associated Press Dollar flex By Patricia Cohen I’m the global economics correspondent. President Trump is of two minds when it comes to America’s currency. He wants a strong dollar — one that is worth more compared with other currencies — because he likes its status as the world’s go-to currency for trade and transactions. On the other hand, he also wants a weak dollar — one that is worth less in comparison — because that makes American goods cheaper to buy abroad, which could boost manufacturing at home. Many things affect the strength of a currency, such as how much the economy is growing. But a president can also steer the dollar’s value more directly. He could drive up the value of a foreign currency by ordering the Treasury Department to buy more of it, for instance. Or he could pressure other nations to revalue their own currencies or buy more American goods by threatening to impose tariffs on their imports. Both Trump’s goals, a strong dollar and a weak dollar, have benefits. But he can’t achieve both at the same time. In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain the drawbacks and rewards of each approach. Source: Source: LSEG Data & Analytics | Chart shows the U.S. dollar index, weekly, against the euro, Swiss franc, Japanese yen, Canadian dollar, British pound and Swedish krona from Jan. 1, 1993 to Jan. 24, 2025. | By The New York Times Weakening dollar The United States buys much more stuff than it sells — $78 billion more, as of November. Trump wants to erase that trade deficit. The hope is that by getting other countries to buy more American products, they’ll juice American manufacturing and create jobs. One obstacle is an overpriced dollar. “We have a big currency problem,” he said last summer. “That’s a tremendous burden on our companies.” When the dollar is strong compared with another currency, American exports are more expensive for customers abroad. Conversely, American shoppers buy more imports when the dollar is strong. A bottle of Mexican tequila would have sold for $30 last year, when the dollar was weaker. Since then, the dollar’s value has risen. Today that same bottle would cost just $25. To reverse the flow of goods into the country, Trump vows to impose tariffs. The latest plan is to put a 25 percent tax on Mexican and Canadian imports, and a 10 percent tax on Chinese imports. The goal is to get Americans to buy more homegrown stuff. (Trump also says it’s to stop the flow of migrants and fentanyl into the country.) The problem with this strategy is that tariffs can strengthen the dollar. If it’s suddenly much more expensive to buy a bottle of Mexican tequila, demand for that product (and everything else from Mexico) falls, weakening the peso in comparison with the dollar. Tariffs would also lift prices in the United States, which could prompt the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. That means higher returns for foreign investors, which once again makes the dollar more attractive. Trump’s tariff threats also create uncertainty, which drives people to look for a stable currency and a safe place (such as the United States, which has the world’s largest economy and one of the best-performing ones) to keep their money. The result? An even stronger dollar. Strengthening the dollar The dollar’s status as the world’s principal reserve currency makes it particularly valuable. It is what businesses, banks and people most often use to price goods and settle accounts, no matter where they are. Every country uses it for trade and transactions. That drives up its value, which makes American exports more expensive. Such status, though, also confers prestige and privileges. The U.S. government, for instance, borrows money by selling Treasury bonds. Because there is so much demand for dollars, the United States doesn’t have to pay as much interest. That lowers its borrowing costs — helpful for a government that is $36 trillion in debt. Being the world’s main reserve currency also bestows unique power. Only American banks can handle dollar transactions. That gives Washington enormous leverage. After the invasion of Ukraine, it barred Russia from using dollars to do business. That made Russia’s dealings with other countries much more costly and cumbersome. Washington has additional leverage because other governments and central banks keep dollars in their storehouses so they can conduct trade. That was why the United States was in a position to freeze dollars that belong to Russia’s Central Bank. Trump clearly likes the dollar’s special status. When a few nations — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — recently resurfaced the possibility of creating a new reserve currency, Trump quickly spit out a warning to anyone who might challenge “the mighty U.S. Dollar.” The bottom line At the moment, at least, the dollar’s status is secure. America’s economic strength and its easy-to-buy — and sell — U.S. Treasury bonds are unmatched. Trump can still take steps to weaken the dollar. The problem is that most economists think his proposals — like activating tariffs — would backfire. THE LATEST NEWS Immigration Colombia’s president, under threat of steep tariffs from Trump, will allow U.S. military planes to fly deported people into Colombia. He had turned two flights away. The Trump administration began immigration raids in Chicago. Illinois officials, including the governor, said they were not notified in advance. More on the Trump Administration The Trump administration has quickly fired or reassigned many senior career officials at the Justice Department. Republicans in Congress who have sought to ally closely with Trump still diverge from some of his policy ideas, including on tariffs and corporate taxes. Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence, grew up in a secretive offshoot of the Hare Krishna movement and has moved across the political spectrum more than once. Read about her career. The 14th Amendment overturned Dred Scott, the 1857 decision that denied citizenship to Black people. Some scholars say Trump’s plan to end birthright citizenship betrays that history. Middle East In central Gaza. Ramadan Abed/Reuters Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians began walking home to northern Gaza. See the dramatic images. A dispute between Israel and Hamas over the cease-fire deal delayed their return by a day. The cease-fires in Gaza and Lebanon are likely to hold, despite violence testing them this weekend, Patrick Kingsley writes. Israel’s military raided the Jerusalem home of a Hamas member who was released under the cease-fire. Soldiers arrested the man’s brother and assaulted others, including a Times journalist who was conducting interviews at the scene. Trump’s suggestion to “clean out” Gaza and ask Egypt and Jordan to receive more Palestinians echoes the wishes of far-right Israelis. Both countries rejected the idea. Europe Aleksandr Lukashenko Evgenia Novozhenina/Reuters Aleksandr Lukashenko, Belarus’s president and Europe’s longest-serving leader, claimed his seventh election victory in a contest widely seen as rigged. World leaders and Holocaust survivors are gathering today to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Italy restarted its program of sending asylum seekers to Albania, months after judges blocked the first transfers. Trump and Vladimir Putin have signaled that they want to negotiate about nuclear arms control as well as ending the war in Ukraine. They haven’t specified a date to meet. More International News A rebel militia backed by Rwanda announced that it captured the city of Goma in eastern Congo, an escalation in the conflict between the two countries. Canadians elected Justin Trudeau on a promise to improve the lives of the middle class. Then prices soared. China is building a large dam in earthquake-prone Tibet. The countries downriver are worried. Business Workers at Whole Foods, which Amazon owns, will vote today on whether to form the chain’s first union. Electric vehicle owners don’t pay gas taxes. States are imposing higher registration fees to make up the revenue and a federal tax could be coming. Other Big Stories Evidence suggests that the Eaton fire in Los Angeles started in dry grasses below power lines. The official cause will likely take months to determine. Health experts are closely monitoring a bird flu outbreak that they say could quickly escalate among people. Opinions Voters who turned right in France and Germany. William Keo and Aliona Kardash for The New York Times Immigration and housing costs: Krista Mahr and Daniel Wakin talk to European voters about why they voted for right-wing parties. Students learn sex education better when the messages come from other teenagers instead of adults, Hillary Frank argues. Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss Trump’s first week. Here are columns by David French on MAGA morality and Ezra Klein on American oligarchy. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS Matt Chase Extra lives? Video gaming is a large part of Elon Musk’s public persona. Other players question whether he’s as accomplished as he claims to be. “Soft decluttering”: It’s the easiest way to feel more organized. Work Friend: “When is neurodiversity an excuse for rudeness?” Antiviral: Flu season is in full swing. When do you need Tamiflu? Metropolitan Diary: Just order already. Lives Lived: Carol Downer was a leader in the feminist women’s health movement who opened clinics, worked to educate women about their reproductive health and promoted an abortion technique she felt was safe enough for laypeople. She died at 91. SPORTS N.F.L.: The Eagles and Chiefs are set for a Super Bowl rematch. Kansas City beat Buffalo, 32-29, in the A.F.C. title game. Philadelphia beat the Commanders, 55-23, in the N.F.C. championship. W.N.B.A.: The Seattle Storm are sending the star guard Jewell Loyd to the Las Vegas Aces. College football: Penn State hired Ohio State’s Jim Knowles as defensive coordinator, days after Knowles helped the Buckeyes win the national championship. ARTS AND IDEAS A plate of haggis. Gabriela Herman for The New York Times This weekend, Scots celebrated Burns Night, a holiday honoring the 18th-century poet Robert Burns. The centerpiece of the celebration is haggis, a dish of boiled sheep innards, oatmeal and spices. The U.S. bans the import of traditional haggis, driving some Scottish Americans to the black market. One Scottish manufacturer is trying to give them a legal option. More on culture In Los Angeles. Joyce Kim for The New York Times More than 600 murals around the world honor Kobe Bryant, according to one tally. Most of them are in Southern California. Patti Smith and Kanye West: Read about 38 landmark “Saturday Night Live” musical performances. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times Stir matcha into overnight oats for a vibrant, efficient breakfast. Don a fashionably thick sweater. Personalize a gift. Clean your kitchen sink. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were honeypot, neophyte and phenotype. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 28 Author Members Posted January 28 January 28, 2025 Good morning. Today, my colleague Ana Swanson explores Trump’s use of tariffs as a political tool. We’re also covering artificial intelligence, Lebanon and a poet’s guide to Venice. —David Leonhardt President Trump Kenny Holston/The New York Times A new cudgel By Ana Swanson I cover trade. For most of U.S. history, tariffs were a solution to specific economic problems. Washington used them to raise money and to protect U.S. industries from foreign competitors. And after World War II, presidents used tariffs selectively. President Trump has upended this practice. He says he’ll use tariffs to solve a raft of policy problems, such as migration and territorial expansion. On Sunday, he threatened Colombia with 25 percent tariffs after it turned away two airplanes carrying deported immigrants. The government in Bogotá quickly reversed course. It’s a strategy rarely seen from other presidents — and one that Trump is now deploying almost daily, as my colleague Alan Rappeport and I describe in a story The Times published this morning. In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain. An all-purpose tool Since taking office, Trump has told several nations he would tax imports from their countries if they didn’t do what he wants. He said he would put a 25 percent tariff on products from Canada and Mexico and a 10 percent tariff on products from China unless those countries stopped flows of drugs and migrants into the United States. He has also said he would put tariffs on Russia for waging war in Ukraine and on Denmark if it refused to cede the territory of Greenland. Colombia’s quick capitulation this weekend may embolden Trump, raising questions for the rest of the world about how far he will take the strategy. Past presidents have typically issued tariffs in response to trade issues — a surge of imported tires from China that hurt American tire makers, subsidies Canada gave to its loggers, a European quota on banana imports. Trump isn’t the first president to use trade to shape other foreign-policy goals. Richard Nixon, for instance, said he’d return Okinawa to Japan only if it sent fewer textiles to the United States. But Trump’s “very overt and transactional” approach is unique in American history, said Douglas Irwin, an economic historian at Dartmouth College. Is this allowed? Countries that belong to the World Trade Organization pledge that they won’t harass one another with tariffs just to boost their own economies. But the international rules have a national security exception. And one U.S. law gives presidents broad powers if they declare a national emergency. In the past, that law — the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 — has been used to issue sanctions but not tariffs. After North Korea tested a nuclear weapon in 2008, for example, Washington used the law to bar trade with the country and to punish its officials. Trump’s tariff threats suggest that he considers the bar for national emergencies to be low, said Ted Murphy, a trade specialist at the law firm Sidley Austin. Other countries are still fumbling for the best way to respond to these threats. Many have drawn up lists of American goods to tax if a trade war ensues. But they also worry about tit-for-tat tariffs. The United States is an immense market, and they need access to it. “An escalating tariff war will hurt other countries a lot more than it hurts the U.S. economy,” said Eswar Prasad, a trade policy professor at Cornell. “This is true of practically every major U.S. trading partner, including Canada, China, the European Union and Mexico.” Which is why many leaders have chosen to acquiesce to Trump’s demands. Mexico is doing more to deter migration and has seized more illicit opioids. Canada sent more drones and helicopters to the border. It boasted that tighter visa rules had lowered illegal crossings by 86 percent in the last two months. What next? Still, many allied governments hate the idea of being strong-armed over policy disagreements. The European Union is expanding trade agreements with South America and Mexico. On Monday, Europe’s top diplomat said that it needed to “close ranks” as the Trump administration threatened more tariffs. She said that Europe was “an economic heavyweight and geopolitical partner.” It would not, she seemed to be saying, submit to bullying. More on tariffs During the diplomatic debacle between Trump and Colombia, there were no Situation Room meetings or calls to de-escalate — just threats and counterthreats. Denmark, Panama and other countries are shopping for D.C. lobbyists with connections to the Trump administration. THE LATEST NEWS Artificial Intelligence Greg Baker/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images A new A.I. system from a Chinese company, DeepSeek, matches the abilities of U.S. systems like ChatGPT but the company says it uses fewer, and cheaper, computer chips. DeepSeek’s breakthrough caused American tech stocks to fall yesterday. Nvidia, which makes advanced chips for A.I., lost hundreds of billions of dollars in value. “At the very least,” our tech columnist writes, “DeepSeek has shown that the A.I. arms race is truly on.” Read more about the little-known Chinese start-up. The Times tech podcast “Hard Fork” analyzed the chaos in a special episode. Trump Administration The White House budget office ordered a pause in all federal loans and grants. The directive could upend funding for local governments, disaster relief and education. Trump authorized the Defense Department to potentially bar transgender soldiers from military service. He also ordered that some service members dismissed for refusing the Covid vaccine be reinstated. The acting attorney general fired more than a dozen prosecutors who worked on the special counsel’s investigations of Trump. Trump officials also reassigned the Justice Department’s most senior career official to a much less powerful post. The Trump administration placed dozens of officials at the U.S. Agency for International Development on administrative leave. An email said some employees appeared to be trying to circumvent a Trump executive order. The Senate confirmed Scott Bessent, a billionaire hedge fund manager, as Treasury secretary. Gulf of America Mexican and Cubans have expressed indignation and amusement at Trump’s order renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Google said it would display “Gulf of America” in its maps for U.S. users as soon as government sources made the update. Users in Mexico will continue to see the gulf’s original name, while the rest of the world will see both. More on Politics Republicans in the Florida Legislature overrode one of Gov. Ron DeSantis’s budget vetoes. It was a rare power move. Speaker Mike Johnson has been conducting himself less like the head of a coequal branch government and more like a junior partner to Trump, Annie Karni writes. Middle East In southern Lebanon. Bilal Hussein/Associated Press Israeli forces fired toward people in Lebanon trying to return to southern border towns. The people had defied Israeli warnings not to return yet. Lebanon is struggling to clear the rubble left by the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. Thousands of Palestinians walked miles to return to northern Gaza. “There’s no moment more joyful than returning home,” a 17-year-old Gazan said. The European Union will lift some sanctions on Syria after the fall of President Bashar al-Assad. More International News In Oswiecim, Poland. Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press, via Associated Press World leaders and Holocaust survivors gathered in Poland to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Speakers warned of a dangerous rise in antisemitism. Elon Musk told a rally for Germany’s far-right party that the country had “too much of a focus on past guilt.” Leaders of African nations and global banks promised $35 billion to expand electricity access across the continent. Sweden is investigating damage to an undersea communications cable. The authorities boarded a ship and said they suspected “gross sabotage.” New Zealand loosened visa requirements for remote workers. It will let newly arrived foreigners work for overseas employers for up to nine months. Direct flights will resume between India and China, after nearly five years, as part of a diplomatic thaw. Other Big Stories A 3.8-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Maine. It shook buildings across New England, where quakes are rare. Workers at a Whole Foods in Philadelphia voted to unionize. It’s the first union at the grocery chain, which Amazon owns. At a high-school track meet in Colorado Springs, a participant threw a hammer that cleared safety barriers and killed a spectator. Opinions Robert F. Kennedy’s Senate hearing is this week. Here are 13 questions he should answer, according to health experts. Musk’s meddling in British politics shows he wants to be more than Trump’s right-hand man. He wants to rule, Louis Staples writes. Democrats treated Latinos as an “amorphous brown bloc: neither Black nor white, not really American either.” That helped Trump win more Latino votes even as he attacked Mexicans, Jean Guerrero writes. Here are columns by Thomas Friedman on China and the U.S. and Thomas Edsall on Trump’s vision. Receive free access to handpicked articles via text message. Now you can get Times journalism sent right to your phone. Each article will be accessible for 30 days. Sign up now MORNING READS In Thunder Bay, Ontario. Pictures from an investigation: How a detective looking into a cold-case murder and an angry rock star helped uncover a vast art fraud. Ask Vanessa: “Is there still a rule against wearing brown shoes with blue pants?” Culture diary: Seven surprisingly busy days in the life of an experimental theater maker. Travel: A poet’s guide to Venice in winter. Lives Lived: François Ponchaud was a French Catholic priest whose book “Cambodia: Year Zero” alerted the world to atrocities by the Khmer Rouge that would take the lives of nearly two million people. He died at 86. SPORTS N.B.A.: The Miami Heat suspended Jimmy Butler without pay for an indefinite period after he walked out of a team shootaround. Butler has asked for a trade. N.F.L.: The new Jets coach, Aaron Glenn, refused to commit to bringing back the quarterback Aaron Rodgers next year. Soccer: Arsenal agreed to pay Gotham F.C. a $100,000 transfer fee for the star defender Jenna Nighswonger. ARTS AND IDEAS In Asheville, N.C. Erin Brethauer for The New York Times Over the past decade, American foodies have come to revere Asheville, N.C. National publications raved about its farm-to-table restaurants and craft breweries. After Hurricane Helene’s floods wreaked damage on the city, Pete Wells spent four days speaking with restaurateurs, chefs and farmers as they try to rebuild. More on culture The publisher Dark Horse Comics announced that it would no longer work with the author Neil Gaiman after several women accused him of sexual misconduct. Jon Stewart joked about Trump’s firing of more than a dozen inspector generals. “Who knows how many generals will now go uninspected?” he said. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Christopher Testani for The New York Times Add toasted, salted almonds to this version of a classic Italian chocolate cake. Clean your humidifier. Sleep on cotton sheets. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was bellyache. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 29 Author Members Posted January 29 January 29, 2025 By German Lopez Good morning. We’re covering how President Trump is trying to reshape the government — as well as R.F.K. Jr., war in Congo and the Lunar New Year. President Trump Kenny Holston/The New York Times Freezing the government President Trump believes that a deep state held him back in his first term. Now, he wants to go through the federal government and its many functions, line by line, to make sure he gets his way — on diversity, climate change, immigration and more. Yesterday, the Trump administration tried to freeze a host of federal grants and loans while it figures out whether these priorities align with the president’s agenda. The directive subjects programs to “ideological litmus tests,” my colleague Nicholas Nehamas wrote. It says government money should not “advance Marxist equity, transgenderism and Green New Deal social engineering.” Moments before it was set to begin, a judge suspended the freeze; a ruling will follow next week. The president is trying to strip any policy or program that he and his allies might call “woke.” He has already moved to bar transgender people from the military and to prevent the government from paying for transgender children’s treatments. He revoked a 60-year-old order that bans hiring discrimination in federal contracting and ended D.E.I. programs for the federal work force. Lawmakers often say that “personnel is policy.” Trump is taking that view seriously as a way to ensure that his new policies are actually enforced, after some federal employees admitted that they secretly undermined his first-term agenda. So the president ordered federal employees to report on colleagues who try to continue D.E.I. efforts. He has dismissed officials who he believes oppose him. Yesterday, his administration offered millions of federal employees payouts to resign. It promised to impose “enhanced standards of conduct” to judge if workers are “reliable, loyal, trustworthy.” The funding freeze is also part of an effort to enforce Trump’s agenda across the entire government. By looking at each agency on a granular level, Trump can see if everyone is doing what he wants. The rest of today’s newsletter breaks down what may happen if the freeze goes forward. ‘Temporary pause’ If the freeze proceeds, some programs that Americans rely on will shut down, though the administration called it a “temporary pause.” My colleagues have put together a list of potentially affected programs. They include: Federal Transit Formula Grants, which local officials use to operate city buses and trains. The National School Lunch Program, which feeds poor schoolchildren. The Wildfire Crisis Strategy Landscapes, which funds projects to prevent wildfires. The CHIPS Incentives Program, which supports the manufacturing of semiconductors in the U.S. Special Education Grants to States, which help students with disabilities. The High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas Program, which helps the police stop drug crimes. The administration said it excluded some major services — Social Security, Medicare and food stamps, for instance — from the freeze. “Any payment required by law to be paid will be paid without interruption or delay,” the Office of Management and Budget said. But the freeze might be illegal. The Constitution gives Congress power of the purse, meaning that its members decide how the government spends its money. The president has some leeway (say, in picking contractors), but he typically can’t decide to withhold money. The Supreme Court has rebuked past efforts by presidents to “impound” funds in this way. In 1975, it ruled against Richard Nixon when he cut off some environmental protection funds. Mass confusion A press briefing at the White House. Evan Vucci/Associated Press When the administration issued the directive on Monday, officials across the government wondered if it would affect them. At first, the White House sent agencies a giant spreadsheet of affected programs, asking officials to explain if any violated Trump’s executive orders. Then, the administration rushed to clarify that it exempted some big programs, like Medicaid and Head Start. But in the pandemonium, states reported yesterday that Medicaid payments were frozen. Providers who care for young children said they couldn’t access Head Start funds. Gov. Jeff Landry of Louisiana, a Trump ally, issued a statement asking the administration to take steps to avoid “jeopardizing the financial stability of the state.” Trump views unpredictability as a virtue that keeps his opponents guessing. In this case, maybe the cuts related to wokeness or climate change will scare federal employees into acting cautiously — to avoid getting on their boss’s bad side. But that unpredictability also has another effect: As Trump moves quickly, some government services — and the things they pay for, like schools and policing — might not always function as Americans expect. More on the funding Attorneys general from 22 states and Washington, D.C., filed a lawsuit challenging Trump’s funding freeze. The administration’s relentless stream of orders and directives is a deliberate effort to “flood the zone,” experts say. Trump hopes that his blitz on the federal government will send a message, Peter Baker writes: Get out of the way or get run over. THE LATEST NEWS Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kenny Holston/The New York Times Senate hearings begin today for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s pick for health secretary. He would oversee several major agencies, including the C.D.C. and the F.D.A. Kennedy, a critic of childhood vaccines, would have power over a government program that gives free vaccines to millions of low-income children. Kennedy’s suspicion of food and drug companies has won him an unusual group of fans for a former Democrat: conservative Christian mothers. Caroline Kennedy, a former U.S. ambassador and the daughter of John F. Kennedy, urged senators to reject the nomination. She called her cousin unfit for the job and a “predator.” Read her letter. Track Trump’s cabinet confirmations here. Trump Administration Trump signed an executive order to restrict transgender medical treatments, including surgery and hormone therapy, for people under 19. The Senate confirmed Sean Duffy, a former Wisconsin congressman, as secretary of transportation. Pete Hegseth removed Gen. Mark Milley’s security detail and security clearance and ordered a review of his record. Milley stood up to Trump in his first term. The Trump administration revoked deportation protections that Joe Biden had extended for more than 600,000 Venezuelans in the U.S. Kash Patel, the president’s pick for F.B.I. director, has long emphasized his personal loyalty to Trump. The agency has made independence central to its identity. More on Politics Oklahoma education leaders approved a plan that would require public schools to request proof of children’s immigration status. Senate Democrats blocked a bill to impose sanctions on officials of the International Criminal Court. The bill, which the House passed, is a rebuke of the court’s decision to charge Israeli leaders with war crimes. A Senate seat in Michigan will soon be vacant. Pete Buttigieg is among the politicians considering a run. Trump’s preferred candidates to replace former Representatives Matt Gaetz and Michael Waltz easily won their special election primaries. International In Manila, Philippines. Eloisa Lopez/Reuters Today is Lunar New Year. Billions of people celebrated with fireworks and feasts. See photos from across Asia. Eight of the 26 hostages that Hamas plans to return to Israel in the coming weeks are dead, Israeli officials said. A Hindu celebration at a holy river in India turned into a stampede. Dozens of people may have died. Rwanda has cultivated good relations with Western leaders and donors. Those leaders have said little as Rwandan-backed rebels wage war in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Business X, formerly Twitter, announced a deal with Visa to let users send money through the app. Venture capitalists invested billions in start-ups like OpenAI and Anthropic. The rise of the China’s DeepSeek calls that funding frenzy into question. The cable news anchor Jim Acosta is leaving CNN. The network told him it was moving his show to midnight. A new CVS app will let some customers unlock stores’ glass security cabinets without waiting for a clerk. Other Big Stories American children’s reading skills have continued to decline, according to federal test scores. Kansas is dealing with a major tuberculosis outbreak. Dozens of people in the Kansas City, Kan., area have the disease, officials said. Opinions Trump’s pause of the TikTok ban could begin an economic era in which the government picks winners and losers — as China does, Tim Wu writes. The Chicago police pulled a live coyote from a supermarket produce aisle last week. Nature is always closer than we think, Margaret Renkl writes. Here’s a column by Bret Stephens on the end of diversity programs. The Times Sale: Our best rate for readers of The Morning. Save now with our best offer on unlimited news and analysis as part of the complete Times experience: $1/week for your first year. MORNING READS In Hazard, Ky. Jon Cherry for The New York Times On the mountaintop: As flood risks increase, Kentucky is relocating people to mine-cratered higher ground. Survival: The plane crash should have killed her. Sometimes she wishes it had. Ask Well: “Does hot lemon water have any health benefits?” Lives Lived: Pableaux Johnson was a New Orleans food writer, photographer and cook who documented Mardi Gras traditions and served red beans and rice to thousands. He died at 59. SPORTS N.B.A.: The Kings are open to trading the star guard De’Aaron Fox, perhaps to the Spurs. W.N.B.A.: The Phoenix Mercury will acquire Alyssa Thomas, a five-time All-Star, from the Connecticut Sun. And Brittney Griner agreed to a one-year deal with the Atlanta Dream after 11 seasons with the Mercury. ARTS AND IDEAS Linda Xiao for The New York Times It’s Dumpling Week, an NYT Cooking celebration of Lunar New Year featuring five new recipes for your dumpling party. “All the good feelings rush in with dumplings,” Genevieve Ko writes. “While making dumplings from scratch can be a meditative solo project, shaping and eating them with a group is its own kind of bliss.” See the recipes, as well as videos showing how they’re made. More on culture Clockwise from top left, Istanbul; Tokyo; Melbourne, Australia; and Kuwait City. Gary He/McAtlas McBaguettes and “ski-through” windows: A new photography book showcases the world’s distinctive McDonald’s locations. The late night hosts discussed Trump’s executive order about trans soldiers. “Trump is acting like they’re doing transition surgeries on the front lines,” said Michael Kosta of “The Daily Show.” THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Linda Xiao for The New York Times Wrap chile oil wontons at home. Take these items on a road trip. Edit photos on your phone. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was mailbox. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. —German Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 30 Author Members Posted January 30 January 30, 2025 Good morning. Today, we’re covering breaking news about a plane crash in Washington. Then, we explore R.F.K. Jr.’s contentious confirmation hearing. —David Leonhardt Wreckage in the Potomac River. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images A midair collision An American Airlines jet and an Army helicopter collided just outside Washington D.C. last night and plunged into the Potomac River. Sixty-four people were on the plane, which was coming from Wichita, Kan., including U.S. and Russian figure skaters returning from a training camp. The military aircraft carried a crew of three. Emergency responders are searching cold and murky waters for survivors, and Reagan National Airport will be closed until 11 a.m. See photos and the latest news from the rescue efforts. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kenny Holston/The New York Times The R.F.K. Jr. effect By David Leonhardt Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has a history of calling attention to overlooked public-health problems, whether it’s autism, river pollution, food additives or the toll of Covid school closures. But Kennedy also has a history of backing solutions that are inconsistent with scientific evidence, especially on vaccines. He has repeatedly made false claims about their effectiveness and their side effects. At Kennedy’s Senate confirmation hearing yesterday, Democrats — and a few Republicans — confronted him about these claims. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, read a 2023 quote in which Kennedy said that “no vaccine is safe and effective,” and Bernie Sanders displayed a photo of a baby’s onesie, promoted by a group Kennedy ran, with the words “No Vax, No Problem.” At times, Kennedy tried to distance himself from his past vaccine skepticism. His chances are likely to come down to a small number of Republicans who seem conflicted about whether to support him. If no Democrats or independents support Kennedy, he can lose only three Republican senators and still be confirmed. (These are the Republicans to watch.) In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain three ways that Kennedy may affect the use of vaccines if the Senate confirms him as President Trump’s secretary of health and human services. 1. Hamper development Bird flu — specifically the H5N1 virus — has spread rapidly over the past year. It has infected nearly 1,000 cattle herds in the U.S. and caused serious illnesses in a small number of people. If the virus mutates to jump more easily between humans, it may become a major problem. (Here is The Morning’s recent bird flu explainer.) A H5N1 vaccine exists, although the supply is modest. If the virus spreads, the federal government, including the Department of Health and Human Services, will likely need to play a central role in accelerating production. Yet Kennedy has criticized the vaccine as dangerous, despite evidence to the contrary. A protester during the confirmation hearing. Kenny Holston/The New York Times If bird flu exploded into a full pandemic — or an unexpected new virus emerged — the country might also benefit from powerful vaccines using mRNA. That’s the technology that the federal Warp Speed project used to create the Covid vaccines, and Kennedy has inaccurately criticized mRNA vaccines for killing many people. “It’s hard to see him championing their development like Warp Speed did,” said my colleague Apoorva Mandavilli, who’s covering bird flu. Kennedy could also push the F.D.A., which he would oversee, not to approve vaccines that are in the pipeline. One potential example is a vaccine for Lyme disease. 2. Encourage lawsuits In 1986, the federal government created a program to compensate families whose children suffer rare side effects from vaccines. The health secretary has the power to choose which vaccines and which side effects are part of the program, which uses a special court to decide claims. If Kennedy expanded the list of supposed injuries eligible for compensation, it could lead to a flood of claims. He could also remove vaccines from the court’s purview, meaning their makers could be sued in a traditional court. “Such an event could lead vaccine makers to take their products off the market,” my colleague Christina Jewett told me. Kennedy has a personal stake in these anti-vaccine lawsuits, The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board noted. He has received payments from a law firm that sued a large vaccine maker, and he plans to continue receiving them even if he becomes health secretary. Some of the cases involve a vaccine called Gardasil, which protects against a group of viruses that cause cervical cancer. 3. Restrict access Kennedy would also have authority over Vaccines for Children, an $8 billion program that helps provide lower-income children with access to vaccines for polio, measles, whooping cough and chickenpox. He has promised not to take vaccines away from people who want them. But he could still alter the program in ways that would make vaccines harder to get or foment doubt about them, as Christina and Sheryl Gay Stolberg have pointed out. The health secretary oversees the contracts that pay vaccine makers to make and distribute the shots. More broadly, Dr. Tom Frieden, a former C.D.C. director, expressed concern about the possibility of a “soft recall” in which “certain vaccines remain technically available but are no longer widely recommended or reimbursed by insurance, making them effectively inaccessible to much of the public.” (Frieden asked one of the 13 questions for Kennedy in a recent Times Opinion article.) The bottom line: Vaccine skepticism, often disconnected from the facts, has been Kennedy’s signature issue for years. It’s a major reason he wants the job of health secretary. If he gets it, the most likely scenario is that vaccine use will decline and the incidence of the underlying illnesses — like measles, which can be fatal — will increase. More on the hearing Kennedy blamed pesticides and processed foods for the rise in chronic disease among American children. He denied that he was anti-vaccine and noted that his children were vaccinated. Democrats pressed Kennedy over his position on abortion. He called himself “pro-choice” when he entered the presidential race in 2023, but he said yesterday that states should be able to set restrictions. Kennedy stumbled over a Republican senator’s questions on Medicare and Medicaid. He confused the programs several times. Other Republicans praised Kennedy as a rebellious truth teller. The crowd in the hearing room, which included many of his supporters, called out,“Make America healthy again” after the hearing ended. Here is a fact-check of Kennedy’s statements. He will appear before the Senate’s health committee today for another hearing. Kash Patel and Tulsi Gabbard, two of Trump’s other high-profile picks, will also make their cases for confirmation today. THE LATEST NEWS The Trump Administration The White House rescinded its directive to freeze trillions of dollars in federal grants and loans after the order caused mass confusion. Read about the chaotic rollout. Trump wants to remake public education. Change will be difficult: States and school boards have a lot of power. Trump’s suspension of American foreign aid could end a lifesaving H.I.V. program. Some fear that the virus will surge in Africa again. The Trump administration’s effort to get federal workers to leave their posts could lead to an exodus of experienced employees. Trump has fired officials in ways that apparently violated federal laws. Getting dragged into court may be exactly what his lawyers want, Charlie Savage writes. Immigration Trump ordered his administration to prepare to house thousands of migrants at Guantánamo Bay. He did not offer details on the plan. Trump signed the bipartisan Laken Riley Act into law. It directs the authorities to deport immigrants accused of certain crimes. ICE agents — in a show of force — worked with dozens of officers from other federal agencies to arrest 39 people in New York. More on Politics Bob Menendez Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times A judge sentenced Bob Menendez, the former New Jersey senator convicted of acting as an agent for Egypt and of trading favors for cash, gold and a luxury car, to 11 years in prison. On a tense call, Democratic governors urged Senator Chuck Schumer to fight harder against Trump’s agenda. Justice Department officials and Manhattan prosecutors have discussed dropping the corruption case against Eric Adams, New York City’s Democratic mayor. Middle East Agam Berger Mohammed Hajjar/Associated Press Hamas released two Israeli hostages. Eight captives in total — three Israelis and five Thais — are expected to be freed today. The first hostage release was careful and calm, but video footage showed a second freed hostage walking through an unruly and chaotic crowd. See the video. Trump’s Middle East envoy made a trip to Gaza. He is the first high-ranking U.S. official to visit the enclave in years. The rebel coalition that took control of Syria appointed its leader, Ahmed al-Shara, to serve as president while the country forms a permanent government. Business Meta agreed to pay Trump $25 million to settle a lawsuit he filed in 2021 over his suspension from Facebook and Instagram after the Jan. 6 riot. As Silicon Valley leaders get close with Trump, employees in the traditionally left-leaning tech industry have staged quiet protests. Frontier Airlines is trying to buy Spirit Airlines again, three years after a failed merger. Other Big Stories The Federal Reserve kept interest rates steady. Jerome Powell, the Fed chair, offered no hints about future cuts. Moments before fire erupted below transmission towers near Altadena, Calif., high-voltage power lines faulted in the area, new data shows. Opinions American corporations should learn from the embattled leaders of higher education and stay silent on political issues, Anthony Casey and Tom Ginsburg write. As Los Angeles rebuilds, the city needs to prioritize money for schools, Jessica Grose writes. Here are columns by Nicholas Kristof on Africa’s booming population, and Pamela Paul on how to stay sane. The Times Sale: Our best rate for readers of The Morning. Save now with our best offer on unlimited news and analysis as part of the complete Times experience: $1/week for your first year. MORNING READS The Johnson Space Center in Houston. NASA Origins: Life’s ingredients lurk inside NASA’s Bennu asteroid samples. Health: Seven big questions about cancer, answered. Interview: Bill Gates is amazed at how things turned out. Social Q’s: “My friend behaved like a lecher at our wedding. Should we tell his wife?” Lives Lived: Iris Cummings Critchell was a swimmer who was the last survivor of the American team that competed in the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. She was also an influential aviator who flew bombers with the Women’s Air Force in World War II. She died at 104. SPORTS W.N.B.A.: Caitlin Clark will not participate in the crossover 3-point challenge at the N.B.A. All-Star Game. N.B.A.: NBC is expected to hire Reggie Miller to be a lead analyst for N.B.A. coverage. ARTS AND IDEAS Breaking character during a live performance is generally seen as unprofessional. But it’s become a hallmark of “Saturday Night Live” over the show’s 50 seasons, and audiences delight when the facade cracks — even if Lorne Michaels reportedly hates it. Jason Zinoman, The Times’s comedy columnist, collected some of the most memorable breaks in the show’s history. More on culture Jimmy Fallon made his Broadway debut in “All In,” a comedy that features a rotating cast. The late-night hosts discussed Kennedy’s confirmation hearing. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Christopher Simpson for The New York Times Add chickpeas to a classic combination of sausage and broccoli rabe. Embrace frozen food (really). Prep meals with a chef’s knife. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were conclave and covalence. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow.— David Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
Members phkrause Posted January 31 Author Members Posted January 31 January 31, 2025 Good morning. My colleague Ruth Maclean explains the fighting happening in the eastern Congo. We’re also covering the plane crash over the Potomac, confirmation hearings and Blue Man Group. —David Leonhardt Near Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo. Guerchom Ndebo for The New York Times A conflict erupts By Ruth Maclean I cover western and central Africa. Rebels backed by Rwanda are seizing huge tracts of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Their progress has been swift and stunning. In a month, they have routed Congo’s underequipped army several times and caused more than half a million people to flee. On Monday, they captured Goma, a major Congolese city along the Rwandan border. (They grabbed it once before, in 2012.) I’ve been talking to Goma residents. They’ve been hiding in their houses for the past week without electricity or running water. Gunfire, and occasionally bombs, explode around them. Some of them took in families who had fled from camps and villages outside the city. But plenty of those displaced people arrived in Goma knowing nobody. Why are the rebels, known as M23, grabbing parts of eastern Congo? In their telling, they’re protecting ethnic Tutsis, the minority group massacred in a 1994 genocide, some of whom also live in Congo. But experts say the real reason is Congo’s rare minerals, which power our phones and devices. Congo’s mines are making the rebels — and their patrons in Rwanda — rich. By The New York Times The United States and China are competing for such minerals, and the rebels could make access uncertain. In today’s newsletter, I’ll explain what’s at stake in the rebels’ advance — and why they may be hard to stop. The minerals in your phone You might be familiar with Rwanda from the film “Hotel Rwanda,” starring Don Cheadle. In 1994, members of the Hutu ethnic majority killed an estimated 800,000 ethnic Tutsis. After a revolt overthrew the Hutu extremists who oversaw the genocide, many of the culprits fled to Congo. Rwanda says they continued attacking the country from across the border, but those salvos ended decades ago. You might not know much about Congo. But you could be holding a piece of it right now, inside the phone on which you’re reading this. The country is full of the minerals used to make our electronics. And everyone wants a piece: Washington and Beijing have been vying for access to minerals like copper and cobalt. Elon Musk gets most of the cobalt in Tesla’s batteries from a Congolese mine. Rwanda’s rebels are seizing land with rare minerals like these. For years, they’ve profited from Congo’s mineral wealth, studies show. Lately, U.N. experts say, they’re taking in $800,000 per month from mines they seized containing coltan, an ore used in smartphones. Africa’s world war M23 soldiers. Guerchom Ndebo for The New York Times What’s at stake, experts warn, is a larger regional war. The United Nations says up to 4,000 Rwandan troops support M23 in Congo. (Rwanda denies this.) Burundi has sent 2,000 troops to defend Goma against the rebels. South Africa sent troops to fight with a U.N. force alongside the Congolese Army. Around the turn of the century, the Great Lakes region of Africa was at the center of a regional war that raged for five years. Several countries sent soldiers, and millions of people died. The current battle, too, seems likely to extend beyond eastern Congo. It may not go as far as Kinshasa, the capital nearly 1,000 miles away, but that is what the rebels have vowed. A few African leaders have lately tried to sort this mess out. Kenya’s president invited the Congolese and Rwandan presidents for talks on Wednesday, but Congo’s president didn’t show up. In December, Angola’s president was set to hold peace talks, but Rwanda’s president pulled out at the last minute. All mouth, no money? The world’s powerful countries have condemned Rwanda for supporting the M23. Yesterday, France called on Rwanda to withdraw its troops from Congo. The new U.S. secretary of state, Marco Rubio, held a genial call with Congo’s president and a tense one with Rwanda’s, in which he said he was “deeply troubled” by the escalation. Back in 2013, after M23 took Goma the first time, Western countries threatened Rwanda with sanctions, and it cut the rebels off. Eventually, Congolese and U.N. forces defeated the rebels. This time, it’s unclear how far big countries will go — or whether the flurry of diplomatic statements will change anything. Rwanda, a country very dependent on aid, has worked to make itself useful internationally. It supplies U.N. peacekeepers to dangerous missions elsewhere in Africa. It has offered to take in asylum seekers whom European countries turn away. It sent troops to fight a jihadist insurgency in Mozambique. It channels foreign aid into impressive economic growth, making it a darling of donors. Another wrinkle is that President Trump has suspended almost all foreign aid, including to Rwanda, so he has less leverage to use on its president. That all may earn Rwanda a pass as its patron countries do little to stop it. U.S.-funded food aid in South Sudan in 2023. Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times Related: Trump’s order to halt most foreign aid has intensified humanitarian crises and raised questions about Washington’s reliability as a global leader. THE LATEST NEWS Potomac Crash Wreckage near Reagan Airport. Kenny Holston/The New York Times All 67 people on board an American Airlines flight and an Army helicopter that collided over the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., died. Crews are working to recover bodies. The victims included world-class figure skaters and friends returning from a hunting trip. Read more about them. Before the crash, an air traffic controller contacted the helicopter’s pilots to make sure they could see the plane ahead of them. Listen to the recordings. Officials believe the helicopter may have been flying too high. These maps show the paths of the plane and the helicopter. The airport control tower was understaffed. The air traffic controller on duty was doing a job usually handled by two people. Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, all suggested diversity initiatives had a role in the crash, though they offered no evidence. Kash Patel Hearing At his Senate hearing, Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to run the F.B.I., denied that a list of anti-Trump officials he published in his book was an “enemies list.” But he evaded questions about whether he would investigate the officials on the list. Patel also refused to say that Joe Biden had won the 2020 election. Patel, who has generally been loyal to Trump, diverged with him on one point: He said he disagreed with the pardons for Jan. 6 rioters who attacked the police. Republicans expressed support for Patel. “Don’t go over there and burn that place down,” Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana said to him. “Go over there and make it better.” Tulsi Gabbard Hearing Tulsi Gabbard Eric Lee/The New York Times Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence, resisted calls from both Democrats and Republicans to declare Edward Snowden a traitor at her Senate confirmation hearing. Gabbard also faced questions about her past comments defending leaders of Russia and Syria. She appeared to walk back her implication that the U.S. bore responsibility for the war in Ukraine. More on Hearings At a second Senate hearing for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s pick for health secretary, Kennedy defended his views on vaccination, and a key Republican — Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician — remained undecided. Here are takeaways from the hearing. The Senate confirmed Doug Burgum as Interior Secretary. More on Trump The Trump administration told top F.B.I. officials to retire or be fired in the coming days. Paramount is in talks with Trump to settle a lawsuit he brought accusing the company of deceptively editing a “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris. It would be an extraordinary concession to a sitting president. Mark Zuckerberg defended his embrace of the Trump administration in a meeting with Meta employees. Immigrant communities are afraid of deportation, and schools, churches and shops are feeling the effects. One minister said fewer congregants were showing up for services. The Trump administration is considering a move to halt New York City’s congestion pricing program. International Debris after a stampede in northern India. Atul Loke for The New York Times A pre-dawn stampede at a massive Hindu festival killed 30 people, but officials appeared to cover up the damage and delay releasing the death toll. Salwan Momika, an Iraqi immigrant who burned a Quran in Sweden in 2023, which set off protests across the Muslim world, has been killed. Officials opened a murder investigation. North Korea sent its best troops to aid Russia in its war against Ukraine. But after months of suffering severe losses, they are no longer on the front line. Moscow has tried to keep Russians off YouTube. People have found workarounds. Other Big Stories A conservative appeals court ruled that a longstanding federal ban on handgun sales to people aged 18 to 20 was unconstitutional. Florida’s recent winter storm nearly froze more than 1,000 sea turtles to death. They washed up on shore just in time. Opinions “America’s not an idea. It’s a country with a border”: Steve Bannon discussed immigration, Trump and the so-called tech right with Ross Douthat. Meghan Daum considered self-reliance a virtue until her home in Altadena, Calif., burned down. Allowing people to help is, in its own way, an act of service, she writes. Here are columns by David Brooks on Trump’s spending freeze, and Lydia Polgreen on mass migration. The Times Sale: Our best rate for readers of The Morning. Save now with our best offer on unlimited news and analysis as part of the complete Times experience: $1/week for your first year. MORNING READS Asian shore crabs ready for serving. Brian Finke for The New York Times Crustacean invasion: Crabs from Europe and Asia have taken over New England. Luckily, they’re delicious. Young Luddites: Meet the college kids sticking to flip phones. Weddings: Couples are restructuring their registries and celebrations to support charitable causes. Space rock: Astronomers are keeping an eye on this asteroid’s odds of hitting Earth. Ask the Therapist: “My boyfriend lacks ambition. Is that a deal breaker?” Lives Lived: Dick Button’s passionate and often tart commentary on figure skating competitions became a television staple over six decades and made him the sport’s unofficial spokesman. He died at 95. SPORTS N.F.L.: Six massage therapists accused the Ravens kicker Justin Tucker of inappropriate sexual behavior, according to an investigation by The Baltimore Banner. N.B.A.: Federal officials are investigating the Heat guard Terry Rozier over an illegal gambling operation in 2023. ARTS AND IDEAS Blue Man Group Vincent Tullo for The New York Times After 17,800 shows and 82,150 gallons of paint, Blue Man Group is coming to an end in New York. The show ran for 34 years. It gave Fred Armisen a drumming gig and “Arrested Development” a hilarious story line. Read about the group. More on culture A new exhibition in London traces the evolution of tarot cards. Late-night hosts commented on Trump’s views on D.E.I. THE MORNING RECOMMENDS … Christopher Testani for The New York Times Make a gumbo. Watch these movies and shows before they leave Netflix in February. Clean your garbage disposal. Take our news quiz. GAMES Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was dizzyingly. And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. —David Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at themorning@nytimes.com. Editor: David Leonhardt Deputy Editor: Adam B. Kushner News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti Associate Editor: Lauren Jackson News Staff: Desiree Ibekwe, Brent Lewis, German Lopez, Ashley Wu News Assistant: Lyna Bentahar Saturday Writer: Melissa Kirsch Quote phkrause Read Isaiah 10:1-13
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