Late Edition
Today, mostly sunny, low humidity, a
VOL. CLXIX . . . No. 58,791
“We’re at an inflection point,” Senator Kamala Harris said in accepting the Democratic nomination for vice president on Wednesday.
Trump Presses Raging Fires Add to California’s August Torment
Weapons Sale
To the U.A.E. many
VACAVILLE, Calif. — How
things can go wrong at Anything That Can
By MARK MAZZETTI
and EDWARD WONG
WASHINGTON — The Trump
administration has accelerated a
push to sell the F-35 stealth
fighter and advanced armed
drones to the United Arab Emir-
ates, at a time when the Gulf na-
tion is working with the Trump ad-
ministration on a historic plan to
formalize diplomatic ties with Is-
rael, according to American offi-
cials familiar with the discussions.
Administration officials in re-
cent weeks gave a classified brief-
ing about the F-35 to the Emirati
military — despite some concerns
among National Security Council
staff about the wisdom of giving
details on one of the Pentagon’s
most advanced weapons to a for-
eign government before a deci-
sion about a potential arms sale
has been finalized.
American officials deny that the
new push to sell the advanced
weapons is a direct reward for the
Emirati role in a diplomatic break-
through, announced by President
Trump last week, where the Emir-
ates would become just the third
Arab nation to recognize Israel. In
exchange, Israel will suspend an-
nexation of occupied West Bank
territory.
But officials do not dispute that
the new momentum on the arms
sale — after years of stalled re-
quests by the Emirates to buy the
fighter jet — is linked to the
broader diplomatic initiative.
Such a move could dramatically
alter the military balance in the
Middle East and is likely to face
strong objections from some parts
of the government in Israel, which
Continued on Page A11
Trump Says QAnon Followers ‘Love Our Country,’ Raising Alarm
By KATIE ROGERS
and KEVIN ROOSE
WASHINGTON — President
Trump on Wednesday offered en-
couragement to proponents of
QAnon, a viral conspiracy theory
that has gained a widespread fol-
lowing among people who believe
the president is secretly battling a
criminal band of sex traffickers,
and suggested that its proponents
were patriots upset with unrest in
Democratic cities.
INTERNATIONAL A9-13
Tokyo’s Very Public Toilets
To allay safety and hygiene fears, col-
orful stalls built in parks use “smart
glass,” which turns opaque. PAGE A10
Pompeo’s ‘Snapback’ Plea
Despite a lack of European support, the
U.S. is asking the U.N. to punish Iran
under the 2015 nuclear deal. PAGE A12
© 2020 The New York Times Company
Valley in Santa Cruz and San Ma-
Heat, Virus, Outages: teoInCounties.
By THOMAS FULLER
Southern California, fires
were reported in Ventura and Riv-
once?
On Wednesday millions of Cali-
fornia residents were smothered
by smoke-filled skies as dozens of
wildfires raged out of control.
They braced for triple-digit tem-
peratures, the sixth day of a pun-
ishing heat wave that included a
recent reading of 130 degrees in
Death Valley. They braced for pos-
sible power outages because the
state’s grid is overloaded, the lat-
est sign of an energy crisis. And
they continued to fight a virus that
is killing 130 Californians a day.
Even for a state accustomed to
disaster, August has been a terri-
ble month.
Wildfires near Vacaville, Calif., have burned over 32,000 acres and destroyed more than 50 homes.
“I’ve heard these are people
that love our country,” Mr. Trump
said during a White House news
conference ostensibly about the
coronavirus. “So I don’t know re-
ally anything about it other than
they do supposedly like me.”
When told by a reporter about
the central premise of the QAnon
theory — a belief that Mr. Trump is
saving the world from a satanic
cult made up of pedophiles and
cannibals connected to Democrat-
ic Party figures, so-called deep-
state actors and Hollywood celeb-
TRACKING AN OUTBREAK A4-8
Plasma Approval Is on Hold
As the F.D.A. prepared to give emer-
gency clearance to use blood plasma to
treat Covid-19, government health
leaders urged caution. PAGE A7
Alabama’s College Experiment
The state is betting its student testing
and technology program will be enough
to ward off outbreaks, even as campuses
abruptly close elsewhere.
Viral Particles on the Subway
Many New Yorkers are avoiding the
subway. Masks and social distancing are
crucial, but good airflow also helps
reduce the risk of infection.
NEW YORK, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Go Wrong, Has
Across the state there were 23
major fires reported on Wednes-
day and more than 300 smaller
ones.
In the San Francisco Bay Area
alone there were 15 wildfires,
most of them burning out of con-
trol and feeding off the grasses
and shrubs desiccated by the ex-
treme heat. Thousands of resi-
dents were ordered evacuated in
the wine country of Napa County
and from the hills above Silicon
Giving a Boost to Fringe
Conspiracy Theorists
rities — Mr. Trump did not ques-
tion the validity of the movement
or the truth of those claims.
Instead, he offered his help.
“Is that supposed to be a bad
thing or a good thing?” the presi-
dent said lightly, responding to a
reporter who asked if he could
NATIONAL A21-24
Postmaster General Under Fire
Democrats are calling on Louis DeJoy
to step down amid fears that changes
he has already made could disenfran-
chise voters in November.
Michigan to Pay Flint Victims
A settlement will provide about $600
million, mostly for children poisoned by
lead-tainted tap water.
PAGE A6
BUSINESS B1-6
A Boon for Big-Box Stores
Walmart and Target reported record
sales, as shoppers sought convenience
PAGE A8 amid the pandemic.
ERIN SCHAFF/THE NEW YORK TIMES
erside Counties — and sweeping
through one of the world’s biggest
collections of Joshua trees, burn-
ing a 43,000-acre stretch of the
Mojave National Preserve. Im-
ages of the fire showed the iconic
trees shooting flames into the air
like blowtorches.
The evening breezes that many
Californians rely on to chase the
heat from their homes had van-
ished. And for those with air-con-
ditioning, the power outages were
a constant threat to that remedy.
But closer to the fires, residents
had more urgent concerns.
Edie Kansas left her home out-
Continued on Page A22
MAX WHITTAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
support that theory. “If I can help
save the world from problems, I
am willing to do it. I’m willing to
put myself out there.”
Mr. Trump’s cavalier response
was a remarkable public expres-
sion of support for conspiracy
theorists who have operated in
Continued on Page A18
CRACKDOWN Facebook went
after thousands of groups related
to the QAnon movement. PAGE B1
PAGE A21
THURSDAY STYLES D1-6
A Small-Is-Beautiful Ethos
PAGE A23 Evan Kinori has drawn a passionate
following with his one-man clothing
label’s meticulous workwear. PAGE D2
Orbivores on the Prowl
On Block Island in this summer of sor-
row, a hunt for handblown glass fishing
PAGE B1 floats has magical meaning.
IN ACCEPTING BID,
HARRIS WARNS U.S.
IS AT CROSSROADS
NEWS ANALYSIS
Unusual Pressure
on Running Mate
By ADAM NAGOURNEY
and KATIE GLUECK
Kamala Harris stands before
the Democratic Party as the
bridge between a moderate
generation of leaders and young-
er liberals on the rise, balancing
the obligations of promoting
Joseph R. Biden Jr. while offering
herself to someday lead the party
into a post-Biden era.
Pressures, hopes, aspirations
— this was the burden on Ms.
Harris at the Democratic conven-
tion on Wednesday, as she
sought to introduce herself to a
nation and a party that really
barely knows her. But this is also
the burden that will be on her for
the next four years if she and Mr.
Biden win in November.
Rarely has a vice-presidential
candidate served under a presi-
dential nominee who well may
not seek a second term. As a
result, Ms. Harris carries an
extraordinary weight of expecta-
tions from her party to rise to the
demands of leadership.
“That’s a lot to put on the
shoulders of a person,” said Tim
Kaine, the Virginia senator who
was the vice-presidential candi-
date for Hillary Clinton in 2016.
In the tumultuous tent that is the
ever-changing Democratic Party,
he said, there was no one person
Mr. Biden could have chosen who
would appeal to everyone.
“There’s no way that you’re
going to get, in this broad family,
like everybody like, ‘Oh, you
were my first pick,’” he said,
even as he spoke enthusiastically
about Ms. Harris.
If anything, the first two days
of the convention were about the
party trying to paper over any
kinds of disagreements, aiming
to present a united front of mod-
erates and progressives, as well
as some Republicans and demo-
cratic socialists. With elaborate
videos and stage-managed
speeches, Democrats showcased
diversity — racial, gender, age —
while nominating a 77-year-old
white grandfather from Dela-
ware as their standard-bearer.
Party leaders gave small slots to
liberals, though barely gave a
platform to their policy goals like
Continued on Page A17
‘Do Not Let Them Take Away
Your Democracy,’ Obama Says
By PETER BAKER
Shortly before the 2016 election,
President Barack Obama told
supporters that he would consider
it “a personal insult” if America
chose a bombastic reality televi-
sion star who trafficked in racist
conspiracy theories and stood
against everything that he had
spent eight years building.
America did it anyway. “This
stings,” Mr. Obama confessed af-
terward.
Four years later, Mr. Obama re-
turned to the national stage on
Wednesday night seeking vindi-
cation with an implicit defense of
his own record and an indignant
condemnation of President
Trump as a corrupt and failing
leader who has used his office to
enrich himself, pit Americans
against one another and threaten
American democracy.
“Donald Trump hasn’t grown
into the job because he can’t,” he
said in an 19-minute Democratic
convention speech from the Mu-
seum of the American Revolution
in Philadelphia. “And the conse-
quences of that failure are severe:
ARTS C1-7
Retracing a Suffragist’s Path
Exalted as a martyr to the cause, Inez
Milholland later fell from view. An artist
is determined to change that. PAGE C1
Setting Stage for Racial Equity
At a handful of theaters in the country,
white artistic directors are stepping
down to diversify leadership.
EDITORIAL, OP-ED A26-27
Gail Collins
U(D54G1D)y+%!&![!?!"
PAGE D1
light breeze, high 81. Tonight, clear
to partly cloudy, low 66. Tomorrow, a
mix of sunshine and clouds, high 84.
Weather map appears on Page C8.
$3.00
A Nominee to Link
Democrats’ Past
and Future
By ASTEAD W. HERNDON
and LISA LERER
MILWAUKEE — Democrats
formally nominated Kamala Har-
ris for the vice presidency on
Wednesday night, placing a wom-
an of color on a major party ticket
for the first time and showcasing
the diversity of race and gender
they believe will energize their co-
alition to defeat President Trump
in the fall.
The program at the party’s na-
tional convention also featured a
striking repudiation of Mr. Trump
by former President Barack
Obama, a break with the presiden-
tial custom of not criticizing a suc-
cessor by name. Mr. Obama
praised Mr. Biden’s character,
contrasting it with Mr. Trump’s,
and directed a portion of his re-
marks to voters undecided about
whom they will vote for, or
whether they will vote at all.
“Donald Trump hasn’t grown
into the job, because he can’t,” Mr.
Obama said, growing emotional at
DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
Barack Obama in Philadelphia.
points as he talked about the chal-
lenges facing the country and de-
mocracy. “The consequences of
that failure are severe. 170,000
Americans dead. Millions of jobs
gone.”
A day after nominating Joseph
R. Biden Jr., a 77-year-old fixture
of Washington establishment poli-
tics, at their national convention,
Democrats tried to make the case
that while Mr. Biden would be one
kind of change agent — a repudia-
tion of Trumpism — Ms. Harris
would help steer the party in new
directions and reflect a changing
Continued on Page A16
170,000 Americans dead. Millions
of jobs gone while those at the top
take in more than ever. Our worst
impulses unleashed, our proud
reputation around the world badly
diminished, and our democratic
institutions threatened like never
before.”
After watching Mr. Trump sys-
tematically demolish many of his
achievements, Mr. Obama has al-
most as much at stake in this
year’s campaign as his former
vice president and his party’s
2020 presidential nominee, Jo-
seph R. Biden Jr., does — a second
chance to redeem his legacy and
prove to history that Mr. Trump’s
election was an anomaly, not a
permanent repudiation.
On the line is the opportunity
not just to restore programs and
international agreements that Mr.
Trump abandoned and bolster
those that remain threatened, but
also to rewrite the narrative about
America and its values according
to Mr. Obama. The story line that
Continued on Page A19
PAGE C1
PAGE A27
A2 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
A. G. SULZBERGER
Publisher
Founded in 1851
ADOLPH S. OCHS
Publisher 1896-1935
ARTHUR HAYS SULZBERGER
Publisher 1935-1961
ORVIL E. DRYFOOS
Publisher 1961-1963
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Publisher 1963-1992
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Publisher 1992-2017
Inside The Times
THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY
Helping you live better.
No matter where you are.
Finding a Way to Bloom Again
Tapping writers from many fields, the Resilience series offers inspiration.
By DAN SALTZSTEIN
In March, when the coronavirus pandemic
began to spread and increase in severity,
the Times newsroom was already devoting
enormous resources to covering it. But as
the deputy editor for Special Sections, I
also started thinking about what we could
offer our readers — as they were quaran-
tined, stressed and perhaps even ill — that
was positive, distracting and, most impor-
tant, helpful.
And so our (more or less) weekly Resil-
ience series was born. It’s admittedly a
broad topic: Resilience can take so many
forms, and means different things to differ-
ent people. In a way, though, that made it a
particularly interesting series to assign and
edit. I knew I wanted a variety of voices,
some offering specific advice, others afford-
ing writers with particular and unusual
Give the gift they’ll perspectives a place to share their stories.
Before the online series began, I hap-
open every day. pened to be reading Eva Holland’s new
book, “Nerve: Adventures in the Science of
Fear,” in which she discussed both over-
coming her own traumas and researching
Gift subscriptions to The Times start at $25.
groundbreaking techniques intended to
Visit nytimes.com/gift or call 1-800-NYTIMES. combat phobias. So I asked her if she would
write about trauma therapies and what
lessons we could learn from them.
Like Ms. Holland’s article, most pieces in
the series combined some form of personal
narrative and information that the reader
could use. In her article on what makes
some people more resilient than others,
Eilene Zimmerman wrote about losing her
ex-husband to a drug overdose, but also
how stress can actually be a character-
building experience. “You can think of
resilience as a set of skills that can be, and
often is, learned,” she wrote. “Part of the
skill-building comes from exposure to very
difficult — but manageable — experiences.”
The articles in this series generally result
from a combination of ideas I have and
pitches I get from writers. Either way,
The truth
some perspectives inevitably feel entirely
counterintuitive to those who haven’t lived
through them. Take the article by Phil Klay,
is worth it.
the veteran and National Book Award
winner, whom we asked to write about
what we could learn from war trauma.
Some soldiers, he said, “found in their
suffering a strange and terrible blessing.”
On This Day in History
A MEMORABLE HEADLINE FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES
TWO IN RACING AUTO KILLED BEFORE 10,000
August 20, 1909. Two men were killed in the first automobile race at the newly con-
structed Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Urefrid Bourque, the driver, and his mechanic,
Harry Holcombe, were in second place in the 250-mile race when their Knox car veered
off the track and crashed into a fence. “All interest in the races disappeared and in a few
moments hundreds had left the grounds,” The Times reported. The race continued, and
Bob Burman, driving a Buick, was the winner. The first Indianapolis 500 was held at the
speedway in 1911.
Subscribers can browse the complete Times archives through 2002 at timesmachine.nytimes.com.
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OPINION A26-27
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VIDEO
A new Op-Doc, “Gods From
Space,” profiles a group called the
Aetherius Society, which believes
in selflessness and extraterrestri-
al life. nytimes.com/video
AVALON NUOVO
Or the one by Bonnie Tsui, who also has
a new book, “Why We Swim,” that touches COOKING
on elements of resilience. Bonnie suggested
Angela Dimayuga, creative
that she write about the older swimmers
director for food and culture for
she had come across over the years, and
Standard Hotels and former Mis-
how the activity had kept them not just
sion Chinese Food New York
physically fit, but mentally and emotionally
executive chef, rounds up 10 of her
stable.
essential Filipino recipes at
It’s a fascinating article, but I was also
cooking.nytimes.com.
touched by many of the comments it got
from readers. They wrote about swimming
as liberating and healing, in a way I’m not
sure I’ve experienced. “If you’re a good
enough swimmer to keep going for 30, 45,
60 minutes or more, no matter how slowly,
what you will experience is a moving medi-
tation, a floating tranquillity and mindful-
ness,” one reader wrote.
We’ve tried to include helpful tips and
techniques in each of these articles, but NEWSLETTER
some are simply inspirational stories — a
balm, we hope, for the pervasive anxiety
Find out what T Magazine’s
editors and contributors are eat-
we’re all facing.
I’ve sometimes joked to my colleagues in
ing, wearing, coveting and listen-
ing to each week with The T List, a
the newsroom that during this pandemic,
newsletter of recommendations.
we should just rename The Times “Piv-
nytimes.com/newsletters
oting!” Nearly everyone is having to adapt
to new circumstances and challenges —
personal, professional and otherwise. But
the hardest parts for me are the unknowns:
Will my daughter go to school in the fall?
Will there be an uptick in cases as colder
weather comes to New York? The open
questions can feel overwhelming. What
these resilience pieces have in common is a
focus on how to combat that spiral.
GAMES
And there is more to come. We just pub-
lished an entertaining and thought-provok- This month’s creator spotlight in
ing piece by the novelist Jami Attenberg on the Wordplay column catches up
whether resilience might be overrated. “I with David Steinberg of Kansas
City, Mo., who has been publishing
am not suggesting we stop encouraging
others to succeed, or surpass goals,” she crosswords in The Times since
2011. nytimes.com/wordplay
wrote. “But are we seeing the concept of
resilience in its current incarnation for
what it really is?”
I hope this series provides at least the
start of an answer to Ms. Attenberg’s ques-
Contact the Newsroom
tion: Resilience is about perspective, about
nytnews@nytimes.com
what we can — and can’t — do when times
are tough, about knowing our limits and, Share a News Tip
sometimes, when we can, going beyond tips@nytimes.com or nytimes.com/tips
them. Contact Customer Care
To see the articles in the Resilience series, go to nytimes.com/contactus
or 1-800-NYTIMES (1-800-698-4637)
nytimes.com/spotlight/resilience.
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 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N A3

Of Interest
NOTEWORTHY FACTS FROM TODAY’S PAPER

In a typical year, Block Island, which All of Apple’s second $1 trillion in

is 12 miles from mainland Rhode value came in the past 21 weeks,
Island, swells from under 1,000 while the global economy shrank
year-round residents to roughly faster than ever, during the
20,000 visitors per day at the height coronavirus pandemic.
of summer. $2,000,000,000,000 B1
The Treasures of Block Island D1 •
• Hyram Yarbro, 24, the creator of the
More than 5,000 visual artists from Skin Care by Hyram, had just under
around the world are based in Berlin, 100,000 TikTok followers in March.
according to statistics compiled by Today, he has more than five million.
city authorities. Moisturizer With a Heart D1
An Art Scene Defies Its Reviews C2 •
MIN HEO

• The golfer Danielle Kang, 27, turned

The Expatriation Act of 1907 pro at the age of 18, less than five
required American women to take Fishing has one of the deepest years after taking up the game.
the nationalities of their husbands. repositories of literature of any sport: A Rising Star Seems Ready
In Memory of a Suffragist and a Martyr C1 Tens of thousands of books have To Fulfill Her Potential B8
been written on the subject, dating
back to at least 1496.
It’s a Keeper (Though Maybe
You Should Sell It) D2

The Conversation Spotlight

FIVE OF THE MOST READ, SHARED AND DISCUSSED POSTS ADDITIONAL REPORTAGE AND REPARTEE
FROM ACROSS NYTIMES.COM FROM OUR JOURNALISTS

Democratic Convention: Best and Worst Moments
Times Opinion writers are rating each night of the Democrat-
ic National Convention on a scale of 1 to 10, and discussing the
moments of excitement and those that fall flat. The team’s
assessment of night 2 was Wednesday’s most read article.
Natasha Singer, a tech reporter for The Times, has lately been
covering some of the ways in which colleges and universities
are adapting to the coronavirus pandemic. Wednesday on
Twitter, she shared some details about the University of Ala-
bama’s ambitious experiment in mass testing for students.

Covid-19 Live Updates

A live briefing that collects the latest pandemic news was also
a popular read. In January, local officials in China hid infor-
mation about the burgeoning coronavirus from Beijing, ac-
cording to U.S. intelligence agencies.
Republicans Float a Scaled-Back Stimulus Bill
A proposal from Senate Republicans to revive extra unem-
ployment benefits at half the original rate was an attempt to
break a political stalemate. Democrats have repeatedly re-
jected previous Republican offers as insufficient. Most read-
ers found this article through an online search.
While U.N.C. and Notre Dame abruptly moved to online
learning this week, Alabama is conducting the largest
higher ed reopening program in the U.S. — testing up to
200,000 students before they return to 59 colleges and
universities across the state.
The University of Alabama at Birmingham is leading
the effort. U.A.B. developed its own diagnostic test
for coronavirus, increasing lab capacity to test 9,000
student samples per day. And it developed two virus
safety apps, which many schools are using.

Alabama hopes that the robust effort — including

testing, technology, required mask-wearing, social
distancing and reduced class sizes — will be enough to
hinder the virus on campuses.

Notre Dame, now experiencing outbreaks, also

tested thousands of undergraduates before they arrived
on campus.
ANNA MONEYMAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

California Fires Live Updates

Fire season has started in California, where a heat wave and Faculty are concerned. Students at the flagship U. of
lighting strikes sparked several blazes in the north of the Alabama are partying in droves. Another risk: Some
state. The Times has a live briefing for that news. schools have limited dorm capacity to one student per
bedroom, but U.A.B. is maintaining shared dorm rooms.
Biden Shouldn’t Take Latinos for Granted
In this Opinion article, Chuck Rocha, who was a senior advis-
er to Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign, argues
that Latino voters could determine the election in November.
Natasha Singer @natashanyt

Read Ms. Singer’s reporting on the University of Alabama on Page A6.

Be the Breeze
WIND CHIME HOOPS
18 k / Rose Cu t D i a m o n d

Quote of the Day “I am not willing to risk my privacy because someone wants PA U L M O R E L L I .COM
TRANSPARENCY MAY BE FINE,
BUT IN WALLS FOR TOILETS? A10
to make a fancy toilet.” N YC : 8 95 M A D I S O N ( 7 2 N D & M A D I S O N )
P H L : 1118 WA L N U T S T R E E T
SACHIKO ISHIKAWA, a writer and translator, who is skeptical about new public restrooms in Tokyo
212. 5 8 5 . 4 2 0 0
that have toilet stalls made out of “smart glass,” which is supposed to turn opaque.

The Mini Crossword Here to Help

BY JOEL FAGLIANO CONSIDER A MASK WARDROBE

Support
1 2 3 4 With mask wearing being the new normal,
you should have a few on hand. That way,
brighter futures.
you’ll always have a backup at the ready,
5
as well as some leeway if you don’t get to Learn how you can sponsor
the laundry as planned. classroom subscriptions at
6 7 If you find a mask you love, it may be nytimes.com/sponsor.
best to buy multiples of that style. You
8 may also consider collecting a handful of
different styles because each kind is more
or less practical for different situations.
9 The mask you might choose to wear for a JAMES ESTRIN/THE NEW YORK TIMES
trip to the grocery store, for example, isn’t
8/20/2020 EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ necessarily the same type you’d reach for Keep your masks accessible.
when exercising. JOANNE CHEN Store them in a bin or on hooks near the
ACROSS door so you’re less likely to rush out with-
1 “Note to ___ ...” Gather a range of materials out one. If you’re using filters in a mask
5 Shape of a hockey rink and mask shapes. pocket, have them at the ready, too.
6 Corporate department Be realistic about what you’ll be willing to
wear in different situations. Try a new-to- Stash a spare or two in your tote or car.
8 Captain in “Twenty Thousand
you mask on at home so that you can This way, if the one you’re wearing gets
Leagues Under the Sea
9 Creator of ripples in a water evaluate the fit and your comfort before dirty or wet, you’ll have another handy.
glass, in a classic movie scene wearing it in public. “Viruses thrive when in wet, warm ma-
If you can buy more than one mask terials,” said Raina MacIntyre, head of the
DOWN type, consider choosing one with a top Biosecurity Program at the University of
1 Another name for our sun layer treated in such a way as to prevent New South Wales’s Kirby Institute. “A wet
2 Baby shower or birthday party droplets from soaking in. (The Banana mask becomes an incubator. Take it off
3 Kind of beer like Corona Republic, Herschel Supply Co., and solid- immediately without touching the face
or Pacifico color Kitsbow masks that Wirecutter likes piece and put on a new one.”
4 Bit of fire
most have some level of water resistance. Joanne Chen is a senior staff writer at Wirecutter,
7 Extra charge for a bagel with
None are waterproof.) a product recommendation site owned by The
cream cheese New York Times Company. A version of this
Include a mix of fasteners.
article appears on Wirecutter.
Ear loops tend to be easy to put on and
SOLUTION TO take off, which is ideal for impromptu
V E T O
PREVIOUS PUZZLE errands and dining outside. For longer-
R A I N
term wear, you may want a mask with ties
F O R M E or headbands, which put less pressure on
D O L E your ears.
A M Y S
A4 THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

Tracking an Outbreak
N

Coronavirus Update Hot Spots in the United States

As of Wednesday evening, more than 5,528,900 people across every state, plus Washington, D.C., and four U.S. territories, have tested positive for
the coronavirus, according to a New York Times database. More than 172,600 people with the virus have died in the United States.
School Openings Bring Threats of Strikes
Average daily cases per 100,000 people
Pope Says the Poor Need Vaccine Access in the past week

Wash.
Testing Shows Toll on Corona, Queens 16 32 48 Few or
no cases Maine
Mont. N.D.
Minn.

By JAMES BARRON Minn.

Vt.
Ore. Idaho N.H.
Many of the questions that swirled through the global conversation
Mass.
about the coronavirus crisis on Wednesday began with the first of S.D. Wis. N.Y.
the basic five W’s: Who will go to school the conventional way in the Calif. Wyo. Conn. R.I.
Mich.
fall, and who will take classes online? Who will get a vaccine, as-
suming one becomes available?
Iowa Pa. N.J.
Another question began with a different W: Which neighbor- Nev. Neb.
Ohio
hoods in New York City were hit hardest when the virus began its Ill. Md.
Del.
relentless sweep in March and April? Ind. D.C.
Colo. W.Va.
Who will go to back school? Only one in seven parents said their Utah Kan. Va.
children would do so full time, according to a new survey adminis-
tered by Morning Consult for The New York Times. That finding Mo. Ky.
pointed to the pressures on parents. Remote learning demands Ariz. N.C.
supervision from an adult at home, and four in five parents said Ark.
Tenn.
they could not count on in-person help from relatives, neighbors,
nannies or tutors. Another factor contributing to parents’ sense of N.M.
Okla. S.C.
Ala.
feeling overwhelmed and abandoned: In households in which both Ga.
parents need to work, three-fourths of the parents said they would
La.
be responsible for their children’s education. Miss.
In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who was a legal
adviser to a SEAL team in Iraq when he was in the Navy more than Texas
a decade ago, likened the need for in-person learning in one local Alaska
school district to the determination of the Navy SEALs assigned to
hunt down Osama bin Laden. But after 13 counties reopened their Fla.
schools last week in accordance with a statewide order for all
schools to offer in-person instruction by the end of the month, at Puerto Rico
Hawaii
least three districts reported positive coronavirus tests among
students or teachers.
The state allowed only the three largest districts — in Miami-
Dade, Broward and Palm Beach Counties — to remain online-only
after Aug. 31. But with the state expected to hit the 10,000-death Sources: State and local health agencies. The map shows the share of population with a new reported case over the last week. Parts of a county with a
mark this week, some officials in other districts would prefer to population density lower than 10 people per square mile are not shaded. Data for Rhode Island is shown at the state level because county level data is
infrequently reported. Data is as of Aug. 19, 2020, at 5 p.m. Eastern. THE NEW YORK TIMES
delay reopening. State officials have countered with threats of a loss
in state funding and an admonition that there might be problems. “If
you have a Covid case or you have symptoms, don’t panic,” Richard
Corcoran, the state education commissioner, told school superin-
tendents last week. “We are going to have cases, and that’s OK.” SOUTH AFRICA
New York City’s powerful teachers’ union stepped up the pres-

Relief Efforts Entangled in Corruption Scandals

sure on Mayor Bill de Blasio on Wednesday to delay or drop his plan
to reopen the nation’s largest school system on Sept. 10. The presi-
dent of the United Federation of Teachers threatened to sue the city
or to support a strike if the city could not satisfy a list of safety
By LYNSEY CHUTEL
demands. Public sector employees are legally barred from striking
JOHANNESBURG, South Afri-
in New York, but teachers have threatened to hold unauthorized
“sickouts” if they do not believe school buildings are safe. Mr. de ca — Contracts are being doled
out to family members. Food
Blasio countered by saying that his focus was on students and fam-
parcels have gone missing. And
ilies, not political “games.”
funds meant for unemployment
insurance are making their way
‘We Must Come Out of It Better’ into the pockets of political
cronies.
On the vaccine question, Pope Francis’ comments pointed to
income inequality. He said that a coronavirus vaccine should be South Africa, the continent’s
economic powerhouse, responded
made universally available, especially to the poor. “How sad it
to the coronavirus pandemic by
would be if access to a Covid-19 vaccine were made available only to
announcing the largest relief ef-
the rich,” the pope said during his weekly address, broadcast from
fort in the country’s history. But
the apostolic library instead of St. Peter’s Square. the undertaking has been dogged
The pandemic, the pope said, could help improve the world by by allegations of widespread cor-
forcing it to overcome “a larger virus,” which he said was a product ruption and mismanagement, un-
of “social injustice, lack of equal opportunity, and the marginaliza- dermining confidence in a govern-
tion of the poor and those in greatest need.” He added, “The pan- ment that had initially received in-
demic is a crisis, and we do not emerge from a crisis the same as ternational acclaim for its as-
before: Either we come out of it better, or we come out of it worse. sertive response to the pandemic.
We must come out of it better.” Charities and ordinary citizens
say they have been left to fill in the
Australia — which appeared to have tamed the virus, only to
have an outbreak emerge and spread last month in Melbourne, the gaps created by the government’s
country’s second-largest city — is promising free doses of a poten- failures.
tial vaccine if current clinical trials proved successful. Despite its moves to control the
The Australian government announced a deal for the vaccine pandemic, South Africa is now
developed under a partnership between the British-Swedish drug overwhelmed by more than
maker AstraZeneca and Oxford University, but Prime Minister Scott 592,144 coronavirus cases, the
Morrison said that the doses would be manufactured “under our fifth-highest infection rate in the
own steam” in Australia. He also said that the government was world and the highest official
caseload on the African continent.
working to arrange early access to the vaccine for “countries in our
South Africa’s ruling African
Pacific family, as well as regional partners in Southeast Asia.” Still,
National Congress party initially
he cautioned that there was “no guarantee that this, or any other,
won praise after it imposed one of
vaccine will be successful” and added that his government was the world’s strictest lockdowns in
casting its net wide. Australia also signed a $17.9 million deal with
March, and announced a raft of so-
the U.S. medical technology manufacturer BD (Becton Dickinson & cial measures that it said would
Company) to supply needles and syringes.
mitigate the devastating eco-
nomic fallout of the pandemic. A
stimulus package of 500-billion
New Coronavirus Cases Announced Daily in U.S. rand ($30 billion) announced in
As of Wednesday evening, more than 5,528,900 people across every April was meant to supplement an
state, plus Washington, D.C., and four U.S. territories, have tested existing social safety net that al-
positive for the virus, according to a New York Times database. ready supported 11.3 million citi-
zens with monthly assistance for
food and other social services.
But that relief effort has instead
60,000
become a source of embarrass-
ment for President Cyril
Ramaphosa, who was elected on a
New cases platform of stamping out corrup-
tion. Mr. Ramaphosa has been
30,000 forced to shift from explaining
lockdown measures to seeking to
reassure the public that aid will be
7-day
delivered, and that those aiming
average
to profit from it — including mem-
bers of his own party — would be
punished.
March 1 Aug. 19
He has called those accused of
Note: Wednesday’s total is incomplete because some states report
corruption “a pack of hyenas cir-
cases after press time. Data is as of Aug. 19, 2020, at 5 p.m. Eastern.
Sources: State and local health agencies; hospitals; C.D.C. THE NEW YORK TIMES cling wounded prey,” and an-
nounced a new law enforcement
unit to investigate the allegations.
New York’s Hardest-Hit Neighborhood The scandal, which has domi-
nated airwaves and talk shows in
And the neighborhood in New York City that the virus scourged recent weeks, includes allegations
the worst in the spring, when the city was the epicenter of the out- that government leaders and po-
break? By coincidence, it was Corona, Queens, a predominantly litically connected cronies si-
Hispanic neighborhood where many restaurant employees and phoned off money meant for the
construction workers live, many of whom faced a higher risk for Unemployment Insurance Fund,
infection because they had to work during the pandemic. Just over and that relatives of public offi-
50 percent of those tested for antibodies in Corona had them, an cials were handed inflated con-
unusually high rate. The finding emerged from data on more than tracts to supply personal protec-
1.46 million coronavirus antibody test results released by the city. tive equipment.
How much protection antibodies may offer in a second wave is In addition, a food distribution
unclear. But higher levels could give Corona and other neighbor- program that was expanded to
hoods an advantage. The city tallied the data by ZIP codes, and in feed some of the 4.5 million South
Africans out of work because of
Manhattan, no ZIP code south of 96th Street was above 20 percent.
the pandemic has been stymied
Two — 10023 on the Upper West Side and 10065 on the Upper East
by local officials policing how the
Side — had the lowest in Manhattan, with 12.6 percent each. food gets delivered, according to
charitable and watchdog organi-
zations.
Coronavirus Update wraps up the day’s developments with infor- Roughly 7.8 million South Afri-
mation from across the virus report. cans have applied for a social re-
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JOAO SILVA/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Hungry residents have turned to a soup kitchen run by volun-
teers in Coronationville, a suburb of Johannesburg.
lief grant providing state assist-
ance, but thousands have yet to
receive the aid, the minister of so-
cial security admitted in a budget
speech to Parliament last month.
Many have been forced to turn
elsewhere for help.
Imtiaz Sooliman, the founder of
Gift of Givers, a nongovernmental
organization that has distributed
relief for nearly three decades,
said that his organization is re-
ceiving a record-breaking number
of requests for food and assistance
in the pandemic, despite the gov-
ernment’s enormous relief pack-
age.
“Never in our history have we
seen such a huge request for
food,” he said. “It’s not only a re-
quest, it’s a pleading, it’s a sob-
bing, it’s a crying.”
He said that his organization
has received reports of children in
rural areas digging for wild plants
to eat.
Mr. Sooliman said he has ob-
served a change in the kinds of
people approaching his organiza-
tion for help. Recently, there have
been calls from apologetic execu-
tives and middle managers, as
well as farmers requesting assist-
ance for themselves and their
workers.
Workers who earn too much to
qualify for state grants but whose
income barely keeps them above
the poverty line of $70 a month are
also falling through the cracks.
With little ability to weather finan-
cial shocks, about half of all such
households have run out of money
to buy food and other essentials,
more than double the number be-
fore the pandemic, according to a
survey released in July.
At least two A.N.C. officials
have already been suspended for
diverting food meant for aid distri-
bution, local media reported. The
president’s office announced that
the president’s own spokeswom-
an has taken a leave of absence
while she and her husband are be-
ing investigated on accusations
that they won a $7 million contract
to supply protective equipment
through political connections.
In another case, the education
department in the Eastern Cape
province is under investigation af-
ter it awarded a grossly inflated
$23 million-dollar contract to sup-
ply tablets for remote learning to a
company headed by an A.N.C. offi-
cial.
Several other A.N.C. party
members are among the targets of
the law enforcement unit recently
formed by the president to investi-
gate corruption related to the pan-
demic. Pule Mabe, a spokesman
for the A.N.C., said the party was
looking into the various allega-
tions, but declined to comment
further.
In April, aid workers with Rays
of Hope, a Christian organization,
said that they arrived to deliver
food at a dilapidated housing bloc
in Alexandra, a sprawling town-
ship bordering Johannesburg’s af-
fluent northern suburbs. But be-
fore they could, a local politician
showed up and blocked the deliv-
ery to the dozens of hungry fam-
ilies.
Sihle Mooi, the director of Rays
of Hope, said the truck was turned
away by a local ward councilor,
Ambe Maseko. In a telephone in-
terview, Ms. Maseko did not deny
that she had turned the aid work-
ers away, but only said the situa-
tion had since been “resolved.”
Mr. Mooi said his organization
was later able to deliver the food
at the housing bloc.
Mr. Mooi said that the A.N.C.,
and officials like Ms. Maseko, are
controlling food distribution to
“reward some people who voted
for them, and punish others.”
“Who gets food is highly politi-
cized,” he said. “Especially if it
comes from government funding.”
When the lockdown was first
announced, researchers at Cor-
ruption Watch, a watchdog group,
set up an online public site called
Lockdown Life. It was intended
for sharing the simple pleasures
of life in quarantine — “grandpar-
ents spending time with their
grandchildren, or being able to
wash your car twice a day, nice
stories,” said Valencia Talane, a
senior researcher with the group.
Instead, the site was quickly
overrun with complaints ranging
from distributors pilfering food
packages and selling the items at
marked up prices, to packages go-
ing missing and local officials
charging for free food vouchers.
“It snowballed,” Ms. Talane
said. People sent videos of food
trucks “literally backing up into
councilors’ homes, and offloading
there.”
On Aug. 15, Mr. Ramaphosa an-
nounced that the lockdown regu-
lations would be eased to allow for
the sale of alcohol and tobacco
products, which had been banned,
as well as some travel. Gatherings
of more than 50 people are still
prohibited, and wearing a mask in
public remains mandatory.
The millions of South Africans
who applied for the social relief
grant can reapply for another
three months of assistance if their
circumstances remain vulnera-
ble, the government said. But in
some cases, ordinary township
residents have had to band to-
gether to help families meet their
most urgent needs.
For Nuraan Gain, a teacher who
runs a soup kitchen in Corona-
tionville, a suburb of Johan-
nesburg, that meant finding new
ways to stay open. Unable to make
her own money stretch to feed the
lines that now swell to 300 people
a day, Ms. Gain said she now relies
on donations of food packages and
cash from local mosques,
churches and well-wishers.
Julian Alexander, a 49-year-old
businessman standing in line at
the soup kitchen recently, used to
run a warehouse storage business
with his cousin. He would take
home about $1,645 a month to sup-
port a family of six. Now, he has
turned to hawking DVDs and pots
to support his family.
“When we’re dealing with a
pandemic around the world, we
still have to deal with this,” said
Mr. Alexander, referring to the
government corruption. But he
still has to look after his family, he
said, adding, “Your pride has to
fall.”

Tracking an Outbreak The Origins
INTELLIGENCE ASSESSMENT
Local Officials Hid Dangers From Beijing, Says U.S. Report
This article is by Edward Wong,
Julian E. Barnes and Zolan Kanno-
Youngs.
WASHINGTON — Trump ad-
ministration officials have tried
taking a political sledgehammer
to China over the coronavirus
pandemic, asserting that the Chi-
nese Communist Party covered
up the initial outbreak and al-
lowed the virus to spread around
the globe.
But within the United States
government, intelligence officials
have arrived at a more nuanced
and complex finding of what Chi-
nese officials did wrong in Janu-
ary.
Officials in Beijing were kept in
the dark for weeks about the po-
tential devastation of the virus by
local officials in central China, ac-
cording to American officials fa-
miliar with a new internal report
by U.S. intelligence agencies.
The report concluded that offi-
cials in the city of Wuhan and in
Hubei Province, where the out-
break began late last year, tried to
hide information from China’s
central leadership. The finding is
consistent with reporting by news
organizations and with assess-
ments by China experts of the
country’s opaque governance sys-
tem.
Local officials often withhold in-
formation from Beijing for fear of
reprisal, current and former
American officials say.
The new assessment does not
contradict the Trump administra-
tion’s criticism of China, but adds
perspective and context to actions
— and inactions — that created
the global crisis.
President Trump said in a July 4
speech at the White House that
“China’s secrecy, deceptions and
cover-up” enabled the pandemic.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
insisted the administration was
“telling the truth every day” about
“the Communist cover-up of that
virus.” Peter Navarro, a White
House trade adviser, said on Sat-
urday that the pandemic was
“perpetrated on America” by the
Chinese Communist Party.
The accusations dovetail with
advice from Trump campaign
strategists to look tough on China
to try to shift the spotlight from
the president’s failures on the pan-
demic and the United States econ-
omy, and to paper over his con-
stant praise of Xi Jinping, China’s
authoritarian leader.
But the broad political messag-
ing leaves an impression that Mr.
Xi and other top officials knew of
the dangers of the new coro-
navirus in the early days and went
to great lengths to hide them.
The report, originally circu-
lated in June, has classified and
unclassified sections, and it repre-
sents the consensus of the C.I.A.
and other intelligence agencies. It
still supports the overall notion
that Communist Party officials hid
important information from the
world, U.S. officials said. The re-
port says senior officials in Bei-
jing, even as they were scram-
bling to pry data from officials in
central China, played a role in ob-
scuring the outbreak by withhold-
ing information from the World
Health Organization.
But the report adds to a body of
evidence that shows how the mal-
feasance of local Chinese officials
appeared to be a decisive factor in
the spread of the virus within Wu-
han and beyond.
An internal U.S. government as-
sessment of the differences in
fault between Chinese leaders and
local officials potentially has sig-
nificant policy implications.
“It makes a huge difference if it
was Wuhan or Beijing,” said Mi-
chael Pillsbury, a China scholar at
the Hudson Institute who infor-
mally advises Mr. Trump.
If Mr. Xi was not the main per-
son at fault, he said, then that
meant that top Chinese officials
had not engaged in total deceit on
the coronavirus, and American of-
ficials had some basis for still try-
ing to engage in good-faith negoti-
ations with Beijing on issues of
mutual interest.
Though Mr. Pillsbury advo-
cates competing with China, he
also supports diplomacy and
sticking to a trade agreement that
Mr. Xi and Mr. Trump signed in
January. Some of Mr. Trump’s
other advisers, notably Mr.
Navarro, have advocated an eco-
nomic “decoupling” with China
and denounced the trade deal.
Mr. Trump oscillates wildly on
China. At times, he and other offi-
cials have asserted the idea of a
cover-up by China to justify policy
decisions such as cutting funding
to the World Health Organization.
When the president announced
that move in late May, he accused
the W.H.O. of helping China cover
up the initial outbreak, though the
organization has denied that.
Separately, Mr. Pompeo, the ad-
ministration’s most vocal China
hawk, publicly pushed an unsub-
stantiated theory that the out-
break began with an accidental
lab leak in Wuhan and asked
American spy agencies to find evi-
Gillian Wong contributed report-
ing from Hong Kong.
dence.
U.S. officials commissioned the
new intelligence report after a De-
partment of Homeland Security
analysis said that Chinese central
government officials hid the se-
verity of the virus in early Janu-
ary to hoard medical gear. That
earlier report, an unusual attempt
by Homeland Security intelli-
gence analysts to examine a for-
eign power, relied heavily on pub-
lic trade data, a senior law en-
forcement official said. Several
news organizations reported that
finding in early May, as top Trump
officials were attacking China
over the virus.
Policymakers asked the entire
intelligence community to exam-
ine it, and analysts came up with
the new consensus report that
aimed to refine and even correct
the Homeland Security assess-
ment.
Alexei Woltornist, a spokesman
for the Department of Homeland
Security, said the agency “does
not comment on any allegedly
leaked documents.” The C.I.A. de-
clined to comment.
The Chinese government has
said it acted quickly to limit the
spread of the virus and to warn
the world. This winter, central au-
thorities ousted a few local party
officials, indicating they were to
blame.
The new report does not dimin-
ish China’s culpability, current
and former administration offi-
cials said.
Communist Party leaders over-
see an authoritarian system that
inhibits local officials from freely
sharing information with na-
The Trump administration has implied that President Xi Jinping of China, foreground, and other officials concealed the virus threat.
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
XIONG QI/XINHUA, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
tional-level officials, they said,
and this has had deadly conse-
quences for the world. It is a ver-
sion of the so-called Chernobyl ef-
fect, where local officials avoid
telling central authorities about a
catastrophic event until it is far
too late, American officials said.
Moreover, officials in Beijing
have tried to spread disinforma-
tion about the origins of the virus.
The C.I.A. has said since at least
February that Chinese central of-
ficials were not sharing every-
thing they knew about the virus —
including a more accurate case
count — or doing all they could to
‘It makes a huge
difference if it was
Wuhan or Beijing,’ a
China scholar said.
help the world prepare for the
pandemic.
Public reporting has revealed
wrongdoing by Chinese officials
at all levels, but in different man-
ners.
In early January, W.H.O. offi-
cials began concluding that offi-
cials in Beijing were hiding infor-
mation, The Associated Press re-
ported in June, citing internal doc-
uments and recordings. Central
officials delayed releasing the
complete virus genome and or-
dered laboratories to destroy vi-
rus samples. At the same time,
they were trying to get more infor-
HECTOR RETAMAL/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
Above, a patient arriving at the Red Cross hospital in Wuhan,
China, in January. Left, an intensive care unit in Wuhan the
same month. Officials in the city tried to hide information on the
virus from China’s central leadership, a new report says.
mation from reticent Wuhan offi-
cials.
Throughout early January, offi-
cials in Wuhan and in the provin-
cial government tried to suppress
information on the outbreak, in
part because they feared derailing
the local annual Communist Party
meeting taking place at the time.
Around mid-January, officials
in Beijing began realizing the po-
tential devastation. On Jan. 13,
Thailand said it had discovered a
case of the new coronavirus,
alarming Chinese officials, who
within a day began disseminating
internal warnings of a pending ca-
tastrophe, according to docu-
ments obtained by The Associ-
ated Press.
A Taiwanese health official who
visited a Wuhan hospital with
other outsiders from Jan. 13 to 15
said an official from Beijing told
him of potential human-to-human
transmission, even though local
officials were playing down that
possibility. Two days later, the Wu-
han health commission an-
nounced that a family in the city
had the virus and that “limited hu-
man-to-human transmission can-
not be ruled out.”
A turning point came when a
cluster of cases emerged in the
southern city of Shenzhen, and
when medical experts from Bei-
jing visited sites in Wuhan on Jan.
19. Back in Beijing the next morn-
ing, they told senior officials that
there was human-to-human trans-
mission, and Mr. Xi said later that
day that the outbreak “must be
taken seriously,” according to a
state television report that
evening.
On Jan. 23, Beijing ordered an
extraordinary lockdown of Wu-
han, a city of 11 million. The cen-
tral government also stopped sell-
ing masks and respirators to other
countries and began buying sup-
plies from around the world.
American officials ignored the
warning signs, and the State De-
partment even flew 18 tons of do-
nated medical gear to China in
February.
Chinese state-run news organi-
zations published an internal
speech on Feb. 15 indicating Mr. Xi
had given instructions on the co-
ronavirus in a meeting of the
country’s top political body, the
Politburo Standing Committee, on
Jan. 7. But those reports might
have been propaganda with exag-
gerations or falsehoods written to
counter foreign news accounts
that said Mr. Xi had been absent
from the coronavirus relief effort.
The Homeland Security report
from May that prompted the new
U.S. intelligence analysis went far
in its assertions about Beijing.
“We assess the Chinese govern-
ment intentionally concealed the
severity of Covid-19 from the in-
ternational community in early
January while it stockpiled medi-
cal supplies by both increasing
imports and decreasing exports,”
the document said, according to
the law enforcement official.
Homeland Security erred in us-
ing trade data to make assump-
tions about the actions and stra-
tegic intentions of the Chinese
government, current and former
officials said.
“This was a rush to judgment
that ultimately clouds the dia-
logue,” said Daniel Hoffman, a for-
mer senior C.I.A. officer.
Some current and former U.S.
officials say Homeland Security
officials might have pushed the re-
port to try to curry favor with the
White House during its anti-China
campaign. Chad F. Wolf, the acting
secretary of the Department of
Homeland Security, has sought to
mesh the agency’s operations
with Mr. Trump’s political agenda.
“Across the board, you’re seeing
a department that appears to be
utilizing its intelligence and analy-
sis wing to solely support the pres-
ident’s mind-set,” said Juliette N.
Kayyem, a former assistant secre-
tary for the department.
“What people have to remem-
ber is: The department serves the
homeland,” she added. “If they
cannot rely on its intelligence
about a pandemic or about who’s
responsible for violence during a
race riot or the trajectory of a hur-
ricane, what are they there for?”
POOL PHOTO BY NG HAN GUAN
N A5
Around the U.S.
And the World
NEW YORK
Cuomo Says Mask Order
Should Have Come Earlier
In a rare moment of admission,
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New
York acknowledged at least one
shortcoming in his handling of the
coronavirus response: His admin-
istration should have mandated
mask-wearing sooner, he said on
Wednesday.
“I should have done it earlier,”
said Mr. Cuomo, who mandated
face coverings in mid-April at the
peak of the outbreak in New York,
where more than 30,000 people
have died from the virus. “I
should have done masks earlier.
That would have made a dramatic
difference.”
Mr. Cuomo, a third-term Demo-
crat, has mostly blamed the fed-
eral government for allowing the
virus to spread unknowingly
early on, even as he has been
criticized for mishandling the
outbreak in the state’s nursing
homes and for failing to shut
down businesses and schools
earlier in March.
The Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention began urging all
Americans to wear a mask in
early April.
The governor also said that,
early on, the federal government
had failed to recognize that
asymptomatic individuals could
spread the disease. That mode of
transmission has since been
widely recognized.
“We were wrong that people
who didn’t have symptoms could
infect other people,” he said on
WAMC, an Albany radio station.
“That was just wrong. We spent
months saying ‘You have to be
sneezed on or coughed on.’ That
was just wrong.”
Mr. Cuomo also suggested that
he might allow movie theaters to
reopen soon with limits on capaci-
ty. He recently said that gyms and
bowling alleys across the state,
and museums in New York City,
could start reopening this month.
PUERTO RICO
Governor Says Island
To Lock Down on Sundays
In Puerto Rico, where cases have
been trending upward, Gov.
Wanda Vázquez said she was
imposing a lockdown that will
apply on Sundays through Sept.
11, the latest in a series of escalat-
ing restrictions meant to keep
people at home and not socializ-
ing with friends or family.
Violators of the island’s mask
order will be subject to a $100
fine. A nightly curfew remains in
effect.
Under the new Sunday order,
Puerto Ricans will be allowed to
leave their homes that day for
only a handful of reasons, like
going to grocery stores, pharma-
cies or hospitals, or working in
essential services. Alcohol sales
will be banned and beaches
closed. Though houses of worship
will be allowed to remain open at
25 percent capacity, Ms. Vázquez
recommended that religious
services be held online.
RISE IN HUNGER
135 Million More Globally
Face Shortage of Food
More than five months into the
pandemic, dire predictions about
how the virus will exacerbate
world hunger are playing out
across the globe.
In Latin America, the spread of
the virus has caused nearly three
times as many people to need
food assistance. In West and
Central Africa, the number of
people faced with starvation has
more than doubled. And in just
the first three months of the pan-
demic, some six million people in
the United States requested food
stamps. These figures were
presented in a report released this
month from CARE, a nonprofit
focused on poverty that estimates
some 270 million people will face
food crises by the end of the year.
In April, experts predicted that
the number of people faced with
the prospect of starving by the
end of 2020 would nearly double
globally from the previous year
because of the pandemic. At the
beginning of 2020, some 135 mil-
lion people globally faced serious
food shortages.
This hunger crisis, experts say,
is global and is caused by a series
of factors linked to the pandemic.
National lockdowns and social-
distancing measures have cost
many people their jobs, leading to
abrupt income loss for millions of
people who were already living
hand-to-mouth.
A6 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Tracking an Outbreak U.S. Response
HARD-HIT STATE
Reopening Schools in Florida Is Likened to Operation to Get Bin Laden
By PATRICIA MAZZEI
and MANNY FERNANDEZ
MIAMI — Of all the ways to de-
scribe the fraught decision to re-
open schools during a pandemic,
Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a
former Navy prosecutor, chose an
especially dramatic example
when he compared the commit-
ment of teachers and administra-
tors to the resolve of Navy SEALs
given the mission to go after
Osama bin Laden.
“Just as the SEALs surmounted
obstacles to bring Osama bin
Laden to justice, so, too, would the
Martin County school system find
a way to provide parents with a
meaningful choice of in-person in-
struction or continued distance
learning — all in, all the time,” he
said, citing the leader of a local
school district.
He meant for the line to be inspi-
rational. But perhaps unintention-
ally, Mr. DeSantis also highlighted
an undeniable truth in Florida
since students began returning to
classrooms last week: There will
be virus casualties.
In one of the states hardest hit
by the coronavirus pandemic, 13
counties reopened their schools
last week in accordance with a
statewide order for all schools to
offer in-person instruction by the
end of the month. At least three
districts soon reported positive
coronavirus tests among students
or teachers, and with the state ex-
pected to hit the 10,000-death
mark this week, there is a move
among some local school officials
to try to delay reopenings — a
pushback that has been met with
threats of a loss in state funding
and a reminder that the road back
will not be an easy one.
“If you have a Covid case or you
have symptoms, don’t panic,” the
state education commissioner,
Richard Corcoran, told Florida
school superintendents last week.
“We are going to have cases, and
that’s OK.”
The state allowed just the three
largest districts — in Miami-
Dade, Broward and Palm Beach
Counties, where the virus has
been most entrenched — to re-
main online-only after Aug. 31.
That has left many other local
school officials juggling a complex
ALABAMA COLLEGES
State Bets on Its Own
Testing and Tech Plan
By NATASHA SINGER
Gov. Kay Ivey of Alabama made
a daring educational decision in
June: She would fund a statewide
student testing and technology
program to help public universi-
ties and colleges reopen for in-
person classes.
Now, as Alabama college stu-
dents start those classes this week
and next even as local virus rates
remain high, that program — one
of the nation’s largest campus re-
opening efforts — is facing the ul-
timate test.
The sweeping endeavor, led by
the state’s public health depart-
ment, along with the University of
Alabama at Birmingham, a lead-
ing academic medical center, fo-
cuses on testing more than
160,000 students for the virus be-
fore they arrive at 59 local col-
leges and universities. The stu-
dents must also wear masks and
follow social-distancing guide-
lines, and many will be required to
use a daily symptom-checking
app developed by U.A.B. On Mon-
day, the university released a sec-
ond app, which can alert students
to possible virus exposures.
But even university leaders ac-
knowledge the effort is a high-
stakes experiment that could set
off new outbreaks in a state with
one of the nation’s highest per
capita infection rates.
“We can’t remove all risk,” said
Dr. Selwyn M. Vickers, dean of the
U.A.B. School of Medicine, “but
what we do want to do is mitigate
risk in a major way.”
Some American universities
like Princeton, Michigan State
and the University of Southern
California have hastily scrapped
or postponed their plans for in-
person instruction. Other schools
have opened for in-person in-
struction without conducting
widespread testing before stu-
dents arrived. One of them, the
University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, abruptly announced
on Monday that it was moving all
undergraduate instruction online,
citing a spate of virus outbreaks.
On Tuesday, the University of
Notre Dame — which had tested
some 8,600 undergraduates be-
fore they returned to campus —
said it was temporarily moving
classes online in an effort to con-
trol a campus outbreak.
The public universities and col-
leges in Alabama, including the
flagship University of Alabama in
Tuscaloosa, by contrast, are
among the schools still forging
mix of political, parental and pub-
lic health concerns over a reopen-
ing mandate that has led to confu-
sion and confrontation with a Re-
publican governor who has long
been a proponent of local control.
In Tampa, the Hillsborough
County school board became con-
vinced that reopening right away
would lead to so much contagion
that the schools would inevitably
be forced to close again.
But when the school board
changed its original reopening
plan and elected to begin with four
weeks of remote instruction, the
state threatened to withhold $200
million in funding.
Addison Davis, the Hillsbor-
ough superintendent, drove from
Tampa to Tallahassee, the state
capital, to try to find a compro-
mise, and eventually settled on a
plan to offer remote instruction
for one week and then open class-
room doors on Aug. 31.
“I was beyond surprised — I
was really shocked,” Karen Perez,
a school board member in Hills-
borough and a clinical social
worker, said about the state’s
power to effectively override the
board’s vote. “Imagine what’s go-
ing to happen in those classrooms.
They’re going to be petri dishes
for Covid.”
Mr. DeSantis has spent weeks
promoting school openings, hold-
ing events with administrators,
teachers and parents who say
they are eager to go back to the
classroom. The benefits of open-
ing outweigh the health risks in
most of the state, Mr. DeSantis
says, and it is up to each district to
decide how its reopening will
work in practice.
“Some of this stuff is just not de-
batable anymore,” he said last
week at a charter school in
Riverview, near Tampa. “We’re
going in a good direction in this
area, and that’s just the reality.”
About a third of districts will be
open for in-person instruction by
the end of the week, and nearly all
of the rest by the end of the month.
Parents in most districts have
the choice to keep their children
learning remotely from home. The
families of about 54 percent of
public school students — some 1.6
ahead with reopening and con-
ducting large-scale student test-
ing to try to mitigate the risks.
But while many other colleges
are depending on third-party vi-
rus-testing and symptom-check-
ing services, Alabama is largely
relying on testing methods and
technology built within the state,
at the University of Alabama at
Birmingham.
Alabama is hoping its statewide
experiment will help answer one
of the most pressing questions
about reopening colleges — and
the country: Can a combination of
aggressive testing, virus safety
apps, mandatory mask-wearing
and reduced classroom occupan-
cy make it safe enough for on-
campus learning?
As of Friday, U.A.B. said it knew
of 99 students — about half a per-
cent of its total student population
of 22,000 — who had tested pos-
itive for the virus this year.
“It’s this comprehensive plan
that gives us confidence,” said Dr.
Ray L. Watts, the president of
U.A.B. “If there is a flare-up, a
small one somewhere, we can find
it early and we can quarantine,
treat and reduce the exposure to
others.”
If the new statewide effort
stumbles, however, Alabama
could face scrutiny for using stu-
dents as guinea pigs in an unwar-
ranted experiment.
“I think it’s just going to be a dis-
aster,” said Karnetris Langford, a
parent in Huntsville, Ala., whose
daughter is a junior at the Univer-
sity of Alabama at Birmingham. “I
even told my daughter, ‘We’re not
moving all of your stuff back, be-
cause I do not believe you all are
still going to be down there in De-
cember.’”
U.A.B. began working on a stu-
dent re-entry plan in March. By
then, the university had devel-
oped its own diagnostic test and
instituted a testing program for
employees at its medical center.
Next, the university wanted to re-
open campus to thousands of oth-
ers, including researchers and
graduate students.
“The platform we have for test-
ing, we developed ourselves and
we depend only on ourselves, and
that’s unusual,” said Dr. Watts,
U.A.B.’s president, who is also a
neurologist. “I can see how many
colleges and universities who
don’t have that expertise find it
very difficult to return.”
Soon university experts had de-
veloped Healthcheck, a web app
that asks if users have been ex-
Katie Stallings setting up a second-grade classroom at MacFarlane Park Elementary in Tampa, Fla.
million children — have said they
want to attend school in person, a
lawyer for the Department of Ed-
ucation said last week.
School board members initially
looked to county health officers to
provide advice on whether their
schools were safe to reopen, and
were outraged when the health of-
ficials, who are employed by the
Florida Department of Health,
told them they were not autho-
rized by the state to recommend
school openings or closures. Marc
Dodd, a school board member in
Lake County, near Orlando, said
the local health officer did tell
them the county did not meet the
conditions to reopen.
“I received a call from another
school board member in Brevard
County asking, ‘How did you suc-
ceed? How did you get your local
health department to give such
specific advice?’” he said. “I
guess we were lucky to ask early.”
Because of the state reopening
order, the district is bringing back
students anyway, though it de-
layed the first day of school until
Aug. 24. Districts have had to se-
As part of a statewide campus reopening program, the University of Alabama at Birmingham has set up 13 testing sites for students.
posed to the virus or have symp-
toms like loss of smell.
U.A.B. football players, who be-
gan returning to campus in June,
were among the first of more than
3,000 students on campus who
have used the app. This semester,
all students will be required to use
it daily. If a student answers yes to
any question, it alerts staff at stu-
dent health services.
U.A.B. has made the
Healthcheck app free to educa-
tional institutions in Alabama and
is marketing it to employers.
In June, Governor Ivey, a Re-
publican, awarded $30 million in
federal virus aid to support the
testing program along with virus
safety apps, announcing the effort
just as President Trump was
pushing schools to reopen.
The result, called GuideSafe,
aims to test up to 200,000 Ala-
bama college students this month
up to two weeks before they arrive
on campus. To pull it off, the U.A.B.
Pathology Lab created its own
testing kits and set up 13 student
testing sites across the state. It
also helped the University of
South Alabama build a testing lab.
They can now process some 9,000
student tests per day, with results
returned in 24 to 48 hours.
U.A.B. plans to run the majority
of the tests itself, using a method
called pooling. That involves com-
bining the samples of, say, eight
cure their own protective and
cleaning supplies and draft plans
for what happens when students
and employees inevitably get sick.
“At this point, the state is just so
full steam ahead, they’re just not
willing to listen or to look at vari-
ous situations county by county,”
Mr. Dodd said. “I think it’s irre-
sponsible.”
A hearing is scheduled for
Wednesday in a lawsuit filed by
the American Federation of
Teachers, the second-largest
teachers’ union in the country, and
one of its affiliates, the Florida Ed-
ucation Association. The union ar-
gues that the reopening mandate
violates a requirement in Florida
law that schools be “safe.”
When students returned to
classrooms last week in Suwan-
nee County, about midway be-
tween Jacksonville and Tallahas-
see, the district did not require fa-
cial coverings or social distancing,
said Eric Rodriguez, 47, a high
school teacher.
The district, where masks are
voluntary, said it encouraged so-
cial distancing “to the greatest ex-
students and testing them togeth-
er. If the pooled results are nega-
tive, students are considered to be
negative. If the results are pos-
itive, each student’s sample is
tested again individually.
Pooled testing can be useful
when most results are expected to
be negative. It is often used to
screen donated blood for the pres-
ence of H.I.V. But U.A.B. is among
the first academic labs in the
United States to develop a pooled
testing method for the virus.
This semester, U.A.B. also plans
to test a random sample of 4 per-
cent of students and employees on
a weekly basis, numbers that are
based on the university’s virus
model and may change depending
on local conditions. Some other
public health models have sug-
gested that universities may need
to test all students more often to
control campus outbreaks, per-
haps as often as every two days.
Separately, U.A.B. worked with
the state’s public health depart-
ment to develop a virus exposure
alert app, using new software
from Apple and Google. The app
uses Bluetooth signals to detect
users who come into close contact
for more than 15 minutes. If users
later tests positive for the virus,
they can use the app to automati-
cally notify other users who
crossed their paths. The app is
free for the public and optional for
OCTAVIO JONES FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
tent possible.” But that seems in-
sufficient to Mr. Rodriguez, a
Spanish and computer teacher
who is the president of the local
teachers’ union.
“What I don’t understand is
why there would be any reluc-
tance to make the reopening as
safe as you possibly could,” he
said.
In Martin County on Florida’s
Treasure Coast, which prompted
Mr. DeSantis’s Navy SEAL anal-
ogy, 310 students have been told to
quarantine for 14 days since
classes reopened on Aug. 11, with
people in six schools developing
coronavirus symptoms.
Another state with an enor-
mous coronavirus caseload,
Texas, is also struggling to reopen
its schools this month and next
month. Gov. Greg Abbott has
clearly told local school officials
they are in charge of the decision.
But the state has come down hard
against any attempts by local pub-
lic health officials to force schools
to remain closed.
Late last month, Mr. Abbott and
other top Republicans released a
students.
Dr. Scott Harris, who oversees
the Alabama Department of Pub-
lic Health, said he hoped the virus
alert app could help address a se-
rious notification problem: Some
Alabamians have ignored calls
from human contact tracers.
Dr. Harris added that once the
statewide student testing was
completed, U.A.B. would have the
capacity to test tens of thousands
of other Alabamians. “It’s just
helpful for our state in general to
have this additional capacity
that’s developed here locally and
can be used locally,” he said.
Critics say the U.A.B. model has
serious weaknesses. For one
thing, they note, apps like
Healthcheck can catch only peo-
ple who have symptoms and are
willing to disclose them. And as
many as 40 percent of people with
virus infections have no symp-
toms.
As for Alabama’s two-week win-
dow for student testing, they warn
that many college students who
test negative a week or two before
their semester starts may develop
the virus a few days later.
“If you test everybody within
two days of coming to campus,
you would have a better shot at
getting an uninfected student
body,” said Dr. Julia Marcus, an
epidemiologist at Harvard Medi-
cal School. “But a two-week win-
joint statement saying that local
health authorities did not have the
power to issue “pre-emptive, blan-
ket” closures and could close indi-
vidual schools only if an actual
outbreak on campus warranted a
shutdown.
The state has also supported
school districts that wanted to re-
open for in-person teacher train-
ings before the start of the school
year.
In the suburb of Cypress, about
30 miles northwest of downtown
Houston, the teachers’ union sued
the district superintendent on Fri-
day, seeking to halt three weeks of
in-person training sessions for
nearly 8,000 teachers and other
school employees that began that
day. The local chapter of the
American Federation of Teachers
said the sessions put employees’
health at risk, violated the coun-
ty’s public health rules and could
be done virtually.
The case quickly went to the
Texas Supreme Court, which al-
lowed the Cypress-Fairbanks dis-
trict to require teachers to return
for in-person training while the
case is pending.
Back in Tampa, the Hillsbor-
ough school district’s back-and-
forth prompted misgivings for one
parent, Earlishia Oates, who is un-
convinced that her children, in
fifth and 10th grades, should re-
turn to school.
“If you guys can’t even get that
right — when we’re going to start
— why would I believe that you’re
going to have the things in school
that we need to be safe?” she said.
She described remote learning
in the spring as chaotic — she had
three children in school at the time
and only one working laptop —
but Ms. Oates, who has since
bought a second laptop, still plans
to keep her remaining two chil-
dren at home for now.
Her oldest daughter, who grad-
uated high school in the spring,
was hospitalized for a week this
summer with Covid-19. Her
daughter’s godparents were both
sick, too, and one of Ms. Oates’s
uncles died from the virus.
“I know what it can do,” she
said. “I’ve seen it firsthand. And
it’s scary.”
STEVE WOOD/UAB
dow is bordering on useless.”
Dr. Vickers of U.A.B. said the
statewide program could not test
students at scale without a two-
week window, noting that stu-
dents with negative results were
asked to stop socializing before re-
turning to their campuses. “It’s a
trade-off,” he said.
Dr. Vickers added that, com-
bined with measures like testing,
social distancing and mandatory
mask-wearing, the Healthcheck
app could help hinder the campus
spread of coronavirus.
Even so, some students said the
university seemed to be sending
contradictory messages — re-
assuring them even as it issued
stern virus warnings to the public.
“You have U.A.B., the medical
end, saying the virus is out of con-
trol,” said Kadie McDowell, a sen-
ior majoring in political science
and criminal justice. “But then
you have the school end of U.A.B.,
the university, saying, ‘We’re do-
ing everything possible for you to
come back to campus.’”
With classes scheduled to begin
on Monday, it is too soon to know
whether U.A.B.’s high stakes stu-
dent re-entry program will be able
to keep the virus in check. If does
not, university officials said they
have a variety of contingency
plans.
“We are prepared, of course,”
Dr. Watts said, “for any scenario.”
 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N A7

Tracking an Outbreak The Science

RESEARCH

F.D.A. Delays Emergency Authorization for Blood Plasma Treatment

This article is by Noah Weiland,
Sharon LaFraniere and Sheri Fink.
WASHINGTON — Last week,
just as the Food and Drug Admin-
istration was preparing to issue
an emergency authorization for
blood plasma as a Covid-19 treat-
ment, a group of top federal health
officials including Dr. Francis S.
Collins and Dr. Anthony S. Fauci
intervened, arguing that emerg-
ing data on the treatment was too
weak, according to two senior ad-
ministration officials.
The authorization is delayed for
now as more data is reviewed, ac-
cording to H. Clifford Lane, the
clinical director at the National In-
stitute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases. An emergency approval
could still be issued in the near fu-
ture, he said.
Donated by people who have
survived the disease, antibody-
rich plasma is considered safe.
President Trump has hailed it as a
“beautiful ingredient” in the veins
of people who have survived
Covid-19.
But clinical trials have not
proved whether plasma can help
people fighting the coronavirus.
Several top health officials —
led by Dr. Collins, the director of
the National Institutes of Health;
Dr. Fauci, the government’s top in-
fectious disease expert; and Dr.
Lane — urged their colleagues
last week to hold off, citing recent
data from the country’s largest
plasma study, run by the Mayo
Clinic. They thought the study’s
data to date was not strong
enough to warrant an emergency
approval.
“The three of us are pretty
aligned on the importance of ro-
bust data through randomized
control trials, and that a pandemic
does not change that,” Dr. Lane
said in an interview on Tuesday.
The drafted emergency author-
ization leaned on the history of
plasma’s use in other disease out-
breaks and on animal research
and a spate of plasma studies, in-
cluding the Mayo Clinic’s pro-
gram, which has given infusions
to more than 66,000 Covid-19 pa-
tients thanks to financing from the
federal government.
An F.D.A. spokeswoman de-
clined to comment.
Plasma, the pale yellow liquid
leftover after blood is stripped of
its red and white cells, has been
the subject of months of intense
enthusiasm from scientists, celeb-
rities and Mr. Trump, part of the
administration’s push for coro-
navirus treatments as a stopgap
while pharmaceutical companies
race to complete dozens of clinical
Noah Weiland and Sharon LaFra-
niere reported from Washington,
and Sheri Fink from Houston.
Katie Thomas contributed report-
ing from Chicago.
Javier Alvarez, who had Covid-19, donating his plasma at Houston Methodist Hospital in July after his grandmother died of the virus.
trials for coronavirus vaccines.
Emergency authorizations,
which do not require the same lev-
el of evidence as a full F.D.A. ap-
proval would, have been a fraught
subject for the government during
the pandemic. The agency gave
one to the malaria drugs hydroxy-
chloroquine and chloroquine only
to rescind it months later after the
drugs were found to be ineffective
against the coronavirus and po-
tentially harmful. An emergency
authorization for blood plasma
would most likely ease the clerical
burdens on hospitals in conduct-
ing infusions.
Senior health officials have pri-
vately expressed concern about
the rapid growth of the Mayo pro-
gram and the perceived rush to
declare plasma effective without
the affirmation of results from
randomized trials, which scien-
tists have long relied on as the
gold standard of evidence. Sky-
rocketing enrollment in the pro-
gram has prompted a debate
among researchers about what
kind of empirical certainty is
needed in treating patients in a
public health emergency.
An emergency approval now
would “change the way people
view trials,” said Dr. Mila B. Or-
tigoza, an infectious disease spe-
cialist at N.Y.U. Langone Health
who started a trial with colleagues
at Montefiore Medical Center.
“We want to make sure that
when we say it works, we are con-
fident, with indisputable evi-
dence,” she said. “We’re dealing
with patients’ lives here.”
Unlike the malaria drugs,
plasma, which has been used
since the 1890s to treat infectious
diseases, has earned the attention
of a highly credentialed communi-
ty of microbiologists and immu-
nologists eager to prove its useful-
ness. The Mayo Clinic has already
published analysis on tens of thou-
sands of patients in its expanded
access program showing that
plasma is safe.
The most recent batch of data
from the program included more
than 35,000 Covid-19 patients,
many of them in intensive care
and on ventilators, and suggested
that plasma administered within
three days of a diagnosis reduced
mortality rates. When calculated
a month after the infusions, the
death rate of patients who re-
ceived plasma within three days
of diagnosis was lower (21.6 per-
cent) than it was for those who re-
ceived plasma later (26.7 per-
cent).
But the study did not have a
control group of patients given a
placebo to compare with those
given plasma, making it difficult
for scientists to assess whether
the treatment really worked. And
given the limited supply of
plasma, it is not clear how realistic
treating patients within three
days of diagnosis would be.
The program’s enrollment has
surged to more than 30 times as
high as initially expected, compli-
cating the ability of scientists to
recruit sick patients to random-
ized trials.
It “ballooned to a degree that,
you know, is becoming unmanage-
able,” Dr. Lane said.
Statisticians at the F.D.A. are
now examining the Mayo data to
better understand what factors
other than the treatment might
have influenced patient respons-
es, such as higher-quality care in
the hospital, Dr. Lane said.
A research team from Houston
Methodist hospitals also pub-
lished preliminary results from a
plasma trial last week. Their
study of hospitalized Covid-19 pa-
tients in the American Journal of
ERIN SCHAFF/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Pathology reported that a group of
136 patients who received the
treatment were more likely to be
alive four weeks later compared
with 251 patients who did not re-
ceive it. That study found a statis-
tically significant benefit only
when patients were treated within
three days of admission and when
the plasma contained a high con-
centration of antibodies.
The Houston study was not ran-
domized, meaning that all of the
patients enrolled received the
treatment and none received a
placebo. (The researchers later
compared their outcomes to
records from other Covid-19 pa-
tients who were not in the study
but were matched to be similar to
them.)
A surge in cases in Texas this
summer quickly brought the hos-
pital system to its enrollment cap,
and doctors there have not been
able to provide the experimental
treatment since mid-July. If the
F.D.A. gave an emergency author-
ization, doctors at the hospital
could possibly begin administer-
ing it again, said Dr. Eric Salazar,
the study’s principal investigator.
But an emergency authoriza-
tion could have the unintended ef-
fect of making it harder for rig-
orous clinical trials to definitively
show whether plasma works. Sci-
entists have struggled to recruit
patients for randomized trials, as
many patients and their doctors
— knowing they could get the
treatment under the Mayo pro-
gram — have been unwilling to
risk receiving a placebo.
Last month, one such trial in the
Netherlands was stopped when
researchers realized that patients
given plasma showed no differ-
ence in mortality, length of hospi-
tal stay or disease severity com-
pared with those given a placebo.
Most of the patients had already
developed their own antibodies by
the time they entered the study,
the researchers noted.
At least 10 randomized trials in
the United States have col-
lectively enrolled only a few hun-
dred people. They have also been
stymied by the waning of the virus
outbreak in many cities, compli-
cating the ability of researchers to
recruit sick people. Dr. Collins has
encouraged a strategy of pooling
the results from randomized tri-
als, an idea that has met resist-
ance from some researchers.
Dr. R. Scott Wright, who is help-
ing oversee the Mayo Clinic’s
plasma program, was an early
proponent of conducting random-
ized trials. But he said in a recent
interview that the mechanics of
setting up large studies were com-
plicated by early shortages of
plasma, coordination via video-
conference calls and the difficulty
of predicting where the virus
would spread next.
If the F.D.A. does grant the
emergency authorization, it could
make it even harder to get an-
swers, said Dr. Ortigoza of N.Y.U.
“We will keep going, because
we’re in desperate need of a ran-
domized placebo-controlled trial
for convalescent plasma,” she
said. “This is something our coun-
try and the world really needs
right now.”

18 DAYS AT SEA

3 Sailors With Antibodies Are Spared

By APOORVA MANDAVILLI
A fishing vessel that left Seattle
in May returned with an unex-
pected catch: the first direct evi-
dence in humans that antibodies
to the coronavirus can thwart in-
fection.
More than a hundred crew
members aboard the American
Dynasty were stricken by the in-
fection over 18 days at sea. But
three sailors who initially carried
antibodies remained virus-free,
according to a new report.
Although the study is small, it
addresses one of the most impor-
tant questions in the pandemic:
whether the immune response to
one bout with the virus protects
against reinfection.
“Knowing the answer to this
question is critical for vaccine de-
sign and epidemiology,” tweeted
Jesse Bloom, an evolutionary biol-
ogist at the Fred Hutchinson Can-
cer Research Center in Seattle
and one of the study’s authors.
The study was posted online
last week and has not yet been
published in a peer-reviewed jour-
nal. Still, the finding set off opti-
mistic chatter among scientists,
who have been relying on monkey
studies for evidence of antibodies’
potency.
“I thought it was very exciting
— good enough news that I was
telling my family about it,” said
Michal Tal, an immunologist at
Stanford University who was not
involved in the work.
Several research teams have
reported that an encounter with
the virus triggers a robust im-
mune response in most people, in-
cluding in those who may have
been only mildly ill. And the vac-
cine candidates now in trials also
seem to elicit strong neutralizing
antibodies, the kind that can block
the virus.
But the amount of those anti-
bodies needed to prevent the vi-
rus from returning is unclear. Sci-
entists measure neutralizing anti-
bodies in titers, an indication of
their concentration in the blood.
The three sailors who remained
protected from the virus had
widely varying titers; two had
only moderate quantities, a find-
ing the researchers said was re-
assuring.
“People have been so worried
about the titers, and the titers go-
ing down,” Dr. Alexander
Greninger, a virologist at the Uni-
versity of Washington in Seattle,
said.
The results indicate even mod-
erate titers prevented reinfection
in a situation in which exposure to
the virus was high, he said:
“These are attainable titers,
right? Hopefully, it’ll be helpful to
The experience on a
fishing vessel offers
hope for a vaccine.
see, and makes make me very op-
timistic about the vaccines.”
The American Dynasty carried
113 men and nine women. All crew
members had been tested for both
virus and antibodies as part of a
routine screening before setting
sail. (The researchers did not
have access to the results from
two members.)
The trawler returned to shore
after 18 days at sea when a crew
member became ill enough to
need hospitalization. The sailors
were tested for the presence of vi-
rus and antibodies again and for
up to 50 days after their return.
The three sailors confirmed to
have neutralizing antibodies did
not test positive for the virus dur-
ing the course of the study; 103 of
the remaining 117 became in-
fected.
These numbers may be small,
but they’re highly significant, Dr.
Greninger said.
“A lot of people, when they see
this are like, ‘Oh come on, it could
be due to random chance,’” he
said. In fact, the likelihood that the
results are just chance is ex-
tremely low, he added.
Other experts agreed. “Just
looking at the numbers, it be-
comes clear that it’s unlikely that
all of these three people were pro-
tected by chance,” said Florian
Krammer, an immunologist at the
Icahn School of Medicine at
Mount Sinai in New York.
Dr. Krammer and his col-
leagues are tracking antibody lev-
els in people who have recovered
from the virus once to see at what
point they might be vulnerable to
reinfection. The team began with
people in New York, but the virus
is circulating at such low levels in
the city now that Dr. Krammer
and his colleagues have had to ex-
pand the study to other locations.
Data from vaccine trials also
will identify the antibody titers re-
quired to disarm the virus. But in
Magnum Opus
the meantime, “this is the first evi- Antonio Frilli
dence in humans,” Dr. Krammer
said. “It made my weekend.”
The study raised other ques- Celebrated sculptor. Masterful execution. Classical beauty.
tions. Based on the Abbott Archi-
A serene nude reclines in her hammock in this exceptional
tect assay, six of the 120 people
tested before the boat’s departure marble by the great Italian sculptor Antonio Frilli. It is
had antibodies to the virus indi- undoubtedly the artist’s masterpiece, skillfully suggesting
cating prior exposure.
weightlessness in spite of the heaviness of the marble. Only
But when the researchers rean-
alyzed those samples using more four of these sculptures were ever carved by Frilli; another
sophisticated tests, only three of is in the collection of Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber. Circa 1892.
the six were confirmed to have
antibodies, suggesting that three 743/4”w x 241/4”d x 431/4”h. #31-1631
test results were false positives.
The Abbott test is advertised as
returning fewer than one false
positive for every 100 samples.
“That’s a little concerning that the
Abbott may be a little less specific
than we thought,” Dr. Tal said.
The researchers also looked at
antibodies in the blood, as most
teams do. But those levels may
not be the same as those in the
nose or in saliva, the two major en-
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A8 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

Tracking an Outbreak Reducing the Risks

PUBLIC TRANSIT

Following Viral Particles on the Subway

And the Importance of Good Air Flow
By MIKA GRÖNDAHL, CHRISTINA GOLDBAUM and JEREMY WHITE

Many New Yorkers are avoiding the subway, fearful of jostling with strangers in crowded cars. Masks and social
distancing are essential, but good air flow is also key to reducing the risk of exposure to the virus. The subway’s ventilation
system moves air within train cars more efficiently than restaurants, schools and other indoor settings, according to
aerosol experts. But it is not a guarantee to protect against the virus. Here’s how the system works.

At any given moment, 75 percent of At the same time, outside air is

the air you breathe in a subway car is pulled into the system, combined
recycled. The rest is pulled in from with the existing mix and released
the outside. Air is constantly sucked into the car through the duct
up from the car through vents, then panels, which span the ceiling.
cooled and filtered before being
Outside air pushed back through ducts.

Air to the
HVAC
C engineer’s cab
Duct panels

Air pushed back

Air sucked up

Engineer’s cab

Continuous air flow through these To try to safeguard the cabins

vents helps limit viral particles where conductors work, fans push
from building up inside a car and filtered air from the passenger
infecting people as they inhale. area into their operating booths
before being pulled back out again.
THE NEW YORK TIMES

Filtering and Ventilating Sneezing in a Subway Car

Mostt cars have
M h ttwo ventilation
til ti units
it att either
ith In a simulation without a mask, many more droplets In a masked simulation, some larger droplets escape
end, which help fully replace air in the car coat the floor around the rider, and aerosols disperse from the sides of the mask and fall to the floor, while tiny
with outside air about every three minutes into the air, eventually moving through the ventilation aerosols hover in the air. Those particles can then be
and 20 seconds on average. system. pulled into ceiling vents and pushed through the filters.

Fans
Filters
Cooli
oolin
olin
ng coil
ng
4.5 seconds 4.5 seconds

Cardboard frame
9.5 seconds 9.5 seconds

Inside the units, fans pull the

air through filters and cooling
coils. The filters work to block
large and small aerosols
before air enters the ducts.
But the filters do not catch
everything — and some viral
particles could slip past and Filters are typically made of 14.5 second
ds 14.5 seconds
get dispersed into trains. cotton and synthetic fibers.
THE NEW YORK TIMES

THE WAY THE FILTERS work is
determined by their materials
and shape. The subway filters
have a wave design that in-
creases their surface area, creat-
ing more opportunities to trap
droplets. The filters are made of
fibers that force incoming air to
change direction, trapping some
particles as air is pulled through
the filters.
Filters like these are rated by
their ability to block large parti-
cles, also known as their min-
imum efficiency reporting value,
or MERV. MERV filters are
rated on a scale of 1 to 20. Ex-
perts recommend that indoor
spaces upgrade their filters to a
Level 13 to help ward against the
airborne transmission of the
coronavirus. Subway cars use
filters that are rated MERV-7.
Still, the subway’s so-called air
exchange rate — or how often
recirculated air is completely
Sources: Dr. Rainald Löhner, George Mason University, Center for Computational Fluid Dynamics;
Dr. Linsey Marr, Virginia Tech; Dr. Don Milton, University of Maryland; Dr. Krystal Pollitt, Envi-
ronmental Health Sciences, Yale School of Public Health; Dr. Jelena Srebric, University of Mary-
land; John Santamaria, vice president of the car equipment division at New York City Transit.
Additional work by Frank O’Connell.
replaced with fresh air — helps
minimize the risk of coronavirus
transmission for riders. The
recycled air on subway cars is
replaced on average at least 18
times an hour, far higher than
the recommended exchange rate
for offices, which is six to eight
times an hour, or classrooms,
which is three to four times an
hour.
Even with a relatively high
exchange rate, however, viral
particles that slip past the sub-
way system’s filters could —
based on ventilation patterns —
circulate at least three times in
the car over the course of sev-
eral minutes. For example, if
someone in a car sneezes, riders
could be exposed to viral parti-
cles that don’t get filtered out
more than once, underscoring
the importance of wearing
masks.
24.5
5 seccond
ndss
nd
BECAUSE THE VENTILATION SYSTEM
pushes air across the train, rather than
down into vents on the floor, aerosols
could come in contact with someone
standing between a person sneezing and
the ceiling vent.
“You can see how well dispersed that
plume is,” said Krystal Pollitt, an assistant
professor of epidemiology at the Yale
School of Public Health. “Even if you are
not standing directly beside the person
who coughed or sneezed, you are still in
contact with that emission.”
Public health experts caution that not
all the particles released from a sneeze —
or those shown in these simulations —
contain viral matter. And while it is still
unclear how much virus is needed for
someone to be infected, coming into con-
tact with a few viral particles may not
24.5 second
ds
make you sick.
Still the sneeze simulations above un-
derscore the importance of both good
ventilation and passengers wearing
masks: Without proper ventilation, those
aerosols would stay aloft in the air and
build with each sneeze or cough.
To help address that, the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority, which runs the
city’s subway, is testing out new ultravio-
let technology that could be installed
inside trains to kill viral matter in the air.
This would prevent any viral particles a
sick rider exhales from being recirculated
through the ventilation system.
New York State has also required sub-
way riders to wear face masks and the
state’s transit agency has begun offering
free masks. Masks not only help protect
riders, but also train conductors, who are
THE NEW YORK TIMES
sequestered in tiny cabins for long
stretches at a time.
Public health experts say that the high
air exchange rate and widespread mask
usage on the city’s subways sharply re-
duces the chances of a so-called super-
spreader event on trains.
Only 25 percent of New York’s 5.5 mil-
lion weekday subway riders now use the
system. The health experts caution that if
more people begin riding the subway,
pushing crowding closer to pre-pandemic
levels, the ability of the system’s ventila-
tion to lessen the risk of viral transmission
diminishes drastically. Even when riders
are wearing masks, it is possible for a
passenger to inhale the viral particles
exhaled by a sick passenger if they are
standing shoulder to shoulder.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 A9
N

Hundreds of Deaths in Police Custody in India Draw Only Scattered Protests

Public Sees Crime
As More Pressing
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
and SAMEER YASIR
NEW DELHI — A father and
son were hauled into a small po-
lice station in the southern Indian
town of Sathankulam in June after
arguing with police officers. When
friends and family members went
to the station, they heard screams
emanating from inside, growing
louder as night fell.
The next afternoon, the two
men, Ponraj Jeyaraj, 58, and
Beniks Jeyaraj, 31, stumbled out-
side surrounded by officers, blood
dripping down the backs of their
legs. They had clearly been tor-
tured in police custody, family
members and lawyers in the town
said.
“Please, find a way to get us
bail,” Ponraj Jeyaraj begged his
sister, Jaya Joseph, as he was tak-
en to a hospital, she recalled. She
said her brother’s last words to
her were, “We will not survive an-
other day.”
Father and son died hours
apart, from severe internal inju-
ries, a few days later. Police offi-
cials in charge of the station de-
clined to comment, saying the
case was now under federal inves-
tigation.
For decades, India has ab-
sorbed case after case of police
brutality, torture and extrajudicial
killings. Every year, scores of In-
dians are killed in what activists
call “fake encounters,” and many
more, activists say, are tortured to AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES

death in police custody. Relatives mourned Ponraj Jeyaraj and his son Beniks, who died of injuries sustained in police custody in southern India. Relatives said the men had been tortured.
Many of these killings have
been extensively covered in the
Indian news media, and some
have set off a few strikes and dem-
onstrations. But rarely have they
provoked widespread protests
calling for change.
Around the world, the death of
George Floyd in police custody in
Minneapolis in May unleashed
searing examinations of police
abuse, racism and injustice — but
not in India, where no large grass-
roots movement has emerged to
take on police brutality. Many In-
dians see day-to-day crime as the
more pressing issue and often side
with the police, even when there is
voluminous evidence that officers
have abused their power. There is
also a fear of speaking against the Ponraj Jeyaraj, above left, and Beniks Jeyaraj, above right, who
police. ran a shop, were arrested by officers enforcing coronavirus rules.
According to a lengthy report Their coffins were carried through a crowd, left. A shopkeepers’
by the National Campaign strike led to a federal investigation and the arrests of officers.
Against Torture, an Indian rights
group based in New Delhi, the lice officers who were going new clothes reddened with blood
capital, at least 1,731 people were around the market in Sathanku- within minutes. The father and
killed in custody last year. The ma- lam, scolding a number of shop- son were then driven to the house
jority of the victims, the report AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
keepers for violating coronavirus of a magistrate, who saw them
said, were the usual victims of rules — including the Jeyarajes, from a distance and gave the po-
abuse: Muslims and lower-caste oversees the police station in More are killed in judicial custody, cers were celebrated as heroes
who had kept their shop open 10 lice permission to send them to
Hindus. Sathankulam. Thiru J. K. Tripa- when they are housed in over- and showered with rose petals.
minutes past the required closing jail.
Police killings in India rarely re- thy, the top police official in Tamil crowded jails. Last month, another question-
time. A few days earlier, family On June 22, they were moved to
sult in punishment. From time to Nadu State, which includes Others have been killed in the able encounter unfolded, this time
members said, the same officers a hospital after complaining of
time, a few officers are arrested, Sathankulam, also declined to middle of riots or bursts of com- on a highway near Kanpur, a hard-
comment. had tried to pressure Beniks Je- chest pains. Ponraj Jeyaraj was
but convictions are few and far be- munal violence, like what hap- scrabble industrial city in Uttar
yaraj into giving them a free the first to die, late that night.
tween. Human rights groups say there pened in February in New Delhi, Pradesh.
has not been a single conviction in when officers responding to phone from his shop, and when he Hours later, his son died.
Many Indians, exasperated Police officers were transport-
the deaths of 500 people alleged to clashes between Hindus and Mus- refused, they left in a huff. After shopkeepers called for a
with the sclerotic functioning of an ing to jail a notorious criminal,
have been tortured in police cus- lims captured a group of Muslim Vikas Dubey, whom many Indian On June 19, around 7 p.m., four strike to protest the deaths, the
overburdened and often corrupt police officers from the Sathanku- Central Bureau of Investigation, a
tody between 2005 and 2018. men and beat them severely. One news outlets had identified as a
law enforcement system, crave lam station arrested the father federal agency, stepped in. Ten po-
In Uttar Pradesh State, which is of those men died two days later gangster. Mr. Dubey’s gang had
justice and welcome the elimina- and drove him away in a van. lice officers have been arrested
notorious for suspicious police from internal injuries. recently shot and killed eight po-
tion of people they see as crimi- When his son rushed to the police and put in jail, but a magistrate
killings, magistrates have investi- Then there are the cases in lice officers, officials said. The po-
nals. gated 74 since March 2017. In ev- lice said the car transporting him station, he was detained as well. told prosecutors that none of the
which officers say they had no
“There are outright public cele- ery case, the officers were choice but to shoot dangerous sus- overturned. Mr. Dubey was shot Several witnesses, including a officers were cooperating and that
brations of police killings,” said cleared. pects who either attacked them or to death along the highway, after lawyer, Raja Ram; one of the Je- they had tried to destroy evi-
Devika Prasad, head of police re- These killings, according to Ms. refused to surrender. These inci- what the police described as a yarajes’ neighbors, Dev Singh dence.
forms at the Commonwealth Hu- Prasad, have accelerated under dents are called encounters. short struggle. Raja; and a rights activist, Yusuf, These days, the Jeyaraj family
man Rights Initiative, a human the leadership of Yogi Adityanath, Last year, the police in Hyder- What raised eyebrows was that who like many Indians uses only spends much of its time meeting
rights organization. “The ex- a strident Hindu nationalist monk abad gunned down four men in an journalists following the convoy one name, said that when the men with investigators and trying to
tremely slow judicial process and who is now the state’s chief min- encounter. The suspects had been transporting Mr. Dubey said they had been taken to a hospital for a obtain the autopsy report, a
low conviction rates make people ister. When he came into office in accused of rape and murder, and were stopped a mile before the medical exam the next day, they process that is likely to take
fear that criminals will get away 2017, Mr. Adityanath openly the police said that during a re-en- site of the accident, a few minutes were limping in blood-spattered months.
with their crimes. That’s why boasted that his government actment of the crime, the suspects before it happened. The journal- pants, leaving a trail of thick, dark “Getting justice in cases like
many see these killings as just.” would “bump off” criminals. had tried to snatch their guns. ists said police officers were al- blood. Ponraj Jeyaraj asked for a these is a long struggle,” said
The use of torture is explicitly Police killings in India come in Few people actually believed that ready blocking the highway. lungi, a type of sarong. His son, Vinod Kumar, a son-in-law of Pon-
banned in India, but in police sta- many forms. Some suspects are account, according to numerous The ordeal for Ponraj Jeyaraj too, changed into fresh clothes. raj Jeyaraj. “Especially when you
tions, it happens all the time, ac- beaten to death in neighborhood interviews with Hyderabad resi- and his son began on the evening Paramedics watched in shock, know the protector has turned
tivists said. There’s even a com- police stations, activists said. dents at the time. But still, the offi- of June 18. They argued with po- Mr. Ram said, as the Jeyarajes’ into a murderer.”
mon euphemism for it: third-de-
gree interrogation.
First-degree interrogation is
hard questioning. Second-degree
is physical assault, including slap-
ping and beating with sticks.
And third-degree interrogation,
according to rights activists and
several police officers who spoke
on condition of anonymity and ac-
knowledged its use, involves
physical torture, like what the Je-
yarajes appear to have been sub-
jected to in June.
Family members, including Ms.
Joseph; Ponshekar Nadar, a son-
in-law of Ponraj Jeyaraj; and two
others who saw the dead bodies,
said that large pieces of skin had
been ripped off the men’s but-
tocks. They also said that doctors
at the hospital had told them that
both men suffered grave internal
injuries, possibly from blunt ob-
jects being thrust inside their rec-
tums.
EPA, VIA SHUTTERSTOCK ASSOCIATED PRESS
Doctors at the hospital declined
to comment, as did an official at Vikas Dubey, at left center, a notorious criminal, was fatally shot by the police last month. The police said he had been killed in a struggle after the car transporting him
the district headquarters that to jail overturned, right. But journalists who had been following the convoy said they had been stopped before reaching the site of the crash, before it happened.
A10 N THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Global Rivalry Projected Onto Photo of a Diplomat’s Visit
By DAMIEN CAVE
SYDNEY, Australia — The
grainy photograph certainly said
something about China and the
Pacific: It showed the Chinese
ambassador, Tang Songgen,
walking over the backs of 30
people on a remote island in the
nation of Kiribati soon after he
had landed on a grassy airstrip.
To some, especially American
and Australian officials who
helped the image go viral this
week, there was no greater sym-
bol of Chinese “Wolf Warrior”
diplomacy — in their view, it
reinforced Beijing’s domineering,
colonial approach.
To others, including people
from Kiribati, the criticism was a
sign of ignorance. The ambassa-
dor was simply taking part in a
local welcome ceremony, typical-
ly reserved for weddings, that
elders had chosen to adapt.
Whether it was inappropriate
statecraft or a tempest in a tropi-
cal teapot, the debate reflected a
new reality for the nations of the
Pacific: They suddenly matter
again in geopolitics. China and
the United States are waging a
war of influence across the vast
region that often brings aid and
attention — but also an urge to
talk (or walk) first and ask ques-
tions later.
“Our islands have always been
geopolitical playgrounds for
others,” said Katerina Teaiwa, an
associate professor at the Aus-
tralian National University’s
College of Asia and the Pacific,
whose father is from Kiribati.
“Given all that, it’s quite frustrat-
ing for Pacific Islanders not to be
taken seriously or heard.”
The photo’s viral surge cannot
be separated from both the
global and local context.
Kiribati, a former British colo-
ny near the Equator that is made
up of 33 islands sprawled over 1.4
million square miles of ocean, is
one of several Pacific countries
that have gradually taken on
greater importance for both
Beijing and Washington as their
bitter rivalry has intensified.
It is primarily a matter of
location. Kiribati is the closest
neighboring country to Hawaii.
All together, the hundreds of
sparsely populated islands in the
Pacific are spread across 15
percent of the globe’s surface,
sitting like scattered chess pieces
right between China, the United
States and Australia.
“For their small size, they
Transparency
May Be Fine,
But in Walls
For Toilets?
By TIFFANY MAY
HONG KONG — Public toilets
around the globe have a reputa-
tion for being dark, dirty and dan-
gerous. Tokyo recently unveiled
new restrooms in two public parks
that aim to address those con-
cerns.
For one thing, they are brightly
lit and colorful.
For another, they are transpar-
ent.
This way, the logic goes, those
who need to use them can check
out the cleanliness and safety of
the stalls without having to walk
inside or touch a thing.
Japan has long experimented
with toilets, resulting in lids that
open and close automatically and
seats that warm up. But the new
stalls — designed by Shigeru Ban,
the Pritzker Prize-winning archi-
tect — are made out of an opacity-
changing “smart glass” that is al-
ready used in offices and other
buildings to provide privacy when
needed.
The toilets were installed in Ja-
pan’s capital this month, coincid-
ing with a nationwide campaign to
phase out the city’s old-fashioned
public toilets ahead of the now-de-
layed Summer Olympics. Set up in
front of a cluster of trees in the
Shibuya district, the stalls stand
out like a Mondrian painting,
bearing tinted walls with colors
like mango, watermelon, lime, vio-
let and teal.
When occupied and locked
properly, the tinted glass toilet
stalls become frosted and opaque.
When the door is unlocked, an
electric current realigns the crys-
tals in the glass to allow more light
to pass through, creating a trans-
parent effect. The toilets were
presented as another futuristic
and aesthetically pleasing exam-
ple of the country’s technological
advancements.
The reviews were mixed.
“I’m worried it will become
transparent due to a malfunction,”
a social media user with the Twit-
ter handle @yukio wrote in a
widely circulated post.
“It will take time to get used to
the idea,” Ming Cheng, a London-
based architect, wrote on Twitter.
But he gave it a “thumbs up.”
Serah Copperwhite, a technol-
ogy worker based in a district
south of Tokyo, said that while she
normally avoided public toilets,
A photo reportedly showing the Chinese ambassador walking on islanders’ backs in Kiribati.
have really profound strategic
significance,” said Jonathan
Pryke, director of the Pacific
Islands Program at the Lowy
Institute, a Sydney think tank.
“In the Second World War, these
tiny islands in the middle of a
far-flung ocean had immeasur-
able strategic importance, and
the geography hasn’t changed
much since then.”
China has been building mo-
mentum in the region, with vic-
tories just starting to emerge.
Last month, Papua New Guinea
joined nations like Iran and
Venezuela in voting to support a
United Nations resolution en-
dorsing the draconian new secu-
rity law that China had imposed
on the semiautonomous territory
of Hong Kong.
In January, the Solomon Is-
lands, where some of the most
important battles of World War II
were fought, cut ties with Taiwan
and shifted its allegiance to
Beijing, which claims Taiwan as
part of China’s territory. A few
Public toilets in Tokyo parks were designed with colorful transparent walls by Shigeru Ban, a Pritzker Prize-winning architect.
she would be more inclined to use
the new ones because they ap-
peared bright and clean. “I trust
the science,” Ms. Copperwhite, 28,
said in a phone interview Wednes-
day, addressing concerns on so-
cial media about the reliability of
the glass technology.
Advocates have long called for
the Japanese national govern-
ment to make brick-and-mortar
toilets in public spaces more ap-
pealing and accessible to resi-
dents and tourists. Some public
bathrooms in Tokyo, particularly
in train stations, lack hand soap. A
kindergarten in southern Japan
stopped taking children to a city
park last year because they were
deterred by the flies in the squat
stalls. The school opted instead to
use a park with Western-style
flush toilets.
More than 300 restrooms were
refurbished from 2017 to 2019, ac-
cording to the Japan Tourism
Agency. Before that, 40 percent of
the country’s public restrooms
consisted of squat stalls rather
than Western-style commodes.
The government had sought to
phase them out before the
Olympics, which have been post-
poned because of the coronavirus
pandemic.
NEWS ANALYSIS
days later, Kiribati (pronounced
keer-uh-bas) followed suit.
The shift brought immediate
praise from China’s leader, Xi
Jinping. He celebrated Kiribati
and its president for being “on
the right side of history” after
the two countries signed a mem-
orandum of understanding that
brought the island nation into
China’s Belt and Road infrastruc-
ture initiative and established
diplomatic ties.
Soon after that, Mr. Tang be-
came China’s first ambassador
on the ground there, where he
has been fielding requests for
help raising portions of the is-
lands to evade seas that are
rising because of climate change.
But the image of him walking on
the backs of others gave him a
new visibility.
It is unclear where the photo-
graph came from. It seems to
have been taken from beneath
the plane that took the ambassa-
dor to the small island of
Marakei during a visit this
But while some appreciated the
new toilets’ advanced technology,
some Tokyo residents said they
were misplaced in exposed public
spaces and were perhaps better
suited for use elsewhere.
“I am not willing to risk my pri-
vacy because someone wants to
make a fancy toilet,” Sachiko
Ishikawa, a 32-year-old writer and
translator, said in a phone inter-
Residents are
skeptical of glass
that turns opaque.
view on Wednesday from Tokyo.
Ms. Ishikawa said she was con-
cerned that human error would
make it too easy for bathroom us-
ers to inadvertently expose them-
selves. The transparent structure
could also make them more vul-
nerable to assailants, she said.
“They could be waiting for you
if you’re getting out of the bath-
room,” she said. “So the argument
of protection does not hold for
me.”
month.
According to a statement that
the Chinese Embassy in Kiribati
posted on Facebook on Monday,
the trip was purely educational,
aimed at promoting “mutual
understanding” and exploring
“cooperation opportunities.”
The statement did not defend
or explain the welcome ceremo-
ny, but it appeared to be a re-
sponse to the discussion online
after the image was posted on
Facebook and Twitter a few days
ago.
Cmdr. Constantine Panayiotou,
the U.S. defense attaché based in
Fiji, was among those who took
up the cause, delivering a rebuke
on Twitter: “I simply cannot
imagine any scenario in which
walking on the backs of children
is acceptable behavior by an
ambassador of any country (or
any adult for that matter!) Yet
here we are thanks to China’s
ambassador to Kiribati.”
Australian officials provided a
similar critique, prompting a
Predecessors to Tokyo’s trans-
parent toilets appeared in Switz-
erland in 2002 and 2015, when the
designer Olivier Rambert un-
veiled two glass bathrooms in the
city of Lausanne. They had a con-
troversial safety feature that auto-
matically opened the doors and
turned the glass transparent if
sensors detected no motion for 10
minutes. That could conceivably
help users who fall unconscious
and need medical attention, he
was quoted as saying.
Other countries have faced
other issues with public bath-
rooms.
South Korea has been plagued
by a proliferation of tiny cameras
placed surreptitiously in public
toilet stalls as well as in changing
rooms in shops and hotels. The
problem became so serious that
the government in Seoul, the capi-
tal, appointed 8,000 workers in
2018 to inspect the city’s public
bathrooms.
Two billion people, or about a
quarter of the world’s population,
do not have access to toilets or la-
trines, according to data pub-
lished by the World Health Orga-
nization in 2019. For World Toilet
Day in 2015, a nonprofit organiza-
tion in New York installed a flush-
flood of objections from people
who were familiar with the ritual.
Some pointed out that the people
lying on their stomachs all
seemed to be adults. Others
noted that the ceremony was an
expression of respect, initiated
not by the ambassador but
rather by local elders.
“This is mainly seen at wed-
dings but not all islands,” Dr.
Teaiwa wrote on Twitter. The
people of Marakei, she added,
have a right to decide how to
welcome people, and they were
“probably trying something
extra customary to show honor
and hospitality.”
In an interview, she said she
believed that an Australian am-
bassador had once taken part in
a similar ritual. (Australia’s
Department of Foreign Affairs
and Trade said that it was not
aware of any senior diplomat’s
ever having participated.)
Commander Panayiotou, when
asked about his response on
Wednesday, said that he would
not be able to comment except to
say that the tweet “reflects my
own personal opinions,” not the
official position of the U.S. Em-
bassy in Fiji or the Defense
Department. Other American
officials have said they are wor-
ried that China will exploit ramp-
ant corruption in Kiribati to build
strategic outposts on Christmas
Island, which sits south of Ha-
waii.
Anne-Marie Brady, a professor
at the University of Canterbury
in Christchurch, New Zealand,
who has frequently criticized the
Chinese government’s approach
to the region, said the intent of
the ceremony simply could not
compete with the way it would
be viewed: “as a visual image of
the perceived unbalanced neo-
colonial relationship.”
And maybe that scrutiny of
colonialism should continue, Dr.
Teaiwa said — but more broadly,
to include how the United States,
Australia and the rest of the
world treat a region they seem to
consider only when a risk of
conflict in Asia arises.
“Islanders are infantilized by
foreign governments, develop-
ment experts, missionaries,
tourists and researchers from all
disciplines,” she said. “The
China-U.S.-Australia tug of war is
frustrating when it removes the
voices and agencies of Pacific
leaders and communities —
especially communities.”
SATOSHI NAGARE/THE NIPPON FOUNDATION
able toilet surrounded by one-way
mirrors looking out on Washing-
ton Square Park to simulate the
experience of relieving oneself in
public view.
Organizers said 200 people had
tried out the stall over the course
of the day. Some of them later said
they had felt uneasy even though
they knew they could not be seen
from the outside.
In Japan, the Nippon Founda-
tion plans to install toilets de-
signed by other prominent archi-
tects at 17 locations by next year.
But Thalia Harris, a freelance
writer who has lived in Tokyo for
seven years, said she did not see
the project as a practical solution
to safety concerns.
“Personally, I think this will
make people feel even more un-
comfortable, especially for wom-
en,” Ms. Harris, 29, said in a phone
interview Tuesday.
She said she would continue to
use the public bathrooms in To-
kyo’s train stations, despite the
lack of hand soap. She always
brings her own, particularly be-
cause of the coronavirus out-
break.
“I would like them to address
that before having these particu-
lar magic new toilets,” she said.
U.S. Presses
China Further
Over Actions
In Hong Kong
By PRANSHU VERMA
WASHINGTON — The Trump
administration on Wednesday
suspended or terminated three bi-
lateral agreements with Hong
Kong related to extradition and
tax exemptions, the latest in a se-
ries of measures that escalate ten-
sions between Washington and
Beijing.
The move comes after Presi-
dent Trump signed an executive
order last month ending the spe-
cial status that the United States
granted Hong Kong in diplomatic
and trade relations.
The administration has sought
to punish China for its attempts to
stifle political dissent in the for-
mer British territory. China an-
nounced in June that it was impos-
ing a national security law in
Hong Kong to grant security
agencies expansive powers, giv-
ing Beijing sweeping authority to
crack down on a variety of politi-
cal actions.
“The Chinese Communist Party
chose to crush the freedoms and
autonomy of the people of Hong
Kong,” Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo said on Twitter. “Because
of the CCP’s actions, we are termi-
nating or suspending three of our
bilateral agreements with the ter-
ritory.”
The three agreements cover the
transfer of fugitives and convicted
prisoners. They also apply to re-
ciprocal tax exemptions on in-
come from international shipping,
the department said.
In recent months, the Trump
administration has taken a series
of financial, diplomatic and tech-
nological measures against China,
which experts say is causing rela-
tions between the two countries to
Agreements on taxes
and extradition are
ended or suspended.
reach new lows.
“It’s actually a remarkable set
of developments,” said Dali L.
Yang, a political scientist from the
University of Chicago. “What we
see here is truly a tug of war in
terms of mutual actions against
each other.”
In early August, the Trump ad-
ministration imposed sanctions
on Hong Kong’s chief executive,
Carrie Lam, and 10 other senior
officials in Hong Kong and main-
land China over their roles in
cracking down on political dis-
sent.
A day before that, Mr. Trump
signed two executive orders bar-
ring American residents and cor-
porations from making any trans-
actions with the Chinese-owned
TikTok and WeChat apps within
45 days. The orders cited national
security concerns, saying the
services do not keep user data pri-
vate. Mr. Trump has since given
ByteDance, the Chinese owner of
TikTok, until November to divest
from its American assets and any
data that TikTok had gathered in
the United States.
In early July, the administration
imposed sanctions on senior Chi-
nese officials, including a member
of the Communist Party’s ruling
Politburo, over human rights
abuses against the largely Muslim
Uighur ethnic minority in the Xin-
jiang region.
American officials have also
shut down the Chinese Consulate
in Houston, citing economic espio-
nage efforts by diplomats to steal
scientific research. Some students
affiliated with Chinese military in-
stitutions have been banned from
traveling to the United States.
The Trump administration has
also imposed visa restrictions on
Chinese journalists in the United
States, effectively expelling doz-
ens of them. In return, Beijing has
taken harsh actions on American
journalists, including expelling
employees of The New York
Times, The Wall Street Journal
and The Washington Post.
The steady drumbeat of meas-
ures against China is in line with a
core part of Mr. Trump’s campaign
strategy. Political strategists seek
to show the president as tough on
the country, to shift the national
conversation from his failures on
managing the pandemic and the
economy.
Mr. Trump has previously been
reluctant to strike a hard stance
against China during his time in
office. Aside from starting a trade
war with the country in 2018, he
has repeatedly praised the Chi-
nese leader, Xi Jinping, even ask-
ing Mr. Xi for help in his re-elec-
tion efforts.
But some China experts say the
two nations are on a path for long-
term confrontation, which may
continue even if the Democratic
presidential candidate, former
Vice President Joseph R. Biden
Jr., wins the election in November.
“Some of the actions may be
hard to undo,” Mr. Yang said. “We
see two juggernauts getting more
antagonistic toward each other.”

No Death Penalty for ISIS ‘Beatles’ if Britain Shares Evidence, Barr Says
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
WASHINGTON — Attorney
General William P. Barr has said
that the United States will not
seek the death penalty against
two notorious British Islamic
State detainees accused of play-
ing a role in the torture and be-
headings of Western hostages, po-
tentially clearing the way for Brit-
ain to share evidence against
them that prosecutors see as cru-
cial to putting them on trial.
The statement, which Mr. Barr
made in a letter to the British
home secretary that the Justice
Department released on Wednes-
day, represented a major shift in
the Trump administration’s policy.
It could open the door to a long-de-
layed prosecution for the two men,
El Shafee Elsheikh and Alexanda
Kotey, who were captured by a
Kurdish militia in early 2018 and
are being held by the American
military in Iraq.
“I am writing to provide an as-
surance that, if the United King-
dom grants our mutual legal as-
sistance request, the United
States will not seek the death pen-
alty in any prosecutions it might
bring” against the two men, Mr.
Barr wrote, adding that if they
were somehow nevertheless sen-
tenced to execution, “the death
penalty will not be carried out.”
At the same time, however, Mr.
Barr imposed a deadline of Oct. 15
for the British government to re-
solve litigation that has tied up its
ability to transfer the evidence. If
it fails to do so by then, he threat-
ened, the United States will in-
stead transfer the two men to the
custody of the Iraqi government.
“Time is of the essence,” he
wrote, adding: “Kotey and
Elsheikh are currently held by
United States military authorities
in an overseas theater of military
operations, and it is not tenable to
continue holding them there for
an extended period. Final deci-
sions must be made about this
matter.”
Mr. Elsheikh and Mr. Kotey
were half of a cell of four ISIS Brit-
ons who handled hostages —
some of whom were eventually
Stephen Castle contributed report-
ing from London.
Trump Presses for Sale
Of Weapons to U.A.E.
Despite Israeli Worries
From Page A1
has the jet and has been wary of
the United States selling the air-
craft to other nations in the re-
gion. Israel’s military has said
such sales could weaken the na-
tion’s strong advantage in the
Middle East.
Without the support of the Is-
raeli government, it is unlikely
Congress would support the sale.
Prime Minister Benjamin Ne-
tanyahu of Israel strenuously de-
nies that he gave even tacit con-
sent for the sale of F-35s or any
other advanced weapons to the
Emirates as part of recent diplo-
matic negotiations with the White
House. He insists he has consis-
tently and repeatedly pressed Is-
rael’s opposition to any such deal
with American officials.
A White House spokesman de-
clined to comment. Yousef al-
Otaiba, the Emirates’ ambassador
to the United States, declined to
comment, as did a spokesman for
the Israeli Embassy in Washing-
ton. Anwar Gargash, the Emirati
minister of state for foreign af-
fairs, has made no mention of any
arms deal in his many comments
on the diplomatic agreement with
Israel.
Even if the Trump White House
were to announce its intent, sell-
ing the F-35s would take six to
eight years and could be undone
by a future administration. Many
of the top foreign policy advisers
to Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Demo-
cratic presidential nominee, were
officials in the Obama administra-
tion and are skeptical of weapons
sales to the Gulf Arab nations be-
cause of the many civilians killed
by the Saudi-led coalition in the
Yemen war.
The Emirati arms deal has been
pushed by Jared Kushner, the
president’s son-in-law, who has
been central to the diplomatic ne-
gotiations between Israel and the
Emirates. His efforts over three
years to forge a peace agreement
between the Israeli government
and Palestinians have gone no-
where, and Palestinians have
been angered by the Trump ad-
ministration’s pro-Israel policies.
Mr. Kushner has hoped to get the
Gulf Arab leaders, including the
Emirati crown prince, Moham-
med bin Zayed, to push the Pales-
tinians to support his proposals.
Another top White House offi-
cial working on the arms deal is
Maj. Gen. Miguel Correa, an Army
officer who formerly served as the
Isabel Kershner and Ronen
Bergman contributed reporting
from Jerusalem, and Eric Schmitt
contributed reporting from Wash-
ington.
beheaded on propaganda videos
— and whose victims nicknamed
them the Beatles because of their
accents.
An early victim was James Fo-
ley, an American journalist who
was beheaded in 2014. Diane Fo-
ley, his mother, said in an email to
The New York Times that the de-
velopment had given the victims’
families hope that the long limbo
surrounding whether the two men
would ever come to trial might be
resolved — although they are also
wary about the short deadline.
“We are so hopeful that this as-
surance will allow the Home Sec-
retary to fully engage with our
DOJ and pool all our evidence im-
plicating Kotey and ElSheikh . . .
just concerned about the tight
time frame and legalities around
the UK Supreme Court,” she
wrote. “But very hopeful and
grateful to AG Barr for agreeing to
waive the death penalty to allow
the UK to share their substantial
evidence.”
As the Islamic State’s so-called
caliphate collapsed, the Kurdish-
led Syrian Democratic Forces, an
American ally, took a large num-
ber of its members from around
the world into wartime custody.
defense attaché in Abu Dhabi.
General Correa is now a senior
member of the National Security
Council staff working on Middle
East issues.
The circumstances around
General Correa’s departure from
Abu Dhabi are murky. Two Ameri-
can officials said he left his posi-
tion after clashing with the em-
bassy’s chargé d’affaires, Steven
C. Bondy, who believed General
Correa was having meetings with
Emirati officials about arms sales,
the war in Yemen and other sensi-
tive topics without his knowledge
or consent.
The Emiratis have pushed the
Americans to sell them F-35s for
at least six years, but Israeli offi-
cials have objected. The warplane
is designed to have a very low ra-
dar signature, and can strike
ground targets and engage in air-
to-air combat to maintain control
of the skies.
“The F-35 has been the single-
biggest defense system objective
the Emiratis have had for years,”
said Barbara A. Leaf, a former
U.S. ambassador to the Emirates.
But, she said, with Israel and
the Emirates agreeing to full dip-
lomatic relations, the Emiratis
now expect Israel to relinquish
some of its traditional technolog-
ical edge. “If you’re making the
big move — normalization of rela-
tions — you’re in a different posi-
tion as an Arab state,” Ms. Leaf
said.
The United Arab Emirates is
among the few traditional allies of
the United States that have en-
joyed good relations with the
Trump administration, and it has
found common cause with the
White House in taking a hawkish
position toward Iran. In an inter-
view Wednesday with The Jerusa-
lem Post, David M. Friedman, the
American ambassador to Israel,
said that improving the Emirates’
arsenal would be beneficial for the
nations allied against Iran.
“Ultimately, under the right cir-
cumstances, both the U.S. and Is-
rael would benefit greatly from
having a strong ally situated
across the Strait of Hormuz from
Iran,” he said.
Mr. Friedman insisted that any
decision on weapons sales would
be made keeping in mind that the
United States is committed to Is-
rael having military supremacy in
the region.
Since the 1973 Arab-Israeli War,
American policy has been to en-
sure that Israel maintains what is
called a “qualitative military
edge” over its Arab neighbors.
The monthslong interagency
process for ensuring proposed
weapons sales meet that require-
ment is highly classified and in-
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Many of the detainees’ home gov-
ernments have proved reluctant
to take them back both for domes-
tic political reasons and because
of security fears that their own le-
gal systems could result in many
of the group’s members’ being re-
leased or serving sentences of
only a few years.
Mr. Kotey and Mr. Elsheikh
were among them. The British
government sought to strip their
citizenship and made it clear that
it did not want to take them back.
The Trump administration has
been willing to prosecute them in-
stead, but the attorney general at
the time, Jeff Sessions, opted not
to make assurances that the
United States would forgo the
death penalty — over the objec-
tions of four American families
whose children were killed by the
Islamic State.
Because Britain has abolished
the death penalty, such assur-
ances are usually routine when
the United States is working with
the British criminal justice sys-
tem. The British government
pressed the Trump administra-
tion to provide them again. But
Britain eventually relented and
agreed to hand over the evidence
The Trump administration hopes to sell the F-35 stealth fighter to the United Arab Emirates, along with advanced armed drones.
volves review by a handful of U.S.
officials. The congressional defini-
tion says the United States must
ensure that Israel can defeat “any
credible conventional military
threat” while sustaining “minimal
damage and casualties.”
Andrew Miller, a former State
Department and National Securi-
ty Council official now at the
Project on Middle East Democra-
cy in Washington, said that “the
mere fact that U.A.E. is making
peace with Israel does not exempt
the U.S.” from requirements to
maintain Israel’s military superi-
ority.
“Based on my assessment,
there’s legitimate concern that the
sale of F-35s to U.A.E. could com-
promise Israel’s qualitative mili-
tary edge,” he said, adding that
the jet can slip through advanced
air defense systems.
If the sales process moves for-
ward, the State Department
would notify Congress. Concerned
lawmakers could try to freeze the
sale or kill it.
Mr. Trump, Mr. Kushner and
other White House aides have
strongly advocated arms sales to
Gulf Arab nations, which has led
to one of the biggest rifts between
the administration and Congress.
Since 2017, lawmakers have put
holds on proposed arms packages
to Saudi Arabia and the Emirates,
citing the thousands of civilians
killed by a Saudi-led coalition in
the Yemen war. Many of the civil-
ians died from precision-guided
bombs made by Raytheon. In
2019, Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo issued a declaration of an
“emergency” over Iranian activi-
ties in the region to bypass Con-
HUSSEIN MALLA/ASSOCIATED PRESS
in its possession — and to send of-
ficials to testify about it at trial so
it would be admissible — if the
United States agreed to give the
detainees a trial in civilian court
rather than sending them to the
wartime prison at Guantánamo
Bay.
But Mr. Elsheikh’s mother filed
a lawsuit in British court arguing
that such sharing of evidence
would be illegal, which has indefi-
nitely delayed the transfer, and
the issue has been mired in that
litigation. In March, the British
Supreme Court sided with her on a
preliminary basis and blocked the
government from sharing the evi-
dence and providing assistance in
the case, although the litigation
continues.
The court order means that the
British government is for now
prevented from transferring the
evidence to the United States, not-
withstanding its changed stance
on the death penalty. But in a
statement, a representative for
the home secretary, Priti Patel,
suggested a cautious embrace of
the development.
The British government’s “pri-
ority has always been to protect
national security and to deliver
gress in pushing through $8.1 bil-
lion of weapons to the two nations.
Administration officials are dis-
cussing whether to end an impor-
tant part of the congressional noti-
fication process in future sales.
In Yemen, the Emirati military,
which is far better trained than
that of Saudi Arabia, has with-
drawn most of its forces. But the
Emirates has deployed warplanes
in the Libyan war, where many ci-
vilians have been killed.
White House officials aim to
shepherd a peace agreement be-
tween Israel and other Arab na-
tions that is similar to the one
reached last week. But there are
Potentially altering
the military balance
in the Middle East.
great obstacles with Saudi Arabia,
and Crown Prince Mohammed bin
Salman and other officials there
would need more robust incen-
tives, say diplomats and experts
on the region. Sales of significant
arms packages to the Emirates
could help prod the Saudis in that
direction, they say, since Riyadh
also wants to buy advanced Amer-
ican weapons.
The proposed sale of armed
drones to the Emirates would al-
most certainly create anxieties
among Israeli officials and U.S.
lawmakers. The Emiratis are try-
ing to buy models of the Predator,
made by General Atomics. Law-
Alexanda Kotey, far left, and El Shafee Elsheikh, Britons being
held by the U.S. military in Iraq, were part of an ISIS cell that tor-
tured and beheaded detainees. Attorney General William P.
Barr, above, is seeking evidence against them from Britain.
justice for the victims and their
families,” the statement said. “We
continue to work closely with in-
ternational partners to ensure
that those who have committed
crimes in the name of Daesh” —
another name for the Islamic
State — “are brought to justice.”
Mr. Barr’s two-month deadline
and his threat to transfer the men
to the Iraqi judicial system will
now pose a test for not just the
British government, but also its
independent judiciary. The Iraqi
option carries several risks that
have previously made American
officials see it as unacceptable.
Iraqi courts frequently impose
death sentences on Islamic State
suspects after trials that last only
a few minutes, raising objections
about both human rights and fail-
ure to take advantage of an oppor-
tunity to develop and bring out ev-
idence about what really hap-
pened with atrocities. In addition,
an Iraqi judge could rule that he
has no jurisdiction over the men,
as it is not clear that they ever vol-
untarily set foot on Iraqi soil, in
which case they could be released.
The renewed push to resolve
the fate of the two men, according
to American officials, stems from
growing impatience by the Penta-
gon, which does not like the head-
ache of holding them in long-term
indefinite detention at a base in
makers have put a hold on one
package. But there is a more pow-
erful drone model, the Reaper,
that the Emiratis also seek to buy,
and that is part of the White
House’s proposed arms sale deal
with the F-35s, made by Lockheed
Martin.
Until now, the U.S. government
had held back from selling that
category of armed drone to other
nations because of a ban in the
Missile Technology Control Re-
gime, a decades-old arms control
pact among 35 nations. But on
July 24, the Trump administration
announced it would issue sales li-
censes for those drones and by-
pass the relevant parts of the
arms control agreement. Demo-
cratic lawmakers and some arms
control experts said the move was
reckless and could lead to prolifer-
ation of the lethal drone technol-
ogy.
On Tuesday, an Israeli newspa-
per, Yediot Ahronot, reported that
the Trump administration had se-
cretly agreed to a sale of F-35s and
drones to the Emirates as part of
the Emirati peace agreement with
Israel.
In response, Mr. Netanyahu’s
office issued an unusually de-
tailed statement listing govern-
ment efforts over the summer to
convey to Washington its opposi-
tion to the sale of F35s to any
country in the region. “The peace
agreement with the United Arab
Emirates does not include any ref-
erence to arms sales, and the U.S.
has made it clear that it will al-
ways take strict care to maintain
Israel’s qualitative edge,” the
statement said.
But it did not explicitly deny the
N A11
ANNA MONEYMAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Iraq. The United States took cus-
tody of them in October after
President Trump gave Turkey a
green light to attack America’s
Kurdish allies along the Turkish-
Syrian border, raising concerns
about the stability of their deten-
tion.
Last month, the National Secu-
rity Council convened an inter-
agency meeting at the White
House to revisit options that had
previously been rejected, includ-
ing transferring the men to Iraqi
custody, taking them to Guantá-
namo, trying to prosecute them
without the British-held evidence
and taking the death penalty off
the table to gain that evidence.
The meeting was scheduled
shortly after the four families pub-
lished a column in The Washing-
ton Post reiterating their call for
the Justice Department to find a
way to move forward with pros-
ecuting the men. They expressed
worries that the detainees could
escape justice while restating
their opposition to continuing to
hold them in long-term detention
without trial.
“We implore the Trump admin-
istration: Please, for the sake of
truth, for the sake of justice, order
these Islamic State suspects
transferred to the United States to
face trial,” they wrote.
WILSON RING/ASSOCIATED PRESS
United States had decided to sell
F-35s to the Emiratis outside the
normalization agreement.
The weapons issue injected a
sour note into Israeli celebrations
over the diplomatic deal, com-
pounded by statements by the Is-
raeli defense and foreign min-
isters, Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition
partners and political rivals, that
they had been left in the dark.
Mr. Netanyahu’s office said the
defense minister, Benny Gantz, a
former chief of staff, had been told
in late July of communications
with American officials opposing
the sale of F-35s.
But Mr. Gantz responded an-
grily to the reports of a secret
arms deal, saying in a news con-
ference on Tuesday that he had
not been informed of the normal-
ization agreement in advance and
that “it is forbidden to take securi-
ty risks.”
“The F-35 is the most advanced
plane in the world,” he added. “It’s
not good for Israel to have it going
around in other places.”
Some Israeli analysts said citi-
zens were wary of trusting Mr. Ne-
tanyahu on the issue because of
revelations last year that the
prime minister had secretly
greenlighted the sale of German
submarines to Egypt, reversing a
yearslong policy opposing such a
sale.
A senior Israeli air force officer
said that if a future Emirati gov-
ernment became hostile to Israel
and deployed F-35s against it, the
capabilities of the jets would im-
pair Israel’s ability to operate
freely in the Persian Gulf — which
Israel sees as a critical need be-
cause of the threat from Iran.
A12 N THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
U.S. Returning to U.N. to Urge Restoring Iran Sanctions Under Nuclear Deal
By LARA JAKES
WASHINGTON — The Trump
administration will formally de-
mand on Thursday that the
United Nations punish Iran with
bruising sanctions for violating an
agreement to limit its nuclear pro-
gram — a deal from which the
United States withdrew two years
ago.
The push sets up a new con-
frontation at the Security Council,
where European allies are resist-
ing the so-called snapback sanc-
tions in a last-ditch attempt to hold
together the fraying 2015 accord.
“It’s a snap back. Not uncom-
mon,” President Trump told re-
porters on Wednesday evening in
Washington. He said he had di-
rected Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo to inform the Security
Council that nearly all of the
President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko voting in Minsk on Aug. 9.
E.U. Rejects Belarus Vote
But Vows Not to Intervene
By STEVEN ERLANGER
BRUSSELS — European Union
leaders said on Wednesday that
they would not recognize the re-
sults of the recent Belarus elec-
tion and would shortly impose
sanctions on those who were in-
volved in electoral fraud and the
repression of protests.
While urging peaceful dialogue
between the government and the
opposition, the Europeans did not
call explicitly for a rerun of the
vote, as the opposition has de-
manded, but did offer to “accom-
pany a peaceful transition of
power in Belarus.”
“The E.U. will impose shortly
sanctions on a substantial number
of individuals responsible for vio-
lence, repression and election
fraud,” said Charles Michel, presi-
dent of the European Council,
which represents the leaders of
the European Union countries, at
the end of an meeting to discuss
the Aug. 9 elections in Belarus,
widely regarded as fraudulent.
While stating that Europe
“stands by the people of Belarus,’’
Mr. Michel said that any resolu-
tion of the crisis “must be found in
Belarus, not in Brussels or in Mos-
cow,” in a dialogue that might be
initiated under the auspices of the
Organization for Security and Co-
operation in Europe, to which both
Russia and Belarus belong.
Ursula von der Leyen, the presi-
dent of the European Commis-
sion, the executive arm of the Eu-
ropean Union, said, “We support
the Belarusian people in the path
Melissa Eddy contributed report-
ing from Berlin, and Anton
Troianovski from Moscow.
Leaders of Mali Coup Cite Patronage and ‘Bad Governance’
This article is by Ruth Maclean,
Cheick Amadou Diouara and Elian
Peltier.
DAKAR, Senegal — The plot-
ters behind the coup that toppled
the leaders of the West African na-
tion of Mali vowed on Wednesday
to hold new elections as they de-
fended the arrest and forced resig-
nation of the country’s democrat-
ically elected president.
In an address to the nation early
Wednesday morning, a spokes-
man for the coup plotters asked
the many foreign forces that have
been trying to stabilize the insecu-
rity-wracked country for years —
including United Nations peace-
keepers and thousands of French
soldiers — to continue supporting
Mali.
The plotters said the arrests of
the president, Ibrahim Boubacar
Keïta, and the prime minister,
Boubou Cissé, on Tuesday night
were justified by years of bad gov-
ernance, corruption, nepotism
and a deteriorating security situa-
tion.
“Political patronage, the family
management of state affairs, have
ended up killing any opportunity
for development in what little re-
mains of this beautiful country,”
said the spokesman, Ismaël
Wague, reading into a microphone
from a sheaf of papers. He made
the remarks while flanked by his
fellow coup leaders, all military
Ruth Maclean reported from Da-
kar, Cheick Amadou Diouara from
Gao, Mali, and Elian Peltier from
London.
United Nations sanctions against
Iran that were lifted as part of the
nuclear deal would be restored.
But diplomats in Europe, China
and Russia — the other powers
that brokered the deal during the
Obama administration — have
questioned the legality of the de-
mand because the United States is
no longer part of the nuclear
agreement.
Mr. Pompeo, who is set to make
the administration’s case on
Thursday and Friday at the U.N.,
noted earlier Wednesday that the
nuclear accord was rooted in a Se-
curity Council resolution. As such,
he said, Iran’s violations must be
punished as they would under any
other international commitment
that is backed by the world body.
“We have every expectation
that every country in the world
SERGEI GRITS/ASSOCIATED PRESS
they choose to go down.” She said
that the commission would “re-
purpose” $63 million in assistance
away from the Belarusian govern-
ment, with $2.4 million going to
victims of the violence, $1.2 mil-
lion to “civil society and independ-
ent media” and the rest to the fight
against the coronavirus.
Speaking afterward in Berlin,
Chancellor Angela Merkel of Ger-
many said that she did not see an
immediate possibility for media-
tion to resolve the situation in Be-
larus. She telephoned the embat-
tled Belarusian leader, Aleksandr
G. Lukashenko, but he refused to
speak to her, she said. “Mediation
can only take place when all par-
ties are in contact with one an-
other,” Ms. Merkel told reporters.
Germany currently holds the
revolving presidency of the Euro-
pean Union, and she had been in-
strumental in talks about Ukraine
following the Russian interven-
tion there in 2014. Unlike in
Ukraine then, protesters in Bela-
rus are not displaying the Euro-
pean Union’s starred blue flag, but
the red-and-white banner that Be-
larus used before Mr. Lukashenko
changed it.
Ms. Merkel also said that, in a
conversation on Tuesday, she had
“made very clear” to President
Vladimir V. Putin of Russia that
military intervention would fur-
ther complicate the situation. “Be-
larus must be able to determine its
own path,” she said.
As the European leaders con-
ferred by teleconference, the riot
police were reappearing on the
streets of Minsk, the capital of Be-
larus. In a meeting with his securi-
ty council, Mr. Lukashenko or-
dered his police commanders to
men, in uniforms and berets.
“Mismanagement, theft and bad
governance have become
virtues.”
But the coup — which resulted
in the deaths of four people, the
hospital union said — has drawn
wide condemnation from a broad
array of nations and international
bodies, including the African Un-
ion, Ecowas (the regional group of
West African countries), the
United States, France and the
United Nations, among others.
Secretary of State Mike Pom-
peo said in a statement on
Wednesday, “The United States
calls on all political and military
actors to work toward a restora-
tion of constitutional govern-
ment.”
The French foreign minister
called for Mr. Keïta to be freed, but
said France would stick to its two
priorities in the country: guarding
the interests of the Malian people
and fighting against terrorism.
Five colonels appeared in the
broadcast, led by Colonel Assimi
Goita, but the group, which has
christened itself the National
Commission for the People’s Sal-
vation, is also led by a general, ac-
cording to Boubacar Sangaré, a
journalist and analyst in Bamako.
“We hear that Gen. Cheick Fanta
Mady Dembele prefers to stay in
the shadows for the moment, be-
cause he risks accusations of be-
ing backed by France,” Mr. San-
garé said, adding that the general
had been trained in France and
had worked at the African Union.
The president’s downfall came
will live up to its obligations,” Mr.
Pompeo said when asked about
doubts that other global powers
on the Security Council would
agree to reimpose sanctions on
Iran’s financial institutions and in-
dustries.
The Trump administration had
for months warned that it would
seek to trigger the U.N. sanctions
if an arms embargo against Iran
was allowed to expire in October,
as scheduled under the nuclear
deal. The U.S. plan to extend the
embargo was decisively defeated
in a Security Council vote last
week, marking an embarrassing
diplomatic rebuke to Washington.
The 2015 nuclear agreement
sought to limit Iran’s nuclear pro-
gram and start bringing the coun-
try out of economic and diplomat-
ic isolation. Tehran had abided by
the terms of the deal for more than
A protest in Minsk on Tuesday of the presidential election. On Wednesday, Mr. Lukashenko ordered that protests be suppressed.
put down protests, signaling a
possible escalation after a week
and a half of mass demonstrations
against his rule.
“There should no longer be any
disorder in Minsk of any kind,” Mr.
Lukashenko said in remarks re-
ported by the official Belarusian
news agency Belta. “People are
tired,” he added. “People demand
peace and quiet.”
The police had been virtually
absent from the streets of Minsk
for several days after a violent
crackdown on protesters last
week provoked a popular back-
lash against Mr. Lukashenko. But
by evening on Wednesday, police
vans had rolled onto Minsk’s main
avenue, which was blocked to pre-
vent the protesters from ap-
proaching the main security serv-
ice, still called the K.G.B in Bela-
rus, and the Interior Ministry.
There were no reports of police
violence against the protesters,
but the new show of force ap-
peared to scare some people off
the streets. Police officers in full
gear dispersed a crowd of pro-
testers who came to support
workers at the Minsk Tractor
Works factory. At least two people
were detained.
In a video message to the Euro-
pean Council before the meeting,
the opposition leader Svetlana
Tikhanovskaya, now in Lithuania,
called on Europe to support “the
after the military mutinied on
Tuesday, arresting ministers as
well as the president. Soldiers cel-
ebrated with crowds of young peo-
ple who descended onto Bamako’s
streets.
The coup happened after more
than two months of protests led by
what has been called the June 5
Movement — a coalition of poli-
ticians, civil society members and
a popular imam from Bamako,
Mahmoud Dicko. The coup lead-
ers appeared to have Mr. Dicko’s
approval. “Imam Dicko believes
After arresting a
president, pledging a
return to democracy.
that his mission has come to an
end,” read a post on the Facebook
page of Mr. Dicko’s supporters.
Cheick Oumar Sissoko, another
leader of the June 5 Movement, is-
sued a warning to the representa-
tives of Ecowas who had planned
to visit Mali and insist Mr. Keïta be
returned to office. “You think you
can ask the Malian people not to
prosecute and dismiss their high-
est elected official, when he has
clearly violated the law and the
constitution he was elected to de-
fend,” he said in an open letter.
Mr. Sissoko said Mr. Keïta was
accused of serious misconduct, in-
cluding high treason, violating the
a year after the Trump adminis-
tration withdrew from it.But last
summer, Iran began compiling
and enriching nuclear fuel beyond
the limits of the agreement,
prompting European officials this
year to formally accuse Tehran of
violating the deal.
At the same time, the other na-
tions that brokered the agreement
— Britain, China, France, Ger-
many and Russia, along with the
European Union — insist that the
United States cannot force inter-
national sanctions on an accord it
is no longer recognizing. In a
statement, the European Commi-
sion said “the U.S. is not in a posi-
tion” to invoke mechanisms re-
served for participants in the deal.
The American demand seeks to
fulfill a campaign promise by Mr.
Trump four years ago to disman-
tle the nuclear deal, which was
awakening of Belarus” and “not to
recognize these fraudulent elec-
tions.’’ She said the opposition had
named a “national coordination
council” to press for new elections
and a transfer of power, both of
which have been rejected by Mr.
Lukashenko.
The meeting on Wednesday did
not significantly alter the Euro-
pean position. European Union
foreign ministers had already
called the election results fraudu-
lent last Friday and agreed on
When Merkel tries to
mediate, Lukashenko
won’t take her call.
sanctions. The bloc has called for
the release of protesters unlaw-
fully detained. And four Central
European countries — the Czech
Republic, Hungary, Poland and
Slovakia — have jointly called for
a new presidential election.
But Europe’s ability to enforce
its demands is thin. No European
country is going to go to war over
Belarus, and there are already rel-
atively harsh sanctions in place
against both Belarus and Russia,
especially since its annexation of
constitution, deliberate assassi-
nations and perjury. “Some of you
still have our people’s respect, so
be careful not to compromise
yourself by wanting to save one of
your own at all costs,” he added.
The bodies of four people killed
by gunfire and about 15 wounded,
all likely hit by stray bullets, were
brought into one of the city’s main
hospitals, said Elhadj Djimé
Kanté, a spokesman for the hospi-
tal union. The coup leaders denied
that anyone had been killed, but
soldiers were constantly firing in
the air Tuesday, cheered on by
crowds of young people.
The former president and his
prime minister were taken to Kati
military camp in a large military
convoy. Mr. Keïta was forced to re-
sign in an appearance on state
television.
“For seven years I had the hap-
piness and the joy of trying to
straighten out this country,” Mr.
Keïta said from a curtained room,
his words muffled by a surgical
mask. “I don’t want any blood to
be shed to keep me in my posi-
tion.”
Mr. Wague said the military had
acted “to prevent the country
from sinking,” and called on the
country’s civil society to help “cre-
ate the best conditions for a civil
political transition leading to cred-
ible general elections.” This would
“lay the foundations for a new
Mali,” he said.
But skeptical voices were al-
ready emerging around the
pledges touting a new commit-
ment to democracy in Mali.
one of President Barack Obama’s
signature diplomatic achieve-
ments. Instead, the Trump admin-
istration has sought to force Iran
to negotiate a new, broader accord
that also curbs Tehran’s military
activities and support for Shiite
militias stirring unrest in the Mid-
dle East.
Without European support, it is
not clear how the United States
alone would enforce the U.N. sanc-
tions, although most global trade
is routed through American finan-
cial institutions. The new sanc-
tions would also extend the arms
embargo on Iran, overriding the
Security Council’s rejection last
week.
It is also unknown if Iran would
declare the nuclear deal defunct if
the Security Council refuses to re-
impose the sanctions. Most ana-
lysts believe that world powers
SERGEI GAPON/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
Crimea.
While eager to defend demo-
cratic values, fair elections and
the rule of law, European leaders
are also being careful not to imply
that they intend to intervene mili-
tarily or provide overt support for
the Belarusian opposition.
In Moscow, officials signaled
displeasure with the Western at-
tention to Belarus, but their sup-
port for Mr. Lukashenko was
muted. The Belarusian leader, an
authoritarian who has ruled the
country of 9.5 million people for 26
years, has long annoyed the
Kremlin with his on-and-off flirta-
tion with the West.
Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s for-
eign minister, said Western coun-
tries were meddling in Belarus as
part of their “fight for the post-So-
viet space.”
“I am not saying that the elec-
tions were ideal — of course not,”
Mr. Lavrov said in a television in-
terview Wednesday. “I would like
to recommend to everyone not to
use the difficult situation in Bela-
rus to derail a normal, mutually
respectful dialogue between the
authorities and society.”
Linas Linkevicius, the foreign
minister of Lithuania, which bor-
ders Belarus, succeeded in his ef-
fort to get Brussels to establish a
fund to help “the victims of Bela-
rusian oppression.’’ Brussels
Ismaël Wague, center, spokesman for the coup plotters, prom-
ised Wednesday in Kati, Mali, that new elections would be held.
“Either one is a democrat, or
not,” said Souleymane Touré, a 47-
year-old teacher in Bamako who
did not participate in any of the re-
cent protests. “A coup d’état is
never the solution, because there
is never a good coup. The only
way to change power has to be
through the ballot box.”
But Aïda N’diaye, a 21-year-old
medical student, said she thought
the coup was probably necessary.
“This country was in a state of
total paralysis,” she said by phone
on Wednesday. “You couldn’t be
sure of security, health, food secu-
rity, education or justice. I hope
that this overthrow will bring us a
new regime that can guarantee
these basic rights.”
The Malian military has a
record of killing and torturing ci-
vilians.
“The military should reflect on
and Iran alike are trying to delay
action until after American elec-
tions in November to see if Mr.
Trump remains in office or
whether a new course would be
charted by the Democratic nomi-
nee, Joseph R. Biden Jr.
Senator Chris Van Hollen, Dem-
ocrat of Maryland, hinted at that
strategy on Wednesday morning
during a forum hosted by the Eu-
ropean Union’s diplomatic mis-
sions in Washington.
Noting the “successful effort”
that brought Iran to the negotiat-
ing table during the Obama ad-
ministration, Mr. Van Hollen said
sanctions “can more effectively
bring pressure to achieve our
goals if we do them in a coordi-
nated and united way — the E.U.
and the United States using our
economic leverage.”
could also build on existing efforts
by nongovernmental organiza-
tions to help Belarusian civil soci-
ety and the political opposition,
both within and outside the coun-
try, much as the West quietly
helped the Solidarity movement
in Poland in the 1980s.
The bloc already has tough
sanctions in place against Bela-
rus, including an arms embargo, a
ban on the export of goods for in-
ternal repression, an asset freeze
and a travel ban against four peo-
ple listed in connection with the
unresolved disappearances of two
opposition politicians some 20
years ago.
The West should be particularly
careful not to offer the opposition
any kind of security guarantee,
said Ian Lesser, director of the
Brussels office of the German
Marshall Fund. “The region is
acutely aware of the West being
unable to deliver on implicit and
sometimes explicit commitments
of support going back to World
War II,” he said, including the
Russia-Georgia war of 2008.
At the same time, Mr. Lesser
said, the West can provide finan-
cial and practical support to oppo-
sition actors, many of whom have
already left or been forced to leave
Belarus. As the role of social me-
dia has become more obvious,
“that kind of support can be ex-
tremely meaningful,’’ he said.
AROUNA SISSOKO/ASSOCIATED PRESS
their own part in the crisis,” said
Corinne Dufka, West Africa direc-
tor at Human Rights Watch. “No-
tably, their failure to adequately
protect civilians, rein in murder-
ous militias and hold to account
solders involved in a growing
number of abuses.”
Bamako’s Independence
Square, which had been the scene
of jubilation as the military drove
their captives through it on Tues-
day, emptied out overnight. And
by Wednesday morning it was
crowded with typical, hooting traf-
fic, although many banks and
businesses were closed.
The soldiers announced a night-
time curfew and closed the coun-
try’s borders from the inside,
while Ecowas, the West African
regional organization, closed
them from the outside and said
sanctions should be imposed.

The police detaining a group of people who had gathered in a Caracas street on July 31, under the umbrella of a nationwide campaign seeking to enforce quarantine measures.
In Venezuela Alone, ‘Having Covid Is a Crime’
Maduro Deploys His Security Forces in a Harsh Coronavirus Crackdown
This article is by Anatoly Kurmanaev,
Isayen Herrera and Sheyla Urdaneta.
CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuelan
officials are denouncing people who may
have come into contact with the coro-
navirus as “bioterrorists” and urging
their neighbors to report them. The gov-
ernment is detaining and intimidating
doctors and experts who question the
president’s policies on the virus.
And it is corralling thousands of Vene-
zuelans who are streaming home after
losing jobs abroad, holding them in
makeshift containment centers out of
fear that they may be infected.
President Nicolás Maduro has tackled
the coronavirus much as he has any in-
ternal threat to his rule: by deploying his
repressive security apparatus against it.
In commandeered hotels, disused
schools and cordoned-off bus stations,
Venezuelans returning home from other
countries in Latin America are being
forced into crowded rooms with limited
food, water or masks. And they are being
held under military guard for weeks or
months for coronavirus tests or treat-
ment with unproven medications, ac-
cording to interviews with the detainees,
videos they have taken on their cell-
phones, and government documents.
“They told us we’re contaminated,
that we’re guilty of infecting the country,”
said Javier Aristizabal, a nurse from the
capital, Caracas, who said he spent 70
days in centers after he returned from
Colombia in March.
In one major city, San Cristóbal, gov-
erning party activists are marking the
homes of families suspected of having
the virus with plaques and threatening
them with detention, residents said. In
another city, Maracaibo, the police are
patrolling the streets in search of Vene-
zuelans who re-entered the country
without official approval. Local opposi-
tion politicians whose constituencies
register an outbreak say they are threat-
ened with prosecution.
“This is the only country in the world
where having Covid is a crime,” said Ser-
gio Hidalgo, a Venezuelan opposition ac-
tivist who said he had come down with
symptoms of the disease, only to find po-
lice officers at his door and government
officials accusing him of infecting the
community.
As the pandemic tore through neigh-
boring countries, overwhelming health
care networks far more prepared than
Venezuela’s collapsed system, Mr. Madu-
ro took a hard-line approach, treating the
coronavirus as a national security threat
that could destabilize his bankrupt na-
tion and jeopardize his grip on power.
“The pandemic clearly presents a
threat to the government because it
shows the precariousness of its re-
sources,” said John Magdaleno, a Vene-
zuelan political scientist in Caracas.
“The priority is not dealing with the pan-
demic. It is short-term political survival.”
In his seven years in power, Mr. Madu-
ro has overseen the collapse of Venezue-
la’s health care system, the destruction
of the national economy, and a marked
increase in the country’s international
isolation.
With dwindling resources to prepare
the nation’s broken hospitals or help its
already impoverished population sur-
Anatoly Kurmanaev and Isayen Herrera
reported from Caracas, and Sheyla Ur-
daneta from Maracaibo, Venezuela. Lore-
na Bornacelly contributed reporting from
San Cristóbal, Venezuela.
THE NEW YORK TIMES INTERNATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
‘They told us we’re contaminated,
that we’re guilty of infecting the country.’
JAVIER ARISTIZABAL, above, a nurse from Caracas,
who said he spent 70 days in detention centers.
vive the crisis, Mr. Maduro has turned to mine. But with 20 top officials reporting
bare-bones detention facilities, repres- that they had tested positive and some
sion and coercion to try to stop the virus doctors warning that their hospitals
from overwhelming the country, political were near capacity, the situation may be
analysts said. far worse than the official tally of 288
The government’s heavy-handed ap- deaths in a country of about 30 million
proach may be keeping more people at people suggests.
home and slowing the virus’s spread, but Doctors and journalists who have
it is also discouraging those who may be questioned official statistics say they
sick from seeking help. That, in turn, is have been threatened. At least 12 Vene-
making the pandemic even harder to zuelan doctors and nurses have been de-
fight, doctors in Venezuela said. tained for making public comments on
“When people feel sick, they think the coronavirus, according to medical
they have a legal or a police problem, as if unions.
they were delinquents,” said Julio Cas- Venezuelan migrants who return
tro, a Venezuelan doctor who advises the home after losing their jobs abroad in the
opposition-controlled Congress on wake of the pandemic are particularly
health care. “So they prefer to hide.” targeted. According to the Colombian
The true scope of the pandemic in Ven- government, about 95,000 Venezuelans
ezuela, which years ago stopped releas- have crossed back into their home coun-
ing health statistics as basic as infant try since March, and 42,000 are waiting
mortality, is nearly impossible to deter- their turn along the border.
Passers-by may be detained for a couple of hours and lectured on the importance of abiding by the quarantine.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ADRIANA LOUREIRO FERNANDEZ FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Only 1,200 are allowed to return each
week through the main border crossing,
under Venezuelan government guide-
lines, forcing others to wait for months in
makeshift camps. Those who use illegal
trails to cross the porous land border are
publicly labeled threats.
On Twitter, the armed forces of Vene-
zuela urged the population to report so-
called bioterrorists, referring to Vene-
zuelans who had evaded government
border controls and returned home.
The Times interviewed seven Vene-
zuelans who were held in containment
centers. Several said they had been
crammed into rooms without beds, hot
food, windows or sufficient drinking wa-
ter. “You couldn’t ask anyone for help, be-
cause the only thing you got was abuse,”
said Mr. Aristizabal, the nurse, who was
shuttled among several centers after he
returned from visiting his mother in Co-
lombia.
Some said that they had been detained
with babies just a year old, with no spe-
cial provisions made for the children.
Others said that they had been obliged to
take the medications outlined in Vene-
zuela’s official protocol for treating any-
one who has, or is suspected of having,
the coronavirus, even without showing
any symptoms.
The drugs listed in the government
guidelines are unproven for treating the
coronavirus, and could have dangerous
consequences. The treatments include
hydroxychloroquine, which the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration has
warned can cause dangerous heart
rhythm abnormalities in coronavirus pa-
tients, and an anti-parasite drug called
ivermectin, which the World Health Or-
ganization said should not be used to
treat the illness.
Videos taken by Venezuelans in con-
finement centers showed unsanitary
conditions. Several people said they
were not getting treatment for pre-exist-
ing conditions, were given a single mask
for their stay and were unable to practice
social distancing. But the worst part,
N A13
they said, was that they had no idea of
how long they would be held.
In one video published by an opposi-
tion lawmaker, five older men and wom-
en wrapped in dirty blankets are shown
crammed into a small, windowless room
with dilapidated chairs and one bunk bed
without mattresses in what they said
was a government-run first-aid station in
Caracas. “Please take me out of here,”
said one visibly distraught man. “I’m dy-
ing here. I feel worse every day.”
Mr. Maduro’s crackdown on returning
Venezuelan migrants contrasts with the
freedom enjoyed by the country’s gov-
erning elite, who are weathering the
lockdown on closed Caribbean islands, in
hillside mansions and in lavish, invi-
tation-only restaurants. Top party offi-
cials who contract the coronavirus seek
treatment in private clinics or at Cara-
cas’s reliable military hospital. For a few
thousand dollars, wealthy returning
travelers can skip the mandatory quar-
antine and go straight home.
Mr. Maduro claims that his rapid re-
sponse — he locked down the country on
March 17, right after the first two coro-
navirus cases were confirmed — has pre-
vented the devastation endured by
nearby countries. Officially, Venezuela
boasts one of the region’s lowest infec-
tion rates. Five months after the virus
was detected, the number of daily
deaths, according to the government,
has never surpassed 12. “You’re given
care that’s unique in the world, humane
care, loving, Christian,” Mr. Maduro said
in a national address on Aug. 14.
But health experts say the low official
figures are the result of extremely low
testing rates. Accurate coronavirus tests
are scarce and take weeks to process in
one of the two laboratories approved by
the government, according to eight doc-
tors in three Venezuelan states inter-
viewed for this article. The doctors did
not want to reveal their names for fear of
government persecution. Most patients
with Covid-19 symptoms are never
tested or die before they receive their re-
sults, so they are never included in the
official statistics, the doctors said.
In the western state of Zulia, the gov-
ernment said 70 people had died from
Covid-19 by the second week of August.
But a group of doctors who track mortal-
ity there said that in a single hospital —
Zulia’s largest — 294 patients had died
with Covid symptoms by then.
Days before Venezuela confirmed its
first coronavirus case, the governor of
Zulia, Omar Prieto, said in a public ad-
dress that he ordered military counterin-
telligence to question a prominent doctor
for alerting about potential infections.
“This is an issue of national security and
this man has to be investigated,” Mr. Pri-
eto said about the doctor, Freddy Pa-
chano.
Zulia’s capital, Maracaibo, has since
become the epicenter of Venezuela’s
pandemic.
One crematory in Maracaibo went
from processing its usual average of five
bodies a day to 20 bodies by June, before
its oven broke from overwork, according
to the facility’s manager, who spoke on
the condition of anonymity for fear of re-
prisal.
Mr. Prieto, the governor, tested pos-
itive for the coronavirus but recovered at
a private clinic. Dr. Pachano, who tried to
sound the alert about the impending cri-
sis, has fled to Colombia. “It’s not possi-
ble to take adequate measures to fight
the disease if you don’t really know what
is happening,” he said.
A14
N
Ferraro to Palin to Harris: What Has, and Hasn’t, Changed
By AMANDA HESS
When Geraldine Ferraro was picked
to run on Walter Mondale’s presidential
ticket, in 1984, the news media did not
know quite what to do with her. The
political press experienced a female
vice-presidential candidate as a kind of
processing error. Journalists expressed
suspicion of Ms. Ferraro’s use of her
maiden name and confusion about how
she would take care of her children.
“What does the inside of her house
look like?” one reporter wanted to
know. Image consultants advised her to
“dress like a woman”
POLITICAL and “choose natural
MEMO fabrics instead of syn-
thetics.” NBC’s Tom
Brokaw, broadcasting
from the floor of the Democratic Na-
tional Convention, reported: “Geraldine
Ferraro, for the record — and this is not
a sexist remark — is a size 6!”
When Ms. Ferraro took the stage at
the convention to formally accept the
nomination, she did not say much about
being a woman, a wife, a mother or a
wearer of natural fabrics. Instead, she
fashioned her gender into a metaphor,
floating it as a symbol of broader
change, progress and the realization of
the American dream.
“By choosing a woman to run for our
nation’s second highest office, you send
a powerful signal to all Americans:
There are no doors we cannot unlock,”
she said. “If we can do this, we can do
anything.” Or as Mr. Mondale put it,
“When we speak of the future, the
message is Geraldine Ferraro.” In the
wake of the 1984 campaign, this regis-
tered not just as a rhetorical flourish
but a premonition. The Ferraro pick
“may lead to the vice-presidential spot
being ‘the woman’s spot,’ ” Lee Atwater,
a Reagan strategist, said. Senator Lloyd
Bentsen of Texas wondered that year
whether he would be the “last white
Anglo-Saxon male to be considered for
the vice presidency.”
Not exactly. Wednesday, Senator
Kamala Harris was set to become just
the third woman, and the first woman
of color, to be nominated for the vice
presidency on a major party ticket.
Since Ms. Ferraro’s run, Hillary Clinton
broke a higher barrier, becoming the
Democratic nominee for president, and
a historic number of women ran for
president this year, including Ms. Har-
ris. Still, the expectations and fears
around this moment have been tum-
bling around the American psyche for
more than 35 years. The identity of a
vice-presidential candidate is, research
suggests, unlikely to swing voters, but
that has not dampened its force as a
media narrative, a historical event, a
television spectacle and an assessment
of America’s relationship to gender and
power — one that culminates in the
candidate’s formal acceptance speech,
which Ms. Harris was scheduled to
deliver from Wilmington, Del.
The speech is an intensely stage-
managed feat of party political messag-
ing, and when a woman delivers it, her
gender is mined for its full meta-
phorical weight. Ms. Ferraro, a con-
gresswoman from Queens who took the
stage as a brass band blasted “New
York, New York,” fused her persona
with the American project, framing
herself as the “daughter of working
Americans” and “the daughter of an
immigrant from Italy.” At the 2008
Republican National Convention, Sena-
tor John McCain’s running mate, the
Alaskan governor, Sarah Palin, ap-
peared before a kind of screen saver
montage of Americana — golden light
dappling Mount Rushmore, sun setting
behind a Ferris wheel — as she lever-
aged her gender to position herself as
the ultimate political outsider, rebuking
“the Washington elite” that had waved
aside her candidacy with a markedly
sexist tone. (Both speeches were
steered by male speechwriters.)
The vice-presidential pick lifts a
mirror to the would-be president. She
heightens the candidate’s deficiencies
while also assuring the public that he is
self-aware enough to correct for them.
When Mr. Mondale tapped Ms. Ferraro,
she was judged the most interesting
thing about him: “He’s not Ronald
Reagan and he picked Geraldine Fer-
raro,” Alan Baron, a Democratic ana-
lyst, said. When he was working as a
political adviser, Tim Russert cast her
as a kind of personality infusion: “a
new chemistry, a new passion, a new
emotion that cannot be measured by
any popularity polls.” In 2008, Ms. Palin
was hailed as a “bold choice,” the hu-
man projection of Mr. McCain’s self-
styled “maverick” streak.
During the Democratic primaries,
Joseph R. Biden Jr., vying against a
number of female candidates, anticipat-
ed criticisms of his own candidacy by
pledging to appoint a woman as his
Kitty Bennett contributed research.
Election 2020
D EM OC R AT IC NAT IONAL C ONVENT ION
When Walter Mondale selected Geraldine Ferraro to be his running mate in 1984, she was judged as the most interesting thing about him.
Thursday running mate without specifying which
one. He has since framed his selection
Speakers
of Ms. Harris as a confirmation of his
own secure masculinity, yet another
opportunity to draw a contrast with
President Trump. “Is it any surprise,”
Mr. Biden said as he formally welcomed
Ms. Harris to the ticket, “Donald Trump
has a problem with a strong woman?”
A woman as vice president presents
Cory Booker
a rhetorical shortcut for hope and
New Jersey senator
change, but as the ticket’s second-in-
Presidential candidate in 2020
line, she represents a measured and
Chris Coons incremental form of progress. She is
forever waiting in the wings to secure
Delaware senator
her own power. “Vice president, OK,
Ally and confidant of Mr. Biden
fine,” Barbara Walters told Ferraro in a
1984 interview. “But do you think you’re
Pete Buttigieg
equipped to be president?” This line of
Former mayor of South Bend, Ind.
thinking has grown even less subtle
First openly gay top-tier
this year; at 77, Mr. Biden would be the
presidential candidate
oldest person ever elected to the White
House. As one Trump campaign staffer
Keisha Lance Bottoms
put it to The Washington Post, “Joe
Atlanta mayor
Biden’s vice-presidential nominee will
Considered as a vice-presidential
be his political ‘living will.’ ”
candidate
According to research produced by
the Barbara Lee Family Foundation,
women are expected to execute a
highly particular personality perform-
ance to win elections. Voters want a
female candidate who projects confi-
dence but does not take herself too
seriously. They want to see her framed
Tammy Baldwin
casually in community settings, gra-
Wisconsin senator
ciously sharing credit for her successes,
Re-elected in 2018 in
not hoarding her power behind a ma-
key swing state
hogany desk.
Tammy Duckworth If she has children, she is expected to
Illinois senator explain how she will square her family
life with her public office. If she does
On shortlist of vice-presidential
not have children, she is expected to
candidates
project a maternal instinct toward
Andrew Yang
members of her extended family.
Entrepreneur
Though voters recognize that this rep-
Presidential resents a double standard not applied
candidate in 2020 to men, “they still actively participate
in perpetuating it,” the foundation has
Joseph R. Biden Jr.
found. This is the kind of gender bal-
Former vice president ancing act that, even when faithfully
Presidential nominee in 2020 executed, risks appearing stilted and
calculated, as Mrs. Clinton was often
accused of being. Mr. Trump has al-
Ms. Ferraro was photographed during the campaign carrying laundry deter-
gent out of a grocery store, a prop in the theater of public motherhood.
‘This convention gives you a very good sense of his belief that you can find common ground with everybody.’
ANITA DUNN, one of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s top strategists. Page A1
ready tried painting Ms. Harris with
the same brush, announcing her as a
“phony.”
In 1984, Ms. Ferraro broached the
subject of her family gingerly, nodding
briefly to her husband and three chil-
dren at the end of her acceptance
speech. She warned her daughters not
to let the press see them cry. Ms. Palin,
in her convention address, leaned into
her “hockey mom” image and sub-
verted the news media critique that her
motherhood could compromise her
ability to lead.
Last week, in her first public remarks
as the vice-presidential candidate, Ms.
Harris presented herself as a kind of
all-purpose maternal figure tending to
stepchildren, godchildren and nieces.
She spoke of cheering at swim meets,
cooking Sunday dinner and hugging
babies. “I’ve had a lot of titles over my
career, and vice president will be
great,” she said, “but ‘Momala’ will
always be the one that means the
most.”
While a male vice president might be
cast as a shadow president (as Dick
Cheney was to George W. Bush) or a
“BFF” (Mr. Biden to Barack Obama),
female candidates have been inter-
preted through the script of romantic
partnership. Ms. Ferraro was styled as
a kind of national wife; at one point
during the campaign, she was pho-
tographed lugging an oversized box of
laundry detergent out of a grocery
store, a prop in the theater of public
motherhood. Susan Bixler, an image
consultant, said at the time that the
double-breasted white dress and string
of pearls Ms. Ferraro wore for her
acceptance speech made her look “like
a bride starting a marriage.” (The
dress, which was acquired by the
Smithsonian Institution, has since been
reinscribed as a nod to the suffrage
movement.)
According to Michael Grant, a col-
umnist for The San Diego Union-Trib-
une, aides preparing Mr. Mondale and
Ms. Ferraro for their convention debut
worried that their presidential candi-
date might literally confuse his running
mate for his wife, Joan. “Strategists
feared that during the excitement on
the podium,” Mr. Grant wrote, “Mon-
dale would reach left reflexively and
hug his vice-presidential running mate,
and possibly kiss her before he realized
what was happening.”
In 2008, the news media framed Ms.
Palin less as a wife than as a passing
sexual spectacle. David Carr, The New
York Times media columnist, wrote
that the leering press viewed Ms. Palin
as “a calendar model for a local auto
body shop”; Marty Peretz of The New
Republic called her “pretty like a cos-
metics saleswoman at Macy’s.” When
Ms. Palin echoed Ms. Ferraro, donning
a cream jacket and pearls for her own
convention speech, the press did not
register it as a bridal display or a nod to
feminist history but as a hypocritical
expense — the jacket was Valentino —
unfitting of her folksy persona.
Even before Mr. Biden announced his
choice, a coalition of women’s groups
THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
PHOTOGRAPHS BY SARA KRULWICH/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Representing a measured
form of progress as a
ticket’s second-in-line.
set to work anticipating sexist attacks
against Ms. Harris, warning the media
against questioning her ambition and
scrutinizing her looks. But old tropes
linger, even as they are recast as femi-
nist insights into sexist political dynam-
ics. Writing in The Los Angeles Times,
Virginia Heffernan compared Mr. Bi-
den’s search for a female vice president
to the lead of “The Bachelor” audition-
ing wives: “It’s a little weird to watch
an old man set out to choose a younger
woman to take to the ultimate fantasy
suite, the White House,” she wrote.
Ms. Harris, the first Black woman on
a major party ticket, has inspired a new
level of backlash. Commentators — in
some cases following the president’s
lead — have questioned not only her
gender but also her blackness and her
Americanism. They have circulated vile
smears about her sex life. Like Ms.
Ferraro, Ms. Harris has emphasized
her experience as the daughter of
American immigrants (her father came
from Jamaica, her mother from India).
Ms. Harris’s story “is America’s story,”
Mr. Biden has said. But unlike when
Ms. Ferraro told this tale, Ms. Harris’s
story has been met with a revived
round of the racist birther conspiracy
theory first lodged against Mr. Obama.
On Fox News, Tucker Carlson flatly
refused to pronounce her name cor-
rectly. While the political establishment
has long pitched white women as sub-
ordinate political partners and sunny
symbols of moderate change, this Black
woman is positioned at the extremes:
She is either a liberal superwoman
imbued with innate moral powers or a
threatening radical bent on tearing the
country apart. In the days after her
selection, Mr. Trump called Ms. Harris
“angry,” “mad,” “horrible” and “nasty.”
In a non-pandemic election year, a
candidate’s convention debut feeds off
the energy of the crowd — the conven-
tion floor is usually filled with a curated
crew of party delegates, fashioned as
an authentic representation for the will
of the people. In 1984, the crowd pre-
empted Ms. Ferraro’s speech for sev-
eral minutes as it chanted “Gerry!”
again and again. “It was almost like a
dance, between me and these people,”
Ms. Ferraro said later. When Ms. Palin
took the stage in 2008, the audience
took her cue and turned on the media,
chanting “Shame on you!”
The embrace of the crowd instantly
lifts the candidate’s own narrative
above the din of commentary. But this
year, the coronavirus has dampened
the carnivalesque atmosphere of the
typical convention. The Democrats
have replaced it with a socially-dis-
tanced program that recalls the aes-
thetics of a telethon, with prerecorded
performances and far-flung satellite-
linked speeches delivered into silence.
Ms. Harris steps into the future alone.

Election The Democratic National Convention
In a Bittersweet Return, Clinton Goes From Bearing a Torch to Passing It
By LISA LERER
and GLENN THRUSH
Hillary Clinton, whose presi-
dential candidacy in 2016 sent Jo-
seph R. Biden Jr. to the sidelines,
spent much of the 2020 primaries
telling friends that her longtime
ally and onetime rival was the
only contender who could defeat
President Trump, according to
people close to both.
But she also saw Kamala Harris
as a possible successor of sorts, a
next-generation leader with the
toughness to build on Mrs. Clin-
ton’s legacy.
So Mrs. Clinton is, by all ac-
counts, reassured by the Biden-
Harris ticket. But her return to
center stage at the convention on
Wednesday night, four years after
becoming the first woman to win
the nomination of a major party,
was bittersweet.
Had things turned out differ-
ently, Mrs. Clinton would have
been delivering a second accept-
ance speech. Instead, she spent
the last several days putting the
finishing touches on an address
aimed at making a case for Mr. Bi-
den and Ms. Harris.
It was a familiar position for the
former secretary of state. For dec-
ades, she spoke on behalf of her
husband, Bill, then to help elect
Barack Obama. Over her many
years at the center of the Demo-
cratic Party, she campaigned for
hundreds of federal, state and lo-
cal candidates.
Yet the moment was uniquely
emotional for Mrs. Clinton and the
tens of millions who propelled her
to a popular-vote majority of
nearly three million in 2016, but a
loss in the Electoral College. It is a
reminder of a job some allies still
maintain was unfairly taken from
Mrs. Clinton, and of the wave of
feminist activism sparked by her
loss.
“For four years people have told
me, I didn’t realize how dangerous
he was, wish I could do it all over
again,” she said, speaking live
from her home in Chappaqua
wearing the same white pantsuit
in which she accepted the 2016
nomination, a nod to the informal
uniform of the women’s suffrage
movement.
“And don’t forget, Joe and Ka-
mala can win by three million
votes and still lose,” she said, ex-
horting Democrats to vote. “Take
it from me. So we need numbers so
overwhelming Trump can’t sneak
or steal his way to victory.”
Mrs. Clinton — who threw in an
“it still takes a village” for old
times’ sake — saw her return to
the spotlight as an opportunity to
harness the powerful feminist
movement that grew out of her
loss and to eject Mr. Trump from
power.
The last time Mrs. Clinton ad-
dressed a Democratic convention
was July 26, 2016, in Philadel-
phia’s hockey arena. . It was a
highlight of her campaign, say for-
mer aides, vindication for decades
of grueling work, brutal attacks
and controversy.
“I remember watching that roll
call vote and being on bated
breath knowing there would be
something that would take this
moment away from her and being
so relieved when it wasn’t,” re-
called Amanda Litman, a political
strategist who worked on Mrs.
Clinton’s campaign. “It was the
most celebratory it ever felt.”
She added, “It’s also proof pos-
itive that a very good convention
has no relevance to the outcome of
Everyone’s Teacher or Colleague:
A Partner Clothed in Familiarity
She will not use fashion as a
shield against the world. She will
not gird herself in glamour, or
arm herself with gilded Euro-
pean brand names.
VANESSA She is certainly not
a trophy sitting on
FRIEDMAN a shelf.
As the Demo-
CRITIC’S cratic Party’s ex-
NOTEBOOK
periment in remote
conventioning continued with
Day 2 on Tuesday, Jill Biden
brought the effort to present her
husband, Joseph R. Biden Jr., as
the anti-Trump in character and
conviction to a personal close,
and played her part in the
drama. After all, if he is the presi-
dential alternative, so she, too, is
the current first lady’s.
First lady is an odd role, as
many historians have pointed
out: unelected, yet also crucial to
fleshing out the humanity of a
president, and the parts of a
candidate that resonate with
voters. That’s why the spouse
gets a keynote during the con-
vention, and also why tradition-
ally so much attention is paid to
what she wears: why, for exam-
ple, her clothes can end up in a
museum, and why the first lady
is sometimes treated like the first
influencer. (Why, when it comes
Watch The Times.
NYTimes.com/Video.
For Hillary Clinton, shown in November, top, her convention speech on Wednesday was a chance to harness the feminist movement
that grew out of her defeat. Joseph R. Biden Jr., left, campaigned for her in 2016. Right, Clinton supporters on election night.
the election.”
But there were danger signs,
even then.
Mrs. Clinton’s speech was pre-
ceded by a queasy moment, when
supporters of Bernie Sanders be-
gan booing as she took the stage,
to be quickly drowned out by
shouts of “Hillary!”
The scars of 2016 have not en-
tirely healed, especially when it
comes to the F.B.I.’s investigation
into her email accounts, publicly
reopened by the F.B.I. director
James B. Comey just 11 days be-
fore the election.
On Tuesday, Mrs. Clinton
posted a brief video clip of herself
blinking disdainfully in response
to a tweet by Mr. Comey that read:
“#19thAmendment is an impor-
tant anniversary but the vote is
not enough. We need more women
in office. VP and Virginia gover-
nor are good next steps.”
Mrs. Clinton’s return perform-
ance at the convention was hailed
by her many millions of support-
ers. But there were hecklers too —
led by Mr. Trump, who has tried,
without much success, to find an-
other foil who evokes comparable
vitriol among conservatives as
the former first lady.
time for a first man, his clothes
will matter, too.)
The first spouse is a key part
of the image-making.
To that end, in her convention
segment Dr. Biden stood in an
empty school hallway in Wil-
mington, Del., a nod to her aca-
demic accomplishments and
record as a teacher — a job that
aides have said she plans to
continue in the White House.
She began speaking and
strolled into the high school
No name checking in
a field where clothes
can speak volumes.
classroom where she once
taught. She talked about family
and loss, the pandemic and par-
ents, and how love — and her
husband — can put things back
together. About caring for one
another as individuals and as a
nation. At the end, her husband
popped out from the wings to
give her a kiss, and praise. It was
a moving scene, in all senses.
She wore a chalkboard-green
coatdress, buttoned down the left
side, and very little jewelry. Yet
despite praise from excited view-
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
RUTH FREMSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES
A few hours before she spoke he
issued an obligatory “Crooked
Hillary” taunt on Twitter.
Mrs. Clinton remains a divisive
figure among parts of her party,
blamed by some for the Demo-
crats’ defeat and considered by
others to be a victim of a misogy-
nistic political system.
She is trying not to be defined
by her enemies — on the right or
the left. Mrs. Clinton’s speech fo-
cused on praising Mr. Biden and
Ms. Harris as much as burying
Mr. Trump, with a forceful testi-
monial to the first woman of color
on a major party’s presidential
ticket.
She also discussed what she
sees as a connective thread be-
tween Mr. Biden, Ms. Harris and
herself — their strong mothers.
Mrs. Clinton has never forgotten
Mr. Biden’s effort to console her
over the death of her mother,
Dorothy, in 2011 at the age of 92.
Mrs. Clinton reciprocated, and
reached out to Mr. Biden after his
son Beau learned he had terminal
brain cancer in 2013.
After considering a third presi-
dential run in early 2019, Mrs.
Clinton offered private support for
Mr. Biden without endorsing him,
ers, some of whom wanted to
know where to get the look, it
had, by Wednesday morning,
gone unclaimed.
That may not seem worthy of
mention, but it is in a world
where it has become rote for
public figures to name check
their designers — see the mod-
erator of the night, Tracee Ellis
Ross, who thanked Proenza
Schouler on Instagram for her
burgundy look. And for a woman
who spent eight years adjacent
to Michelle Obama, whose every
outfit set off a frenzy, it was a
meaningful choice.
It wasn’t the most interesting
of the night. That honor has to go
to some of the individual roll call
electors, who represented not
just the nominating choices of
the 57 states and territories but
also a veritable rainbow of dress.
Floral crowns! Plaid shirts!
Scrubs! They were all there. Plus
a lot more.
Still, Dr. Biden’s look re-
inforced the folksiness that has
become part of Biden lore, and
the couple’s relatability, just as
her words underscored her hus-
band’s empathy (as the segment
about his Amtrak friends did on
Day 1). And it provided a clear
contrast with Melania Trump,
who has costumed herself for the
last three years in the glossiest
of aspirational designer names
and let them largely do the
calling the former vice president
several times to give advice and
encouragement, two Democrats
close to the situation said.
“Hillary Clinton really likes Joe
Biden, and always has,” said
Thomas R. Nides, a Biden sup-
porter who served as under secre-
tary of state for Mrs. Clinton from
2011 to 2013. “This is a real thing,
not politics. She really liked him as
a human being, and the feeling is
Urging a big turnout
so Trump can’t ‘steal
his way to victory.’
mutual.”
The two know each other very
well, a little too well, at times.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides tried to
leverage her affection for Mr. Bi-
den in their effort to overcome her
initial reluctance to accepting Mr.
Obama’s offer to become his sec-
retary of state in late 2008.
One top Clinton adviser told her
to call Mr. Biden, then the vice
speaking for her.
In her coatdress, Dr. Biden
looked comfortable and pulled
together. She looked like every-
CALLA KESSLER/THE NEW YORK TIMES
TODD HEISLER/THE NEW YORK TIMES
president-elect, to wish him a
happy birthday. It was a setup.
They had arranged for him to
pressure her to say yes.
“No,” she said. “I know today
isn’t really his birthday.”
During Mr. Obama’s first term,
Mr. Biden and Mrs. Clinton had a
standing breakfast appointment
every two weeks at the vice presi-
dent’s residence at the Naval Ob-
servatory. But the relationship
was tested in the second term
when it became apparent to Mr.
Biden that the president viewed
Mrs. Clinton as his rightful suc-
cessor.
Mr. Biden was privately furious,
and two of his top aides, Mike
Donilon and Steve Ricchetti,
drafted a memo outlining his
strengths as a candidate, arguing
that negative perceptions of Mrs.
Clinton made her a deeply vulner-
able candidate.
The death of Beau Biden in
mid-2015 effectively ended Mr. Bi-
den’s aspirations that cycle. But
he has often contended he could
have beaten Mr. Trump.
He campaigned vigorously for
Mrs. Clinton, but the bitter experi-
ence of being pushed to stand
down helped fuel his fire to run
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
one’s teacher: familiar but also a
little bossy.
The biographical video mon-
tage that preceded the speech
0N A15
again, aides said.
Mrs. Clinton is not averse to
peering in the rearview mirror ei-
ther. When a supporter recently
tweeted that she would “never for-
get” the time Rihanna, the singer
and songwriter, wore a Hillary T-
shirt, Mrs. Clinton replied, “Me
neither.”
Still, she seems to be taking the
reversal of roles in stride as she
supports Mr. Biden’s quest. She
shares his pragmatic brand of lib-
eralism and has said she is glad
Mr. Sanders dropped out of the
race without much of a fuss this
year — in sharp contrast to the
months of sniping between the
Clinton and Sanders camps four
years ago.
She is anxious that Mr. Trump
will not concede defeat if he is
beaten, and she raised the alarm
to her allies that he would try to
block voting by mail, weeks before
the current battle over the Postal
Service erupted into public view,
according to a former adviser who
communicates with her regularly.
More than anything, Mrs. Clin-
ton is embracing the role as a gen-
der trailblazer that has defined
her career, an updated version of
the never-give-up message she
delivered in the most admired ad-
dress she has ever delivered, the
“glass ceiling” speech that signi-
fied her exit from the 2008 Demo-
cratic primary.
During her last campaign, Mrs.
Clinton hoped to ride into office on
the support of such a feminist up-
rising. The fact that the move-
ment she hoped to spark grew
from her defeat marks another
twist in a career full of them.
In the Trump era, women have
mobilized behind the Democratic
Party, volunteering, donating and
running for office in record num-
bers. The support of suburban
women helped Democrats win
control of the House in 2018, flip
state legislatures and boost Mr.
Biden to the nomination.
Mrs. Clinton still possesses a
loyal constituency of female sup-
porters. As late as the fall of 2019,
Mrs. Clinton was considering a
third bid for the presidency, as no
real front-runner emerged in the
primary race.
While she cast herself as a
champion of women in politics,
she declined to endorse or even
more subtly signal a possible fe-
male heir among the diverse
group of women running for presi-
dent.
When Mrs. Clinton did speak
out, she courted controversy. A
critique of Mr. Sanders during the
launch of a documentary about
her spurred fears that she was re-
igniting divides within the party.
And her suggestion that Republi-
cans were grooming Representa-
tive Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii to be-
come a third-party spoiler helped
Ms. Gabbard extend her time in
the national spotlight.
But many of Mrs. Clinton’s long-
time supporters saw Wednesday
night’s speech as an opportunity
for her to transfer her legacy to
someone else — not to Mr. Biden
but to Ms. Harris.
“She’s passing the torch to the
Kamala Harris generation. That’s
what makes it really exciting,”
said Ms. Litman, now the execu-
tive director of Run for Some-
thing, which encourages young
Democrats to seek political office.
“It’s not just to Kamala Harris, but
to a whole generation of women
that come next, that can do so be-
cause Hillary Clinton went first.”
Jill Biden’s chalkboard-green
coatdress was also part of a
wide array of clothing on dis-
play on Tuesday, most notably
traditional accents like those
worn by delegates from the
Northern Mariana Islands.
and invited viewers into her life
had set the stage. There she was:
as a young mother, as a partner;
in mourning, in joy. There she
was, getting ready to run . . . a
marathon? Just around the
block? Both. She was wearing
leggings and an old T-shirt; the
uniform of the working-from-
home pandemic.
It created a jolt of recognition:
Oh, I know her.
A16 0 N
Election The Democratic National Convention
At every step of the way,
I’ve been guided by the
words I spoke from the
first time I stood in a
courtroom: Kamala
Harris, For the People.
KAMALA HARRIS
California senator
Vice-presidential nominee
At minimum, we should
expect a president to
feel a sense of responsi-
bility for the safety and
welfare of all 330 mil-
lion of us — regardless
of what we look like,
how we worship, who
we love, how much
money we have — or
who we voted for. But
we should also expect a
president to be the cus-
todian of this democra-
cy.
BARACK OBAMA
Former president
Kamala Harris is the
vice president we need
right now — committed
to our Constitution, bril-
liant in defending it, and
a witness to the women
of this nation that their
voices will be heard.
NANCY PELOSI
California representative
Speaker of the House
For four years, people
have told me, ‘I didn’t
realize how dangerous
he was,’ ‘I wish I could
do it all over’ or, worst, ‘I
should have voted.’
Look, this can’t be an-
other woulda coulda
shoulda election.
HILLARY CLINTON
Former secretary of state
It’s time to recognize
that child care is part of
the basic infrastructure
of this nation — it’s
infrastructure for fam-
ilies. Joe and Kamala
will make high-quality
child care affordable for
every family, make pre-
school universal, and
raise the wages for every
child care worker.
ELIZABETH WARREN
Massachusetts senator
We’re laying a road map
here for what America
can and should look like
in the 21st century.
MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM
New Mexico governor
Words once came easily,
today I struggle to
speak. But I have not
lost my voice. America
needs all of us to speak
out, even when you
have to fight to find the
words. We are at a
crossroads. We can let
the shooting continue,
or we can act. We can
protect our families, our
future. We can vote.
GABRIELLE GIFFORDS
Former Arizona representative
What unites us is far far
greater than what di-
vides us.
TONY EVERS
Wisconsin governor
Former President Barack Obama offered up a rare rebuke, mentioning his successor by name. “Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the job, because he can’t,” he said.
Harris Accepts the Nomination to Be Vice President
From Page A1
America.
Speeches by Mr. Obama, former
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton,
Senator Elizabeth Warren and
Speaker Nancy Pelosi were in-
tended to underscore the history-
making moment of Ms. Harris’s
nomination, highlighting Ms. Har-
ris’s uniquely American biogra-
phy: A child of immigrants and a
graduate of a historically Black
university, she is one of the few
women of color elected to the
United States Senate.
“We’re at an inflection point,’’
Ms. Harris said as she formally ac-
cepted the nomination for vice
president. “The constant chaos
leaves us adrift. The incompe-
tence makes us feel afraid. The
callousness makes us feel alone.
“We can do better and deserve
so much more. We must elect a
president who will bring some-
thing different, something better
and do the important work.”
Far more than the two previous
nights, which centered on testi-
monials to Mr. Biden’s character
and empathy, the program fo-
cused on policy, addressing issues
like gun violence, climate change,
affordable child care and immi-
gration. In videos, activists pro-
moted Mr. Biden’s plans to tackle
a warming planet, and survivors
of sexual assault and domestic vi-
olence reminded viewers of his
role in crafting the Violence
Against Women Act. The Ameri-
can child of a deported undocu-
mented mother begged the presi-
dent to reunite families torn apart
by his immigration policy.
In perhaps the most policy-
heavy speech of the evening, Ms.
Warren, speaking from an early
childhood learning center in her
home state of Massachusetts,
praised Mr. Biden’s “real good
plans.” She highlighted his pro-
posals to make child care more af-
fordable, to provide universal pre-
school and to raise wages for child
care workers.
Much of the evening was de-
voted to the power of women in
politics. In a week marking the
hundredth anniversary of the 19th
Amendment, which gave women
the right to vote, Ms. Pelosi and
Mrs. Clinton, two of the most influ-
ential women in politics, wore
white in their appearances, in
homage to the suffragists. In their
remarks, both anointed Mrs. Har-
ris as a successor of sorts, though
they had declined to endorse her
or any of the other five women
who sought the Democratic presi-
dential nomination.
Yet, even as Democrats cham-
pioned change, they promised to
keep fighting for policies to com-
bat sexual assault and domestic
violence and to improve access to
affordable child care. The promi-
nent airtime given to those issues
underscores the influence Demo-
cratic women have gained during
the Trump era. Women have
emerged as the backbone of the
party, shattering records for polit-
ical giving, running for office in
unprecedented numbers and
overwhelmingly voting for Demo-
crats.
The third night of the Demo-
cratic National Convention, con-
ducted virtually because of the co-
ronavirus pandemic, was a tribute
to the constituencies that have
driven the party’s rise during the
Trump administration — women,
minority voters, and young vot-
ers. While Ms. Harris was the eve-
ning’s main attraction, the pro-
gram featured remarks from sev-
eral of the most powerful women
in the party, as well as Spanish-
language speakers, victims of gun
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
Former Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, left, who delivered a plea to stop gun vio-
lence, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, right, both wore white on the centennial of the women’s vote.
violence and everyday Americans
meant to represent marginalized
slices of the electorate. Like the
previous evenings, the night com-
bined elements of an old-fash-
ioned variety show, a telethon and
a political event.
The evening opened with a sur-
prise appearance by Ms. Harris,
who welcomed the audience along
with Kerry Washington, the third
Hollywood actress to assume
M.C. duties this week.
In her acceptance speech, Ms.
Harris, 55, wove her personal
story with policies that she said
would improve the lives of all
Americans “to achieve the future
we collectively want.” Ms. Harris,
who is of Jamaican and Indian de-
scent, said her experiences would
ensure that the perspective of
people long marginalized in
America — African-Americans,
Asian-Americans, women, first-
generation residents — would
have a voice at the highest levels
of Mr. Biden’s administration.
She said she was committed to
“a vision of our nation as a beloved
community — where all are wel-
come, no matter what we look like,
where we come from, or who we
love.”
While the pandemic denied Ms.
Harris, California’s junior senator,
the typical pomp that awaits any
vice-presidential nominee — a
clamoring convention audience of
thousands — it provided her a
controlled setting to reintroduce
herself to the American people af-
ter her unsuccessful presidential
campaign. She delivered her re-
marks from Mr. Biden’s home
Hillary Clinton urged people to do whatever it takes to cast their ballots: “No matter what, vote.”
state of Delaware — rather than
from Milwaukee, where the con-
vention was initially chosen to
take place — and she introduced
by her sister and niece, both of
whom played key roles in her pri-
mary campaign, and her step-
daughter.
Though voters selected Mr. Bi-
den, the former vice president, as
their nominee over candidates
who made up the most diverse
slate ever in a presidential prima-
A more diverse lineup
of speakers, mostly
women, on Day 3.
ry race, he has often been cast as a
transitional figure, selling himself
as an elder statesman who can
stabilize a country in crisis and re-
store a sense of decency to gov-
ernment. Ms. Harris, meanwhile,
was positioned Wednesday night
to represent the diverse elector-
ate that Democrats have long
maintained will enshrine them in
power, a forward-looking comple-
ment to Mr. Biden’s steady hand.
Many Democrats have specu-
lated about the possibility of Mr.
Biden’s serving only one term if
elected, and the selection of Ms.
Harris as his running mate in-
stalls her as the leading candidate
for 2024 should he choose not to
run again.
Mrs. Clinton made the case for
DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris as a dual
package offering policy and em-
pathy, saying they could move the
country forward in areas such as
housing and health care. She
noted that Ms. Harris would face
attacks as a woman on the na-
tional ticket, but added, “I know
something about the slings and
arrows she’ll face, and believe me,
this former district attorney and
attorney general can handle them
all.”
Making an urgent plea for
Americans to turn out for this
election, Mrs. Clinton said: “This
can’t be another woulda, coulda,
shoulda election. No matter what,
vote. Vote like our lives and liveli-
hoods are on the line — because
they are.”
On Wednesday, the program of-
fered a diverse lineup of speakers,
a majority of whom were women.
Former Representative Gabrielle
Giffords of Arizona, one of the
country’s most vocal advocates
for stricter gun laws, planned to
deliver a moving plea for curbing
gun violence, according to ex-
cerpts. Other speakers were set to
address climate change, immigra-
tion and economic policy. An emo-
tional video featuring an undocu-
mented family in North Carolina
was filmed entirely in Spanish,
with English subtitles.
In a halting speech, Ms. Gif-
fords, who has struggled with
speaking since being shot in the
head at a congressional event in
2011, urged viewers to support Mr.
Biden.
“Words once came easily, but
today I struggle to speak. But I
ELIZABETH FRANTZ FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL CONVENTION
have not lost my voice,” she said in
a pretaped video. “We must elect
Joe Biden. He was there for me.
He’ll be there for you, too.”
Mr. Obama’s comments were a
departure from his first turn on
the convention stage, when he cat-
apulted to national prominence af-
ter giving the 2004 keynote ad-
dress, a soaring manifesto of hope
and national unity. On Wednesday,
his message was darker, a reflec-
tion of a country changed by crisis
and a party desperate to oust an
incumbent president. He offered a
grim warning about the durability
of American democracy.
He said the effects of the coro-
navirus crisis had made clear the
stakes of stable leadership, and he
cited the 170,000 American deaths
from the virus that Mr. Trump has
rarely acknowledged. He also al-
luded to some of Mr. Trump’s most
controversial moments, saying
his actions had eroded America’s
standing throughout the world.
Mr. Obama delivered his remarks
from the Museum of the American
Revolution in Philadelphia, in a
room with the U.S. Constitution
displayed on its walls. The subtext
was clear: The core of our democ-
racy was at stake.
“Do not let them take away your
power,” Mr. Obama said. “Do not
let them take away your democra-
cy.”
Yet Ms. Harris was the night’s
unquestioned focus, showing
signs of the political prowess that
once made her a top-tier presiden-
tial candidate. During her cam-
paign, she struggled to find a bal-
ance between the party’s progres-
sive and moderate wings, and
failed to deliver a consistent mes-
sage on policy. But on Wednesday
night, as Mr. Biden’s running
mate, the most famous faces of the
party made the case for her, in-
cluding Mrs. Clinton, the party’s
first female nominee, and Mr.
Obama, the country’s first Black
president.
While Democratic activists and
political insiders pressured Mr. Bi-
den to showcase his commitment
to diversity by selecting a Black or
Latino running mate, Democratic
voters have rarely placed the
same importance on representa-
tion, even at a moment of rapidly
changing national views on race
and gender.
During the primary race, many
Black voters expressed disen-
chantment with the idea that ra-
cial representation equated to
change, and that they should auto-
matically support a candidate
who looked like them. But with
Ms. Harris on the ballot, some
Democrats believe that turnout
among minority voters may be
higher, and that the same voters
who overlooked her as a presiden-
tial candidate will be inspired by
her as a running mate.
But for all the embrace of Ms.
Harris for symbolizing a new era
of Democratic politics, there was
little on Wednesday night to sug-
gest that her ascension would sig-
nal a break from mainstream
Democratic orthodoxy. A former
prosecutor and California attor-
ney general, she spent the prima-
ry campaign oscillating between
the party’s moderate and progres-
sive lanes, supporting ideas like
the expansive Green New Deal to
combat climate change but reject-
ing left-wing litmus tests such as
“Medicare for all” and higher
taxes for the wealthiest Ameri-
cans.
On issues such as racial equal-
ity, her proposed solutions mimic
the policies of Mr. Obama and
Mrs. Clinton, not those of the ac-
tivists who pushed the Democrat-
ic Party leftward in recent years.

Election The Democratic National Convention
Harris Faces Unusual Pressure to Bridge a Party’s Past and Future
From Page A1
“Medicare for all.”
For the time being, the party’s
desire to beat President Trump
overrides all over factors. But if
the Democrats succeed, Mr.
Trump will be gone, and the
challenge of satisfying the many
constituent parts of the Demo-
cratic Party will become only
more difficult for Ms. Harris, the
figure who is supposed to be that
bridge for generations and the
face of the party’s future.
Like every vice-presidential
candidate, Ms. Harris will be
judged in the coming weeks in a
multitude of ways: her ability as
a campaigner, and her skill at
drawing in President Trump,
debating Mike Pence and excit-
ing turnout among voters —
particularly younger voters and
progressives — who might not be
overly enthusiastic about turning
out in a pandemic to support Mr.
Biden.
But as a woman of color seek-
ing an office held only by white
men so far, she may also be
judged by some in ways that
reflect deep-seated biases that
remain strong in segments of the
country. Ms. Harris, on a night
devoted largely to women’s issue,
took this subject on directly for
her Democratic audience, and it
is probably not the last time she
will need to address it in the
months ahead.
“We must elect a president
who will bring something differ-
ent, something better, and do the
important work,” she said, speak-
ing from Wilmington. “A presi-
dent who will bring all of us
together — Black, white, Latino,
Asian, Indigenous — to achieve
the future we collectively want.
We must elect Joe Biden.”
She now faces some daunting
tests as she steps into the big-
gest spotlight of her career at a
pivotal moment for the nation
and her party.
Can Ms. Harris, a former pros-
ecutor and relatively moderate
Democrat, navigate the complex
political terrain marked by a
rapid transformation in ideology,
powered by the rise on the left,
and on the verge of a genera-
tional handoff? Given Mr. Bi-
den’s age, does the first-term
Democratic senator from Califor-
nia, whose career in public serv-
ice began 16 years ago as the San
Francisco district attorney, seem
prepared to step into the Oval
Office should that be necessary?
In her speech, Ms. Harris
spoke about the threat of the
pandemic and a president “who
turns our tragedies into a politi-
At Primary Debates and on Instagram,
A Spouse Embraces His Campaign Role
By SARAH LYALL
Douglas Emhoff was meeting a
client about a case in his Los An-
geles law office in the early 2010s
when the conversation took an un-
expected turn. Was Mr. Emhoff
single, the client wondered — and
if so, did he want to go on a blind
date with her old friend Kamala
Harris?
His first response to the
prospect of meeting Ms. Harris,
then the California attorney gen-
eral, was “She’s hot!” Mr. Emhoff
(who was indeed single) recalled
in a recent YouTube interview. His
second was to text Ms. Harris
from his seat at the Lakers game
that evening.
His third was to call her super
early the next morning and then,
in a fit of nervous ardor, leave a
rambling, self-described “lame”
voice mail message whose long-
windedness horrified him, even as
he compounded it with further
verbiage. (He had to physically
stop himself from leaving a follow-
up message disavowing the first
one. “It was like the scene in
‘Swingers’ when Jon Favreau just
keeps calling and calling,” he said
in the YouTube interview which,
in a way that seems perfectly nor-
mal in this strange campaign, was
conducted over Zoom in April by
Pete Buttigieg’s husband, Chas-
ten.)
Mr. Emhoff, and Ms. Harris,
both now 55, married in 2014 — his
second marriage, her first — and
they both love their origin story.
(She saved the voice mail mes-
sage and makes him listen to it
each year on their anniversary.)
And now Mr. Emhoff, who
emerged as a fervent professional
spouse during his wife’s thwarted
campaign for the Democratic
nomination for president, is a seri-
ous contender to be the country’s
first-ever Second Gentleman.
Only two women besides Ms.
Harris have ever been nominated
for the vice presidency from ma-
jor parties, so Mr. Emhoff finds
himself in a rarefied men’s club.
Kenneth P. Vogel contributed re-
porting.
Senator Kamala Harris may be judged by some in ways that reflect deep-seated biases that remain strong in segments of the country.
cal weapons.” She talked about
grief and “a loss of normalcy” in
the pandemic era, and pointed
out that Black, Latino and Indig-
enous people were suffering
disproportionately because of
“structural racism.”
Facing doubts from
younger, more liberal
Democratic voters.
In perhaps her most direct
callout to the Americans who
have marched against police
abuses in American cities for
months, she said, “There is no
vaccine for racism,” she said,
naming victims of police violence
like George Floyd and Breonna
Taylor.
But she spent just as much
time on the centrality of family
and friendships, and her biogra-
phy as a prosecutor defending
people and victims. “I know a
predator when I see one,” she
said.
His predecessors include John Za-
ccaro, a well-off real estate devel-
oper whose complicated financial
arrangements and reluctance to
release his tax returns tarnished
the luster of his wife, Geraldine
Ferraro, Walter F. Mondale’s run-
ning mate in the 1984 election.
And there was Todd Palin, the
rough-and-ready snowmobile-
racing “first dude” of Alaska,
whose wife, Sarah Palin, played
up her hot-marriage-to-a-macho-
guy credentials but ran a disas-
trous vice-presidential campaign
that hampered the candidacy of
Senator John McCain in 2008.
(The Palins are now divorced.)
Husbands of high-profile candi-
dates walk a tricky line, required
to exude both alpha-male inde-
pendence and second-wheel sup-
portiveness, said Lori Poloni-
Staudinger, a professor in the poli-
tics and international affairs de-
partment at Northern Arizona
University whose work focuses on
women and politics. “There’s a
fascination with women candi-
dates’ domestic lives that we don’t
see with men’s lives,” she said.
That extends to questions about
their child care arrangements,
their work-life balance — and the
balance of power in their mar-
riage.
“It goes back to our gendered
expectations of women and the
way they are supposed to be-
have,” Ms. Poloni-Staudinger con-
tinued. “They’re normally rele-
gated to the private sphere, and
when they come into the public
sphere, it’s as if they have to be
given permission. So their spouse
has to show both that he’s totally
supportive and that he isn’t emas-
culated by them.”
The Harris campaign declined
to make Mr. Emhoff available for
an interview.
But the candidate’s husband, a
partner at the law firm DLA Pipe
who specializes in media, sports
and entertainment litigation, is
certainly supportive. (He has tak-
en a leave of absence from his job,
apparently mindful about avoid-
ing any possible conflicts of inter-
est; the firm declined to com-
ment.) Throwing himself with un-
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
NEWS ANALYSIS
She would be the first Black
woman and first person of Indian
descent to serve as vice presi-
dent, and the power of such a
historically symbolic choice was
evident in the excitement that
greeted her selection and has
coursed through this convention
(albeit virtually). After a prima-
ry that was dominated by two
white men and one white wom-
an, all over 70 years old, the
election of a 55-year-old woman
of color signaled that the Demo-
cratic Party’s leadership is catch-
ing up with the demographic
changes that have swept the
country.
She has shown herself to be a
fierce debater and sharp speaker
during her short-lived campaign
for president and, even more, as
a member of the Judiciary Com-
mittee questioning William P.
Barr, the attorney general. There
is little doubt in Democratic
circles that she will live up to the
tradition of vice-presidential
candidates wielding the sword
against the other side.
“Donald Trump’s failure of
leadership has cost lives and
livelihoods,” she said. “The con-
stant chaos leaves us adrift. The
abashed enthusiasm into the
project, Mr. Emhoff has produced
a stream of social media posts fol-
lowing one basic theme: I love this
woman. “I’ve got you. As always,”
he tweeted last December, when
she dropped out of the presiden-
tial race, over a photo of Ms. Har-
ris sitting in his lap under a “Ka-
mala Harris for the People” post-
er, his arms wrapped around her
as she leaned back against him.
“I think he is having a good
time,” said Aaron H. Jacoby, an old
friend and former law partner of
Mr. Emhoff. Mr. Emhoff’s enthusi-
astic befriending of other candi-
dates’ spouses in the primaries
was consistent with his friendly,
engaging approach to making
contacts and building his law
practice, said Mr. Jacoby, now
managing partner for the Los An-
geles office of Arent Fox.
Born in Brooklyn, Mr. Emhoff
moved to California with his par-
ents when he was a teenager and
has remained there ever since.
(He says “awesome” a lot in inter-
views.) He went to California
State University, Northridge, and
got his law degree from Univer-
sity of Southern California Gould
School of Law.
Mr. Jacoby recalled when he
and Mr. Emhoff were young cor-
porate lawyers, ready to open
their new firm together in Los An-
geles. (The firm was called
Whitwell Jacoby Emhoff, and it
went on to become an arm of the
larger firm Venable.) “We had the
usual start-up needs, including
choosing art to make us look ‘im-
portant’ and serious,” he said. Mr.
Jacoby and their third partner,
Ben Whitwell, favored using the
Los Angeles County Museum
lending program to procure big-
ticket pieces, but Mr. Emhoff ar-
gued for the abstract impression-
ist work of his father, who had re-
tired and taken up amateur paint-
ing.
“Doug insisted on his dad’s
painting for our office,” Mr. Jacoby
said. “Doug won.” (The paintings
were actually very nice, Mr. Ja-
coby added.)
Mr. Emhoff supported Mr. Ja-
coby through his divorce — and
incompetence makes us feel
afraid. The callousness makes us
feel alone. It’s a lot.”
But even the toughest cam-
paign in California doesn’t ap-
proach what it’s like battling on a
national stage, particularly in a
nation as polarized as this one,
and particularly in the age of
President Trump. She has had
competitive contests in Califor-
nia, but her presidential cam-
paign collapsed early, beset by
infighting and a lack of clear
message from its candidate.
Patti Solis Doyle, who served
as a campaign manager for
Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presiden-
tial run, pointed to the surge of
contributions that followed Ms.
Harris’s announcement — $48
million in 48 hours — as a sign of
the enthusiasm she infused into
the presidential race.
“Voters, Democrats, are excit-
ed at the prospect of the first
African-American woman, the
first American Indian woman on
a national ticket,” Ms. Solis Doyle
said of Ms. Harris, who is the
daughter of immigrants from
India and Jamaica.
Mr. Kaine said Ms. Harris
could help the ticket expand its
Douglas Emhoff, a lawyer who is married to Kamala Harris, has
thrown himself wholeheartedly into supporting her career.
then Mr. Jacoby did the same
when Mr. Emhoff divorced his
first wife, Kerstin Emhoff, the co-
founder and chief executive of the
Los Angeles production company
Prettybird.
The split was unusually unran-
corous. The two share parental re-
sponsibilities of their young-adult
children, named Cole and Ella af-
ter John Coltrane and Ella
Fitzgerald, and are “very adult
about dealing with any issue that
comes up,” Mr. Jacoby said. “They
are the model couple for an amica-
ble divorce.”
Mr. Emhoff, his ex-wife, his cur-
rent wife and the children, who
call Ms. Harris “Momala,” cele-
brate Thanksgiving together. Ella
Emhoff was set to join Ms. Har-
ris’s sister and niece in officially
nominating her stepmother for
vice-president. Ms. Emhoff cam-
paigns for Ms. Harris and pro-
motes her on social media; Ms.
Harris in turn wrote “an ode” to
Ms. Emhoff for Mother’s Day, Mr.
Emhoff said.
After their initial encounters by
phone and text, Mr. Emhoff and
Ms. Harris finally met for the first
time over dinner in Los Angeles.
The next day, he sent her an email
listing “all of his available dates
for the next couple of months,” Ms.
Harris wrote.
“I’m too old to play games or
hide the ball,” the email said, man-
gling its metaphors a bit. “I really
like you.” The two decided to give
their relationship six months, af-
ter which, “if we still felt the way
we did, we would just go for it,” Mr.
DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES
generational appeal, engaging
Americans who feel it’s time for a
new guard even as some older
voters have indicated that they
are comfortable with Mr. Biden’s
centrist views and promises to
restore civility and stability to
government.
“There’s a segment of the
Democratic vote, not all of this,
but a segment that may be a
little bit older that just wants
competence and character and
kind of old-time virtues to come
back into the Oval Office,” he
said. “You also want to have
some excitement and energy.
And Kamala really brings that.”
But her bigger challenge — for
Ms. Harris as a candidate, poten-
tial vice president and future
party leader — is how she re-
sponds to the rising influence of
the left wing of the party. Mr.
Biden won the Democratic pri-
mary on his strengths with Black
voters, older voters and white
suburbanites, but younger and
more liberal voters over all were
skeptical of his center-left in-
stincts and embrace of biparti-
sanship, of which they were
reminded with the awarding of
prime speaking spots on Monday
ELIZABETH FRANTZ FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Emhoff recalled.
He proposed while they were
about to order takeout from a local
Thai restaurant. Their marriage,
at the Santa Barbara courthouse,
reflected their Indian and Jewish
heritages: She placed a flower
garland around his neck; he
stomped on a glass.
Living with Ms. Harris through
several elections — re-election as
state attorney general, election to
the Senate and now this — doesn’t
mean her new husband is inher-
ently political, per se.
“Doug is committed to Kamala,
and he is committed to Kamala’s
career,” said Alex M. Weingarten,
a longtime friend and former col-
league, whom Mr. Emhoff twice
recruited to join his law firm. “Ob-
viously, being married to someone
who has made a career and is so
passionate about these issues has
to have an impact on him. But I
wouldn’t say that marrying some-
one in politics has made him more
political, or turned him into a poli-
tician. He is the same Doug.”
The one essential quality in be-
ing a successful campaign spouse
“is wanting to be there,” Chasten
Buttigieg said in an interview.
“The thing that Doug does so well
is that he loves his wife so openly.”
Mr. Emhoff became a bona fide
political spouse during Ms. Har-
ris’s Senate race in 2016. But he
was startled by the demands
placed on him during the Demo-
cratic primaries earlier this year,
when he was thrust into events on
his own, with a microphone and no
script, “freaking out,” he told
0N A17
and Tuesday to Republicans
backing Mr. Biden.
And while Ms. Harris, as a
product of California, is more
fluent in the language of the left
than Mr. Biden, her selection did
not reassure many liberal Demo-
crats, wary of her record on
policing issues.
“She’s the choice of the party
establishment to be the stand-
ard-bearer, but she’s not the
choice of the party’s base, espe-
cially the next generation of
Democrats,” said Waleed Shahid,
a spokesman for the prominent
progressive organization Justice
Democrats.
Representative Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez of New York, one
of the most prominent leaders of
the progressive wing, never
mentioned Mr. Biden or Ms.
Harris when she spoke for 90
seconds nominating Senator
Bernie Sanders on Tuesday
night.
That dissent has been largely
submerged during this conven-
tion, testimony to the party’s
hunger to defeat Mr. Trump. But
that will change if the Democrats
win. Ms. Harris will need to
finesse this divide or risk a pri-
mary from the left should the
time come when she is the one
running for president.
Varshini Prakash, the execu-
tive director of the Sunrise
Movement, a youth-led group of
climate activists, said Ms. Har-
ris’s nomination was a historic
moment that excited Democrats
across generational and ideolog-
ical spectrums.
“Kamala Harris could repre-
sent one way in which the future
of the Democratic Party is
headed,” she said. “But the Dem-
ocratic Party has far more ideo-
logical diversity that goes be-
yond the Harris ticket.”
Ms. Harris did not appear to
any such doubts as she spoke of
following in the footsteps of
President Barack Obama, the
nation’s first Black president,
and Hillary Clinton, who sought
to become the nation’s first fe-
male president. She has been
elevated by Mr. Biden to national
stature, embraced by many in
the party, and celebrated at a
convention.
Things will surely get more
difficult in the weeks and, should
she win, the years ahead. But for
now, addressing Democrats with
a message about unity and the
future in the midst of a pan-
demic, presenting herself as a
new leader of the party to a
nation facing an unnerving fu-
ture, this was Kamala Harris’s
moment.
Clear message from
Harris’s husband: He
loves this woman.
Chasten Buttigieg.
Soon he began to relish his role.
He mentioned particularly a trip
through rural Nevada. “It was a
really incredible experience,” he
said. “For a kid who grew up in
New York and L.A. and spent
most of my life there, it really
opened my eyes.”
In an interview, Chasten
Buttigieg said that Mr. Emhoff
made a point of befriending him
during the primaries. As their
spouses battled it out onstage, Mr.
Emhoff and Mr. Buttigieg would
sit in the audience and text fire
emojis to each other.
“When you’re in the debate
arena, you’re like dance moms —
you want your kid to do the best,”
Mr. Buttigieg said. “But with the
senator and Doug,” he continued,
speaking of Ms. Harris and Mr.
Emhoff, “it was like we were on
the same team. We wanted each
other to do well.”
It is unclear what role the cam-
paign will assign to Mr. Emhoff —
it is a much bigger deal, obviously,
to be an official spouse on an offi-
cial ticket than it is to be just an-
other husband in a half-empty
high school auditorium during the
primaries — but for now he seems
content to take his cues from his
wife.
When the country went into
lockdown this spring, Mr. Emhoff
and Ms. Harris found themselves
marooned in Washington, she do-
ing her work in the Senate, he do-
ing his legal work from home.
They had never spent so much
time together.
“We’re learning about each
other during the pandemic,” Mr.
Emhoff told Chasten Buttigieg, as
their spouses joined the Zoom in-
terview.
“For example, I had to have a
conversation with my mother-in-
law about the fact that apparently
my husband was not required to
clean up his room when he was
growing up,” Ms. Harris said.
“I’m making up for lost time,”
Mr. Emhoff said.
“He’s really trainable,” his wife
replied.
A18 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Election Contention, Convention and Conspiracy
Bloomberg Has Donated Millions, but Some Say ‘He Stiffed Our Party’
By REBECCA R. RUIZ
Michael R. Bloomberg prom-
ised to spend big to defeat Presi-
dent Trump. Across a few short
months, he put a billion dollars
into his own bid for the Democrat-
ic nomination.
Now, having dropped out in
March after a skewering on the
debate stage and a lone electoral
success in American Samoa, Mr.
Bloomberg is preparing to step
back into the political spotlight on
Thursday with an address to the
Democratic National Convention.
The appearance, coming just
before Joseph R. Biden Jr. will ac-
cept the party’s nomination, has
stirred anger among some pro-
gressives as well as former
Bloomberg campaign workers —
and has reignited questions about
the multibillionaire’s pledge to
throw his fortune behind the effort
to defeat Mr. Trump.
“He stiffed our party and all the
monthly workers he promised to
keep on through November,” Amy
Siskind, a prominent progressive
activist, wrote on Twitter. “Why is
Bloomberg speaking?”
In March, Mr. Bloomberg made
a $18 million transfer to the Demo-
cratic Party and offered up the
leases to 13 field offices for the
party’s use. Within weeks of exit-
At Her 17th Convention,
She Cheers From Home
But Longs to Schmooze
By MIRIAM JORDAN
LOS ANGELES — Rosalind
Wyman has been a delegate at ev-
ery Democratic National Conven-
tion since 1952, save the one in
1968. And, at age 89, she was cer-
tain that this year would be no dif-
ferent.
Until a pandemic ruined her
streak.
This week, instead of sitting
with the California delegation in
Milwaukee, Ms. Wyman has been
hibernating in her Los Angeles
home, relegated to watching the
spectacle on TV in her den.
“It feels so lonesome when you
don’t have all the crowds and the
excitement of the convention,”
said Ms. Wyman, with audible dis-
appointment.
The streaming bunting, the
waving flags, the rousing celebra-
tion — all the familiar trappings of
what would have been a conven-
tion hall of 50,000 supporters —
have been reduced to video
speeches. Ms. Wyman cheers
from her chair, upholstered in
blue, the color of Democrats.
Gone is the opportunity to net-
work and energize, to come home
and spread the party gospel with
buttons, stickers and I-was-there
stories.
“For hard-core operatives, the
convention is the Christmas of
politics every four years; it’s the
quinceañera for political parties,”
said Guillermo Meneses, a former
Democratic National Committee
staff member. “The fact it’s not
happening is a huge disappoint-
ment for them.”
In Ms. Wyman’s house, the con-
vention is blaring from television
sets in four rooms. “I have it so
that I won’t miss anything,” she
said, in case she needs to get up
for a glass of water or a bathroom
break. “I wasn’t going to miss a
beat, I assure you.”
She is the longest-serving mem-
ber of the Democratic National
Committee and the longest-serv-
Susan Beachy contributed re-
search.
President Says the Followers of QAnon ‘Love Our Country,’ Raising Alarm
From Page A1
the darkest corners of the internet
and have at times been charged
with domestic terrorism and
planned kidnapping.
“QAnon conspiracy theorists
spread disinformation and foster
a climate of extremism and para-
noia, which in some cases has led
to violence. Condemning this
movement should not be difficult,”
said Jonathan A. Greenblatt, the
chief executive of the Anti-Defa-
mation League. “It’s downright
dangerous when a leader not only
refuses to do so, but also wonders
whether what they are doing is ‘a
good thing.’ ”
Mr. Trump’s comments also ele-
vated a group of people who the
F.B.I. has said poses a domestic
terrorism threat.
“QAnon is promoting political
disinformation, medical disinfor-
mation and carrying on a legacy of
anti-Semitic tropes,” Joan Dono-
van, the research director at the
Katie Rogers reported from Wash-
ington, and Kevin Roose from San
Francisco. Sheera Frenkel contrib-
uted reporting from San Francisco.
ing the race, he put $4.5 million
into three major progressive
groups — Swing Left, Collective
Future and Voto Latino.
But he has not given directly to
Mr. Biden, whom he endorsed,
and his termination of thousands
of campaign workers who ex-
pected to be working through No-
vember in Mr. Biden’s name has
inspired multiple lawsuits.
“After spending a billion dollars
on his own candidacy in the pri-
mary, many in the party thought
that would imply spending at least
as much on the general election, if
not more,” said Eleanor Neff Pow-
ell, an associate professor at the
University of Wisconsin-Madison
with a focus on money in politics.
“A billion dollars may be an unrea-
sonable expectation, but he set —
and in some ways expanded —
those expectations during the pri-
mary.”
Former Mayor Michael Nutter
of Philadelphia, who served as na-
tional political chair of Mr. Bloom-
berg’s campaign, called the bil-
lionaire “a significant investor, but
also a strategic investor,” pointing
to his down-ballot donations and
gifts to Democratic causes like
Fair Fight, a voting rights group
created by Stacey Abrams, the
former candidate for governor of
ing member of the California
Democratic Party. Had the in-per-
son gathering in Milwaukee not
been scrapped, she would have
been one of the oldest delegates in
attendance.
“Oh, I’m infamous,” Ms. Wyman
declared. “I have been at it for a
long time.”
Her home office, cluttered with
campaign memorabilia, is a testa-
ment to a lifetime spent with the
Democratic Party. A cork wall is
coated with buttons from cam-
paigns going back decades. Wrist-
bands, lanyards and pens are
stuffed in 14 boxes that she pulls
out whenever anyone shows an
interest.
In her den, framed pictures of
her posing with past presidents,
including Harry S. Truman, Lyn-
don B. Johnson, Bill Clinton and
Barack Obama, adorn a shelf.
“My family comes first,” Ms.
Wyman said. “Second comes the
Democratic Party. Third comes
baseball.”
For someone who shuns cell-
phones and the internet and is ac-
customed to being in the thick of
the action, it has felt unsettling to
be a spectator at a Zoom-style
event designed to choose a presi-
dential candidate whose face is
but an image on a screen.
“This is someone who really
cares about the party and the peo-
ple,” said her son, Brad, 56, who
joined her to watch on the first
night. “It’s a really big deal for her
not to attend the convention.”
Ms. Wyman, the daughter of
New Deal Democrats, has been
immersed in politics almost from
birth. In 1932, her mother, Sarah
Wiener, hung campaign posters
for Franklin Delano Roosevelt in
the family drugstore in Los Ange-
les — over the objections of her fa-
ther, Oscar, who was convinced it
would cost them customers.
Her mother was a precinct cap-
tain for Roosevelt’s first presiden-
tial campaign.
Growing up, Ms. Wyman wrote
letters to Roosevelt at the White
House “like he was my uncle,” she
Shorenstein Center on Media,
Politics and Public Policy, said in
an interview. “Attention from the
president is only going to embold-
en these groups to grow their
ranks.”
Although a majority of Ameri-
cans say they remain unfamiliar
with the particulars of the move-
ment — research shows that peo-
No questions about
the group’s claims,
just an offer of help.
ple who use social media plat-
forms like Twitter and Reddit are
more likely to be familiar with
QAnon — those who study the be-
havior of fringe groups have
warned of the power to produce
extremism among followers.
QAnon is a larger and many-
tentacled version of the Pizzagate
conspiracy theory, which falsely
claimed that Hillary Clinton was
operating a child sex-trafficking
ring out of the basement of a
Georgia, to which Mr. Bloomberg
gave $5 million late last year.
This week, Mr. Bloomberg an-
nounced that he would put an-
other $50 million toward helping
House Democrats, on top of $10
million he gave to the same cause
late last year.
“Mike has made it clear that he
will increasingly be on the stage,
and, on Thursday, literally,” Mr.
Nutter said. “You’re seeing the re-
emergence of the political Mike
Bloomberg.”
Mr. Bloomberg’s retreat from
the limelight came after attacks
by Senator Elizabeth Warren of
Massachusetts, who challenged
past remarks of his on redlining, a
discriminatory housing practice,
and highlighted his history of
crude and sexist comments.
Staff members and allies said
he had spent the past five months
focused on responding to the coro-
navirus, with his foundation
putting up more than $330 million.
That included money for New
York State’s contact-tracing pro-
gram.
Mr. Bloomberg has also put $35
million toward Hawkfish, a data
and analytics operation that has
contracts with the Democratic
National Committee and Unite the
Country, a pro-Biden super PAC
permitted to accept unlimited con-
recalled. In them, she complained
about things like political apathy
at her school. She savored the re-
sponses she received from
Stephen Early, the president’s
press secretary.
In 1952, she attended her first
convention, in Chicago, as a mem-
ber of the Democratic youth lead-
ership from California.
The next year, as a 22-year-old
senior at the University of South-
ern California, she ran for a seat
on the Los Angeles City Council.
With friends, she went door to
door distributing leaflets and little
bars of soap. Her slogan was
“Let’s Clean Up L.A.,” and she
Washington, D.C., pizza restau-
rant. In December 2016, a man
who said he was on the hunt for
proof of child abuse was arrested
after firing a rifle inside the
restaurant.
QAnon supporters often flood
social media pages with memes
and YouTube videos that target
well-known figures — like Mrs.
Clinton and her husband, former
President Bill Clinton, and the ac-
tor Tom Hanks — with unfounded
claims about their links to child
abuse. Lately, activists have used
anti-child-trafficking hashtags as
a recruitment tool.
“It’s not just a conspiracy the-
ory, this is a domestic extremist
movement,” said Travis View, a
host of “QAnon Anonymous,” a
podcast that seeks to explain the
movement. Mr. View said that
Twitter and Facebook pages ex-
ploded with comments from glee-
ful followers after Mr. Trump’s
comments.
Mr. View pointed out that the
president answered the question
by supporting the central premise
of the QAnon theory — that he is
battling a cabal of left-wing pe-
dophiles — rather than address-
ing the lack of evidence behind the
tributions.
In spite of his continued exten-
sive philanthropy, his contribu-
tions have fallen short of what
some in the party had thought he
would spend.
“There’s no sane, rational per-
son in politics who would say, ‘I’m
going to spend “X” amount of
money on a race,’” Mr. Nutter
said, adding that much of Mr.
Bloomberg’s influential giving
around the 2018 midterm elec-
tions had come the month before
Election Day.
Yet while “donors do like to hold
their cards till the 11th hour,” said
Dr. Powell, the political science
professor, large gifts that arrive
early can allow campaigns to
make better strategic choices.
“Our normal election timeline re-
ally has to be shifted forward, giv-
en there’s going to be so much
early voting,” she said.
Some Bloomberg allies sug-
gested that he had simply decided
that Mr. Biden didn’t need his as-
sistance, given the former vice
president’s lead in the polls and
the increasing strength of his
fund-raising operation.
Indeed, asked in January about
his potential future support of the
Democratic nominee, Mr. Bloom-
berg implied that he would cali-
brate his giving. “If they’re doing
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DAVID WALTER BANKS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
timed her door-knocking forays
deliberately.
“We knew on Monday people
would be home to watch ‘I Love
Lucy,’ ” she said.
The youngest woman ever
elected to the City Council, she
played a pivotal role in bringing
the Dodgers baseball team in from
Brooklyn in 1957. She also helped
the city secure the 1960 Democrat-
ic National Convention.
It was partly at her urging, she
said, that Robert F. Kennedy
agreed to move John F. Kennedy’s
speech accepting the Democratic
presidential nomination from the
Los Angeles Memorial Sports
movement.
“They are very practiced at try-
ing to interpret any comment
from Trump as validation,” Mr.
View said of the movement’s fol-
lowers. “And Trump very coyly in-
dicated he would help if he could.”
In recent weeks, platforms in-
cluding Twitter and Facebook
have rushed to dismantle a mush-
rooming number of QAnon-relat-
ed accounts and fan pages, a move
that people who study the move-
ment say is too little and too late.
On Wednesday, after a record
amount of QAnon-related growth
on the site, Facebook said it re-
moved 790 QAnon groups and was
restricting another 1,950 groups,
440 pages and more than 10,000
Instagram accounts.
On Facebook alone, activity on
some of the largest QAnon groups
rose 200 to 300 percent in the past
six months, according to data
gathered by The New York Times.
“We have seen growing move-
ments that, while not directly or-
ganizing violence, have celebrat-
ed violent acts, shown that they
have weapons and suggest they
will use them, or have individual
followers with patterns of violent
behavior,” Facebook said in a
very well, they need less,” he said.
“If they’re not, they’ll need more.”
Mr. Bloomberg’s transfer to the
party in the spring went toward
building out field operations in
battleground states like Florida,
Pennsylvania and Virginia,
though a party spokesman de-
clined to specify how that money
had been spent.
“He’s continuing the work he’s
done over several cycles to sup-
After dropping out, a
vow to throw a fortune
into the campaign.
port our party, and coming out of
the convention, he’s helping put
Democrats in the strongest posi-
tion possible to win at every level
of the ballot in November,” said
Tom Perez, the chairman of the
Democratic National Committee.
Former Secretary of State Hil-
lary Clinton said she had similarly
valued his “chops to speak to both
parties about the economy,” when
he addressed the 2016 convention.
“And as a fellow New Yorker who
had seen how Donald Trump oper-
Rosalind Wyman, 89, has
been a delegate to all but one
Democratic National Conven-
tion since 1952. This year, she
is watching from a blue-uphol-
stered chair in the den of her
Los Angeles home. Left, pho-
tos of her with past presidents
and candidates.
Arena to the larger Los Angeles
Memorial Coliseum. His main
worry, she said, was that his
brother would not draw a crowd
large enough to fill the 100,000-
seat venue. “I called everyone I
could, and those buses started
rolling in,” Ms. Wyman recalled.
A poster-size picture of Ken-
nedy talking to Ms. Wyman while
he was president graces the stair-
case wall in her house.
Ms. Wyman does not regret
missing the 1968 convention in
Chicago, where thousands of Viet-
nam War protesters battled police
officers in the streets. Her hus-
band, Eugene, attended — and left
early, she said. “That one was a
mess,” she said.
After leaving the City Council,
Ms. Wyman took jobs in the enter-
tainment industry and supported
the arts and humanitarian causes
in Los Angeles. But the Democrat-
statement, adding that it would
also block QAnon hashtags like
#digitalarmy and #thestorm.
But the movement made the
jump from social media long ago:
With dozens of QAnon supporters
running this year for Congress —
including several who have won
Republican primaries in Oregon
and Georgia — QAnon is knocking
on the door of mainstream poli-
tics, and has done so with the pres-
ident’s help.
For years, Mr. Trump and his
campaign have flirted with the
QAnon movement. Kayleigh McE-
nany, the White House press sec-
retary, has interviewed support-
ers in her role as a spokeswoman
for the Trump campaign, creating
footage that was later promoted to
Mr. Trump’s supporters.
“If you could say one thing to
the president, what would you
say?” Ms. McEnany said to a sup-
porter outside a campaign rally in
February as several attendees
shouted, “Q!” The two talked
about what it meant to be a “dig-
ital soldier” for Mr. Trump.
“Who is Q?” the man replied.
Ms. McEnany said that she would
pass the message along.
For his part, the president has
ates for years, he was uniquely po-
sitioned to highlight his failings,”
Mrs. Clinton said in a statement.
But former campaign workers
for Mr. Bloomberg have likened
Mr. Bloomberg to Mr. Trump, call-
ing for Mr. Perez to remove their
onetime boss from the convention
program. They pointed to what
they have called Mr. Bloomberg’s
false promises of continued em-
ployment.
After the workers were termi-
nated in March, publicly agitating
about the prospect of going with-
out health care during a pan-
demic, the campaign extended
that coverage through November.
“I’m an organizer by trade and I
don’t want to have infighting, but
he’s a problem, and he doesn’t ac-
tually hold the values that the
D.N.C. supposedly expresses,”
said Jane Conrad, a former field
organizer for Mr. Bloomberg in
Minnesota who is among more
than 150 former workers involved
in a proposed class-action lawsuit
against him.
Mr. Bloomberg’s team dis-
missed such criticisms and in-
voked his outsize support of the
party, with a spokeswoman call-
ing the calls for his removal from
Thursday’s program distractions
from the Democrats’s shared goal
of defeating Mr. Trump.
ic Party remained her life’s work.
In 1984, she chaired the national
convention in San Francisco, per-
suading Dianne Feinstein, who
was then the city’s mayor and is
now a California senator, to allow
fireworks indoors. It was a first.
When Geraldine Ferraro be-
came the first woman nominated
as vice president on her party’s
ticket, Ms. Wyman recalled dele-
gates screaming, women standing
on chairs and tears rolling down
faces.
“That’s what being in a conven-
tion hall is all about,” Ms. Wyman
said. “Nineteen eighty-four was
everything to me.”
It was the only Democratic con-
vention she can remember that
had an official wine. But Ms.
Wyman and Nancy Pelosi, chair of
the host committee for the con-
vention that year, did not drink.
“In the afternoon, we would have
ice cream delivered to our office,”
Ms. Wyman said.
Later, she became a fervent
supporter of both Bill and Hillary
Clinton.
This election, she said, “I
wanted Biden from Day 1.”
On the first night of this week’s
convention, she had praise for
John R. Kasich, a Republican and
former Ohio governor who ad-
dressed the virtual audience. But
she found herself waiting impa-
tiently for that night’s keynote
speaker. “I couldn’t wait to hear
Michelle Obama,” she said. “I
knew she would be great. I hope a
lot of America waited for her.”
On the second night, her eyes lit
up during the roll-call nomination
vote. She was thrilled by Jill Bi-
den’s closing.
“I was terribly concerned after
Michelle, that Jill Biden might
have a tough night,” she said. “She
rose to the occasion and she
knocked it out of the ballpark.”
With the second night a wrap,
she was starting to believe that an
online convention might work.
“They did a first-class job with
this Zooming stuff,” she said. “I
am sure the Republicans will copy
some of it.”
Ms. Wyman is not ready to give
up on being there in 2024. “I hope I
am still kicking around when I am
almost 94,” she said. “That’s a
pretty big number,” she said, after
a minute’s reflection. “My health
is pretty good.”
How will the nation’s health be?
“I hope we don’t have to Zoom
four years from now,” she said.
often reposted QAnon-centric
content into his Twitter feed. And
QAnon followers have long inter-
preted messages from Dan Scav-
ino, the White House director of
social media, as promoting
tongue-in-cheek symbols associ-
ated with the movement.
“I’m not surprised at all by his
reaction, and I don’t think QAnon
conspirators are surprised either.
It’s terrifying,” Vanessa Bouché,
an associate professor of political
science at Texas Christian Univer-
sity, said in an interview. “In a
democratic society, we make deci-
sions based on information. And if
people are believing these lies,
then we’re in a very dangerous po-
sition.”
Last week, Mr. Trump tweeted
his support of Marjorie Taylor
Greene, a QAnon follower who
won her House primary runoff in
Georgia, but he declined to di-
rectly embrace the movement it-
self during a White House news
conference.
“She won by a lot,” he said. “She
comes from a great state.”
But on Twitter, Mr. Trump en-
dorsed Ms. Greene, calling her a
“future Republican Star” and “a
real WINNER!”

Election The Democratic National Convention
Biden, a Political Lifer,
Now Prepares to Give
The Speech of His Life
By KATIE GLUECK
and MATT FLEGENHEIMER
WILMINGTON, Del. — Over
his near half-century in public life,
Joseph R. Biden Jr. has made
many speeches: good speeches,
bad speeches, campaign kickoff
speeches and concession
speeches, speeches without
proper attribution to original
sources, speeches so impossibly
Biden that no one could ever ac-
cuse him of lifting anything.
“No one ever doubts that I
mean what I say,” Mr. Biden, 77, is
fond of telling audiences. “The
problem is, I sometimes say all
that I mean.”
What he means to say on Thurs-
day, as he accepts the Democratic
presidential nomination in the
most important — and likely most
surreal — address of his career,
has been something of a work in
progress for several decades,
since he charged onto the national
stage as a 29-year-old senator-
elect and sparked his first presi-
dential speculation soon after.
And so, friends said, some ele-
ments of his preparation process
were to be expected: consulta-
tions with a coterie of family mem-
bers and his longest-serving ad-
visers, including his sister Valerie
Biden Owens, his wife, Jill Biden,
and his chief strategist, Mike
Donilon. Cycling through multiple
drafts, reflecting a longstanding
habit of tinkering until the end, of-
ten by hand. Mr. Biden and his
team have also conferred with
close friends and others he ad-
mires about themes and narrative
arcs. Jon Meacham, the presiden-
tial historian, has been among
those contributing to the process.
(The title of a recent book by Mr.
Meacham, “The Soul of America,”
has been echoed by Mr. Biden
throughout his campaign.)
But other parts of the task this
week were less familiar. Namely:
planning to deliver remarks with
virtually no audience — distress-
ing for a politician who has long
fed off the energy of a crowd —
with his top supporters left to un-
cork miniature bottles of confetti
(supplied by the Biden team for
solo watch parties) amid a pan-
demic that has claimed more than
170,000 American lives.
Mr. Biden’s speech, those close
to him say, will be fashioned ac-
cordingly to meet the moment:
more sober than jubilant, more re-
strained than swaggering, in his
most ambitious effort yet to offer
the American people a vision of
steady leadership and national
Kitty Bennett contributed re-
search.
Obama’s Warning to Voters: ‘Do Not Let Them Take Away Your Democracy’
From Page A1
Mr. Obama and his allies pro-
moted for years was that his elec-
tion as the first Black president
and a leader of a new generation
demonstrated a fundamental
change in the country. Instead, he
left behind a nation that elevated
his polar opposite as his succes-
sor.
“Each president kind of begets
the next guy,” William M. Daley,
who served as Mr. Obama’s White
House chief of staff, said in an in-
terview before Mr. Obama’s con-
vention speech. “He’s got to clar-
ify what about him didn’t beget
this guy. Why did the eight years
not change the country when we
thought in ’08 things were differ-
ent?”
This time around, Mr. Obama’s
vehicle for validation happens to
be the same man he gently eased
aside for the Democratic nomina-
tion in 2016 in favor of Hillary Clin-
ton, whom Mr. Obama himself de-
feated in 2008 by telling the coun-
try that she was a relic of the past.
Many Democratic drinking ses-
sions in the interim have been
consumed by the what-if game
over what would have happened
had Mr. Obama anointed Mr. Bi-
den instead. It is an exercise the
former president himself finds un-
productive, according to advisers,
and there are plenty of reasons to
suspect that Mr. Biden would not
have been able to overtake Mrs.
Clinton.
Still, it has left the 44th presi-
dent addressing a Democratic
convention he had never expected
— not nominating Mrs. Clinton for
a second term, but wrapping his
arms around his vice president to
present him as the antidote to Mr.
Trump’s toxic brand of politics
and, even at 77, the rightful heir to
the Obama record.
“There is a deep belief by not
just Obama, but many people who
have worked for him, that we can
recover from four years of Trump,
but the damage from eight would
be irreversible,” said Jen Psaki,
who served as Mr. Obama’s White
House communications director.
unity in the face of extraordinary
crises.
“The times dictate a different
type of speech,” said former Gov.
Terry McAuliffe, Democrat of Vir-
ginia and a close ally of Mr. Bi-
den’s. “This is a different speech,
this is a different time, than proba-
bly any other time going back to
the days of F.D.R. when we were
dealing with a world war and we
were dealing with a Depression.
This is a very serious speech.”
Asked how long Mr. Biden had
been preparing for his Thursday
appearance, Mr. McAuliffe re-
plied, “for his entire life.”
To borrow from Mr. Biden, that
is not — entirely — hyperbole. Be-
fore he turned 30, Mr. Biden
kicked off a long-shot Senate bid
from a storied Wilmington hotel,
assailing divisiveness and preach-
ing optimism about the capabili-
ties of the American people.
Around five decades later, he is ex-
pected to touch on similar themes
in his remarks from a conference
center here on Thursday, less than
two miles from the hotel where he
began his career in national poli-
tics.
“I would expect him to follow
the same process he’s used for
years,” said Senator Chris Coons,
Democrat of Delaware and a close
Biden ally who said they spoke on
Sunday. “You ask outside advis-
ers. Message, pollsters, political
advisers — they give you sort of
framing. Then you go away, and
you take a crack at it. Then you
share it with the folks who know
you — I mean, literally his sister
— with your sister, with your
spouse, with your closest political
advisers. They give you some in-
put. Then you go and think about it
some more. And then you give
your speech.”
While every prominent political
figure becomes a practiced public
speaker through sheer force of
repetition, the act is, for Mr. Biden,
almost definitional. Negotiating a
stutter since his youth, Mr. Biden
carved out a national reputation
built in large measure on the
power, preponderance and more-
than-occasional precariousness of
his words.
His belief in his own skills as an
orator — his ability to persuade, to
move, to own the room — has been
a through-line of his public arc, of-
ten leading him to seek his own
counsel despite any guidance he
might absorb from advisers.
One former Senate speech-
writer recalled Mr. Biden describ-
ing their working relationship like
this: “I’m going to compare you to
a golf coach,” Mr. Biden told the
aide. “If you try to change my
swing, we’re not going to get
“That urgency from Obama is
powerful.”
In his speech on Wednesday
night, Mr. Obama offered valida-
tion for Mr. Biden, portraying him
as “a brother” to him and “a man
who learned early on to treat ev-
ery person he meets with respect
and dignity.” And in praising Mr.
Biden’s record, Mr. Obama man-
aged to frame his own legacy as
well, describing how his vice pres-
ident helped him pull the economy
out of recession, expand health
care and stem the H1N1 and Ebola
outbreaks.
He also offered a passionate de-
fense of voting rights at a time
when Democrats fear that Repub-
licans are trying to make it harder
for Americans to cast ballots. “Do
not let them take away your
power,” Mr. Obama said. “Do not
let them take away your democra-
cy.”
Mr. Obama’s primary target,
though, was Mr. Trump, his voice
dripping with scorn as he said that
while he never expected Mr.
Trump to embrace his vision, he
did hope that the next president
“might show some interest in tak-
ing the job seriously.”
“But he never did,” Mr. Obama
said. “For close to four years now,
he has shown no interest in
putting in the work, no interest in
finding common ground, no inter-
est in using the awesome power of
his office to help anyone but him-
self and his friends, no interest in
treating the presidency as any-
thing but one more reality show
that he can use to get the attention
he craves.”
While he had a 36-year record in
the Senate before becoming vice
president, Mr. Biden has focused
far more on the eight he spent in
the White House, cloaking himself
in the former president’s mantle
and citing his service to Mr.
Obama as a way to appeal to liber-
als, younger voters and especially
African-Americans who helped
him win key primaries.
Little wonder. Mr. Obama re-
mains one of the most popular fig-
ures in American life. A new poll
by Politico and Morning Consult
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Joseph R. Biden Jr. once compared a speechwriter to a golf coach, saying, “If you try to change my swing, we’re not going to get along.”
along.”
Matt Teper, a top Biden speech-
writer during his vice presidency,
suggested Mr. Biden’s attention to
detail could border on the obses-
sive. “You have an engaged prin-
cipal,” he said. “You’ve also got
someone who, on a word level, is
caring about things that some-
times you’re like, ‘well, let’s leave
the commas to me.’ But by and
large, his engagement makes
things better.’”
Mr. Teper predicted that the fi-
nal edits on Thursday would be
made as late as “an hour or two in
advance” — or, perhaps, extempo-
raneously. “He will change one
thing as he delivers it,” Mr. Teper
said, “to make it better.”
Of course, Mr. Biden’s words
have not always landed with care.
His first presidential bid, for the
1988 Democratic campaign,
Valerie Biden Owens, the Democratic nominee’s sister and advis-
er, is one of the people trusted to critique the acceptance speech.
found that 58 percent of Ameri-
cans have a favorable view of the
former president, the highest rat-
ing of any of the 28 political figures
tested other than his wife, Mi-
chelle, who topped him with 60
percent. Mr. Biden, by contrast,
was seen favorably by 46 percent
and Mr. Trump by 39 percent.
Even so, history has shown that
presidents cannot always transfer
their personal popularity to oth-
ers, as Mr. Obama was reminded
in 2016. And while he has deep af-
fection for Mr. Biden, advisers say
the former president harbors his
own concerns about his former
vice president’s chances this year.
He had originally picked Mr. Bi-
den as his running mate in 2008 as
a governing partner, not as a puta-
tive successor, and he never
groomed any younger figure to
follow, leaving the party in 2016
with weathered leadership.
That has left many in his party
anxious for him to play the bigger
role that until lately he has re-
sisted. Mr. Obama has been reluc-
tant to fully engage with Mr.
Trump or the campaign, only oc-
President Barack Obama in 2015 with Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., now the focus of his hopes.
ended in a hail of plagiarism accu-
sations. His next one, 20 years lat-
er, reinforced perceptions of ver-
bal recklessness almost immedi-
ately, when Mr. Biden gave an in-
terview in which he called Mr.
Obama, his fellow competitor, “the
first mainstream African-Ameri-
can who is articulate and bright
and clean and a nice-looking guy.”
When Mr. Biden became Mr.
Obama’s vice president, his incau-
tion by turns frustrated White
House aides and cemented Mr. Bi-
den’s standing as a kind of incorri-
gible tale-telling uncle, prone to
exaggeration or profanity on a live
mic. On the campaign trail this cy-
cle, he constantly wandered off-
script, into meandering asides,
verbal missteps and the occa-
sional inaccurate story that had to
be walked back.
Yet it is also no coincidence that
SEAN RAYFORD FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
casionally emerging from his
Washington home where he is still
writing his overdue memoir to
take on the current president, as
he did energetically during the
2018 midterm elections and as he
had begun to do this year.
“We have no moral voice today
— no Martin Luther King, no Nel-
son Mandela, no John Lewis, no
Eleanor Roosevelt,” said Susan
Dunn, a presidential historian at
Williams College. “Obama could
retake that moral role — and not
just reclaim his own legacy and
not just denounce Trump for re-
versing all of Obama’s policies and
achievements. He’d have to play a
more active role in American life
as a voice of moderation and de-
cency.”
Mr. Obama’s determination to
see Mr. Trump defeated may be as
strong as, or even stronger than,
his desire to elevate Mr. Biden. Af-
ter all, Mr. Trump spent years ped-
dling the lie that Mr. Obama might
have been born in Africa and has
spent much of his presidency un-
raveling whatever he could of Mr.
Obama’s legacy. In recent months,
scores of families have trusted Mr.
Biden with the most sacred
speechmaking task: delivering
eulogies. His fluency in grief and
resilience was forged through his
own grim fate, burying his first
wife and daughter — who died in a
car crash just after his first Senate
election — and his son Beau, who
died of brain cancer in 2015.
“They’re very difficult,” said
former Senator Ted Kaufman, a
longtime Biden friend and former
chief of staff who briefly suc-
ceeded him in the Senate, in an in-
terview this spring about Mr. Bi-
den’s eulogy-writing process. “It
takes a lot out of him emotionally,
but also just physically. It is real —
it isn’t like he sits down and does it
on the back of an envelope or
something like that. He really con-
centrates on these eulogies. He
spends time on them. It takes out
of whatever else he’s doing.”
Former Biden speechwriters
have said that Mr. Biden was more
engaged, and easier to work with,
on eulogies than on virtually any
other kind of speech.
But the skills he has developed
as a eulogist — an ability to com-
municate empathy and a sense of
optimism to people confronting
unfathomable loss — may be im-
portant preparation for a nomi-
nating speech Mr. Biden makes to
a grieving nation confronting an
uncertain future.
“He’s going to show people that
he’s going to connect with real
people,” said Representative Deb-
bie Dingell, Democrat of Michi-
gan. “That he understands that
they’re scared.”
Mr. Biden entered convention
week fresh off the search for a
the president has twisted the facts
to accuse Mr. Obama of “spying”
on his 2016 campaign and even
suggested his predecessor had
committed “treason,” a crime that
carries the death penalty.
“For Obama, I think this mo-
ment isn’t about his legacy or spe-
cific policy differences,” said Chris
Lu, who managed Mr. Obama’s
first-term cabinet. “It’s really
about Trump’s repudiation of our
common values as Americans and
the assault on democratic norms
and institutions.”
As for Mr. Trump, his fixation on
Mr. Obama is as strategic as it is
visceral, according to his own ad-
visers, stemming from a need to
chip away at his predecessor’s
popularity and, in the process, dis-
qualify Mr. Biden.
“I think the president sees Bi-
den’s strongest card is that he
worked for Obama,” said Christo-
pher Ruddy, chief executive of
Newsmax and a friend of Mr.
Trump. “If Joe’s going to hang his
hat on Obama’s record, then this
president is going to show that
Obama wasn’t as good as you
STEPHEN CROWLEY/THE NEW YORK TIMES
0N A19
COURTLAND WELLS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
vice-presidential contender.
While he selected Senator Kamala
Harris of California, he had exten-
sive conversations with a list of
candidates representing a diverse
range of states and of personal
and political experiences, and a
number of Democrats said they
expected that process to have also
informed his thinking about how
to address the nation.
“I’m sure it did,” said Repre-
sentative Lisa Blunt Rochester,
Democrat of Delaware and a co-
chair of Mr. Biden’s vice-presiden-
tial search committee. “Their per-
sonal stories, I think, are repre-
sentative of America. I think all of
that will feed into the remarks that
he gives. But ultimately I think
he’s going to really focus on the re-
silience of our country and the fu-
ture direction we’re going to go
in.”
Though Mr. Biden and his party
have never encountered a con-
vention quite like this, he has been
something of a regular through
the years for the in-person affairs.
Since at least as far back as
1980, he has addressed Democrat-
ic National Conventions, accom-
panied at least occasionally by
presidential rumblings.
While some television networks
cut away during his speech that
year, according to an account in
The News Journal of Wilmington,
his local supporters never lost
faith.
From their perch on the conven-
tion floor, delegates from Dela-
ware held a banner hinting at a fu-
ture that would have to wait a bit
longer than they had hoped back
then: “Biden in ’84.”
thought.”
Mr. Obama and his team have
spent some of the last four years
asking themselves where things
went off track, wondering how a
Black president could leave the
country more racially polarized,
according to polls, than it had
been in years and questioning
their own understanding of his
place in history.
In private conversations with
aides after the 2016 election, Mr.
Obama called Mr. Trump a “car-
toon” figure, but wondered
whether they had misjudged the
mood of the country and their own
accomplishments. “What if we
were wrong?” he asked one aide
at the time. “Maybe we pushed too
far. Maybe people just want to fall
back into their tribe.”
Others have second-guessed
his failure to take more decisive
action to counter the intervention
in the 2016 election by President
Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia.
“Obama’s presidency lost a
great deal of luster because of
Trump’s surprise victory,” said
David Greenberg, a presidential
historian at Rutgers University.
“Obama’s retreat from world lead-
ership, which emboldened Putin,
encouraged Russia to meddle in
the 2016 election.”
A bipartisan Senate report re-
leased this week confirmed that
Russia intervened in the 2016 elec-
tion with the goal of helping elect
Mr. Trump and that Mr. Trump’s
campaign was willing to be
helped, even if the special counsel,
Robert S. Mueller III, did not find
enough evidence to allege a crimi-
nal conspiracy. Mr. Trump has re-
jected such conclusions, dismiss-
ing the Russia episode as a “hoax”
drummed up by Democrats and
“deep-state” actors to smear him.
For Mr. Obama, then, Wednes-
day was a point to move beyond
that, to correct what he sees as the
mistake of four years ago. The
speech, of course, was just a
speech. Just one night out of 75 left
until Nov. 3. “What could salvage
Obama’s legacy isn’t this speech,”
said Mr. Greenberg, “but whether
Biden wins.”
A20 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Election Congress and Policy
A Return to the Days of Bipartisanship? Biden Should Not Expect Much
By JONATHAN MARTIN
and CARL HULSE
As Joseph R. Biden Jr. prepares
to formally accept his party’s
nomination for the presidency
Thursday, the gap is widening be-
tween the optimism of a standard-
bearer shaped by his career in a
more collegial Congress and the
skepticism of current Democratic
lawmakers who see a Capitol that
would be unrecognizable to the
Senator Biden who served there a
dozen years ago.
Lawmakers who reach across
the aisle these days are more
likely to find their hands slapped.
And they have a warning for their
nominee as he basks at a Demo-
cratic convention brimming with
nostalgia for an earlier, less polar-
ized political era: A Biden victory,
even if accompanied by Demo-
cratic majorities in the House and
Senate, is more likely to be fol-
lowed by partisan warfare than bi-
partisan bonhomie.
Democrats are eager to see if
Republicans will prove more will-
ing to negotiate should they lose
the White House and Senate, and
many in the party are willing to
initially defer to a Biden charm
campaign.
But a range of Democratic law-
makers say they may be willing to
scrap the Senate’s filibuster rule
and govern by partisan muscle if
Republicans prove recalcitrant.
“We have to get a lot done,” said
Senator Chuck Schumer of New
York, who would become majority
leader if Democrats take control
of the Senate. “The nation de-
mands it, and nothing is off the ta-
ble.”
Senator Richard J. Durbin of Il-
linois, the second-ranking Demo-
crat, said, “the Senate of 12 years
Seeking Vast Changes,
Progressives Lament
Biden’s Views on Police
By REID J. EPSTEIN
and JOHN ELIGON
In a virtual convention this
week that is heavy on personality
and light on policy, Democrats
have presented a unified front on
issues of racial justice, declaring
that the status quo is not accept-
able.
Not far beneath the surface,
however, lies broad disagreement
over policing, with the reform-ori-
ented proposals of Joseph R. Bi-
den Jr., the party’s nominee, fall-
ing well short of the demands of
progressive activists who believe
that police departments need to
be significantly downsized or
abolished.
The gap between Mr. Biden and
his party’s progressive flank was
evident in a line he delivered dur-
ing a discussion on the Democrat-
ic National Convention’s opening
night: “Most cops are good, but
the fact is, the bad ones need to be
identified and prosecuted.” It
struck an array of activists as dis-
cordant at a moment when the po-
lice killing of George Floyd has
spurred nationwide calls for
transformational change.
Progressives say they see ex-
traordinary will and momentum
to transform policing that they
can’t let slip away in an election
year. Having a standard-bearer
who is not fully committed to the
The ‘few bad apples’
approach undercuts
calls for revolution.
kind of fundamental change they
believe is necessary could be
problematic, some say.
“What I’m concerned about is
the continued conversation about
it being a few bad apples as op-
posed to systemic racism in the
system,” said Jamaal Bowman,
the Bronx Democrat who is run-
ning for a House seat. “Part of our
issue is recognizing that racism is
not an individual-to-individual
problem, it’s our system. It’s part
of America’s DNA because we’ve
never reckoned with our history
of slavery.”
Since Mr. Floyd’s death on Me-
morial Day, Mr. Biden has made
eloquent calls for systemic
changes to the country’s criminal
justice system and proposed re-
forms in police tactics. But he has
said he opposes cutting resources
for law enforcement — rather, he
has proposed new funding for
community policing, which a
spokesman said would be condi-
tioned on departments imple-
menting reforms.
As a longtime Democratic poli-
tician who has pitched himself as
a champion of the working class,
Mr. Biden has courted support
from law enforcement unions —
groups that have resisted the sort
ago does not exist today.”
Or as Senator Christopher S.
Murphy of Connecticut put it:
“Shame on me if I went to kick the
football after it was pulled out
from under me six times.”
President Trump may yet eke
out a victory in November, and
even if he loses, Democrats must
net at least three Senate seats to
capture the majority. A Republi-
can Senate would force a Presi-
dent Biden to negotiate any legis-
lation with the opposition and
doom the progressive push that
Democrats are clamoring for in
this election.
Even if Democrats win the
White House and Congress, their
road next year could still be rocky.
After the last Democratic sweep,
in 2008, the Republicans’ Senate
leader, Mitch McConnell of Ken-
tucky, told his diminished ranks
they would remain relevant only if
they banded together in strict op-
position to President Barack
Obama. They largely did.
“Mitch McConnell just says no
to everything,” said Senator Deb-
bie Stabenow, Democrat of Michi-
gan.
The picture painted in the con-
vention video of the “unlikely
friendship” between Mr. Biden
and John McCain, in which sena-
tors of differing parties fight it out
during the day, gather for fellow-
ship at night and proudly come to-
gether for the good of the nation in
the end, could not be drawn today.
The former vice president, who
served in the Senate for 36 years,
would arrive in the White House
with the most high-level legisla-
tive experience of any president
since Lyndon B. Johnson. Like Mr.
Johnson, he would take office at a
traumatic moment — a lethal vi-
rus raging, tens of millions out of
of systemic changes and account-
ability for individual officers that
activists and even Mr. Biden are
now demanding. Mr. Biden also
played an important role in pass-
ing the tough-on-crime legislation
of the 1990s that many activists
feel led to the abuses in the crimi-
nal justice system that fueled this
summer’s protests.
He has long insisted that Ameri-
can law enforcement can be im-
proved by weeding out bad per-
sonnel. He has also called for tacti-
cal reforms like banning choke-
holds and ending the transferring
of “weapons of war” to police
forces, and he has pledged to cre-
ate a national police oversight
commission within the first hun-
dred days of his presidency.
“I don’t think it’s rotten in the
core,” Mr. Biden said of policing
during a June interview on “The
Daily Show.” “I don’t think all cops
are bad cops.”
But by cheering calls for re-
forms while also proposing in-
creased funding for law enforce-
ment and attributing problems to
a few bad apples, Mr. Biden is try-
ing to appeal to the widest possi-
ble expanse of general election
voters without alienating either
end of the political spectrum.
“I’ve heard him speak really el-
oquently about systemic racism
and housing,” said Vanita Gupta,
who led the Justice Department’s
civil rights division under former
President Barack Obama. “And
he’s had a close relationship with
law enforcement for many years,
and I don’t think the two live as
contradictory things in his mind.”
In trying to have things both
ways Mr. Biden risks alienating
both ends of his coalition. Subur-
ban voters — particularly older
white voters — are less enthralled
with the idea of defunding the po-
lice. And activists say a pledge to
prosecute bad cops doesn’t go
nearly far enough.
“We have to get away from this
good cop, bad cop thing,” said Cori
Bush, a Missouri Democrat who
went from protesting police vio-
lence in Ferguson to unseating a
longtime House member this
month. “I agree with Joe Biden
that something needs to change,
but we have to take it much fur-
ther than that. Because in the bal-
ance are dead people that look like
me.”
Progressive lawmakers and ac-
tivists say they do not believe
their differences with Mr. Biden
and his running mate, Senator Ka-
mala Harris, on policing will hurt
him electorally. They say they can
find common ground that they
could not with President Trump,
who they fear will make things
only worse for Black and Hispanic
people with his aggressive vision
of law enforcement.
Mr. Biden’s “most cops are
good” comment came during a
conversation about racial justice
he was having with prominent
Democrats, including Gwen Carr,
whose son, Eric Garner, was killed
work and racial tensions boiling —
but he would find a far more polar-
ized capital than Mr. Johnson did.
There are fewer moderates in
both parties, and a Democratic
sweep would most likely mean
that one of the few deal-makers
left in the Senate — Susan Collins
of Maine — would be defeated.
The pillars of the Senate that
Mr. Biden last served in are gone:
Mr. McCain, Edward M. Kennedy,
Robert C. Byrd, Daniel K. Inouye
and Ted Stevens have all died, and
Harry Reid has retired.
Mr. Schumer is reluctant to
scrap the chamber’s filibuster
rule, which requires 60 votes to
pass most legislation, knowing
that Republicans would some day
return to the majority. But he has
been informally polling his caucus
about what he should do next year,
according to Democratic senators
who have spoken to him.
In an interview, Mr. Schumer,
who is facing immense pressure
from the left to let a simple major-
ity rule and is facing a potential
primary of his own in 2022, said
that while he hoped “Republicans
will see the light,” Democrats
would push their agenda “with
them or without them.”
Mr. Reid, the last Democratic
majority leader, was blunter.
“To think that, with what Mc-
Connell has done to change the
Senate forever, he is going to step
in there and things will be just
hunky dory, it won’t be,” Mr. Reid
said. “If he wants to be a president
who wants to be known for getting
something done, he can’t need 60
votes for everything.” (It was Mr.
Reid who terminated the filibus-
ter on most judicial nominations).
A range of lawmakers, from
Senator Bernie Sanders of Ver-
mont on the left to Senator Chris
Outrage over police brutality has led to protests across the nation, including in Oakland, Calif., above, and Seattle, below.
by the New York Police in 2014.
Immediately after saying “most
cops are good,” Mr. Biden turned
to Ms. Carr and asked, “How are
you doing?”
“We can’t let things settle
down,” she said. “We have to go to
the politicians and we have to hold
their feet to the fire. Because oth-
erwise, the big uprising is not go-
ing to mean a lot.”
Mr. Biden pumped his fist in ap-
proval.
The Democratic divide over
how to address policing is playing
out in battles over police budgets
in cities nationwide.
In Minneapolis, Oakland and
Seattle, City Councils led by Dem-
ocrats have been at odds with
their Democratic mayors over
how much money to cut from po-
lice coffers and invest in other
services. Progressive council
members have pushed for slash-
ing the budgets in half in Seattle
and Oakland. And in Minneapolis,
a majority of the Council has
pledged to dismantle the Police
Department and create a new sys-
tem of public safety.
Jeremiah Ellison, a Minneapo-
lis councilman in favor of defund-
Coons of Delaware in the center,
are reassessing their support of
the legislative filibuster, egged on
by Mr. Obama, who used Repre-
sentative John Lewis’s funeral to
announce his support for scrap-
ping the 60-vote majority.
Many of Mr. Biden’s closest ad-
visers and former colleagues say
he is still loath to burn bridges
with Republicans. He’s the same
man, they say, who supported civil
rights as a young senator but still
worked with the Senate’s arch
segregationists, something he
boasted about as recently as last
year.
“This convention gives you a
very good sense of his belief that
A Capitol that is more
polarized and less
open to deal-making.
you can find common ground with
everybody,” said Anita Dunn, one
of his top strategists.
Recently, though, Mr. Biden has
suggested the overlapping crises
demand that the government re-
spond the way it did during the
Depression and World War II, and
he told reporters that Senate
Democrats would have “to take a
look at” at eliminating or modify-
ing the filibuster should Republi-
cans prove “obstreperous.”
Yet in the same interview, he
predicted Senate Republicans
would be “liberated” by a Trump
loss.
That was not his experience in
2009, when Republican leaders
steered their members away from
ing, said he has heard Democrats
suggest reforms that he believes
already have been tried and
failed.
“I think that there’s a pretty
large gap,” he said of the diverging
views of policing.
Even seemingly small differ-
ences among Democrats can be
significant, he said. He recalled a
recent conversation with a former
police chief in which they both
agreed that public safety required
more investment in things like
mental health services and vio-
lence prevention. But the former
chief said the police should pro-
vide those services, which Mr. El-
lison opposed.
“We have a fundamentally dif-
ferent opinion about what will
work in order to competently pro-
vide those services,” he said.
Part of the difficulty for Demo-
crats to build a unified approach to
policing is their diversity, Mr. Elli-
son said.
“The Democratic Party is really
several different parties,” he said.
“There are members of the Demo-
cratic Party that really have no
business being in the same party
together. I think maybe the thing
GRANT HINDSLEY FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
cooperating to ameliorate the last
economic downturn or pass
health care legislation. Instead,
they believed they could more ef-
fectively tap into voter anger in
the midterms if they united in op-
position.
“If they choose to repeat 2009,
and McConnell slaps his hand
away, then we’ve got choices to
make,” said Mr. Coons, who in 2017
co-wrote a bipartisan letter de-
fending the filibuster. He added,
“If we’re six months into it and
they’re blocking every piece of
legislation, I’m willing to re-exam-
ine my commitment to defending
the filibuster.”
Some progressives say Demo-
crats cannot afford to wait six
weeks, let alone six months.
“We just need to get enough
votes to pass our bills, that’s the
bottom line,” said Jamaal Bow-
man, the New York progressive
who this summer defeated the
long-serving Representative Eliot
L. Engel in a primary that re-
flected the new activism of the
Democratic Party. “I would advise
a President Biden to tap into the
energy taking place in the streets
of America, harness it and lever-
age it.”
Some Democratic senators still
believe they can gather enough
Republican support to keep the fil-
ibuster and legislate effectively,
especially on job-creating meas-
ures like infrastructure funding.
”These are bipartisan issues,”
said Senator Tom Carper of Dela-
ware.
Mr. Biden, however, is eyeing a
more aggressive opening salvo.
“We have to tackle both public
health and the economy at the
same time,” said Jake Sullivan, a
senior campaign adviser.
The ultimate solution for Senate
that would tether us together is,
loosely, a belief that people are
more important than property
and individual wealth.”
While polls suggest there is
broad public support for re-
directing some police funding to-
ward social services, a prospect
favored even by Democratic Na-
tional Committee members, there
is less backing, including among
Democrats, for drastically down-
sizing or eliminating police de-
partments.
Representative Bobby Scott of
Virginia, who served as chairman
of the criminal justice task force
arranged by the campaigns of Mr.
Biden and Senator Bernie Sand-
ers, agreed with Mr. Biden’s senti-
ment.
“Most cops are, in fact, good,”
Mr. Scott said. “But there are just
too many that conduct themselves
in such a way that violate constitu-
tional rights and violate the law.”
Like Mr. Biden, Mr. Scott op-
poses efforts to strip funding from
law enforcement agencies. The
“Defund the Police” movement,
he said, fails the test of being easi-
ly understood by a large enough
segment of the electorate.
“The slogan, when you immedi-
ately have to start explaining
what you mean, it becomes prob-
lematic,” Mr. Scott said.
But progressive lawmakers
said it was important for the Dem-
ocratic establishment to ensure
that people who believed in dras-
tic overhauls and even the abol-
ishing of police departments had a
seat at the table to help shape the
party’s positions.
“If we don’t agree to speak to
each other and have the tough
conversations and wrestle with
the solutions together,’’ said M.
Lorena González, the president of
the Seattle City Council, “then
there could be the unintended
consequence of people becoming
Democrats may be to find a way
around the 60-vote rule without
scrapping it entirely. “You don’t
have to eliminate it, you could just
trim its sails,” Mr. Murphy said.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi sug-
gested using a budget rule called
“reconciliation” to pass some big-
ticket legislation with a simple
Senate majority, the way Mr.
Trump and congressional Repub-
licans passed their tax overhaul
and tried to repeal the Affordable
Care Act.
“That’s always an option for
us,” she said.
If the Democrats claim control
of Washington, the Republican re-
sponse could determine how the
majority proceeds.
At least one Republican facing a
competitive re-election in a state
that rewards bipartisanship, Sen-
ator Steve Daines of Montana,
said he could work with Mr. Biden.
“I think one of Obama’s mis-
takes was not allowing Joe Biden
to be more engaged with the Sen-
ate,” said Mr. Daines, citing the
former vice president’s long legis-
lative history.
Many Democrats are skeptical
such attitudes would prevail.
“My sense is he will find, unfor-
tunately, that the people you could
work with in the past are largely
gone or their voices are so muted
you cannot hear them,” said for-
mer Senator Kent Conrad, Demo-
crat of North Dakota.
Former Senator Charles S.
Robb of Virginia, who married
Lyndon Johnson’s elder daughter,
said Mr. Biden’s “natural inclina-
tion is, to use a term associated
with my father-in-law, to bring us
together.”
“But,” he added, “I can’t think of
a time when we’ve been this divid-
ed as a country.”
JIM WILSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES
disaffected with the Democratic
Party, particularly young activists
of color.”
Democrats in Seattle have been
unified around the belief that re-
forming the police was not
enough, Ms. González said. There
is broad support in investing in
things like education and health
care that Democrats believe will
stabilize communities and reduce
crime. The tension comes in that
some people also want to reduce
the size of the police force, while
others believe that those social in-
vestments can be made without
downsizing the department, she
said.
Libby Schaaf, the Democratic
mayor of Oakland, considers her-
self a progressive who believes in
transformational reform in polic-
ing. But some of the city’s law-
makers and activists see Ms.
Schaaf as a barrier to systemic
change. She cast the deciding vote
last month that prevented the Po-
lice Department’s budget from be-
ing slashed beyond the roughly
$14.5 million that the City Council
had cut in June.
Ms. Schaaf said that while she
agreed that the current system of
policing did not keep everyone
safe, she urged a more cautious
approach to defunding because
people needed someone to call
when they were in crisis. But she
acknowledged that Democrats
who are adamant about defunding
or abolishing police departments
can move the needle toward nec-
essary changes, pointing to na-
tionwide efforts to trim police
budgets that, not long ago,
seemed unlikely.
“There is an appetite right now
for transformative change,” she
said. “And the more people get in-
volved, the more appetite there is.
People’s participation matters
and has tremendous impact on
policies that get put forward.”
THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Freeze on Changes to Post Office Fails to Quench Democrats’ Fury
This article is by Emily Cochrane, Hailey
Fuchs, Kenneth P. Vogel and Jessica Silver-
Greenberg.
WASHINGTON — Louis DeJoy’s
move to halt changes that were viewed
as a threat to mail-in voting did little to
quell the outcry over his leadership as
postmaster general, with lawmakers
calling on Wednesday for his removal
and one top Democrat demanding more
answers about the secretive process that
led to a major Trump donor running the
Postal Service.
Senator Chuck Schumer of New York,
the Democratic leader, called on the
Postal Service board of governors to re-
lease information about the selection
process that resulted in Mr. DeJoy’s ap-
pointment in May, saying that the
changes made under his watch under-
scored the need for more details. In a
separate letter to Mr. DeJoy, Mr. Schu-
mer also requested more information
about the changes that had been put in
place and which ones would be sus-
pended.
Mr. DeJoy, who will face lawmakers at
two separate hearings in the coming
days, said on Tuesday that he would sus-
pend cost-cutting and operational
changes that have slowed mail delivery
and fueled worries about mail-in voting
in the November election. But Mr. DeJoy
did not commit to reversing changes al-
ready put in place, including the removal
of hundreds of mail-sorting machines,
some of which have already been de-
stroyed, according to union officials and
postal workers.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California,
who spoke with Mr. DeJoy on Wednes-
day, said in a statement that the postmas-
ter general “frankly admitted that he had
no intention of replacing the sorting ma-
chines, blue mailboxes and other key
mail infrastructure that have been re-
moved, and that plans for adequate over-
time, which is critical for the timely deliv-
ery of mail, are not in the works.”
Lawmakers plan to question Mr. De-
Joy, who previously ran a logistics and
transportation company, at a Senate
committee hearing on Friday and at a
House oversight hearing on Monday.
House lawmakers are also expected to
vote Saturday on legislation that would
reverse the changes put into place by Mr.
DeJoy, prevent any further changes be-
fore the end of the pandemic and provide
$25 billion for the beleaguered agency,
with $15 million of that going to the Post-
al Service Office of Inspector General.
Top House Republicans, who con-
ferred on Wednesday by phone with
Mark Meadows, the White House chief of
staff, are formally urging members of the
conference to vote against the measure,
according to three people familiar with
the discussions.
Close to 100 Democrats called for Mr.
DeJoy’s removal from the position of
postmaster general, writing to the agen-
cy’s board of governors that Mr. DeJoy
“has already done considerable damage
to the institution, and we believe his con-
flicts of interest are insurmountable.”
Mr. Schumer, along with other Demo-
crats and some Republicans, have ex-
pressed concerns about the changes be-
ing put in place that have resulted in
some Americans going days or weeks
without receiving mail, including critical
medications and Social Security checks.
In a letter sent Wednesday to Robert
M. Duncan, the chairman of the board of
governors, Mr. Schumer demanded
Emily Cochrane, Hailey Fuchs and Ken-
neth P. Vogel reported from Washington,
and Jessica Silver-Greenberg from New
York. Nicholas Fandos, Catie Edmondson
and Alan Rappeport contributed report-
ing from Washington.
Citing Fraud, New Jersey Judge Orders a Revote
By TROY CLOSSON
In the days before New Jersey’s third-
largest city held municipal elections in
May entirely by mail, postal workers be-
came suspicious when they found hun-
dreds of ballots bundled together.
The discovery set off an investigation
that led to charges of voter fraud against
two local elected leaders and resulted in
nearly 20 percent of the ballots being re-
jected. It also prompted President
Trump to cite the case as an example of
how mail-in voting can corrupt elections,
though election experts staunchly dis-
agree.
On Wednesday, a New Jersey judge
ruled that the election in Paterson, N.J.,
had been irreversibly tainted and or-
dered a new vote held in November to
settle the race for the City Council seat.
The superior court judge, Ernest M.
Caposela, wrote that the election “was
not the fair, free and full expression of the
intent of the voters.”
His decision came one day after the
Trump campaign sued New Jersey over
its recent decision to conduct the No-
vember election almost entirely by mail
to keep people safe from the coronavirus.
The lawsuit claims that the move by
Gov. Philip D. Murphy, a Democrat, was
unconstitutional, arguing that the power
to change election rules lies with state
lawmakers, not the governor.
Mr. Trump’s campaign cited the Pater-
son corruption case as a reason not to ex-
pand voting by mail. “By ordering uni-
versal vote-by-mail, he has created a
A mail truck in the Bronx. Residents of some cities said they had gone weeks without mail since major operational changes were made to the Postal Service.
more details about Mr. DeJoy’s selection,
saying that the board had repeatedly de-
nied lawmakers’ requests to gain access
to that information.
Mr. Schumer said the postal board had
blocked lawmakers from questioning the
firm involved in the selection of Mr. De-
Joy, Russell Reynolds, by refusing to re-
lease the firm from a nondisclosure
agreement. Mr. Schumer said that his of-
fice had sought a briefing from Kimberly
Archer, a leader of the firm’s global non-
profit practice, and information from the
firm so “Congress could satisfy its
oversight obligations to better under-
Lawmakers called for
Louis DeJoy’s removal
as postmaster general.
stand the selection of Mr. DeJoy,” but that
the postal board in July had deemed
much of the information sought by law-
makers to be confidential.
“This administration has repeatedly
pointed to the role of Russell Reynolds to
defend the selection of a Republican
megadonor with no prior postal experi-
ence as postmaster general while at the
same time blocking the ability of Con-
gress to obtain briefings from the firm
and concealing the role of Secretary
Mnuchin and the White House in its
search process,” Mr. Schumer wrote, re-
ferring to Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury
secretary.
A spokesman for the Postal Service di-
recipe for disaster,” the suit said.
With more voters than ever eligible to
cast ballots by mail because of the out-
break, Mr. Trump has repeatedly
warned, without any evidence, that mail-
in ballots would lead to widespread fraud
and would call into question the results of
the November election.
But some election experts said it was
somewhat misleading to use the Pater-
son scandal as a cudgel to discredit mail-
in voting, noting that election fraud is ex-
tremely rare and, as the case in New Jer-
sey shows, is usually easy to detect.
Once votes were tallied after the May
12 special election in Paterson, William
McKoy, a 20-year incumbent city coun-
cilman, had lost by 240 votes. But after
he filed a lawsuit in June accusing Alex
Mendez, the person who defeated him, of
fraud, Judge Caposela ruled that no one
would be allowed to take office until the
case was resolved.
“There were so many problems that
came up that we were never going to be
able to come to a realistic answer of who
actually won,” said Scott Salmon, a law-
yer representing Mr. McKoy.
The state attorney general, Gurbir S.
Grewal, started an investigation and in
June charged four men, including Mr.
Mendez and another councilman, with
the unauthorized possession of ballots.
The two elected officials were accused of
delivering mail-in ballots that were not
theirs and of submitting voter registra-
tion applications for people who were not
eligible to vote.
All four men have denied any wrong-
rected inquiries about the search to a
news release announcing Mr. DeJoy’s se-
lection and to previous remarks by a
Postal Service governor, John M. Barger,
who has said candidates were exten-
sively vetted.
In an interview, Mr. Barger, who spear-
headed the search, said that the board’s
decision to select Mr. DeJoy was unani-
mous and included the board’s sole Dem-
ocrat at the time, Ron A. Bloom.
“Bloom was a strong yes,” Mr. Barger
said.
One Democratic member of the board,
David C. Williams, resigned in April,
shortly before the announcement of Mr.
DeJoy’s selection, over concerns that the
Postal Service was becoming increas-
ingly politicized by the Trump adminis-
tration, according to two people familiar
with his thinking.
Mr. Barger said he was “surprised” by
the resignation and had “never heard an
objection from David Williams about any
of the candidates, other than the ones we
did not hire.”
“I don’t recall him ever having ob-
jected to anything,” Mr. Barger said, “or I
would have asked him why. And it would
have been considered.” Mr. Williams is
expected to testify on Thursday before
lawmakers from the Congressional Pro-
gressive Caucus.
Mounting pressure prompted Mr. De-
Joy to backpedal on many of his changes,
saying post office hours would not be
shortened, mail-processing equipment
and mailboxes would remain, and over-
time would continue to be approved, as
needed. But state officials, postal work-
ers and union representatives said some
damage has already been done. Hun-
dreds of sorting machines, union officials
doing.
As the investigation unfolded, some
conservative groups seized on the more
than 3,000 ballots that were thrown out
to make the case that mail-in voting
makes it too easy to manipulate elections
by allowing ineligible voters, including
the dead, to vote.
“The defendants in the ballot fraud
case are not criminal masterminds,” a
writer at Judicial Watch, a conservative
organization that focuses on govern-
ment misconduct, wrote on the group’s
website. “Ballot fraud is easy.”
But officials in New Jersey argue that
what happened in Paterson was being
oversimplified and that the majority of
ballots were rejected because they had
been filled out incorrectly and not be-
cause they had been submitted illegally.
About 1,200 votes were disqualified be-
cause voters’ signatures did not match
those on file, according to the Passaic
County Board of Elections.
In New Jersey, voters can designate
someone to submit ballots on their be-
half, but no one is allowed to drop off
more than three during an election. As a
result, an additional 1,000 votes were dis-
qualified because a section on the ballot
to list the name of the person sending
them in had been left blank.
Only three ballots were thrown out be-
cause they had been cast in the names of
people who were dead, and another was
rejected because of suspicions that
someone might have tried to vote twice.
Voting experts say seizing on a rela-
tively small case involving a handful of
and workers said, have already been de-
stroyed.
Since the changes were put in place,
large institutional Postal Service
customers have reported mass mailings
routinely arriving at home addresses a
day or two later than their intended de-
livery date, said Michael Plunkett, the
president of the Association for Postal
Commerce, or PostCom.
His group represents catalog makers,
banks, phone companies and other busi-
nesses that produce and send large
quantities of mail. He attributed the de-
livery delays to the cutting of overtime
and truck trips between processing
plants and post offices.
“It appears as if they made these
changes without taking into account the
effect that it might have on service,” he
said.
More than 20 states announced Tues-
day that they would sue the Trump ad-
ministration over the changes, claiming
that they were unlawful, disadvantaged
residents and disenfranchised voters.
Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania’s attorney
general, who plans to file a lawsuit on be-
half of the state on Wednesday, said in an
interview that Mr. DeJoy’s changes have
caused delays for small businesses and
veterans and people who receive their
prescription medicines in the mail. In
some cases, he said that medicines that
require temperature control have taken
three times as long as usual to arrive, po-
tentially compromising their potency,
and that the delays have been particu-
larly problematic for veterans.
Mr. Shapiro said the state had found
evidence of mail left in boxes and trucks
because of cutbacks on overtime pay for
postal workers. The lawsuit will claim
JULIO CORTEZ/ASSOCIATED PRESS
people to tar efforts to make voting easi-
er has become a tactic to disenfranchise
voters.
“If these claims are true and these peo-
ple are saying they’ve seen voter fraud,
they need to produce what that looks
like,” said Amber McReynolds, the chief
executive of the National Vote at Home
Institute and Coalition, a nonpartisan
group focused on expanding access to
the ballot. “Every time I’ve ever asked
for that, nobody has ever given it to me.”
Mr. Murphy has also dismissed criti-
cisms that the Paterson scandal signals
larger issues with mail-in voting, argu-
ing that the rejected ballots show that
even a quickly rolled-out vote-by-mail
election can weed out ineligible votes.
A21
N
GEORGE ETHEREDGE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
that the changes are illegal because they
did not go through the normal postal reg-
ulatory commission process and are un-
dermining the right of Pennsylvanians to
vote.
“I want to see evidence and binding
agreements that roll back the illegal
changes they’ve already made and con-
crete commitments to not make any
other changes going forward that don’t
go through the regulatory process,” said
Mr. Shapiro, a Democrat.
A lawsuit filed Tuesday by Washington
and 13 other states included similar accu-
sations of delays and disenfranchise-
ment. Among the accusations contained
in the lawsuit: Baltimore residents have
gone weeks without mail, and dozens of
trailers filled with packages have been
left behind in the Milwaukee area. Rent,
food and child support checks have ar-
rived late. And seniors have received de-
layed Social Security checks, the lawsuit
states, adding that veterans have experi-
enced weekslong waits for medications.
In Connecticut, voters across the state
received their mail-in ballots after the
August primary. Many were postmarked
at a least a week or up to 10 days prior.
Some voters who requested ballots
weeks in advance received them too late
to return via mail.
Some Minneapolis residents also
found themselves without their ballots,
within days of the state’s primary.
The states maintain that they will con-
tinue their lawsuit until Mr. DeJoy
agrees to rescind all of the changes that
have resulted in widespread delays. Sev-
eral attorneys general said that they did
not trust that Mr. DeJoy would restore
the Postal Service to what it was before
his changes.
Gurbir S. Grewal, New Jersey’s attor-
ney general, charged four men after
postal workers found suspicious
ballots in Paterson, N.J., this spring.
On Wednesday, he fired back on Twit-
ter against the Trump campaign’s law-
suit, arguing that it was a “brazen at-
tempt to sow fear and confusion, and to
delegitimize our elections,” adding in an-
other post that “we will defend our rights
vigorously and we will not back down.
Bring it on.”
Paterson has had elections controver-
sies in the past. Concerns around poten-
tial voter fraud arose in 2018, after there
was a surge in the number of mail-in bal-
lots, though no evidence was found.
Eight years before that, a Paterson coun-
cilman and his wife were charged with
conspiring to collect and submit fraudu-
lent ballots during a 2010 local election.
Rick Hasen, an election law professor
at the University of California Irvine
School of Law, said the problems in Pat-
erson illustrate the challenges of mass
rollouts of mail-in voting and the need for
anti-fraud mechanisms like ballot track-
ing, which allows voters to follow their
ballots through the postal system.
But, he added, the case also shows
large-scale voting fraud would be diffi-
cult to successfully carry out.
“When you start tampering with ab-
sentee ballots, if you were doing it on a
large enough scale to try to influence an
election, it’s going to typically involve a
large number of moving parts,” Mr.
Hasen said. “It’s hard to keep conspira-
cies quiet and people will notice when
they go to vote.”
A22 N THE NEW YORK TIMES NATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
A charred area near Vacaville, Calif., where the fires now cover an area larger than Washington, D.C. California has had 6,754 fires this year, compared with about 4,000 at the same time last year.
Raging Fires Add to California’s August Torment of Heat and Virus
From Page A1
side Vacaville, northeast of San
Francisco, at 1 a.m. on Wednesday
as a wall of fire traveling down
hillsides threatened the cattle
ranch that has been in her family
since the 1860s. When wildfires
struck in past years, inmate fire
crews from nearby prisons
quickly arrived to help protect
homes. But this year, partly be-
cause of the coronavirus, the num-
ber of inmate crews has been
slashed. Some prisoners are un-
der quarantine and others were
released early to mitigate the
spread of the virus in prisons.
The fires, the power outages
and the threat of the coronavirus
have conspired to make 2020 the
worst year Ms. Kansas can re-
member.
“This year,” Ms. Kansas said.
“It’s just so horrible.”
On Wednesday, a helicopter pi-
lot taking part in firefighting oper-
ations in Fresno County died in a
crash while trying to drop water,
according to a Cal Fire spokes-
man.
The wildfires threatening Va-
caville are known together as the
L.N.U. Lightning Complex, and
have destroyed more than 50
homes and are threatening nearly
2,000 more buildings, the authori-
ties said.
West of Vacaville on Wednes-
day afternoon, houses along
Pleasants Valley Road were con-
sumed by flames, ash was flying
through the air and smoke poured
from vast rows of fire plodding
down forested hills.
In just 12 hours, from Tuesday
evening to Wednesday morning,
the area’s fires, which have in-
jured four people, grew more than
14,000 acres. They now cover
more than 46,000 acres in Napa,
Sonoma and Solano Counties —
larger than the size of Washing-
ton, D.C. — and are completely un-
contained.
California has had 6,754 fires
this year, Gov. Gavin Newsom
said on Wednesday, compared
with just more than 4,000 at the
same time last year.
But Mr. Newsom, who declared
a state of emergency on Tuesday
to access out-of-state resources,
emphasized that California was
painfully familiar with the chal-
lenges of a busy wildfire season,
and that officials have been brac-
ing for months. “This is what the
state does,” he said.
Mr. Newsom thanked other
governors for sending additional
resources, including Gov. Doug
Ducey of Arizona and Gov. Greg
Abbott of Texas. “We’re putting
everything we have on these
fires,” he said.
Mr. Newsom also mobilized the
California National Guard to as-
sist with relief efforts.
The cause of the fires is still un-
der investigation but many ap-
pear to have been started by an
unusually large number of light-
ning strikes over the weekend.
Reporting was contributed by
Kellen Browning from Davenport,
Calif.; Ivan Penn from Burbank,
Calif.; Jill Cowan from Los Ange-
les; Shawn Hubler from Sacra-
mento; Henry Fountain from Al-
buquerque; and Nicholas Bogel-
Burroughs, Lucy Tompkins and
Derrick Bryson Taylor from New
York.
Chief Jeremy Rahn, a Cal Fire
spokesman, said California had
experienced “a historic lightning
siege” over the past 72 hours that
resulted in about 11,000 lightning
strikes, igniting more than 367
new wildfires.
Even before the season began,
Mark Ghilarducci, the director of
the state’s office of emergency
services, said the pandemic was
bringing “an almost oppressive
level of complexity” to fire plan-
ning, from evacuation plans to re-
ductions in manpower, notably
among inmate fire crews. Cal Fire
said it usually had about 190 in-
mate fire crews but this year had
only 90 deployed or ready to de-
ploy. Inmates currently make up
about 1,300 of the 6,900 firefight-
ers deployed across the state.
While it is too early to say
whether climate change influ-
enced this heat wave, warming
linked to human-caused emis-
sions of greenhouse gases has
generally contributed to the
state’s worsening fires. Climate
change has also expanded the fire
season, once largely confined
from August to November, to
nearly year-round.
“And if that’s not bad enough,”
Mr. Ghilarducci said, “now we
have to deal with a worldwide
pandemic. In a fire season. With
the power off. What else do you
want from us?”
New fire precautions were an-
nounced in July by Mr. Newsom.
Among them: protocols to beef up
fire crews and to prevent the virus
from spreading in evacuation cen-
ters. The new evacuation rules in-
clude health screenings upon en-
try to a shelter, extra cleaning,
prepackaged meals, cordoning off
evacuees with coronavirus symp-
toms, and the repurposing of col-
lege dorms, Airbnb houses, camp-
grounds and hotels into evacua-
tion shelters.
“We have to think differently,”
Mr. Ghilarducci said. “We know
sticking everybody into a big
room at a fairground isn’t going to
work this year.”
In Riverside, Nevada and Con-
tra Costa Counties, dozens of
evacuated families are being sent
first to emergency hotel lodging
rather than to the high school
gyms that usually serve as evacu-
ation centers.
In the coastal town of
Pescadero, south of San Fran-
cisco, authorities used the high
school as an evacuation center on
Wednesday. Normally, cots would
be set up for people to spend the
night. But no one is allowed inside
now, so aid workers have been set-
ting up displaced residents at
nearby hotels.
Rita Mancera, the executive di-
rector of Puente, a social services
organization helping evacuees,
said people have been bringing
their pigs, turkeys, goats, cows
and horses to the school parking
lot.
Masked volunteers were hand-
ing out water, food and hand sani-
tizer. People waiting at the school
have to sit outside or in their cars.
Dealing with the evacuees during
a pandemic was “kind of over-
whelming,” Ms. Mancera said.
“We’re asking people to be social
distanced.”
Power cuts have added an extra
layer of complexity to the multiple
crises in the state.
Mr. Newsom blamed a lack of
MAX WHITTAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
planning in an angry letter to the
energy agencies on Monday.
“Collectively, energy regulators
failed to anticipate this event and
to take necessary actions to en-
sure reliable power to Californi-
ans,” Mr. Newsom said, adding,
“This cannot stand.”
The state’s electrical grid is
deep in transition from a fossil-
fuel-driven system to one increas-
ingly reliant on renewable energy.
Dozens of workhorse power
plants have been shuttered. Some
had grown old, inefficient and en-
vironmentally hazardous to the
air and marine life. Others proved
uneconomical as the state pushed
carbon-free sources like solar and
wind.
With the threat of even more de-
structive and aggressive fires in
the fall, when faster winds propel
them across the parched land-
scape, some health officials are
concerned that smoke pollution
could make people more suscepti-
ble to respiratory infections like
Covid-19.
MAX WHITTAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
The fires in California are al-
ready spreading smoke across a
wide region, with the National
Weather Service’s Bay Area office
warning that air quality in the
area will be “very poor for the
foreseeable future.”
In many parts of the Bay Area,
the air quality index, a measure of
the level of air pollution, was
higher than 200 on Wednesday.
That number is high compared
with other cities known for poor
air quality like New Delhi, which
had an index of 154, and Beijing,
where that number has hovered
around 150 this week. The air
quality index scale goes up to 500,
but anything above 100 is consid-
ered unhealthy, and above 200 is
“very unhealthy,” says the Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency.
Studies have also shown that in
areas with poor air quality, people
are more likely to die if they con-
tract the coronavirus.
Solano County, which includes
Vacaville and has about 450,000
residents, has been averaging
about 76 new cases a day over the
last two weeks, according to a
MAX WHITTAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES New York Times database.
For some Vacaville residents,
losing power made the situation
even more treacherous. As a wild-
fire approached his home, Philip
Galbraith did not receive any type
of alert when his power shut off on
Tuesday night. He assumed it was
part of intentional blackouts
meant to lower power usage.
Then a neighbor began “desper-
ately banging” on his door, alert-
ing him to the evacuation.
At 2:45 a.m. he fled.
“I got out of the house, in pretty
much what I had on,” he said. “I
got my son and we left.”
A two-hour drive southwest, in
Pescadero, Lynne Bowman ges-
tured to the trailer where she
slept.
“This is where I live now,” Ms.
Bowman said. She, her husband
and her daughter evacuated their
house on Tuesday in 45 minutes,
bringing clothes, jewelry and
their two dogs, Viggo and Hedy.
Just days earlier, Ms. Bowman
was celebrating her daughter’s
wedding, a 20-person socially dis-
JIM WILSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES tanced affair. Now, she is contem-
plating the confluence of cata-
Friends working to save a home in Vacaville, top. Deer fleeing a blaze, center. A fire caused by
strophic events in the area.
lightning razed a house, above. A Cal Fire spokesman said the state had experienced “a historic “Yeah, pandemic, fire,” she said.
lightning siege” over 72 hours that resulted in about 11,000 lightning strikes, igniting more than “I mean, it is apocalyptic in many
367 new wildfires. Because of the pandemic, there are fewer prison inmate fire crews to help. ways.”

Senators Detail Trump’s Calls, Renewing Questions
By JULIAN E. BARNES
WASHINGTON — More than
200 pages into a sprawling,
1,000-page report on Russian
election interference, the Senate
NEWS
Intelligence Com-
mittee made a
startling conclusion
ANALYSIS
endorsed by both
Republicans and
Democrats: Donald J. Trump
knew of and discussed stolen
Democratic emails at critical
points late in his 2016 presiden-
tial campaign.
The Republican-led committee
rejected Mr. Trump’s statement
to prosecutors investigating
Russia’s interference that he did
not recall conversations with his
longtime friend Roger J. Stone Jr.
about the emails, which were
later released by WikiLeaks.
Senators leveled a blunt assess-
ment: “Despite Trump’s recollec-
tion, the committee assesses that
Trump did, in fact, speak with
Stone about WikiLeaks and with
members of his campaign about
Stone’s access to WikiLeaks on
multiple occasions.”
The senators did not accuse
Mr. Trump of lying in their re-
port, released Tuesday, the fifth
and final volume from a three-
year investigation that laid out
extensive contacts between
Trump advisers and Russians.
But the report detailed even
more of the president’s conversa-
tions with Mr. Stone than were
previously known, renewing
questions about whether Mr.
Trump was truthful with investi-
gators for the special counsel,
Robert S. Mueller III, or misled
them, much as prosecutors con-
vinced jurors that Mr. Stone
himself misled congressional
investigators about his efforts to
contact WikiLeaks.
The committee’s doubts are
significant because the stolen
emails were one of the major
operations in Russia’s 2016 as-
sault on American democracy,
and a central question that re-
mains even after years of intense
scrutiny is what the Trump cam-
paign knew, if anything, about
the Kremlin’s plans. Mr. Stone, a
onetime campaign adviser who
promoted his connections to
WikiLeaks to other Trump aides,
has maintained that he did not
know Russia was behind the
stolen emails.
But the Senate report made
clear that WikiLeaks, at least,
“very likely” knew the emails
Sharon LaFraniere and Nicholas
Fandos contributed reporting.
Big Tech Firms Tighten
Grip on Flailing Economy
By PETER EAVIS
and STEVE LOHR
American tech titans flew high
before the coronavirus pandemic,
making billions of dollars a year.
Now, the upheaval has lifted
them to new heights, putting the
industry in a position to dominate
American business in a way un-
seen since the days of railroads.
A rally in technology stocks ele-
vated the S&P 500 stock index to a
record high on Tuesday even as
the pandemic crushes the broader
economy. The stocks of Apple,
Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and
Facebook, the five largest publicly
traded companies in America,
rose 37 percent in the first seven
months this year, while all the
other stocks in the S&P 500 fell a
combined 6 percent, according to
Credit Suisse.
Those five companies now con-
stitute 20 percent of the stock
market’s total worth, a level not
seen from a single industry in at
least 70 years. Apple’s stock mar-
ket value, the highest of the
bunch, reached $2 trillion on
Wednesday — double what it was
just 21 weeks ago.
The tech companies’ domi-
nance of the stock market is pro-
pelled by their unprecedented
reach into our lives, shaping how
we work, communicate, shop and
relax. That has only deepened
during the pandemic, and as peo-
ple shop more frequently on Ama-
zon, click on a Google or Facebook
ad or pay up for an iPhone, the
companies receive a greater
share of spending in the economy
and earn ever larger profits. This
is why investors have flocked to
those stocks this year at the ex-
pense of the scores of companies
struggling in the health crisis, and
are betting that their position will
be unassailable for years.
“Covid was the perfect positive
storm for these guys,” said Thom-
as Philippon, a professor of fi-
nance at New York University.
The companies’ deeper en-
croachment into American lives
can be seen in web traffic num-
bers for Alphabet, Facebook and
Amazon, which own the four most
visited sites in the country. The
traffic on these sites was immense
before the pandemic, but daily vis-
its increased sharply in March,
when stay-at-home orders began,
with Facebook up 15 percent and
YouTube 10 percent, according to
SimilarWeb, an online data
provider.
A Senate panel’s report said that Donald J. Trump discussed stol-
en Democratic emails with his friend Roger J. Stone Jr. in 2016.
were coming from Russian intel-
ligence, and that Mr. Stone knew
about the most critical Wiki-
Leaks release before it hap-
pened.
Mr. Stone categorically denied
that he had ever discussed Wiki-
Leaks with Mr. Trump. “The
report is rife with inaccuracies,”
Mr. Stone said in an interview on
Wednesday. He said he had
counted 1,098 mentions of his
name in the report and footnotes
and was about halfway through
reviewing them.
The Intelligence Committee
provided new details about con-
versations between the two men
in 2016, including calls in late
September and early October as
chatter intensified about Russia’s
operations and WikiLeaks’ plans.
Ultimately, the site released
hacked Democratic emails on
Oct. 7, 2016, about an hour after
the presidential race was up-
ended by The Washington Post’s
publication of archived “Access
Hollywood” footage of Mr. Trump
boasting about assaulting wom-
en.
Notably, the evidence was
enough for senators in the presi-
dent’s own party to sign off on a
report suggesting that he may
have stonewalled prosecutors
and clearly laid out evidence of
cooperation between a high-
ranking member of the Trump
campaign — its onetime chair-
man Paul Manafort — and a
Russian intelligence officer.
Despite voting to endorse and
release the reports, Republicans
were reluctant to discuss it pub-
licly. Aides to Senator Marco
Rubio of Florida, the acting
chairman of the committee, and
Senator Richard M. Burr of
North Carolina, his predecessor,
The web traffic has held steady
at the higher plateau, with more
than one billion daily visits to the
big four sites in the United States
alone. And the same pattern is evi-
dent worldwide. Facebook re-
ported that the number of daily
users of its services globally in
June was 12 percent higher than a
year earlier.
Amazon’s business, already
towering over competitors in e-
commerce and cloud computing,
has become even more important
to businesses and households. Its
stock is up over 50 percent from
its pre-pandemic high, underscor-
ing just how much investors think
it has benefited from the disrup-
tion.
Critics say the companies have
grown in part because of a range
of anticompetitive practices. Eu-
ropean regulators are investigat-
ing whether Apple’s App Store
breaks competition rules. Ameri-
can regulators are looking at
whether large tech firms commit-
ted antitrust abuses when acquir-
ing other companies. Some an-
titrust scholars believe the rise of
industry-dominating companies
has led to stagnant wages and in-
creased inequality. Last month,
tech chief executives were grilled
by members of the House Judicia-
ry antitrust subcommittee.
“Any single action by one of
these companies can affect hun-
dreds of millions of us in profound
and lasting ways,” said Repre-
sentative David Cicilline, a Rhode
Island Democrat, in his opening
statement at the hearing. “Simply
put: They have too much power.”
According to some competition
experts, the concentration in
some industries is greater today
than in the late 1800s, when Con-
gress passed sweeping antitrust
legislation to curb the power of the
railroads.
Jan Eeckhout, an economics
professor at Pompeu Fabra Uni-
versity in Barcelona, Spain, said
that in 1929, Sears and A.&P. ac-
counted for 3 percent of retail
sales, a situation that stirred up
concern in Congress and helped
give rise to additional antitrust
laws in 1936.
Today, he said, Walmart and
Amazon jointly account for 15 per-
cent of retail sales.
In a recent study, researchers at
the RAND Corporation used pub-
lic filings, other data and statis-
tical inference techniques to mod-
el the connections among top
THE NEW YORK TIMES NATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES
who stepped down after the
F.B.I. began investigating his
stock trades, declined interview
requests to discuss the issue on
Wednesday.
Senator Jim Risch of Idaho, a
Republican and the lone law-
maker to vote against the report,
said the findings could not prove
what had happened in 2016,
including Mr. Trump’s state-
ments about WikiLeaks and his
conversations with Mr. Stone.
“Yes, I disagree with the re-
port’s ‘assessment,’ as there was
no factual substantiation of it,” he
said in a statement. “The report
assumes much.”
Aides for the five other Repub-
licans on the committee said
their bosses were unavailable or
did not respond to requests for
comment.
The findings of the Senate
report also raised new questions
about Mr. Trump’s decision last
month to commute the sentence
of Mr. Stone, who was convicted
last year of seven felonies in a
bid to thwart a separate congres-
sional inquiry that threatened
the president. Mr. Stone denied
that he or his lawyers had ever
discussed a pardon or commuta-
tion with Mr. Trump in return for
not speaking against him. “Si-
lence about what? Categorically
false,” he said. “I comport with
his claim that we did not discuss
WikiLeaks because we did not.”
The report also served as a
reminder that Mr. Mueller did
not subpoena Mr. Trump, instead
accepting written answers.
Over all, the Senate report was
a bipartisan endorsement of the
finding that Russia tried to inter-
vene in 2016 on behalf of Mr.
Trump’s election and that the
campaign welcomed the assist-
companies. Its leading example
was Amazon, with its e-commerce
marketplace used by thousands of
retailers and its cloud computing
arm, Amazon Web Services, pow-
ering so many online businesses.
On a typical work-from-home
day, a person might communicate
with colleagues using Slack, at-
tend videoconferences on Zoom,
order takeout food via DoorDash
and in the evening watch a movie
on Netflix, said Jonathan Wel-
burn, a lead author on the RAND
study. All of them run their busi-
nesses on Amazon Web Services.
“Amazon is a very central dig-
ital hub, and it epitomizes the di-
rection our economy has taken,”
Mr. Welburn said.
The growing importance of
cloud computing, the digital en-
gine rooms of the modern econ-
omy, shows how tech firms are
building on their dominance.
Global spending on cloud comput-
ing rose 33 percent to more than
$30 billion in the second quarter,
according to Synergy Research.
To be a full-service cloud
provider like Amazon, Microsoft
and Google is an immensely ex-
ance.
The bipartisan Senate report
was likely to be the last word
from an official government
inquiry about Russia’s election
sabotage operations. But the
Justice Department is scrutiniz-
ing its own inquiry into the elec-
tion interference, and Attorney
General William P. Barr has long
publicly criticized the work of
national security officials trying
in 2016 to understand Russia’s
efforts to sway the election in Mr.
Trump’s favor and any links to
his campaign.
On Friday, the prosecutor
whom Mr. Barr appointed to
examine the earlier inquiry, John
H. Durham, is expected to inter-
view John O. Brennan, the C.I.A.
director in 2016, according to a
person familiar with elements of
the investigation. Mr. Durham
has asked witnesses about Mr.
Brennan’s work on the intelli-
gence assessment that concluded
President Vladimir V. Putin of
Russia favored Mr. Trump’s
election, other people familiar
with the inquiry have said.
Judd Deere, a White House
spokesman, reasserted his com-
ment from a day earlier that the
Senate report affirmed the find-
ings of other inquiries that there
was “absolutely no collusion
between the Trump campaign
and Russia.”
Mr. Deere compared the report
to Mr. Mueller’s findings in
claiming exoneration for Mr.
Trump. While the two reports
have broad similarities, and
neither exonerated the president,
there are important differences.
Both teams of investigators
largely worked with the same
classified material from the
intelligence agencies. Mr. Muel-
ler’s team approached it as pros-
ecutors, requiring evidence more
in line with what would be usable
in a courtroom. In contrast,
Senate investigators looked at
the material more like intelli-
gence analysts who work with
partial information to make
conclusions and create a mosaic
of the broader picture.
That approach allowed the
Senate investigators to draw
sharper conclusions than Mr.
Mueller’s team did — for exam-
ple, labeling Mr. Manafort’s
longtime associate Konstantin V.
Kilimnik as a Russian intelli-
gence officer.
It also helped enable the Sen-
ate committee to include conclu-
sions and material not presented
in either the Mueller report or at
the trial of Mr. Stone, such as an
intriguing phone call on Oct. 6,
pensive endeavor. Each spends an
estimated $10 billion to $15 billion
a year on its data centers and
cloud networks, said John Dins-
dale, chief analyst at Synergy.
That is just the capital-spending
table stakes to compete. Only a
handful of companies in the world
can afford them.
The companies say their huge
spending helps the U.S. economy
and ends up lowering prices.
“Our engineers are helping
America remain a global leader in
emerging technologies like artifi-
cial intelligence, self-driving cars
and quantum computing,” Sundar
Pichai, Google’s chief executive,
said in his prepared testimony at
the recent House hearing. “Com-
petition drives us to innovate, and
it also leads to better products,
lower prices and more choices for
everyone.”
In his testimony, Tim Cook, Ap-
ple’s chief executive, asserted that
Apple did not have a dominant
share of any market in which it did
business.
And during an earnings call in
July, Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s
chief executive, said his company
2016, to Mr. Trump.
According to the Senate re-
port, Mr. Stone received a call
that afternoon from a number
belonging to an aide to Mr.
Trump, who regularly used oth-
ers’ phones to make calls. The
topic of the conversation was not
known, Senate investigators
wrote, but they noted that Mr.
Stone was focused on a potential
WikiLeaks release.
“Given these facts,” the report
said, “it appears quite likely that
Stone and Trump spoke about
WikiLeaks.”
The committee laid out a range
of evidence that Mr. Stone was
focused on WikiLeaks. He and
Mr. Trump had spoken a few
days earlier, on Sept. 29, also on
the aide’s phone. Another cam-
paign aide, Rick Gates, wit-
nessed it and told investigators
that the two men discussed Wiki-
Leaks. After that call, Mr. Trump
told Mr. Gates that “more releas-
es of damaging information
would be coming.”
From March to November
2016, court records showed, Mr.
Stone had 39 calls with Mr.
Trump.
Mr. Stone said the Senate
conclusion that he had discussed
WikiLeaks with the president
was based solely on testimony by
Mr. Gates and Mr. Trump’s for-
mer lawyer Michael D. Cohen.
Mr. Stone called their testimony
tainted by agreements with
prosecutors to answer their
questions.
In September, three days be-
fore the call with Mr. Trump, Mr.
Stone told Mr. Manafort, who had
by then left the campaign, that
hacked emails of Hillary Clin-
ton’s campaign chairman would
be leaked.
And after he learned about the
release of the damaging “Access
Hollywood” tape, Mr. Stone, the
report said, hoped the release of
those emails would be timed to
counter it.
On the same day that the tape
came out, American intelligence
officials announced that the
Russian government had “di-
rected the compromise of
emails” of Americans and U.S.
political organizations.
But that warning, overshad-
owed by the tape, did not stop
the Trump campaign from mak-
ing use of the WikiLeaks disclo-
sures and minimizing or dismiss-
ing the Russian involvement,
according to the Senate report.
“The Trump campaign consid-
ered the release of these ma-
terials to be its ‘October sur-
prise,’ ” the report said.
NICK LITTLE
could not indefinitely thrive while
the rest of the economy and other
industries struggled. “The world
needs to do well for us to do well in
the long run,” he said.
It is still possible for new com-
panies to make inroads. Users of
Zoom, the videoconferencing
company, have ballooned during
the pandemic, and its stock is up
over 150 percent since the end of
February. And TikTok shows that
it is still possible to build a highly
popular social media app, though
Microsoft may soon acquire it.
Of course, the searing rally in
the stocks could be the result of
excessive optimism and the
stocks could fall. But if the Big
Five keep reporting huge profits,
they should still make up an out-
size share of the overall market. In
the 12 months through the end of
June, they earned nearly $500
million a day in net income com-
bined.
“The stock market has the great
advantage that it’s looking at the
stream of future profits,” Mr. Phil-
ippon said. “They think they are
high today — and going to remain
very high in the future.”
N A23
$600 Million
For Victims
Of Lead
In Flint Water
By JULIE BOSMAN
The State of Michigan is ex-
pected to pay about $600 million
to victims of the Flint water crisis,
according to two people with
knowledge of a major settlement
that is set to be announced this
week.
The money would largely be
designated for children in Flint
who were poisoned by lead-
tainted tap water after officials
changed the city’s water supply
six years ago, setting off a crisis
that drew national attention and
remains a worry for many resi-
dents.
Details of the settlement were
not released and lawyers and pub-
lic officials involved in the case de-
clined to comment on Wednesday
night. But tens of thousands of
Flint residents were expected to
be eligible to receive money under
the settlement, which is subject to
approval by a federal judge in
Michigan.
The individual amounts re-
ceived from the settlement would
depend on Flint residents’ degree
of suffering and damage from
drinking the water.
The settlement is the culmina-
tion of more than 18 months of ne-
gotiations, meant to answer a dif-
ficult question for the residents of
a city battered by catastrophe:
What are the victims of the Flint
water crisis owed?
In 2014, as a cost-saving meas-
Michigan has agreed
to the payout,
concluding 18 months
of negotiations.
ure for a city in deep financial dis-
tress, officials in Flint, led by a
state-appointed emergency man-
ager, switched the city’s water
supply from Lake Huron to the no-
toriously foul Flint River. Officials
failed to add corrosion controls to
the tap water, investigations later
found, allowing lead and other
chemicals to leach from the old,
worn pipes into the drinking sup-
ply.
It did not take long before Flint
residents knew there was some-
thing terribly wrong with their
water. It tasted metallic and often
appeared to be green or light
brown. Many people began feeling
ill and experiencing skin rashes,
hair loss and other mysterious
symptoms.
But when they confronted
elected officials and demonstrat-
ed outside City Hall, their pleas
were dismissed.
Months later, testing showed in-
creased and alarming levels of
lead in the blood of some Flint chil-
dren. Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a
local pediatrician, and other sci-
entists and researchers raised
warnings that were initially disre-
garded by state and local officials.
In fall 2015, in the face of over-
whelming evidence, Gov. Rick
Snyder of Michigan acknowl-
edged that the water was not fine.
In the years since, the city and
the state have taken steps to help
Flint residents recover.
The water source in Flint was
switched back to Lake Huron wa-
ter, which is treated in Detroit. But
in Flint, it is still common to use
bottled water for cooking, drink-
ing and even bathing, since suspi-
cion of government officials runs
high.
Some of the work to repair pipes
in Flint remains unfinished. Last
week, Mayor Sheldon Neeley an-
nounced that the multiyear
project to replace lead service
lines was in its final phase, with
fewer than 2,500 Flint homes
awaiting line replacement. The
project, financed in an $87 million
settlement with the State of Michi-
gan, was originally promised to be
completed by January 2020. It
was paused again this spring be-
cause of the coronavirus pan-
demic and restarted in June.
Last year, Attorney General
Dana Nessel announced that her
office was dropping pending crim-
inal cases against government of-
ficials who were implicated in the
scandal, but she pledged to contin-
ue investigating. Her office has
not filed additional charges since.
Thousands of Flint residents
have filed lawsuits against the
state.
Two court-appointed mediators
helped the parties reach an agree-
ment: former Senator Carl Levin
of Michigan and Judge Pamela
Harwood, who is retired from the
Wayne County Circuit Court.
Anyone who was living in Flint
between 2014 and 2016 could be el-
igible for a claim. The payments
are expected to be distributed be-
ginning in spring 2021.
Kathleen Gray contributed
reporting.
A24 N THE NEW YORK TIMES NATIONAL THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Wayne LaPierre, the National Rifle Association’s longtime leader, remains popular despite reports of financial mismanagement.
Insider’s Book Calls N.R.A. ‘Rife With Fraud’
By DANNY HAKIM
This month, the National Rifle
Association was sued by the New
York attorney general, who is
seeking to dissolve the organiza-
tion and said top executives had
“looted” it. Now the N.R.A., which
has faced two years of turmoil and
infighting, is confronting a new
adversary from within its own
senior ranks.
Josh Powell, one of the group’s
highest-ranking former execu-
tives, is poised to release “Inside
the NRA: A Tell-All Account of
Corruption, Greed and Paranoia
Within the Most Powerful Political
Group in America.” Mr. Powell,
former chief of staff to Wayne
LaPierre, the group’s longtime
chief executive, says the N.R.A. is
“rife with fraud and corruption”
and writes that its finances “are in
shambles,” and that “it has operat-
ed in the red for the past three
years, despite annual revenues of
roughly $350 million.”
The book, to be published Sept.
8 by Twelve, a division of Hachette
Book Group, will arrive as Mr.
LaPierre and the N.R.A. are fight-
ing for their survival.
Both Mr. LaPierre and Mr. Pow-
ell, who for a time was seen as the
N.R.A.’s de facto second-in-com-
mand, are named defendants in
the suit brought by the attorney
general, Letitia James, who has
special jurisdiction because the
N.R.A. was founded in New York.
Beyond aiming to shut down the
gun group, the suit seeks to re-
move Mr. LaPierre — who is ac-
cused of using millions of dollars
of N.R.A. money to fund an extrav-
agant lifestyle — and to bar both
him and Mr. Powell from serving
on nonprofit boards in the state.
Mr. Powell was assailed in the
attorney general’s complaint,
which said he was fired in Decem-
ber “for falsifying his travel ex-
penses.” A lawyer for Mr. Powell
has said that allegations in the suit
“will be shown to be the result of
false accusations made by Wayne
LaPierre and others.” And Mr.
Powell said he walked away from
“a substantial severance pack-
age” because the N.R.A. wanted
him to sign “a nondisclosure
agreement, which I declined.”
Carolyn Meadows, the presi-
dent of the N.R.A., said in a state-
ment “It’s not surprising Mr. Pow-
ell would try to save his failing ca-
reer by peddling fiction about the
N.R.A. I doubt this is a book peo-
ple will read, much less believe.”
Excerpts from Mr. Powell’s
book provide an insider’s view
into the N.R.A.
He writes about the day of the
2012 massacre at an elementary
Corrections
INTERNATIONAL
An article on Friday about
Beirut’s Shiite community mis-
stated when Lebanon’s power-
sharing system was put in place.
It was in existence before the
country’s civil war; it was not
adopted after the war. The article
also overstated what is known
about the country’s demographic
composition. No reliable census
data on the current population is
available; it is not clear whether
Shiites represent the largest sect
of Islam in the country.
NATIONAL
Because of an editing error, an
article on Monday about a sharp
increase in the cost of U.S. natu-
ralization misstated the amount
Contact the Newsroom:
nytnews@nytimes.com
or call 1-844-NYT-NEWS
(1-844-698-6397).
MICHAEL M. SANTIAGO/GETTY IMAGES
school in Newtown, Conn. — be-
fore he had even joined the
N.R.A.’s leadership — and de-
scribes a conversation with Tony
Makris, a senior executive at Ack-
erman McQueen, which was the
N.R.A.’s longtime advertising firm
until a bitter legal fight between
the two organizations began last
year.
“Get ready,” Mr. Powell writes
that the executive told him. “This
is going to be the mother of all
gunfights. It’s really bad. There
are still dead kids on the floor.
Watch and learn. If we do this
right the members will go nuts.”
Mr. Makris, in a statement
through his lawyer, said, “A simple
Google search will reveal all you
need to know about Josh Powell.”
Ackerman has previously said in
court filings that its executives re-
fused to work with Mr. Powell and
accused him of sexually harassing
one of its employees; a statement
from Mr. Powell’s lawyer said no
legal claim regarding harassment
had ever been brought. (He was
also once the subject of a sex dis-
crimination complaint from an
N.R.A. employee.)
After the Newtown massacre,
Mr. Powell writes, “membership
money and donations were an
by which fees for naturalization
applications could rise under a
proposed plan. They would rise to
$1,170, or $1,160 for online applica-
tions, not vice versa.
ARTS
A list of museum executives with
an article on Tuesday about the
salaries of museum directors
incorrectly included Kevin M.
Rudd for the Asia Society. While
Mr. Rudd is president of the Asia
Society Policy Institute, a part of
the society, he is not an executive
of its museum and has no role in
its operations.
Errors are corrected during the press
run whenever possible, so some errors
noted here may not have appeared in
all editions.
Editorials: letters@nytimes.com
Newspaper Delivery:
customercare@nytimes.com or call
1-800-NYTIMES (1-800-698-4637).
MICHAEL A. MCCOY FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Josh Powell, Mr. LaPierre’s
former chief of staff, has writ-
ten a book criticizing the
group. Letitia James, the New
York attorney general, left, has
named both Mr. Powell and
Mr. LaPierre in a lawsuit.
open spigot,” adding that “if we
needed more, Wayne would just
pour ‘gasoline on the fire,’ as he
put it.”
The organization was working
“to create and fuel the toxicity of
the gun debate until it became out-
right explosive,” he writes. “We
only knew one speed and one di-
rection: Sell the fear.” He adds, “It
worked to excite the most ex-
treme faction of our membership
— they ate it up.”
The book is the latest in a series
of challenges for Mr. LaPierre, the
most influential voice in the gun
movement, who built the N.R.A.
into a cultural and lobbying jug-
gernaut. In the last couple of
years, he fought off an effort to
oust him at the N.R.A.’s conven-
tion in the spring of 2019; clung to
power for more than a year amid
allegations of corruption; and
Revealing details
about finances and
crisis response.
pushed out the organization’s top
lobbyist, its president, its adver-
tising firm and several board
members.
Such have been the N.R.A.’s tra-
vails that its longtime accounting
firm, RSM, severed ties last year,
people informed of the move said.
RSM declined to comment.
Experts in New York charity
law see Mr. LaPierre’s removal as
all but a foregone conclusion, and
say that without him at the helm,
the N.R.A. has a better chance at
avoiding dissolution. But the
N.R.A.’s lawyers adamantly dis-
agree, and a legal battle could take
years. The organization’s sprawl-
ing 76-person board appears to be
sticking behind Mr. LaPierre, and
membership has surged.
“The board members that I’ve
spoken to certainly continue to
support Wayne; no one was sur-
prised by this, and every board
member I’ve spoken to is ready to
fight,” Todd Rathner, a lobbyist
from Arizona who is on the board,
said in an interview.
He added that he had “heard
that support from gun owners has
been extraordinary,” as the N.R.A.
moved swiftly to rally the faithful.
An N.R.A. video posted on Twitter
the day after the suit was filed,
featuring video clips of Ms. James
and scored with ominous-sound-
ing music, urged viewers to
“stand and fight” and become
members. The group, which has
more than five million members,
added roughly 50,000 to its ranks
in the week after the lawsuit was
announced.
MARK PETERSON/REDUX
Ms. James, who called the
N.R.A. a “terrorist organization”
when she ran for attorney general
in 2018, sent a new fund-raising
email shortly after filing the com-
plaint, promising to pursue
“abuses of trust and unchecked
greed run amok,” without specifi-
cally referring to the N.R.A.
But Mr. Powell writes that “the
waste and dysfunction at the
N.R.A. was staggering, costing
the organization and its members
hundreds of millions of dollars
over the years.”
“What I witnessed during my
time at the N.R.A. should horrify
every gun owner and Second
Amendment advocate,” he said in
a statement. “Wayne La Pierre
oversees his evil circus at the ex-
pense of all those Americans who
are lawful gun owners and dues-
paying N.R.A. members.”
Mr. Powell declined to discuss
the attorney general’s lawsuit,
which depicted him as a failed
businessman with a trail of law-
suits, who had “routine disregard”
for N.R.A. policies regarding ex-
penses and contracts, and who
was known for “abusive behavior
towards N.R.A. and vendor staff.”
Among the accusations leveled at
him is that a consulting firm hired
by the N.R.A. paid Mr. Powell’s
wife $30,000 a month as an inde-
pendent contractor, that he “took
affirmative steps to hide the con-
flict,” and that he interceded to
have his father hired as a photog-
rapher for N.R.A. events, accord-
ing to the complaint.
A statement from Mr. Powell’s
lawyer, provided earlier this
month, said he had been “fired by
Wayne LaPierre and the N.R.A.’s
lawyers for his efforts to correct
much of the misconduct cited in
the attorney general’s complaint.”
The lawsuit seeks tens of mil-
lions of dollars in restitution from
Mr. LaPierre and Mr. Powell, as
well as from John Frazer, the
N.R.A.’s general counsel, and Wil-
son Phillips, a former chief finan-
cial officer.
The depth of detail in the law-
suit is formidable. Mr. LaPierre is
accused of using N.R.A. money to
pay $13.5 million to a personal
travel consultant over six and a
half years; to cover $1 million in
costs ferrying his family on pri-
vate flights, without him; and for
frequent trips to the Bahamas.
There, he allegedly made use of an
N.R.A. contractor’s lavish yacht
called “Illusions.” He once spent
more than $12,000 to put his niece
up at a Four Seasons hotel for
eight nights, according to the com-
plaint.
“It’s inconceivable that he’ll be
permitted to stay, and he’ll have a
substantial amount of money to
repay,” said Daniel Kurtz, a former
chief of the charities bureau at the
attorney general’s office, the divi-
sion handling the case.
Sean Delany, another former
chief of the bureau, said that if the
attorney general “is able to prove
even a fraction of the catalog of
self-dealing and fraud that is recit-
ed in the complaint, it is impossi-
ble to see any court leaving
LaPierre (or the other officers) in
their positions.”
Shortly after the filing by Ms.
James’s office, the N.R.A. hit back
with a federal suit, claiming that
the action brought by the attorney
general was politically motivated
and violated the gun group’s First
Amendment rights.
“The so-called ‘experts’ know
nothing about this case,” said
Charles Cotton, the first vice pres-
ident of the N.R.A., in a statement
sent through the organization’s
lawyers. “Many have been wrong-
fully predicting and, frankly, hop-
ing for our demise for decades.”
Mr. LaPierre, he added, is “not go-
ing anywhere.”
Trump Cites His Record
On Veterans. Problems
Are Actually Expanding.
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
WASHINGTON — As he cam-
paigns for a second term, Presi-
dent Trump brags about few
things more consistently than his
record on veterans affairs. Among
his signature lines: “No one has
done more for veterans than me.”
But nearly four years into his
promises to fix systemic problems
at the Department of Veterans Af-
fairs, charges of sexism, inepti-
tude and other flaws remain.
Mr. Trump’s signature plan to
expand veteran access to health
care outside the department’s
own health care centers has been
hobbled by the coronavirus pan-
demic.
His secretary of veterans af-
fairs, Robert L. Wilkie, has been
ensnared in an investigation into
whether he used his authority to
discredit a female veteran who
said she was assaulted at a veter-
ans health center in Washington,
D.C. Complaints of harassment at
veterans centers by female veter-
ans remain high.
Black workers recently accused
leaders of the Kansas City V.A. of
fostering a culture of racism. And
as calls from Black veterans and
active-duty members of the
armed forces to remove the
names of Confederate officers
from military bases have grown
louder, Mr. Wilkie’s own history of
insensitive remarks have resur-
faced, including those describing
the president of the confederacy,
Jefferson Davis, as a victim of
Northern aggression. He also
gave a vigorous defense of Nazi
headstones at veterans cemeter-
ies before bowing to pressure to
remove them.
While some of Mr. Trump’s
promises to ferret out corruption
at the department have come to
pass, other forms have taken root,
including at a new office formed to
protect whistle-blowers, which
the inspector general determined
often found ways to retaliate
against them.
Beyond issues of administra-
tion at the Department of Veter-
ans Affairs, questions remain
about the care offered to those
who served.
The suicide rate among veter-
ans — one of Mr. Wilkie’s stated
A questionable tactic
in a re-election
campaign.
priorities — has not been reduced.
The Trump administration’s cut-
backs at the post office have hit
some veterans, who say they are
unable to get their prescriptions
by mail.
And while care for veterans
with coronavirus appeared to go
well — deaths at the hospitals
were lower than at many health
systems — the department was
plagued by a lack of protective
equipment for its workers.
And an expensive plan to con-
vert the system’s medical records
electronically has hit one delay af-
ter another.
That long and expanding litany
of problems at the Department of
Veterans Affairs has left analysts
and some veterans questioning
why Mr. Trump has tried to make
his record there a centerpiece of
his quest for a second term.
“The challenges at the V.A. are
multifaceted,” said Terri
Tanielian, a senior analyst at the
RAND Corporation who special-
izes in military and veteran health
issues. “Recognizing that ad-
dressing these issues takes sus-
tained leadership commitment,
not sound bites, is essential if we
are going to deliver on the prom-
ises to veterans at the V.A.”
Mr. Trump is fond of saying that
he delivered the Veterans Choice
Program, which enables some
veterans to get care outside of the
agency’s health centers, and that
“no president’s ever been able to
do it, and we got it done.”
This is untrue: President
Barack Obama signed that law,
the product of a bill negotiated be-
tween Senators Bernie Sanders,
independent of Vermont, and the
late John McCain, Republican of
Arizona, in 2014. What Mr. Trump
signed in 2018 — a measure called
the Mission Act — greatly loos-
ened the standards allowing vet-
erans to seek primary care, ur-
gent care and mental health serv-
ices outside the department’s sys-
tem.
The urgent care component is
viewed largely as a success. But
for primary and specialist care,
the legislation has, so far, not
transformed the system. It was
somewhat hobbled out of the gate
by a shortage of doctors in the net-
work the department chose for
the program. The company told
lawmakers last year that it would
probably need millions of dollars
more to meet the coverage goals.
Then the coronavirus hit, and in
March, the department told Con-
gress it would place a “temporary
strategic pause in the Mission Act
access standards for 90 days, or
until the soonest possible time
that routine care may safely re-
sume.” Community care referrals
fell about 70 percent and millions
of veterans canceled appoint-
ments over the ensuing months.
“The V.A. has been conducting
Mission Act referrals in many ar-
eas where it is safe to do so
throughout this national emer-
gency,” said Christina Noel, a
spokeswoman for the depart-
ment. “Some sites are doing more
referrals amid the pandemic than
they were prior to the pandemic.”
“During this public health cri-
sis, our job is to make sure veter-
ans are cared for properly and en-
sure they are not contracting
Covid-19,” she added. “That’s why
V.A. is taking into account
whether referrals for community
care are clinically appropriate
during the Covid-19 outbreak.”
The pandemic allowed the de-
partment to move forcefully
ahead with telemedicine, which
could ease the need for a more ex-
tensive community care network
for basic medical needs. The de-
partment had a 1,200-percent in-
crease in video visits from the first
week of March to the end of July.
Given the variable conditions
across the country and the sys-
tem’s highly decentralized struc-
ture, tracking the outside care vet-
erans are receiving is difficult. But
lawmakers and veterans groups
note that wait times for care are
increasing, which the Mission Act
was meant to ease.
“I trusted V.A.’s decision in
March to restrict non-urgent care,
in the community and in V.A., and
I trust that V.A. has and will move
to remove those restrictions
safely and in full compliance with
the law moving forward,” said
Representative Phil Roe of Ten-
nessee, the senior Republican on
the House Veterans Affairs Com-
mittee.
Mr. Trump also promised to root
out fraud in the department. He
vowed to use executive powers to
remove and discipline the federal
employees and managers who
have violated the public’s trust.
But his move to protect and pro-
mote whistle-blowers had the op-
posite impact, according to a re-
port by the inspector general, who
found that instead, the depart-
ment targeted whistle-blowers
who reported on officials friendly
with high-level employees in the
department.
Recently, a former nursing as-
sistant at a Department of Veter-
ans Affairs hospital in West Vir-
ginia pleaded guilty to second-de-
gree murder in the deaths of sev-
en patients, and an emergency
room doctor working on contract
at a center in Washington, D.C.,
was heard saying that she did “not
care” if a veteran who came seek-
ing help killed himself, which he
later did. In both cases, no senior
managers were held accountable.
“The notion that policies and
protocols can unfailingly stop
those intent on committing crimes
strains credulity,” Ms. Noel said.
In September, a senior House
policy adviser on female veterans
issues said she was sexually as-
saulted at the Department of Vet-
erans Affairs hospital in Washing-
ton.
After receiving a complaint that
Mr. Wilkie had tried to dig up dirt
on the woman, a reserve Navy in-
telligence officer, the depart-
ment’s inspector general began
an investigation that is expected
to conclude soon.
Around the same time, the dep-
uty secretary of veterans affairs
was abruptly and mysteriously
fired, and three former and cur-
rent employees from the depart-
ment said it was partly because of
his unwillingness to participate in
the effort to smear the woman’s
reputation. The case was one of
thousands of complaints that fe-
male veterans make every year
about harassment at veterans’
centers.
The recent slowdown over the
Postal Service has also caused
problems for veterans, who get
roughly 80 percent of their pre-
scriptions through the mail. For
weeks, reports of a slowdown in
the orders have mounted.
Last week, several health care
workers complained about the
problem. A doctor at a veterans af-
fairs community care center in the
Denver area said that roughly 15
percent of his patients reported
that their drugs were going to the
wrong place or not arriving at all.
A colleague in New Orleans told
him the center there had set up an
outdoor tent outside the facility to
help veterans scrambling for im-
portant medications like insulin.
The doctor, who requested ano-
nymity because he feared retalia-
tion from department officials,
said the lagging prescriptions
were making efforts to help those
seeking care even harder.
 THE NEW YORK TIMES OBITUARIES THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N A25

dians to take up to half the annual

Slade Gorton, Moderate runs of salmon and steelhead
trout in Puget Sound and the Co-
lumbia River. He sought cuts in

Voted Out of the Senate, the Bureau of Indian Affairs budg-

et and fought tribal immunity
from some civil suits. His public

Then Back In, Dies at 92 hearings in Seattle attracted peo-

By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
Slade Gorton, a Washington Re-
publican who in three nonconsec-
utive terms in the Senate champi-
oned his state’s logging, aviation
and technology industries and
feuded with Native American
tribes over fishing rights and
sovereignty in the casino age, died
on Wednesday at his daughter
Sarah’s home in the Seattle area.
He was 92.
J. Vander Stoep, who served as
Mr. Gorton’s chief of staff in the
Senate, said the cause was compli-
cations of Parkinson’s disease.
In his interrupted Senate serv-
ice, from 1981 to 1987 and again
from 1989 to 2001, Mr. Gorton
achieved a little-noticed distinc-
tion: He was one of only 16 sena-
tors in history to win the office
back after having been turned out
by the electorate. (Senators have
been directly elected by voters
only since 1914, when a constitu-
tional amendment removed that
power from the various state leg-
islatures.)
First elected on the coattails of
Ronald Reagan’s presidential
landslide in 1980, Mr. Gorton be-
came known as a “giant killer” for
upsetting Senator Warren G.
Magnuson, a 75-year-old Demo-
cratic institution who began his
congressional career during the
Depression and ended it as the
Senate’s senior member.
Although Mr. Gorton was 52
and had been a state official for
two decades, he looked youthful —
a bit like the actor Henry Fonda —
and he was a marathon runner. To
demonstrate his vigor to the vot-
ers, he ran 62 miles from his home
in Seattle to Olympia, the state
capital, to pay the filing fee for his
Senate campaign.
He also said it was “time for a
change,” a cliché that would come
back to haunt him 20 years later
when a younger opponent used it
to end his Senate career. But in
1980 Mr. Gorton trounced Senator
Magnuson with 54 percent of the
ballots and joined a Senate that
was controlled by Republicans for
the first time since 1954.
Calling himself a “passionate
Julia Carmel contributed report-
ing.
moderate,” Mr. Gorton soon estab-
lished himself as a contrarian. He
won a seat on the Budget Commit-
tee and backed President Rea-
gan’s programs to cut taxes and
social-welfare spending and to
support a military buildup. But he
broke with the president by en-
dorsing the Equal Rights Amend-
ment and favoring the use of fed-
eral funds to pay for abortions for
poor women.
His vote against a rise in Social
Security benefits rankled voters,
and critics said he failed to dispel
the impression that he had not
been forceful enough in challeng-
ing the federal government when
it was considering using the Han-
ford nuclear power plant in south-
eastern Washington State as a
A Republican from
Washington State
who was a friend
to logging and tech.
dumping ground for nuclear
waste. In 1986, he lost his re-elec-
tion bid to Brock Adams, Presi-
dent Jimmy Carter’s secretary of
transportation.
Saying he was retiring from
politics, Mr. Gorton resumed his
law practice in Seattle. But he ran
again in 1988 when Washington’s
other senator, Daniel J. Evans, a
former governor, decided to re-
tire.
Mr. Gorton took a rare step for a
politician: He admitted that he
had made mistakes. He said he
should never have opposed Social
Security cost-of-living increases
or supported aid to Nicaragua’s
right-wing contras in their guer-
rilla war against the leftist revolu-
tionary Sandinista government.
“I needed to listen more,” he
told voters. On Election Day, he
edged out Representative Mike
Lowry, a liberal Democrat and a
future governor of the state. He
returned to the Senate in 1989,
joining that rarefied club of 16 who
had made a comeback to the
Slade Gorton on Capitol Hill in 1992. He lost re-election in 1986 but ran again in 1988 and won.
chamber after a re-election loss.
(The historical significance was
hardly noted at the time. Ameri-
cans unfamiliar with constitu-
tional amendments are often sur-
prised to learn that senators were
elected by state legislatures, not
by voters, for 125 years after the
founding of the federal govern-
ment. The framers believed that
having state legislatures elect
senators would free senators from
MAUREEN KEATING/CQ ROLL CALL, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
popular pressures. But fights in timber interests in the West, and
the legislatures over slavery, the of Boeing, Alaska Airlines, Air-
Civil War, bribes and political chi- borne Express and other Wash-
canery led to a reconsideration, ington aviation interests.
and the 17th Amendment, ratified When the Senate voted on arti-
in 1913, rewrote the rules for the cles of impeachment against Pres-
1914 elections.) ident Bill Clinton, Mr. Gorton
Back in the Senate, Mr. Gorton voted yes on the obstruction-of-
became known as “Senator Micro- justice charge and no on perjury.
soft” for his support of that Se- Mr. Gorton feuded with Native
attle-based technology giant. He American tribes for many years
also became a leading advocate of over treaty rights that allowed In-
ple waving American flags and
shouting anti-Indian slogans.
In 2000, tribes flush with casino
revenues fought back, contribut-
ing $1.3 million to Maria Cantwell,
a former Democratic representa-
tive 30 years younger than Mr.
Gorton. She echoed lines he had
used in 1980, saying it was “time
for a change.” Mr. Gorton stressed
his seniority and influence —
points Mr. Magnuson had made 20
years earlier — and the result was
the same: The incumbent lost.
Thomas Slade Gorton III, who
almost never used his first name,
was born in Chicago on Jan. 8,
1928, the oldest of four children of
Thomas Slade Gorton Jr., the
founder of a successful fish busi-
ness, and Ruth (Israel) Gorton.
Slade and his siblings, Mary Jane,
Mike and Nat, grew up in Ev-
anston, Ill.
He graduated from Evanston
High School in 1945, served a year
in the Army and earned a bache-
lor’s degree from Dartmouth Col-
lege in 1950 and a law degree from
Columbia University in 1953. He
joined the Air Force as a lieuten-
ant and rose to colonel. Resuming
civilian life in 1956, he practiced
law in Seattle but joined the Young
Republicans with a political ca-
reer in mind.
In 1958, he married Sally Jean
Clark. She died in 2013. His sur-
vivors include their three chil-
dren, Thomas Gorton, Sarah
Nortz and Rebecca Gorton; his
brothers, U.S. District Judge Na-
thaniel M. Gorton and Mike Gor-
ton Sr.; his sister, Mary Jane Gor-
ton; and seven grandchildren.
Mr. Gorton served five terms in
the Washington House of Repre-
sentatives from 1959 to 1969. As
the state’s attorney general over
the next 12 years, he pressed for
health warnings on cigarette
packages, unit pricing on grocer-
ies and campaign finance disclo-
sures.
After leaving the Senate, he
joined the National Commission
on Terrorist Attacks in 2002 and
helped write its final report, which
concluded that successive admin-
istrations had failed to read warn-
ing signs leading to the Sept. 11 at-
tacks.
An authorized biography by
John C. Hughes, “Slade Gorton: A
Half Century in Politics,” ap-
peared in 2011.

Mary Hartline, 92, Sultry Star During TV’s Early Days

By ANITA GATES
Mary Hartline, the high-energy
platinum-blond entertainer who
became one of network televi-
sion’s earliest stars on the chil-
dren’s show “Super Circus,” died
on Aug. 12 at her home in Hills-
boro, Ill. She was 92.
The death was confirmed by the
Hough & Sons Funeral Home in
Hillsboro.
“Super Circus,” a live Sunday
afternoon series on ABC, began in
early 1949, when the television in-
dustry was still laying its coaxial
cables. Ms. Hartline was a striking
presence with her long, wavy hair,
her majorette-style costumes —
including her signature uniform,
with musical notes on the thigh-
high hemline — and white tas-
seled boots.
Between the show’s death-defy-
ing circus acts, she conducted the
band’s lively musical numbers,
performed comedy sketches with
the clowns, guided young audi-
ence members through contest
segments and delivered live com-
mercials. (Everybody did it. The
future newsman Mike Wallace,
also a cast member, pushed
peanut butter.)
Ms. Hartline, often called televi-
sion’s first sex symbol (a lot of fa-
thers, it seems, were watching,
alongside their offspring), was a
master of promotion. In addition
to having her face on Kellogg’s ce-
real boxes, representing Canada
Dry beverages and demonstrat-
ing the joys of the newest Dixie
Cup dispenser, she had her own
merchandise line.
Those three dozen products in-
cluded the Mary Hartline doll (“all
hard plastic with socket head,
jointed arms and legs, sleep eyes,
blond wig,” according to a recent
auction-lot description), which
can still bring hundreds of dollars
at auction.
“Put that in the vault,” Ms. Hart-
line advised a man holding up his
vintage doll at a 1997 appearance.
Even Ms. Hartline’s sister had
learned the dolls’ value the hard
way, she said: Hers “was stolen
right out of her own living room.”
Mary Pauline Hartline was
born on Oct. 29, 1927, in Hillsboro,
a small town south of Springfield.
She was the younger of two
daughters of Paul Hartline, a
salesman who later became the
town postmaster, and Dorothy
(Crowder) Hartline.
Mary was a brunette beauty
queen at Hillsboro High School,
class of 1945, when Harold Stokes,
a noted bandleader, entered her
life. While living in temporary re-
tirement in his nearby hometown,
Mr. Stokes had been asked to or-
ganize an amateur-show fund-
raiser. He hired a cast of musical
locals, including, as a dancer,
Mary.
When Mr. Stokes took a job in
Chicago, he suggested she move
there to pursue a modeling career.
By 1946 she was on “Junior Junc-
tion” (later “Teen Town”), a radio
MIKE PLUNKET/JOURNAL-NEWS
Ms. Hartline in 2010.
Having a striking
presence and being a
master of promotion.
series produced by Mr. Stokes
about a community where all the
citizens were teenagers. During
the first season, Ms. Hartline re-
ceived a diagnosis of polio but
made a rapid recovery. She and
Mr. Stokes married the next year.
Ms. Hartline was on “Super Cir-
cus,” broadcast from the Civic
Theater in Chicago, every week
from January 1949 to December
1955. From 1950 to 1952 she also
did “The Mary Hartline Show,” a
15-minute cartoon and music se-
ries. (It was a far more innocent
time; 11-year-olds brought onto
the stage introduced themselves
by giving out their street ad-
dresses.)
After “Super Circus,” Ms. Hart-
line starred in “Princess Mary’s
Castle” (1957-58), a local chil-
dren’s show with singing puppets,
a talking crow and a magic mirror.
It was her last job in show busi-
ness.
Ms. Hartline, who never had
children, married four times. In
1951, the year of her divorce from
Mr. Stokes, she married George
Barnard, a Chicago lawyer.
Months after their divorce in 1960,
she married George Carlson, a
Chicago contractor, who died in
1963. In 1964 she married Wool-
worth Donahue, an heir to the
Woolworth five-and-dime-store
fortune; they were together until
his death in 1972. They lived
mostly in Palm Beach, Fla., and
Southampton, N.Y., entertaining
guests including the Duke and
Duchess of Windsor.
Ms. Hartline’s sister, Dorothy
Jane Coderko, died in 2017.
In 1997, Ms. Hartline was hon-
ored by the Museum of Broadcast
Communications in Chicago. She ABC
was still good-natured about the
Mary Hartline, often called television’s first sex symbol, wearing
dangerous unpredictability of do-
ing live television. “You don’t have one of her trademark costumes for the ABC series “Super Circus.”
a chance,” she said with a laugh.
Remembering a costume- her — and of her scene partner, is what you gets,’” Ms. Hartline
change mishap that put her on Cliffy the clown — who couldn’t told the audience of early-televi-
camera with no back to her dress, understand why she was walking sion fans at the museum. “And if it
she recalled the reactions of the sideways. doesn’t go right, you get it any-
male orchestra members behind “Like they say, ‘What you sees way.”

Deaths Deaths Deaths Deaths Deaths Deaths Deaths

Buchholz, Bernard Koval, Barbara
Diefenbach, Ruth Krogstad, Donald
Fradin, Margery Richmond, Irving
Gregg, John Tassinari, Mary Jane
Wolfensohn, Elaine
and devotion to each other.
BUCHHOLZ—Bernard,
died August 19 in New York Ruth dedicated herself to her
City at the age of 90. A husband, family, friends and
many community causes. In
Holocaust survivor sent by
Kindertransport from his Fort Myers, she served as a
trustee of the Sidney & Berne
birthplace in Mannheim,
Germany to England before Davis Art Center. During her
60 years in Rye, she worked
coming to New York. Went
on to City College and Colum- with the Junior League, the
Rye Garden Club, and the
bia Law School and a long
legal career. For nearly 30 Garden Club of America. She
chaired the Twig Organiza-
years a trustee of the Jewish
Child Care Association. Sur- tion and Westchester Cotil-
lion, and served on the board
vived by his wife, Awilda
of managers of United Hospi-
Guerrero Buchholz, sons
tal, Osborne and the Health-
David and Phillip, daughter-
care Chaplaincy. Ruth was
in-law Jeanne, stepchildren
loved and admired for her ef-
Elliott and Melissa, and
fusive spirit and ability to en-
beloved grandchildren. A
gage all with whom she had
memorial will be held in
contact: family, friends, and
the future.
strangers alike with lively
conversation. After raising
her six children, she and Rob
DIEFENBACH—Ruth embarked on a life made rich
DeNoyelles, by adventurous travel, cultur-
of Fort Myers, FL and New al experiences and enjoying
York City, formerly Rye, NY, sunsets at their beach house
died Tuesday, August 18th at on North Captiva. Ruth is sur-
the age of 86. Born in New vived by her loving husband
York on August 31, 1933 to E. Rob, her children, Robert E.
Harold and Althea Baldwin Jr., E. Michael (Michele), Da-
DeNoyelles, Ruth attended vid (Nina), Eric (James Keith
Rye Country Day school, Brown), Margi Gray (Stuart),
Rosemary Hall, Abbot Peter (Michael Caravetta)
Academy and Mount Vernon and her 12 grandchildren
College. Ruth married Robert Robert E. III, Andrew (Shan-
E. Diefenbach in 1953. Their non), Mark, Teddy, Colin (Ve-
67 year marriage has always ronica), Heather Call (Mi-
reflected their love, respect chael) Hilary, Anna, Rebecca,
Paul, Taylor Gray and Alex-
ander Gray and finally her
three great - grandchildren
Braden Call, Caroline, and Le-
vi. She was predeceased by
her brother Edward DeNoy-
elles. Services will be private.
Donations may be made to
Florida Arts, Inc., 2301 First
Street, Fort Myers, FL 33901.
FRADIN—Margery.
Margery Fradin, mother of
Russell Fradin and Roger
Fradin died on August 1st,
2020 at age 98. Beloved wife
for 60 years of Dr. Irving Fra-
din DDS, She is survived by
her two sons, 5 grandchildren
and 9 great-grandchildren.
Private memorial planned.
Judith B. Fradin
GREGG—John Rains.
Montecito, California - John
Rains Gregg passed away on
August 7, 2020, at the age of
95. He was born in Minneapo-
lis, Minnesota, on April 23,
1925, to the late John W. and
Leila H. Gregg. He will be lo-
vingly remembered by his
sons John, Jr. (Katherine
Ford Gregg), Jim (Martha
Bellis Gregg), Bill (Catherine
Anderson Gregg) and David
(Mary Bishop Gregg), his
grandchildren Courtney, Mar-
garet, Isabelle, William, Char-
lotte and Jonathan, and his
niece Nanette DeLaittre. He
was predeceased by his wife,
Patricia, and sisters, Estelle
and Mary Louise. After gra-
duating from The Blake
School, he entered Yale Uni-
versity. World War II, howev-
er, interrupted his college
plans. At age 20 he entered
the Army Air Corps (now
known as the United States
Air Force) as a lieutenant and
navigator on a B-29 Superfor-
tress. While in the Air Corps
he flew bombing missions
from the Marianas Island of
Tinian to mainland Japan. It
was an experience he never
forgot. After the war John
went onto Harvard Business
School and graduated with
his MBA. John spent a major-
ity of his business career,
over 30 years, at Johnson &
Johnson in consumer pro-
ducts. Later in his tenure he
was instrumental in starting
the Home Healthcare Divi-
sion at Johnson & Johnson
for which he received the
Johnson & Johnson Entre-
preneurial Award. John and
his wife, Patricia, raised four
sons starting with a home in
Madison, New Jersey later
settling in Mendham, New
Jersey. While living in Mend-
ham John served 21 years on
the Mendham Borough Plan-
ning Board and was head of
the Environmental Commis-
sion. After the turn of the cen-
tury he and Patricia turned
their sights west and moved
to Montecito, California. John
was an avid reader. He en-
joyed walks with his dogs
while living in Mendham,
swimming, and long vaca-
tions in Puerta Vallarta, Mexi-
co. John is remembered as a
warm, kind, and generous
man. He was a good listener
and great conversationalist.
He was particularly devoted
to Patricia, his wife, and life-
long companion for 66 years.
A private family service will
be held in Santa Barbara, Ca-
lifornia. His ashes will be in-
terred at Lakewood Cemete-
ry in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
KOVAL—Barbara,
92, died August 15, 2020. Be-
loved mother of Jeff and
Paul. Adored grandmother of
Greg and Emily. Devoted
wife of the late Stanley. Servi-
ces will be held via Zoom,
11am Friday, August 21st at
Sinai Chapels, 718-445-0300.
KROGSTAD—Donald J., MD
(1943-2020) Donald J. Krog-
stad M.D. passed away at
home in Palm Coast, Florida
on August 14th at age 77. He
retired from Tulane Universi-
ty in October of 2019. Dr.
Krogstad was a physician
and researcher who devoted
his life to the treatment of in-
fectious diseases, with an em-
phasis on malaria. That inter-
est was first triggered when
doing a two-month elective in
Haiti at Hopital Albert
Schweitzer during his final
year of medical school. It was
furthered by two years at
CDC as an EIS officer fol-
lowed by a two-year stint as a
physician in the Peace Corps
in Malawi (1973-75). He be-
came an internationally re-
spected malaria researcher
while at Washington Univer-
sity in Saint Louis. While on
sabbatical at the NIH he was
recruited to be chair of the
Department of Tropical Me-
dicine in the SPHTM of Tu-
lane University in New Or-
leans. Don was a major con-
tributor to the school and was
known as an excellent col-
league and mentor to the
many faculty, researchers,
and students with whom he
worked in different leader-
ship positions. Following his
time as Department Chair Dr.
Krogstad was awarded a Ful-
bright Scholarship to ad-
vance infectious disease re-
search and training in Mali,
West Africa. This allowed
him to lead a team of investi-
gators from the US and West
Africa to establish an NIH-
funded International Center
of Excellence in Malaria Re-
search in 2010. Dr. Krogstad
was known for his gentle na-
ture, diligence, collegial part-
nerships, and the students in
whom he invested so much
of his energy. He was always
grateful for the opportunities
and educational advance-
ment that his undergraduate
(Bowdoin 1965) and medical
degree (Harvard 1969) pro-
grams afforded him. He is
survived by his wife Fran,
sons, Aric and Kirk, as well as
three grandchildren. Dona- WOLFENSOHN—Elaine.
tions can be made in memo-
Congregation Or Zarua
ry of Don Krogstad, Past- mourns the death of our
President of the American
member, Elaine Wolfensohn.
Society of Tropical Medicine May the One who consoles
and Hygiene, at
the mourners of Zion and
www.astmh.org on the dona- Jerusalem bring comfort to
tion page or to Hopital Albert
her family.
Schweitzer Haiti, Scott N. Bolton, Rabbi
www.hashaiti.org.
Diane Okrent, President
RICHMOND—Irving.
In Memoriam
UJA-Federation of New York
mourns the passing of Irving
Richmond, beloved father
and father-in-law of our dear
friends Elayne and Barry
CORBIE—Dr. Leo A.
Moss, whose exemplary ge-
nerosity and leadership help 8/20/30 - 10/1/07.
On the occasion of your 90th
us serve those in need. We
extend our heartfelt con- birthday, you are forever
missed and forever loved.
dolences to the entire family.
All your family, children and
Amy A. B. Bressman,
President; grandchildren, and especially
David L. Moore, your loving wife Helen, in our
Chair of the Board; hearts forever.
Eric S. Goldstein, CEO
TASSINARI—Mary Jane,
died at Mary Manning Walsh
Home on August 14, 2020 at
age 78. Known as Jane to her
family and friends, she pur-
sued a successful career in
advertising and cable media
until her retirement in 2008.
She loved to travel and to vi-
sit family and friends. As her
mobility in later life declined,
her favorite pastime was to
enjoy lunch at several of her
favorite Turtle Bay restau-
rants located near her home
in mid-town Manhattan. Jane
is survived by her husband of
almost 35 years, Frederick
Corden.
A26 THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

EDITORIAL LETTERS

Russia Helped. Case Closed. Virus Control: What Works, What Doesn’t
TO THE EDITOR: may live.
Americans must rigorously quar-
As Covid-19 began to take hold in
America, Dr. David Ho, an ac- antine and social distance so a child
claimed Columbia University virol- they’ll never meet doesn’t lose her
ogist, issued a prescient warning. immune-compromised mother.
To control Covid-19 within a reason- They must shun crowds so a doctor
able time frame, he advised, there they’ll never know doesn’t die after
must be one nationally coordinated contracting Covid-19 in a hospital
policy. If 50 individual states deter- emergency room. Children will
mine their own policies and time- need to slog through another se-
lines the pandemic would drag on, mester of online learning. Their
devastating lives and livelihoods. families will navigate their academ-
From the beginning, President ic and emotional difficulties to
Trump and the G.O.P. rejected a protect teachers and staff from
strong federal response because school environments that quickly
their ideology got in the way of spread the coronavirus.
common sense. A core value in the Americans must hold the human-
Republican creed going back to ity of strangers above their individ-
Ronald Reagan is that government ual right to sit in a bar, demand
is the problem, not the solution. in-school instruction or ignore
Refusing to use the power of the mask mandates. Like Blanche
federal government, Mr. Trump DuBois in “A Streetcar Named
shifted responsibility for fighting Desire,” the United States needs
the pandemic to state and local “the kindness of strangers” to save
governments. lives during a lethal pandemic.
As Dr. Ho predicted, the results MARYELLEN DONNELLAN
have been disastrous. Now seven FALLS CHURCH, VA.
months along, other nations not
blinded by big government phobias
TO THE EDITOR:
have the virus under control and
their citizens are getting back to This pandemic scares the hell out of
normal life. We Americans have no me. I am in my mid-60s and I have
end in sight. several pre-existing medical condi-
tions. If I contract the coronavirus,
BOB TAYLOR I am at high risk for the develop-
NEWPORT BEACH, CALIF. ment of serious medical complica-
ERIN SCHAFF/THE NEW YORK TIMES
tions, including death.
From the start, the Trump-Russia story has been both eye- Committee. TO THE EDITOR: This is a life-or-death national
Re “New York’s Control of Virus crisis. More than 170,000 people
glazingly complex and extraordinarily simple. The report also found that Konstantin Kilimnik, a long- have already died in the United
Surprises Experts” (front page,
Who is Oleg Deripaska? What’s the G.R.U. again? Who time business associate of Mr. Trump’s former campaign States. Tens of thousands more
Aug. 18):
owed what to whom? The sheer number of crisscrossing chairman, Paul Manafort, was a Russian intelligence officer, I am not surprised. Each day I lives will be lost by Election Day. I
characters and interlocking pieces of evidence — the phone and may have been linked to the Russian military’s hacking watched Gov. Andrew Cuomo talk do not want to be one of them.
calls, the emails, the texts, the clandestine international and leaking of the D.N.C. emails in the first place. to “us” and clearly explain what Donald Trump is our president,
meet-ups — has bamboozled even those who spend their Mr. Trump and his allies will parse and prevaricate for- was going on. He followed the our leader, our national role model.
days teasing it all apart. It’s no wonder average Americans science and was strong, clear and If he takes this pandemic seriously
ever. Ignore them. If it wasn’t already overwhelmingly clear and emphasizes the best mitigation
tuned out long ago. loving in his daily briefings. He was
what was going on, it is now. As the Democrats on the com- measures we have — mask wearing
human in his presentation of the
A bipartisan report released Tuesday by the Republi- mittee put it in an appendix to the report: “This is what col- and social distancing — we have a
daily cases and showed empathy
can-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee cuts through lusion looks like.” Alas, the Republicans refused to join in on for the daily deaths. chance to contain Covid very soon.
the chaff. The simplicity of the scheme has always been star- this straightforward assessment, stating in their own appen- I am also not surprised that the If not, our trajectory of infections
ing us in the face: Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign sought dix that “we can now say with no doubt, there was no collu- incredible, diverse people of New and deaths will continue to rise.
and maintained close contacts with Russian government of- York listened, took direction and It is time for Donald Trump to
sion.” That is to insist that up is down. honor his oath of office by protect-
ficials who were helping him get elected. The Trump cam- did what they needed to do. This is
But call it whatever you like: The Intelligence Commit- ing us and saving lives. He must
paign accepted their offers of help. The campaign secretly what competent leadership can and
tee report shows clear coordination between Russians and should do in a crisis. beat this pandemic by making
provided Russian officials with key polling data. The cam- the Trump campaign, though there is no evidence of an ex- mask-wearing and social distancing
paign coordinated the timing of the release of stolen infor- SHELLEY BALESTRIERI a top priority for all of us. He has to
plicit agreement. The evidence the report lays out suggests GLEN ROCK, N.J.
mation to hurt Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Mr. Trump knew this at the time. Whether or not it can be stop with the magical thinking,
The Senate committee’s report isn’t telling this story for conspiracy theories, scapegoating
proved that he ordered this interference or violated the law TO THE EDITOR: and reckless cure-alls.
the first time, of course. (Was it only a year ago that Robert in doing so, the fact remains that neither he nor anyone else
Re “America Could Control the He can be a hero. Or he can con-
Mueller testified before Congress about his own damning, in his campaign alerted federal law-enforcement authori- Pandemic by October” (editorial, tinue to be disengaged and uninter-
comprehensive investigation?) But it is the first to do so ties, as any loyal American should have. ested in saving lives.
Aug. 9):
with the assent of Senate Republicans, who have mostly ig- Mr. President, this is your time to
And remember: Mr. Trump tried this scheme again. The editorial’s coronavirus road
nored the gravity of the Trump camp’s actions or actively map requires one additional provi- shine.
The president was impeached for his efforts to invite foreign
worked to cast doubt about the demonstrable facts in the sion: the collective willingness to
interference in the 2020 election, this time by Ukraine, again ALAN D. BLOTCKY
case. endure hardship so that strangers BIRMINGHAM, ALA.
on his behalf. Part of that requested interference involved an
It’s also a timely rebuke to the narrative that Attorney
attempt to smear Joe Biden. But the other part involved pin-
General William Barr has been hawking since before he
ning the 2016 election interference on Ukraine rather than
took office early last year — that “Russiagate” is a “bogus” Trump: ‘People Say . . . ’
scandal. Mr. Barr and other Trump allies claim that the Rus-
on Russia. Who was “almost certainly” one of the primary Old School Ties
sources spreading that claim in the media, according to the TO THE EDITOR: TO THE EDITOR:
sia investigation was begun without basis and carried out
senators’ report? None other than Konstantin Kilimnik. Re “The Great Leaders of 2020 Are I don’t get it! When President
with the intent of “sabotaging the presidency.” That argu-
ment has been debunked by every investigative body that There has never been any reliable evidence that Part of a Club,” by Sarah Vowell Trump says, “I’ve heard . . . ,” why
Ukraine interfered in 2016; the Senate committee concluded (Sunday Review, Aug. 16), about doesn’t anyone ask him where he
has spent any time looking into what happened, including
as such, in line with all previous investigations. elected officials who are graduates heard it? When he says, “People
the nation’s intelligence community, Mr. Mueller’s team, the of public universities:
Russia is now attempting to help Mr. Trump again this say . . . ,” why doesn’t anyone ask,
Justice Department’s inspector general and now the Senate I grew up in the Pacific Heights “Which people?”
Intelligence Committee. November, according to American intelligence assessments
neighborhood of San Francisco as a It’s been my experience as a
In fact, the committee report, which is nearly 1,000 reported in The Times. For any normal president, that doctor’s daughter and went to trial lawyer, examining witnesses
pages long and is the fifth in a series examining Russian in- would be a top-of-mind concern, and he or she would be public schools all the way through for almost 50 years, that those type
terference in 2016, goes further than Mr. Mueller’s investiga- marshaling all available resources to thwart it. What has Mr. medical school. of statements are never support-
tion. Trump done? On Sunday night, he retweeted Russian prop- When I arrived in Cambridge to able, never come from real sources
aganda that the U.S. intelligence community had already do my Harvard-affiliated intern- and are never true.
For example, Mr. Mueller declined to say whether Mr. ship, the first thing I was asked at
Trump had lied under oath when he said that he did not re- flagged as part of that country’s efforts to skew the election. While you and I might know that
any party was “where did you go to
call speaking with Roger Stone, his longtime aide and confi- On Monday, Miles Taylor, a former chief of staff at the those statements are made up and
school?” The questioners would
Department of Homeland Security in the Trump administra- false, there are those in the elector-
dant, about WikiLeaks, which released the batches of emails wait for the answer to pass judg-
tion, wrote that the president “showed vanishingly little in- ment on whether I was worth talk- ate who are willing to accept those
stolen by the Russians. But the Senate committee found that unchallenged statements as fact.
the president “did, in fact, speak with Stone about Wiki- terest in subjects of vital national security interest, includ- ing to.
Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, “I’ve heard . . . ” and “people say
Leaks and with members of his campaign about Stone’s ac- ing cybersecurity, domestic terrorism and malicious foreign . . . ” should not be enough to per-
interference in U.S. affairs.” He added, “the country is less who both attended public universi-
cess to WikiLeaks on multiple occasions.” ties at some point in their educa- suade citizens to vote for someone,
The committee documented that, on Oct. 7, 2016, Mr. secure as a direct result of the president’s actions.” tion, will connect in a way no Ivy nor should they be the basis for
Stone received advance notice of the impending release of There’s no way to sugarcoat it. In less than three League snob is capable of, and put presidential action or inaction.
the “Access Hollywood” tape, in which Mr. Trump brags months, the American people could re-elect a man who re- the priority back on opportunity for We must always require truth
about sexually assaulting women. In response, Mr. Stone ceived a foreign government’s help to win one election and all. Fantastic. and not lies from our elected offi-
made at least two phone calls arranging for WikiLeaks to re- has shown neither remorse nor reservations about doing so cials and those who seek our votes.
PENNY LOWENSTEIN
lease stolen internal emails from the Democratic National again. BRANFORD, CONN. RICHARD A. GURFEIN, NEW YORK

Uber and Lyft Just Can’t Stop Flouting the Law

Greg Bensinger what hundreds of thousands of drivers expanding majority of industries that rely able fare. But labor experts say Uber and again, Uber’s drivers have borne the
have grown accustomed to or tell us that heavily on technology could with impuni- Lyft could classify drivers as employees brunt of the company’s whims.
they want,” said Noah Edwardsen, an ty deprive legions of workers of the basic while still providing them flexible work For example, Uber doesn’t pay into

T
HE ride-hailing apps Uber and
Lyft have long disingenuously in-
sisted that they are not trans-
portation companies. This is a le-
gal strategy that, so far, has allowed them
to label their legions of drivers contract
workers, depriving them of company-
backed benefits like health care, paid
leave and severance pay.
But as of Thursday, at least in Califor-
nia, Uber and Lyft may finally be able to
state honestly they are not in the business
of arranging rides. That’s because they
say they have no choice but to shutter op-
erations in one of their largest markets af-
ter a state judge ordered them to comply
with a new California law requiring them
to reclassify contract drivers and grant
them the benefits and protections af-
forded to regular employees.
The companies argue that they can’t
comply with the law by the deadline. Uber
said it would need a year or more to rejig-
ger its operations to comply. Unless a stay
of the judge’s order is granted, “we would
have no choice but to shut down ride-shar-
ing in California, while we work to imple-
ment a dramatically different service than
Uber spokesman.
The writing was on the wall for Uber
and Lyft in California more than two years
ago, when the state’s highest court creat-
ed a new standard for classifying workers
that implicated gig companies. The new
law effectively codifies that court ruling.
Last fall, Uber made changes to its app
to give the appearance of more independ-
ence for drivers in anticipation of the state
law’s taking effect in January.
Lyft and Uber spent millions lobbying
against the law while arguing that it does-
n’t apply to them because they are nothing
more than digital marketplaces for con-
necting drivers with riders.
In May, the state sued Uber and Lyft
over their defiance of the law. This has not
gone well for the companies. “To state the
obvious, drivers are central, not tangen-
tial, to Uber and Lyft’s entire ride-hailing
business,” wrote Judge Ethan Schulman
of California Superior Court, who last
week gave the companies until Thursday
to comply.
If the companies’ argument that they
are just digital “matchmakers” were to
stick, Judge Schulman wrote, “the rapidly
protections afforded to employees by
state labor and employment laws.”
This is not the first time Uber and Lyft
have threatened to pull out of a market
over legislation they oppose. Maryland
legislators backed off a proposal to bolster
background checks for gig workers with
fingerprinting after Uber warned it would
leave the state. And after a multimillion-
dollar campaign led by Uber and Lyft
against fingerprint background checks for
drivers failed to sway voters in Austin,
Texas, the companies left for a year until a
state law was passed in their favor.
This time, however, Uber and Lyft are
fighting with diminished leverage as the
coronavirus pandemic and shelter-in-
place orders have made ride-share vol-
ume nosedive. At one point in the fight
against the California law, Uber’s chief at-
torney unleashed a corker, arguing that
“drivers’ work is outside the usual course
of Uber’s business.”
Central to the ride-hailing companies’
argument against the state law is that
drivers would lose the flexibility they
cherish — the ability to log into the app
when they choose to see if there is a desir-
schedules.
The most compelling argument against
the California law may be that the higher
costs of paying for guaranteed wages and
benefits will have to be passed along to
passengers. But the truth is that these
companies have trained customers to ex-
pect artificially low fares, and it’s time rid-
ers dug deeper into their wallets to reflect
the real cost of taking an Uber or a Lyft.
This could be beneficial for the compa-
nies as well: By subsidizing the rides,
Uber and Lyft have racked up billions in
losses. They appear to be biding their time
until ubiquitous self-driving cars mean
they can eliminate drivers once and for all.
And even under contract worker model,
there is little evidence that Uber and Lyft
have a sustainable business model. To-
gether, they lost a staggering $11.1 billion
last year and another $3.3 billion in this
year’s first quarter before the full force of
the pandemic took hold. It’s likely they
would have to raise fares soon anyway.
In a New York Times Op-Ed essay this
month, Dara Khosrowshahi, the chief ex-
ecutive of Uber, argued that “gig workers
deserve better.” Indeed. But time and
state unemployment funds for drivers,
meaning the workers were reliant on fed-
eral assistance when the pandemic
struck. And drivers have complained that
the companies can cut off access to the
app suddenly and without recourse,
change fare structures and dictate pre-
cisely what routes to take.
Now the two companies are weighing
adopting a franchise model in California
that would make them reliant on fleet op-
erators to handle rides. Doing so would
likely cut off thousands of drivers, The
Times reported.
Mr. Khosrowshahi says a third model of
employment is necessary, where the com-
panies could pay into a fund that drivers
can use for health care or sick leave while
remaining contractors. The notion, floated
since California’s law went into effect, will
be considered by voters in a ballot meas-
ure in November. The measure appears to
be a rollback of protections and benefits
that drivers should be getting under the
state law. 0
GREG BENSINGER is a member of the edito-
rial board.

The Jersey
Shore of My
Imagination
Jennifer Finney Boylan
L
ET’S go down the shore. Grab the Cop-
pertone and the beach towels, I’ll
fill the cooler with Rolling Rock
and some hoagies and a bag of
Herr’s Barbecue Flavored potato chips.
Did I forget anything? The Kadima pad-
dles? My black bikini? A novel by Agatha
Christie? A cheesesteak wit wiz?
I know what I forgot — that between the
pandemic and the sheer distance, the only
Jersey Shore I can visit now is the one in
my imagination.
Fortunately, coming from Philly, I have
a lot of Jersey in my memories. My friend
Kenny’s parents had a house in Ventnor.
After his father, Mickey, died, the family
put a plaque up on a boardwalk bench,
capturing a thing that Mickey once said as
he gazed out at the crashing waves.
“You know,” he said, “this beach is a
good idea.”
Some people I grew up with went to the
Poconos or Bucks County or vacation
places in Maine (where I live now). But for
my family, the only destination was the
Jersey Shore.
When I was really little, we stayed in
Cape May, with its Victorian mansions
and beaches full of clam shells. I remem-
ber being so sunburned one day that tears
came to my eyes as my mother touched
my back. I can still feel the cool of the
Noxzema cream she rubbed on my shoul-
ders, can still hear her voice saying,
“Don’t cry, this will make it better.”
When I was a little older, we went to Surf
City, on Long Beach Island. Some days,
we’d ride our bikes to Barnegat Light. The
lighthouse there was called Old Barney.
When I was 10, I stood at the edge of a
Surf City jetty one day as a hurricane ap-
proached, wondering how I was going to
survive my life. I stood there watching the
Where the Bruce is
loud and the Rolling
Rocks are cold.
crashing waves, trying to come up with a
way of solving the insoluble problem of be-
ing trans.
Then I thought, maybe you could be
cured by love.
Later that night, as the island was evac-
uated, we drove back toward Philly in a
black Dodge Seneca, an amazing car with
fins like a manta ray. As we drove away, I
looked out the back window at the beach
where I’d had my moment of insight.
“Don’t worry,” my aunt said. “We’re going
to be safe now.”
Eight years later, on the night of the na-
tion’s bicentennial, I was on a beach in
Stone Harbor with my friend Toby and his
girlfriend, Sally. Fireworks exploded over
the sea before us. Toby was on one side of
Sally, and I was on the other, and we all
had our arms around each other. This was
not exactly what I had in mind, back in
Surf City, when I pledged to be trans-
formed by love. But it was close enough.
As a teenager I spent my days in Atlan-
tic City. In those pre-gambling days, it was
a spooky ghost town, full of almost-aban-
doned hotels like the Marlborough-
Blenheim overlooking Park Place.
The boardwalk, though, was not yet
dead, and on a hot summer day you could
see someone dressed up as Mr. Peanut
standing near the Peanut Store, shaking
the hands of strangers.
Over at the Steel Pier you could ride
something called the Hell Hole. This was a
circular chamber that spun so fast you
were pinned to the wall by centrifugal
force. At a certain moment of rarefaction,
they dropped out the floor.
At the top of the Hell Hole was a circular
railing where you could stand and look at
the people getting sick on the ride below
you. A sign by the entrance read: RIDE
OR WATCH, SAME PRICE.
In college I worked at Lenny’s Hot Dogs
in Margate, next door to Lucy, a 19th-cen-
tury hotel shaped like an elephant. My
friends and I might have strayed out of a
Bruce Springsteen song that summer,
staying up all night slinging hot dogs and
pepper hash, passing out on the beach as
the sun came up. One day, tipsy on Mateus
rosé, I made out with someone on an aban-
doned lifeguard stand.
I said, I’m hurt, she said, Honey let me
heal it.
It’s a shame the summer can’t last for-
ever. I could easily spend my days watch-
ing the saltwater taffy machine spinning
that thick goop around in the humid twi-
light; or playing Skee-Ball; or riding the
bumper cars with their sleek graphite
floor and sparks raining down from the
electrical grid overhead. I could eat an
Ocean Liner from the Super Sub Shop; or
nosh on an onion bagel with Nova from
Lou’s in Ventnor; or just lie there in the hot
sun, hour after hour, listening to Bruce
Springsteen and the E Street Band on a
battery-operated boom box.
So we closed our eyes and said goodbye,
to gypsy angel row, felt so right, together
we danced like spirits in the night.
Fall is coming, and with it the most im-
portant election of our lives, a chance once
and for all to end our national nightmare.
In no time at all, we will turn our faces to
all that.
But right now I’m taking a day to re-
member the crashing ocean, the smell of
Noxzema, a fairground organ playing “In
the Good Old Summertime,” as horses on
a carousel rise, and fall and rise again.
You know, this beach is a good idea. 0
JENNIFER FINNEY BOYLAN, a contributing
Opinion writer, is a professor of English
at Barnard College. Her most recent book
is “Good Boy: My Life in Seven Dogs.”
THE NEW YORK TIMES OP-ED THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
What’s Your Risk Tolerance?
Elisabeth Rosenthal
A
S SOME parts of America gingerly
begin to open up, people have
questions. Will it be safe to take a
train? A plane? Visit the hair sa-
lon? An indoor restaurant?
The final answer may depend on your
individual risk tolerance for exposure to
infectious disease.
Most Americans alive today have never
before had to make that self-assessment.
In the past, deadly outbreaks of plague,
flu and polio were regular occurrences. Up
until the mid to late 20th century there
were mumps, measles and chickenpox to
contend with.
In a world of effective antibiotics and
antivirals and other treatments, deaths or
even serious illnesses from infectious dis-
ease seem nearly incomprehensible. So
our fear is enormous, and our risk toler-
ance for exposure is just about zero.
I hear too many people saying “I’m not
going back to life until there’s a vaccine” —
as if that will immediately eliminate the
risk. It won’t. Even if one of the current
vaccine candidates works, it could be
quite a while before it’s widely distributed.
And to be approved by the Food and Drug
Administration, it has to protect only half
of the people who take it from infection.
For the foreseeable future we will be liv-
ing in a world with some level of coro-
navirus out there. So if we want to get out
of our bunkers, we all need to take stock of
our risk tolerance.
As a doctor, I worked in a New York City
emergency room and in a remote coastal
clinic in Kenya, and then I became a jour-
nalist covering disease. I’ve had to meas-
ure my risk tolerance for infection in dif-
ferent situations.
Once, collecting blood from an AIDs pa-
tient, I couldn’t feel the artery through my
glove. The glove came off.
Treating a patient with multi-drug-re-
sistant tuberculosis, I pulled my surgical
mask a little tighter, made sure the win-
dows were open and — irrationally —
tried to breathe in less.
Reporting from the animal market
where the SARS outbreak is thought to
have started, I told myself that I should be
Biden’s Secret Untapped Weapon
Chuck Rocha
I
N LESS than four years, the Trump
administration has done great dam-
age to the Latino community. Yet
Donald Trump, who won 28 percent
of the Latino vote in 2016, is still the
choice of nearly 20 percent — enough
support to make a difference in a close
election. You’d think that Latinos would
rally behind Joe Biden, but he has strug-
gled to connect with them.
By some estimates, nearly 60 percent
of eligible Latino voters in battleground
states, will sit out the 2020 election. Ral-
lying these voters — most of them young,
most of them hostile to Mr. Trump — will
be vital to capturing the White House.
As a senior adviser for Senator Bernie
Sanders’s presidential campaign, I led a
$15 million Latino outreach program that
secured victories in Nevada and Califor-
nia, and helped us compete hard every-
where Latinos could hear our message.
Senator Sanders, an older, white man
from Vermont, may seem an unlikely
hero for Latinos. But as the son of an im-
migrant, Tío Bernie was relatable to
them. He was the first Democratic presi-
dential candidate to establish a presence
in the Latino community and engage
with its members. Mr. Biden can take a
page out of our playbook.
Mr. Biden has begun to ramp up in-
vestment in communications to Latinos,
but he has to go further. That includes ex-
panding the universe of Latino voters
he’s talking to and engaging with them
across different platforms. The Sanders
2020 campaign worked to reach all the
Latinos who were eligible to vote in Ne-
vada ahead of the caucus including more
ONLINE
For Opinion coverage of the Democratic
National Convention, please visit
nytimes.com/opinion
OK, since it was outdoors. But I stayed
away from animals being slaughtered,
didn’t touch any surfaces and took my
shoes off before entering my hotel room.
Note that these decisions do not mean
ignoring the data and infectious disease
specialists’ recommendations, as some on
the right are doing as they push ahead to
reopen schools, businesses, restaurants
and sports events.
Accepting risk means taking all precau-
tions and deciding you can live with the
very reduced risk that remains.
With the coronavirus, the only way to
eliminate all risk is essentially to move to
a house in the countryside and live in your
family bubble. And many Americans, par-
ticularly wealthy ones, have done just
that. This response may have seemed ex-
treme, but was understandable because
our national response was so scattershot,
flat-footed and incompetent.
As states and cities engineer sensible
reopening policies, everyone is going to
We will be living in a
world with some level of
coronavirus out there.
have to assess their risk tolerance and
cautiously push their personal boundaries
bit by bit.
Some, of course, never got to make this
decision. Risk tolerance is about duty and
conscience but very often it’s also about
how much you need a paycheck.
Doctors, nurses and others who work in
health care had no choice but to dive in.
These folks did not, as so many have
claimed, go into the profession “knowing
the risks.” They came to work knowing
that the risk of infectious diseases could
be controlled with careful precautions.
That’s why they felt angry and betrayed
when they were asked to fight the novel
coronavirus without an adequate supply
of protective gear or (in some places)
training about the new pathogen. And
tragically, some died as a result.
Now many physicians I know in
Covid-19 hot spots say they actually feel
safest in the hospital, where procedures
than 100,000 newly registered voters as
well as those with no history of voting.
We integrated Latino organizers into
our staff and reached out to Latino voters
early and often. We visited them at their
homes and work sites. We connected
with them via phone and bilingual radio
ads and mailers. We organized commu-
nity-based events like soccer tourna-
ments where we’d register voters and
host caucus trainings. Our strategy
worked — Senator Sanders won 73 per-
cent of Nevada’s Latino vote. He also
won big in California and Colorado.
If Mr. Biden takes a conventional ap-
proach and talks to the same little sliver
of older Latinos in Arizona everyone
talks to, he could be in trouble. But if he
Latino voters could
ultimately be the ones
who send Trump packing.
taps into the culture of activism in Ari-
zona that registered 138,000 Latinos
since Mr. Trump was elected, helped oust
Joe Arpaio and is working to ensure Mr.
Trump is next, Mr. Biden can reshape the
electoral map and win.
Right now, the Biden campaign is
spending $800,000 a week on Spanish-
language cable television ads. But more
can be done through a multilayered
strategy. This includes swapping terres-
trial for digital radio, advertising in the
Spanish-language newspapers abuelas
read and sending bilingual mailers that
explain his plan to rebuild an economy in
tatters.
Luz Chaparro Hernandez, a bilingual
elementary-school teacher and union
member, is part of the Democratic con-
vention this week, as well as Aldo Mar-
tinez, a 26-year-old DACA recipient and
paramedic from Fort Myers, Fla., who is
braving the horrors of the coronavirus
ANA GALVAÑ
like masking and sanitizing are assidu-
ously followed. (Hell hath no fury like a
surgeon who witnesses a medical student
touch a sterile surface with an unsterile
hand.) In contrast, on the sidewalk, the co-
ronavirus could be roaming free if people
aren’t wearing masks.
Which is why masking should be man-
dated and enforced. It’s not just about
your individual risk tolerance, but about
keeping everyone safe.
In addition to wearing masks and social
distancing when not at home, we should
avoid prolonged periods in indoor spaces
with crowds or strangers; wash or sani-
tize our hands — a lot — and try not to
touch “high-touch” surfaces that hun-
dreds of people have grabbed before.
And we have to demand that anywhere
we go — bookstores, medical offices,
trains or hair salons — requires that pa-
trons follow these guidelines. I, for one,
won’t enter if they don’t.
I do not blame teachers for being unwill-
ing to return to school in places where ad-
ministrators and local officials have been
in denial about Covid-19 or have been un-
willing or unable to do this preparatory
work. But once schools have put in place
appropriate science-based steps, most
teachers (those not in high-risk groups)
should return to their jobs.
Covid-19 is a very serious disease. But it
is not the Black Death, which killed up to
half of Europe in the 14th century. A vac-
cine, when and if it arrives, will be a big
help. But in the meantime, we have sci-
ence. We know what causes Covid-19. We
are learning more about how to detect,
prevent and treat it every day.
So instead of taking your temperature
and checking your pulse oximeter reading
twice a day, it may be time to take stock of
your risk tolerance. In those places where
governments, businesses and administra-
tors have set the stage properly, we can —
with sensible precautions — begin to live
again. 0 terested in mega-achievement. One of
ELISABETH ROSENTHAL, the editor in chief
of Kaiser Health News, is the author of
“An American Sickness: How Healthcare
Became Big Business and How You Can
Take It Back” and a contributing opinion
writer.
head on. The next step for the campaign
is to invest in telling stories like these on
every platform Latinos engage with,
from Pandora and YouTube to Telemu-
ndo and El Nuevo Herald.
I’ve been part of focus groups with La-
tino voters who bring up the 2016-era
problem that Democrats still haven’t
cracked: An anti-Trump message is use-
ful — after all, the president is a disaster
for Latinos — but Latinos don’t know
what a Biden administration would
mean for their families. We need to tell
them how Mr. Biden’s recently an-
nounced Latino agenda would inject
their small businesses with capital, raise
the minimum wage to $15 an hour and
eliminate the minimum tipped wage,
which would greatly benefit Latino
restaurant workers.
Mr. Biden has one more secret weapon
to unlocking the Latino vote: Kamala
Harris, a multicultural daughter of immi-
grants who embodies the American
dream. Senator Harris — a public ser-
vant raised by a single mother, an advo-
cate for immigrant children separated
from their parents and Latino small busi-
nesses devastated by the pandemic shut-
down — can bridge the gap between Mr.
Biden and the Latino community.
A recent poll found that 52 percent of
Latino voters in key battleground states
said the selection of Ms. Harris as his
running mate would make them more
likely to vote for Mr. Biden.
If Mr. Biden uses the Sanders multilay-
ered approach to connect with Latinos,
maybe he will also become a tío we can
be proud of. If he manages to reach and
mobilize them, these voters could ulti-
mately be the ones who send Mr. Trump
packing. 0 male governors and senators. The vice
CHUCK ROCHA, the founder and president
of Solidarity Strategies and a former
senior adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders,
is the author of “Tío Bernie: The Inside
Story of How Bernie Sanders Brought
Latinos Into the Political Revolution.”
0N A27
GAIL COLLINS
Who’s the Best
First Lady?
ALREADY SORTA LOOKING forward to the
Republican convention next week. The
White House says Melania Trump will be
speaking to the American people from
the Rose Garden on Tuesday.
Chances are her speechwriters won’t
lift any lines from Michelle Obama like
they did four years ago. Although if you
hear Melania urging her audience to
“grab our comfortable shoes, put on our
masks, pack a brown-bag dinner and
maybe breakfast, too,” when they go to
the polls, you will know what happened.
There’s still some first lady fascination
at the conventions. Michelle Obama’s
feisty first-night Democratic finale had
people swooning. (“If we have any hope
of ending this chaos, we have got to vote
for Joe Biden like our lives depend on
it.”)
Listening, I remembered the first time
I ever saw her at a speaking engage-
ment. It was very early in the 2008 cam-
paign, and she appeared to be a nervous
wreck. It wasn’t really the public speak-
ing that scared her — it was the thought
that she could say something as an aside,
or by mistake, that would screw up ev-
erything and ruin her husband’s chance
of becoming president.
I dare say we can all agree she’s gotten
over that.
Jill Biden introduced herself to the na-
tional audience from a classroom where
she used to teach English. Dr. Biden talks
a lot about education, which is great. And
she can remind voters of her husband’s
extraordinary story of achievement
combined with personal loss.
And when things calm down she has
some great sagas from the past, like the
time she lobbied against the idea of a Bi-
den presidential campaign in 2003 by
walking past his advocates in a bikini
with the word “no” written across her
stomach.
Besides Barack Obama, the Demo-
You know, we’re voting
for more than a president.
crats’ Day 3 was a woman’s place, even if
a virtual one. Starring Kamala Harris, of
course, and Hillary Clinton, whose at-
tempt to move from that president’s-wife
shelf into the top job pretty much defined
early-21st-century American politics.
Just for the heck of it, let’s take a his-
torical walk down First Lady Lane.
Martha Washington tried, without much
success, to get her husband to stop
throwing extremely boring dinner par-
ties. Dolley Madison opened up Wash-
ington to the kind of socializing nobody
expected to find in a primitive capital in a
swamp. Visiting diplomats must have
thanked God for them at evening pray-
ers.
The modern first lady era began with
Eleanor Roosevelt, who was really too
extraordinary to compare to anyone
else, and moved on to Mamie Eisenhow-
er, who was heavily marketed as a presi-
dential wife. (“Keep our first lady in the
White House for four more years!”) Ma-
mie made it very clear that she wasn’t in-
her favorite maxims was: “Every wom-
an over 50 should stay in bed until noon.”
Her favorite color, the nation knew,
was pink, and we hit some new marker in
1955 when Ike suffered a heart attack
and the public was informed that Mamie
was staying in the hospital room next to
his, requesting virtually no special treat-
ment except a pink toilet seat.
We marched on to the present, through
Jacqueline Kennedy, who gave the job
mega-glamour, and Lady Bird Johnson,
who Americans came to realize was ac-
tually the family breadwinner, through
the super-efficient Rosalynn Carter and
Nancy Reagan, who the public was
taught to think of as only a superficial
snob until her husband got sick and ev-
eryone realized that, politics aside, this
really was a love match.
With Hillary, everything changed. She
became as much a part of the public con-
sciousness as the men in the White
House. She reminded the country that it
was time to think about women in a dif-
ferent presidential role. She also demon-
strated what a very bad idea it was to try
to use the first lady thing as a spring-
board for the top job.
Although it’s not likely that many of
the Democrats at the convention
Wednesday were holding grudges. Clin-
ton was one of the stars of the night. “Re-
member back in 2016 when Trump
asked, ‘What do you have to lose?’” she
asked them. “Well, now we know.”
Marching through modern history with
Hillary was at times traumatic, but it was
never defeatist. Everybody moves on.
It’s not too tough to have a women-
themed night at a political convention
featuring a female speaker of the House,
a female vice-presidential candidate and
the former first lady who reminded the
country it was time to think about wom-
en in a different White House job.
This convention marks the point
where everyone has agreed the debate
about gender at the top is all over. The
future looks pretty terrifying on occa-
sion, but it’s almost certainly going to be
one full of expanding political opportuni-
ties for women. More once and future fe-
presidency will look like old hat. We’ll re-
fer to the chief justice of the Supreme
Court as “her” and gossip about which
guy might make the best first gentleman.
Until we think of something better to
call him. 0
A28 N THE NEW YORK TIMES OBITUARIES THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Peter V. Tytell, 74, Dies;
Forensic Wizard of Type
Who Ferreted Out Truth
By RICHARD SANDOMIR
Peter V. Tytell, whose intricate
knowledge of typewriters, shaped
amid the Olivettis, Underwoods
and Royals of his parents’ repair
shop in New York, led him to a ca-
reer as a renowned forensic docu-
ment examiner and even to a
small but important part in the
2004 presidential campaign, died
on Aug. 11 at his home in Manhat-
tan. He was 74.
His sister, Pamela Tytell, said
the cause was pleural mesothelio-
ma.
Mr. Tytell’s vast expertise in
typewriter, paper and handwrit-
ing analysis was sought by pros-
ecutors, public defenders, banks,
insurance companies and crime
laboratories to help resolve dis-
putes over the authenticity of doc-
uments.
“Peter could look at one charac-
ter in a typewritten document and
he’d know which machine it was
made by,” Samiah Ibrahim, man-
ager of forensic document exami-
nation at the Canada Border Serv-
With one look ‘he’d
know which machine’
was used to create a
typewritten document.
ices Agency, said in an interview.
“The thing about Peter was his re-
call. He had all these images in his
head.”
One of his most famous cases in-
volved the superscript “th.”
In 2004, the midweek edition of
“60 Minutes” reported that Presi-
dent George W. Bush had received
special treatment while serving in
the Texas Air National Guard in
the early 1970s. The segment,
which aired during President
Bush’s re-election campaign
against Senator John Kerry, used
memorandums said to be from the
files of Mr. Bush’s squadron com-
mander, Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, to
make its case.
After the documents’ authen-
ticity came into question, CBS
convened an independent panel to
investigate why the segment had
been produced and aired so hast-
Ben Cross, 72, Lead in Oscar-Winning ‘Chariots of Fire’ Amer Fakhoury, 57, Detainee
By AZI PAYBARAH
Ben Cross, the actor best known
to one generation for playing a de-
termined runner in the 1981 Acad-
emy Award-winning film “Chari-
ots of Fire” and to another audi-
ence decades later for his role in a
reboot of “Star Trek,” died on
Tuesday at a hospital in Vienna.
He was 72.
His daughter, Lauren, con-
firmed the death but did not speci-
fy the cause, though she said it
was not Covid-19.
“Chariots of Fire” tells the true
story of two track stars represent-
ing Britain in the 1924 Paris
Olympics who are vying for med-
als and world records but also for
something greater. Mr. Cross
played Harold Abrahams, a furi-
ously competitive athlete and a
son of Jewish immigrants who
fights anti-Semitism as a Cam-
bridge student while seeking visi-
bility in Anglo-Saxon society.
In 2009, Mr. Cross appeared in
the “Star Trek” reboot playing
Spock’s father, Sarek, who im-
parts this bit of advice to this son:
“What is necessary is never un-
wise.”
In between Mr. Cross worked in
television and film for decades. At
his death he had just completed
shooting “The Devil’s Light,” a
forthcoming film about an exor-
cism, according to his representa-
tive, Tracy Mapes. She said he
would also be seen in the coming
movie “Last Letter From Your
Lover,” about a journalist who dis-
covers a series of letters depicting
a star-crossed love affair from the
1960s.
In a 1983 interview, Mr. Cross
described his acting style as “a
method, not The Method,” refer-
ring to the school of acting that
promotes emotionally and psy-
chologically naturalistic perform-
ances.
“The whole thing about acting
is that you draw on other people’s
experiences,” he said. “I watch
them and I listen to them. How I
play it is my instinctive interpre-
tation.”
Harry Bernard Cross was born
on Dec. 16, 1947, in London. His fa-
ther was an apartment house
doorman who struggled to sup-
port the family. The younger Mr.
Cross quit school at age 15 and
worked as a window cleaner, a
butcher’s boy and a dishwasher
until eventually landing work as a
theater stagehand.
Watching from the wings, by his
Julia Carmel contributed report-
ing.
ily, and asked Mr. Tytell to exam-
ine four documents.
Mr. Tytell told the panel that the
superscript “th” in the documents
could not have been made by the
Olympia manual typewriter used
in the early 1970s by the Texas Air
National Guard. The “th” of the
Olympia was underlined and did
not rise above the adjacent char-
acters, unlike the “th” in the docu-
ments featured in the “60 Min-
utes” segment. That, plus the pro-
portional spacing and a typeface
that closely resembled Times
New Roman in Microsoft Word,
led him to conclude that the docu-
ments were probably created on a
computer unavailable in the early
1970s.
Soon after the panel delivered
its findings in early 2005, CBS
fired a producer and three execu-
tives for their role in the segment.
In another high-profile legal
case, Mr. Tytell was asked in 2011
by Mark Zuckerberg, a founder of
Facebook, to examine a two-page
work-for-hire contract that Paul
Ceglia, a wood-pellets salesman,
said entitled him to a substantial
stake in the social media giant,
which he sought in a federal law-
suit.
Using the tools of his craft —
among them hand magnifiers, a
stereoscopic microscope, ultravi-
olet lamps and precision measur-
ing devices — Mr. Tytell demon-
strated that the contract showed
unusual differences between the
typefaces and spacing from one
page to the other, suggesting that
they had been prepared at differ-
ent times. He also concluded that
attempts had been made to age
the pages artificially.
A federal judge dismissed the
lawsuit in 2014 on the grounds that
the contract was a forgery.
Peter Van Tytell was born on
Aug. 13, 1945, in Manhattan and
raised in the Bronx. His parents,
Martin and Pearl (Kessler) Tytell,
rented, repaired and restored
typewriters in a shop on Fulton
Street in Manhattan whose
customers included the broad-
casters David Brinkley and Andy
Rooney and the writers Richard
Condon and Dorothy Parker. Mr.
Tytell’s mother also started a fo-
rensic documentation examina-
tion business.
Young Peter was attracted to
JON FURNISS/INVISION, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
account, he thought he could per-
form better, so he auditioned for
the Royal Academy of Dramatic
Art and was accepted.
After roles in regional theater
and a brief part in Richard Atten-
borough’s 1977 epic war film “A
Bridge Too Far,” Mr. Cross got his
break when he joined the cast of a
Broadway musical, “I Love My
Wife,” which had transferred to
London’s West End. Then came
another musical, “Chicago,” in
which he was performing when he
read for a role in “Chariots of
Fire.”
After getting the part he trained
daily for two and a half months to
prepare for it.
The film co-starred Ian
Charleson as Eric Liddell, a Scot-
tish Presbyterian missionary who
refuses to take part in the Games
on the Sabbath. Mr. Charleson
died of AIDS in 1990 at 40. (The
the typewriters.
“When he was a young boy, his
parents used to take him to the of-
fice with them on the weekend,”
Tikva Tytell, his wife, said in an
email. “His father gave him a can
with typewriter parts and he
would play with them. He knew
how to fix and restore typewriters
from an early age.”
By the time he was 11, he was
helping out with the forensic
work.
In the late 1960s, he left New
York for two years to work as a
roadie for the Steve Miller Band,
Janis Joplin and the Grateful
Dead. “He was searching for him-
self,” his wife said.
STANLEY BIELECKI MOVIE COLLECTION/GETTY IMAGES
Ben Cross, above left, with Ian Holm in the 1981 film “Chariots
of Fire,” which won an Academy Award for best picture; and in
2012. He played Spock’s father in the 2009 reboot of “Star Trek.”
movie also starred Ian Holm, who
died in June.)
“Chariots of Fire” won the
Academy Award for best picture.
Vincent Canby of The New York
Times declared the film, with a
stirring Oscar-winning score by
the Greek composer Vangelis,
“unashamedly rousing, invigorat-
ing” and a “very cleareyed evoca-
tion of values of the old-fashioned
sort that are today more easily
satirized than celebrated.”
Mr. Canby described Mr. Cross
as “handsome in a Byronic way”
and wrote that he was “tough,
abrasive and completely believ-
able as the low-born but richly
bred Cambridge student who
fights for his rights with a mixture
of extroverted charm and naked
ambition, which shocks the Caius
College dons.”
Mr. Cross and Mr. Charleson
“are so good,” Mr. Canby wrote,
“that one wonders why it’s taken
even this long for them to receive
the kind of attention that each will
certainly enjoy from this film for-
ward.”
Mr. Cross went on to gather nu-
merous credits in films, television
series and TV movies, but his
“Chariots of Fire” performance
would be his high-water mark.
Mr. Cross’s marriages to Penny
Butler, in 1977, and to Michele
He returned to New York in
1970, rejoined his parents’ shop,
opened his own forensic business
and received a bachelor’s degree
from the John Jay College of Crim-
inal Justice.
Mr. Tytell became known inter-
nationally as a charismatic inves-
tigator and mentor. In 2017 he won
the Albert S. Osborn Award for
distinguished service from the
American Society of Questioned
Document Examiners.
In 1997, he was hired by a law
firm representing Bahrain in a
long-running legal battle with Qa-
tar at the International Court of
Justice at The Hague over the pos-
session of islands in the Persian
Mörth, in 1996, ended in divorce.
He married Deyana Boneva in
2018. In addition to his daughter,
Lauren, from his first marriage,
he is survived by his wife as well
as a son from his first marriage,
Theo, and three grandchildren.
After the success of “Chariots of
Fire,” Mr. Cross seemed to go out
Great lengths to avoid
being typecast again
as Harold Abrahams.
of his way to avoid being typecast
as a Harold Abrahams kind of
character again.
After a man spotted him at a
New York hotel in 1983 and said,
“Say, aren’t you that guy from
‘Chariots of Fire?,’ ” Mr. Cross re-
sponded by deliberately lighting a
cigarette in front of him.
“I wanted to disillusion him,”
Mr. Cross said. “I am a smoker,
and until people stop identifying
me with ‘Chariots of Fire,’ I will
continue to smoke.”
He also put distance between
himself and the sport portrayed in
the film. “The only running I do
now is from the tax man,” he said.
Peter V. Tytell in 2001. He helped resolve the 2004 dispute sur-
rounding memos used in a “60 Minutes” segment on President
George W. Bush and the Texas Air National Guard. Mr. Tytell
concluded the documents were fake, in part because the “th” su-
perscript was not consistent with manual typewriters of the time.
Gulf.
While browsing a gift shop at
The Hague, he noticed that a col-
lection of floral-motif Latin seals
from the 1980s bore a close resem-
blance to the seals used on docu-
ments, said to be decades old, that
Qatar had submitted in the dis-
pute. Further examination
showed that the newer seals had
been placed on reused documents
from the Ottoman Empire to cre-
ate the forgeries.
“These findings have led to the
determination that the suspect
documents bearing these seals
could not have been prepared on
or about their purported dates,”
he wrote in his report.
Qatar withdrew the documents
in 1998. And in 2001 the court ruled
that the Hawar Islands, the larg-
est of those in dispute, would stay
with Bahrain, and rejected Qatar’s
claim of sovereignty. The court
awarded Qatar a smaller island
region.
In another case involving forg-
eries, Mr. Tytell testified for the
prosecution against a former
paralegal at a New York law firm,
Released From Jail in Beirut
By JENNY GROSS
Amer Fakhoury, a Lebanese-
born naturalized American citizen
who was detained for months in
Beirut on charges of torturing
Lebanese prisoners decades ago
during the Israeli occupation of
southern Lebanon, died on Mon-
day in Boston. He was 57.
Mr. Fakhoury, who owned a
Lebanese restaurant in Dover,
N.H., had been found to have late-
stage lymphoma while held in
Lebanon and died at the Dana-
Farber Cancer Institute, his fam-
ily said.
Mr. Fakhoury, who became a
United States citizen last year,
was arrested and detained in
Beirut in September, days after he
had returned to Lebanon for the
first time in 20 years to see family.
He was charged with having over-
seen the torture of fellow Leba-
nese decades ago as a member of
a Christian-dominated militia and
collaborating with Israeli forces
during their 18-year occupation of
southern Lebanon, charges he de-
nied.
In March, after U.S. govern-
ment efforts to secure his release,
Mr. Fakhoury was freed from jail
when a judge ruled that the stat-
ute of limitations for prosecuting
him had expired.
“We believe that God took him
out of these evil, terrorist hands
and brought him to America to die
peacefully with his family right by
his side,” Macy Fakhoury, one of
his four daughters, said on Tues-
day. “I think that’s the biggest
blessing of all.”
His case drew the attention of
U.S. senators as well as coverage
on “Fox & Friends” on Fox News,
which is regularly watched by
President Trump. Senior Trump
administration diplomats pres-
sured the Lebanese government,
warning that the case could dam-
age its relationship with Washing-
ton, which sent the country more
than $2.3 billion in military assist-
ance between 2005 and 2019.
Administration officials said
they believed that Mr. Fakhoury’s
arrest was directed by the militant
group Hezbollah, which plays a
major role in the country’s gov-
ernment. Hezbollah officials, in a
statement after Mr. Fakhoury’s
release in March, said the drop-
ping of charges against him was
“a sad day for Lebanon and jus-
tice.”
While detained, his daughter
Guila Fakhoury said, Mr.
Fakhoury was tortured and had
RUTH FREMSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Lawrence X. Cusack III, who had
defrauded $7 million from invest-
ors in a scheme to sell fake docu-
ments said to connect President
John F. Kennedy to Marilyn Mon-
roe and the gangster Sam Gian-
cana.
Mr. Tytell told the court that the
typewriter used to create the doc-
uments did not exist at the time
they were supposed to have been
written. Mr. Cusack was found
guilty in 1999 and received a nine-
year sentence.
In addition to his wife and sister,
Mr. Tytell is survived by his
mother. His father died in 2008,
seven years after the family’s 66-
year-old typewriter shop closed.
At the time, Peter Tytell told
The New York Times that he
would keep some of the typewrit-
ers “as a living archive” to help
with his document examination
work, and try to sell or donate oth-
ers. He displayed antique type-
writers in his small apartment
and tucked the ugly ones in clos-
ets.
“I have such great affection for
them,” he said.
GUILA FAKHOURY, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
Amer Fakhoury, of Dover,
N.H., was detained last Sep-
tember and freed in March.
Accused of having
overseen the torture
of Lebanese prisoners.
several ribs broken, and he was
forced to drink dirty water while
held in unsanitary conditions. He
was healthy when he arrived in
Lebanon, but, his family said,
while he was detained there he be-
came infected with the Epstein-
Barr virus, and he later received a
diagnosis of lymphoma, a cancer
of the lymphatic system.
Amer Fakhoury was born on
May 31, 1963, in Jdaydet Marjey-
oun, Lebanon, to Josephine Abou
Kassem and Elias Fakhoury.
When Mr. Fakhoury returned to
New Hampshire, where he owned
a restaurant called Little Lebanon
to Go, he looked like a different
person, his daughters said. He
and his wife, Micheline, used to go
on evening walks around Dover.
After he came back from Lebanon,
he could make it only as far as the
mailbox.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a
New Hampshire Democrat, said
in a statement that she was re-
lieved that Mr. Fakhoury was able
to spend the last few months of his
life surrounded by loved ones and
receiving excellent medical care.
“Amer was a loving husband, fa-
ther and grandfather, and a pillar
in his community,” she said. “He
immigrated to the United States,
and through hard work and en-
trepreneurship, he lived the
American dream.”
In addition to his wife and his
daughters Guila and Macy, he is
survived by two other daughters,
Amanda and Zoya, and three
grandchildren.
“This is not how we wanted his
story to end,” Zoya Fakhoury said.
4 TECHNOLOGY 6 TECH TIP 8 SPORTS

The home rental company A step-by-step guide on how Danielle Kang was on a tear
Airbnb, whose business was to protect your privacy, and before the pandemic shut
crushed by the pandemic, the environment, when down the L.P.G.A. Tour. Now
has filed to go public. parting with an old gadget. she’s playing even better.

TECH ECONOMY MEDIA FINANCE THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 B1

N

TRILLIONS
$2.0
AUG. 19, 2020
Apple surpasses $2 trillion,
doubling its value in only
two years.

Apple is the first U.S. company to reach $2 trillion in value, 1.8

capping a staggering ascent that began in the pandemic.

$2,000,000,000,000
1.6

1.4

By JACK NICAS announced aggressive new meas- Onset of the

It took Apple 42 years to reach
$1 trillion in value. It took it just
two more years to get to $2 trillion.
Even more stunning: All of Ap-
ple’s second $1 trillion came in the
past 21 weeks, while the global
economy shrank faster than ever
before in the coronavirus pan-
demic.
On Wednesday, Apple became
the first U.S. company to hit a $2
trillion valuation when its shares
climbed 1.4 percent to $468.65 in
midday trading, though they later
declined and ended the day flat. It
was another milestone for the
maker of iPhones, Mac computers
and Apple Watches, cementing its
title as the world’s most valuable
public company and punctuating
how the pandemic has been a bo-
nanza for the tech giants.
As recently as mid-March, Ap-
ple’s value was under $1 trillion af-
ter the stock market plunged over
fears of the coronavirus. On
March 23, the stock market’s na-
dir this year, the Federal Reserve
ures to calm investors. Since then, coronavirus
the stock market — and particu- pandemic
larly the stocks of Apple, Micro- 1.2
soft, Amazon, Alphabet and Face-
book — has largely soared, with
the S&P 500 hitting a new high on
Tuesday.
Investors have poured billions AUG. 2, 2018
of dollars into the tech behemoths, Apple reaches $1 trillion
1.0
betting that their immense size in value in 2018, 42 years
and power would serve as refuges after its founding.
from the pandemic-induced reces-
sion. Together, those five compa-
nies’ value has swelled by almost
$3 trillion since March 23, nearly
0.8
the same growth as the S&P 500’s
next 50 most valuable companies
combined, including Berkshire
Hathaway, Walmart and Disney,
according to S&P Global, the mar-
ket analytics firm. Apple’s valua-
0.6
tion alone rose by about $6.8 bil-
lion a day, more than the value of
American Airlines.
“It’s become the new flight to A ‘flight to safety’ Tim Cook becomes
chief executive,
safety,” Aswath Damodaran, a
New York University finance pro-
on Wall Street that replacing co-founder
Steve Jobs
CONTINUED ON PAGE B5 has Big Tech soaring. 0.4

0.2
iPhone
Apple’s market value introduced

Initial public offering Market Dot-com

Founded 1976 Dec. 12, 1980 bubble bubble Plotted monthly

0
1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020

Source: Refinitiv KARL RUSSELL AND GUILBERT GATES/THE NEW YORK TIMES

Behind-the-Scenes Drama Facebook

At ‘All Rise,’ a CBS Rarity
By NICOLE SPERLING
The courtroom drama “All Rise”
was something rare for CBS when
it made its debut in September: a
prime-time drama with a Black
woman as its protagonist. After
bringing in an average of more
than five million viewers per
episode, it was renewed for a sec-
ond season in May.
But almost from the start of pro-
duction last summer, many of the
staff writers clashed with the
Five writers have left
a series after clashes
with a show runner.
MONTY BRINTON/CBS, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
Simone Missick plays the lead
in “All Rise” on CBS, a network
criticized for a lack of diversity.
show runner, Greg Spottiswood,
over how the program handled
race and gender.
Now that work is underway for
the second season of “All Rise,”
which stars Simone Missick as an
idealistic Los Angeles judge, five
writers from the original staff of
seven are gone. Among those who
quit were the program’s three
highest-ranking writers of color.
Produced by Warner Bros. Tele-
vision, a division of AT&T’s Warn-
erMedia, “All Rise” is loosely
based on a 2005 nonfiction book,
“Courtroom 302,” about a white
male judge in Cook County, Ill. In
an effort to make it of the moment,
Mr. Spottiswood, a white writer-
producer, changed the main char-
acter to a Black woman. For CBS,
a network that had been criticized
for a prime-time lineup that
lacked diversity, “All Rise” was a
key part of a new wave of pro-
gramming meant to better reflect
the American population.
Shernold Edwards, a Black
woman who has been a writer-
producer on Fox’s “Sleepy Hol-
low” and other shows, said she
had left “All Rise” in November af-
ter disagreements with Mr. Spot-
tiswood. “We had to do so much
behind the scenes to keep these
scripts from being racist and of-
fensive,” she said in an interview.
Sunil Nayar, an Indian-Ameri-
can television writer who has
worked on ABC’s “Revenge” and
CBS’s “CSI: Miami,” also said he
had left after disputes with Mr.
Spottiswood. Some of them had to
do with his attempts to have “All
Rise” accurately reflect the expe-
riences of Black people and other
people of color, he said; another
point of contention was that, in his
view, Mr. Spottiswood seemed
more interested in having him ap-
pear at public events than in giv-
ing him duties that matched his
job title, co-executive producer.
“It became clear to me, when I
left the show, that I was only there
because I’m the brown guy,” Mr.
Nayar said in an interview. “Greg
hired me to be his brown guy.”
Warner Bros. said in a state-
ment that Mr. Spottiswood, from
the beginning, had “insisted on
CONTINUED ON PAGE B4
“These big-box retailers are just perfectly positioned,” said Andrew Lipsman, a data analyst with eMarketer.
Pandemic Has Been a Boon for Big Boxes
By GILLIAN FRIEDMAN
In the early days of the pandemic,
when grocery stores in the United
States ran low on staples like toilet
paper, people flocked to Walmart
and Target to stock up. Five
months later, as the number of co-
ronavirus cases remains high,
shoppers continue to buy from the
big-box retailers in record
amounts.
On Wednesday, Target reported
the greatest percentage increase
in quarterly sales in the compa-
ny’s history. Walmart, which re-
ported earnings on Tuesday, dou-
bled its e-commerce sales. Home
Depot’s sales increased more than
23 percent in this year’s second
quarter. Wayfair reported earlier
that its revenue was up roughly 80
percent year over year.
Shoppers turn to
Walmart and Target
in record numbers.
The success of those retailers
can be attributed, in part, to their
one-stop shopping advantage —
both in person and online. It al-
lows budget-conscious shoppers
to pick up groceries, clothing,
electronics, and home goods at the
same time.
“In a pandemic, you don’t want
to make multiple stops, you want
to go to one place that is safe and
convenient,” said Andy Mantis,
head of data insights for the re-
search firm 1010Data.
BRENDAN MCDERMID/REUTERS
The pandemic has been devas-
tating for the broader retail indus-
try, with name-brand companies
like Neiman Marcus, J. Crew, J.C.
Penney and the owner of Men’s
Wearhouse among those that
have filed for bankruptcy in re-
cent months. But monthly retail
sales — after plummeting in
March and April — have returned
to the level they were at in Febru-
ary, fed in large part by behe-
moths like Amazon, Walmart and
Target.
Walmart had strong demand for
groceries, as well as for home and
sporting goods. With people still
largely stuck at home, Target’s
electronics sales surged. Home
Depot and Lowe’s drew crowds of
people eager to finally tackle
CONTINUED ON PAGE B4
Pulls Voices
For QAnon
From Its Site
By SHEERA FRENKEL
OAKLAND, CALIF. — Facebook said
on Wednesday that it had re-
moved 790 QAnon groups from its
site and was restricting another
1,950 groups, 440 pages and more
than 10,000 Instagram accounts
related to the right-wing conspir-
acy theory, in the social network’s
most sweeping action against the
fast-growing movement.
Facebook’s takedown followed
record growth of QAnon groups
on the site, much of it since the co-
ronavirus pandemic began in
March. Activity on some of the
largest QAnon groups on the so-
cial network, including likes, com-
ments and shares of posts, rose
200 to 300 percent in the last six
months, according to data gath-
ered by The New York Times.
“We have seen growing move-
ments that, while not directly or-
ganizing violence, have celebrat-
ed violent acts, shown that they
have weapons and suggest they
will use them, or have individual
followers with patterns of violent
behavior,” Facebook said in a
statement, adding that it would
also block QAnon hashtags such
as #digitalarmy and #thestorm.
The actions, less than three
months before the presidential
election, underline how QAnon is
causing alarm. Founded four
years ago, QAnon was once a
fringe phenomenon with believ-
ers who alleged, falsely, that the
world was run by a cabal of Satan-
worshiping pedophiles who were
plotting against President Trump
while operating a global child sex-
trafficking ring.
But in recent months, the move-
CONTINUED ON PAGE B6
B2 N THE NEW YORK TIMES BUSINESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

The Digest

RETAIL

Goodyear Stocks Fall After Record, S&P 500 Takes a Step Back
After Trump Boycott Call By The Associated Press

Shares of the Goodyear Tire &
Rubber Company fell as much as 4
percent on Wednesday, after Pres-
ident Trump called on his support-
ers to boycott the Ohio-based com-
pany because of its policy on polit-
ical attire in the workplace.
“Don’t buy GOODYEAR TIRES
- They announced a BAN ON
MAGA HATS,” Mr. Trump wrote
on Twitter on Wednesday, refer-
ring to his “Make America Great
Again” campaign slogan.
Mr. Trump’s outburst came a
day after a television station in
Kansas shared an image from a
Goodyear training presentation
that said “MAGA Attire” as well as
“Blue Lives Matter,” the slogan in-
tended to support police officers
but also decried as an ill-suited re-
action to the Black Lives Matter
movement, were considered un-
acceptable.
Goodyear responded
Wednesday by saying that its pol-
icy against harassment and dis-
BANKING
JPMorgan Explored
Services at Post Offices
JPMorgan Chase, the largest
bank in the United States, had
considered opening A.T.M.s and
other banking facilities inside
branches of the United States
Postal Service, a bank spokes-
woman said.
Several months ago, the bank
explored the possibility of leasing
space in post office branches, a
move that would have put it in a
highly favorable position com-
pared to its giant peers, the
spokeswoman said.
Following a report on Wednes-
day by The Capital Forum that
cited an internal Postal Service
document describing the plans,
the JPMorgan spokeswoman, Pa-
tricia Wexler, said the bank had
discussions “about what it might
look like to lease a small number
of spaces to place A.T.M.s to better
serve some historically under-
served communities.”
Democrats in Congress have
been pushing for the Postal Serv-
ice to offer its own banking op-
S&P 500 INDEX The S&P 500 pulled back from its The S& P 500 Index
newly set record on Wednesday
–0.44% after a meandering day of trading Position of the S& P 500 index at 1-minute intervals on Wednesday.
3,374.85
took a late turn lower. 3,400
The benchmark index fell 14.93
points, or 0.4 percent, to 3,374.85, a
day after it wiped out the last of its
3,390
STOCKS & BONDS
MICHAEL REYNOLDS/EPA, VIA SHUTTERSTOCK
losses created by the pandemic Previous close
crimination means that it asks and surpassed its Feb. 19 peak. 3,389.78
that “associates refrain from DOW JONES INDUSTRIALS The Dow Jones industrial aver- 3,380
workplace expressions in support age also gave up an earlier gain
of political campaigning for any –0.31% and lost 85.19, or 0.3 percent, to
candidate or political party.” 27,692.88
27,692.88. The Nasdaq composite
Mr. Trump has attacked compa- dropped 64.38, or 0.6 percent, to 3,370
nies on Twitter in the past for poli- 11,146.46.
cies he disagreed with. These in- Indexes turned lower in the af- 10 a.m. Noon 2 p.m. 4 p.m.
clude the automaker Ford, for ternoon after the Federal Reserve Source: Reuters THE NEW YORK TIMES
manufacturing cars outside of the released the minutes from its lat-
United States, and the drug maker est policy meeting. The central
Pfizer because of the rising cost of bank has been one of the main pil- now we’ve been climbing the sharp decline in their profits for
pharmaceuticals. lars propping up the market after stairs back up, and we’re higher the spring, but not as bad as Wall
Goodyear’s shares ended trad- NASDAQ COMPOSITE INDEX it slashed short-term interest than we were before.” Street expected. More than 93
on ing on Wednesday with a decline This is a traditionally slow time percent of the earnings reports
rates to their record low and es-
of about 1.6 percent. –0.57% sentially promised to buy as many of the year for stocks, and the mar- are in, and the index is on pace for
MOHAMMED HADI 11,146.46
ket is also still in wait-and-see a roughly 33 percent drop from the
bonds as it takes to keep markets
running smoothly. mode on several fronts. prior year.
The Fed’s minutes showed Investors still seem to believe Target jumped 12.7 percent for
again that policy makers are find- that Congress and the White the biggest gain in the S&P 500 af-
tions so that more low-income
ing it difficult to forecast the path House will reach a deal to deliver ter it reported results for the
Americans can have access to ba-
sic services, like cashing checks, of the economy, which will depend more aid to the economy after fed- spring that easily beat Wall
greatly on what happens with the eral unemployment benefits and Street’s expectations.
without having to pay the same
virus. other stimulus expired. Demo- But TJX, the operator of T.J.
rates that banks or payday lend-
Several Fed officials said trying crats and Republicans have been Maxx and Marshalls, slumped 5.4
ers charge to people without bank
accounts, which can be extremely
10-YEAR TREASURY YIELD to set upper limits for yields be- stuck at an impasse, but investors percent after its results fell short
high. 0.68% yond ultrashort-term rates would are seeing speculation about a of analysts’ forecasts.
Having JPMorgan’s banking fa- provide only a modest help. Some possible scaled-down version of Apple continued its run of domi-
–0.01 points
cilities in post office branches may investors have been speculating aid passing Congress, said Willie nance and rose 0.1 percent. Earli-
have made the idea of postal bank- that could be a step the Fed would Delwiche, investment strategist er in the day, its total market value
ing harder to execute. That would take next to help the economy. at Baird. briefly topped $2 trillion, the first
have been good for JPMorgan and The yield on the 10-year Treas- Beyond Capitol Hill, investors time a U.S. company has crossed
other large banks, which general- ury fell to 0.68 percent from 0.69 are also waiting for more develop- that threshold. It’s the latest acco-
ly oppose postal banking because percent late Tuesday. It had been ments on the rising tensions be- lade for Big Tech, which has
it would undermine their ability to as low as 0.64 percent earlier in tween the United States and thrived as the pandemic acceler-
attract new customers. the morning. China. The world’s largest econo- ates work-from-home and other
In June, a consortium of bank Across the stock market, mo- mies have longstanding trade is- tech-friendly trends.
CRUDE OIL (U.S.) sues, and President Trump has re-
lobbying groups, including the mentum has largely remained “While we talk about the S&P
American Bankers Association, $42.93 solid. But it has slowed recently cently been targeting Chinese 500 at an all-time high, really it’s a
the largest such group in the coun- +$0.04 after roaring back from a terrify- tech companies in particular. handful of stocks at all-time
try, wrote to leaders in the House ing plummet of nearly 34 percent Also hanging over the market is highs,” said Mr. Delwiche. “Maybe
of Representatives urging them to in February and March. Trading the upcoming U.S. election, with beyond the headlines of what the
oppose legislation that would has been so tepid that it took the the big changes in tax and other index is doing, stocks are actually
have provided funding for postal S&P 500 several attempts to break policies that it can create. Demo- endorsing the bond market view
banking services for the 2021 fis- its record after pulling within 1 crats formally nominated Joe Bi- that there’s still a lot of work to be
cal year. percent of the mark a week and a den late Tuesday to run against done with respect to a Main Street
Ms. Wexler said JPMorgan’s half ago. Mr. Trump for the White House in recovery, and that message gets
talks with the Postal Service were “The elevator went down very November’s election. overwhelmed in a cap-weighted
preliminary. “There is no agree- GOLD (N.Y.)
quickly, so to speak,” Nancy Da- Earnings reporting season for index like the S&P 500, where you
ment in place and no imminent vis, chief investment officer of big U.S companies has nearly have five to seven stocks rallying
plans to move forward,” she said. $1,985.70 Quadratic Capital, said of the mar- wrapped up, with businesses in and that makes the index look re-
EMILY FLITTER –$40.70 ket’s plunge earlier this year. “And the S&P 500 on track to report a ally good.”

What Happened in Stock Markets Yesterday

POWERED BY

S&P 500 3374.85 0.4% Nasdaq Composite Index 11146.46 0.6% Dow Jones industrials 27692.88 0.3%

3,600 30,000

+20% 11,000 +20% 29,000 +20%

3,400
+15% +15% 28,000 +15%
10,500

27,000
3,200 +10% +10% +10%
10,000
26,000
+ 5% + 5% + 5%
3,000 9,500 25,000

0% 0% 0%
24,000
June July Aug. June July Aug. June July Aug.

TOTAL
Best performers Worst performers Most active World Stocks TOTAL RETURN
ASSETS
VOLUME
S&P 500 COMPANIES CLOSE CHANGE S&P 500 COMPANIES CLOSE CHANGE S&P 500 COMPANIES CLOSE CHANGE IN MIL. 1 YR 5 YRS IN BIL.

1. Target (TGT) $154.22 +12.7% 1. JHA (JKHY) $172.22 –12.9% 1. BofAML (BAC) $25.50 –0.1% 59.3 1. Vanguard Total Intl Stock Index Inv(VGTSX) +9.0% +4.8% $156.9
2. Freeport Mcmo (FCX) 14.94 +3.7 2. TJX (TJX) 54.36 –5.4 2. American Airl (AAL) 12.68 +0.6 58.9 2. American Funds Capital Income Bldr A(CAIBX) +2.3 +4.3 59.8
3. CenturyLink (CTL) 11.29 +3.6 3. Gilead Scien (GILD) 65.70 –4.9 3. GE (GE) 6.38 –0.9 54.1 3. American Funds Capital World Gr&Inc A(CWGIX) +12.5 +7.6 50.7
4. Nrwn Crs Ln (NCLH) 15.68 +3.2 4. Ross Stores (ROST) 90.26 –4.3 4. Ford Motor (F) 6.87 –0.3 44.0 4. American Funds New Perspective A(ANWPX) +25.7 +12.5 48.8
5. Live Nation (LYV) 51.56 +2.5 5. Regency Cente (REG) 40.20 –3.9 5. United Arlns (UAL) 34.44 +1.4 40.5 5. Vanguard International Growth Adm(VWILX) +48.9 +16.1 42.6
6. Twitter (TWTR) 38.89 +2.3 6. Marathn Oil (MRO) 5.73 –3.7 6. Target (TGT) 154.22 +12.7 40.1 6. Dodge & Cox International Stock(DODFX) +0.1 +1.1 37.2
7. Charles Schw (SCHW) 35.71 +2.2 7. Essex Propert (ESS) 210.70 –3.7 7. AMD (AMD) 81.09 –0.7 37.3 7. American Funds SMALLCAP World A(SMCWX) +23.1 +10.8 26.7
8. Nielsen Hold (NLSN) 15.95 +2.0 8. Darden (DRI) 79.87 –3.6 8. Apple (AAPL) 462.83 +0.1 36.2 8. Fidelity International Index(FSPSX) +6.9 +3.9 25.9
9. Amcr (AMCR) 11.29 +1.9 9. Biogen (BIIB) 279.98 –3.1 9. Wells Fargo (WFC) 24.07 +0.1 33.4 9. DFA International Core Equity I(DFIEX) +6.0 +3.8 25.4
10. Oracle (ORCL) 56.20 +1.9 10. Hess (HES) 48.49 –3.1 10. TJX (TJX) 54.36 –5.4 31.9 10. American Funds Europacific Growth A(AEPGX) +17.4 +7.1 23.9
Source: Morningstar

Sector performance How stock markets fared yesterday in Asia … … in Europe … and in the Americas.
S&P 500 SECTORS
+2.5
–0.1% Financials Tokyo +0.3%
+2.0
–0.3 Information technology
–0.3 Industrials +1.5

–0.3 Utilities +1.0

–0.3 Materials Frankfurt +0.7%
+0.5
–0.4 Health care
–0.5 Communication services 0.0
London +0.6% Toronto –0.3%
–0.7 Consumer discretionary –0.5 New York –0.4%
Shanghai –1.2%
–0.7 Consumer staples
–1.0
–1.2 Energy Major stock market indexes
–2.0 Real estate –1.5
6 p.m. E.T. 8 10 12 a.m. 2 4 6 a.m. 8 10 12 p.m. 2 4 6 p.m.

What Is Happening in Other Markets and the Economy

Bonds Currencies Consumer rates Commodities Economy

10-year Treas. Key rates 1 euro = $1.1840 Crude oil Unemployment Rate Consumer confidence
3% $1.3
6% $100 a barrel
10% 120
1.2 Borrowing rate
2
30-year fixed mortgages
Fed Funds 5 50
1.1 5 100
1 2-year Treas.

0 1.0 4 0 0 80
’19 ’20 ’15 ’16 ’17 ’18 ’19 ’20 ’12 ’14 ’16 ’18 ’20 ’16 ’18 ’20 ’16 ’18 ’20

3
Yield curve $1 = 106.12 yen Corn New-home sales Industrial production
3% 120 $6 a bushel
2 Savings rate 700 thousand
1-YEAR AGO 1-year CDs 260
2 110 4
600
1 240
1 100 2 500
YESTERDAY
0 Maturity 90 0 0 400 220
3 6 2 5 10 30 ’15 ’16 ’17 ’18 ’19 ’20 ’10 ’15 ’20 ’12 ’14 ’16 ’18 ’20 ’16 ’18 ’20 ’16 ’18 ’20
Months Years

The Economy Needs More Help From Congress, Fed Officials Said
By JEANNA SMIALEK
WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve
officials emphasized the need for
ongoing economic support in late
July as the coronavirus pandemic
dragged on, keeping millions of
workers at home and threatening
U.S. growth.
“Uncertainty surrounding the
economic outlook remained very
elevated, with the path of the
economy highly dependent on the
course of the virus and the public
sector’s response to it,” minutes
from the central bank’s July 28-29
meeting showed.
The Fed’s meeting came as vi-
rus cases staged a resurgence,
one that has since leveled off, and
before the July labor market re-
port showed that job gains are
slowing. It also took place just be-
fore government support pro-
grams lapsed, including enhanced
unemployment benefits that were
helping many households to stay
afloat as business closures keep
them out of work.
The need for additional fiscal
policy support — in other words,
money from Congress — was a
major point of discussion at the
meeting, based on the minutes re-
leased Wednesday. Fed officials
noted it was “uncertain” in the
short term whether additional
government help would come
through, and they pointed out that
monetary policy and “particularly
fiscal policy” had important roles
to play in supporting business ac-
tivity.
With some stimulus provisions
“set to expire shortly against the
backdrop of a still-weak labor
market, additional fiscal aid
would likely be important for sup-
porting vulnerable families, and
thus the economy more broadly, in
the period ahead,” some partici-
pants said, according to the min-
utes.
The path to reaching some sort
of deal to provide another dose of
fiscal support is unclear, even as
millions of Americans remain out
of work and some businesses con-
tinue to struggle. Senate Republi-
cans began circulating the text of
a narrow coronavirus relief pack-
age on Tuesday, but it is unlikely
that Democrats will sign on.
While President Trump has
tried to unilaterally extend en-
hanced unemployment insurance,
alongside other measures, his ex-
ecutive orders and memorandum
will offer only partial relief that
could take weeks to reach con-
sumers. Economists increasingly
expect America’s millions of un-
employed people to go without the
$600-per-week supplement they
Larry Ellison, the chairman of Oracle. The Trump administration is trying to force a sale of TikTok to his company.
Trump Would Back Oracle Owning TikTok
By DAVID McCABE
WASHINGTON — President Trump
said late on Tuesday that he would
support Oracle’s buying TikTok,
the Chinese-owned viral video
app that his administration says
must be sold in the next few
weeks.
In comments to reporters at an
event in Arizona, Mr. Trump
called Oracle a “great company”
and said the firm, which special-
izes in enterprise software, could
successfully run TikTok.
“I think that Oracle would be
certainly somebody that could
handle it,” he said.
Mr. Trump declined to say
whether he believed Oracle was a
better option to take over the app
than Microsoft, the software giant
that has also talked with
ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese
owner, about buying the app.
The Trump administration is
trying to force the sale of TikTok
over concerns that its ownership
poses a national security threat.
Officials have said Chinese apps
could provide a way for Beijing to
seize Americans’ data, which Tik-
Tok and other Chinese firms deny.
This month, the Trump admin-
istration issued an order that aims
to restrict TikTok and WeChat, a
Federal Reserve officials expressed “very elevated” uncertainty about the economic outlook as the virus continued to surge across the United States.
had been receiving for at least all
of August.
That could place more strain on
less-advantaged households. Mi-
nority workers and those with less
education have been more likely
to lose jobs, and Fed officials
seemed concerned with how they
will fare going forward.
“With lower-wage and service
sector jobs disproportionately
held by African-Americans, His-
panics and women, these portions
of the population were bearing a
disproportionate share of the eco-
nomic hardship caused by the
pandemic,” the minutes noted.
“Participants noted that the fiscal
support initiated in the spring
through the CARES Act had been
very important in granting some
financial relief to millions of fam-
ilies.”
The so-called CARES Act pro-
vided for an extra $600 in weekly
unemployment benefits, student
loan and mortgage relief, and
small business loans, all of which
have helped households and the
companies they work for to make
it through the pandemic. But the
popular Chinese messaging serv-
ice owned by Tencent. Mr. Trump
has said TikTok would have to
shut down unless it was sold to a
new owner by Sept. 15. The moves
follow a yearslong campaign by
the administration against Chi-
nese telecom companies like
Huawei and ZTE, including push-
ing major allies to abandon their
products.
TikTok has said that while it is
owned by a Chinese company, its
The president did not
say whether Microsoft
is a better buyer.
top executives are Americans and
its user data is stored domesti-
cally. In recent months, it has rap-
idly expanded its lobbying opera-
tion to fend off scrutiny from
Washington and said it planned to
hire thousands of additional em-
ployees in the United States.
Oracle, TikTok and Microsoft
declined to comment.
Mr. Trump’s support for a po-
tential Oracle bid underscores his
close relationship with the tech
company, which has spent years
building ties to his administration.
THE NEW YORK TIMES BUSINESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
VIRUS FALLOUT | SOCIAL MEDIA
policies were designed as a short-
term solution, and many have ei-
ther run out or will do so in coming
months.
The Fed has taken its own ac-
tions to support the economy, but
its policies primarily enable
growth by making it cheaper to
borrow and spend — they do not
directly put money in consumers’
and companies’ pockets. That
task falls to Congress.
Since the late-July Fed gather-
ing, real-time indicators of con-
sumer spending have continued
to muddle along without showing
much further improvement, even
retreating slightly by some met-
rics. The stock market, on the
other hand, has continued to
surge, with key indexes touching
new highs.
Central bank staff warned in
July that financial vulnerabilities
were “notable,” and flagged asset
prices. They specifically pointed
to commercial real estate prices,
which continued to increase even
as vacancies ticked up.
And some Fed officials sug-
gested that they were worried
JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES
On Monday, the State Department
said Oracle was backing its pro-
gram targeting Chinese telecom
companies and apps.
Unlike many of their Silicon Val-
ley peers, Oracle’s executives are
political allies of the president.
Safra Catz, the company’s chief
executive, was a member of Mr.
Trump’s transition team, and Ora-
cle’s founder and chairman, Larry
Ellison, hosted a fund-raiser for
the president this year.
Last week, a Labor Department
lawyer said she was facing re-
moval from her position after rais-
ing concerns about intervention
by Mr. Trump’s labor secretary,
Eugene Scalia, in a pay discrimi-
nation case against Oracle. (The
agency said Mr. Scalia had done
nothing improper in the case, and
Oracle said the lawsuit had no
merit.)
Oracle has had its share of wins
in Washington under Mr. Trump.
After it spent years arguing that
the bidding process for a $10 bil-
lion Pentagon cloud computing
contract was rigged in favor of
Amazon, the Defense Department
awarded the deal to Microsoft.
And this year, the Trump adminis-
tration backed Oracle’s position in
a continuing copyright battle with
Google.
about potential risks to financial
stability should the coronavirus
crisis drag on, the minutes
showed.
“Banks and other financial in-
stitutions could come under sig-
IN THE UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS, HOUSTON DIVISION
) Chapter 11
In re:
HI-CRUSH INC., et al.,1 ) Case No. 20-33496 (DRJ)
Debtors. ) (Jointly Administered)
NOTICE OF (I) PLAN CONFIRMATION HEARING,
(II) OBJECTION AND VOTING DEADLINES, AND
(III) SOLICITATION AND VOTING PROCEDURES
YOU ARE RECEIVINGTHIS NOTICE BECAUSEYOU MAY BE ENTITLED
TOVOTE ONTHE PLAN.THEREFORE,YOU SHOULD READTHIS NOTICE
CAREFULLY AND DISCUSS ITWITHYOUR ATTORNEY. IFYOU DO NOT
HAVE AN ATTORNEY, YOU MAYWISHTO CONSULT ONE.
TO: ALL HOLDERS OF CLAIMS AGAINST, AND HOLDERS OF EQUITY
INTERESTS IN, HI-CRUSH INC. AND ITS AFFILIATED DEBTORS AND
DEBTORS IN POSSESSION AND ALL OTHER PARTIES IN INTEREST
INTHE ABOVE-CAPTIONED CHAPTER 11 CASES.
PLEASE TAKE NOTICE THAT on July 12, 2020 (the “Petition Date”),
Hi-Crush Inc. and its affiliated debtors, as debtors and debtors in posses-
sion (collectively, the “Debtors”), each commenced a case under chapter
11 of title 11 of the United States Code (the “Bankruptcy Code”) in the
United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas (the
“BankruptcyCourt”).
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE THAT on August 14, 2020, the
Bankruptcy Court entered an order [Docket No. 288] approving the
Disclosure Statement for Joint Plan of Reorganization for Hi-Crush Inc. and
its Affiliate Debtors Under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code (as may be
amended, modified or supplemented from time to time, the “Disclosure
Statement”) [Docket No.282] and the Debtors now intend to solicit votes
from the Holders of Claims in Class 4 (Prepetition Notes Claims) and Class
5 (General Unsecured Claims),of record as of August 14,2020 (the“Voting
RecordDate”).
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE THAT a hearing (the“Confirmation
Hearing”) is scheduled for September 23, 2020 at 2:00 p.m. (Prevailing
Central Time) to consider confirmation of the Joint Plan of Reorganization
for Hi-Crush Inc. and its Affiliate Debtors Under Chapter 11 of the
Bankruptcy Code,dated August 15,2020 (as may be amended,modified or
supplemented from time to time, the“Plan”).2 The Confirmation Hearing
will take place in Courtroom 400, 4th Floor, 515 Rusk Street, Houston, TX
77002 or via videoconference,if necessary.3 The Confirmation Hearing may
be continued from time to time by the Bankruptcy Court or the Debtors
without further notice other than by such adjournment being announced
in open court or by a notice of adjournment filed with the Bankruptcy
Court and served on such parties as the Bankruptcy Court may order.
Moreover, the Plan may be modified or amended, if necessary,pursuant to
section 1127 of the Bankruptcy Code, prior to, during or as a result of the
ConfirmationHearing,withoutfurthernoticetopartiesininterest.
Only Holders of Claims in Class 4 and Class 5 are entitled to vote to accept
or reject the Plan. All other Classes of Claims and Equity Interests are either
deemedtoacceptortorejectthePlanand,therefore,arenotentitledtovote.
VOTING DEADLINES
The deadline for the submission of votes to accept or reject the
Plan is September 18, 2020 at 5:00 p.m. (Prevailing Central Time)
(the“VotingDeadline”).
CRITICAL INFORMATION REGARDINGVOTING ONTHE PLAN
1. On August 15, 2020, the Debtors filed the Plan and the Disclosure
Statement pursuant to sections 1125 and 1126(b) of the Bankruptcy Code.
Copies of the Plan and the Disclosure Statement may be obtained free
of charge by visiting the website maintained by the Debtors’ voting and
claims agent, Kurtzman Carson Consultants LLC (the“Voting and Claims
Agent”), at www.kccllc.net/hicrush. Copies of the Plan and Disclosure
Statement may also be obtained by calling the Voting and Claims Agent
at 866-554-5810 (US and Canada) or 781-575-2032 (international) or
by sending an electronic mail message to HiCrushinfo@kccllc.com with
“Hi-Crush”inthesubjectline.
2. In accordance with sections 1122 and 1123 of the Bankruptcy Code,
the Plan contemplates classifying Holders of Claims and Equity Interests
into various Classes for all purposes,including with respect to voting on the
Plan,asfollows:
SUMMARY OF STATUS ANDVOTING RIGHTS
Class Claim/Equity Interest Status Voting Rights
1. Other Priority Claims Unimpaired Deemed to Accept
2. Other Secured Claims Unimpaired Deemed to Accept
3. SecuredTax Claims Unimpaired Deemed to Accept
4. PrepetitionNotesClaims Impaired EntitledtoVote
5. GeneralUnsecuredClaims Impaired EntitledtoVote
6. Intercompany Claims Impaired Deemed to Accept
7. Old
Affiliate Interests in any Unimpaired Deemed to Accept
Parent Subsidiary
8. Old Parent Interests Impaired Deemed to Reject
3. Voting Record Date. TheVoting Record Date is August 14,2020. The
Voting Record Date is the date by which it will be determined which Holders
ofClaimsinClass4andClass5areentitledtovoteonthePlan.
4. Voting Deadline. TheVoting Deadline for voting on the Plan is 5:00
p.m. Prevailing Central Time on September 18, 2020. If you held a
Claim against one or more of the Debtors as of the Voting Record Date and
are entitled to vote to accept or reject the Plan,you should have received a
Ballot and corresponding voting instructions. For your vote to be counted,
you must: (a) follow such voting instructions carefully, (b) complete all
the required information on the Ballot; and (c) sign, date and return your
completed Ballot so that it is actually received by the Voting and Claims
Agent according to and as set forth in detail in the voting instructions on or
before the Voting Deadline. If you are a Holder of Prepetition Notes Claims
in Class 4 and you are instructed to return your Beneficial Holder Ballot to
your Nominee,you must submit your completed ballot to your Nominee in
enough time for your Nominee to send a Master Ballot recording your vote
to the Voting and Claims Agent by the Voting Deadline. A failure to follow
suchinstructionsmaydisqualifyyourvote.
CRITICAL INFORMATION REGARDING OBJECTINGTOTHE PLAN
ARTICLEX OFTHE PLANCONTAINSRELEASE,EXCULPATIONAND
INJUNCTIONPROVISIONS.THUS,YOU AREADVISEDTOREVIEWAND
CONSIDERTHEPLANCAREFULLY BECAUSEYOURRIGHTSMIGHTBE
AFFECTEDTHEREUNDER.
5. Plan Objection Deadline. The deadline for filing objections to the
Plan is September 18,2020 at 5:00 p.m.Prevailing Central Time (the
“ConfirmationObjectionDeadline”).
6. Objections to the Plan. Any objection to the Plan must:(i) be in writ-
ing; (ii) conform to the Bankruptcy Rules and the Bankruptcy Local Rules;
(iii) state the name and address of the objecting party and the amount
and nature of the Claim or Equity Interest held by such Entity; (iv) state
with particularity the basis and nature of any objection to the Plan and, if
practicable, a proposed modification to the Plan that would resolve such
objection;and (v) be filed,contemporaneously with a proof of service,with
the Bankruptcy Court and served so that it is actually received no later
than the Confirmation Objection Deadline by the parties listed below (the
“Notice Parties”). CONFIRMATION OBJECTIONS NOT TIMELY FILED AND
SERVED INTHE MANNERSETFORTH HEREINMAY NOTBECONSIDEREDBYTHE
BANKRUPTCYCOURTANDMAYBEOVERRULEDWITHOUTFURTHERNOTICE.
7. Notice Parties.The Notice Parties include: (i) Counsel to the Debtors:
Latham & Watkins LLP, 885 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10022 (Attn: Keith
A. Simon, Esq. and Annemarie V. Reilly, Esq.) (keith.simon@lw.com and
annemarie.reilly@lw.com) and Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP, 600 Travis
Street, Suite 4200, Houston, TX (Attn: Timothy A. Davidson II, Esq. and
Ashley L. Harper, Esq.) (TadDavidson@HuntonAK.com and AshleyHarper@
HuntonAK.com); (ii) Counsel to the DIP ABL Agent: Simpson, Thacher &
Bartlett LLP, 425 Lexington Avenue, New York,NY 10017 (Attn:Elisha Graff,
Esq.and Daniel L.Biller,Esq.) (egraff@stblaw.com and dbiller@stblaw.com);
(iii) Counsel to the Ad Hoc Noteholders Committee: Paul, Weiss, Rifkind,
Wharton & Garrison,LLP,1285 Avenue of the Americas,NewYork,NY 10019
(Attn: Brian S. Hermann, Esq. and Elizabeth R. McColm, Esq.) (bhermann@
paulweiss.com and emccolm@paulweiss.com) and Porter Hedges LLP,
1000 Main St., 36th Floor, Houston, TX 77002 (Attn: John F. Higgins, Esq.)
(JHiggins@porterhedges.com); (iv) Counsel to any statutory committee
appointed in these Chapter 11 Cases;and (v) the Office of the United States
Trustee for the Southern District of Texas, 515 Rusk Street, Suite 3516,
Houston, TX 77002 (Attn: Stephen Statham, Esq. and Hector Duran, Esq.)
(stephen.statham@usdoj.govandhector.duranjr@usdoj.gov).
NON-VOTINGSTATUSOFHOLDERSOFCERTAINCLAIMS
ANDEQUITYINTERESTS
8. As set forth in the Plan, certain Holders of Claims and Equity
Interests are not entitled to vote on the Plan. As a result, such parties did
notreceiveanyballotsandotherrelatedsolicitationmaterialstovoteonthe
Plan. The Holders of Claims in Class 1 (Other Priority Claims),Class 2 (Other
Secured Claims), Class 3 (Secured Tax Claims), and Class 7 (Old Affiliate
Interests in any Parent Subsidiary) are Unimpaired. Pursuant to section
1126(f) of the Bankruptcy Code,the Holders of Claims or Equity Interests in
each of the foregoing Classes are conclusively presumed to have accepted
thePlanand,thus,arenotentitledtovote.
9. While Class 6 (Intercompany Claims) is Impaired, the Holders of
Claims in Class 6 are not entitled to vote as they are deemed to accept the
Plan as they are Affiliates of the Debtors. Further,while Class 8 (Old Parent
Interests) is Impaired, such Holders are not entitled to vote as they are
deemedtorejectthePlan.
10. All Classesthat are not Affiliates ofthe Debtors willbe provided with
this notice. As explained above, the Voting and Claims Agent will provide
TING SHEN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
nificant stress,” some meeting
participants noted, also pointing
out that companies have bor-
rowed large sums of money and
the government is issuing huge
amounts of debt, which could
you, free of charge, with copies of the Plan and the Disclosure Statement,
uponrequest.
NOTICE REGARDING CERTAIN RELEASE,EXCULPATION AND INJUNCTION
PROVISIONS INTHE PLAN
PLEASE BE ADVISED THAT THE PLAN CONTAINS CERTAIN RELEASE,
EXCULPATION, AND INJUNCTION PROVISIONS, INCLUDING THOSE
LISTED BELOW. YOU ARE ADVISED AND ENCOURAGED TO CAREFULLY
REVIEW AND CONSIDER THE PLAN, INCLUDING THE RELEASE,
EXCULPATION AND INJUNCTION PROVISIONS, AS YOUR RIGHTS
MIGHTBEAFFECTED.
ArticleX.B–ReleaseofClaimsandCausesofAction
1. Release by the Debtors and their Estates. PURSUANT TO
SECTION 1123B AND ANY OTHER APPLICABLE PROVISIONS OF
THE BANKRUPTCY CODE, AND EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE EXPRESSLY
PROVIDED IN THE PLAN, EFFECTIVE AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE, FOR
GOOD AND VALUABLE CONSIDERATION PROVIDED BY EACH OF THE
RELEASED PARTIES, THE ADEQUACY AND SUFFICIENCY OF WHICH
IS HEREBY CONFIRMED, THE DEBTORS AND THE REORGANIZED
DEBTORS, IN THEIR RESPECTIVE INDIVIDUAL CAPACITIES AND AS
DEBTORSINPOSSESSION, AND ON BEHALF OF THEMSELVES AND
THEIR RESPECTIVE ESTATES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION,
ANY SUCCESSOR TO THE DEBTORS OR ANY ESTATE REPRESENTATIVE
APPOINTED OR SELECTED PURSUANT TO SECTION 1123B3 OF
THE BANKRUPTCY CODE COLLECTIVELY, THE “DEBTOR RELEASING
PARTIES” SHALL BE DEEMED TO HAVE CONCLUSIVELY, ABSOLUTELY,
UNCONDITIONALLY, IRREVOCABLY, AND FOREVER PROVIDED A
FULL DISCHARGE, WAIVER AND RELEASE TO EACH OF THE RELEASED
PARTIES AND EACH SUCH RELEASED PARTY SO RELEASED SHALL BE
DEEMED FOREVER RELEASED, WAIVED AND DISCHARGED BY THE
DEBTOR RELEASING PARTIES AND THEIR RESPECTIVE ASSETS AND
PROPERTIES THE “DEBTOR RELEASE” FROM ANY AND ALL CLAIMS,
CAUSES OF ACTION, AND ANY OTHER DEBTS, OBLIGATIONS, RIGHTS,
SUITS, DAMAGES, ACTIONS, REMEDIES, AND LIABILITIES WHATSO
EVER, WHETHER KNOWN OR UNKNOWN, FORESEEN OR UNFORESEEN,
WHETHER DIRECTLY OR DERIVATIVELY HELD, EXISTING AS OF THE
EFFECTIVE DATE ORTHEREAFTER ARISING, IN LAW, AT EQUITY OR OTH
ERWISE, WHETHER FOR TORT, CONTRACT, VIOLATIONS OF FEDERAL
OR STATE SECURITIES LAWS, OR OTHERWISE, BASED IN WHOLE OR IN
PART UPON ANY ACT OR OMISSION, TRANSACTION, OR OTHER OCCUR
RENCE OR CIRCUMSTANCES EXISTING OR TAKING PLACE PRIOR TO OR
ON THE EFFECTIVE DATE ARISING FROM OR RELATED IN ANY WAY IN
WHOLE OR IN PART TO ANY OF THE DEBTORS OR THEIR AFFILIATES,
INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, I THE CHAPTER 11 CASES, THE
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT, THE PLAN, THE RESTRUCTURING SUPPORT
AGREEMENT, THE BACKSTOP PURCHASE AGREEMENT, THE RIGHTS
OFFERING, THE RESTRUCTURING DOCUMENTS, THE PREPETITION
DEBT DOCUMENTS, AND THE DIP LOAN DOCUMENTS, II THE SUBJECT
MATTER OF, OR THE TRANSACTIONS OR EVENTS GIVING RISE TO, ANY
CLAIM OR EQUITY INTEREST THAT IS TREATED IN THE PLAN, III THE
BUSINESS OR CONTRACTUAL ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ANY DEBTOR
AND ANY RELEASED PARTIES, IV THE NEGOTIATION, FORMULATION
OR PREPARATION OF THE RESTRUCTURING SUPPORT AGREEMENT,
THE BACKSTOP PURCHASE AGREEMENT, THE RIGHTS OFFERING, THE
PLAN, THE DISCLOSURE STATEMENT, THE PLAN SUPPLEMENT, THE
RESTRUCTURING DOCUMENTS, THE PREPETITION DEBT DOCUMENTS,
THE DIP LOAN DOCUMENTS, OR RELATED AGREEMENTS, INSTRU
MENTS OR OTHER DOCUMENTS, V THE RESTRUCTURING OF CLAIMS
OR EQUITY INTERESTS PRIOR TO OR DURING THE CHAPTER 11 CASES,
VI THE PURCHASE, SALE, OR RESCISSION OF THE PURCHASE OR SALE
OF ANY EQUITY INTEREST OR PLAN SECURITIES OF THE DEBTORS OR
THE REORGANIZED DEBTORS, AND/OR VII THE CONFIRMATION OR
CONSUMMATION OF THE PLAN OR THE SOLICITATION OF VOTES ON
THE PLAN THAT SUCH DEBTOR RELEASING PARTY WOULD HAVE BEEN
LEGALLY ENTITLED TO ASSERT WHETHER INDIVIDUALLY OR COLLEC
TIVELY OR THAT ANY HOLDER OF A CLAIM OR EQUITY INTEREST OR
OTHER PERSON OR ENTITY WOULD HAVE BEEN LEGALLY ENTITLED
TO ASSERT FOR, OR ON BEHALF OR IN THE NAME OF, ANY DEBTOR,
ITS RESPECTIVE ESTATE OR ANY REORGANIZED DEBTOR WHETHER
DIRECTLY OR DERIVATIVELY AGAINST ANY OFTHE RELEASED PARTIES;
PROVIDED, HOWEVER, THAT THE FOREGOING PROVISIONS OF THIS
DEBTOR RELEASE SHALL NOT OPERATE TO WAIVE OR RELEASE A
THE RIGHTS OF SUCH DEBTOR RELEASING PARTY TO ENFORCE THE
PLAN AND THE CONTRACTS, INSTRUMENTS, RELEASES, INDENTURES,
AND OTHER AGREEMENTS OR DOCUMENTS DELIVERED UNDER OR
IN CONNECTION WITH THE PLAN INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITA
TION, THE EXIT FACILITY LOAN DOCUMENTS AND THE NEW SECURED
CONVERTIBLE NOTES DOCUMENTS OR ASSUMED OR ASSUMED AND
ASSIGNED, AS APPLICABLE, PURSUANT TO THE PLAN OR PURSUANT
TO A FINAL ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT AND B CLAIMS OR
LIABILITIES ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO ANY ACT OR OMISSION
OF A RELEASED PARTY THAT CONSTITUTES A CRIMINAL ACT, FRAUD,
WILLFUL MISCONDUCT, OR GROSS NEGLIGENCE, IN EACH CASE AS
DETERMINED BY FINAL ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT OR
ANY OTHER COURT OF COMPETENT JURISDICTION. THE FOREGOING
RELEASE SHALL BE EFFECTIVE AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE WITHOUT
FURTHER NOTICE TO OR ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT, ACT OR
ACTION UNDER APPLICABLE LAW, REGULATION, ORDER, OR RULE OR
THE VOTE, CONSENT, AUTHORIZATION OR APPROVAL OF ANY PERSON
OR ENTITY AND THE CONFIRMATION ORDER SHALL PERMANENTLY
ENJOIN THE COMMENCEMENT OR PROSECUTION BY ANY PERSON OR
ENTITY, WHETHER DIRECTLY, DERIVATIVELY OR OTHERWISE, OF ANY
CLAIMS, OBLIGATIONS, SUITS, JUDGMENTS, DAMAGES, DEMANDS,
DEBTS, RIGHTS, CAUSES OF ACTION, OR LIABILITIES RELEASED PUR
SUANT TO THIS DEBTOR RELEASE. NOTWITHSTANDING THE FOREGO
ING, NOTHING IN THIS ARTICLE X.B. SHALL OR SHALL BE DEEMED TO
I PROHIBIT THE DEBTORS OR THE REORGANIZED DEBTORS FROM
ASSERTING AND ENFORCING ANY CLAIMS, OBLIGATIONS, SUITS,
JUDGMENTS, DEMANDS, DEBTS, RIGHTS, CAUSES OF ACTION OR
LIABILITIES THEY MAY HAVE AGAINST ANY PERSON OR ENTITY THAT
IS BASED UPON AN ALLEGED BREACH OF A CONFIDENTIALITY OR NON
COMPETE OBLIGATION OWED TO THE DEBTORS OR THE REORGANIZED
DEBTORS AND/OR II OPERATE AS A RELEASE OR WAIVER OF ANY
INTERCOMPANY CLAIMS, IN EACH CASE UNLESS OTHERWISE
EXPRESSLY PROVIDED FOR INTHIS PLAN.
ENTRY OF THE CONFIRMATION ORDER SHALL CONSTITUTE THE
BANKRUPTCY COURT’S APPROVAL, PURSUANT TO BANKRUPTCY
RULE 9019, OF THE DEBTOR RELEASE, WHICH INCLUDES BY REF
ERENCE EACH OF THE RELATED PROVISIONS AND DEFINITIONS
CONTAINED HEREIN, AND FURTHER, SHALL CONSTITUTE THE
BANKRUPTCY COURT’S FINDING THAT THE DEBTOR RELEASE IS:
I IN EXCHANGE FOR THE GOOD AND VALUABLE CONSIDERATION
PROVIDED BY THE RELEASED PARTIES; II A GOOD FAITH SETTLE
MENT AND COMPROMISE OF THE CLAIMS RELEASED BY THE DEBTOR
RELEASE; III IN THE BEST INTEREST OF THE DEBTORS AND THEIR
ESTATES; IV FAIR, EQUITABLE AND REASONABLE; V GIVEN AND
MADE AFTER DUE NOTICE AND OPPORTUNITY FOR HEARING; AND
VI A BAR TO ANY OF THE DEBTORS, THE REORGANIZED DEBTORS, OR
THE DEBTORS’ ESTATES ASSERTING ANY CLAIM OR CAUSE OF ACTION
RELEASED PURSUANTTOTHE DEBTOR RELEASE.
2. Release By Third Parties. EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE EXPRESSLY
PROVIDED INTHE PLAN, EFFECTIVE AS OFTHE EFFECTIVE DATE,TOTHE
FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, FOR GOOD AND
VALUABLE CONSIDERATION PROVIDED BY EACH OF THE RELEASED
PARTIES, THE ADEQUACY AND SUFFICIENCY OF WHICH IS HEREBY
CONFIRMED, AND WITHOUT LIMITING OR OTHERWISE MODIFY
ING THE SCOPE OF THE DEBTOR RELEASE PROVIDED BY THE DEBTOR
RELEASING PARTIES ABOVE, EACH NONDEBTOR RELEASING PARTY
TOGETHER WITH THE DEBTOR RELEASING PARTIES, THE “RELEASING
PARTIES” SHALL BE DEEMED TO HAVE CONCLUSIVELY, ABSOLUTELY,
UNCONDITIONALLY, IRREVOCABLY, AND FOREVER PROVIDED A
FULL DISCHARGE, WAIVER, AND RELEASE TO EACH OF THE RELEASED
PARTIES AND EACH SUCH RELEASED PARTY SO RELEASED SHALL BE
DEEMED FOREVER RELEASED, WAIVED, AND DISCHARGED BY THE
NONDEBTOR RELEASING PARTIES AND THEIR RESPECTIVE ASSETS
AND PROPERTIES THE “THIRD PARTY RELEASE” FROM ANY AND ALL
CLAIMS, CAUSES OF ACTION, AND ANY OTHER DEBTS, OBLIGATIONS,
RIGHTS, SUITS, DAMAGES, ACTIONS, REMEDIES, AND LIABILITIES
WHATSOEVER, WHETHER KNOWN OR UNKNOWN, FORESEEN OR
UNFORESEEN, WHETHER DIRECTLY OR DERIVATIVELY HELD, EXIST
ING AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE OR THEREAFTER ARISING, IN LAW, AT
EQUITY OR OTHERWISE, WHETHER FOR TORT, CONTRACT, VIOLATIONS
OF FEDERAL OR STATE SECURITIES LAWS, OR OTHERWISE, BASED IN
WHOLE OR IN PART UPON ANY ACT OR OMISSION, TRANSACTION, OR
OTHER OCCURRENCE OR CIRCUMSTANCES EXISTING OR TAKING PLACE
PRIOR TO OR ON THE EFFECTIVE DATE ARISING FROM OR RELATED IN
ANY WAY IN WHOLE OR IN PART TO ANY OF THE DEBTORS OR THEIR
AFFILIATES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, I THE CHAPTER 11
CASES,THE DISCLOSURE STATEMENT,THE PLAN,THE RESTRUCTURING
SUPPORT AGREEMENT, THE BACKSTOP PURCHASE AGREEMENT,
THE RIGHTS OFFERING, THE RESTRUCTURING DOCUMENTS, THE
PREPETITION DEBT DOCUMENTS, AND THE DIP LOAN DOCUMENTS,
II THE SUBJECT MATTER OF, OR THE TRANSACTIONS OR EVENTS
GIVING RISE TO, ANY CLAIM OR EQUITY INTEREST THAT IS TREATED
IN THE PLAN, III THE BUSINESS OR CONTRACTUAL ARRANGEMENTS
BETWEEN ANY DEBTOR AND ANY RELEASED PARTIES, IV THE NEGO
TIATION, FORMULATION OR PREPARATION OF THE RESTRUCTURING
N B3
weigh on Treasury market func-
tioning.
“There was general agreement
that these institutions, activities
and markets should be monitored
closely,” the minutes said, and a
“couple” of Fed officials pushed
for extended restrictions on bank
shareholder payouts, which in-
clude dividends, though another
argued against such a move.
The Fed has limited dividends
without actually halting them.
The Fed has also been review-
ing its policy framework — the
guiding principles it follows when
setting interest rates and other
monetary policies — for more
than a year. It is widely expected
to soon announce that it is scrap-
ping its practice of raising rates
pre-emptively in an effort to choke
off coming inflation, opting in-
stead for an approach that will al-
low price increases to run above
the official 2 percent goal for a
time.
That tweak would leave interest
rates lower for longer, keeping
borrowing for home-buying and
business investment cheap. It
would also respond to the reality
that inflation has been weak for
years, running consistently shy of
the central bank’s target for slow
but steady price gains. Exces-
sively weak inflation can have bad
side effects.
Officials at the meeting said
that they should update their
long-run statement of policy
goals, which describes their ap-
proach, and that “it would be im-
portant to finalize all changes to
the statement in the near future,”
the minutes showed.
SUPPORT AGREEMENT, THE BACKSTOP PURCHASE AGREEMENT,
THE RIGHTS OFFERING, THIS PLAN, THE DISCLOSURE STATEMENT,
THE PLAN SUPPLEMENT, THE RESTRUCTURING DOCUMENTS, THE
PREPETITION DEBT DOCUMENTS, THE DIP LOAN DOCUMENTS, OR
RELATED AGREEMENTS, INSTRUMENTS OR OTHER DOCUMENTS, V
THE RESTRUCTURING OF CLAIMS OR EQUITY INTERESTS PRIOR TO OR
DURINGTHE CHAPTER 11 CASES, VITHE PURCHASE, SALE OR RESCIS
SION OF THE PURCHASE OR SALE OF ANY EQUITY INTEREST OR PLAN
SECURITIES OF THE DEBTORS OR THE REORGANIZED DEBTORS, AND/
OR VII THE CONFIRMATION OR CONSUMMATION OF THE PLAN OR
THE SOLICITATION OF VOTES ON THIS PLAN THAT SUCH NONDEBTOR
RELEASING PARTY WOULD HAVE BEEN LEGALLY ENTITLED TO ASSERT
WHETHER INDIVIDUALLY OR COLLECTIVELY AGAINST ANY OF THE
RELEASED PARTIES; PROVIDED, HOWEVER, THAT THE FOREGOING
PROVISIONS OF THIS THIRD PARTY RELEASE SHALL NOT OPERATE TO
WAIVE OR RELEASE ATHE RIGHTS OF SUCH NONDEBTOR RELEASING
PARTY TO ENFORCE THE PLAN AND THE CONTRACTS, INSTRUMENTS,
RELEASES, INDENTURES, AND OTHER AGREEMENTS OR DOCUMENTS
DELIVERED UNDER OR IN CONNECTION WITH THIS PLAN INCLUDING,
WITHOUT LIMITATION,THE EXIT FACILITY LOAN DOCUMENTS AND THE
NEW SECURED CONVERTIBLE NOTES DOCUMENTS OR ASSUMED OR
ASSUMED AND ASSIGNED, AS APPLICABLE, PURSUANT TO THE PLAN
OR PURSUANT TO A FINAL ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT AND
B CLAIMS OR LIABILITIES ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO ANY ACT
OR OMISSION OF A RELEASED PARTY THAT CONSTITUTES A CRIMINAL
ACT, FRAUD, WILLFUL MISCONDUCT, OR GROSS NEGLIGENCE, IN EACH
CASE AS DETERMINED BY FINAL ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT
OR ANY OTHER COURT OF COMPETENT JURISDICTION. THE FOREGO
ING RELEASE SHALL BE EFFECTIVE AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE WITH
OUT FURTHER NOTICE TO OR ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT,
ACT OR ACTION UNDER APPLICABLE LAW, REGULATION, ORDER,
OR RULE OR THE VOTE, CONSENT, AUTHORIZATION OR APPROVAL
OF ANY PERSON OR ENTITY AND THE CONFIRMATION ORDER SHALL
PERMANENTLY ENJOIN THE COMMENCEMENT OR PROSECUTION BY
ANY PERSON OR ENTITY, WHETHER DIRECTLY, DERIVATIVELY OR OTH
ERWISE, OF ANY CLAIMS, OBLIGATIONS, SUITS, JUDGMENTS, DAM
AGES, DEMANDS, DEBTS, RIGHTS, CAUSES OF ACTION, OR LIABILITIES
RELEASED PURSUANTTOTHISTHIRD PARTY RELEASE.
ENTRY OF THE CONFIRMATION ORDER SHALL CONSTITUTE THE
BANKRUPTCY COURT’S APPROVAL, PURSUANT TO BANKRUPTCY
RULE 9019, OF THE THIRD PARTY RELEASE, WHICH INCLUDES
BY REFERENCE EACH OF THE RELATED PROVISIONS AND DEFINI
TIONS CONTAINED HEREIN, AND FURTHER, SHALL CONSTITUTE THE
BANKRUPTCY COURT’S FINDING THAT THE THIRD PARTY RELEASE IS:
I CONSENSUAL; II ESSENTIALTOTHE CONFIRMATION OFTHE PLAN;
III IN EXCHANGE FOR THE GOOD AND VALUABLE CONSIDERATION
PROVIDED BY THE RELEASED PARTIES; IV A GOOD FAITH SETTLE
MENT AND COMPROMISE OF THE CLAIMS RELEASED BY THE THIRD
PARTY RELEASE; V IN THE BEST INTEREST OF THE DEBTORS AND
ALL HOLDERS OF CLAIMS AND EQUITY INTERESTS; VI FAIR, EQUI
TABLE AND REASONABLE; VII GIVEN AND MADE AFTER DUE NOTICE
AND OPPORTUNITY FOR HEARING; AND VIII A BAR TO ANY OF THE
RELEASING PARTIES ASSERTING ANY CLAIM OR CAUSE OF ACTION
RELEASED PURSUANTTOTHETHIRD PARTY RELEASE.
Article X.E – Exculpation. EFFECTIVE AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE, TO
THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW,THE EXCULPATED PARTIES SHALL
NEITHER HAVE NOR INCUR ANY LIABILITY TO ANY PERSON OR ENTITY FOR
ANY CLAIMS OR CAUSES OF ACTION ARISING PRIORTO OR ONTHE EFFECTIVE
DATE FOR ANY ACT TAKEN OR OMITTED TO BE TAKEN IN CONNECTION WITH,
OR RELATED TO, FORMULATING, NEGOTIATING, PREPARING, DISSEMINAT-
ING, IMPLEMENTING, ADMINISTERING, CONFIRMING OR EFFECTING THE
CONFIRMATION OR CONSUMMATION OF THIS PLAN, THE DISCLOSURE
STATEMENT,THE RESTRUCTURING DOCUMENTS,THE RIGHTS OFFERING,THE
PREPETITION DEBT DOCUMENTS,THE DIP LOAN DOCUMENTS, OR ANY CON-
TRACT, INSTRUMENT, RELEASE OR OTHER AGREEMENT OR DOCUMENT CRE-
ATED OR ENTERED INTO IN CONNECTION WITH THIS PLAN, INCLUDING THE
RESTRUCTURING SUPPORT AGREEMENT AND THE BACKSTOP PURCHASE
AGREEMENT, OR ANY OTHER PREPETITION OR POSTPETITION ACT TAKEN
OR OMITTED TO BE TAKEN IN CONNECTION WITH OR IN CONTEMPLATION OF
THE RESTRUCTURING OF THE DEBTORS,THE APPROVAL OF THE DISCLOSURE
STATEMENT OR CONFIRMATION OR CONSUMMATION OF THIS PLAN; PRO-
VIDED,HOWEVER,THAT THE FOREGOING PROVISIONS OF THIS EXCULPATION
SHALL NOT OPERATETOWAIVEOR RELEASE:(I)ANYCAUSES OFACTIONARIS-
ING FROM WILLFUL MISCONDUCT, ACTUAL FRAUD, OR GROSS NEGLIGENCE
OF SUCH APPLICABLE EXCULPATED PARTY AS DETERMINED BY FINAL ORDER
OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT OR ANY OTHER COURT OF COMPETENT JURIS-
DICTION; AND/OR (II) THE RIGHTS OF ANY PERSON OR ENTITY TO ENFORCE
THIS PLAN AND THE CONTRACTS, INSTRUMENTS, RELEASES, INDENTURES,
AND OTHER AGREEMENTS AND DOCUMENTS DELIVERED UNDER OR IN
CONNECTION WITH THIS PLAN OR ASSUMED PURSUANT TO THIS PLAN OR
FINAL ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT;PROVIDED,FURTHER,THAT EACH
EXCULPATEDPARTY SHALL BEENTITLEDTORELY UPONTHEADVICEOFCOUN-
SEL CONCERNING ITS RESPECTIVE DUTIES PURSUANTTO,OR IN CONNECTION
WITH,THE ABOVE REFERENCED DOCUMENTS, ACTIONS OR INACTIONS. THE
FOREGOING EXCULPATION SHALL BE EFFECTIVE AS OF THE EFFECTIVE DATE
WITHOUT FURTHER NOTICE TO OR ORDER OF THE BANKRUPTCY COURT, ACT
OR ACTION UNDER APPLICABLE LAW,REGULATION,ORDER,OR RULE OR THE
VOTE,CONSENT,AUTHORIZATION OR APPROVAL OF ANY PERSON OR ENTITY.
NOTWITHSTANDING THE FOREGOING, NOTHING IN THIS ARTICLE X.E SHALL
OR SHALL BE DEEMED TO PROHIBIT THE DEBTORS OR THE REORGANIZED
DEBTORS FROM ASSERTING AND ENFORCING ANY CLAIMS, OBLIGATIONS,
SUITS, JUDGMENTS, DEMANDS, DEBTS, RIGHTS, CAUSES OF ACTION OR LIA-
BILITIES THEY MAY HAVE AGAINST ANY PERSON OR ENTITY THAT IS BASED
UPON AN ALLEGED BREACH OF A CONFIDENTIALITY OR NON-COMPETE OBLI-
GATION OWED TO THE DEBTORS OR THE REORGANIZED DEBTORS, IN EACH
CASEUNLESSOTHERWISEEXPRESSLYPROVIDEDFORINTHEPLAN.
Article X.G – Injunction. EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE EXPRESSLY PRO
VIDED IN THE PLAN ORTHE CONFIRMATION ORDER, FROM AND AFTER
THE EFFECTIVE DATE, ALL PERSONS AND ENTITIES ARE, TO THE FULL
EST EXTENT PROVIDED UNDER SECTION 524 AND OTHER APPLICABLE
PROVISIONS OF THE BANKRUPTCY CODE, PERMANENTLY ENJOINED
FROM I COMMENCING OR CONTINUING, IN ANY MANNER OR IN
ANY PLACE, ANY SUIT, ACTION OR OTHER PROCEEDING; II ENFORC
ING, ATTACHING, COLLECTING, OR RECOVERING IN ANY MANNER
ANY JUDGMENT, AWARD, DECREE, OR ORDER; III CREATING, PER
FECTING, OR ENFORCING ANY LIEN OR ENCUMBRANCE; IV ASSERT
ING A SETOFF OR RIGHT OF SUBROGATION OF ANY KIND; OR (V)
COMMENCING OR CONTINUING IN ANY MANNER ANY ACTION OR OTHER
PROCEEDING OF ANY KIND, IN EACH CASE ON ACCOUNT OF OR WITH
RESPECT TO ANY CLAIM, DEMAND, LIABILITY, OBLIGATION, DEBT,
RIGHT, CAUSE OF ACTION, EQUITY INTEREST, OR REMEDY RELEASED
OR TO BE RELEASED, EXCULPATED OR TO BE EXCULPATED, SETTLED OR
TO BE SETTLED OR DISCHARGED OR TO BE DISCHARGED PURSUANT
TO THIS PLAN OR THE CONFIRMATION ORDER AGAINST ANY PERSON
OR ENTITY SO RELEASED, DISCHARGED, OR EXCULPATED OR THE
PROPERTY OR ESTATE OF ANY PERSON OR ENTITY SO RELEASED, DIS
CHARGED, OR EXCULPATED. ALL INJUNCTIONS OR STAYS PROVIDED
FOR IN THE CHAPTER 11 CASES UNDER SECTION 105 OR SECTION
362 OF THE BANKRUPTCY CODE, OR OTHERWISE, AND IN EXISTENCE
ON THE CONFIRMATION DATE, SHALL REMAIN IN FULL FORCE AND
EFFECT UNTILTHE EFFECTIVE DATE.
THIS NOTICE IS BEING SENT TO YOU FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES
ONLY. IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS WITH RESPECT TO YOUR RIGHTS UNDER
THE PLAN OR ABOUT ANYTHING STATED HEREIN OR IF YOU WOULD LIKE
TO OBTAIN ADDITIONAL INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT THE VOTING
AND CLAIMS AGENT AT THE NUMBER OR ADDRESS SPECIFIED ABOVE.
PLEASE NOTE THAT THE VOTING AND CLAIMS AGENT CANNOT PROVIDE
LEGALADVICE.
1
The Debtors in these cases, along with the last four digits of each
Debtor’s federal tax identification number,are:Hi-Crush Inc.(0530),OnCore
Processing LLC (9403),Hi-Crush Augusta LLC (0668),Hi-Crush Whitehall LLC
(5562), PDQ Properties LLC (9169), Hi-Crush Wyeville Operating LLC (5797),
D & I Silica,LLC (9957),Hi-Crush Blair LLC (7094),Hi-Crush LMS LLC,Hi-Crush
Investments Inc.(6547),Hi-Crush Permian Sand LLC,Hi-Crush Proppants LLC
(0770), Hi-Crush PODS LLC, Hi-Crush Canada Inc. (9195), Hi-Crush Holdings
LLC,Hi-CrushServicesLLC(6206),BulkTracerHoldingsLLC(4085),Pronghorn
Logistics Holdings, LLC (5223), FB Industries USA Inc. (8208), PropDispatch
LLC, Pronghorn Logistics, LLC (4547), and FB Logistics, LLC (8641). The
Debtors’addressis1330PostOakBlvd,Suite600,Houston,Texas77056.
2
Capitalized terms used but not otherwise defined herein will have the
meaningssetforthinthePlan.
3
If the hearing occurs over videoconference the Court will utilize
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you choose to connect via a web browser, available literature suggests
that Chrome is the preferred browser.Please note that connecting through
a browser may limit the availability of some GoToMeeting features. To
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B4 N THE NEW YORK TIMES BUSINESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Airbnb, ‘Sharing Economy’ Pioneer, Moves Toward a Public Offering
By ERIN GRIFFITH
SAN FRANCISCO — Airbnb said on
Wednesday that it had confiden-
tially filed to go public, taking a
key step toward one of the largest
public market debuts in a genera-
tion of “sharing economy” start-
ups.
A public offering by the com-
pany, which lets people rent out
their spare rooms or homes to
travelers, would cap a volatile
year in which its business was
devastated by the spread of the
coronavirus. Airbnb had been pri-
vately valued at $31 billion before
this year, and the company must
now convince investors that it can
thrive and turn a profit in a new
era of limited travel.
Airbnb declined to comment be-
yond its brief announcement.
Airbnb’s offering would signal
the end of an era for the first wave
of highly valued start-up “uni-
corns,” many of which were
founded in the recession of 2008
and then rode a wave of growth fu-
eled by smartphones, gig work
and copious amounts of venture
capital. In recent years, many of
Airbnb’s well-known “sharing
economy” peers have gone public
(Uber and Lyft), sold themselves
(Postmates), or unraveled spec-
tacularly (WeWork).
Its debut will most likely be
helped by an ebullient stock mar-
ket, which has remained robust
despite the economic destruction
caused by the pandemic. On Tues-
day, the S&P 500 hit a new high as
investors focused on signs that
the worst might be over, and on
Wednesday, Apple became the
first U.S. company to hit a $2 tril-
lion market value.
Airbnb’s initial public offering
plan shows the resilience of the
tech industry in the pandemic and
an investor appetite for tech
stocks, said Ted Smith, president
of Union Square Advisors, a tech-
focused financial advisory firm.
“There’s going to be some chop-
piness in the short term until we
get through the pandemic,” he
Big-Box Retailers’ Profits
Surge as Pandemic Persists
FROM FIRST BUSINESS PAGE
home improvement projects, with
sales of hard surface flooring and
interior lighting doing especially
well.
“These big-box retailers are
just perfectly positioned,” said An-
drew Lipsman, an analyst at the
data analytics firm eMarketer.
“They have basically every tail-
wind at their back.”
For shoppers who wanted to
completely avoid in-store shop-
ping, big box retailers already had
robust e-commerce platforms in
place that allowed them to imme-
diately start providing customers
with so-called contactless shop-
ping options, including curbside
pickup and home delivery of
things as diverse as groceries and
furniture.
“Throughout this crisis, we
have deepened our relationship
Writers’ Room Drama at ‘All Rise,’ a Rare CBS Show With a Black Female Lead
FROM FIRST BUSINESS PAGE
having a co-show runner to serve
as a trusted and valued partner to
promote diverse storytelling with
the series.” It added, “The truth is,
the intended partnership we all
hoped for did not materialize.”
The Warner Bros. human re-
sources department reviewed the
show’s workplace between last
August and November after com-
plaints from staff members about
Mr. Spottiswood’s leadership, the
studio confirmed. After the inquir-
ies, Warner Bros. kept him in
place and provided him with a cor-
porate coach, a Black woman, to
advise him.
Mr. Spottiswood, who started
his career in Canadian television
after growing up in Ontario, said
he was aware of the problems with
his leadership and pledged to do
better.
“When it appeared the writers’
room was struggling to function
as effectively as it should, I recog-
nized that I needed to change how
I was working,” he said in a state-
ment. “I voluntarily sought man-
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The headquarters of Airbnb in San Francisco. Its I.P.O. will most likely be helped by a strong stock market.
said. “But I think it mirrors the
overall faith that the market
seems to have in the long term.”
Start-ups have taken advantage
of the excitement for technology.
Tech companies including Lem-
onade, an insurance provider, and
ZoomInfo, a business database
company, watched their prices
soar after listing over the summer.
Other start-ups such as Palan-
tir, a data company founded by Pe-
with American consumers and in-
troduced millions of them to our
digital fulfillment services,” Tar-
get’s chief executive, Brian Cor-
nell, said on an earnings call.
These advantages have won the
stores new customers who might
have previously preferred local
grocers or hardware stores. Tar-
get added 10 million new digital
customers in the first half of this
year.
“It’s creating a massive oppor-
tunity, and if they are smart about
it, this is going to help them retain
those customers and continue to
fuel their growth,” Mr. Mantis of
1010Data said.
Whether the retailers are able to
sustain this growth will depend
partly on how much disposable in-
come their customers have. The
stimulus payments and $600
weekly increase to unemployment
agement training and leadership
coaching.”
CBS had no comment. A net-
work spokesman referred inter-
view requests to Warner Bros.
“As soon as we became aware of
concerns in the ‘All Rise’ writers’
room, we took steps to conduct a
review of the work environment,”
Warner Bros. said in a statement.
“While the studio identified areas
for improvement, the findings did
not reveal conduct that would
warrant removing series creator
Greg Spottiswood from the execu-
tive producer role.”
The backstage problems at “All
Rise” have come to light during
the widespread protests
prompted by the police killing of
George Floyd, a movement that
has caused some entertainment
companies to question longstand-
ing industry practices.
Last month, CBS Television
Studios and the National Associa-
tion for the Advancement of Col-
ored People announced that 25
percent of the network’s pro-
grams would come from creators
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TECHNOLOGY | RETAIL | MEDIA
ter Thiel, and Asana, a collabora-
tion technology provider run by
the Facebook co-founder Dustin
Moskovitz, are also planning to go
public this year. Many are pushing
to reach the market before the No-
vember election, which typically
creates volatility in the stock mar-
ket. Palantir and Asana declined
to comment.
Airbnb was founded in 2008 by
Brian Chesky, Nathan Blechar-
The one-stop shopping advantage is one factor driving customers.
benefits meant that millions of un-
employed Americans were still
able to buy necessities at stores
like Walmart and Target, and in
some cases a few extras, like toys
to keep their children entertained
at home. But with the $600 pay-
ments now stopped, and Congress
still deadlocked on an additional
who are people of color. In addi-
tion, CBS Television Studios
pledged that, by the 2022-23 sea-
son, 50 percent of the writers on
its shows would be people of color.
CBS Television Studios also
took steps last month to clean up
part of the CBS prime-time lineup
when it fired the prolific producer
Peter Lenkov, the show runner of
“Magnum P. I.,” “MacGyver” and
“Hawaii 5-0.” A CBS investigation
concluded that he had favored
male employees and spoken in-
appropriately to women and peo-
ple of color.
Mr. Spottiswood hired a diverse
crew to write “All Rise.” Of the
original seven writers, two were
white men. The writers who left
said Mr. Spottiswood had some-
times ignored, rejected or resisted
their attempts to have the charac-
ters and story lines accurately re-
flect the experiences of Black peo-
ple and other people of color.
The lead character was some-
times given dialogue or story lines
that seemed false or offensively
stereotypical, one of the writers,
Ms. Edwards, said. When she told
colleagues that certain scenes in-
accurately depicted how a Black
woman would speak or act, she
was asked why the character’s
race mattered, she added.
“The fact that I’m still being
asked that question tells me that
there are people on the show who
3440 are incapable of writing for people
of color and should not be writing
for people of color,” Ms. Edwards
wrote in an email to the show’s top
producers shortly before her de-
parture. She shared the email with
The New York Times.
Ms. Edwards and Mr. Nayar
said the problems had been appar-
ent as early as the second episode,
which included a story line cen-
tered on the character Emily Lo-
pez, a public defender who had re-
JASON HENRY FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
czyk and Joe Gebbia as a way to
help people make extra money
renting out their spare rooms. The
platform has spread to almost ev-
ery country, amassing seven mil-
lion listings and attracting $3 bil-
lion in funding from venture capi-
tal firms including Andreessen
Horowitz, Founders Fund and Se-
quoia Capital.
Airbnb takes a cut of the stays
and activities that its rental opera-
EDUARDO MUNOZ/REUTERS
aid package, some shoppers may
have to tighten their belts.
In contrast, many people who
have held onto their jobs and are
now working from home full time
have found themselves with more
discretionary income than ever
before. People who might have
spent money on dining out, travel
cently left her physically abusive
husband.
As the character, played by the
actress Jessica Camacho, enters
the courthouse, she is having a
conversation with Sara Castillo, a
court reporter played by Lindsay
Mendez, about how hard it is to
live alone. In the original script,
Ms. Mendez’s character tells Ms.
Camacho’s character that “a one-
night stand” would solve her prob-
lem. Some writers said the dia-
logue, while meant to be funny,
was an insensitive response to a
character grappling with the con-
sequences of domestic abuse.
As the sequence progresses, the
two women get on an elevator. A
naked white man joins them, and
they continue their conversation
as if nothing odd is going on. Mr.
Nayar and Ms. Edwards said they
had sent emails to Mr. Spottis-
wood objecting to the scene after
the majority of the show’s writers
found it objectionable.
“Two women would not calmly
continue a conversation with a na-
ked white guy running into the el-
evator,” Ms. Edwards said. “That
is violence. That is a dangerous
situation that they would have to
respond to.”
Mr. Spottiswood called Mr. Na-
yar and Ms. Edwards into a meet-
ing, the two writers said, and ad-
monished them for complaining
about the scene so late in the pro-
duction process. He ultimately cut
the naked man and changed the
dialogue.
Writers also questioned the
handling of a sensitive issue in the
third episode centered on a Black
character, a bailiff who is stopped
by police while jogging.
Mr. Nayar wrote a scene in
which the bailiff, played by J. Alex
Brinson, and the lead character,
played by Ms. Missick, discuss
racist policing. Mr. Spottiswood
tors book. It has come closer to
turning a profit than Uber or We-
Work — until the coronavirus
evaporated more than $1 billion of
bookings almost overnight. In the
spring, Airbnb projected its reve-
nue for 2020 would drop to half of
the $4.8 billion it brought in last
year. The company quickly cut
costs, raised emergency funding,
laid off almost 2,000 employees
and shelved its plans to go public.
“It really did feel like a moment
of truth, a bit of a test,” Mr. Chesky,
Airbnb’s chief executive, said in
an interview this year.
In May, Airbnb’s revenue began
bouncing back as people took
summer road trips and sought to
stay in private homes away from
crowds. The company’s gross
bookings — which is its total reve-
nue before it pays commissions to
hosts — rose to last year’s levels in
June and July, according an inter-
nal presentation attended by The
New York Times.
Perennially an I.P.O. candidate,
Airbnb has been officially prepar-
ing to go public since last year
when it announced plans to do so
in 2020. Pressure for the offering
has mounted as some of its early
employees have sought a payday
from the company shares that
they own, which begin expiring
this fall.
Last month, Mr. Chesky an-
nounced to employees that Airbnb
had resumed its plans to go public,
declaring that Airbnb “was down
but we were not out.”
The company is likely to pitch
investors on its fast rebound and
ability to adapt to the new reality,
but some forms of travel — like in-
ternational vacations, business
travel or anything related to large
events — are unlikely to return
anytime soon.
Airbnb also aims to make its
public market debut stand out by
highlighting its business philoso-
phy, called stakeholder capital-
ism. The philosophy focuses on
what is good for society over
short-term profits.
or event tickets are now re-
directing those funds toward
home improvement projects like
buying a hot tub, building a home
movie theater, redecorating a
home office or building a guest
cottage.
“Sales were driven by a con-
sumer focus on the home, core re-
pair and maintenance activities,
and wallet share shift away from
other discretionary spending,”
Lowe’s chief executive, Marvin
Ellison, said on Wednesday in an
earnings release.
The recent sales growth of big
box stores is good for the econ-
omy, keeping supply chains
strong and helping ensure job se-
curity for the millions of people
the retailers employ, said Matt
Williams, managing partner at
the Brand Federation, a consult-
ing firm.
“For the economy, it means con-
sumers are still spending, maybe
not at the same volumes and on
the same things as in the past, but
they’re still spending,” Mr.
Williams said. “That’s encourag-
ing.”
TOMMASO BODDI/WIREIMAGE, VIA GETTY IMAGES
Greg Spottiswood, the show runner
of “All Rise,” hired a diverse crew.
killed the scene, arguing that such
harassment was so common that
it would not merit a discussion be-
tween two Black co-workers, Mr.
Nayar said. After Ms. Missick
complained about the omission,
saying her character would look
callous if she did not acknowledge
what had happened to her col-
league, Mr. Nayar rewrote the
scene, he said. (Ms. Missick de-
clined to comment.)
A later episode, with a script
credited to Greg Nelson, a white
colleague of Mr. Spottiswood’s
from his days in Canadian televi-
sion, included a subplot about a
gang of Latin American teenagers
who terrorize citizens with ma-
chetes in the hills of Los Angeles.
That story line seemed false and
offensive to a Latin American
writer on the staff, as well as to the
cast member Ms. Mendez, Ms.
Edwards said.
“She felt that she could not in
good conscience appear in the
episode as written,” Ms. Edwards
wrote in the email to the
producers. (Ms. Mendez didn’t re-
Yet Airbnb has tussled with reg-
ulators and local communities.
Local regulators have battled the
company over taxes and enforce-
ment, while community members
have criticized the platform for
turning neighborhoods into tour-
ist areas and contributing to hous-
ing shortages.
Safety has also been an issue.
Last year, after a fatal shooting at
a party at an Airbnb rental in
Orinda, Calif., Airbnb announced
it would ban unauthorized parties
and crack down on those responsi-
ble. It also sought to verify all of its
listings to prevent bait-and-
switch situations after a viral arti-
cle about fraudulent listings.
The problem persists. In Au-
gust, a fatal shooting at a party at
an Airbnb rental in Sacramento
prompted Airbnb to pursue legal
action against the guest who
threw the party, a first for the com-
pany.
Airbnb has also struggled with
hosts who discriminate against
nonwhite guests. In June, the
company teamed up with the ra-
cial justice group Color of Change
to try to measure and evaluate
discrimination on its site with the
aim of preventing it.
Airbnb has also endured scru-
tiny from its own rental operators.
When travel shutdowns began in
March, the company allowed
customers to cancel nonrefund-
able bookings, a move that
prompted an outcry among its
hosts, who relied on the income.
Mr. Chesky later apologized for
how the decision was communi-
cated.
In the July staff meeting, Mr.
Chesky said Airbnb planned to get
back to its “roots” by focusing
more on its hosts.
“We realized it is just more
pressing than ever that we have to
get back to what made Airbnb
special,” he said. The realization
would not have been so clear to
him, he said, “had our business
not flashed before our eyes a cou-
ple months ago.”
But it comes with a cost, partic-
ularly for small businesses, whose
survival has long been threatened
by the increasing dominance of
corporate retailers.
While large retailers like Wal-
mart and Target were deemed es-
sential businesses when the pan-
demic hit, many small stores were
not, and they were forced to close
their doors, leading to lost reve-
nue and wasted inventory. Many
small businesses did not have a
robust e-commerce business be-
fore the virus struck, and they
have lost customers while they
struggle to adapt.
People are also less likely to
start their own businesses during
this period, unable to muster
enough capital or fearful that their
businesses will fail in such uncer-
tain times, said Ryan Gellis,
founding partner of RMG Media, a
digital commerce agency.
“It’s part of why a pandemic is a
tragedy,” Mr. Gellis said. “It is not
just the loss of life, but the loss of
people’s ability to run their own
businesses and pursue that Amer-
ican dream.”
spond to requests for comment.)
Mr. Spottiswood agreed to cut the
machete subplot after he learned
of Ms. Mendez’s complaints.
After Mr. Nayar and Ms. Ed-
wards left “All Rise” last year, Mr.
Spottiswood held a meeting to dis-
cuss the tensions in the writers’
room, said two people with knowl-
edge of the meeting, who spoke on
the condition of anonymity. Two
representatives from the Warner
Bros. human resources depart-
ment were present, as was Maria
Rodriguez, a labor lawyer hired
by the studio. Mr. Spottiswood
grew emotional as he told the staff
that he had failed them, the two
people said.
“I acknowledge that I can have
a rhetorical, professorial tone in
the room, and that can be per-
ceived by some as condescending,
and that I can be defensive in cre-
ative conversations and debates,”
Mr. Spottiswood said in his state-
ment. “I remain strongly commit-
ted to improving my communica-
tion style and skills, and to being a
more inclusive leader — ensuring
that writers and artists are not
just heard, but feel listened to, re-
spected, safe and valued.”
Dee Harris-Lawrence, a Black
woman who was the show runner
of the OWN drama “David Makes
Man,” was hired as a co-show run-
ner in December, taking over Mr.
Nayar’s role on “All Rise.”
Ms. Edwards said that, in her
view, Mr. Spottiswood had been al-
lowed to remain in charge be-
cause his approach to race was a
fit for CBS.
“He makes race palatable for a
CBS audience and the CBS brass,
because he doesn’t know anything
about it,” she said. “So there is this
strange tone of nothing being said,
but the visual representation is
there. It’s safe, and it’s empty. All
the reality is absent.”
 THE NEW YORK TIMES BUSINESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N B5

MARKETING | TECHNOLOGY

Powerful Companies
Are Pushing Big Tech
For More Say on Ads
By TIFFANY HSU
For years, companies have com-
plained that they pay good money
for online ads, only to see them
end up near a racist post or an ar-
ticle promoting a conspiracy the-
ory.
Now major advertisers like
Clorox and Coca-Cola, along with
a number of large advertising
agencies, are pushing the big tech
companies to give them more con-
trol over where and how their ads
show up.
The effort follows the adver-
tiser boycott of Facebook last
month, when more than 1,000
companies stopped buying ads on
the platform to protest its han-
Building on a boycott
protesting the speech
policies of Facebook.
dling of hate speech and misinfor-
mation.
Ben Hovaness, an executive at
Omnicom Media Group, a com-
pany that manages $38 billion in
global marketing spending, said it
was time for the tech giants to go
by the rules that applied before
digital platforms were dominant.
“Advertisers buying TV ads,
print ads, radio ads have for many
decades had control over which
programs or which pieces their
ads appear next to or within,” Mr.
Hovaness said. “Now that social
advertising is a major portion of a
lot of our clients’ budgets, having
control over adjacency is just
something that we see as essen-
tial as the ecosystem matures.”
Omnicom Media Group, known
as OMG, has demanded that Face-
book, Twitter and other tech com-
panies do more than make prom-
ises that ads will be kept away
from inappropriate content. It
wants the big digital platforms to
put systems in place to make sure
that online ads will appear where
companies are comfortable, and it
wants proof that the systems
work.
Mr. Hovaness also said that the
reports on ad placement and ad
performance provided by the tech
companies were insufficient and
should be supplemented by inde-
pendent quarterly audits.
Greater control of ad placement
and the independent meas-
urement of ad performance were
included in a list of proposals sub-
mitted recently to tech companies
by the Council on Accountable So-
cial Advertising, a lobbying group
formed by OMG, along with doz-
ens of clients, including Clorox.
Facebook, Reddit, Snap, Tik-
Tok, Twitter and YouTube have
agreed to most of the proposals in
principle, and OMG is monitoring POOL PHOTO BY MANDEL NGAN
the platforms to see if they update An advertiser backlash against Big Tech has come amid increased scrutiny of digital companies, including hearings on Capitol Hill last month.
their practices.
The OMG campaign comes dur-
ing a summer when tech compa- nership for Responsible Address- pear to be doing something,” Au- Facebook cited its work with aness, the OMG executive,
nies have fallen under new scru- able Media, is pushing back gustine Fou, an independent ad the Global Alliance for Responsi- sounded optimistic. Sort of.
tiny. In a congressional hearing against planned changes from Ap- fraud researcher, said. “The only ble Media, an advertising trade “Now the really fun part starts,”
last month, lawmakers interro- ple and Google that are expected thing that’s really going to have a group created last year to address he said. “The platforms are say-
gated the leaders of Amazon, Ap- to disrupt how companies reach long-term effect is when con- toxic online content, and said that ing, philosophically, we agree with
ple, Google and Facebook. Criti- potential customers. IPG Media- sumers or marketers revolt and it had spent billions of dollars to your construct of advertiser
cism has mounted over the prolif- brands, an ad group, released an actively stop using the platforms.” keep hatred off its platform. rights and remedies, and we think
eration of misinformation related audit of nine tech companies last Tech executives have defended Tara Walpert Levy, the vice your clients are entitled to these
to the coronavirus pandemic and week. their dealings with advertisers president of agency and brand so- features.”
the coming election on various But some industry watchdogs and pledged to do better. lutions for Google and YouTube, He added, “We see this as a
digital platforms. are skeptical of the efforts, espe- “We fundamentally believe that said: “It is terrific to see Omnicom monthslong effort. Getting these
The ad industry is adding its cially at a time when companies our advertisers should have con- and others leaning in even fur- partners to agree in principle is a
grievances to the mix. In addition spend more than half of their mar- trol over what content a user sees ther.” key but early step. The odds of
to the OMG-led effort, a newly keting budgets on digital plat- before and after their ad,” said An- Does that mean there will be these platforms’ first pass at solu-
formed coalition of trade groups, forms. drew Abbott, who is Reddit’s liai- peace between the advertisers tions being perfect is pretty low.
ad firms and companies, the Part- “It’s for optics, so they can ap- son to OMG. and the tech companies? Mr. Hov- And that’s fine.”

A $2 Trillion Milestone for Apple, With Half of It Gained in 21 Weeks

FROM FIRST BUSINESS PAGE
fessor who studies the stock mar-
ket, said of investors flocking to
Big Tech. Companies that are rich,
flexible and digital are benefiting
in the pandemic — and that de-
scribes the tech Goliaths, he said,
adding, “This crisis has strength-
ened what was already a strong
hand.”
Apple’s rapid rise to $2 trillion is
particularly astonishing because
the company has not done much
new in the past two years. It has
simply built one of the tech indus-
try’s most effective moneymak-
ers, which has such a firm grip
over how people communicate,
entertain themselves and shop
that it no longer relies on ground-
breaking inventions to keep the
business humming.
Apple first reached $1 trillion in
August 2018, after decades of in-
novation. The company, founded
in 1976 by Steve Jobs and Steve
Wozniak, churned out world-
changing products like the Macin-
tosh computer, the iPod, the App
Store and the iPhone.
Since then, it has mostly
tweaked past creations, selling
gadgets with names like the Apple
Watch Series 5, the AirPods Pro
and the iPhone 11 Pro Max. It has
also pushed into services such as
streaming music, streaming mov-
ies and TV programs, and provid-
ing news, selling subscriptions for
them.
Under its chief executive, Tim
Cook, Apple’s most important in-
novation in recent years has argu-
ably been its nearly unrivaled
ability to generate profits. Mr.
Cook has built a sophisticated
global supply chain to produce bil-
lions of devices — most assem-
bled in China — and leaned into a
product line designed to lock
customers into its ecosystem so
they buy new gadgets every few
years and pay monthly fees to use
Apple’s suite of digital services.
Apple has also grown despite its
size by extracting more money
from the companies that run busi-
nesses on iPhone apps, drawing
accusations that its 30 percent cut
of some app revenues is unfair.
The Silicon Valley company’s
business has been only further en-
trenched by the pandemic, which
has forced people to work, learn
and socialize virtually. From April
through June, even as Apple shut-
tered many of its retail stores be-
cause of the virus, it posted $11.25
billion in profits, up 12 percent
from a year earlier. It increased its
sales of every product and in ev-
ery part of the world.
“Our products and services are
very relevant to our customers’
lives and, in some cases, even
more during the pandemic than
ever before,” Luca Maestri, Ap-
ple’s finance chief, said in an inter-
view last month.
Still, Mr. Maestri disputed that
the pandemic had been good for
business. Apple would have made
billions of dollars more without it,
he said.
Under Tim Cook, Apple’s most important innovation in recent years may be its ability to generate profits.
In the company’s most recent
earnings call, Mr. Cook said, “We
do not have a zero-sum approach
to prosperity.” He added, “We are
focused on growing the pie, mak-
ing sure our success isn’t just our
success and that everything we
make, build or do is geared to-
ward creating opportunities for
others.”
Apple declined further com-
ment.
Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook
and Alphabet, which owns Google
and YouTube, have also continued
raking in billions of dollars amid
the pandemic. Their outsize influ-
ence has attracted intense scru-
tiny over the past year, including
a bipartisan grilling of four of the
companies’ chief executives in
Congress last month.
Representative David Cicilline,
ATTENTION DIRECT AND INDIRECT HOLDERS OF, AND
PROSPECTIVE HOLDERS OF STOCK ISSUED BY VIVUS, INC.:
Upon the motion (the “Motion”) of VIVUS, Inc. and its affiliated
companies (collectively, the “Debtors”), on August 16, 2020, the
United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (the
“Bankruptcy Court”), having jurisdiction over the chapter 11 cases
of the Debtors, captioned as In re VIVUS, Inc.,et al., No.11779 (LSS) (the
“Chapter 11 Cases”),entered a final order establishing procedures (the
“Procedures”) with respect to transfers in the beneficial ownership
(including directly and indirectly) of common stock issued by VIVUS,
Inc.(“Common Stock”) and options to acquire beneficial ownership of
CommonStock.
In certain circumstances,the Procedures restrict transactions involv-
ing, and require notices of the holdings of and proposed transactions
by,any person,group of persons,or entity that either (i) is a Substantial
Stockholder of the Common Stock or (ii) as a result of such a transaction,
would become a Substantial Stockholder of the Common Stock. For pur-
poses of the Procedures,a“Substantial Stockholder”is any person or
entity (within the meaning of applicable regulations promulgated by
the U.S. Department of the Treasury, including certain persons making
a coordinated acquisition of stock) that beneficially owns (including
options to acquire, assuming full exercise thereof, and including direct
or indirect ownership and ownership by a holder’s family members) in
total at least 800,000 shares of Common Stock (representing approxi-
mately 4.5% of all issued and outstanding shares of Common Stock as
of April 30, 2020). Any prohibited acquisition or other transfer of
Common Stock (including options to acquire beneficial ownership
of Common Stock) will be null and void ab initio and may lead to
contempt, compensatory damages, punitive damages, or sanc-
tionsbeingimposedbytheBankruptcyCourt.
The Procedures are available on the website of Stretto, the
Debtors’ Court-approved claims agent, located at https://cases.
stretto.com/VIVUS, and on the docket of the Chapter 11 Cases,
Docket No. 161, which can be accessed via PACER at https://www.
pacer.gov.
The requirements set forth in the Procedures are in addition to the
requirements of applicable securities, corporate, and other laws and do
notexcusenoncompliancetherewith.
A direct or indirect holder of, or prospective holder
of, Common Stock that may be or become a Substantial
StockholdershouldconsulttheProcedures.
Dated: August20,2020 BYORDEROFTHECOURT
Wilmington,Delaware
Democrat of Rhode Island and
chairman of the House subcom-
mittee that is investigating how
the tech giants are brandishing
their power, warned at the hear-
ing that the companies had grown
too powerful.
“Their ability to dictate terms,
call the shots, upend entire sec-
tors and inspire fear represent the
powers of a private government,”
he said. “As hard as it is to believe,
it is possible that our economy will
emerge from this crisis even more
concentrated and consolidated
than before.”
IN THE UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS, HOUSTON DIVISION
) Chapter 11
In re: )
DENBURY RESOURCES INC., et al.,1 ) Case No.20-33801 (DRJ)
(Jointly Administered)
Debtors.
) Re: Docket No. 62
CORRECTED NOTICE OF DISCLOSURE PROCEDURES
APPLICABLE TO CERTAIN HOLDERS OF COMMON
STOCK AND DISCLOSURE PROCEDURES FOR
TRANSFERS OF AND DECLARATIONS OF
WORTHLESSNESS WITH RESPECT TO COMMON STOCK
TO: ALL ENTITIES (AS DEFINED BY SECTION 101(15) OF THE
BANKRUPTCY CODE OR WITHIN THE MEANING OF TREASURY
REGULATION SECTION 1.382-3) THAT MAY HOLD BENEFICIAL
OWNERSHIP OF COMMON STOCK OF DENBURY RESOURCES
INC.(THE“COMMON STOCK”):
PLEASE TAKE NOTICE that on July 30, 2020 (the “Petition Date”),
the above-captioned debtors and debtors in possession (collectively,
the“Debtors”),filed petitions with the United States Bankruptcy Court for
the Southern District of Texas (the“Court”) under chapter 11 of title 11 of
the United States Code (the“Bankruptcy Code”). Subject to certain excep-
tions, section 362 of the Bankruptcy Code operates as a stay of any act to
obtain possession of property of or from the Debtors’estates or to exercise
controloverpropertyoforfromtheDebtors’estates.
PLEASETAKE FURTHER NOTICE that on the Petition Date,the Debtors
filed the Debtors’ Emergency Motion for Entry of Interim and Final Orders
(I) Approving Notification and Hearing Procedures for Certain Transfers
of and Declarations of Worthlessness with Respect to Common Stock, and
(II)GrantingRelatedRelief[DocketNo.10](the“Motion”).
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that on July 31, 2020, the Court
entered the Final Order (I) Approving Notification and Hearing Procedures
for Certain Transfers of and Declarations of Worthlessness with Respect to
Common Stock,and (II) Granting Related Relief [Docket No.62] (the“Order”)
approving procedures for certain transfers of and declarations of worth-
lessness with respect to Common Stock,set forth in Exhibit 1 attached to
theOrder(the“Procedures”).2
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that, pursuant to the Order, a
Substantial Shareholder or entity who may become a Substantial
Shareholder may not consummate any purchase, sale, or other transfer
of Common Stock or Beneficial Ownership of Common Stock in violation
of the Procedures,and any such transaction in violation of the Procedures
shallbenullandvoidabinitio.
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that, pursuant to the Order, the
Procedures shall apply to the holding and transfers of Common Stock or
any Beneficial Ownership therein by a Substantial Shareholder or some-
onewhomaybecomeaSubstantialShareholder.
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that pursuant to the Order, a
50-Percent Shareholder may not claim a worthless stock deduction with
respect to Common Stock, or Beneficial Ownership of Common Stock,
in violation of the Procedures, and any such deduction in violation of the
Procedures shall be null and void ab initio,and the 50-Percent Shareholder
shall be required to file an amended tax return revoking such proposed
deduction.
JIM WILSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Last week, Apple’s power over
its App Store was in the spotlight
when it booted the popular game
Fortnite from its store. Epic
Games, which makes Fortnite,
then sued Apple in federal court,
accusing the company of violating
antitrust laws by forcing develop-
ers to use its payment systems.
Apple has also wielded another
powerful tool to boost its valuation
and enrich its investors and exec-
utives: stock buybacks. Since the
company’s value hit $1 trillion, it
has returned $175.6 billion to
shareholders, including $141 bil-
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that upon the request of any entity,
the notice, claims, and solicitation agent for the Debtors, Epiq Corporate
Restructuring,LLC,will provide a copy of the Order and a form ofeachof the
declarations required to be filed by the Procedures in a reasonable period
of time. Such declarations are also available via PACER on the Court’s web-
site at https://ecf.txsb.uscourts.gov for a fee,or free of charge by accessing
theDebtors’restructuringwebsiteathttps://dm.epiq11.com/Denbury.
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE THAT FAILURE TO FOLLOW
THE PROCEDURES SET FORTH IN THE ORDER SHALL CONSTITUTE
A VIOLATION OF, AMONG OTHER THINGS, THE AUTOMATIC STAY
PROVISIONSOFSECTION362OFTHEBANKRUPTCYCODE.
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE THAT ANY PROHIBITED
PURCHASE, SALE, OTHER TRANSFER OF, OR DECLARATION OF
WORTHLESSNESS WITH RESPECT TO COMMON STOCK, BENEFICIAL
OWNERSHIP THEREOF, OR OPTION WITH RESPECT THERETO IN
VIOLATION OF THE ORDER IS PROHIBITED AND SHALL BE NULL AND
VOID AB INITIO AND MAY BE SUBJECT TO ADDITIONAL SANCTIONS AS
THISCOURTMAYDETERMINE.
PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE that the requirements set forth in
the Order are in addition to the requirements of applicable law and do not
excusecompliancetherewith.
Houston, Texas, August 17, 2020, /s/ Matthew D. Cavenaugh , JACKSON
WALKER L.L.P., Matthew D. Cavenaugh (TX Bar No. 24062656),Vienna F.
Anaya (TX Bar No. 24091225),Victoria Argeroplos (TX Bar No. 24105799),
1401 McKinney Street, Suite 1900, Houston, Texas 77010, Telephone:
(713) 752-4200, Facsimile: (713) 752-4221, Email: mcavenaugh@jw.com,
vanaya@jw.com, vargeroplos@jw.com, Proposed Co-Counsel to the Debtors
and Debtors in Possession -and- KIRKLAND & ELLIS LLP, KIRKLAND &
ELLIS INTERNATIONAL LLP, Joshua A. Sussberg, P.C. (admitted pro hac
vice),ChristopherMarcus,P.C.(admittedprohacvice),RebeccaBlakeChaikin
(admitted pro hac vice),601 Lexington Avenue,New York,New York 10022,
Telephone: (212) 446-4800, Facsimile: (212) 446-4900, Email: joshua.
sussberg@kirkland.com, christopher.marcus@kirkland.com, rebecca.
chaikin@kirkland.com -and- David L. Eaton (admitted pro hac vice), 300
North LaSalle Street, Chicago, Illinois 60654, Telephone: (312) 862-2000,
Facsimile: (312) 862-2200, Email: david.eaton@kirkland.com, Proposed
Co-CounseltotheDebtorsandDebtorsinPossession
1
The Debtors in these chapter 11 cases, along with the last four digits
of each Debtor’s federal tax identification number, include: Denbury
Resources Inc. (7835); Denbury Air, LLC (7621); Denbury Brookhaven
Pipeline Partnership,LP (6322);Denbury Brookhaven Pipeline,LLC (6471);
Denbury Gathering & Marketing, Inc. (6150); Denbury Green Pipeline-
Montana, LLC (6443); Denbury Green Pipeline-North Dakota, LLC (7725);
Denbury Green Pipeline-Riley Ridge,LLC (2859);Denbury Green Pipeline-
Texas, LLC (2301); Denbury Gulf Coast Pipelines, LLC (0892); Denbury
Holdings, Inc. (1216); Denbury Onshore, LLC (7798); Denbury Operating
Company (7620); Denbury Pipeline Holdings, LLC (0190); Denbury
Thompson Pipeline, LLC (0976); Encore Partners GP Holdings, LLC (N/A);
Greencore Pipeline Company, LLC (9605); Plain Energy Holdings, LLC
(0543). The location of Debtor Denbury Resources Inc.’s principal place of
business and the Debtors’service address in these chapter 11 cases is 5320
LegacyDrive,Plano,Texas75024.
2
Capitalized terms used but not otherwise defined herein have the
meaningsascribedtothemintheOrderortheMotion,asapplicable.
lion in stock buybacks. Apple has
repurchased more than $360 bil-
lion of its own shares since 2012,
by far the most of any company,
and has announced plans to spend
at least tens of billions of dollars
more on Apple stock.
Apple has increased its buy-
backs since it used the Trump ad-
ministration’s 2017 tax law to
bring back most of the $252 billion
it had once held abroad. (The law
saved it $43 billion in taxes on the
move, according to the Institute
on Taxation and Economic Policy,
a research group in Washington.)
Apple has $194 billion in cash and
bonds.
Buying back stock generally in-
creases a company’s share price,
in part because it reduces the
number of shares for sale. Critics
YOU ARE ADVISED TO CAREFULLY REVIEW AND CONSIDER THE
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT AND THE PLAN, INCLUDING THE
INJUNCTION, RELEASE, AND EXCULPATION PROVISIONS, AS
YOURRIGHTSMAYBEAFFECTED.
The Plan seeks a release of Claims that you may have against
third parties, including certain foreign affiliates of the
Debtors, such as any guarantee claims you may have against
such parties. If you are a holder of a Claim in Class 1 (Priority
Non-Tax Claims), Class 2 (Other Secured Claims), Class 3 (ABL
Claims), Class 4 (Superpriority Notes Guarantee Claims), Class
5 (Exchange Priority Notes Claims), Class 6 (First Lien Notes
Claims), or Class 7 (General Unsecured Claims), you may be
affected by such releases and injunctions in the Plan. You
should carefully review Section 10 of the Plan and Section
Sections I.F. and V.I. of the Disclosure Statement to see if and
how your rights may be affected. If you object to such releases
or injunctions, you must file an objection to the Plan in
accordance with the procedures described herein. Failure to
object to the Plan may result in such releases being approved
bytheBankruptcyCourt.
UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT
DISTRICT OF DELAWARE
In re ) Chapter 11
EXIDE HOLDINGS, INC., et al., ) Case No. 20–11157 (CSS)
Debtors.1 ) (Jointly Administered)
Hearing Date: September 25, 2020 at 2:00 p.m. (ET)
Obj. Deadline: September 17, 2020 at 4:00 p.m. (ET)
PUBLICATION NOTICE
TO ALL PARTIES IN INTEREST:
PLEASETAKE NOTICETHAT:2
1. Conditional Approval of Disclosure Statement. On August
11, 2020, Exide Holdings, Inc. and its debtor affiliates (collectively,
the “Debtors”) filed the Disclosure Statement For Joint Chapter 11
Plan of Exide Holdings, Inc. and Its Affiliated Debtors (Docket No. 708)
(as may be amended, modified, or supplemented, “Disclosure
Statement”) and the Joint Chapter 11 Plan of Exide Holdings,Inc.and
Its Affiliated Debtors (Docket No.706) (as may be amended, modified,
or supplemented,the“Plan”). On August 14,2020,the United States
Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (the “Bankruptcy
Court”) entered an order approving the Disclosure Statement on a
conditionalbasis(DocketNo.745).
2. Combined Hearing. A hearing to consider (i) final approval
of the Disclosure Statement,(ii) confirmation of the Plan,(iii) approval
of the Europe/ROW Sale Transaction, and (iv) approval of the Global
Settlement, and any objections thereto (the “Combined Hearing”)
has been scheduled before the Honorable Christopher S. Sontchi,
United States Bankruptcy Judge, in the United States Bankruptcy
Court for the District of Delaware (the “Bankruptcy Court”), 824
North Market Street, 3rd Floor, Courtroom 6, Wilmington, Delaware
19801,on September 25, 2020 at 2:00 p.m. (prevailing Eastern
Time), or on such date and time as is convenient to the Court. The
Combined Hearing will be held telephonically and via Zoom, and
may be adjourned or continued from time to time by the Bankruptcy
Court or the Debtors without further notice other than adjournments
announced in open court or as indicated in any notice of agenda
of matters scheduled for hearing filed by the Debtors with the
Bankruptcy Court. The Plan may be modified, if necessary, prior to,
during,orasaresultoftheCombinedHearing.
3. Voting Record Date. The following holders of Claims against
the Debtors as of August 14, 2020 (the“Voting Record Date”) are
entitledtovoteonthePlan:
Class Description
Class 4 Superpriority Notes Guarantee Claims
Class 5 Exchange PriorityNotes Claims
Class 6 First Lien Notes Claims
4. VotingDeadline. All votes to accept or reject the Plan must be
actually received by the Debtors’voting and tabulation agent,Prime
Clerk LLC (“Prime Clerk”), by no later than September 17, 2020
(the“Voting Deadline”). Any failure to follow the voting instructions
includedwithyourBallotmaydisqualifyyourBallotandyourvote.
5. Parties in Interest Not Entitled to Vote. Holders of
Unimpaired Claims and/or Interests in classes deemed to accept the
Plan are not entitled to vote and will not receive a Ballot. In addition,
holders of impaired Claims in classes deemed to reject the Plan are not
entitledtovoteandwillnotreceiveaBallot.
6. Releases. Please be advised that the Plan contains
various releases, exculpation, and injunction provisions that
mayaffectyourrights,including:
(a) If your Claim is unimpaired under the Plan,you will be deemed
to have granted the releases contained in Section 10.6 of the Plan (the
“ThirdPartyReleases”);and
(b) Pursuant to the Plan, the Debtors are seeking approval of
Third Party Releases by holders of General Unsecured Claims of the
Transferred Entities, Consenting Creditors, and the Europe/ROW
Purchaser.
have argued that it also increases
inequality because it mostly en-
riches wealthy investors and the
company’s executives, who are of-
ten large shareholders, as is the
case with Apple. Executives and
some economists said returning
excess cash to shareholders was
better than sitting on it.
Apple is the second publicly
traded company to hit $2 trillion.
Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia’s
state-owned oil company, went
public in December and briefly ex-
ceeded the mark. It remained the
world’s most valuable company
until Apple surpassed it last
month.
Others are vying to reach $2
trillion soon. The candidates likely
to hit that milestone next? Micro-
soft, Amazon and Alphabet.
A COPY OF THE PLAN CAN BE FOUND AT: HTTPS://CASES.
PRIMECLERK.COM/EXIDE2020/.
7. Objections. The deadline to object or respond to (i) final
approval of the Disclosure Statement, (ii) confirmation of the Plan
(including objections to the releases and exculpation provisions
provided therein), (iii) approval of the Europe/ROW Sale Transaction,
and (iv) the Global Settlement is September 17, 2020 at 4:00 p.m.
(EasternTime)(the“ObjectionDeadline”).
8. Objections and responses must: (i) be in writing, (ii) conform
to the Bankruptcy Rules and the Local Rules,(iii) set forth the name of
the objecting party and the nature and amount of Claims or Interests
held or asserted by the objecting party against the Debtors’ estates
or property, (iv) provide the basis for the objection and the specific
grounds therefor,and provide proposed language that,if accepted and
incorporated by the Debtors,would obviate such objection,and (v) be
filed,togetherwithproofofservice.
9. Registered users of the Bankruptcy Court’s case filing system
must electronically file their objections and responses. All other
parties in interest must file their objections and responses in writing
with the United States Bankruptcy Court Clerk’s Office, 824 Market
Street, 3rd Floor, Wilmington, Delaware 19801 to the attention of
the chambers of the Honorable Christopher S. Sontchi, United States
BankruptcyJudge.
Any objections or responses must be served so that they are
actually received by the following parties no later than the
Objection Deadline: (i) Debtors: Exide Holdings, Inc., et al., c/o Prime
ClerkLLC,OneGrandCentralPlace,60East42ndStreet,Suite1440,New
York,New York 10165,Attn:Roy Messing,Email:roy.messing@ankura.
com; (ii) Office of the U.S. Trustee: Office of the U.S.Trustee for the
District of Delaware,844 N.King Street,Wilmington,Delaware 19801,
Attn:Linda J.Casey,Esq.,Email:linda.casey@usdoj.gov;(iii) Attorneys
to the Debtors: Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, 767 Fifth Avenue, New
York, New York 10153, Attn: Ray C. Schrock, P.C., Sunny Singh, Esq.,
Email: ray.schrock@weil.com,sunny.singh@weil.com; (iv) Attorneys
to the Debtors: Richards, Layton, & Finger, P.A., One Rodney Square,
920 North King Street, Wilmington, Delaware 19801, Attn: Daniel J.
DeFranceschi, Esq., Zachary I. Shapiro, Esq., Email: defranceschi@rlf.
com, shapiro@rlf.com; (v) Attorneys to the Creditors’ Committee:
Lowenstein Sandler LLP, 1251 Avenue of the Americas, New York,
New York 10020, Attn.: Robert M. Hirsh, Esq., Eric Chafetz, Esq., Email:
rhirsh@lowenstein.com,echafetz@lowenstein.com;(vi) Attorneysto
the Ad Hoc Group: Paul,Weiss,Rifkind,Wharton & Garrison LLP,1285
Avenue of the Americas,NewYork,NY 10019,Attn: Alice Belisle Eaton,
Esq., Robert Britton, Esq., Email: aeaton@paulweiss.com, rbritton@
paulweiss.com; (vii) Attorneys to the DIP Agents: Gibson, Dunn &
Crutcher LLP, 333 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90071, Attn:
Robert A. Klyman, Esq., Matthew G. Bouslog, Esq., Email: rklyman@
gibsondunn.com, mbouslog@gibsondunn.com; and (viii) Attorneys
to the Trustee under the Indentures: Arent Fox LLP, 1301 Avenue
of the Americas,New York,New York 10019,Attn.:Andrew Silfen,Esq.,
Jordana L. Renert, Esq., Email: andrew.silfen@arentfox.com, jordana.
renert@arentfox.com.
IF OBJECTIONS ARE NOT FILED AND SERVED STRICTLY AS
PRESCRIBED HEREIN, THE OBJECTING PARTY MAY BE BARRED
FROM OBJECTING TO FINAL APPROVAL OF THE DISCLOSURE
STATEMENT, CONFIRMATION OF THE PLAN, AND APPROVAL OF
THE EUROPE/ROW SALE TRANSACTION AND MAY NOT BE HEARD
ATTHECOMBINEDHEARING.
10. Additional Information. Any party in interest wishing to
obtain a copy of the Disclosure Statement, the Plan, and Europe/
ROW Purchase Agreement should contact Prime Clerk, the Debtors’
solicitation agent,in writing at Exide 2020 Ballot Processing,c/o Prime
Clerk LLC, One Grand Central Place, 60 East 42nd Street, Suite 1440,
NewYork,NY 10165,or by email at exide2020ballots@primeclerk.com
with a reference to“Exide 2020”in the subject line. Interested parties
may also review the Disclosure Statement and the Plan free of charge
at https://cases.primeclerk.com/Exide2020/. In addition, the
Disclosure Statement,Plan,and Europe/ROW Purchase Agreement are
on file with the Bankruptcy Court and may be reviewed by accessing
the Bankruptcy Court’s website: www.deb.uscourts.gov. Note that
a PACER password and login are needed to access documents on the
Bankruptcy Court’s website. A PACER password can be obtained at:
www.pacer.psc.uscourts.gov. Copies of the Disclosure Statement
and Plan may also be examined by interested parties during normal
businesshoursattheofficeoftheClerkoftheBankruptcyCourt.
1
TheDebtorsinthesechapter11cases,alongwiththelastfourdigits
of each Debtor’s federal tax identification number are Exide Holdings,
Inc.(5504),ExideTechnologies,LLC (2730),Exide Delaware LLC (9341),
Dixie Metals Company (0199),and Refined Metals Corporation (9311).
The Debtors’mailing address is 13000 Deerfield Parkway,Building 200,
Milton,Georgia30004.
2
Capitalized terms used but not otherwise defined herein shall
have the respective meanings ascribed to such terms in the Disclosure
StatementorPlan,asapplicable.
B6 N THE NEW YORK TIMES BUSINESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
A Parting That’s Safe and Eco-Friendly
Time to ditch your old gear? Here’s how to move on while protecting your privacy and the planet.
Before you give away any tablet, smartphone or computer, fully erase its
data to ensure that all of your personal information is secure.
Tech Tip
By J. D. BIERSDORFER
Taking better care of your tech
gear can help make it last longer,
but sometimes you just need to
upgrade. Even if your phone,
tablet or computer hasn’t suf-
fered a fatal flop, you may find it
doesn’t fit your work-from-home
needs, or you plan to pass it
down to a family member who
needs it for remote learning. Or,
be honest: You really want the
fall season’s latest, greatest
phone.
Whatever the reason for the
new purchase, simply tossing
your old hardware in the junk
drawer or trash can be bad from
a privacy standpoint and for the
environment. When upgrade
time comes, here are some secu-
rity and eco-friendly tips for
when your old equipment goes
on without you.
Prepare for Departure
Back up your content to a cloud
service or a computer.
To get your old device ready to
leave your possession, start by
backing up its contents to an
external drive or secure cloud
server.
Next, look for a program to
automatically move your data
from the backup or old device.
Apple’s support site has guides
for transferring the contents of
Mac computers and iOS gadgets,
Facebook Removes 790 QAnon Groups Giving Voice to Fringe Theories
FROM FIRST BUSINESS PAGE
ment has become mainstream.
Believers of Q, the shadowy cen-
tral figure of QAnon, have shown
up at political rallies. Some have
committed violence in the name of
the movement. And members of
the group are rising in politics.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, a QAnon
supporter from Georgia, won a Re-
publican primary this month and
may be elected to the House in No-
vember.
At a White House news confer-
ence on Wednesday, Mr. Trump
was asked what he thought about
QAnon’s theory that he is saving
the world from a satanic cult of pe-
dophiles and cannibals. Mr.
Trump, who has shared informa-
tion from QAnon accounts on Twit-
ter and Facebook, said, “I haven’t
heard that, but is it supposed to be
a bad thing or a good thing?”
In response to the growing ac-
tivity, tech companies have
ramped up their measures to limit
QAnon on social media, where the
movement is deeply ingrained.
Last month, Twitter announced
that it was removing thousands of
QAnon accounts and said it was
blocking trends and key phrases
related to QAnon from appearing
in its search and Trending Topics
section. Reddit has also banned
some of its forums for QAnon con-
tent, while the video app TikTok
has banned several QAnon-relat-
ed hashtags.
YouTube also regularly takes
down QAnon content, including
“tens of thousands of Q-related
videos, and terminated hundreds
of Q-related channels for violating
our community guidelines,” a
YouTube spokesman said
“There needs to be a real
change in how these platforms
think about conspiracy theories
and the real-world harm they
cause,” said Cindy Otis, vice presi-
dent of analysis for Alethea
along with advice for giving
away a Mac or one of Apple’s
phones or tablets.
Outside the Apple ecosystem,
Laplink’s PC transfer software
transplants data between old and
new machines. Google’s support
site has instructions for moving
data to a new Android phone or
transferring it to a Pixel smart-
phone. Other phone makers have
their own solutions, like Sam-
sung’s Smart Switch for its Ga-
laxy products.
Now, de-authorize your old
device from any online subscrip-
tions for music, movies, software
and cloud services. Make sure
you have any serial numbers or
installation programs needed to
reinstall applications on new
hardware. (Unless you installed
an application from a disc or
drive and have the paperwork,
serial numbers are typically
emailed when you buy computer
software online and are still
needed even if you download the
program again on a new ma-
chine.)
Finally, unpair any Bluetooth
accessories before you sign out
of your user accounts on the
device for good.
Erase Your Past
After you’ve transferred your
data to its new home, wipe the
Apple provides a step-by-step guide to preparing a Mac for reuse.
Group, an organization that inves-
tigates disinformation. “Since the
start of the pandemic, we have
seen QAnon move much faster
than the social media platforms to
gain a following and push their
content out.”
Facebook grew concerned by
QAnon’s presence in May, said two
employees with knowledge of the
efforts, who were not authorized
to speak publicly.
That was when a video known
as “Plandemic,” featuring a dis-
credited scientist spreading a
baseless conspiracy theory about
the coronavirus, gathered steam
on the social network, fueled by
QAnon groups.
QAnon activity also spilled out
into the real world. In New York, a
woman who had cited QAnon the-
ories as a reason she wanted to
“take out” the Democratic presi-
dential nominee Joseph R. Biden
Jr., was arrested on May 1 with
dozens of knives in her car. The
group has been linked to more
than a dozen violent incidents
over the last year, including a train
hijacking.
The spiking activity on its net-
work, combined with real-world
incidents, pushed Facebook to dis-
cuss policy changes to limit
QAnon’s spread, the two employ-
ees said. But the conversations
stalled because taking down
QAnon-related groups, pages and
accounts could feed into the move-
ment’s conspiracy theory that so-
cial media companies are trying to
silence them, the people said.
Marc-André Argentino, a Ph.D.
candidate who is studying QAnon,
said part of the problem was that
QAnon had absorbed members of
other conspiracy groups into its
pantheon. Even if Facebook re-
moved the groups, they would
likely find a foothold within other
Facebook networks.
“QAnon is a super conspiracy,”
TECHNOLOGY
Daisy, Apple’s recycling robot, can disassemble 200 iPhone models an hour and recover materials for reuse.
information from the old device.
On an iPhone or iPad, go from
Settings to General and then
Reset; select the Erase All Con-
tent and Settings option. Wiping
an Android phone varies by
hardware and software versions,
A QAnon supporter at a Trump rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. Facebook’s action was its most sweeping against the QAnon conspiracy theory movement.
Mr. Argentino said. “Various
other conspiracies have various
places in the hierarchy under the
QAnon narrative, so it draws in
people in different ways and gives
them one central home. There is
no easy answer about what to do
about QAnon.”
How effective the social media
companies’ takedowns will be at
limiting QAnon is unclear.
YouTube sometimes surfaces
QAnon videos as additional view-
ing after one QAnon video is
but try going to System, then
Advanced and Reset Options.
Computers should also be
wiped of data before they leave
the house. Apple’s support site
has guides to erasing a Mac and
reinstalling its operating system.
PC users have several disk-
deleting programs available,
including White Canyon’s
WipeDrive Home and Eraser.
Check with the computer’s man-
ufacturer for steps to reinstalling
the operating system; using
another PC with an external
drive to download and reinstall
Windows 10 or Ubuntu Linux
may be one method.
Pass Down a Device
The recipient of your used com-
puter or mobile gadget will need
to set it up and install any new
applications. If you plan to give
your old smartphone to someone
in the family, check with your
wireless carrier about adding a
new line and other necessary
watched. Members still post
about the conspiracy theory on
some parts of Reddit. And on Tik-
Tok, accounts promoting the false
conspiracy have amassed hun-
dreds of thousands of followers.
A TikTok spokeswoman said
that QAnon content “frequently
contains disinformation and hate
speech which violates our com-
munity guidelines,” and that
searches for dozens of hashtags
related to QAnon were directed to
monitors. “We continually update
APPLE
equipment (like a SIM card) to
get it up and running.
Even without cellular service,
Wi-Fi-enabled phones and tab-
lets can still get online by con-
necting to a wireless network.
And if you’re bequeathing a
Samsung and others offer credit toward a new phone for trade-ins.
our list as people work to break
through our safeguards with mis-
spellings and new phrases,” she
added.
Reddit did not respond to a re-
quest for comment.
On Wednesday, Facebook said it
had taken down the QAnon
groups as part of a new policy to
clamp down on movements that
discuss “potential violence.” Un-
der that policy, Facebook said, it
will also remove 980 groups such
as those related to the far-left an-
phone or tablet to a child, Apple
and Google both include parental
controls in their software.
Trade In (and Up)
If money is tight, swapping your
old gadget for credit helps pay
for the new one. Several hard-
ware manufacturers — Amazon,
Apple, Dell, Google, Samsung
and others — have their own
trade-in programs.
Best Buy has a trade-in pro-
gram in exchange for gift cards
or merchandise discounts. Third-
party companies like Buy Back
World, Gazelle and It’s Worth
More also convert old electronics
into cash.
Give to a Good Cause
If your old equipment is in de-
cent shape, donating it to charity
is another option. (You may be
able to deduct the contribution
from your taxes with a receipt
from a recognized charity.)
If no local charities, schools or
libraries accept hardware dona-
tions, search for a legitimate
organization like the National
Cristina Foundation or Cell
Phones for Soldiers. The sites for
Charity Navigator and the Fed-
eral Trade Commission have
information on donating wisely.
Recycle Responsibly
Even if your old gear is dead, you
can recycle it to recover valuable
materials and keep them out of a
landfill. Some municipalities like
New York City have regulations
concerning “electronic waste,” so
check your local government’s
website. The Environmental
Protection Agency’s site also has
a list of electronics recycling
options.
Some manufacturers support
“takeback” programs that accept
products mailed in for recycling;
Amazon, Apple and Google are
among them. Best Buy and Sta-
ples stores also accept all kinds
of electronics for recycling. If
pandemic precautions are tem-
porarily impeding collection, set
a reminder on your new device
to check back.
MATT ROURKE/ASSOCIATED PRESS
tifa movement, and others related
to militia movements or protests.
The new policy also bars the
groups from buying ads on the
platform.
Ms. Otis of the Atlantic Council
said the actions by Facebook and
others against QAnon had not
come soon enough.
“It has taken far too many
weeks, too many months, for the
platforms to get their arms
around what is happening,” she
said.
SCORES ANALYSIS COMMENTARY THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 B7
N

Even in a Pandemic, Everyone Hates the Astros

With the stands empty, fans
get creative about jeering
the team that cheated in 2017.

By DAVID WALDSTEIN
Just the thought of the Houston Astros
skating away without any public rebuke
rankled Jon Wilson.
A 43-year-old software consultant
from California’s East Bay and a devout
Oakland Athletics fan, Wilson was stew-
ing at the injustice of it all as the 2020
season approached. First the Astros
cheated their way to the 2017 World Se-
ries, he thought, and then their players
avoided punishment in what amounted
to an unsavory plea bargain after Major
League Baseball’s investigation this
year.
The final outrage was the empty ball-
parks. Because of the coronavirus,
M.L.B. decided to start its 2020 season
without fans in stadiums, enabling the
Astros to avoid what Wilson and many
others had eagerly anticipated: a sea-
son-long public flogging in the form of
loud, visceral, deep-throated jeers.
“How many different ways can they
get away with what happened?” Wilson
said in a telephone interview. “They
don’t even have to face the wrath of the
fans.”
So, earlier this month, inspired by a
video of a lone Dodgers fan outside Ana-
heim Stadium booing the Astros (who
were playing inside), Wilson took action.
He hired a plane to fly above Oakland
Coliseum during batting practice before
an Athletics-Astros game, towing a sign
that read, “Houston Asterisks.”
The words referred to the notion held
by many fans besides Houston’s that the
Astros’ 2017 World Series title is tainted.
That year, Astros players stole signs us-
ing a live video feed and communicated
them to batters by banging on a trash DAVID J. PHILLIP/ASSOCIATED PRESS

can. When The Athletic revealed the
scheme last winter, many in the baseball
world felt the championship deserved an
asterisk in the record book to highlight
the cheating.
In lieu of that, Wilson and others are
carrying out an ongoing, underground
opposition campaign against the Astros.
With an assist from a widely followed
Twitter account called 2020 Astros
Shame Tour, Wilson raised the $1,200 for
the flight in less than 24 hours. So much
money came in, he said, that he can af-
ford another flight when the Astros re-
turn to Oakland in September.
“It would be cool to have a banner fol-
low the Astros from city to city,” he said.
“No matter where they go, the same ban-
ner just keeps popping up to remind
them.”
Even in a most unusual M.L.B. season,
fans like Wilson and the lone booer in An-
aheim have uncovered unique ways to
express their outrage despite not being
allowed in ballparks, determined to keep
a spotlight on Houston, which remains a
lightning rod for negativity.
To the delight of the anti-Astros crowd,
the Houston players have faced more
than their share of misfortune this year.
They’ve had bench-clearing alterca-
tions, suspensions, costly injuries, a five-
game losing streak and enough batting
slumps to fuel joyful speculation that
perhaps the team’s players, especially
second baseman Jose Altuve, can’t hit as
well when it’s on the up-and-up.
A three-time American League batting
champion, Altuve was batting .168
through Tuesday, 144 points below his ca-
reer average.
Manager Dusty Baker, who was hired
in January after the team fired A.J.
Hinch in the wake of the cheating scan-
dal, was asked last week if Altuve might
be putting too much pressure on himself,
trying to prove to a skeptical world that
he can perform without knowing what
pitch is coming.
“Altuve, he has been hitting all his life,”
Baker responded. “It’s only a matter of
time before Altuve hits again.”
Until then, many are relishing in his
struggles and those of his team: The As-
tros, who reached the World Series last
season, were 13-10 and battling for sec-
ond place in the American League West
just over a third of the way through the
season.
Brendan Donley, a writer and Cubs fan
from Chicago, started the Astros Shame
Tour Twitter account for the same reason
Wilson had in flying his sign over an
empty Coliseum: to give the Astros a
steady reminder of their transgressions.
While Hinch and General Manager Jeff
Luhnow were suspended and then fired,
no Astros players were punished by
M.L.B., something that outraged many
fans and opposing players.
Donley opened the account in Febru-
ary, before the pandemic was declared,
and within a short time it became a cen-
tral clearinghouse for all things anti-As-
tros.
It began in a time of relative normalcy,
when opposing fans were showing up to
the Astros’ spring training games in
Florida to boo, some bearing signs that
mocked the team. The real punishment,
though, was expected during the regular
season. One Dodgers fan group was or-
ganizing a trip to Anaheim specifically to
jeer the Astros.
“But then this pandemic happened,”
Donley said, “and you think, did they re-
ally get their one year of shame?”
His account has exploded, with nearly
300,000 followers who get a daily dose of
mockery, sarcasm and news of Houston’s
struggles. Donley particularly enjoys
that the account has gained more follow-
ers than either Alex Bregman or Carlos
Correa, two popular Astros players im-
plicated in the scandal.
“It would have been fine if it were only
10,000 people,” said Donley, who has
written a book about the 1968 World Se-
ries. “But to see the legion of people who
feel the same way is really cool.”
The anti-Astros movement has
adopted a few heroes along the way.
Among them is Trevor Bauer, the outspo-
ken Cincinnati Reds pitcher who has
written about the “bad blood” many
M.L.B. players still have for the Astros.
Another is Ramon Laureano, the Ath-
letics outfielder who was hit by an Astros
pitch on Aug. 8, then engaged in a shout-
ing match with Alex Cintron, Houston’s
hitting coach, charged the Astros’ dug-
Jose Altuve, the Astros’ All-Star second baseman, has struggled at the plate this season, batting only .168 through Tuesday’s games.
Anti-Astros gear sold well during spring training, and could be found even at a Yankees-Tigers exhibition game.
out and incited a bench-clearing fracas
that flouted any sense of physical dis-
tancing.
Cintron received a 20-game suspen-
sion for starting the shouting match,
while Laureano was barred for four
games and joined Dodgers pitcher Joe
Kelly in the pantheon of anti-Astros an-
tagonizers.
“Everybody who hates the Astros
loves Joe Kelly,” said Wilson, the man
who hired the plane.
Kelly, a Dodgers reliever, earned his
special status on July 28 — not so much
for throwing a fastball behind Bregman’s
head during a game in Houston but be-
cause he later taunted Correa with a
pouty-face expression that incited an-
other benches-clearing encounter and
has since been canonized on social media
and emblazoned on T-shirts.
Kelly received an eight-game suspen-
sion, which was later reduced to five
DAVID J. PHILLIP/ASSOCIATED PRESS
JOHN BAZEMORE/ASSOCIATED PRESS
games on appeal. Chris Young, M.L.B.’s
senior vice president for on-field opera-
tions, said in an interview that the league
was not intentionally making an exam-
ple of Kelly, who had previously been
suspended for throwing at batters. But
he added that the league would not toler-
ate players taking justice into their own
hands against Houston.
“We will closely monitor any throwing
incidents involving the Astros, as with
any other team,” Young said. “There is
just no place in our game for players issu-
ing their own punishment by inflicting
pain on another player. We can’t have
that.”
But Kelly then added to his anti-Astro
bona fides last week during an appear-
ance on the Big Swing podcast, along
with his teammate Ross Stripling and the
host, Cooper Surles, when he called the
Astros “rats” and said they were “not re-
spectable men.”
Joe Kelly of the Dodgers
earned plenty of fans by an-
tagonizing Carlos Correa and
the Astros. Left, one of the
many signs that dogged the
Astros during spring training.
Altuve was asked on Friday whether
opponents needed to move on from the
campaign of shame, or if it was up to the
Astros to simply endure all these indigni-
ties. He paused.
“I need to think about that,” he said.
For his part, Kelly brushed aside the
fact that he previously pitched for the
Boston Red Sox, who were deemed to
have cheated intermittently in 2017 and
during their championship season in
2018 — with Kelly on the roster both
years. Boston beat the Astros in the play-
offs in 2018 and won the World Series
that year, also against the Dodgers.
But the Red Sox’ cheating was minor
compared with what the Astros did, and
Kelly, through his mocking facial contor-
tions, quickly tapped into the general an-
imus that many in the baseball world still
feel toward the Astros.
“You’ll never get over it,” Stripling said
on the podcast. “Absolutely never get
over it.”
Maybe not, but the 2020 Astros Shame
Tour provides players and fans with a
continuous resource for everything neg-
ative about the Astros, and any tidbit is
welcome. When the actor Rob Lowe ap-
peared on Joe Rogan’s podcast wearing a
hat with an H pasted over an orange as-
terisk, Donley shared it. When George
Springer, the Astros’ talented leadoff hit-
ter, had his star status downgraded in a
video game, Donley posted that, as well.
Shame aside, the Astros have faced a
litany of other baseball issues this year,
including injuries to Justin Verlander,
Michael Brantley and Yordan Alvarez,
all while Baker tries to manage a shaky
bullpen with nine rookies in it. No sur-
prise, then, that the Astros are off to such
a disappointing start — not that people
outside Houston are upset over it.
“They are definitely not the same
team, and that makes me happy,” Wilson
said. “They need to feel what it’s like to
be in last place, to finally have some tan-
gible consequences. Because so far, they
haven’t had them.”
FRANK FRANKLIN II/ASSOCIATED PRESS
B8 N THE NEW YORK TIMES SPORTS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

S O C C E R C H A M P I O N S L E AG U E S C O R E B OA R D

Numbers That Detail Bayern’s Dominance Again Don’t Lie BASEBALL

AMERICAN LEAGUE
East W L Pct GB
By RORY SMITH eryone else, is what Bayern offers
Yankees 16 7 .696 —
Bayern Munich’s numbers, at the other end of the field.
Lewandowski is the headline Tampa Bay 15 9 .625 1{
Lyon Manager Rudi Garcia had
said, were so intimidating that threat, but the German champion Baltimore 12 12 .500 4{
they were best ignored. Unbeaten bristles with threats across the Toronto 10 11 .476 5
since early December. Flawless, board. Boston 7 18 .280 10
with not Gnabry was the star on Central W L Pct GB
BAYERN MUNICH 3 so much Wednesday, his dazzling run and Minnesota 16 8 .667 —
LYON 0
as a point fearsome finish shattering Lyon’s
Cleveland 14 9 .609 1{
dropped, hearts after a bright start. But
Semifinals in 19 con- there were worthy contributions
Chicago 13 11 .542 3
secutive from Lewandowski — scoring in Detroit 9 12 .429 5{
games. Scoring goals at an eye- his 10th straight Champions Kansas City 10 14 .417 6
watering rate. League game, and now only two West W L Pct GB
“If we just look at the statistics,” goals from Cristiano Ronaldo’s Oakland 16 8 .667 —
Garcia had said before Lyon faced
record of 17 in a single campaign Houston 13 10 .565 2{
Bayern in the Champions League
— but also from Leon Goretzka,
semifinals on Wednesday night in Texas 10 12 .455 5
Lisbon, “we might as well watch Alphonso Davies and Thiago Al- Los Angeles 8 16 .333 8
the game in the hotel.” cantara.
Seattle 7 18 .280 9{
Lyon could not, in the end, stop The experience that Bayern’s
WEDNESDAY
Bayern’s big red machine from manager, Hansi Flick, can call on Tampa Bay at Yankees
rolling on to its first tournament fi- may provide an edge, too. In Toronto 5, Baltimore 2
Boston 6, Philadelphia 3
nal since winning the competition Neuer, Thomas Müller, Jérôme Kansas City 4, Cincinnati 0, 1st game
Cincinnati at Kansas City, 2nd game
in 2013. Two goals from Serge Boateng and David Alaba, Bayern Cleveland at Pittsburgh
Gnabry — the first a bone-shaking has four holdovers from its vic- Detroit at Chicago White Sox
Milwaukee at Minnesota
finish from the edge of the penalty tory against Borussia Dortmund Houston at Colorado
Texas at San Diego
area, the second a scrappy tap-in in the 2013 final. Five, actually, if Arizona at Oakland
— effectively settled the game be- JOSE SENA GOULAO/EPA, VIA SHUTTERSTOCK one includes Lewandowski, who L.A. Dodgers at Seattle
L.A. Angels at San Francisco
fore halftime. was in Dortmund’s yellow and
Robert Lewandowski, scoring Robert Lewandowski of Bayern Munich heading in a goal, his 15th of this year’s tournament. THURSDAY
black that night. Tampa Bay (TBD) at Yankees (Paxton 1-1),
his 55th goal of the season and his P.S.G., of course, has never 1:05
Philadelphia (Howard 0-1) at Toronto
15th in this season’s Champions opened the scoring. the ball past Neuer but hit the enough from Lyon to believe that reached the final before this sea- (Anderson 0-0), 1:05, 1st game
League, scored on a header in the A ball from deep in midfield split post. Bayern might be more vulnerable son, though several of its players
Philadelphia (Nola 2-1) at Toronto (TBD),
4:35, 2nd game
88th minute to cap a 3-0 victory. the center backs and sprung Gnabry scored his first goal a in Sunday’s final than Wednes- have. Di María won the tourna- Detroit (Turnbull 2-1) at Chicago White Sox
day’s final score suggested: The (Giolito 1-2), 2:10
Lyon was hardly a passive ob- Memphis Depay straight down minute later. ment in 2014 with Real Madrid, Houston (Javier 2-1) at Colorado (Marquez
server to the proceedings, though. the middle, sprinting out of the In the second half, when most pace of Kylian Mbappé, the craft 2-3), 3:10
and Neymar lifted the trophy a Cleveland (Bieber 4-0) at Pittsburgh
This was no meek surrender, as center circle. But Depay took too would have considered its chance of Neymar and the endeavor of (Williams 1-3), 7:05
Ángel Di María should trouble a year later with Barcelona. They
RB Leipzig’s defeat to Paris St.- many touches trying to round blown, Lyon continued to push L.A. Dodgers (Kershaw 2-1) at Seattle
Germain, also by 3-0, on Tuesday goalkeeper Manuel Neuer and forward, searching for the slice of Bayern defensive line that strug- and Mbappé will not plan to be (Kikuchi 0-1), 7:10
Milwaukee (Woodruff 1-1) at Minnesota
night had been. sent his falling shot into the right- good fortune that might have gled to contain Ekambi and De- passive observers, and will be- (Berrios 1-3), 7:10
lieve they can have a rather better Boston (Eovaldi 1-2) at Baltimore
Twice, Lyon came close to tak- side netting in the sixth minute. In brought its players a lifeline. pay. (Wojciechowski 1-2), 7:35
ing the lead before Gnabry the 17th, Karl Toko Ekambi ripped P.S.G., certainly, will have seen The trouble, for P.S.G. and ev- outcome than Lyon did. Texas (Gibson 1-2) at San Diego (Lamet
2-1), 8:10
Arizona (Young 1-0) at Oakland (Manaea
0-2), 9:40
L.A. Angels (Heaney 1-1) at San Francisco

GOLF
(Gausman 0-1), 9:45

NATIONAL LEAGUE
East W L Pct GB

A Rising Star Seems Ready to Fulfill Her Potential

By KAREN CROUSE
LONDON — The golfer Dan-
ielle Kang has a small tattoo on
her right index finger to remind
her of her parents’ advice to be
herself. “Just be,” it reads. But
those words took on added mean-
ing after the coronavirus crisis
shut down the L.P.G.A. Tour in
February, and Kang found herself
atop a receding wave.
At the time the schedule was
suspended, Kang, 27, had re-
corded four top-three finishes, in-
cluding a victory, in her previous
five starts. She was No. 4 in the
world, as near as she had ever
been to the women’s world No. 1
ranking, a position that had
seemed her destiny since she
turned pro at the age of 18, less
than five years after taking up the
game.
To be heralded as a budding star
while still essentially an appren-
tice had created a perception gap
that Kang, a two-time U.S. Wom-
en’s Amateur champion, had tried
to close with impatience. That left
the people around her worried as
she entered lockdown. She was al-
ways so hard on herself, they
thought. Would the negative
thoughts churned by Kang’s inner
dialogue overwhelm her during a
pandemic?
Stripped of the peripatetic life-
style that grounded her, could
Kang, a searcher wrapped in in-
tensity inside a bubble, just be?
The question hung in the air for
five long months, but when the
L.P.G.A. tour resumed recently
with two events in Ohio, the an-
swer was clear: Kang won both
events to ascend to No. 2 in the
world, within striking distance of
South Korea’s Jin Young Ko, who
has held the top spot for more than
a year, as Kang begins play this
week at the Women’s British Open
at Royal Troon.
In Las Vegas, where Kang, a na-
tive San Franciscan, lives, the
courses remained open during
lockdown, she said, and she took
full advantage. She worked with
her coach, Butch Harmon, hitting
shots with one of her least-favor-
ite clubs, the 3-wood, until she had
complete confidence in it. She also
regularly engaged her boyfriend,
Maverick McNealy, a PGA Tour
rookie, in two- and three-hour con-
tests around the green, stoking
her competitive fire and refining
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her short game.
“People asked me left and right,
‘Are you bummed you’re not play-
ing when you were playing so
good?’” Kang said in a Zoom in-
terview ahead of last week’s La-
dies Scottish Open. “They asked
me, ‘What are you going to do if
you’re not playing good when you
come back?’”
It was a case of two negatives —
other people’s and hers — equal-
ing a positive. “I’ve got this time,”
she recalled thinking of her pan-
demic break, “and I’m going to uti-
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game.”
The hard work allowed Kang to
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past 10 months, Kang’s lowest fin-
ish in eight tour starts is a tie for
12th. She has three victories, one
second and two thirds. Last week,
she tied for fifth, one shot out of a
four-way playoff, at the Scottish
Open.
“She has been doing amazing
things,” marveled Collin
Morikawa, who won the P.G.A.
Championship two weeks ago.
Morikawa, who also lives in Las
Vegas, added, “That’s Tiger-esque
type things, almost winning three
times in a row.”
This week, Kang will try to col-
lect her second major title, and
sixth pro victory, at the Women’s
British Open.
The player she is chasing in the
rankings, Ko, will be conspicuous
by her absence. Ko, who won two
of last year’s five women’s majors,
has not made an L.P.G.A. Tour
start since the 2019 season-ending
Tour Championship. Ko’s man-
ager told Golf Channel.com last
month that Ko’s return to the tour
— and specifically the events
around the British Open — is up in
the air because of her concerns
about Covid-19 containment in
Britain and the United States. For
the time being, Ko is playing on
the Korean L.P.G.A. circuit, which
allows her to stay close to her
home base in Seoul.
South Korean players have won
five of the 12 majors contested
since Kang’s victory in the 2017
Women’s P.G.A. Championship,
but global representation has be-
come the tour’s calling card; play-
ers from four countries have won
the seven tournaments contested
in this disjointed season.
Kang, an American of South Ko-
rean descent, said she has kept in
contact “with quite a few” of her
Korean friends on the tour. The
competitor in her wishes they
were all at Royal Troon this week,
but she said she recognizes that
the hardships and hazards of trav-
eling abroad during a pandemic
have made playing a moot point
for some.
“I do the best I can to under-
stand from everyone’s perspec-
tive,” Kang said.
The delicate ecosystem of
sports in the coronavirus age was
driven home last week with the
cancellation, because of health
As the tour resumes,
Danielle Kang picks
up where she left off.
concerns and significant travel re-
strictions, of the tour’s October
stop in Shanghai, where Kang is
the two-time defending champion.
Kang praised the virus-preven-
tion protocols in place at the first
L.P.G.A. events of the tour’s re-
start. Of the Women’s British
Open, she said, “As long as it was
possible, I was coming.”
The PGA Tour resumed tourna-
ments a month before the L.P.G.A.
did, allowing Kang to employ Mc-
Nealy, 24, as a kind of advance
scout for her strange, new world.
She quizzed him about testing
protocols. She asked him what he
considered the toughest adjust-
ment returning to tour play after
such a long layoff. He told her to
ditch a cart and walk the course
during her practice rounds.
And after his first week back,
when he was back to having to hit
Atlanta 14 11 .560 —
Miami 9 8 .529 1
Philadelphia 9 10 .474 2
Mets 11 14 .440 3
Washington 9 12 .429 3
Central W L Pct GB
Chicago 15 8 .652 —
St. Louis 6 6 .500 3{
Milwaukee 10 11 .476 4
Cincinnati 9 12 .429 5
Pittsburgh 4 15 .211 9
West W L Pct GB
Los Angeles 18 7 .720 —
Colorado 13 10 .565 4
Arizona 13 11 .542 4{
San Diego 13 12 .520 5
San Francisco 9 16 .360 9
WEDNESDAY
Mets at Miami
Boston 6, Philadelphia 3
St. Louis 9, Chicago Cubs 3, 1st game
Chicago Cubs at St. Louis, 2nd game
Kansas City 4, Cincinnati 0, 1st game
Cincinnati at Kansas City, 2nd game
Cleveland at Pittsburgh
Washington at Atlanta
GENE J. PUSKAR/ASSOCIATED PRESS Milwaukee at Minnesota
Houston at Colorado
Texas at San Diego
Arizona at Oakland
L.A. Dodgers at Seattle
L.A. Angels at San Francisco
THURSDAY
Mets (Matz 0-4) at Miami (Castano 0-1), 6:10
Philadelphia (Howard 0-1) at Toronto
(Anderson 0-0), 1:05, 1st game
Philadelphia (Nola 2-1) at Toronto (TBD),
4:35, 2nd game
Houston (Javier 2-1) at Colorado (Marquez
2-3), 3:10
Cleveland (Bieber 4-0) at Pittsburgh
(Williams 1-3), 7:05
L.A. Dodgers (Kershaw 2-1) at Seattle
(Kikuchi 0-1), 7:10
Milwaukee (Woodruff 1-1) at Minnesota
(Berrios 1-3), 7:10
Texas (Gibson 1-2) at San Diego (Lamet
2-1), 8:10
Cincinnati (Gray 4-1) at St. Louis
(Wainwright 2-0), 8:15
Arizona (Young 1-0) at Oakland (Manaea
0-2), 9:40
L.A. Angels (Heaney 1-1) at San Francisco
(Gausman 0-1), 9:45
BASKETBALL
GENE J. PUSKAR/ASSOCIATED PRESS N.B.A. PLAYOFF SCHEDULE
All games in Orlando, Fla.
FIRST ROUND
Wednesday, Aug. 19
Toronto 104, Nets 99
Utah 124, Denver 105
approaches at pins that weren’t in Boston vs. Philadelphia
L.A. Clippers vs. Dallas
the middle of the greens, McNealy Thursday, Aug. 20
Miami vs. Indiana, 1 p.m.
called the greenskeepers at TPC Oklahoma City vs. Houston, 3:30 p.m.
Summerlin, the Las Vegas course Milwaukee vs. Orlando, 6 p.m.
L.A. Laker vs. Portland, 9 p.m.
where Kang was preparing, with a
favor. “He asked them to tuck all RAPTORS 104, NETS 99
BROOKLYN (99)
the pins for me the last few days of Harris 4-9 2-4 14, Luwawu-Cabarrot 6-16
my practice,” Kang said. 2-2 17, Allen 5-9 4-6 14, LeVert 5-22 6-9
16, Temple 6-13 4-4 21, Kurucs 1-4 0-0 2,
The gesture was vintage Mc- Chiozza 1-2 1-2 3, T.Johnson 5-10 0-0 12.
Nealy, she said. “He’s so support- Totals 33-85 19-27 99.
TORONTO (104)
ive of the way I am, as a golfer and
Anunoby 2-8 2-4 6, Siakam 6-14 5-9
as a person,” she added. “That’s 19, Gasol 0-2 0-0 0, Lowry 7-14 4-6 21,
VanVleet 8-22 5-5 24, Hollis-Jefferson 0-0
the best way I can put it.” 0-0 0, Ibaka 3-9 2-2 8, M.Thomas 1-1 0-0
The same week that Kang won 2, Powell 11-17 1-2 24. Totals 38-87 19-
28 104.
the L.P.G.A. Drive One Champi- Brooklyn . . . . . 33 20 27 19—99
onship in Toledo, Ohio, in the L.P- Toronto . . . . . . 29 21 24 30—104
.G.A.’s return, McNealy finished
3-Point Goals—Brooklyn 14-41 (Temple
5-11, Harris 4-7, Luwawu-Cabarrot 3-10,
seventh at the Barracuda Cham-
pionship in Truckee, Calif., which
T.Johnson 2-5, Kurucs 0-3, LeVert 0-4),
Toronto 9-35 (Lowry 3-6, VanVleet 3-11,
Siakam 2-4, Powell 1-6, Anunoby 0-3,
was his sixth tournament back. Ibaka 0-4). Fouled Out—None. Rebounds—
Brooklyn 46 (Allen, Harris 15), Toronto 44
When they talked that night, Mc- (Lowry 9). Assists—Brooklyn 25 (LeVert
Nealy’s excitement for Kang’s
11), Toronto 22 (VanVleet 10). Total Fouls—
Brooklyn 25, Toronto 21.
success was palpable, she said. W.N.B.A. SCHEDULE
“He’s able to put his own
All games in Bradenton, Fla.
dreams aside and be so happy for Wednesday, Aug. 19
Atlanta at Washington
me,” she said. “And be happy with Dallas at Minnesota
me. That’s hard to do, especially Phoenix at Los Angeles
Thursday, Aug. 20
when you’re in the same career.”
Chicago at Liberty, 7 p.m.
Kang is on the cusp of becoming Seattle at Indiana, 8 p.m.
Connecticut at Las Vegas, 10 p.m.
the third American woman since
2006, after Cristie Kerr and Stacy HOCKEY
Lewis, to occupy the No. 1 spot.
STANLEY CUP PLAYOFF
That would fulfill the prediction
SCHEDULE
that Harmon made when they be-
gan working together in 2018. All games played in Edmonton and Toronto
Wednesday, Aug. 19
As soon as Kang believed that Tampa Bay 5, Columbus 4, OT, Tampa Bay
wins series, 4-1
she was as good as everybody Boston 2, Carolina 1, Boston wins series, 4-1
could see that she was, Harmon Colorado 7, Arizona 1, Colorado wins series,
4-1
told her, watch out world. That Montreal vs. Philadelphia
Vancouver vs. St. Louis
should have been empowering, Thursday, Aug. 20
coming from a teacher who has Islanders vs. Washington, 8 p.m.
Dallas vs. Calgary, 10:30 p.m.
worked with Tiger Woods, Phil
Mickelson and Dustin Johnson. SOCCER
But Kang still can’t help herself.
M.L.S. SCHEDULE
“He’ll say something and I’ll
Wednesday, Aug. 19
say, ‘Are you sure?’” Kang said, No games scheduled.
laughing. “And he’ll look at me Thursday, Aug. 20
N.Y.C.F.C. at Red Bulls, 7 p.m.
and say: ‘Am I sure? Listen to me. Chicago at Columbus, 7:30 p.m.
I know what good looks like.’” Philadelphia at New England, 7:30 p.m.

The Nets Are Behind, but They’re Not Really Losing
Is it possible for a postseason
series to tell us everything and
nothing at the same time? I
present to you the Nets and the
Toronto Raptors facing off in the
first round of the
SOPAN N.B.A. playoffs.
DEB On one hand, you
have the Nets, who
ON PRO are down, 2-0, after
BASKETBALL losing, 104-99, on
Wednesday. This
was expected: The Raptors, the
defending champions, are more
talented and heavily favored to
win. Many of the current Nets
players will either not be on the
team next year, when Kevin
Durant, Kyrie Irving, Spencer
Dinwiddie and DeAndre Jordan
return, or they will not get nearly
as much playing time. Jacque
Vaughn may not even be the
coach then.
Opposite them, you have To-
ronto: a professional and effi-
cient team doing what it’s sup-
posed to do. But this series does-
n’t answer any of the key ques-
tions for the Raptors as they try
to make a deep postseason run
— namely, do they have enough
top-level talent to repeat as
champions?
But the games have been
instructive as to the culture of
both teams, offering some
lessons that the Nets in particu-
lar can take going into next year,
regardless of how this series
turns out.
At a macro level, the Nets have
shown themselves to be resilient,
both against the Raptors and in
the eight seeding games leading
up to the playoffs. Sean Marks,
the Nets’ general manager, has
spoken many times about the
team’s culture of toughness and
hard work, which flourished
under Kenny Atkinson, who
stepped down as head coach
during the season, and has con-
tinued under Vaughn. This cul-
ture has been on full display at
Walt Disney World near Orlando,
Fla., where the Nets have com-
peted at a high level against
better teams.
Right Now,
Lillard
Looks Like
The Best
By SCOTT CACCIOLA
Scott Bamforth knows Damian
Lillard better than most. For two
seasons, they shared the back-
court as teammates at Weber
State. Lillard eventually left as an
N.B.A. lottery pick while Bam-
forth, after breaking Lillard’s
school records for 3-point shoot-
ing, landed in Spain a year later.
They still keep in touch via text
message, Bamforth said, and get
together for the occasional off-
season workout. But while little
about Lillard surprises him any-
more — Bamforth knew his for-
mer teammate was bound for big
things — Bamforth has detected a
subtle change in Lillard’s demean-
or in recent weeks.
“You can see there’s a differ-
ence in him where he truly knows
and believes he’s the best player
on the court every time he plays,”
Bamforth said. “There’s just no
doubt in his mind. It doesn’t mat-
ter if he’s on the court with LeBron
James, or if he’s on the court with
James Harden — anyone. And I
feel like everyone else knows it,
too.”
On Tuesday night, Lillard left
his imprint on another opponent.
In leading the Portland Trail Blaz-
ers to a 100-93 victory over the Los
Angeles Lakers (and the afore-
mentioned James) in Game 1 of
their Western Conference first-
round playoff series, Lillard col-
lected 34 points and 5 assists.
Game 2 of their best-of-seven se-
ries is Thursday night.
“The job is far away from being
done,” Lillard said, “but I’m proud
of our effort.”
Bamforth, 31, watched the
game from his home in Tempe,
Ariz., where he was preparing for
his trip this week to France, where
he will play this coming season for
Le Mans of LNB Pro A, the coun-
try’s top league. Lillard’s exploits
have been both familiar and new
to Bamforth — somehow even
more explosive, somehow even
more refined.
They were all on display during
one stretch of the fourth quarter,
which Lillard kicked off by bury-
ing a 30-foot jumper — and danc-
ing to “Blow the Whistle” by the
rapper Too Short as he settled into
his defensive stance at the other
end. A few possessions later, Lil-
lard pulled up from 36 feet to
swish a 3-pointer over the top of
the Lakers’ Anthony Davis. Then,
on Portland’s next trip up the
court, he passed out of swarming
pressure to Carmelo Anthony,
who drained a 3-pointer of his
own.
The right shots. The right pas-
The Raptors’ Fred VanVleet, left, stealing the ball from the Nets’ Garrett Temple during Toronto’s 104-99 victory.
“We weren’t likely to be the
seventh seed once several of our
players didn’t come down to the
bubble,” Garrett Temple said
after scoring 21 points on
Wednesday. “We weren’t likely to
beat the teams we beat while we
were here in the bubble. We
enjoy being underdogs.”
The Nets led most of Game 2,
until the more experienced Rap-
tors made just enough shots and
caused just enough turnovers in
the fourth quarter to come back.
The Nets had a chance to tie in
the last 15 seconds, but a handoff
from Joe Harris to Temple went
awry. Kyle Lowry got the steal,
and the Raptors iced the game —
and breathed a sigh of relief. The
Nets did not win, but they did
enough to make the Raptors
ses. And another tour de force for
a point guard who has fashioned
the N.B.A.’s bubble at Walt Disney
World into his personal stage.
“He can dance all he wants if
he’s going to shoot from half-court
and score 30,” the Blazers guard
CJ McCollum said.
Lillard’s theatrics punctuated
another wild day for the league,
which was true to form: Every-
thing about the bubble has been
odd and different, and Tuesday
was no exception. For the first
time since 2003, both No. 1 seeds
lost their opening games of the
playoffs. The Milwaukee Bucks,
the top seed in the East, were the
THE NEW YORK TIMES SPORTS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
PRO BASKETBALL
sweat. It was a moral victory if
not a real one.
“The adjustments we did make
put us in a position to even be in
the final minutes and seconds of
a game against the defending
champs,” Vaughn said after the
game.
On a personnel level, this
series has provided two revela-
tions: Caris LeVert’s playmaking
and Timothé Luwawu-Cabarrot’s
deserving a shot in the N.B.A.
LeVert is shouldering a heavy
burden as the Nets’ point guard
— not his normal position. He is
also one of the few players on the
team who can consistently break
down defenses. LeVert dished a
career-high 15 assists in the
series opener on Monday and 11
on Wednesday. He has been
POOL PHOTO BY MIKE EHRMANN
first to take a tumble, losing, 122-
110, to the Orlando Magic as all the
Bucks not named Giannis Ante-
tokounmpo combined to shoot
41.5 percent from the field.
A few hours later, it was the
Lakers’ turn. In fairness, the Trail
Blazers are not a typical No. 8
seed. One year removed from ad-
vancing to the conference finals,
they labored through an injury-
marred season before reconven-
ing in Florida for the league’s re-
start — where Lillard promptly
seized control as the bubble maes-
tro.
In eight seeding games, he av-
eraged 37.6 points and 9.6 assists
adept at countering a steady diet
of Toronto double teams and
traps with crisp passes to the
open man. Imagine how happy
this must make Durant and
Irving, who may be able to feel
comfortable leaving the floor and
handing the reins to LeVert
when they return.
As for Luwawu-Cabarrot, 25,
he is on his fourth team in four
years — his fifth if you include
the Cleveland Cavaliers, who
signed him in September and
then cut him before he played a
game. But after signing multiple
10-day contracts with the Nets,
and eventually a multiyear con-
tract in February, he seems to
have found a home with the
franchise.
He scored 26 points in Game 1
The Trail Blazers’ Damian Lillard scored 34 points against Le-
Bron James and the Lakers in Game 1 of their playoff series.
“The job is far away from being done,” Lillard said. Left, Lillard
in the first half with his teammate Wenyen Gabriel.
as the Blazers went 6-2 to give
themselves a chance of reaching
the postseason. They punched
their way in by defeating the
Memphis Grizzlies on Saturday in
a play-in game, during which Lil-
lard scored the coolest, most un-
derstated 31 points imaginable.
“It just looked so easy for him,”
Bamforth said. “At this point, if he
doesn’t have 50, it seems like he
had a bad game. It’s crazy.”
Long before he became one of
the N.B.A.’s most dynamic play-
ers, Lillard exerted his influence
in less public ways. He, for exam-
ple, was the main reason that
Bamforth, a shooting guard, en-
rolled at Weber State, a midmajor
school in Ogden, Utah, as a junior
college transfer. “I knew they had
a great point guard,” Bamforth
said.
Lillard’s work ethic stood out to
Bamforth from the start. The team
had a shooting drill called Celtic
50, which involved counting the
number of 3-point attempts it took
to sink a total of 50. One night, af-
ter Lillard needed just 51 at-
tempts, Bamforth stayed in the
gym until he matched him. Sure
enough, Lillard returned the next
day to chase perfection: 50
straight makes without a miss.
“We were always competing
against each other,” Bamforth
said.
Even after they left school,
Bamforth continued to learn from
Lillard simply by being in his or-
bit, he said, and by watching his
games on television. Lillard’s pro-
file grew, but Bamforth under-
POOL PHOTO BY KEVIN C. COX
against Toronto, and then 17 on
Wednesday. Including the play-
offs, Luwawu-Cabarrot has hit
double digits in scoring for the
Nets in seven of his last 10
games. He is an adept cutter and
a reliable shooter. He’s become
so reliable that Vaughn inserted
him into the starting lineup on
Wednesday.
In the series opener, the Nets
were in a 33-point hole in the
first half. They had every reason
to lie down: They weren’t ex-
pected to win. Coming back from
that deep a deficit would be
nearly impossible against the
defending champions, who are
known for their poise. And yet,
the Nets cut the lead to single
digits in the second half, riding
LeVert.
POOL PHOTO BY ASHLEY LANDIS
stood through it all that Lillard
was the same person with the
same single-minded drive. Noth-
ing about his approach to the
game was about to waver.
Bamforth recalled how they
were working out a couple of sum-
mers ago when Lillard pulled him
aside. He had noticed Bamforth’s
footwork coming off a screen —
Bamforth had dribbled to his right
before elevating for a jump shot —
and wanted to know everything
about how he had done it in micro-
scopic detail.
“He was like, ‘If I can get that
pull-up going to my right, it’s
over,’” Bamforth recalled him say-
ing. “And I kind of thought I had
already learned that move from
him. Like, ‘What are you even
talking about? You’re Dame Lil-
lard!’ But if he sees something
that he can improve, he’s going to
ask — and he’ll ask anyone.”
It was a small but significant
moment that stuck with Bam-
forth, because it got at the essence
of the Damian Lillard he had al-
ways known: his determination,
his dedication.
Lillard’s path through the
N.B.A. has included its share of
postseason disappointments.
Nothing has come easily for the
Blazers. Now, they have another
opportunity in front of them, an
unexpected one given the circum-
stances — but one they earned.
Lillard seems intent on making
the most of it.
“He’s found another level,”
Bamforth said.
N B9
“Seems like they were trying
to deliver an early message to
the group,” Vaughn told report-
ers on Monday. “I did like the
way our group responded after
halftime and accepted that first
punch from Toronto. The rounds
will continue.”
Ideally, the Nets would not
have put themselves down by 33
in a playoff game. But that they
muscled back is an indication
that the team is playing motivat-
ed under Vaughn.
Unfortunately, mental muscles
ultimately don’t equal real ones,
Putting up a good
fight against the
defending champions.
as much as I tried to convince
my high school basketball
coaches otherwise. (Coach! I
would’ve made a great glue guy!
Your loss, Howell High!) The
Nets are unlikely to win this
series — not without getting
LeVert some serious help in the
form of another playmaker.
(Where art thou, Jamal Craw-
ford?) And with Harris leaving
the bubble for a personal matter
after Game 2, the challenge is
even greater.
But the team has so far acquit-
ted itself about as well as it can
given the circumstances. Effort
isn’t the issue, and that’s some-
thing the Nets can take into next
year when, in theory, they will
have a team ready to contend for
championships.
“I think anyone watching
these past two games felt our
team, the energy, the effort, their
hard play, their togetherness,
never doubting each other, being
extremely resilient,” Vaughn
said. “Definitely proud of that
from the group. We put ourselves
in a position to win a ballgame.
And so that’s all you can ask.”
N.B.A. to Let
Teams Create
Tiny Bubbles
By SOPAN DEB
The eight N.B.A. teams that did
not qualify for the season’s restart
at Walt Disney World in Florida
can create bubbles and hold vol-
untary group workouts at their
team facilities beginning in mid-
September, the league and its
players’ union announced on
Tuesday.
The provision applies to teams
like the Knicks and the Golden
State Warriors, who were no long-
er in contention for the playoffs
when the N.B.A. suspended its
season on March 11 because of the
coronavirus pandemic. The
league resumed play in July with
22 teams in an isolated campus at
Walt Disney World near Orlando,
Fla., that has thus far not yielded
any positive coronavirus tests af-
ter players and staff members left
quarantine.
The announcement by the
league is an indication that the
N.B.A. has faith in its approach
and feels comfortable expanding
it, even as the pandemic continues
to affect lives in the United States.
Like the Florida restart, this plan
would be implemented in phases,
including a quarantine period be-
fore workouts. It would require
players and staff members to stay
“in a campuslike environment un-
der controlled conditions,” accord-
ing to the statement released by
the N.B.A., and to undergo daily
testing for the coronavirus.
The eight teams affected are the
Knicks, Warriors, Minnesota Tim-
berwolves, Cleveland Cavaliers,
Atlanta Hawks, Detroit Pistons,
Chicago Bulls and Charlotte Hor-
nets. The league said that all eight
teams could also invite up to five
players who are not signed to a
league contract but were assigned
to the team’s G League affiliate.
The news release said that it
would be up to the teams to create
campus environments in their
own home cities and that it was
not mandatory for players to at-
tend. This new agreement would
open the door for teams to have in-
trasquad scrimmages and group
conditioning sessions.
It is not clear where the home
city campuses would be. The
Knicks declined to comment. The
team recently hired Tom Thi-
bodeau as its newest head coach.
In the plan for the Florida re-
start, the N.B.A. allowed 22 teams
to take part: the eight teams
slated for the playoffs in each con-
ference, as well as six teams that
were within six games of the
eighth seeds in their conferences.
They played eight seeding games
to complete the regular season
and to determine which 16 teams
made the playoffs and where they
would be seeded. The playoffs be-
gan Monday.
B10 N THE NEW YORK TIMES SPORTS THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Kraft Wins Again as Appeals Court Upholds Decision to Dismiss Video
By KEN BELSON
Robert K. Kraft, the owner of
the New England Patriots, won
another decisive victory in his at-
tempt to fight two misdemeanor
charges of solicitation of prostitu-
tion, after judges issued a strong
rebuke of police tactics used in the
case against him.
In a unanimous decision, a
three-judge panel in the Florida
Fourth District Court of Appeal in
West Palm Beach affirmed a
lower court decision that the po-
lice improperly gathered video ev-
idence central to the case made
against Kraft and two dozen other
men who were recorded visiting
and receiving treatment at sev-
eral South Florida day spas.
“We find the trial courts prop-
erly concluded that the criminal
defendants had standing to chal-
lenge the video surveillance and
that total suppression of the video
recordings was constitutionally
warranted,” the judges wrote in
their decision on Wednesday.
Unless prosecutors ask the
state Supreme Court to hear their
appeal, the decision effectively
ends the case against Kraft, who
was charged in February 2019
with two counts of soliciting sex in
Jupiter, Fla., after the police inves-
tigated the spas and massage par-
lors on suspicion of prostitution
and human trafficking.
“We are pleased that the Flor-
ida’s Fourth District Court of Ap-
peal has ruled in our favor by af-
firming suppression of recordings
that should never have been tak-
en,” a spokesman for Kraft said in
a statement. “This ruling protects
the constitutional rights and civil
liberties of all the men and women
who were illegally spied on in this
case. More broadly, this ruling will
further protect the civil liberties of
all Americans, by helping prevent
future Fourth Amendment vio-
lations like those that occurred in
this case.”
The decision is likely to reduce
the chance that the N.F.L. will pe-
nalize Kraft, 79, for conduct
deemed detrimental to the league.
Commissioner Roger Goodell has
broad authority to hold players,
league executives and owners ac-
countable for their actions, and
penalties can include fines of up to
$500,000 and suspensions, based
not just on the outcome of the legal
case, but also on the damage to the
league’s reputation.
When law enforcement officials
first brought the case, they
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journalism spans nearly every topic and interest,
making The Times the perfect gift for just about
PRO FOOTBALL
claimed they had unearthed a hu-
man trafficking ring at day spas in
South Florida. But over time, the
case focused more narrowly on
the misdemeanor charges against
Kraft and the other men.
While some of the two dozen
other men also charged in the case
have paid fines and performed
community service to resolve
their cases, Kraft declined to take
a plea deal, which would have ex-
punged any record of the case.
Kraft’s lawyers argued that vid-
eo showing him and other patrons
at the day spa, Orchids of Asia,
was improperly obtained by un-
dercover cameras and that the po-
lice did not sufficiently minimize
the scope of their surveillance
when applying for a warrant to
film there. The video, they said, vi-
olated the rights of Kraft and the
other customers recorded.
In May 2019, a Palm Beach
County court judge agreed with
Kraft’s lawyers and threw out the
video evidence in the case. The
ruling echoed decisions made by
judges in nearby counties where
defendants were charged after
having been identified in surveil-
WILFREDO LEE/ASSOCIATED PRESS
lance investigations.
Robert K. Kraft was charged in 2019 with soliciting sex. Courts The Florida attorney general,
have ruled that evidence against him was obtained improperly. Ashley Moody, taking up the case
everyone — and every occasion.
Gift subscriptions start at $25.
Visit nytimes.com/gift or call 1-800-NYTIMES.
for the state attorney in Palm
Beach County who charged Kraft
and the others, argued that the po-
lice followed established pro-
cedures for obtaining permission
to install the cameras. Lauren
Cassedy, a spokeswoman for the
state attorney general, said her
“office is reviewing the ruling.”
The judges on the appeals panel
A case against the
Patriots’ owner
appears to be over.
said that “while there will be situa-
tions which may warrant the use
of the techniques at issue, the
strict Fourth Amendment safe-
guards developed over the past
few decades must be observed.”
The judges added: “To permit oth-
erwise would yield unbridled dis-
cretion to agents of law enforce-
ment and the government, the an-
tithesis of the constitutional lib-
erty of people to be secure against
unreasonable searches and
seizures.”
3 THEATER 4 BOOK REVIEW

Kissing onstage with a cast in Four thinkers who

quarantine. BY ERIC GRODE
5 TELEVISION
transformed
Puzzling out our connections philosophy in the
to the universe. BY REMY TUMIN 1920s. BY JENNIFER SZALAI

NEWS CRITICISM THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 C1

N

An artist retraces
the crusading trip
Inez Milholland
embarked on in 1916.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

In Memory
Of a Suffragist
And a Martyr
By MEREDITH MENDELSOHN
In October 1916, Inez Milholland, a rene-
gade young lawyer and ardent social re-
former, collapsed onstage while eloquently
pleading with more than a thousand women
in Los Angeles to stand together in the bat-
tle for women’s suffrage.
Run ragged from weeks of campaigning
across the West while fighting strep throat
and tonsillitis, she died the next month, at
age 30, from pernicious anemia.
The loss of their heroic, rising star devas-
tated suffragists, who exalted her as a mar-
tyr and emblazoned her famous last words
— “Mr. President, how long must women
wait for liberty?” — on their banners while
picketing Woodrow Wilson’s White House
the following year.
One of the great, though tragic, chapters
of the road to suffrage, Milholland’s story,
like so many others of women’s history, is
little known to the wider public. The history-
obsessed activist artist Jeanine Michna-
Bales is trying to change that. In her latest
project, “Standing Together: Photographs
of Inez Milholland’s Final Campaign for
Women’s Suffrage,” she provides a visual
account of Milholland’s journey West
through a mix of photographs of landscapes
and historical re-enactments, contextu-
alized with historical ephemera.
Originally set to go on view this month for
the centennial of the 19th Amendment’s rat-
ification, but postponed because of the pan-
CONTINUED ON PAGE C6

Left, from top: “Bound for Medford” and

“Transitioning” are part of Jeanine
Michna-Bales’s “Standing Together:
Photographs of Inez Milholland’s Final
Campaign for Woman’s Suffrage.” Top right,
Milholland herself in 1913.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JEANINE MICHNA-BALES

A Dance Troupe Returned; Pushing for Racial Equity in Theater

An Outbreak Soon Arrived
The Mariinsky Ballet stopped
performances after dozens of
positive coronavirus tests.
By ALEX MARSHALL
For the past three weeks, the Mariinsky
Ballet, one of Russia’s most renown compa-
nies, led the dance world in showing how
ballet could return to the stage.
It hosted galas at its St. Petersburg the-
aters, featuring solos and duets performed
by dancers who had undergone weekly
tests for coronavirus.
More ambitiously, it had begun staging
full-length ballets, with a run of the Roman-
tic classic “La Sylphide.” Audience mem-
bers were provided with masks and gloves,
and seating was distanced, with an empty
space between each viewer.
Then, on Aug. 13, the performances
stopped. In a development that will concern
other dance companies hoping to return to
the stage, the Mariinsky Ballet has sus-
pended all performances, classes and re-
hearsals, a spokeswoman said in an
emailed statement. (The Mariinsky’s opera
and orchestral programs continue uninter-
rupted, the statement added.)
She did not answer questions about the
reason for that suspension. But on Monday,
Interfax, the Russian news service, re-
ported that about 30 people in the company
had contracted the coronavirus. Xander
Parish, a British dancer who is a principal
soloist with the Mariinsky, confirmed in a
CONTINUED ON PAGE C2
Some white artistic directors
step aside in calls for change.
By MICHAEL PAULSON
Fifteen years ago, Paul Kuhn co-founded
the Curio Theater Company in Philadel-
phia. Now, having reached the conclusion
that his leadership is part of a racist power
structure, Kuhn says he is relinquishing all
authority to choose plays, directors and de-
signers to a new co-artistic director, Rich
Bradford, who is Black.
Across the country in Berkeley, Calif., Jon
Tracy, a white man who serves as the artis-
tic facilitator at TheatreFirst, is demoting
himself, and the company is creating a
term-limited position of artistic director,
hoping the opening will provide an opportu-
nity to diversify its leadership.
And in New York City, William Carden is
planning to leave Ensemble Studio Theater,
a company he joined in 1978. All four people
on its artistic staff are white, and Carden,
who has been the artistic director since
2007, said he believed his departure was the
way to prompt change.
“The key to antiracism is sharing power,”
Carden said. “It takes a lot of work and a lot
of humility, and it requires that white people
step aside.”
The outcry over racial injustice this sum-
mer was followed at first by a wave of state-
ments in which American theatrical institu-
tions, with a flurry of news releases and
website postings, declared themselves al-
lies of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Now there is a second wave: changes to
Rich Bradford, above in leadership and practices at a handful of the-
“The Mystery of Irma aters around the country.
Vep” at the Curio The theaters are mostly small, and it re-
Theater Company in mains unclear how calls for change in the
Philadelphia, is its new industry will (or won’t) affect life at larger
co-artistic director. institutions, many of which have been pro-
grammatically and financially hobbled by
CONTINUED ON PAGE C4
C2 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

An Art Scene Defies Its Reviews National Gallery, a glass-box museum by

OLAFUR ELIASSON AND NEUGERRIEMSCHNEIDER
The news that three top collectors were leaving
Berlin set off negative headlines and prompted
soul-searching from artists and others.
By KIMBERLY BRADLEY
BERLIN — It’s not looking good for the Berlin
art scene, if you believe the newspaper
headlines. This spring, Die Welt, a German
daily, called the city an “art metropolis in de-
cline.” The Financial Times reported that
the art world had “said goodbye.”
These dire proclamations were spurred
by announcements that three prominent
art collectors with art on public view here —
Julia Stoschek, Thomas Olbricht and
Friedrich Christian Flick — were departing,
taking their collections with them.
It was just the latest bad news: In Decem-
ber, the Art Berlin fair folded; in February
the international mega-gallery Blain South-
ern, which had a space in Berlin, announced
it would be closing.
Yet, art in Berlin goes on — perhaps in a
more-established, less-hyped way than dur-
ing this German capital’s cheap, come-one-
come-all halcyon days. From the fall of the
Berlin Wall in 1989 until the early 2010s,
when rents began rising sharply, Berlin was
a hotbed for unregulated experimentation
and exuberant hedonism.
But along the way, the art scene here also
grew up. Several once-scrappy gallerists,
like Esther Schipper, who arrived in 1992,
are now global art-market players. Artists
with bases here, such as Olafur Eliasson,
Hito Steyerl and Tómas Saraceno, have be-
come bona fide stars.
“There are great artists living in Berlin,
so you can’t start saying that everything is
dead,” the gallerist Philomene Magers said
in an interview.
The exhibition “Local Talent,” running
through Saturday at Sprüth Magers, a
gallery Ms. Magers co-founded and oper-
ates with Monika Sprüth, is a direct reaction
to the negative buzz, Ms. Magers added.
The gallerists invited the artist Thomas De-
mand to curate a show, on short notice, of
works by artists living and working in
Berlin.
On view are works by 25 artists, including
longtime residents Mr. Eliasson, Tacita
Dean and Thomas Struth, as well as a num-
ber of emerging artists. Exhibition logistics
were easy, Ms. Magers said: “We drove a
truck to the studios, picked up the works,
Clockwise from above left:
“Your Lost Lighthouse,” a 2020
work by Olafur Eliasson in the
exhibition “Local Talent,” at
Sprüth Magers in Berlin
through Saturday; Mr.
Eliasson, a Danish-Icelandic
artist who has been based in
Berlin since the 1990s; and an
untitled floor installation by
Jason Dodge in the “Local
Talent” show.
JOHN MacDOUGALL/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
TIMO OHLER
and brought them to the gallery. Everyone
was here.”
More than 5,000 visual artists from
around the world are based here, according
to statistics compiled by city authorities.
Despite high-profile closures, there are still
more than 300 galleries, and before
Covid-19 restrictions, there were public art
talks nearly every night. The postponed
Berlin Biennial is scheduled to go forward
on Sept. 5, and Gallery Weekend, in which
about 50 local galleries court international
collectors, has moved to mid-September
from its usual spring time slot.
Many art world insiders blame Berlin’s
policymakers, however, for failing to de-
velop a solid institutional infrastructure for
contemporary art, including securing real
estate for its display. According to Klaus
Lederer, Berlin’s top culture official since
2016, the city has depended too much on pri-
vate collectors to purchase and show art.
Museum budgets for buying new works re-
main too low, he said.
And that isn’t the only problem facing
Berlin’s state-funded museums: The New
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, has been closed
for renovation since 2015, and its reopening
has been delayed. The Humboldt Forum, a
huge new museum under construction in
the city center, is also running late.
There are difficulties for private exhibi-
tion spaces, too, with some collectors ex-
pressing frustration at local bureaucracy, or
taking shots at politicians.
The lease on Ms. Stoschek’s Berlin loca-
tion, where she has mounted extensive ex-
hibitions of video art, ends in 2022: The
building will then undergo overdue renova-
tions. Mr. Olbricht, who has exhibited his
collection in Berlin since 2010, has said he
would return to Essen, in western Germany.
And the wing displaying Mr. Flick’s loan of
1,500 artworks in the Hamburger Bahnhof
museum is slated for demolition. He plans
to take the works to Switzerland next year.
Mr. Lederer said in an interview that he
was aware of past policy mistakes, but that
he was taking steps to protect and promote
an art scene that was integral to shaping the
city’s identity. His department has helped
secure around 1,400 studio spaces that are
then rented to artists at submarket, subsi-
dized rates, he said. More recently, he was
behind an aid program in which artists
could apply for 5,000 euros, about $6,000, in
the first days of the pandemic lockdown in
Berlin, he added.
And not all collectors are leaving. Art
spaces like Fluentum and the Kindl Center
for Contemporary Art, both established by
private collectors, remain and plan to show
new exhibitions in September. Two of the
city’s most visible contemporary art buy-
ers, Christian and Karen Boros — who,
since 2008, have mounted exhibitions in a
monolithic World War II bunker in the city
center — will soon host “Studio Berlin” in
collaboration with Berghain, the techno
club. From Sept. 9, the cavernous club will
display work by more than 80 local artists;
for the first time, the public will be allowed
in without first being scrutinized by
Berghain’s famously picky bouncers.
In an interview, Mr. Demand said that
with the “Local Talent” exhibition at Sprüth
Magers he wanted “to show, on a small
scale, that Berlin still works,” adding:
“We’re still here, we’re still working, we still
have the same problems and we’re still
coming up with individual solutions.”
Mr. Lederer said: “There were always
two perspectives on Berlin’s art scene. On
the one hand, that everything was fabulous
and worth cheering for; on the other that it
was a catastrophe, a mess. There was noth-
ing in between.”
After the three collectors announced they
were leaving, “it’s as if everyone was wait-
ing to toll the death knell for Berlin as an art
city,” he said. “But that’s nonsense.”
And Ms. Stoschek’s collection might stay
put after all: She must vacate her location
when the lease ends, but, in an email, Ms.
Stoschek said she had not decided whether
her collection will leave Berlin for good.
“We will have to see how the pandemic
around the world develops,” she said.
“What makes the city so attractive is
never the administration, but the people
who release an enormous amount of energy
and ensure constant movement,” Ms.
Stoschek said. “To observe this in the last
months alone is valuable. Berlin is coming.
Even if perhaps in a different form than be-
fore.”

Dancers Returned,
Then Covid Arrived
CONTINUED FROM PAGE C1
telephone interview that there had been an
outbreak.
“They’ve tried really hard to be safe,” he
said. “It’s not like our rehearsals have been
badly organized or anything.”
Last week, Mr. Parish said, a member of
the company had an elevated temperature,
“then another and another and it was like,
‘Oh, dear.’ ”
On Saturday, everyone in the company
was sent an email telling them to quaran-
The Mariinsky’s tine until they could be tested by Russian
experience showed that health authorities, he added.
‘testing once a week is News of the outbreak has caused con-
not enough.’ cerns among other European ballet compa-
nies, which had been watching the Mariin-
sky’s return to the stage closely. “We were
so full of hope, and this is a scary situation,” NATASHA RAZINA/STATE ACADEMIC MARIINSKY THEATRE

Christiane Theobald, acting artistic direc-

A prepandemic tor for the Staatsballett Berlin, one of Ger-
performance of many’s major companies, said in a tele-
“La Sylphide” by phone interview.
the Mariinsky Ballet. The news, Ms. Theobald said, would not
change her company’s plan to hold a gala on
Aug. 27, which will feature a maximum of
six dancers onstage at a time, all staying at
least three meters, or about 10 feet, apart.
The Mariinsky’s experience showed that
“testing once a week is not enough,” she
said, adding that the Staatsballett could not
afford to test its dancers every day.
The Mariinsky is not the only Russian
company affected by coronavirus. The Bol-
shoi Ballet, in Moscow, had a positive test in
its corps de ballet this month, Makhar
Vaziev, its ballet director, said in a telephone
interview. When that dancer became ill, the
company sent home 54 people who had
been in classes with her, Mr. Vaziev said.
They all later tested negative for the virus.
“Thank God everything is fine,” he added.
The Bolshoi is now testing its dancers
weekly, urging them to limit contact with
one another and ordering them to wear
masks when outside the studio. The com-
pany intends to return to its theater on Sept.
10 with four new commissions, followed by
“Romeo and Juliet” on Sep. 15. Those pro-
grams will involve contact.
Mr. Vaziev said that the company would
cancel shows if there was an outbreak. But,
he added, he understood that dancers need
to work. “The longer dancers don’t have a
chance to be onstage, the more they lose,”
he said.
European dance companies, many fi-
nanced by their governments, are far ahead
of American ones in returning to the stage.
Several major companies in France, Ger-
many and Austria restarted classes in May
as lockdowns were eased, with some now
gearing up for shows before socially dis-
tanced audiences to mark the beginning of
the fall season. Those productions are
scheduled to occur even as coronavirus
cases are swerving upward across Europe.
In Russia, where President Vladimir V.
Putin in July declared the battle against the
coronavirus won, worries about the pan-
demic have receded in recent weeks, with
bars and the subway in Moscow crowded.
On Aug. 11, it became the first country in the
world to approve a coronavirus vaccine de-
spite global health bodies saying it had yet
to complete clinical trials.
Mr. Parish said that Mariinsky dancers
had returned to class at the end of May.
Class sizes were initially limited to three
dancers, with a teacher and a pianist. “It felt
brilliant being back, and being able to move
again,” he said.
He also felt safe, he said, given the pre-
cautions being taken. Dancers were at first
tested every two weeks, then weekly. Re-
hearsal rooms were disinfected between
classes. Dancers also had to undergo tem-
perature checks to get into the building, and
wear masks until they entered rehearsal
rooms. Outside the Mariinsky, the dancers
had no restrictions; now, once they test neg-
ative, they are allowed out only for essen-
tials.
When the company decided to hold galas,
it split 16 soloists into pairs so they could
dance together. Those performances, at the
start of August, went well, Mr. Parish said,
and were met with applause. That seemed
to give the company the desire to “put on
the accelerator,” he said. The corps de ballet
soon joined rehearsals, and the class size
jumped to 30 dancers. “Now this has hap-
pened,” Mr. Parish said, “and it took, what,
two and a half weeks to kick off?”
The Mariinsky had received “a lot of flak
on social media” for returning too soon, he
said. But he did not think that was fair. The
ballet had taken every measure it could, he
said. “And those same people are saying we
should wait two years to get back onstage,”
he added. “That’s ridiculous. A dancer’s ca-
reer is 20 years.”
Mr. Parish dismissed criticism of Valery
Gergiev, the head of the Mariinsky and a vo-
cal supporter of Mr. Putin. “I respect his de-
sire to get back onstage despite the situa-
tion,” he said. “It really shows how much he
cares about this art form.”
But Mr. Gergiev has also been questioned
by some for taking the Mariinsky’s orches-
tra on tour, despite the ballet company’s
outbreak. Kay Baburina, who runs the pub-
lishing department of the Samara Opera
and Ballet Theater, said in an email that he
and some of his colleagues were “scared of
having to contact with the Mariinsky art-
ists” when they played the theater in Sa-
mara, Russia, on Monday.
“Going on tour knowing that there is an
outbreak in your theater is just too irre-
sponsible,” he said.
In a telephone interview, Olga Smirnova,
a principal dancer with the Bolshoi Ballet,
said she felt sad about the situation at the
Mariinsky, but it had not put her off wanting
to return to the stage. “What can we do?”
she said. “I think art is more powerful than
fear.”
The question of how to return to the stage
safely is one that many companies across
Europe are grappling with. Ms. Theobold
said she was talking with Berlin health au-
thorities about how to dance safely, but was
considering asking her dancers to quaran-
tine in groups for up to a month at a time so
they could dance without distancing.
“It’s finding the balance,” Mr. Parish said.
“I guess we’re the guinea pigs for that.”
 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N C3

These ‘Romantics’
audiences choose which of several movie
theaters to support with a home ticket pur-
chase, “Romantics Anonymous” viewers in
the United States can select one of six

Can’t Stay Apart

The musical By ERIC GRODE
comedy will be Sandra Marvin had just dropped her plants
off with a friend in March, in anticipation of
livestreamed, with a three-month U.S. tour performing in the
a quarantined cast musical comedy “Romantics Anonymous.”
She checked her phone and got a message
and tickets aiding that there might be what she called “a small
more than 30 hiccup” in the company’s travel plans owing
to growing concerns over the coronavirus.
venues. Within days, the tour was called off.
Almost six months later, “Romantics
Anonymous” is on the road again. Sort of.
But instead of the production traveling to
its original tour destinations of Los Ange-
les, Washington and Charleston, S.C., audi-
ences in those cities and others will take
turns coming to the Bristol Old Vic in Eng-
land — virtually — over five consecutive
nights.
The livestreamed performances, which
begin on Sept. 22, will feature the creator/
director Emma Rice’s original 2017 staging
in its entirety, complete with sets, choreog-
Carly Bawden and Marc raphy, a seven-member cast and even on-
Antolin will reunite to stage kissing. The only modifications to the
perform in “Romantics script, Rice said this week, will stem from
Anonymous.” the absence of an audience in the theater.
“We are all nervous,” said Rice, who first
presented “Romantics” (which features
music by Michael Kooman and lyrics by
Christopher Dimond) at Shakespeare’s
Globe Theater in London during her time as
its artistic director. (“Sweet-natured and
giddy” was The New York Times verdict on
the show, a Gallic romance centered on two
timid chocolatiers and the titular support
group.)
“The thought that we might all get to be
together again and make music together
again and forget what’s happening for a few
hours is intoxicating,” Rice added. “Let’s
see what we can make happen safely and
joyously.”
In the latest of several attempts to rep-
licate, or reimagine, the live experience
when many countries have severely cur-
tailed and even forbidden indoor theatrical
productions, the “Romantics” cast, musi-
cians and crew will spend the first 10 days
sheltering in place at their respective
homes.
They will then be transported in private
vehicles to an apartment block around the
corner from the Old Vic for the last two
weeks. Everyone involved will be tested for
Covid-19 at the beginning and end of their
first quarantine, then weekly while togeth-
er in Bristol.
“On the whole, we haven’t been looking at
theater all that much for ideas because
there aren’t that many examples,” said
Poppy Keeling, executive producer of Wise
Children, the Bristol-based company that
STEVE TANNER
Rice created after leaving the Globe.
“We’ve really been looking at what TV and
film have done in this country, with very
clear, government-ratified guidance for get-
ting that industry back up and running.”
Simon Baker, the production’s technical
director and Rice’s partner, performed in a
similar capacity on the popular June
livestreams of the Duncan Macmillan play
“Lungs” at the Old Vic’s London theater. Its
popularity may have had a lot to do with the
starry two-person cast — “The Crown” co-
stars Claire Foy and Matt Smith — but that
modified production demonstrated the pos-
sibility of guerrilla filming.
“We realized that the technology had re-
ally come down in price and we could do it
ourselves,” said Baker, who plans to use a
camera crew of just four.
As with the virtual cinema model, where
presenting organizations as their venue.
Joining the original three U.S. destina-
tions — the Wallis Annenberg Center for the
Performing Arts, the Shakespeare Theater
Company and Spoleto Festival USA — are
St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, Berkeley
Rep in California and Chicago Shakespeare
Theater.
In each case, the selected theater will
split the proceeds with Wise Children. Tick-
ets will cost 15 pounds (about $20) in ad-
vance and go up to 20 pounds (about $27)
the week of the performances. Information
can be found at wisechildrendigital.com or
at the individual presenters’ websites.
With no limit on tickets, it is hard to deter-
mine the financial prospects of the five-per-
formance run. “We’re taking a huge risk,”
Rice said. “We know how many tickets we
have to sell to break even, but we have
found underwriters in case it’s a disaster.”
In keeping with the idea of a touring pro-
duction, the first four performances are ex-
clusive to specific regions of Britain, begin-
ning with a Sept. 22 show sponsored by sev-
en theaters in Scotland and northern Eng-
land. The sole U.S. performance will be the
final one, at 4 p.m. Eastern time on Sept. 26.
And the creative team hasn’t ruled out the
possibility of more performances.
The series of livestreams will give every-
one the chance to learn from the previous
performance’s mistakes, according to Rice.
“The experience will be like a typical the-
ater show,” she said. “We’ll all meet at the
end of the night and talk about what can be
done better.”
While Keeling lamented that those
nightly talks won’t happen at a local pub,
Marvin — who plays three characters in
“Romantics” — is looking forward not just
to being on the stage after almost half a
year, but also to sharing that stage with so
many colleagues.
“I live by myself,” she said. “This will be
the most people I’ve been around since
March.”

Cuba Gooding Jr. Is Accused of Rape in Civil Suit as He Awaits Groping Trial
By JULIA JACOBS
Cuba Gooding Jr. has been accused of rap-
ing a woman twice after coaxing her into his
Manhattan hotel room in 2013, in a lawsuit
filed against the actor on Tuesday.
The new allegations go significantly fur-
ther than a series of claims that Mr. Gooding
subjected women to unwanted sexual
touching, three of which are the basis of an
coming criminal trial. Of the more than 20
accusations discussed in court papers, none
had alleged rape until now.
According to the lawsuit, filed by an anon-
ymous woman referred to as Jane Doe, she
first met Mr. Gooding at a restaurant in
Greenwich Village. He invited her and a
friend to have drinks at the Mercer Hotel in
SoHo. There, Mr. Gooding ushered the
woman to his fifth-floor room, where he said
New allegations go
further than previous
claims by numerous
women.
he quickly needed to change his clothes, the
lawsuit said.
When the woman tried to leave the room,
the lawsuit said, Mr. Gooding blocked her
way out and eventually pushed her onto the
bed and raped her. Afterward, as she tried
to get away, Mr. Gooding raped her again,
according to the complaint. She told Mr.
Gooding “no” many times, the lawsuit said,
but he did not stop. One of the lawyers rep-
resenting the woman is Gloria Allred, the
longtime women’s rights lawyer.
Mr. Gooding’s lawyer, Mark J. Heller, said
that the allegations in the lawsuit are “com-
pletely false and defamatory,” pointing out
that they had never resulted in criminal
charges during the past seven years.
Ms. Allred declined to comment on
whether the district attorney’s office or the
New York Police Department had been in-
formed of her client’s allegations or had
been investigating them. A Police Depart-
ment spokeswoman also declined to com-
ment.
The lawsuit claims that Mr. Gooding vio-
lated a city law aimed at protecting victims
who are targeted because of their gender
and caused the plaintiff both physical and
emotional injury.
Groping allegations against Mr. Gooding
first became public last year when a woman
told the police that Mr. Gooding squeezed
her breast at Magic Hour Rooftop Bar at the
Moxy NYC Times Square hotel on Seventh
Avenue in Manhattan. After that, two other
women came forward with claims that re-
sulted in criminal charges, and Mr. Gooding
now faces three sets of groping charges.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office
had publicly documented the claims of an
additional 19 women with accusations of un-
wanted sexual touching against Mr. Good-
ing, requesting that the jury be allowed to
hear testimony from these women to dem-
onstrate a pattern of behavior. A judge or-
dered that two of the women would be al-
lowed to provide such testimony.
In a court hearing last week, an assistant
district attorney, Jenna Long, said that the
total number of women who had come for-
ward with accusations against Mr. Gooding
had risen to 30.
His trial was supposed to begin in April,
but the coronavirus pandemic stalled the
proceedings.
Last year, Mr. Gooding was sued by one of
the women that he is charged with groping,
Natasha Ashworth. She has accused Mr.
Gooding of pinching her buttocks while she
was serving him at a Manhattan nightclub.

Two Not Touch Crossword Edited by Will Shortz

ANSWERS TO
PREVIOUS PUZZLES PUZZLE BY GRANT THACKRAY
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For solving tips and more KenKen puzzles: www.nytimes.com/kenken. For feedback: nytimes@kenken.com E N T R Y A N O S T V M A nytimes.com/crosswords ($39.95 a year).
KenKen® is a registered trademark of Nextoy, LLC. Copyright © 2020 www.KENKEN.com. All rights reserved. G A M E H O M E H E A D Read about and comment on each puzzle: nytimes.com/wordplay.
C4 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

Push for Racial Equity

Takes Root in Theaters
CONTINUED FROM PAGE C1
the coronavirus pandemic.
But there are indications — on Broadway,
Off Broadway, and at regional theaters —
that the charges of systemic racism aired
this summer, along with the advocacy of
several organizations pressing for change
— are having an initial impact.
Look, for example, at Baltimore Center
Stage, whose artistic director, Stephanie
Ybarra, has supported calls for transforma-
tion of the industry.
Ybarra, responding to demands for
change published by an online collective
called “We See You, White American The-
ater,” announced that her theater would
make a series of changes, most of which
were included among those demands:
scheduling rehearsals only five days a week
(rather than the standard six); eliminating
“10 out of 12” rehearsal days, when artists
are expected to work 10 hours; paying play-
wrights during rehearsal periods; and
equalizing compensation for work on the
theater’s small and large stages.
“I am hopeful that change is afoot, but I
am also waiting, along with my BIPOC col-
leagues,” Ybarra said, using an acronym for
Black, Indigenous and people of color. “Part
of me is in a position of power and account-
able like everyone else, but I’m also walking
through our industry for over two decades
as a Latinx woman with all of the institu-
tional trauma that comes with it, and on that
front I’m waiting.”
Not all of the change taking place is vol-
untary. In Philadelphia, the nonprofit
And the Broadway League, the trade as-
sociation of theater owners and producers,
this month doubled the number of Black
members of its board of governors, to four
from two, by adding Brian Moreland, a
producer, and Kendra Whitlock Ingram, the
president and chief executive of the Marcus
Performing Arts Center in Milwaukee.
“For the Broadway League to loudly and
proudly proclaim that Black lives matter —
a lot of people are saying it’s just words, but
it’s so different from where we were four
years ago,” Ingram said. GABRIELLA DEMCZUK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Even some Black theater companies are
making change. Penumbra Theater, in St.
Paul, Minn., announced this month that it is
transforming into the Penumbra Center for
Racial Healing.
“This is our organic evolution, but also re-
ally timely,” said Sarah Bellamy, the artistic
‘It takes a lot of work
and humility, and it
requires that white
people step aside.’
director. “For over four decades we’ve been
focusing on things like narrative change
and inclusion — countering painful and
stereotypical depictions of our people, and
celebrating our joy — but we have to care
about what happens to Black people when
they’re offstage too.”
The calls for equity are rippling across
the industry in other ways.
PIOTR REDLINSKI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

PlayPenn, which supports the development
of new work, accepted the resignation of its
artistic director and fired its associate artis-
tic director after receiving allegations that
it “was not meeting community members’
expectations for racial and cultural compe-
tence.” In Georgia, the Serenbe Playhouse
laid off its entire staff after allegations of
racism.
And at the Alliance of Resident Theatres/
New York, executive director Ginny
Louloudes was placed on leave after a
group of current and former employees
wrote a letter saying “her presence is toxic,
abusive and an obstacle to progress.” The
organization, which provides a variety of
forms of assistance, including performance,
rehearsal and office space, for many small
theaters, has appointed Risa Shoup as in-
terim executive director.
“As at so many organizations and institu-
tions, people are seeing that they can take
control of what’s happening in their work-
place,” said Susan Bernfield, a member of
the alliance’s executive committee.
In the commercial realm, change is less
obvious, but there are some noteworthy
data points.
The musical “Company” has pledged to
hire 10 paid apprentices, all of them Black,
when Broadway resumes. The musical
“Wicked” is sponsoring the Broadway Ad-
vocacy Coalition’s “artivism” fellowship,
which plans an inaugural class of Black fe-
male artist-activists focused on systemic
racism and criminal justice reform.
The Stage Directors and Choreographers
Foundation said it would establish a new
residency program pairing midcareer di-
rectors and choreographers of color with
theaters seeking to make change.
And at a time when theaters are laying off
employees, rather than hiring, a number of
institutions and organizations are nonethe-
less announcing new Black leaders. In New
York, the Public Theater is naming two art-
ists of color — Saheem Ali and Shanta
Thake — as associate artistic directors.
The Tank, a New York nonprofit that
seeks to nurture emerging artists, named
Johnny Lloyd, who is Black, as a new direc-
tor of artistic development, as the theater
examines “how white supremacy is limiting
our mission,” according to Meghan Finn,
the artistic director.
In Washington, Ford’s Theater this week
named Sheldon Epps, who is Black, as a
senior artistic adviser; in the announce-
ment, the theater cited “the national reck- GLEN STUBBE/STAR TRIBUNE, VIA GETTY IMAGES
oning for racial justice” as context. And
Theater Philadelphia, an umbrella organi-
zation, named LaNeshe Miller-White as its From top: Stephanie Ybarra, The resignations by white leaders are the as a theater to serve our West Philadelphia
executive director; she was the co-founder artistic director of Baltimore most dramatic developments. “At this mo- audience, and as a white leader I had creat-
of Theater in the X, a company focused on Center Stage; William Carden, ment of ignition we’re in,” said Tracy, the ar- ed that environment,” he said. “We were
African-American work. seen in 2007, who is stepping tistic facilitator in Berkeley, “it just felt like a trying to make movement, and we thought
down as artistic director of time to throw the gauntlet down.” it was genuine, but at best it was glacier
One of Miller-White’s proposals is to re-
Ensemble Studio Theater in Kuhn, now the co-artistic director at Cu- speed, so I felt I needed to make a change
quire theaters to meet specific hiring tar-
New York; and Sarah Bellamy, rio, said he had been struck, during a pan- and make it immediately.”
gets in order to compete for Philadelphia’s
artistic director of Penumbra demic Zoom gathering of local theater lead- Bradford, his new co-artistic director,
annual Barrymore Awards. “I’ve always
Theater in St. Paul, Minn. ers, by “staring at all the white squares.” said he was pleased to have the opportunity.
had a focus on access and equity for people
of color,” she said, “and now I get a prime “It’s been on our minds for a very long “There are going to be changes,” he prom-
position to be able to enact that.” time that we weren’t fulfilling our mission ised.

JENNIFER SZALAI BOOKS OF THE TIMES

Deep European Thinkers in a Decade of Crisis

An author traces the lives of
four figures who transformed
philosophy in the 1920s.
IN THE AUTUMN OF 1922, as Germany was
convulsed by food shortages and soaring in-
flation, the philosopher Martin Heidegger
wrote a letter to his wife about the intricate
choreography required to secure the most
basic needs. “Mother asks if they should
send potatoes even before 1 Oct; I answered
yes and sent the money at the same time,”
he explained. “What should I do when the
potatoes arrive?”
At a time of crisis, the threats to existence
can be so immediate that most people be-
come understandably preoccupied with ur-
gent matters of survival. But even as Hei-
degger was worried about the potatoes, he
believed that a crisis could also offer a radi-
cal break from the dispensation that
produced it, a moment of genuine openness,
a chance to rethink everything anew.
As Wolfram Eilenberger writes in “Time
of the Magicians,” his vibrant group portrait
of four philosophers during a turbulent dec-
ade, Heidegger welcomed danger and suf-
fering as a social condition that forced peo-
ple to confront their mortality — at least,
that was the idea. His wife wanted to ensure
that the demands of reality didn’t intrude
too much on his work, so she planned and
supervised the construction of a cabin in the
Black Forest, financing it with her inher-
itance. There, Martin could live like a sturdy
peasant, taking in the mountain air and
spending days on his woodwork before con-
templating an existence that was grounded
in groundlessness.
Heidegger finally had what Eilenberger
calls “a hut of one’s own.” The irreverence is
funny, but it amounts to more than just a
joke; everything in “Time of the Magicians”
— ideas, narrative and phrasing (translated
from the German into seamless English by
Shaun Whiteside) — has been fused into a
readable, resonant whole.
Eilenberger’s book begins in 1919 and
ends in 1929, elegantly tracing the life and
work of four figures who transformed phi-
losophy in ways that were disparate and not
ANNETTE HAUSCHILD
Wolfram Eilenberger
Time of the Magicians:
Wittgenstein, Benjamin,
Cassirer, Heidegger, and the
Decade That Reinvented
Philosophy
By Wolfram Eilenberger
Translated by Shaun Whiteside
Illustrated. 418 pages. Penguin
Press. $30.
fore avoided active combat, spent the dec-
ade immersing himself in thoughts of the
abyss while fine-tuning his philosophy ca-
reer, publishing “Being and Time” in 1927.
Walter Benjamin dithered away his early
opportunities for an academic sinecure and
turned toward journalism and criticism;
ever the envious genius, he wanted to start
a magazine whose main mission was the
“demolition of Heidegger.” (Like so many of
Benjamin’s projects, nothing ever came of
it.)
Ludwig Wittgenstein, heir to one of the
wealthiest families in Europe, had written
what would become his “Tractatus Logico-
Philosophicus” as a prisoner of war in Italy,
deploying rigorous logic to arrive at the lim-
its of language, and then summarily aban-
doned his fortune to serve as a primary
schoolteacher for several years in the Aus-
trian countryside.
Ernst Cassirer, the most settled and least
eccentric of the bunch, painstakingly built a
reputation for lucid explication and formi-
dable erudition, not for charisma or audaci-
ty. “Cassirer’s only truly radical trait was
his will to equilibrium,” Eilenberger writes.
To his younger detractors, the white-haired
Cassirer was the establishment personified.
A photograph in the book has him wearing a
ruff.
But Cassirer was responding to the same
crisis that animated the other three of
Eilenberger’s magicians — a sense that the
old ways of philosophizing had failed to
keep up with the reality of lived experience.
The dominant Kantian approach was born
during the era of Newtonian physics, which
was displaced in 1905 by Einstein’s theory
of relativity. Freud had unsettled any as-
sumptions about the transparency of hu-
man consciousness. An Enlightenment
faith in progress was laid to waste by the
mechanized carnage of World War I.
Eilenberger quotes Max Scheler, another
German philosopher, who put it this way:
“Ours is the first period when man has be-
come completely and totally problematical
to himself, when he no longer knows what
he is, but at the same time knows that he
knows nothing.”
Language was implicated in this plight,
and the responses among the figures in this
book were varied and often strange. Hei-
meaningful propositions and those that
only seemed meaningful, famously ending
similated Jew, would leave Germany for-
ever, eventually settling in the United
the “Tractatus” with an aphorism: “Where- States. Cassirer’s unwavering decency
of one cannot speak, thereof one must re-
main silent.” A chaotic, euphoric Benjamin
made him a stalwart defender of Weimar’s
democratic ideals, but it had also kept him
(wonderfully described in this book as a imperturbable and optimistic until it was al-
“one-man Weimar”) thought that “over-
most too late.
naming” led to “melancholy,” and that lan-
“When we first heard of the political
guage was better suited for “the revelation
myths we found them so absurd and incon-
of being.” gruous, so fantastic and ludicrous that we
Cassirer’s understanding of language
could hardly be prevailed upon to take them
was capacious, incorporating not only Ger- seriously,” Cassirer would later write before
man and English but also myth, religion,
his death in 1945. “By now it has become
technology and art. Different languages of- clear to all of us that this was a great mis-
fered different ways of seeing the world. His
take.”
pluralistic outlook seemed to provide him
with an escape valve. As he wrote to his
wife, “I can express everything I need with-
out difficulty.”
As the most stolid figure in Eilenberger’s
book, Cassirer is also, somewhat perverse-
ly, the most enigmatic. Compared with the
others’ sexual adventuring (Benjamin, Hei-
degger) or sexual anguish (Wittgenstein),
Cassirer’s love life was uneventful and un-
troubled, leading Eilenberger to suggest
that the Cassirers’ resolutely bourgeois
CLUE OF THE DAY
marriage “acquired a distinctively political
edge as a rejection of confused adventures, EUROPEAN
ARTBORDERS
revolutions or civil wars.” As it happened,
Cassirer was the only one of the four to
speak up publicly for the embattled Weimar BARELY CHANGED
Republic. He was also the only democrat. SINCE A 1297
In 1929, a debate between Cassirer and AGREEMENT, THE
Heidegger amid the snowy peaks of Davos BORDER BETWEEN
clarified the stakes: Reject your distracting
THESE 2 COUNTRIES IS
anxiety, per Cassirer, and embrace the liber-
ation offered by culture; or reject your dis- CALLED LA RAYA ON
tracting culture, per Heidegger, and em- ONE SIDE & A RAIA ON
brace the liberation offered by your anxiety. THE OTHER
But the reality for attendees was more mun-
dane. One journalist described a self-con-
gratulatory atmosphere where the audi- FOR THE CORRECT
ence “enjoyed the spectacle of a very nice RESPONSE, WATCH
person and a very violent person, who was JEOPARDY! TONIGHT
still trying terribly hard to be nice, deliver- OR LOOK IN THIS
ing monologues.” SPACE TOMORROW
Eilenberger is a terrific storyteller, un- IN THE TIMES.
earthing vivid details that show how the
philosophies of these men weren’t the arid
products of abstract speculation but vitally Yesterday’s Response:
connected to their temperaments and expe- WHO IS HARPER LEE?
riences. Yet he also points out that as much

infrequently at odds: degger insisted on a vocabulary of Dasein
Heidegger, who served as an army me- (“being there”) and Sein-zum-Tode (“be-
teorologist during World War I and there- ing-toward-death”), neologisms that were-
n’t tainted by the old ways of thinking.
Follow Jennifer Szalai on Twitter: @jenszalai. Wittgenstein drew a distinction between
Watch JEOPARDY!
as they were wrestling with life-or-death
philosophical questions, the bigger crisis
was still to come.
By May 1933, Heidegger would be a mem- 7 p.m. on Channel 7
ber of the Nazi Party, and Cassirer, an as-
 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N C5

His Harvard Ph.D.? A License to Be Dumb

Latif Nasser discusses going
on-camera for ‘Connected’ and
how crucial staying curious is.
By REMY TUMIN
Latif Nasser’s new Netflix series, “Con-
nected,” was only two days old when he and
his wife headed to the hospital to have a
baby. Add a pandemic to the mix and you
have what Nasser calls “the weirdest time
on top of the weirdest time.”
But Nasser is used to weird. In fact, he
thrives in it.
“That’s sort of my compass,” he said last
week from Los Angeles. “Surprise and de-
light and wonder. Those are the things that I
gravitate toward.”
It’s the approach he has taken at “Radio-
lab,” the popular WNYC audio program for
which he is the director of research, and
now with “Connected,” a six-part documen-
tary series that connects the dots on some
of the biggest questions facing science and
humanity today. That includes looking at
the power of surveillance through the lens
of migratory birds in Newark, Del.; the
complex history of human excrement in
Minde, Portugal; and a literal fishing expe-
dition through the Sahara.
Nasser’s storytelling is known for helping
“Radiolab” listeners make sense of the cha-
os of the world — and maybe even find a lit-
tle comfort and joy in it. With a Ph.D. in the
history of science from Harvard, Nasser
sits at an uncommon vantage point to play
guide to the world’s deepest curiosities.
“Connected” debuted on Aug. 2, and since
then Nasser has been splitting his time be-
tween work and child care, which often in-
volves checking Twitter in the middle of the ‘I would much rather be
night while pacing back and forth with his the dumbest guy in the
newborn.
Nasser took a moment from his garage room than the smartest
home studio to hop on a Google Hangout, because I think that’s
where he talked about his new project, what more intellectually
made him fall in love with science and the honest.’
gravitational pull of true-crime shows. LATIF NASSER,
These are edited excerpts from the conver- HOST OF THE NEW NETFLIX
sation. SCIENCE SERIES ‘CONNECTED’

You had two babies — an actual child and

“Connected” — within a week. How are you
holding up?
The baby thinks day is night and night is
day, and then we have a 3-year-old who is
certain that day is day and night is night, so
between the two of them, this house is abuzz
24 hours a day.
Is it strange for you, being a media guy, to
be on the other side of this all of a sudden?
On the one hand, the swap from radio to TV
is totally normal; I’m just doing the same
job I’ve been doing, but there’s a camera in-
volved. But I didn’t realize I was so dumb! I
would watch a documentary and see a host
walking through the desert alone. But now
I’m the host in the desert and wait a second
— there’s an enormous camera crew, cooks,
security, fixers, producers and sound peo-
ple.
JOYCE KIM FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

It was such a trip because I should know
this stuff! I feel like I just learned to use my
eyes. It’s so weird.
Were you self-conscious going from behind
the mic to in front of the camera?
I hate listening to myself. I hate watching
myself. All I see is my crooked teeth and bad
posture and ask, “Why are you nodding so
much?” But I realized it’s so much more fun
than mortifying for me to talk to people. I’m
really excited and curious and want to learn
about the amazing things they’re finding.
That outpaces the mortification factor. As
much as I hate seeing my own face in the
interview, I love watching the other person’s
face light up. Being able to transfer that to
the viewer is something you can’t do in ra-
NETFLIX
dio. That’s really priceless.
Did you have an “ah-ha” moment when you
first fell in love with science?
When I was in high school, it felt like some-
one handed you a big fact textbook and said,
“Here are a bunch of answers to questions
that you didn’t even ask.” That’s how we
teach science. I realized in college, and then
more so in grad school, that oh no, no no,
they’re not the answers. There are shock-
ingly simple questions that we don’t know
the answer to, and we’re still figuring it out.
I can vividly remember when I tried to be
an archaeologist. I was like, “Oh my God, ar-
chaeology, this is going to be like ‘Indiana
Jones’-type stuff.” They brought me in, sat
me down and gave me a bucket of what felt
to me like rocks — and a toothbrush to clean
NETFLIX them. I hated it so much. But once you put it
Above, the geologist Moussa Abderamane in “Dust,” an episode of “Connected” on in a big picture, that we’re trying to answer
Netflix. Above that, Assaf Anyamba, left, and Latif Nasser in the documentary. this dynamic question about human history
or fundamentals of our universe, and there
are these dramatic stories of individuals
trying to figure it out . . . once you click that
in, tooth-brushing those rocks seems like
the most dynamic, interesting thing in the
whole world. But you need to have that
other information.
We can’t be experts at everything, but you
do have a Ph.D. in the history of science.
Has that helped shape your reporting?
Paradoxically, I think my fancy Harvard
Ph.D. has given me the license to be dumb. I
feel like I can walk into a room and I can just
ask the actual question that is actually on
my mind without fear of people thinking I’m
an idiot. Because often I am! That’s why I
love this job.
Playing dumb is often one of the best jour-
nalistic tools we have.
Oh, I feel that so hard! That’s my default
crouch: I’m an idiot. Explain it to me. That’s
how I jump into every interview.
People seem to have this attraction to curi-
osity over authority. What do you make of
that?
I find this time we live in as a very cynical
time and maybe for a good reason — people
are out there lying to us all the time and
spinning things and selling us stuff. People
are quite hesitant to believe you or go on a
story with you. I never pretend to be an au-
thority. I would much rather be the dumbest
guy in the room than the smartest because I
think that’s more intellectually honest.
There are honest to god authorities out
there that we should be listening to, but on
the other hand, let’s just be open minded
and listen and think critically and have our
own questions. To me, that’s a really impor-
tant shift, and I think it’s a valuable one. In-
tellectual humility is a core value for me.
So in a way, you’re setting up a new way of
learning about the world.
I hope so. I’m not alone, but I do think the
trick is to lead with the question, not the an-
swer.
People want to be awakened to a question
they didn’t even realize they had. And then
all of a sudden they’re totally possessed by
that question and need to know the answer.
There something deeply satisfying about
that, going all the way back to the riddle of
the Sphinx.
It’s about creating a little black hole in-
side peoples’ minds so it has this gravita-
tional pull — it wants the information, it’s
seeking out the information. This is a weird
analogy, but it’s the same thing with cop
shows. They always start with the murder.
It’s a problem: I need to know how they
solved this. The moral order of the universe
is off: I need some resolution. The hard part
is building the question in such a way that
you need to know the answer.
Do you think about your children when you
approach the world through that lens?
I haven’t been a dad for a long time, but
when you boil it down, what’s the thing I
want this kid to know? In a way, I hope this
show is like a letter to pass on to them. We
say we’re all connected, but it’s in a scary
way now. Hopefully, this is in a beautiful and
poetic way that will make kids’ jaws drop,
and adults’ too, and serve as a way to re-
mind us this is the way we’re fingerprinting
on each others’ lives.

Brooklyn Museum and El Museo del Barrio Plan to Reopen Next Month
Face masks will be required,
and the number of visitors will
be limited with timed tickets.
By SARAH BAHR
After months of having empty halls, the
Brooklyn Museum and El Museo del Barrio
will reopen on Sept. 12, but with limited
hours and restrictions on capacity.
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced last
week that museums could reopen as soon
as Monday, at 25 percent capacity and with
timed ticketing. Face coverings will be nec-
essary, and museums will be required to
control the flow of traffic through their halls.
The Brooklyn Museum’s opening week-
end festivities, some of which will be out-
doors, will include musical performances,
chalk drawing and food offerings from local
vendors on the museum’s plaza. Inside, the
museum will premiere its “Studio 54: Night
Magic” exhibition about the social politics
of the storied Manhattan nightclub, which
was originally scheduled to open on March
13, the day the museum closed because of
the pandemic.
The museum will also begin a sunset out-
door screening series on Sept. 9, with video
works from artists in its collection. The
nightly screenings will start at 6 p.m.,
Wednesdays through Sundays, and contin-
ue through Nov. 11. The museum will also
offer socially distant outdoor yoga and med-
itation events at 10 a.m. on Sept. 19 and Sept.
26.
The museum’s first- and fifth-floor gal-
leries will be open Wednesdays through
Sundays, 11 a.m.-6 p.m., with extended
hours until 8 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.
Members can visit a few days in advance,
from Sept. 9 through Sept. 11. Visitors may
pay what they wish for admission, and they
will be encouraged to buy timed-entry tick-
ets online in advance.
The museum’s restaurant, the Norm, will
remain closed, and all in-person tours and
indoor public programs are canceled
through the end of the year.
“Studio 54” will be open through Nov. 8,
and the “JR: Chronicles” exhibition has
been extended through Oct. 18. The first
solo exhibition for John Edmonds, a Brook-
lyn-based photographer, and a renovated
display of items in the Decorative Arts col-
lection, “Design: 1880 to Now,” will both
open Oct. 23. Exhibitions about KAWS, an
American graffiti artist and former Disney
animator, and Lorraine O’Grady, a feminist
artist, will open in February and March.
Exhibitions delayed by
the pandemic will soon
have their moment.
El Museo del Barrio, the Latino, Caribbe-
an and Latin American art museum on the
north end of the Museum Mile, will also re-
open Sept. 12, with a monograph exhibition
about Taller Boricua, the East Harlem-
based Nuyorican collective workshop and
alternative space. The exhibition, which
had been postponed from March, will be on
view through Jan. 17.
The museum will be open Saturdays and
Sundays from noon to 5 p.m., and to gain ad-
mission visitors may pay what they wish.
The Whitney said last week that it
planned to open on Sept. 3; the Museum of
Modern Art and the Museum of the City of
New York were planning to open on Aug.
27; the American Museum of Natural His-
tory was planning to open on Sept. 9; and
the Metropolitan Museum of Art was plan-
ning to open on Aug. 29.
C6 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

In Memory
Of a Suffragist
And a Martyr
Right, “A Wonderful
Argument,” Jeanine
Michna-Bales’s imagining of
a moment Inez Milholland
described in a letter, part of
the artist’s “Standing
Together” project. Below,
Ms. Michna-Bales with the
National Woman’s Party flag
at home in Dallas.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE C1
demic, “Standing Together” is scheduled to
be published in book form and exhibited at
PDNB Gallery in Dallas next March for
Women’s History Month.
The artist already has posted parts of it
online.
Milholland was a firebrand long before
she stepped onto the national stage. Born in
Brooklyn to wealthy, progressive parents
and educated at Vassar College and the
New York University School of Law, she
was radical even by today’s standards, hav-
ing fought passionately for women’s rights,
racial equality, labor reform, prison reform
and against World War I.
A “new woman” of the early 20th century,
she flouted social conventions, spoke freely
of sex and proposed marriage to a man, Eu-
gen Boissevain, a like-minded Dutch citi-
zen. He accepted, they married in 1913, and
the United States promptly stripped her of
her citizenship, a consequence of the Expa-
triation Act of 1907, which required a wom-
an to take the nationality of her husband.
“She wouldn’t be able to vote, even when
all women won the right, but she kept on
fighting for it anyway,” Ms. Michna-Bales
said. “That amazes me.”
That same year, Milholland led about
8,000 women up Pennsylvania Avenue in
Washington during the first major suffrage
parade. Astride a white horse and garbed in
an elegant cape and crown, she was com-
pared by the press to Joan of Arc and called
the “most beautiful suffragist.” The moni-
ker stuck. “I do think it helped draw crowds
JEANINE MICHNA-BALES

NITASHIA JOHNSON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

NITASHIA JOHNSON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Above, a map tracing
Milholland’s journey west.
Right, a depiction of
Milholland in “Women Hold
Up Half of the Sky.” Bottom
left, Inez Milholland, left (as
Mrs. Boissevain, her
married name), with her
sister and traveling
companion, Vida Milholland.
Bottom right, “Union Pacific
Passenger Depot” is blurred
to see her,” Ms. Michna-Bales said. “But she
was also a very charismatic person and be-
lieved so deeply in her cause, that people
just listened when she spoke.”
Well aware of her talents, the National
Woman’s Party sent her West in the fall of
1916. By that time, most women could vote
in 12 states, from Illinois to California, while
those in the East were still fighting for the
right. For the National Woman’s Party, the
only way forward was a constitutional
amendment guaranteeing women nation-
JEANINE MICHNA-BALES

to reflect Milholland’s state
as she self-medicated.
‘I tried to get in her
head to imagine
seeing things through
her eyes.’
JEANINE MICHNA-BALES
ABOUT INEZ MILHOLLAND
wide the right, but President Woodrow Wil-
son and his fellow Democrats showed no
support.
Pinning their hopes on defeating his bid
for re-election that fall, suffragists concen-
trated their efforts out West, enlisting wom-
en like Milholland for the task.
Calling on female voters to stand togeth-
er and elect Wilson’s pro-amendment Re-
publican opponent, Charles Evans Hughes,
Milholland made 50 speaking engagements
in eight states in 28 days, traveling with her
sister, Vida, by train and by car, by day and
by night, as her health deteriorated.
“It was heartbreaking reading her letters
to her husband as the trip progressed,
knowing that she was pushing herself too
hard,” said Ms. Michna-Bales, who spent
the last four years researching, mapping
out and photographing Milholland’s path
West. “She was one determined woman. THE SPOKANE DAILY CHRONICLE JEANINE MICHNA-BALES

And that is what I wanted to convey

through the series.”
Ms. Michna-Bales took more than 90 col-
or photographs, juxtaposing some with im-
ages she created from excerpts from the
suffragist’s speeches and letters, as well as
local newspaper clippings about her visits.
To take us back a century, the artist used
digital processes to age some of the images
so they resemble autochromes, a popular
method of coloring images at the time.
Ms. Michna-Bales, who is based in Dal-
las, came to the subject of suffrage while re-
searching abolitionists for her award-win-
ning photo essay, “Through Darkness to
Light: Photographs Along the Under-
ground Railroad” (2012-15). “The suffrage
movement was really born out of the anti-
slavery movement,” she said. “It hit home
that for a very long time ‘democracy’ only
applied to certain people — white men.”
After reading through Milholland’s let-
ters and telegrams, National Woman’s
Party papers and newspaper accounts, Ms.
Michna-Bales traced the suffragist’s path
and spent weeks traveling along it. “I tried
to get in her head to imagine seeing things
through her eyes,” she said.
Her photographs of landscapes show
some of the same dramatic open skies and
unspoiled mountains and deserts that Mil-
holland had described poetically in dozens
of intimate letters to her husband. For the
historical re-enactments, the artist outfitted
friends and volunteers from the League of
Women Voters in period dress and ar-
ranged for the use of vintage transportation
and buildings.
Ms. Michna-Bales is trying to paint a big-
ger picture of the remarkable journey. “I
wanted to showcase what she was going
through and doing, as well as what she rep-
resented,” she said. For instance, numerous
women stand in for Milholland — old,
young, white, Black.
The series opens with “Ready for Battle”
(2019), an image of a young woman in a
cape, sash and crown holding an American
flag like a sentinel atop a grassy hill. It
closes with “Transitioning” (2019), a shot of
a woman in a white dress wading into the
waves of the Pacific. “I imagined her walk-
ing off into the ocean and that is the last we
see of her as she shifts from the physical
body to whatever comes next,” the artist ex-
plained. “She left such a legacy behind. I
feel like she is still with us, guiding us from
the other side, and I wanted to convey that.”
In between, we see more concrete exam-
ples of Milholland’s daily routine. She rarely
came up for air. “A Wonderful Argument”
(2019), for instance, shows a re-enactment
of a woman and train conductor conversing.
The artist paired it with a typewritten ex-
cerpt from a letter to Milholland’s husband
that reads, “Just been having a wonderful
argument with the conductor and Pullman-
car conductor — got them over to our side.”
Such moments come across as energizing
highs amid draining stretches of endless
train travel.
The underlying tragedy of her escalating
illness is always lurking. “She wrote about
‘doctoring’ herself with drugs she was giv-
en to get through the trip: iron, arsenic and
strychnine,” recalled Ms. Michna-Bales,
who interspersed the project with gauzy, lu-
minous landscapes that reflect the drugged
and feverish state she imagined Milholland
enduring.
It was a punishing endeavor even for a
healthy young woman, and she was strong-
minded and devoted to have persisted as
long as she did. “She made such a sacrifice
so we could vote,” Ms. Michna-Bales said.
“So many women did. And today, as so
many Americans face attacks on their vot-
ing rights, those sacrifices feel especially
relevant.”
 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N C7

EVENING
7:00 7:30 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30 10:00 10:30 11:00 11:30 12:00
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2 WCBS Inside Edition (N) Entertainment Big Brother A houseguest is evicted.
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FXX The Simpsons The Simpsons Family Guy (14) Family Guy (14) Family Guy (14) Family Guy (14) Cake (N) (MA) Cake (MA) (10:34) Cake (MA) (11:08) Cake (MA) (11:41) Archer (12:15)
FYI Top Gear (PG) Top Gear (PG) Top Gear “First Cars.” (PG) Top Gear “Flying Coupe DeVille.” Top Gear “Rut’s Show.” (11:01) Top Gear (PG)
GOLF Golf Central P.G.A. Champions P.G.A. Tour Golf The Northern Trust, first round.
GSN America Says America Says America Says Master Minds Family Feud Family Feud Family Feud Family Feud Family Feud Family Feud Family Feud NETFLIX

HALL Summer in the City (2016, TVF). (6) Pearl in Paradise (2018, TVF). Photographer and writer pursue rare jewel. Golden Girls Golden Girls Golden Girls Golden Girls Golden Girls Zahia Dehar, left, and Mina Farid.
HGTV Christina/Coast Christina/Coast Christina on the Coast (G) Christina on the Coast (N) (G) House Hunters Hunters Int’l
House Hunters Hunters Int’l Christina/Coast
HIST Alone “Pins and Needles.” (14) (6:30) Alone “Over the Edge.” (Season Finale) (N) (14) Mountain Men “The Big Reckoning.” Alone “Over the AN EASY GIRL (2020) Stream on Netflix.
Josh hits the jackpot. (11:05) Edge.” (12:03)
Summer, sex and saltwater: These are
HLN How It Really Happened (PG) How It Really Happened (PG) How It Really Happened How It Really Happened Forensic Files Forensic Files Forensic Files
some of the ingredients in this latest film
ID The Case That Haunts Me “Devil’s 48 Hours on ID “Cold Blooded Killer.” The Head on the Highway (N) (14) A Time to Kill “Words From the Grave.” Diabolical “Killer Track Record.” (14) The Head on the
Triangle.” (14) (14) (N) (14) Highway (14) from the French director Rebecca Zlo-
IFC Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half Two and a Half towski. A tale of two cousins, “An Easy
Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men Curse. (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Men (14) Girl” is told from the perspective of Naïma
LIFE Married at First Sight “Couples’ Cam: Married at First Sight “Couples’ Cam: Married at First Sight “Australia: Sea- Married at First Sight “Australia: Sea- Married at First Sight “I See Red Married at First (Mina Farid), a 16-year-old preparing to
Highs and Lows.” (14) The Long Road Home.” (N) (14) son 7, Episode 26.” (N) (14) son 7, Episode 27.” (N) (10:03) Flags.” (14) (11:03) Sight (14) (12:01)
LIFEMOV Stalked by My Patient (2018, TVF). The Doctor Will Kill You Now (2019, TVF). Gina Vitori, Anthony Jensen. Sur- His Fatal Fixation (2020, TVF). Sarah Fisher, Robin Dunne. Scarred survivor The Doctor Will start a culinary summer internship on the
Bree Williamson, Eddie Matos. (6) geon saves woman’s life after skiing accident. has visions of violent stalker. Kill You Now French Riviera. The story begins with the
7:00 7:30 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30 10:00 10:30 11:00 11:30 12:00 surprise arrival of Naïma’s older cousin,
LOGO Gilmore Girls “The Breakup, Part 2.” Gilmore Girls “The Third Lorelai.” Rich- New Adventures New Adventures New Adventures New Adventures New Adventures New Adventures Will & Grace (PG) Sofia (Zahia Dehar), who hooks up with a
Rory kisses Tristin at a party. ard’s visiting mother stirs fears. of Old Christine of Old Christine of Old Christine of Old Christine of Old Christine of Old Christine
pair of yacht-riding older men (Nuno Lopes
MLB M.L.B. Regional Coverage. (6) M.L.B. Tonight M.L.B. Regional Coverage.
and Benoît Magimel) — and helps usher in
MSG M.L.S. New York City FC vs. New York Red Bulls. Red Bulls Post N.H.L. Giants Training Giants Access Horse Racing Saratoga Live.
Naïma’s coming of age. “Sultry, but never
MSGPL N.H.L. Islanders Shorts The Ten Tennis Classics 2019 A.T.P. Paris Masters, Round 3. N.H.L. Islanders Shorts The Ten
sleazy, observant yet nonjudgmental, ‘An
MSNBC Democratic National Convention Democratic National Convention Decision 2020: Democratic National Convention (N) (Live) Democratic National Convention Democratic
Easy Girl’ is more than just a tale of inno-
MTV Ridiculousness Ridiculousness Double Shot at Love Revenge Prank Ridiculousness Ridiculousness Ridiculousness Ridiculousness Ridiculousness Ridiculousness
cence and experience,” Jeannette Catsoulis
NBCS N.H.L. Conference first round: Teams TBA. N.H.L. Conference first round: Teams TBA. N.H.L. Overtime
wrote in her review for The Times. “Taking
NGEO Life and Death Row (Part 2 of 4) Life and Death Row “The Oath.” Life and Death Row “Mercy.” (14) Life and Death Row (Part 4 of 4) Life and Death Row (14) (11:03) Death Row
a nuanced look at sexual awakening and, to
NICK Shrek Forever After (2010). (PG) (6) Rio 2 (2014). Voices of Anne Hathaway, Jesse Eisenberg. (G) Friends (PG) Friends (PG) Friends (14) Friends (PG) Friends (PG)
a lesser extent, class distinction, the movie
NICKJR Blaze, Monster Blaze, Monster Bubble Guppies Blue’s Clues Peppa Pig (Y) Peppa Pig (Y) Peppa Pig (Y) Peppa Pig (Y) Bubble Guppies Blue’s Clues Peppa Pig (Y)
has a charming flightiness that builds to an
NY1 Inside City Hall News/Evening News/Evening The 2020 Democratic National Convention (N) Inside City Hall News All Night
unexpectedly touching climax.”
OVA . A League of Their Own (1992). Tom Hanks. Women and baseball, back when. Immensely enjoyable. (PG) . Rain Man (1988). Autistic savant and hustler brother. When allowed, Cruise shines. (R)
OWN 20/20 on OWN (14) 20/20 on OWN (14) 20/20 on ID (14) 20/20 on OWN (14) 20/20 on OWN (14) 20/20 on ID (14)
OXY
PARMT
Killer Couples (14)
Two/Half Men Two/Half Men
Killer Couples (Season Finale) (N) Killer Couples (14)
Rocky (1976). Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire. (PG)
Dateline: Secrets Uncovered “The Bathtub Mystery.” (PG)
Rocky IV (1985). Sylvester Stallone. (PG)
Dateline: Secr.
What’s on TV
SCIENCE Strange Evidence (14) Strange Evidence (14) Strange Evidence (N) (14) Strange Evidence “Omen of the Alien Cloud.” (N) (14) Evidence
THE SENATOR WAS INDISCREET (1947) 8 p.m.
SMITH Air Disasters “Impossible Landing.” Hell Below “Atlantic Showdown.” Hell Below “Destroyer Killer.” (PG) Hell Below “Fatal Voyage.” (PG) Hell Below “Atlantic Showdown.” Hell Below (PG)
on TCM. As the virtual Democratic Na-
SNY M.L.B. New York Mets vs. Miami Marlins. (6) Mets Postgame Three Teams, One City, One Year SportsNite SportsNite SportsNite
tional Convention wraps up on Thursday,
STZENF American Tail My Girl (1991). Dan Aykroyd, Jamie Lee Curtis. (PG) (7:42) The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle (9:26) Thunderbirds (2004). Bill Paxton. (PG) (10:59)
TCM will show this political satire, the only
SUN Law & Order “Bogeyman.” A novelist is Law & Order “Strike.” A legal aid striker Law & Order “Personae Non Grata.” Law & Order “Excalibur.” Jack McCoy’s Law & Order “Rumble.” Stockbroker’s Law & Order
found dead in her car. (14) is killed. (14) (14) job is threatened. (14) death leads to a battle. (14) “Challenged.” (14) film directed by the playwright and theater
SYFY The Bourne Identity (2002). Matt Damon, Franka Po- . The Bourne Supremacy (2004). Matt Damon, Franka Potente. (PG-13) Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016). Iain Glen. Alice the avenger seeks director George S. Kaufman. It follows a
tente. (PG-13) (6) vial that can save humanity. Sixth film is series’s weakest. (R) (10:45) senator (played William Powell) who keeps
TBS The Big Bang The- The Big Bang The- The Big Bang The- The Big Bang The- The Big Bang The- The Big Bang The- Lost Resort “Reiki Gone Wrong.” (N) Conan With guest Lost Resort “Reiki Gone Wrong.” Ac-
ory (PG) ory (PG) ory (PG) ory (PG) ory (PG) ory (PG) (14) Emily Mortimer. qua delivers a message to Becca.
a diary of transgressions committed within
TCM . Libeled Lady (1936). William Pow- l The Senator Was Indiscreet (1947). Ella Raines. Sharp, . Life With Father (1947). William Powell, Irene Dunne. Turn-of-last-century Manhattan family . One Way Pas- his party. The diary goes missing.
ell, Myrna Loy. (6) hilarious satire and you’ll never guess who directed. life. Comfortable, charming reprise of stage caper. (9:45) sage (1932). GABE COHN
TLC Dr. Pimple Popper (14) Dr. Pimple Popper (14) Dr. Pimple Popper (N) (14) Dr. Pimple Popper (N) (14) My Feet Are Killing Me (14) Dr. Pimple
TNT Wonder Woman (2017). Gal Gadot, Chris Pine. Cloistered Amazon warrior discovers the world. Fizzy, witty blockbust- Wonder Woman (2017). Gal Gadot, Chris Pine. Cloistered Amazon warrior discovers the world.
er. (PG-13) Fizzy, witty blockbuster. (PG-13)
ONLINE: TELEVISION LISTINGS
TRAV Ghost Adventures (PG) Ghost Adventures (PG) Ghost Adventures (N) (PG) Ghost Adventures “Provoking the Dead.” Haunted Tennessee marina. (N) Ghost Adv.
Daily television highlights, recent reviews by
TRU Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers Tacoma FD (MA) Tacoma FD (N) Tacoma FD (N) Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers Imp. Jokers The Times's critics, series recaps and what to
TVLAND Andy Griffith Andy Griffith Love-Raymond Love-Raymond Love-Raymond Love-Raymond Love-Raymond Love-Raymond King of Queens King of Queens King of Queens watch recommendations. nytimes.com/tv
USA Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Cannonball “Tiny Weenie Mankini.” Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows Chrisley Knows
Best (14) Best (14) (N) (PG) Best (N) (9:01) Best (14) (9:32) Best (14) (10:02) Best (14) (10:32) Best (14) (11:02) Best (14) (11:32) Best (14) (12:01)
Definitions of symbols used in Ratings:
VH1 . Friday (1995). Ice Cube. (R) (6) Next Friday (1999). Young man and lottery-winning uncle. Loud. (R) Friday After Next (2002). Ice Cube, Mike Epps. (R) All About Benj. the program listings: (Y) All children
VICE Always Sunny Always Sunny Always Sunny Always Sunny Shipping Wars Shipping Wars Shipping Wars Stick to Sports VICE News The Pizza Show Shipping Wars ★ Recommended film (Y7) Directed to older children
✩ Recommended series (G) General audience
WE Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars Marriage Boot Camp: Reality Stars Marriage- Reality ● New or noteworthy program (PG) Parental guidance
(14) (6:50) (14) (7:50) (N) (14) (14) (10:01) (14) (11:01) Stars (N) New show or episode suggested
WGN-A How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met How I Met Married . With (CC) Closed-caption (14) Parents strongly cautioned
(HD) High definition (MA) Mature audience only
YES M.L.S. New York City FC vs. New York Red Bulls. (6:30) M.L.B. Tampa Bay Rays vs. New York Yankees. WN.B.A.
 C8 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

Weather Report Meteorology by AccuWeather

Vanc
Vancouver
Van Metropolitan Forecast
60s
0s 70s
Seattle
eatt e
L Regina Winn
Winnipeg
nipeg
nip
ipeg
peg
eg Quebecc
TODAY .....................................Mostly sunny
Record
70s Spokane High 81. It will be sunny, as high pressure highs
H
Halifax
Portlan
and
an d Montreal 60s crosses the region. Humidity will be low.
7
70s Helena
a 90°
Eugen
ne 60ss Bismarck
i L Fargo Ottawa Por
Portland TONIGHT ..................................Partly cloudy
Billings Burlington
n n
Boi
oise
oi 70s 0 Manchester
80s
0s M Low 66. High pressure will continue to
H Minne
neapolis
n
ne St. Paul
S 80ss To
Toronto
oronto Albany Bos
Boston dominate the weather. After a warm and
80s
80
0s 70
70s Pierre
rrre Milwauke
ee Buffalo Ha
Hartford
a dry evening, the night will be clear to
Detroit
Casper
Sioux
oux
ou
u Falls
New York
N H partly cloudy. The temperature will remain
Reno Cheyenne
Des Moines Chicago H Cleveland
and
d P
Pittsburgh
Phi
Philadelphia
near average, with a light breeze. Normal
Salt Lake Omaha
70s
0s highs
City Indianapolis
a Washi
Washington
ashi TOMORROW ...............Sunshine and clouds 80°
Sa
San
an Francisco
Fran co Denver Kansas
H Topeka City
Springfield
e Richm
chmond High 84. As high pressure moves away, a
Charleston
e Norfolk
Fresno
100+ no Las Colo
C lo
orado St. Louis Louisville 70
70s few clouds will return, but there will still
Vegas 100+ Sprrings
Rale
ale
leigh
L be sunshine. Wet weather will remain off
Wichita
Los Angele
eles Santa
nta
ta Fe Nashville Charlotte to the south. Temperatures will begin to
Oklahoma City
O 80s
100+
0 90s Little Rock
Memphis trend higher.
San
Sa
an Diego Phoen
Ph enix
en Albuquerque Columb
um
mbia
80s
80
8 0s Lubbock
Birmingham
m
Atlanta SATURDAY ....Some sunshine, more humid
Tuc
Tucson 70°
Da
allas
a 90
90s
0s With high pressure offshore, there will be
El Paso Ft. Worth Jackson a flow of warm and more humid air. There
J
Jacksonville Normal
80
80s will be a blend of sunshine and clouds. A lows
100+ Mo
Mobile
Honolulu
Baton
o Rouge
ouge few spots can have thunderstorms by the
New O
Or
Orlando
70s
0ss Hilo
San
nAAnton
Antonio
Antoni Hou
ouston
n Orleans Tampa
a end of the day.
H 80s
L 90s SUNDAY
9
90s Corpus Christi
C Miami MONDAY ................Thunderstorms Sunday 60° S S M T W T F S S M
Nassau
50s Monter
Monterrey
onter Sunday will be humid, with clouds and
70s
Weather patterns shown as expected at noon today, Eastern time. sunshine, along with thunderstorms. High TODAY
Fairbanks
irbanks TODAY’S HIGHS
86. Monday will be partly sunny and
humid. High 88. Forecast
70s <0 0s 10s 20s 30s 40s 50s 60s 70s 80s 90s 100+
60s Actual range
Anchorage
Anchorage
H L High High
Juneau
au Record
COLD WARM STATIONARY COMPLEX HIGH LOW MOSTLY SHOWERS T-STORMS RAIN FLURRIES SNOW ICE
lows
FRONTS COLD PRESSURE CLOUDY PRECIPITATION Low Low

Highlight: The Weekend Outlook National Forecast Metropolitan Almanac

Showers and thunderstorms will focus In Central Park for the 16 hours ended at 4 p.m. yesterday.
L over the southeastern quarter of the
nation. While most of this activity will not Temperature Precipitation (in inches)
be severe, a small number of storms may Record Yesterday ............... 0.14
JET STREAM high 94° Record .................... 2.53
bring flooding downpours and strong wind (2002)
90° TUE. YESTERDAY For the last 30 days
gusts. Part of the region is in need of rain,
Actual ..................... 6.71
while a few pockets, such as the North Normal .................... 4.59
Carolina coast and the southern Ap- Normal
H palachians, have had a wet summer. high 83°
For the last 365 days
Actual ................... 44.44
Normal .................. 49.92
L Most areas from New England and the 80° 75°
upper part of the Mid-Atlantic to the 1 a.m. LAST 30 DAYS

Midwest and Great Plains will be dry and Air pressure Humidity
sunny. Storms will run along the northern High ............. 29.98 noon High ........... 96% 11 a.m.
Low ............ 29.91 4 a.m. Low .............. 51% 1 a.m.
Unusually Unusually tier of the Great Lakes. 70° Normal
warm cool L Most of the West will be dry and hot. low 68° Cooling Degree Days
Cooler air that pushed into the Northwest An index of fuel consumption that tracks how
will be reinforced by rain in coastal areas 66° far the day’s mean temperature rose above 65
Thunderstorms will be widespread across the Southeast this weekend as tropical moisture of Washington and northern Oregon. Only 11 a.m. Yesterday..................................................................... 6
60° So far this month ...................................................... 238
feeds north into the region. The interior West will remain hot with just isolated afternoon spotty storms that may cause new wild- Record So far this season (since January 1) ...................... 1025
thunderstorms in the southern Rockies. fires will dot the interior West. low 55° Normal to date for the season ................................. 845
(1924)
4 12 6 12 4
p.m. a.m. a.m. p.m. p.m. Trends Temperature Precipitation
Little Rock 87/ 62 0 86/ 65 S 87/ 67 S New Delhi 84/ 77 1.50 87/ 78 T 89/ 80 PC
Cities Los Angeles 94/ 71 0 93/ 71 S 94/ 70 PC Riyadh 106/ 79 0 110/ 81 PC 112/ 83 PC Average Average
High/low temperatures for the 16 hours ended at 4 Louisville 82/ 63 Tr 84/ 69 PC 83/ 69 T Seoul 90/ 72 0 89/ 75 PC 84/ 73 C Avg. daily departure Avg. daily departure Below Above Below Above
p.m. yesterday, Eastern time, and precipitation (in inches) Memphis 86/ 68 0.04 87/ 71 T 87/ 70 T Shanghai 97/ 82 0 98/ 79 PC 95/ 79 PC from normal from normal Last 10 days
for the 16 hours ended at 4 p.m. yesterday. Miami 89/ 79 0.34 90/ 81 T 92/ 81 T Singapore 88/ 79 0.14 88/ 79 Sh 89/ 79 T this month ............. +1.2° this year ................ +2.5°
Milwaukee 80/ 64 0 83/ 63 S 85/ 66 S Sydney 70/ 53 0.04 65/ 51 W 66/ 49 W 30 days
Expected conditions for today and tomorrow.
Mpls.-St. Paul 83/ 67 0 85/ 68 PC 87/ 68 T Taipei City 100/ 81 0 98/ 80 C 98/ 80 T 90 days
C ........................ Clouds S .............................Sun Nashville 85/ 67 0 85/ 70 T 84/ 68 T Tehran 95/ 73 0 98/ 77 PC 101/ 78 PC Reservoir levels (New York City water supply) 365 days
F............................. Fog Sn ....................... Snow New Orleans 91/ 74 0.12 89/ 72 T 89/ 74 T Tokyo 93/ 79 0 92/ 80 S 92/ 80 S
H .......................... Haze SS .......... Snow showers Norfolk 87/ 74 0.10 82/ 74 T 83/ 73 T Yesterday ............... 85% Chart shows how recent temperature and precipitation
Oklahoma City 86/ 63 0 87/ 65 S 88/ 64 C Europe Yesterday Today Tomorrow Est. normal ............. 87% trends compare with those of the last 30 years.
I............................... Ice T............ Thunderstorms
Omaha 85/ 61 0 86/ 63 PC 89/ 68 PC Amsterdam 81/ 58 0.04 82/ 67 PC 79/ 62 T
PC ............. Partly cloudy Tr ......................... Trace Athens 90/ 73 0 90/ 75 S 90/ 74 S
Orlando 89/ 72 0.12 90/ 74 T 90/ 75 T
R ........................... Rain W ........................ Windy Berlin 79/ 60 0 87/ 65 PC 94/ 70 C
Philadelphia 82/ 64 0.63 82/ 66 S 84/ 70 PC
Sh ................... Showers –............... Not available Brussels 81/ 59 0.16 85/ 69 PC 80/ 60 T
Phoenix
Pittsburgh
114/
77/
91
55
0
0
110/ 90 C
83/ 62 S
107/
83/
88
66
PC
PC Budapest 80/ 63 0.01 82/ 58 PC 86/ 62 S
Recreational Forecast
N.Y.C. region Yesterday Today Tomorrow
Portland, Me. 79/ 56 0 78/ 59 S 84/ 65 S Copenhagen 75/ 63 0.16 75/ 66 C 77/ 64 T
New York City 75/ 66 0.14 81/ 66 S 84/ 70 PC Portland, Ore. 84/ 64 0 83/ 66 C 78/ 60 Sh Dublin 63/ 54 0.66 66/ 55 R 67/ 55 Sh Sun, Moon and Planets Beach and Ocean Temperatures
Bridgeport 78/ 66 0.06 80/ 64 S 83/ 70 PC Providence 76/ 59 0 81/ 62 S 85/ 67 S Edinburgh 65/ 57 0.02 69/ 58 R 65/ 55 Sh
Caldwell 81/ 64 0.11 83/ 61 S 86/ 68 PC Raleigh 86/ 69 0.05 84/ 69 T 83/ 69 T Frankfurt 82/ 58 0 89/ 68 S 94/ 68 PC First Quarter Full Last Quarter New
Danbury 77/ 57 0 78/ 55 S 83/ 64 PC Reno 99/ 64 0 95/ 59 S 96/ 60 PC Geneva 84/ 59 0.01 89/ 63 S 90/ 64 S Today’s forecast
Islip 77/ 64 0.35 79/ 62 S 81/ 68 PC Richmond 84/ 66 0.05 82/ 68 T 81/ 69 T Helsinki 73/ 53 0 75/ 53 T 75/ 58 S
Newark 78/ 65 0.77 81/ 64 S 84/ 69 PC Rochester 72/ 52 0 78/ 59 S 86/ 63 S Istanbul 86/ 71 0 82/ 71 PC 85/ 71 PC
Trenton 79/ 62 0.49 80/ 59 S 83/ 66 PC Sacramento 105/ 62 0 97/ 62 PC 97/ 65 PC Kiev 88/ 60 0 88/ 62 PC 80/ 58 T Aug. 25 Sep. 2 Sep. 10 Sep. 17
White Plains 76/ 62 0.20 78/ 59 S 82/ 66 PC Salt Lake City 101/ 72 0 98/ 70 PC 99/ 72 S Lisbon 79/ 65 0 76/ 66 PC 78/ 64 S 1:22 a.m. 6:59 a.m.
United States Yesterday Today Tomorrow San Antonio 101/ 72 0 101/ 74 PC 100/ 75 S London 68/ 60 1.12 75/ 62 W 74/ 59 Sh Kennebunkport
San Diego 83/ 72 0 83/ 72 S 82/ 72 PC Madrid 93/ 64 0 95/ 64 S 92/ 65 S Sun RISE 6:11 a.m. Moon R 7:44 a.m. 75/57 Mostly sunny
Albany 73/ 50 0 75/ 53 S 83/ 61 S Moscow 68/ 50 0 69/ 50 PC 70/ 53 S
San Francisco 79/ 58 0 75/ 61 PC 76/ 60 PC SET 7:46 p.m. S 9:08 p.m.
Albuquerque 97/ 70 0 98/ 70 C 97/ 68 PC Nice 82/ 71 0 83/ 73 S 85/ 74 S
San Jose 94/ 61 0 84/ 62 PC 83/ 63 PC NEXT R 6:12 a.m. R 8:59 a.m. Cape Cod
Anchorage 65/ 53 0.04 69/ 54 PC 71/ 56 S Oslo 75/ 57 0 73/ 59 R 68/ 59 Sh 60s
San Juan 91/ 79 0.04 90/ 79 T 89/ 80 T 77/63 Mostly sunny
Atlanta 88/ 70 0.05 83/ 69 T 80/ 68 T Paris 77/ 63 0.10 90/ 68 PC 81/ 61 T Jupiter S 2:59 a.m. Mars S 11:03 a.m.
Seattle 81/ 62 0 76/ 63 Sh 72/ 59 Sh
Atlantic City 79/ 67 0.55 79/ 68 S 79/ 70 C Prague 75/ 58 0 82/ 60 S 87/ 64 PC R 5:40 p.m. R 10:16 p.m.
Sioux Falls 88/ 64 0 90/ 68 PC 89/ 67 C L.I. North Shore
Austin 101/ 65 0 100/ 72 S 99/ 75 S Rome 86/ 66 0 88/ 66 S 90/ 67 S
Spokane 92/ 61 0 82/ 60 PC 85/ 57 S Saturn S 3:41 a.m. Venus R 2:35 a.m.
Baltimore 83/ 63 0.30 83/ 65 PC 85/ 69 T St. Petersburg 74/ 48 0 77/ 53 PC 77/ 57 S 80/65 Plenty of sunshine
St. Louis 81/ 60 0 83/ 65 S 85/ 65 S R 6:10 p.m. S 5:09 p.m.
Baton Rouge 93/ 69 0.05 91/ 69 PC 90/ 71 T Stockholm 79/ 57 0 74/ 57 PC 77/ 60 C
St. Thomas 90/ 81 0.06 90/ 81 PC 91/ 80 T
Birmingham 89/ 70 0 84/ 70 T 83/ 68 T Vienna 80/ 62 0 83/ 62 PC 88/ 65 S L.I. South Shore
Syracuse 74/ 53 0.05 79/ 59 S 87/ 64 S Boating
Boise 99/ 68 0 93/ 63 S 96/ 59 S Tampa 87/ 75 0.37 88/ 74 T 88/ 77 T Warsaw 77/ 63 0 80/ 58 PC 84/ 64 S 77/67 Mostly sunny
Boston 79/ 61 0 77/ 62 S 85/ 68 S Toledo 78/ 54 0 82/ 57 S 87/ 62 S
North America Yesterday Today Tomorrow From Montauk Point to Sandy Hook, N.J., out to 20
Buffalo 75/ 56 0 78/ 64 S 84/ 66 S Tucson 110/ 82 0 106/ 80 C 100/ 79 PC N.J. Shore
Burlington 73/ 53 0 75/ 59 S 83/ 64 T nautical miles, including Long Island Sound and New York
Tulsa 86/ 62 0 87/ 63 S 89/ 66 S Acapulco 87/ 78 0.05 86/ 77 T 87/ 77 T 79/68 Partly sunny
Casper 93/ 57 0 92/ 54 PC 93/ 52 S Harbor.
Virginia Beach 85/ 73 0.10 81/ 73 T 81/ 73 T Bermuda 86/ 80 0.33 87/ 80 T 88/ 79 PC
Charlotte 87/ 69 0.05 81/ 65 T 81/ 66 T Washington 82/ 66 0.02 83/ 69 PC 83/ 70 T Edmonton 73/ 50 0 74/ 50 T 73/ 46 PC Wind will be from the north, then east to southeast, at Eastern Shore
Chattanooga 88/ 69 0.08 84/ 70 T 83/ 69 T Wichita 86/ 63 0.10 89/ 65 PC 88/ 68 PC Guadalajara 80/ 60 0.10 77/ 61 T 81/ 61 T 5-10 knots. Waves will be 1 foot or less on New York 83/68 Sun and clouds 70s
Chicago 82/ 63 0 86/ 65 S 88/ 65 S Wilmington, Del. 80/ 61 0.58 81/ 63 S 83/ 68 C Havana 88/ 72 0.38 91/ 76 T 89/ 75 PC Harbor and Long Island Sound and 2-3 feet on the ocean.
Cincinnati 79/ 57 0 82/ 62 PC 82/ 66 PC Kingston 97/ 77 0 89/ 78 Sh 91/ 77 T Visibility will be unrestricted. Ocean City Md.
Cleveland 72/ 52 0 79/ 56 S 83/ 64 S Africa Yesterday Today Tomorrow Martinique 90/ 79 0.04 91/ 77 T 89/ 78 T 77/69 Clouds and sun
Colorado Springs 92/ 58 0 91/ 59 T 92/ 62 PC Algiers 92/ 69 0 97/ 75 PC 95/ 73 S Mexico City 74/ 54 0.28 72/ 56 T 74/ 57 T High Tides
Columbus 78/ 56 0 83/ 62 S 84/ 66 PC Cairo 92/ 73 0 96/ 75 S 94/ 74 S Monterrey 92/ 72 0 96/ 69 PC 97/ 69 S Virginia Beach Color bands
Concord, N.H. 78/ 48 0 79/ 52 S 88/ 59 S Cape Town 59/ 41 0 62/ 45 Sh 69/ 46 S Montreal 72/ 54 0 71/ 60 PC 77/ 61 T Atlantic City .................... 9:04 a.m. .............. 9:20 p.m. indicate water
81/73 A couple of thunderstorms
Dallas-Ft. Worth 91/ 68 0 92/ 69 S 94/ 73 PC Dakar 91/ 82 0 88/ 78 PC 87/ 79 T Nassau 87/ 80 0.29 90/ 82 PC 90/ 80 S Barnegat Inlet ................. 9:20 a.m. .............. 9:34 p.m. temperature.
Denver 95/ 64 0 95/ 65 T 96/ 62 S Johannesburg 57/ 32 0 60/ 39 PC 66/ 43 PC Panama City 84/ 74 0.29 84/ 75 T 86/ 75 T The Battery ..................... 9:52 a.m. ............ 10:00 p.m.
Des Moines 83/ 58 0 85/ 61 PC 87/ 62 PC Nairobi 70/ 56 0.01 75/ 57 PC 72/ 55 R Quebec City 64/ 52 0.04 67/ 55 PC 69/ 53 PC Beach Haven ................ 10:46 a.m. ............ 10:58 p.m.
Detroit 77/ 57 0 81/ 60 S 86/ 63 S Tunis 97/ 73 0 97/ 77 S 100/ 76 S Santo Domingo 93/ 76 0.20 90/ 75 T 90/ 75 PC Bridgeport .................... 12:29 a.m. ............ 12:59 p.m.
El Paso 100/ 73 0 103/ 74 PC 104/ 75 PC Toronto 73/ 55 0 81/ 63 S 86/ 64 PC City Island ..................... 12:17 a.m. ............ 12:49 p.m.
High pressure moving over the region will
Fargo 89/ 64 0 89/ 65 PC 87/ 63 T Asia/Pacific Yesterday Today Tomorrow Vancouver 69/ 58 0 73/ 62 R 72/ 57 Sh
Hartford 80/ 55 0 81/ 59 S 87/ 65 S Baghdad 109/ 78 0 110/ 78 PC 111/ 78 PC Fire Island Lt. ................ 10:14 a.m. ............ 10:26 p.m. bring dry weather and sunshine to most of
Winnipeg 88/ 60 0 88/ 60 PC 86/ 61 PC
Honolulu 87/ 77 0.03 89/ 78 PC 90/ 76 PC Bangkok 93/ 78 0.04 94/ 79 C 92/ 78 T Montauk Point .............. 10:34 a.m. ............ 10:53 p.m. the beaches from New England to the
Houston 98/ 70 0 95/ 71 PC 96/ 73 PC Beijing 77/ 68 0 80/ 62 PC 82/ 62 S South America Yesterday Today Tomorrow Northport ..................... 12:33 a.m. .............. 1:01 p.m.
Indianapolis 80/ 57 0 81/ 60 S 83/ 64 S Damascus 97/ 66 0 98/ 63 PC 97/ 65 PC Buenos Aires 53/ 42 0.02 54/ 40 PC 60/ 45 PC Port Washington ........... 12:29 a.m. ............ 12:58 p.m. Jersey Shore. There will be more in the
Jackson 89/ 67 0 88/ 68 T 86/ 68 T Hong Kong 86/ 80 1.79 89/ 80 T 90/ 80 T Caracas 87/ 75 0.16 87/ 76 T 87/ 75 T Sandy Hook .................... 9:28 a.m. .............. 9:40 p.m. way of clouds farther to the south, with a
Jacksonville 88/ 70 0.07 88/ 70 T 88/ 72 T Jakarta 91/ 76 0.04 91/ 77 PC 92/ 75 W Lima 64/ 59 0 64/ 59 C 65/ 59 PC Shinnecock Inlet ............. 9:11 a.m. .............. 9:31 p.m.
Kansas City 80/ 58 0 82/ 60 PC 85/ 64 S Jerusalem 86/ 67 0 85/ 66 S 84/ 69 S Quito 64/ 51 0.06 66/ 51 C 69/ 49 C Stamford ...................... 12:31 a.m. ............ 12:59 p.m.
potential for thunderstorms near Virginia
Key West 91/ 83 0.39 91/ 83 T 91/ 84 Sh Karachi 94/ 84 0.01 93/ 83 C 95/ 83 PC Recife 82/ 74 0 85/ 74 PC 84/ 73 R Tarrytown ..................... 11:41 a.m. ............ 11:49 p.m. Beach. Highs will range from the 70s to
Las Vegas 112/ 89 0 112/ 88 PC 111/ 86 S Manila 86/ 77 0.10 87/ 78 Sh 88/ 79 T Rio de Janeiro 79/ 74 0 74/ 65 Sh 69/ 65 Sh
Lexington 79/ 58 0 83/ 65 PC 80/ 65 T Mumbai 86/ 78 0.38 86/ 79 T 85/ 79 Sh Santiago 61/ 34 0.01 72/ 37 S 74/ 38 S
Willets Point .................. 12:19 a.m. ............ 12:53 p.m. the lower 80s.

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2 HOOK, LINE AND SINKER
How much is that old fishing
gear worth? BY EZRA MARCUS
2 CRITIC’S NOTEBOOK
A designer’s small-is-beautiful
ethos pays off. BY GUY TREBAY
FASHION BEAUTY NIGHTLIFE
The Treasures of Block Island
SKIN DEEP
Moisturizer With a Heart
Gen Z customers demand that
today’s beauty brands speak
out on social justice issues.
By RACHEL STRUGATZ
Tiffany Zhong, 23, describes herself as the
“Gen Z Whisperer.” She names her compa-
nies after emoji, including Zebra IQ, a plat-
form that helps content creators make
money from their audiences, and Pineapple
Capital, an early stage “mini fund” that in-
vests in consumer brands.
Typically, Ms. Zhong likes to get in on
companies early. At 21, she was the first in-
vestor in Kinship, a skin care label that’s
about to hit shelves at hundreds of Ulta
Beauty stores.
All six products in the collection, includ-
ing Insta Swipe alpha hydroxy acid wipes
and Pimple Potion acne treatment, were
created for Generation Z. For more than
two years, the Kinship founders Christin
Powell and Alison Haljun worked with a
Kinship Circle of 20 Gen Z-ers to develop
products.
3 SWEET LOOKS
The strawberry dress TikTok
meme. BY ISABEL SLONE
4 QUIET VACATIONS
‘Travel shaming’ leads to less
sharing. BY SARAH FIRSHEIN
THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 D1
N
A game of hunting
for glass orbs
takes on new and
magical meaning.
By HILLARY RICHARD
NEW SHOREHAM, R.I. — In a forest here on
Block Island, Katie Hall and members of her
extended family were dangling her moth-
er’s bra into a hollowed-out tree trunk with
the focus of open-heart surgeons. When
that failed, Ms. Hall, her mother, brother,
aunt and cousin used their shoe laces to
form a net in the hopes of picking up some-
thing just out of arm’s reach. Two hours and
one downpour later, success came with the
help of a spaghetti spoon taped to a branch.
On another part of the island, Dawn
Holmes walked back up a dirt path after
completing her mission. A group of women
approached, still reeling from getting lost at
Rodman’s Hollow without cellphone signal.
Ms. Holmes lingered casually, adjusting her
now empty backpack. When the women dis-
covered what she had hidden, their screams
of glee pierced the air.
Hundreds of beautiful handblown glass
fishing floats are scattered across the wil-
derness of Block Island each year, attract-
ing an underground society of fanatics who
will stop at nothing to find them.
These are the orbivores. Eben Horton is
their Pied Piper.
“I love the term ‘orbivore,’” Mr. Horton
said. “They call them orbs. Technically
they’re floats, but sure, they’re orbs. It’s like
a tribe. I’m absolutely amazed and humbled
and proud but, like, what have I created?
Am I a cult leader? I had no idea that this
would turn into this.”
Mr. Horton, a 46-year-old glass artist,
started the Glass Float Project in 2012 as a
whimsical scavenger hunt. He spent his
childhood sailing the 12 miles from main-
land Rhode Island to Block Island, a 7,000-
acre dot in the Atlantic. For roughly a cen-
tury, fishermen attached glass floats to their
nets. The floats inevitably detached and
traveled across the sea, washing up in fated
spots after unimaginable journeys. Mr. Hor-
ton, an avid beachcomber, loves mulling the
history of these pieces.
The first year, Mr. Horton handmade 150
glass floats at his studio in Wakefield, R.I.
The event began that June, gathering unan-
ticipated momentum with locals and tour-
ists. Block Island swells from under 1,000
year-round residents to roughly 20,000 vis-
itors per day at the height of summer. Peo-
ple come for the beaches and restaurants,
but most never explore the deceptively wild
and desolate natural areas. The scavenger
hunt became a gateway to a different world.
Now in its eighth year, the Glass Float
Project has worked its way into the daily
flow of Mr. Horton’s gallery. While waiting
for the furnace to get hot each morning, he;
his wife, Jennifer Nauck; and their two as-
sistants fill in time gaps by making floats.
The crew makes 550 highly coveted floats
yearly, etching the year and a number onto
each with a Dremel bit. Most are clear glass.
The annual No. 1 typically has gilding.
A certain amount (corresponding with
CONTINUED ON PAGE D6
Eben Horton, a glass artist,
hides his creations on Block
Island for visitors to find
and collect.
JILLIAN FREYER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Today, the Kinship Circle is made up of
125 young people who give input on logo,
color, typography, packaging design and
beta product testing. Self Reflect sun-
screen, with its airy, whipped texture and
vanilla scent, was formerly Golden Milk
Latte, a heavier SPF with notes of turmeric
and cardamom. The original version was
scrapped, Ms. Powell said, because the Kin-
ship Circle found it too “spicy” and the tex-
ture lacking.
Gen Z-ers “care a lot about seeing what’s
happening behind the scenes, getting a
transparent look into things,” Ms. Zhong
said. Equally critical to her is that a beauty
line is eco-friendly, vegan, cruelty free and
“stands up for what’s right.”
So what does it mean to be a beauty
brand for Gen Z today?
A company can’t just sell skin care, cos-
metics, hair care or perfume. Good product
matters, but what matters more is standing
for something, whether it’s being cruelty
free (E.L.F. Cosmetics) or simply being the
best version of yourself (Glossier). It can’t
politely sit out seismic cultural moments.
CONTINUED ON PAGE D5 MEITING SONG
D2 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020

CRITIC’S NOTEBOOK

Want to Make It Big in Fashion? Think Small

Evan Kinori has drawn a
passionate following with
his meticulous workwear.
By GUY TREBAY
SAN FRANCISCO — Is this a good time to talk
about “enoughness?”
It was in long-ago 1973 that the economist
E. F. Schumacher first published “Small Is
Beautiful,” a seminal (and, to the surprise of
some, best-selling) collection of essays cri-
tiquing Western economics. Mr. Schu-
macher was among the first to champion
sustainability, localization, small-scale in-
dustry and “a humane employment of ma-
chinery” to yield a more benevolent form of
capitalism, one that utilized human effort
and ingenuity for the common good.
“Enoughness,” was a Schumacher
coinage. Plenty of abuse was heaped on him
at the time — mainly he was attacked as an
unprogressive Luddite — yet these days his
ideas seem prophetic. Maybe it took a
worldwide pandemic to remind us that the
antidote to too-muchness may be enough-
ness. Small may be beautiful, indeed.
Or so it seemed on a recent visit to an airy,
whitewashed space in the Hayes Valley
neighborhood of San Francisco. Here, on a
side street in a once dicey area now chock-
ablock with rambling renovated Victorians,
cool retail shops and restaurants, Evan Ki-
nori, 32, operates a one-man clothing label.
Here — or rather in an adjacent garage —
he creates garments that are manufactured
mostly within a one-mile radius of his work-
shop in small hand-numbered batches, in
patterns and fabrics that change by subtle
degrees from one season to the next and
that, as GQ recently noted, “sell fast and
never reappear.”
In just five years, Mr. Kinori has attracted
the attention of specialty retailers across
the country, in Europe and Japan (Dover
Street Market in New York, Los Angeles
and Tokyo; C’H’C’M’ in Manhattan; Atelier
Solarshop in Antwerp) and of a growing cult
that, while it skews heavily to workers in
the tech industry, also includes Bay Area
chefs, graphic artists, Hollywood screen-
writers and at least one 70-year-old Silicon
Valley seer.
Officially, Mr. Kinori’s clothing — patch-
pocket chore coats, zip-front jackets of
matte waxed cotton, Belgian linen shirts or
roomy trousers whose cut falls somewhere
between that of classic, early Yohji Yama-
moto and something you might spot on a
butcher in an August Sander photograph —
is men’s wear. Yet it seems increasingly
likely that the relaxation of arbitrary
boundaries between genders will turn out
to be among the beneficial aftereffects of ev-
eryone being forced to work at home in
hoodies and sweats.
None of this is of particular concern to Mr.
Kinori, a sturdy man of brooding good looks
with a thick tousle of hair and black-painted
fingernails that could use a fresh coat of pol-
ish. Neither is he much interested in design
in the rigidly formal sense. Mr. Kinori does
not call himself a tailor or even a designer.
Rather, he is a craftsman, somewhat in the
tradition of people like the great Bay Area
architect Joseph Esherick, who throughout
his career concerned himself less with cre-
ating branded monuments to himself than
with making harmonious, humane spaces.
Think of Sea Ranch.
Mr. Kinori’s clothes bring to mind those
houses — careful, deliberate, free of osten-
tation, handmade. They are cut from pat-
terns he devises himself and sewn with
French seams on single-needle machines.
They are pieced together from cloth
sourced from dead stock or traditional Irish
tweed makers like Molloy & Sons in County
Donegal or Belgian linen manufactories or
kimono cotton mills in far-off Japanese pre-
fectures. When he works, he thinks less
about the demands of the industrial fashion
machine than a desire to create durable
objects.
“He is a disciplined clothier,” said Jon
Robin Baitz, the playwright and screenwrit-
er, for whom Mr. Kinori’s clothes have be-
come a daily uniform.
If most of what Mr. Kinori makes costs a
lot (shirts start at $285, pants at $365 and
jackets at $525), it is in part because they
are produced in such limited quantities.
“It’s not Supreme, it’s not a drop,” he said
of the deliveries he announces on Insta-
gram and that sell out almost at once.
“There’s a reason for it,” he added. “It’s
everything I made.”
The editions are numbered as a form of
inventorying and a way of keeping things at
a manageable scale. Sales of Mr. Kinori’s
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JASON HENRY FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
clothes grossed him just over half a million
dollars last year, roughly what some design-
ers pay influencers to shill for them. While
he maintains a respectable social media
presence, his primary means of exerting in-
fluence is the handwritten note.
“When you buy his clothes, he sends you
a note, not a long one, that he writes him-
self,” Mr. Baitz said. Often Mr. Kinori’s one
employee, Ryne Burns, follows up with an
email to see how the purchases are working
out.
“It is my small screw you to big compa-
nies that can’t number their styles,” Mr.
Kinori said.
“It’s the by-hand part that sticks now,”
Mr. Baitz explained. What he meant is that,
in the era of disposable fast fashion, when
the labor required to create things has been
effectively erased, when there is always an
ugly part of the equation to consider — that
of consuming disposable stuff made by an
underpaid and invisible work force on the
Evan Kinori in his workshop
and warehouse in San
Francisco, with offerings from
his summer 2020 collection.
Mr. Kinori creates garments
that are manufactured mostly
within a one-mile radius of
the workshop in small
hand-numbered batches.
other side of the world — a wholesome al-
ternative may lie in the traditional personal
relationship of consumer to maker.
“My design ethos is basically geared to-
ward people not buying stuff all the time,”
Mr. Kinori said.
That seems borne out by clients like Kyle
King, 33, a clinical social worker who stum-
bled upon Mr. Kinori’s clothes four years
ago at the Reliquary boutique. “There’s so
much artifice and false narrative in the mar-
ketplace,” said Mr. King, whose wardrobe
consists predominantly of garments
thoughtfully selected on two annual visits to
Mr. Kinori’s shop. “We need to get back to
the richness and simplicity of basic, well-
designed things.”
Much as the early Bay Area proponents
of the Slow Food movement once sought to
alert a generation raised on Saltines and
Cheez Whiz to the wonders of a locally
sourced tomato, Mr. Kinori seems focused
on simplifying his chain of supply.
When first encountered one foggy after-
noon at his shop in Hayes Valley and then
again at his new studio across town in lower
Pacific Heights, Mr. Kinori talked excitedly
about his sources and varied inspirations.
Those may equally include a stenciled can-
vas duffel bag from his father’s Israeli boy-
hood; a tsubo jar by the Japanese ceramist
Kazunori Hamana; designs from Rei
Kawakubo’s famous 1997 “hump” col-
lection; or a monumental drawing of a cleft
boulder rendered by the artist Afton Love in
charcoal and wax.
Though there is a tendency to romanti-
cize indie designers working outside the so-
called fashion system, Mr. Kinori resists the
cliché and is quick to say he backed into
design as if by default.
In his 20s and armed, if that is the word,
with a liberal arts education with specialties
in philosophy and French, he decided to en-
roll in the Fashion Institute of Design &
Merchandising, a local school with a heavy
emphasis on the trades. “It was definitely
not predicted that I would be a pattern-
maker,” said the designer who, though
raised near New Haven, left the East Coast
at 18 to attend, for a brief and not notably
successful period, San Francisco State
University.
“It was the first time in my life when I did
something that felt completely natural,” he
said of his stint at FIDM, as the school is
known. “I really had no burning aspirations
to have a career in design. I was mostly fu-
eled by dissatisfaction with what I wanted
and couldn’t find.”
He first made some shirts, and then,
when friends of friends asked to buy them,
he sewed some more. He added trousers
that hang informally, loosely, but with a de-
ceptively architectonic structure and that
are Californian only in the sense that West
Coast style has tended to emphasize sim-
plicity. “I was so anti-California for the long-
est time,” he said.
With the profits from his early efforts, Mr.
Kinori ventured into jackets, and in less
than five years, by word of mouth, he found
he had a name and a brand. When backers
approached him with plans for scaling up,
he demurred. And while it is impossible to
predict whether this may change, he is sat-
isfied for now with the steady growth of a
loyal customer base that is not so small
anymore.
“I love clothes, I love making clothes, I
love presenting clothes,” Mr. Kinori said
from behind a protective mask that, while it
concealed a characteristically wry smile,
emphasized the intensity of his gaze. “Intu-
ition is my homeplace 100 percent. Building
up a story and a spirit with an object is what
I’m after. I don’t know that there is much
more to it. That’s kind of enough.”

It’s a Keeper (Though Maybe You Should Sell It)

Antique fishing gear is prized
by collectors, leading to big
sales. Check your basement.
By EZRA MARCUS
Ellis Whiteaker, 11, didn’t know what he
might find when he went hunting in his
basement in Fayetteville, N.C. But he had
seen a call for fishing antiques on a social-
networking app he uses (he’s been an avid
fishermen since age 4) and knew that his
grandfather, a former Air Force pilot who
passed away before Ellis was born, had left
some very old stuff in boxes.
What he found were six antique rods —
one with a handle carved in the shape of a
baseball bat. He looked it up, and a similar
model on eBay was selling for around $700.
“It was really neat-looking,” said Ellis’s
mom, Sarah Whiteaker. And, of course, the
value of the item “made him feel excited.”
Vintage fishing gear falls into a category
of collectibles sometimes called “man-
tiques,” which includes hunting parapher-
nalia like antique rifles and duck decoys.
But unlike antique cars, say, which can’t be
hidden for decades in the basement of one’s
home, antique fishing lures and reels can be
packed away and appreciating in value for
years, unbeknown to their owners.
John Stephenson, a buyer for the British
fishing auction house Thomas Turner, said
he fields 10 to 20 phone calls a day from peo-
ple inquiring about items they’ve found. Of
those, he estimates, one in 10 have some
value. Once a month, someone brings in
something to his auction house that is
worth five figures. “There are many more
people looking for them now than there
were 50 years ago,” he said of fishing an-
tiques.
Over the past several hundred years,
there have been endless variations of fish-
ing tackle — rods, reels, flies and lures —
providing fertile ground for collectors, who
thrive on subtle distinctions and rarity.
“The 1850s period to the 1950s is the gold-
en hundred years, where after that point
fishing tackle became virtually all mass
produced, and it lost the handmade appeal,”
said Jim Schottenham, the valuator for
Lang’s Auction, which specializes in fishing
tackle.
In an effort to uncover some of these for-
gotten gems, Lang’s Auction worked with
Fishbrain, the app for avid fisherman, to en-
courage people to go treasure hunting in
their own homes, using a catalog-style list-
ing of rare items as inspiration. (This initia-
tive is what prompted Ellis to ransack his
basement.)
One item on the Lang’s wish list is a reel
and rod set from 1876 inlaid with gold and
topaz; if found, it’s expected to sell for more
than $100,000.
According to Mr. Schottenham, the mar-
ket for fishing antiques accelerated in the
late 1970s. In 1985, The New York Times re-
ported that an antique reel fetched $5,000 at
auction. In the 1990s the market got even
Top, the Giant Haskell
Minnow, one of which
sold at auction for
$101,200 in 2003. Above,
a copy of “Preston
Jennings Book of Trout
Flies,” written in 1935.
One sold at auction for
$94,400 in 2007.
PHOTOGRAPHS VIA LANG’S AUCTION
bigger, as buyers and sellers began con-
necting online. Today, fishing auction
houses advertise heavily, encouraging peo-
ple who aren’t necessarily fishermen to go
sifting through their attics and basements.
One of the holy grails for collectors is the
Giant Haskell Minnow, a large hammered
copper lure with a flexible tail that wiggles
in the water. Patented in 1859 by an Ohio ar-
tisan named Riley Haskell, the lure was “a
real masterpiece of craftsmanship,” accord-
ing to the fishing antiques dealer Fred
Kretchman.
Only a handful of Giant Haskell Minnows
have ever been located; in 2003, Lang’s sold
one at auction for $101,200, setting a record
at the time for antique fishing gear. The
amount shocked collectors and sellers, and
brought new buzz to the market.
“Somebody said to me, ‘50 grand or
something is a lot of money for a Haskell,’”
recalled Mr. Stephenson (referring to the
sale figure in British pounds). “I said, ‘Well,
it’s bigger than a diamond.’”
Today, people are often shocked by the
value of objects they find. In a 2018 article
for the American Museum of Fly Fishing,
Mr. Kretchman described a client who
brought in an antique rod her husband’s fa-
ther had received as a gift from a craftsman.
When he told her it was worth $8,000, “you
could have knocked her over with a feather,”
he wrote in the piece. “She was speechless.”
Nick Lyons, the fly-fishing author and
publisher, believes the draw for collectors is
connected to romantic myths of American
frontiersman identity, citing Huckleberry
Finn and Daniel Boone. Fishing has one of
the deepest repositories of literature of any
sport: tens of thousands of books have been
written on the subject, dating back to at
least 1496, when an English prioress named
Dame Juliana Berners wrote an instruc-
tional overview titled “A treatyse of
fysshynge wyth an Angle.”
And rare fishing texts are as collectible as
tackle. The Lang’s listing includes the
“Preston Jennings Book of Trout Flies,”
written in 1935, which sold at auction for
$94,400 in 2007.
But even more appealing to collectors
than a literary pedigree is a fishing item’s
nostalgia factor. “I don’t know any adult
male or female who fishes who doesn’t want
the rest of his family to fish,” said Mr. Lyons.
“There’s the affection; the great mystery of
what’s under the water.” Many people grew
up spending afternoons on the water with
parents or grandparents. Decades later,
those memories exert a powerful hold.
To that point, Ellis Whiteaker didn’t end
up selling the valuable rod he found. “To
him, it’s worth a million dollars; he will
never get rid of it,” Ms. Whiteaker said. “It’s
his connection to my dad, who he’s never
met.”
As for the other antique rods, Ellis plans
to divide them among his first cousins. “It’s
the right thing to do if we split them up,” he
told his mother, “and let everybody have
one.”
 THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020 N D3

Where Dreams Are Made of Strawberries

A summery dress inspires a
legion of fans on TikTok who
yearn for the return of frivolity.
By ISABEL SLONE
Last summer, a sacklike white dress mot-
tled with black polka dots selling at Zara for
$50 was all the rage on Instagram. But
while the discomfiting qualities of 2019 may
have called for something shapeless and re-
laxed, the sheer horror of 2020 demands an
incredulous level of mythical escapism.
Enter the strawberry dress that took over
TikTok.
The dress is a cotton-candy cloud dotted
with sequined strawberry motifs by Lirika
Matoshi, 24, a fashion designer in New
York. With its pastel pink tulle overlay,
plunging neckline and gently puffed
sleeves, it looks like something Marie Antoi-
nette would wear if she were a modern-day
influencer.
While the strawberry dress may not have
achieved the ubiquity of its Zara counter-
part just yet — it costs 10 times as much — it
is huge on TikTok, where users alternately
covet, prance around in or throw shade at
the flouncy frock. The common refrain is:
“This dress lives rent-free in my head.”
Alongside numerous videos of people un-
boxing the gossamer gown and modeling it
to their followers, an entire subgenre has
emerged of disappointed customers point-
ing out the flaws in the imitation strawberry
dresses they’ve bought on Amazon or
AliExpress.
The original has inspired fan art, count-
less memes of Led Zeppelin, Hannibal
Lecter and Gollum Photoshopped into the
dress, at least one guitar-accompanied bal-
lad and a denunciation from boyfriends in
Mel magazine.
“I first saw the dress in early-ish April
and noticed it gaining traction over the last
few months,” said Avery Mayeur, a 20-year-
old content creator and student at Ryerson
University in Toronto. “It has exploded in
popularity over the last two weeks.” Accord-
ing to Lyst, the global fashion platform,
searches for the strawberry dress spiked by
103 percent since the beginning of August.
Celebrities, including the model and actress
Tess Holliday and, more recently, Busy Phil-
ipps’s 12-year-old daughter, Birdie, have
worn it.
“The second I laid my eyes on it, I imme-
diately fell in love,” said Ms. Mayeur, whose
video unpackaging the strawberry dress
has amassed five million views on TikTok.
“It reminds me of something you would
wear to go to a field with your dog or have a
picnic by the lakeshore.”
Ms. Mayeur coveted the dress so deeply
that she drew an image of an anime charac-
ter she invented, Hina Tskurum (who in-
habits the “My Hero Academia” universe),
decked out in Lirika Matoshi duds. Her
followers loved the rendering so much that
they began donating to her KO-Fi account
in droves, and eventually she collected
enough money — 700 Canadian dollars — to
buy the dress.
“It was shocking that my followers cared
about me so much, and wanted to see me
happy, that they just gifted this amazing
surprise of a dress to me out of the kindness
of their own hearts,” Ms. Mayeur said.
Harley Ann Carter, 22, a recent envi-
ronmental sciences graduate of George
Washington University, who lives in Wash-
ington and whose pronouns are they and
them, first saw the strawberry dress when
Ms. Holliday wore it on the Grammys red
carpet in January.
By May, Ms. Carter had saved up enough
money from working at a part-time job at a
grocery store on a military base to splurge
on the dress as a birthday present: “It
makes me feel like a princess.”
Serena Pinuelas, 22, a nonbinary ceram-
ist from Portland, Ore., said: “The dress just
really just sparks joy in people during such
an unsettling time. It’s kind of like a symbol
of hope and empowerment, almost.” Mx.
Pinuelas became obsessed with the straw-
berry dress from the minute they first saw it
on the designer’s Instagram.
When it arrived in the mail, “I basically
had a little mini heart attack because I was
so excited,” Mx. Pinuelas said. The experi-
ence of wearing the dress is “probably the
best I’ve felt in a few months.”
Mx. Pinuelas is planning a fancy picnic
with their roommates — one of whom owns
the similarly ethereal Lirika Matoshi star
dress — “where we can all feel like we’re in
‘Pride and Prejudice.’”
Incongruously, a special-occasion gown
has taken off during a period in history
when public events have become verboten.
“It looks like something you’d wear to a ball
or something you’d get married in,” Ms.
Carter said.
But maybe this is precisely the reason for
the dress’s popularity? “It gives off a vibe of
softness and something delicate and unique
in a time of trouble,” Ms. Mayeur said. The
garment suggests to her “fun times in the
future where you can just go out and have
fun and not have to worry about getting
sick.”
The designer, Ms. Matoshi, said the dress
was based on her own recollections of
youth. “It reminds you of better times,” she
said.
But Ms. Matoshi grew up in Kosovo dur-
ing the war, and her childhood was hardly a
frolic through a sweet-smelling strawberry
patch. “I grew up with horror stories of how
much damage the war did to our country,
how women were raped and innocent peo-
ple were massacred,” she said. “My only
dream was that one day I will travel and I
will represent my country and I will help Thoughts of
them as much as I can.”
Ms. Matoshi had expected sales of her di- better times
aphanous frock to fall because of the pan-
demic; instead, she said, sales have in-
ahead, frolicking
creased 1,000 percent since it went on sale
in January. “My whole life is this dress,” she
in a diaphanous
said. gown in a
Not only is the dress the stuff of saccha-
rine dreams, it also looks good on almost pasture or at a
every body type. “It’s such a flattering sil-
houette. It makes anyone look like a straw- fancy ball.
berry fairy,” Ms. Mayeur said. “Everyone
always looks so happy when they’re wear-
ing it because it’s such a treat to wear.”
For those with the time in quarantine, it’s
also readily made at home. “I’m plus size
and they don’t carry it in my size — I’m a
22-24 — so I could never own it, even if I
really wanted to,” said Sarah Hambly, a 26-
year-old content creator from Reno, Nev.
(Ms. Matoshi stocks up to size 18, with
some custom measurements available.)
Ms. Hambly, who describes her style as
“a mix of cottagecore and dark academia,”
sewed a strawberry dress using a free pat-
tern from Mood Fabrics and fabric pur-
chased from Etsy and Silk Baron, and
posted the experience on TikTok. “I wanted
to make a video inspired by the strawberry
dress so people who can’t own the original
but have the skills to sew can at least have Fit for a picnic: the
their own version of the dress,” she said. strawberry dress by the
The relatively high price tag of the origi- designer Lirika Matoshi,
nal may account for the deluge of fan art de- worn by Isabelle Chaput,
picting celebrities like Harry Styles and at left, and a matching
countless anime characters enveloped in shirt worn by Nelson
layers of pink tulle. “I tend to draw the Tiberghien. They are the
clothes I wish I had,” said Ann Marie Coch- creators of the Instagram
rane, 23, a freelance artist from Fort page Young Emperors.
Collins, Colo.
Ms. Cochrane drew Kim Tae-hyung of the
K-pop band BTS in the strawberry dress.
“BTS preaches that they don’t feel clothing
is gendered and they wear a mix of boy’s
and girl’s clothes,” she said, “so I thought it
would be nice to draw Tae in a dress be-
cause he’s a very pretty boy.”
Sara Aguilar, a 21-year-old art student at
the University of Barcelona, found herself
enthralled by the “jellyfishlike silhouette”
of the dress, and drew a pair of lesbian
witches wearing black and pink companion
version. Ms. Aguilar suggests that canny
artists have gravitated toward drawing the
meme of the moment to expose more poten-
tial fans to their work.
With its toothache-inducing sweetness
and naïve charm, the strawberry dress
masks the pain of the current moment with
a sense of hazy enjoyment. It has captured
people’s attention precisely because of its
frivolity, harking back to a more innocent
time when one could roam unencumbered
by the crushing specter of death.
“Even though we are in a pandemic and
money’s tight for a lot of people, myself in-
cluded, one day we’re going to get out of
this and be able to do the things we used to
do, like get fancy brunch or go to the the-
ater,” Ms. Carter said. “Then we’ll be able to
wear it.”

Bustle Digital Group Steps Up to Save W Magazine

Other investors include the
racecar driver Lewis Hamilton
and the model Kaia Gerber.
By JACOB BERNSTEIN
W magazine, the oversize fashion magazine
whose 450,000-person circulation belies an
outsize influence, is changing hands again.
Now to be known as W Media, its new op-
erating partner will be Bustle Digital
Group, a web company whose properties in-
clude Bustle, an online magazine for wom-
en, and Mic, the social-justice-focused web-
site, along with a group of investors that in-
cludes the movie and television producer
Jason Blum, the racecar driver Lewis Ham-
ilton and the model Kaia Gerber, Cindy
Crawford’s daughter, who is just 18.
“We did it all over Zoom,” said W’s editor,
Sara Moonves, who will remain. “None of us
even met in person.”
Ms. Moonves, 35, got help putting togeth-
er the group from the model Karlie Kloss, TIM WALKER, VIA W MAGAZINE
who is also investing. Ms. Moonves met her
in 2009 during a Vogue shoot, Ms. Kloss’s EMILY ASSIRAN/GETTY IMAGES
first, with Annie Leibovitz. COLIN DODGSON, VIA W MAGAZINE

Ms. Moonves was working there at the

time as the assistant to the stylist Phyllis
Posnick.
She became known as a stylist for having
a love for quirky, kaleidoscopic shoots with
an Alice in Wonderland aesthetic — as well
as for being a collector of people. Her father
is Les Moonves, the former head of CBS. In
high school at Harvard-Westlake, she be-
came close friends with the actor Jonah
Hill.
Ms. Moonves met Mr. Blum through W’s
editor at large, Lynn Hirschberg.
Mr. Blum is also a friend of Bryan Gold-
berg, who heads Bustle and founded
Bleacher Report, a sports website that
Turner Broadcasting bought in 2012 for
what Lizzie Widdicombe of The New Yorker
reported was more than $200 million.
The deal is the latest attempt to revive a
title that seemed at death’s door in March,
when Marc Lotenberg, the owner of Future
Media Group, furloughed the majority of
W’s staff and suspended its publication,
blaming the coronavirus.
Just nine months before, he had bought it
from Condé Nast in a deal The New York
Post estimated at $7 million.
In the weeks preceding the shutdown, the
magazine was hard at work on a new issue
whose cover subjects were Dua Lipa and
Megan Thee Stallion.
Mr. Lotenberg was hardly the ideal suitor
for the magazine — his design and fashion
title, Surface magazine, was notorious
among contributors for its late payments —
FROM LEFT: REBECCA SMEYNE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES; DEIDRE SCHOO FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES; ISABEL INFANTES/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE —
GETTY IMAGES; ANDREAS SOLARO/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES; VALERIE MACON/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
but Condé Nast, its parent company since
1999, wasn’t unloading W because things in
the industry were good.
The changing news cycle has rendered
much monthly content obsolete. More and
more, celebrities were turning to Instagram
to promote their own projects (and publish
their own staged photographs).
Mr. Lotenberg’s purchase of W came with
the understanding that he would be able to
pay Condé Nast in installments, said two
Condé Nast employees who requested ano-
nymity because the negotiations were pri-
vate. By January of this year, as Mr. Loten-
berg later acknowledged to The Times, he
was running behind on payments to them
and to vendors.
The pandemic made things worse, mak-
ing him open to finding a buyer.
Most of the magazine’s employees
thought this was a fine idea indeed, and Ms.
Moonves began what she described in an in-
terview as a “complicated undertaking” to
Top left, Bustle Digital
Group’s founder and chief
executive, Bryan Goldberg,
at Bustle’s 2019 Rule
Breakers Festival in
Brooklyn. Above from left:
Sara Moonves, who
coordinated the sale of W
magazine; the model Karlie
Kloss, an investor in the
title, at a W magazine
party; and Lewis Hamilton,
Kaia Gerber and Jason
Blum, who are also
investors in the purchase
of the magazine by Bustle
Digital Group.
locate a buyer.
It turned out there were several.
But the biggest partner will remain Bus-
tle Digital Group; its primary experience is
online, but it was eager to expand into print.
Now it has a title that has won numerous
awards over the last two decades for pho-
tography but that also needs to expand its
digital position. Ms. Moonves said W would
publish six print issues in the next year. The
furloughed staff is back on the job.
The high celebrity quotient of the deal
notwithstanding, she doesn’t want the mag-
azine to turn into another experiment in
synergy, the way Talk Magazine was in 1999
when Tina Brown, the former editor of Van-
ity Fair and The New Yorker, and Harvey
Weinstein started it in collaboration with
Hearst. (Talk folded in 2002.) But Ms.
Moonves also wouldn’t rule out Ms. Gerber
and Ms. Kloss as cover subjects.
“We’ll pick the best people for the maga-
zine,” she said.
THE L ATE ST
AT TEMP T TO
REVIVE A TITLE
THAT SEEMED AT
D EATH’ S D OOR.
Mr. Goldberg is not a universally beloved
figure in media. A story about him last year
in The Columbia Journalism Review de-
scribed him as a kind of “digital slumlord”
known for “snatching up gutted media
properties, bidding low and running them
on cheap labor.”
Elizabeth Spiers, the former editor of
Gawker and The New York Observer, char-
acterized him in a piece for Genius.com as a
practitioner of “lazy entrepreneurial solip-
sism.” (When interviewed by Ms. Widdi-
combe of The New Yorker, he spoke of his
intention to make Bustle the “biggest and
most powerful women’s publication in the
world,” which has not exactly happened.)
But Ms. Moonves said the possibility of
having a consortium of people was an ideal
situation in a sharing economy, a way to
have “more players at the table.”
“If there was ever a moment to figure out
how we do this differently, this is it,” she
said.
D4 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
We’re Out. Thanks for Not Sharing.
Some travelers are content to
keep their summer vacation
adventures to themselves.
By SARAH FIRSHEIN
Next month, Elena Gaudino will fly from
New York to Las Vegas, rent an S.U.V. and
drive to the Grand Canyon, Joshua Tree Na-
tional Park and other desert destinations.
The 10-day trip stands in for her favorite an-
nual tradition — Burning Man, the Nevada
arts festival that was canceled this year be-
cause of the pandemic — and gives her
something to look forward to after a coro-
navirus-induced travel dry spell.
Now she is itching to trade her Brooklyn
apartment for the wide-open spaces of the
American Southwest. But unlike in years
past, Ms. Gaudino will post no requests for
restaurant recommendations on Facebook,
nor will she swap excited texts with friends
detailing her itinerary. Aside from her hus-
band and their two travel companions —
and, now, readers of The New York Times —
Ms. Gaudino has no plans to tell anyone
about her trip.
“Some people believe you’re selfish for
leaving your home unless it’s to get grocer-
ies,” said Ms. Gaudino, 34, a communica-
tions consultant. “I’d rather avoid potential
altercations and I can go into this experi-
ence with a clear mind: I’m taking all the
mandated precautions, I know the risk.”
Sharing the details about where we have
traveled has always been a way to transmit
our values, tastes and means. Look no fur-
ther than the postcards of the 19th century
or the Kodak carousels of the 1960s and ’70s.
Then came Instagram, a decade ago, to tur-
bocharge the practice. And while technol-
ogy has made it easy to keep up with loved
ones during this period of physical distance,
there is one topic being withheld from con-
versations and hidden from social media:
vacations. For a variety of reasons related
to the pandemic, some travelers are content
to let the tree fall in the forest, so to speak,
without a single soul around to hear it.
“In addition to protecting your self-image
and reputation, a main reason people keep
secrets is to protect relationships and avoid
conflicts,” said Michael Slepian, a Columbia
Business School associate professor who
studies secrecy. “People often think, ‘You
know, life would just be easier if I didn’t
have that fight with my parents, so I’m not
going to let them know about my trip.’ ”
In the last couple of years, the concept of
“flight shaming” — originally coined as
“flygskam” by the Swedish climate activist
Greta Thunberg — has gained momentum
as part of an anti-air-travel environmental
movement. Today, midpandemic, general
“travel shaming” could also take off.
Two-thirds of the nearly 4,000 Americans
surveyed in June by Ketchum Travel, a pub-
lic relations agency, said they would judge
others for traveling before it was consid-
ered “safe.” Half expected to censor their
social media posts to avoid being “travel
shamed” themselves. Compare that with
last year, when about 80 percent of the 1,300
respondents in a Skift Research survey said
they posted trip photos on social media.
“The pandemic presents a unique case of
travel entering the moral sphere, because
there are two things that happen when you
travel: The first is that I put myself at risk,
and the second is by virtue of putting myself
at risk, I could be spreading coronavirus to
other people,” said Jillian Jordan, a Harvard
Business School assistant professor who
studies moral psychology.
All it took for Lauren Pearlman, who lives
in Gainesville, Fla., to discover what she
called a friend’s “shame-cation” was some
shrewd digital sleuthing. One hint? A rogue
Instagram post — depicting a lake cottage
in a decidedly vacation-y setting — by the
friend’s husband.
For Americans, Second Passports Are in Demand
The documents have become
quite desirable as the pandemic
ravages the United States.
By VALERIYA SAFRONOVA
Growing up in Chicago, Juliana Calistri was
surrounded by all things Italian: Italian
music, Italian food and Italian language.
Ms. Calistri’s grandparents were raised in
Bagni di Lucca, Italy, and though her father
was born in Chicago, he spoke Italian before
he spoke English.
“If you ask me to bake, I’m going to make
biscotti and lemon knots, not chocolate chip
and oatmeal raisin cookies,” Ms. Calistri, 46,
said from her home in Nashville. “Being
Italian has always been my identity.”
Ms. Calistri, a claims advocate for a bro-
kerage firm, always wanted to live abroad,
but thought gaining Italian citizenship
would be impossible. According to Italian
laws, women could only pass their citizen-
ship to their children after 1948, when Ita-
ly’s current constitution came into effect.
Ms. Calistri’s father was born in 1947, so he
did not inherit citizenship from his mother.
His father gave his Italian citizenship up
when he was naturalized in the United
States.
In May, Ms. Calistri began working with a
life coach, who pushed her to look up the
laws again. Ms. Calistri discovered that
since a landmark ruling was made in 2009,
people have been contesting the 1948 ma-
ternal lineage law in court, and winning.
She decided to apply. “The pandemic re-
ally allowed me to get to basics,” Ms. Calistri
said. “You look at what you need in life and
what’s most important. It’s my family and
not things. This identity and this culture is
exactly who and what I am.”
When Ms. Calistri contacted Italian Citi-
“I feel like it compromises our friendship
because it exposes very different philo-
sophical approaches to the pandemic,” said
Ms. Pearlman, 37, a history professor at the
University of Florida. “And if you’re going to
go on vacation, then own it and say that you
are. If you don’t feel like you can advertise
it, then obviously you aren’t positive it’s the
ethical thing to do.”
Dr. Jordan said the pandemic, thanks to
its unprecedented nature in modern times
and patchwork of geography-based restric-
tions, remained a gray area for ethical
norms. Whereas most people would agree
that shoplifting is unacceptable, for exam-
ple, so far there is no universal consensus
about whether to travel.
“Some people think any trips of any kind
are bad; others are off flying to hot spots,”
Dr. Jordan said. “If you think it’s fine to trav-
el and some people don’t think it’s fine, but
you’re not persuaded by the opposing argu-
ment, you may feel motivated to hide your
behavior.”
That can be true even when travelers feel
confident they’re taking proper health pre-
zenship Assistance, an agency that helps
people acquire Italian passports, she joined
hundreds of other people who have reached
out to the agency during the last few
months, said Marco Permunian, the
founder. “We have seen the number of peo-
ple who contacted us between May and
now increase by five times from last year,”
Mr. Permunian said. His team of 48 is over-
whelmed. “We’re getting so many requests,
we’re not even able to handle them all.”
Ms. Calistri plans to move to Italy with
her 9-year-old daughter and her 73-year-
old mother as soon as she receives her new
passport. “It’s such a me-first attitude here,
and there’s no sense of unity,” she said.
As the pandemic has ravaged the United
States, some Americans are finding that a
second citizenship or permanent residency
has a renewed appeal. “Even the most ba-
sic things have become politicized,” said
Anjelica Triola, 34, a director of marketing
at Wethos, a company that helps
freelancers grow their businesses, who also
has Italian heritage.
She brought up protective masks an ex-
ample. “My father’s parents came here to
be free, and there is an entire generation
that are trying to go back now to pursue
similar freedoms,” she said.
Some see it as a kind of insurance policy,
a way to ensure freedom of movement in
the future. Newfound free time at home has
enabled others to engage in a laborious ap-
plication process they have had on their to-
do lists for years.
The Golden Visa
There are two paths to acquiring a second
passport that don’t require living or work-
ing abroad: spending a lot of money or
proving that you have inherited an ances-
tor’s nationality.
Many countries offer residence visas to
cautions. Ms. Gaudino plans to stay in
Airbnbs and campgrounds; except for gro-
cery shopping — while wearing a face mask
— she will not participate in any public in-
door activities. To prepare for a 14-day quar-
antine upon her return, required by New
York for anyone coming from states like Ar-
izona and California, she has stocked her
fridge and pantry with long-lasting provi-
sions.
Catharine Jones, 39, also prioritized hy-
giene and safety when in June she drove
with her family from their home in Roches-
ter, Minn., to a lake about three and a half
hours north. They stayed in-state, wore
masks and bunked in a self-contained cabin.
Watching her children — ages 2, 4 and 7
— play happily by the lake at dusk, she did
what many parents might do: She took a
photograph and posted it on Instagram.
“Right after I posted it, I thought, ‘Wait a
second,’” said Ms. Jones, a journalist. “ ‘Am
I going to be judged for doing this? Are peo-
ple going to say, “Wait, you left your
Elena Gaudino, top, house?”’ The second thing that ran through
on her terrace in my mind was an awareness of how lucky we
Brooklyn, with the are: to travel, to be able to spend money, to
camping gear she will have a leisurely weekend.”
use on her vacation. Though she was not chided for that post,
Above, instead of a Ms. Jones realized that she wants to keep
wedding with 350 her next trip — another private in-state
guests in Atlanta, road trip with little, if any, contact with
Sonia Chopra had a strangers — to herself.
very quiet event in “We’re living in this moment when long-
upstate New York. standing inequities are particularly stark
and the dividing line is between people
whose lives remain relatively normal and
people whose lives have been completely
turned upside down by this pandemic,” she
said. “I feel like vacation pictures signal to
the world: ‘Hey! This isn’t so bad!’ And it
has been really that bad for many, many,
many people.”
The question of what, if anything, to pub-
lish on social media is even more complex
for travel influencers, whose incomes rely
on trips. Some are concerned about back-
lash from an audience of thousands; others
are mulling over how to depict travel re-
sponsibly.
people who invest in them, a type of pro-
gram that is colloquially referred to as “The
Golden Visa.” Some nations, like Cyprus, St.
Lucia, Grenada, Malta, Turkey and Monte-
negro, offer citizenship to people who buy
property within their borders or invest.
Every country has its own rules. In Cy-
prus, the government takes about eight to
12 months to process a passport application
made through investment, whereas in
Montenegro it can take as little as three
months, according to Henley & Partners, a
British-based law firm that advises high-
net-worth clients on these types of pro-
grams.
“The pandemic has been terrible in so
many ways,” said Paddy Blewer, the direc-
tor of Henley & Partners U.K. and the group
director of public relations. “For lots of our
Many citizens clients, it has been the tipping point for, ‘I’ve
been thinking about doing this, but now I re-
who have ally understand how significant volatility
can be around the world and I need op-
European roots tions.’”
are eligible. Mr. Blewer said that Henley & Partners
has seen one and a half times as many in-
quiries from January to April of this year as
during the same period last year. Those who
secure the services of Henley & Partners
pay 20,000 euros, or $24,000, to €500,000,
depending on the complexity of the case.
Families are considering eligibility costs,
speed of application approval, and educa-
tion and health care policies in the various
countries.
Freedom of movement is also important.
Arton Capital, an advisory firm specializing
in investment-based citizenship or residen-
cy, has a tool that ranks passports based on
different factors, like the mobility they af-
ford their holders. Look up the U.S. passport
on the Passport Index today, and you will
see that Americans can travel easily to 87
countries. In 2019, that number was 171.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHANG W. LEE/THE NEW YORK TIMES
“As travel storytellers, our influence can
sometimes be a double-edged sword, be-
cause while we may have influenced some-
one to travel to a certain place, we can’t con-
trol what they do when they get there,” said
Oneika Raymond, a New York-based TV
host and travel expert. “Keeping trips qui-
eter might just keep intense wanderlust,
and subsequently these transgressions, at
bay.”
Although there are obvious benefits to
digitally detaching — Ms. Gaudino, for one,
is looking forward to a trip without a mad
dash for Wi-Fi — sneaky trips may have
other drawbacks.
“Secrecy can still be hard even in the ab-
sence of shame and guilt, because you want
to share your experiences with others,” Dr.
Slepian said. “Even before the vacation you
can get a lot of joy just from talking about it,
and this is the real reason secrecy is so diffi-
cult: It deprives yourself from a way to con-
nect with other people.”
Yet it was secrecy that allowed Sonia
Chopra, a Brooklyn-based food editor, to
find joy in her wedding last month, a week-
end in upstate New York in lieu of what had
been planned as a blowout bash in Atlanta.
Out of the 350 original guests, only her par-
ents and a couple of close friends knew
about the trip.
She didn’t want to endure a barrage of
questions: Did she go away? (Yes; to Tarry-
town, N.Y.) Did she stay at a hotel? (Yes;
Tarrytown House Estate, which has a slew
of Covid-19 measures.) Did she and her hus-
band dine out? (Yes; at Blue Hill at Stone
Barns, an upscale restaurant offering a con-
tactless outdoor “picnic” where everything
is ordered online, including bottled cock-
tails.)
“Although we were being very safe and
very careful, we wanted to make sure that
nothing put a pall on our day,” said Ms.
Chopra, 31. “We’re taking this very seri-
ously, but people in very well-meaning
ways can sometimes ask questions that can
make you feel badly, and we were trying re-
ally hard to make sure the weekend felt spe-
cial.”
“The drop of American passports over 50
percent in terms of mobility was a wake-up
call for a lot of families,” said Armand Ar-
ton, the founder of Arton Capital. “The al-
mighty U.S. passport is not as powerful as it
used to be.”
Time and Patience
People who are born in the United States
are automatically citizens. In many other
countries, nationality is passed from par-
ents to their children. In terms of dual citi-
zenship, this has meant people who are de-
scendants of immigrants from some coun-
tries can claim citizenship in those coun-
tries if they can prove that the lineage has
not been broken over a certain number of
generations.
Descendants of Latvian citizens who fled
the country during the German or Soviet
occupations, for example, can apply to have
their citizenship reinstated there today,
said Evgeny Belyaev, whose law firm offers
citizenship and immigration services in
Riga, a city in Latvia. People of Italian de-
scent, of whom there are about 16.5 million
in the United States, can restore their Ital-
ian citizenship through parents, grandpar-
ents and even great-grandparents.
Applying for heritage-based citizenship
has become popular among Americans
with roots in some countries. But in most of
the world, heritage-based citizenship is
more difficult or less advantageous for a
U.S. passport holder to obtain, because na-
tionality is passed only from parent to child,
because the country does not allow dual cit-
izenship (which means the American
would have to renounce her U.S. citizen-
ship) or because the second passport does
not offer benefits like expanded travel op-
tions or free education.
The practice of establishing a second na-
tionality has risen in the past few months.

Selling Moisturizer With a Heart
CONTINUED FROM PAGE D1
There’s an expectation of comment on sus-
tainability, social justice, police reform and,
soon, a presidential election.
Customers demand it, especially those
under 25 who make up Gen Z, also known as
the activist generation.
“It’s a group that has big spending
power,” said Mary Dillon, the chief execu-
tive of Ulta. “This is going to be the group
that’s driving spending and decisions for
many years to come.
“They’re super-influential. All you have
to do is look at the racial injustice discussion
and dialogue we’ve had in the last few
months. Gen Z is leading the way.”
Where Does Gen Z Buy Beauty?
Ulta has become the go-to purveyor of
teenage beauty, according to data from the
investment bank Piper Sandler. Of the 5,200
teenagers surveyed by the firm, 39 percent
said Ulta was their top destination for
beauty purchases, followed by Sephora
with 24 percent. Spring 2019 was the first
time Ulta was crowned the favorite beauty
destination for teenagers.
How did a store once associated with
cheap drugstore makeup and suburban
strip malls become so popular with this
demographic?
Because it’s just about the only place you
can find Gen Z staples like Morphe, Kylie
Cosmetics and Sugar Rush, Tarte’s little sis-
ter line, IRL. Ulta also sells drugstore sta-
ples from E.L.F. Cosmetics and Maybelline
next to more expensive brands like Anasta-
sia Beverly Hills, an alluring proposition to
Gen Z-ers who are value conscious and mix
high and low.
Amaya Smith, a founder of Brown Beauty
Co-op, a store that sells and incubates
Black-owned brands in Washington, has
had success with brands that hone in on a
trend or practice that’s specific to Gen Z,
like Baby Tress, an edge styler.
“My niece is generally not going out of the
house without her edges styled,” Ms. Smith
said. The edge styler, she said, is an item
that resonates with teenagers because it
comes in pastel colors, it’s affordable ($15)
and is a multifunctional. (It’s a brush and
comb in one with a pointed tip for parting.)
“Everyone was using toothbrushes before,”
she said.
Expensive Doesn’t Mean Better
This demographic’s prom was canceled,
they don’t know if they’re going to college
this month and chances are they grew up
with at least one parent out of work during
the recession of 2008. Gen Z-ers pore over
ingredient labels and reviews online; they
want to know what they’re putting on their
skin and what it’s doing for them.
“If something is cheap, it’s not necessar-
ily bad,” said Rogelio Munoz-Franco, 15. “If
something is expensive, it’s not necessarily
good.”
This sentiment was unanimous among
the 13 people ages 12 to 23 who were inter-
viewed for this article. Many are regular us-
ers of the Inkey List and the Ordinary,
which sells serums for about $7, or follow
recommendations from the Gen Z skin care
oracle Hyram Yarbro, the creator of the
Skin Care by Hyram.
Mr. Yarbro, 24, has had a meteoric rise.
He went from having just under 100,000 Tik-
Tok followers in March to having more than
five million today. He credits the spike in
skin care interest during quarantine and his
focus on reviewing cheaper products,
which he said were not much different, in
terms of ingredients, from “extreme lux-
ury” items.
“Ingredients don’t lie,” said Mr. Yarbro,
who gained the trust of his young viewers
through honest reviews. Last year he told
viewers he had reservations about Kylie
“I see how European people have really
stepped up to take a collective problem and
work together toward achieving the goal,
i.e. of getting rid of the virus,” said Susan
Periharos, who began her application
process for Greek citizenship about four
weeks ago. “The pandemic pretty much
clinched it for me.”
Ms. Periharos said she is not fleeing the
United States, but she sees certain advan-
tages of having a second passport: She and
her husband will be able to travel to Greece
even if there are entry bans for Americans
in the future, and with a passport from a
country in the Schengen zone, her children
will be able to live and work in most of Eu-
rope.
Andreas Politis, who works as a manag-
ing associate for Christina Mantas & Asso-
ciates, which is helping Ms. Periharos with
her case, said that the firm has seen about a
threefold increase in the number of people
who want to apply for a Greek passport.
“A lot of it is people who come back to
Greece almost every year, and they want to
make sure they can come back to their fam-
ilies in the future,” Mr. Politis said. Most
American citizens are currently banned
from entering Greece because of the coro-
navirus. “Traveling to Greece with a U.S.
passport is usually very easy. Before, it did-
n’t make sense to apply for a Greek pass-
port. Now it does.”
Mr. Politis said that Christina Mantas &
Associates charges clients seeking Greek
citizenship 600 euros, or $700, to €2,000 for
the firm’s help. The process can take from
three months to three years. Mr. Permuni-
an’s agency charges an average client about
$6,000 for support from beginning to the
end.
As part of a heritage-based application,
people usually have to submit birth certifi-
cates, naturalization records from the
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Catering to consumers who are ‘going to be the group that’s
driving spending and decisions for many years to come.’
Skin’s exfoliating scrub because it was
made with walnuts, which can be abrasive.
He doesn’t shy away from being critical
when reviewing items from sponsored
brands.
“There were a few products that I went
pretty hard on,” Mr. Yarbro said of last
year’s paid partnership with the Korean
skin care label Purito.
No More Full Beats
Gen Z-ers possess a distinct set of beauty
and grooming habits, attitudes and buying
patterns. Many gravitate toward an unvar-
nished aesthetic from brands that are pro-
gressive in the imagery they use. Teen-
agers don’t want a “full beat,” or the over-
done Instagram face that defined a genera-
tion of millennial influencers who were one
cosmetic procedure away from looking like
a Kardashian.
“Their intellectual take on beauty is di-
vorced from the millennial idea, which is
Instagram filter, having the perfect lip and
looking like an idealized beauty,” said Lucie
Greene, the founder of Light Years, a con-
sultancy.
Ms. Greene pointed to the singer Billie
Eilish, crediting the 18-year-old with inspir-
ing a “competitive creativity” — the antith-
esis of airbrushing or perfection.
“It’s not about the male gaze,” Ms.
Greene said. “It’s her expression of her-
self.”
This is why the very millennial-pink
brand Glossier is such a hit with this crowd.
When building her company, Emily
Weiss, the Glossier founder and chief exec-
utive, steered clear of projecting a singular
beauty ideal. Instead of coaxing customers
to look like a model or celebrity, Ms. Weiss
encouraged them to be “more like you”
(but maybe a slightly dewier version).
“One of the appeals of Glossier is that it’s
all supposed to enhance your natural
beauty,” said Abby Kwok, 16.
Ms. Zhong, the Gen Z investor, said:
“Gen Z is like, ‘How can I be the realest I
can be?’ In fact, the messier it looks, the
United States, and marriage and divorce
records. The process takes time and pa-
tience.
“With Covid, the world has paused a little
bit,” said Bianca Ottone, the founder of My
Italian Family, which has been providing
citizenship services since 2001. Ms. Ottone
said the number of people contacting her
company has gone up by about 50 percent
during the past six months. “Many people
contacted us saying, remember we dis-
SKIN DEEP
more real they are, the more real they
seem.”
Think About Beauty Differently
Groundbreaking companies are always
contrarian, but what’s considered contrar-
ian is ever evolving. Probably no one would
consider minimal-pink branding and fresh-
faced “no-makeup makeup” a groundbreak-
ing idea, but what Ms. Weiss, 35, set out to
do nearly six years ago — create a beauty
company sold entirely online — was un-
heard-of. So was the way Glossier talked to
and treated its consumers, communicating
and operating as a “beauty BFF.”
“What’s interesting about Glossier is we
just hold up a mirror, and we’re like, ‘We’re
here to make you look more like you,’ ” Ms.
Weiss said.
Olamide Olowe, 23, the co-founder and
chief executive of Topicals, a new skin care
line designed to treat conditions like ecze-
ma and hyperpigmentation, has a similar
ethos. Ms. Olowe raised more than $2 mil-
lion in venture capital funding, with invest-
ors that include the chief executives of All-
birds, Warby Parker and Casper; Issa Rae;
Hannah Bronfman; and Bozoma Saint
John, the chief marketing officer of Netflix.
“The brands of yesterday focused on as-
ILLUSTRATIONS BY MEITING SONG
‘Gen Z brands focus on celebrating
you in the way that you are.’
piration in making you want to be some-
body,” said Ms. Olowe, who is Black. “Gen Z
brands focus on celebrating you in the way
that you are.”
In the 1990s and early aughts, MAC Cos-
metics was centered on diversity, self-ex-
pression and gender and sexual fluidity —
radical ideas at the time that deviated from
the beauty norms promoted by mainstream
brands. The makeup artist brand was thriv-
ing with the drag scene, while millennials
were buying Clinique’s classic “3-Step Skin
CHIARA VERCESI
cussed this in 2018 or 2019?’” she said. “It
was in their pipeline and now is the time to
pick it up.”
A Different Lifestyle
Ms. Triola, the director of marketing for
Wethos, started looking into getting Italian
citizenship in 2018 but let the project fall to
the wayside after running into some diffi-
culties with obtaining her grandparents’
marriage certificate and with mismatched
N D5
Care System” (plus a free gift with pur-
chase) at department store counters.
But as its consumers aged and depart-
ment store beauty counters were replaced
by Sephora and Ulta, MAC struggled to be
relevant. Last year, Drew Elliott was
brought in as the global creative director to
make the brand cool again. (He is the per-
son responsible for the break-the-internet
issue of Paper magazine with Kim Kar-
dashian West’s glossy bare backside on the
cover.)
One of his first projects was the MAC Un-
derground collection that came out during
Pride month, the kickoff of a series of lim-
ited-edition drops. Each of the 1,000 units,
which are numbered, sold out in 55 minutes,
according to the company.
“They’re moving at the speed of the inter-
net, not at the speed of a supply chain,” Mr.
Elliott, 39, said of Gen Z. “To just get some-
thing out into the market within three
months — for a makeup brand, that’s bon-
kers.”
MAC in its heyday was the embodiment
of Gen Z values today. Except to this gener-
ation, there is nothing radical about self-ex-
pression or fluid sexuality, identity or gen-
der. Millennials talk about being gender flu-
id and accepting, but Gen Z is the first gen-
eration to live the promise of those values,
said Shireen Jiwan, the founder and chief
executive of Sleuth Brand Consulting,
“Genuinely, off the tip of their tongues,
roll the pronouns anybody asks them to use,
and there’s no agita about it,” she said.
“They were raised in a world where every-
body is already a mix of 10 different races.
Nobody asks, ‘What are you?’ ”
Invest in TikTok and TikTok Creators
Kory Marchisotto, the chief marketing offi-
cer of E.L.F. Cosmetics, was hired last year
to modernize the struggling (at the time)
makeup brand. The company has always
been vegan and cruelty free, with most of its
products costing around $5 — important
values to Gen Z-ers — but it wasn’t publi-
cized enough. Nor was the fact that “E.L.F.”
stood for “Eyes Lips Face.”
The brand invested heavily in a TikTok
campaign to communicate this to Gen Z us-
ers, many of whom were born at or around
the same time E.L.F. Cosmetics was started
in 2004. The Eyes Lips Face Challenge was
introduced on TikTok, and to date, the #eye-
slipsface hashtag has six billion views, and
there are 4.5 million pieces of user-generat-
ed content with the hashtag.
Morphe, too, is turning its attention from
traditional YouTubers to TikTok stars.
The brand had success with influencer
collaborations with YouTubers like James
Charles and Jeffree Star — it has since sev-
ered ties with Mr. Star because of racist
comments that surfaced online — but knew
it needed to do something different to reach
Gen Z.
The company just released another label,
Morphe 2, which is touted by Charli D’Ame-
lio, the owner of the most-followed account
on TikTok, and her older sister, Dixie. In-
stead of Morphe’s boldly colored signature
makeup and black packaging, Morphe 2 is
fresher, lighter and focused on “natural
beauty.” Its packaging is all white.
“I don’t really love the look of beauty in-
fluencers like James Charles, that sort of
makeup that’s super-heavy with really
bright eye shadow and contouring,” said
Anya Dua, 16, the founder of Gen Z Identity
Lab, an online platform that fosters discus-
sions about identity.
Cecilia Granda-Scott, 16, a classmate of
Ms. Dua’s, said the dramatic makeup popu-
larized by Ms. Charles and Mr. Star clashed
with Gen Z’s “minimalist” views.
“It’s very telling that Morphe’s sub-brand
for Gen Z is all about being more natural,”
Ms. Granda-Scott said.
names on documents from the United
States and from Italy. But recently, Ms. Tri-
ola decided to pick her application up again.
“It feels as if there is more freedom if you
are an E.U. citizen,” said Ms. Triola, who
lives in Los Angeles. “I haven’t pursued
graduate school because I can’t justify
putting myself $100,000 in debt to get a mas-
ter’s degree or a Ph.D. If I were to do that as
an E.U. citizen, that could be entirely free.”
Affordable health care and guaranteed
paid parental leave are other advantages to
having an Italian citizenship, she said. Ms.
Trioladoes not expect to see these benefits
in the United States anytime soon. The cur-
rent political atmosphere, she said, makes
her “skeptical that we will achieve the
things we need to achieve to live comfort-
ably here.”
Dave Gallo, 73, a retiree in San Francisco,
began the application process for Italian cit-
izenship in 2017 and was approved in Febru-
ary of this year. The pandemic has con-
firmed that he made the right choice, he
said. Despite the age difference, his reason-
ing is not all that different from Ms. Triola’s.
“In San Francisco, there’s nothing for old
people except nursing homes,” Mr. Gallo
said. After visiting Italy for the first time in
2015, Mr. Gallo discovered seven cousins
who live there. As soon as he is able to, Mr.
Gallo plans to move to the town in north Ita-
ly from which his grandfather came to
America. There is little traffic there, the cost
of living is cheaper, it is surrounded by vine-
yards, and Mr. Gallo said he found it easier
to connect with people there.
“The pandemic has created so much un-
certainty that no one knows what life will be
like for the next 10 to 15 years,” Mr. Gallo
said. “For an old person, it’ll be even more
difficult. Where do I want to spend the rest
of my life?” For Mr. Gallo, the answer is
clear: Italy.
D6 N THE NEW YORK TIMES, THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2020
Treasures of Block Island
CONTINUED FROM PAGE D1
the current year) are colored. Found floats
are registered on the island’s website to
keep track of what’s still at large. Orbivores
are held to an honor system: only one float
per person per year, to keep things fair.
FOR 2020, MR. HORTON felt inspired to create
something beautiful and lighthearted in a
year that has been anything but. This year’s
No. 1 is a colorful coronavirus particle,
which he calls the Rona. A typical glass float
takes 10 minutes to make, but the Rona took
Mr. Horton several hours.
The orbivores went wild, asking whether
he would make more available to buy. As a
compromise, Mr. Horton created a second
Rona for a raffle, with proceeds helping to
pay for more floats.
The Glass Float Project (which costs an
estimated $20,000 per year) is funded
largely by donations with help from the
Block Island Tourism Council. Mr. Horton
has been offered plenty of opportunities to
sponsor the project, but he refuses to com-
mercialize what is an art adventure for the
people.
While orb hunting is a year-round activi-
ty, Mr. Horton starts each summer “season”
by packing a box of 100 sturdy glass floats
onto his sailboat and heading to Block Is-
land. He is easily recognizable and highly
accessible, through both his glass studio
and an online group he started. The orbi-
vores openly adore him, which has some
drawbacks when it comes to covert opera-
tions like hiding.
“These orbivores know what he drives,
what he sails; they constantly see him,” said
Jessica Willi, the director of the tourism
council. “If he’s coming to Block Island,
they’re coming to Block Island. Poor guy
can’t go anywhere.”
Ms. Willi is one of several top-secret
friends Mr. Horton trusts to help hide orbs.
Over the years, she has had to make some
life adjustments. She uses a different car
when she hides, so nobody recognizes her.
She tries not to post photos of her leisure
walks, because her more suspicious friends
have rushed in after her.
“Everyone on the trails thinks that if
you’re not hunting, you’re hiding,” she said.
“The orbivores have their special walking
sticks they poke in the bushes, because
there’s poison ivy. They have their water
bottles. They pack lunches. They’re
prepared.”
To dodge them, Ms. Willi has occasionally
ventured out in the dead of night with only a
headlamp. Darkness didn’t stop Katie Nel-
son, 53, a retired sales and marketing direc-
tor from Montana who once hunted under a
full moon with her flashlight in the hopes
that the light would reflect off any glass. (It
rained, and she returned empty-handed.)
Hiding spots are up to those doing the
hiding, outside of some logistical rules that
developed over time. There is no hiding on
private property, near the school or in any
environmentally sensitive areas. Every-
thing else is up to chance. Even Mr. Horton
has no idea where most of the orbs are. He
prefers it that way, to keep himself honest
when orbivores attempt to pry him for
information.
“Sometimes I’ll put a smaller one in a
fisherman’s glove on the beach, or in a lob-
ster pot,” Mr. Horton said.
“Twice, I’ve dropped some off the ferry so
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JILLIAN FREYER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
they’d wash up on Block Island. One was
found later on Long Island,” he said. “At that
point, am I littering? Is that cool or is it bad?
I don’t know.”
Mr. Horton likes hiding spots where the
glass orbs are easy to see but hard to re-
trieve. He frequently hides some in an is-
land cannon, because they roll all the way to
the back.
Tricia Serio, 50, a professor and dean at
the University of Massachusetts Amherst,
who lives in Leverett, Mass., was driving
back from an ice cream date with her hus-
band and two sons when her boys suddenly
insisted that she stop the car near a cannon.
One hour (and lots of screaming) later, the
mosquito-bitten foursome were still stand-
ing around in the dark debating how to get a
float out.
“I went to our rental house and brought
back a ladle and some duct tape, which did
the trick,” Ms. Serio said. “Everyone was ec-
static. Later that night we remembered that
they’re called floats and that we should
have poured water into the cannon.”
After coming home orb-less on his first is-
land visit in 2017, Bill Holbrook spent hours
devising a “divide and conquer” strategy.
He compiled five years’ worth of data from
the town website, built queries to generate
statistically relevant hiding spots and creat-
ed a heat map of the island.
In 2018, he covered 22 miles in 48 hours,
with no luck. In 2019, after another unsuc-
cessful day left him physically and emotion-
ally exhausted, his girlfriend, Lisa, sug-
gested they head back via a stretch of sand
near Payne’s Dock. There, Lisa casually
found an orb hidden in an old tire.
“I now believe it’s more about karma than
data,” said Mr. Holbrook, 52, a marketing di-
Clockwise from top left: Eben
Horton distributing his orbs
around Block Island; Mr.
Horton and his wife, Jennifer
Nauck, preparing an orb for
hiding; Mr. Horton giving one
of his orbs some light; and
another orb in the works.
The floats seem to appear unexpectedly,
when you’ve lost your will or when you need
a little wink from the universe.
rector from South Weymouth, Mass. “Was
this little stretch of sand on my heat map?
No way. Was this little treasure meant to be
found by Lisa? Absolutely.”
This is a common theme of orbivore
stories: The floats appear when you least
expect them to, or when you’ve lost your
will, or when you need a little wink from the
universe.
Last winter, Isaac Ariel, 67, a retired I.T.
professional and a resident of the island,
casually found a No. 61 float on the beach,
two days before the 61st birthday of his orbi-
vore wife, Susan.
“Finding a float is a bit like finding love,”
said Ms. Holmes, a retired educator from
Newburyport, Mass., who honeymooned on
the island. “You have to be open to it and not
try too hard, but then when the moment is
right it finds you.”
Ms. Holmes found her first float unex-
pectedly after days of intensely scouring
the trails. She spotted a snake in the grass
one afternoon. After a brief moment of
panic, she realized it was wrapped around a
float, like it was some kind of glass apple in
the Garden of Eden.
Mr. Horton likes to say that the point to all
of this is there is no point. It’s about the jour-
ney, being outside, enjoying the island. Or-
bivores may be obsessive, but they take
that to heart. Some go so far as to restage
floats they’ve found for their loved ones,
like grandparents who can no longer walk
far, or small children with high hopes.
In 2018, Nicole Dorfman’s boyfriend at
the time, Mark, hatched a plan to propose
via orb. He ordered an inscribed float
through Mr. Horton’s studio, then sneaked it
into a spot alongside some canoes at Fresh
Pond.
“I found it and obviously said yes, but I
knew it didn’t truly count since it wasn’t a
real orb,” said Ms. Dorfman, 27, a third-
grade teacher from Schaumburg, Ill., who
has been searching since 2012. Last July, af-
ter an anniversary dinner celebration, she
and her family stopped by Island Cemetery
on a whim. She found an orb between a rock
wall and a tree.
The orb hunting Facebook group (started
by Mr. Horton) is a rarity on social media:
thousands of strangers with a common ob-
session and no off-topic rants. It is a hyper-
focused, passionate community that some-
how — even in 2020 — remains supportive
and positive.
People post photo updates of their seek-
ing missions. Fellow orbivores celebrate
their successes and lament their failures.
Occasionally, Mr. Horton will pop in with a
clue, which he believes ruins the fun, but the
group disagrees so he acquiesces.
Leah Melius, a 38-year-old physical ther-
apist from Essex, Conn., has been orb hunt-
ing with her family since 2012. One day in
2017, her phone dinged with a new hint on
the Facebook page, where Mr. Horton had
posted a photo with a jetty she recognized.
They piled into two cars and sped across the
island from Mohegan Bluffs to Charleston
Beach.
“We felt like we were on ‘The Amazing
Race’; we couldn’t believe our eyes when it
was still there!” said Ms. Melius, whose
mother now displays the float proudly in
her living room. “Everyone was cheering
and high-five-ing and crying tears of joy.”
JOSIE LAWRENCE, 15, has been orb hunting
since she was 9. She was unsuccessful until
2018, when after an online hint and some
quick sleuthing, she and her mother raced
over to the beach near the North Light light-
house. With no orb in sight, they watched a
seal play offshore instead. On the way back
to the car, Josie noticed something glinting
inside a log.
“At that moment I started crying,” she
said. “Though it took a lot of time and hard
work, all the summers of long walks and
hikes have been completely worth it.” Mr.
Horton and his hiders enjoy keeping up
with the orbivores online, where they get to
put a face to a found float. He thinks a lot
about how this project took on an effortless
life of its own and why it resonates so deeply
with so many.
“I think people want answers for every-
thing in life now,” he said. “The thing with
the glass floats is there are no answers. You
don’t find them, they find you.”
“It’s all just a magical thing. People want
answers, but people need some magic.”