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VOL. CLXVII . . . No. 57,913 © 2018 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, MONDAY, MARCH 26, 2018 U(D54G1D)y+#!%!#!=!{ A proposal to change to a skills-based immigration system could shrink a primary source of workers for the grow- ing senior-care industry. PAGE A11 NATIONAL A11-16 Needs That Immigrants Fulfill A pothole epidemic has upended the streets of Rome, the city that built an empire on its roads. PAGE A4 INTERNATIONAL A4-10 Striking Fear Into S.U.V.s Amazon now collects sales tax in every state that has one, but a report faults its local tax collection. PAGE B1 Cities Want Amazon Tax Share David Leonhardt PAGE A23 EDITORIAL, OP-ED A22-23 tarian facing corruption charges, who posted a photograph with the president on Facebook. This type of access has value on the international stage, where the perception of support from an American president — or even a photo with one — can benefit for- eign leaders back home. Mr. Broidy was open about his business interests, but the admin- istration made no effort to curtail his offers of access to clients or prospective clients. Yet Mr. Broidy was so ag- gressive, some associates said, that they warned him to tone down his approach for fear that he might run afoul of the president, clients or American lobbying and anti-corruption laws. As with so many other political conventions, Mr. Trump has up- ended the traditional system of ac- cess to the president, among the most prized chits in Washington. WASHINGTON — For Elliott Broidy, Donald J. Trump’s presi- dential campaign represented an unparalleled political and busi- ness opportunity. An investor and defense con- tractor, Mr. Broidy became a top fund-raiser for Mr. Trump’s cam- paign when most elite Republican donors were keeping their dis- tance, and Mr. Trump in turn over- looked the lingering whiff of scan- dal from Mr. Broidy’s 2009 guilty plea in a pension fund bribery case. After Mr. Trump’s election, Mr. Broidy quickly capitalized, mar- keting his Trump connections to politicians and governments around the world, including some with unsavory records, according to interviews and documents ob- tained by The New York Times. Mr. Broidy suggested to clients and prospective customers of his Virginia-based defense contract- ing company, Circinus, that he could broker meetings with Mr. Trump, his administration and congressional allies. Mr. Broidy’s ability to leverage his political connections to boost his business illuminates how Mr. Trump’s unorthodox approach to governing has spawned a new breed of access peddling in the swamp he vowed to drain. Mr. Broidy offered tickets to V.I.P. inauguration events, includ- ing a candlelight dinner attended by Mr. Trump, to a Congolese strongman accused of funding a lavish lifestyle with public re- sources. He helped arrange a meeting with Republican senators and offered a trip to Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private Florida re- sort, for an Angolan politician. And he arranged an invitation to a party at Mr. Trump’s Washington hotel for a Romanian parliamen- The fund-raiser Elliott Broidy with his wife, Robin, in 2012. ALEX J. BERLINER/ABIMAGES, VIA A.P. As President Trump heads into one of the most critical phases of the special counsel’s investiga- tion, his personal legal team has shrunk to essentially just one member, and he is struggling to find any top lawyers willing to represent him. Working for a president is usu- ally seen as a dream job. But lead- ing white-collar lawyers in Wash- ington and New York have repeat- edly spurned overtures to take over the defense of Mr. Trump, a mercurial client who often ignores his advisers’ guidance. In some cases, lawyers’ firms have blocked any talks, fearing a back- lash that would hurt business. The president lost two lawyers in just the past four days, includ- ing one who had been on board for less than a week. Joseph diGenova, a longtime Washington lawyer who has pushed theories on Fox News that the F.B.I. made up evidence against Mr. Trump, left the team on Sunday. He had been hired last Monday, three days before the head of the president’s personal legal team, John Dowd, quit after determining that the president was not listening to his advice. Mr. Trump had also considered hiring Mr. diGenova’s wife, Victoria Toensing, but she will also not join the team. That leaves the president with just one personal lawyer who is working full time on the special counsel’s investigation as Mr. Continued on Page A14 Defense Team For President: Army of One By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT and MAGGIE HABERMAN JOHN MOORE/GETTY IMAGES A photographer has spent years capturing various scenes such as a Border Patrol agent in Texas chasing a man in 2014. Page A6. Covering the Story of Immigration, From All Sides BEIJING — Ms. Choi was wor- ried about her sister in North Ko- rea. The last time they spoke, two months earlier, her sister had sounded desperate. She said she had been imprisoned and beaten, and could no longer bear the tor- ment. She said she wanted to flee and join Ms. Choi in South Korea. She said she would carry poi- son, to kill herself if she were cap- tured. For Ms. Choi, 63, a grandmother with large brown eyes and a steely fortitude, getting the rest of her family to South Korea was the most important thing left in life. She had fled North Korea 10 years ago. Her son had made it out too, as had her sister’s daughter, now a hairdresser living near her in Seoul, the South’s flashy capital. Ms. Choi longed to be reunited with the sister, a 50-year-old dressmaker with her own home business, and also the nephew she had left behind. She wanted to get them to safety, out of the reach of the government that had arrested her husband, her brother-in-law and her son-in-law on suspicions of helping people leave. They had been targeted as enemies of the state and were never seen again. One evening this past summer, Ms. Choi got the news she had been waiting for. As she opened her apartment door, her niece, 25, shouted: “My brother called. He said: ‘We crossed the border. We’re in China. Get the car.’” Ms. Choi, who must go by only Defecting From North Korea, Vowing: ‘We Are Ready to Die’ By JANE PERLEZ and SU-HYUN LEE Continued on Page A8 The passionate gun control ral- lies Saturday that brought out large crowds around the country sent a vivid signal that the issue is likely to play a major role in the 2018 midterm elections, and that Republicans could find them- selves largely on the defensive on gun issues for the first time in dec- ades. The gun debate could play out very differently in House and Sen- ate races, as Republicans strain to save suburban congressional dis- tricts where gun control is popu- lar, and Democrats defend Senate seats in red states where the Sec- ond Amendment is sacrosanct. But, in a year of extraordinary political intensity, and in the first national election of the Trump presidency, Republican and Dem- ocratic leaders say the gun issue appears to have become a potent rallying point for voters opposed to Mr. Trump and fed up with what they see as Washington’s indiffer- ence to mass shootings. The scale of demonstrations over the week- end was reminiscent of the Wom- en’s March, earlier in Mr. Trump’s presidency, and underscored the intense energy of activists on the left ahead of the fall campaign. The commitment of the young march organizers to keep the is- sue front and center makes it un- likely to fade before November. But they are certain to face con- siderable resistance from pro-gun forces, particularly the National Rifle Association, which has for- midable financial resources at its disposal and a long record of suc- cessfully mobilizing conserva- tives and helping win elections. Still, Republicans have already been struggling to keep their foot- ing in densely populated suburbs where Mr. Trump is unpopular and the N.R.A. is an object of wide- spread scorn. The gun issue ap- pears likely to deepen Republi- cans’ problems in these areas, fur- ther cleaving moderate, pocket- book-minded suburban voters from the party’s more hard-line rural base and raising the risks for Republicans in swing House dis- tricts around the country. Gun control may be a compli- cated issue for Democrats, too, be- cause of the makeup of the Senate Passion of Gun Protests Testing G.O.P.’s Hold on Swing Suburbs By ALEXANDER BURNS and JONATHAN MARTIN March for Our Lives placards in New York. Opinion polls show powerful support for gun laws. HOLLY PICKETT FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES ALSO BEHIND RALLIES: ADULTS Sophisticated, experienced organi- zational muscle helped ease the way for youth marches. Page A16. Continued on Page A16 The pornographic film star Stephanie Clifford told “60 Min- utes” that she struck a $130,000 deal for her silence about an al- leged affair with Donald J. Trump in the final days of the 2016 cam- paign because she was worried about her safety and that of her young daughter. That concern, she told “60 Min- utes” in an interview broadcast on Sunday night, was based on a threat she received in 2011 from a man who approached her in Las Vegas. She said the threat came after she sold her story about Mr. Trump for $15,000 to Bauer Pub- lishing, which finally published the interview in its magazine In- Touch early this year. Bauer had initially decided not to run it after Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, Mi- chael Cohen, threatened to sue. “I was in a parking lot going to a fitness class with my infant daughter,” she told the “60 Min- utes” correspondent and CNN host Anderson Cooper. “And a guy walked up on me and said to me, ‘Leave Trump alone. Forget the story.’ And he leaned round and looked at my daughter and said, ‘That’s a beautiful little girl, it would be a shame if something happened to her mom.” Ms. Clifford said she did not go to the police after the threat, but when, years later, a lawyer came to her with an offer brokered by Mr. Cohen in the final days of the presidential campaign, she took it because, “I was concerned for my family and their safety.” Adult Film Star Feared for Safety Of Daughter After Trump Threat By JIM RUTENBERG Continued on Page A14 When 20,000 West Virginia teachers staged a rare statewide walkout, questions of pay and benefits dominated the headlines. But those concerns could not fully account for the teachers’ fero- cious resolve. After all, stagnant wages and receding benefits have been an issue for workers for dec- ades. The missing variable appears to have been anxiety about their sta- tus as professionals. Fred Albert, a math teacher and local union official in the Charles- ton area, said many felt that the Legislature had devalued their training and certification by proposing to let people teach a subject they hadn’t studied and had no experience in. “If someone really wants to be a teacher, if they feel the call to be in the classroom with students, they need to go through the same pro- grams we went through,” he said. In that sense, Mr. Albert and his colleagues were in the main- stream of recent labor history. From doctors and nurses to gov- ernment workers and journalists, some of the most aggressive and successful labor actions in recent years have erupted when profes- sionals felt their judgment, exper- tise and autonomy were under as- sault. Teachers in Oklahoma, who are threatening a walkout on April 2, have expressed similar frustra- tions, as have adjunct faculty members at a college in Florida and the recently unionized staff of Labor Revolts Signal Threats Beyond Money By NOAM SCHEIBER Continued on Page A13 A survey notes that a rise in obesity is putting people at greater risk for heart disease, diabetes and cancer. PAGE A13 U.S. Adults Are Getting Fatter The company is making deals with Steven Spielberg and other big names. But the giant, built on careful engineer- ing, is still in alien territory. PAGE B1 BUSINESS DAY B1-6 Apple Goes to Hollywood A grieving family of three displaced by a Bronx blaze last year has struggled to find affordable housing. PAGE A17 NEW YORK A17-19 In Limbo After a Fatal Fire The U.S. carried out its first drone strike in southern Libya, an expansion of its counterterrorism efforts. PAGE A10 U.S. Targets Al Qaeda in Libya The Jayhawks, who outlasted Duke, and the Wildcats, who beat Texas Tech, rounded out the Final Four. PAGE D1 SPORTSMONDAY D1-7 Kansas and Villanova Advance Will the Astros repeat? Will the Yan- kees take the next step? Tyler Kepner makes his predictions. PAGES D4-5 Before ‘Play Ball,’ a Crystal Ball A London-born revival of Tony Kush- ner’s “Angels in America” pulses with spirit, Ben Brantley writes. PAGE C1 ARTS C1-8 An ‘Angels’ That Soars Mike Judge talks about the changes in the fifth season of his HBO series, and why “Idiocracy” endures. PAGE C1 ‘Silicon Valley’ Starts Anew Marketing Ties to Trump, Top Donor Made Millions Offers of Private Parties With the President, Sent With Proposed Business Deals By KENNETH P. VOGEL and DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK Continued on Page A15 Ruth Wakefield, who died in 1977, began making her enduring Toll House choco- late chip cookies in the 1930s. PAGE A21 OBITUARIES A20-21 Overlooked: A Cookie Creator Late Edition Today, sunshine and patchy clouds, rather cool for late March, high 48. Tonight, clear, cold, low 32. Tomor- row, plenty of sunshine, high 50. Weather map appears on Page D8. $3.00
