Download - AT FIVE FACTORIES SOME 14,000 JOBS G.M. TO ELIMINATE PROSECUTORS SAY BROKE PLEA DEAL ... · 2019-11-11 · in the Trump campaign knew about or assisted Moscow s effort. Striking a

VOL. CLXVIII . . . No. 58,159 © 2018 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 2018

C M Y K Nxxx,2018-11-27,A,001,Bs-4C,E2

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NASA/JPL-CALTECH

Crowds at a viewing party inTimes Square, above, andNASA engineers at the JetPropulsion Laboratory inPasadena, Calif., near left,celebrated the landing of theInSight spacecraft on Marson Monday. The spacecraft’sfirst image after landing waspartly obscured by dirt.InSight will study the Mar-tian underworld, listeningfor marsquakes. Page A14.

Blue Planet CheersVisitor to Red Planet

JEENAH MOON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

POOL PHOTO BY AL SEIB

General Motors announcedMonday that it planned to idle fivefactories in North America andcut roughly 14,000 jobs in a bid totrim costs. It was a jarring reflec-tion of the auto industry’s adjust-ment to changing consumertastes and sluggish sales.

The move, which follows job re-ductions by Ford Motor Company,further pares the work force in asector that President Trump hadpromised to bolster. Referring toG.M.’s chief executive, Mary T.Barra, he told reporters, “I spoketo her and I stressed the fact that Iam not happy with what she did.”

Mr. Trump also invoked the res-cue of G.M. after its bankruptcyfiling almost a decade ago. “Youknow, the United States savedGeneral Motors,” he told report-ers, “and for her to take that com-pany out of Ohio is not good. Ithink she’s going to put somethingback in soon.”

In addition to an assembly plantin Lordstown, Ohio, the cuts affectfactories in Michigan, Marylandand the Canadian province of On-tario.

Part of the retrenchment is a re-sponse to a slowdown in new-carsales that has prompted automak-ers to slim their operations andshed jobs. And earlier bets onsmaller cars have had to be un-wound as consumers have gravi-tated toward pickup trucks andsport-utility vehicles in responseto low gasoline prices.

In addition, automakers havepaid a price for the trade battlethat Mr. Trump set in motion. InJune G.M. slashed its profit out-look for the year because tariffswere driving up production costs,raising prices even on domesticsteel. Rising interest rates are alsogenerating headwinds.

Ms. Barra said no single factorhad prompted G.M.’s cutbacks,portraying them as a prudenttrimming of sails. “We are takingthese actions now while the com-pany and the economy are strong

G.M. TO ELIMINATESOME 14,000 JOBS AT FIVE FACTORIES

SHIFTING MARKET CITED

As New-Car Sales Slump,Pickups and S.U.V.s

Regain Favor

By NEAL E. BOUDETTE

Continued on Page A13

MOSCOW — Ukraine’s presi-dent put his nation on a war foot-ing with Russia on Monday, as ten-sions over a shared waterway es-calated into a crisis that draggedin NATO and the United Nations.

Russia’s seizure a day earlier ofthree small Ukrainian naval ves-sels and 23 sailors — including atleast three wounded in a shootingby the Russian side — was thefirst overt armed conflict betweenthe two sides since the beginningdays of the conflict in 2014, whenRussian special forces occupiedCrimea.

The opening of an additionalfront at sea, even if Ukraine lacksa real navy, introduced an un-stable element into what had beena shadowy war. The conflict pit-ting Ukrainian soldiers againstRussian-backed separatists in thebreakaway Donbas region, ineastern Ukraine, has sputteredalong for almost five years withmore than 10,000 people killed.

The Kremlin, along with someUkrainian opposition figures,called the martial drumbeatsechoing from Kiev a domestic po-litical ploy by its embattled presi-dent, Petro O. Poroshenko. Theyaccused him of fearmongering inorder to delay or at least reconfig-ure the March 31 election that hehad seemed certain to lose.

Mr. Poroshenko delivered a Continued on Page A6

Crimea FightMoves CloserTo Wider War

By NEIL MacFARQUHAR

DMITRY KOSTYUKOV FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

A hospital in France is testing how Zora the robot can provide care for aging loved ones. Page B1.Caregiver. Companion. Robot.

MEXICO CITY — The newpresident of Mexico, AndrésManuel López Obrador, has builthis entire political career on de-fending the poor.

Now, days before Mr. LópezObrador takes office, PresidentTrump is testing how firmly hewill live up to that.

Thousands of migrants fromCentral America have massedalong the border of Mexico andthe United States — with thou-

sands more on the way. Americanborder patrol agents fired tear gasat them on Sunday to prevent hun-dreds from reaching the border.

Mr. Trump has vowed to keepthe migrants on Mexican soilwhile they apply for asylum in theUnited States, a process that couldsqueeze them into squalid, over-crowded shelters for months, pos-

sibly even years. Mexican officialssay the strain is already causing ahumanitarian emergency, creat-ing a political crisis for Mr. LópezObrador even before he takes of-fice.

Mexico’s Foreign Ministry saidMonday that it had presented adiplomatic note to the UnitedStates Embassy asking for an “ex-haustive investigation” into theuse of nonlethal weapons at theborder on Sunday, where at leasttwo dozen tear gas canisters re-leased by American agents

Taking Charge in Mexico With a Border on EdgeBy AZAM AHMED

and ELISABETH MALKINCrisis for New Leader:

Trump vs. Migrants


Ever since scientists createdthe powerful gene editing tech-nique Crispr, they have braced ap-prehensively for the day when itwould be used to create a genet-ically altered human being. Manynations banned such work, fear-ing it could be misused to alter ev-erything from eye color to I.Q.

Now, the moment they fearedmay have come. On Monday, a sci-entist in China announced that hehad created the world’s first ge-netically edited babies, twin girlswho were born this month.

The researcher, He Jiankui,said that he had altered a gene inthe embryos, before having themimplanted in the mother’s womb,with the goal of making the babiesresistant to infection with H.I.V.He has not published the researchin any journal and did not shareany evidence or data that defini-tively proved he had done it.

But his previous work is knownto many experts in the field, who

Did a Gene EditShape 2 Babies? Experts TrembleThis article is by Gina Kolata, Sui-

Lee Wee and Pam Belluck.


Bernardo Bertolucci’s early work re-flected the revolutionary spirit of the1960s and ’70s. Mr. Bertolucci, abovewith Marlon Brando, was 77. PAGE B12

OBITUARIES B11-12

‘Last Tango in Paris’ AuteurIn a wadded-up ball, scientists discovera landscape of surprising mathematicalorder, with broader dynamics. PAGE D1

SCIENCE TIMES D1-8

How the Paper CrumplesThe colossal space built by Myanmar’smilitary to honor itself shows a forceobsessed with its reputation. PAGE A4

INTERNATIONAL A4-10

A Grandiose Military Museum

Sandra Lee, a Food Network star andGov. Andrew Cuomo’s longtime girl-friend, had shunned the political spot-light. Cancer changed that. PAGE A19

NEW YORK A19-21

New Role for ‘First Girlfriend’President Trump, ignoring science onclimate change, has made the disman-tling of policies curbing greenhousegases a focus of his agenda. PAGE A12

NATIONAL A11-18

Discarding Rules for Pollution

Samuel Little, a convicted killer whomone detective calls “pure evil,” has saidthat he killed more than 90 women since1970. The police believe him. PAGE A11

Confessing to Evil

Firefighters recount the hope and hor-ror during their days battling the CampFire, the most destructive in California’shistory. PAGE A14

Describing the Unimaginable

After a vote (and a century of study), thestandard measure for mass is revised:Le Grand K’s reign has ended. PAGE D1

The Kilogram, RedefinedAmerican and Czech forces are beinginvestigated in the death of an Afghanbeaten in NATO custody. PAGE A6

Prisoner’s Killing Investigated

At a conference to mark the 20th anni-versary of an international accord onrestitution, Hungary, Poland, Spain,Russia and Italy were faulted. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-8

Lagging on Nazi-Looted Art

David Brooks PAGE A23

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A22-23

SAN JUAN, P.R. — Juan F. Ro-dríguez had substantial damageto his house in northeasternPuerto Rico after Hurricane Ma-ria slammed through in Septem-ber 2017, but he felt better when hewas told that the Federal Emer-

gency Management Agencywould pay for $5,000 in repairs.

The contractor hired by PuertoRico’s FEMA-financed housingrecovery program treated the roofwith sealant, replaced four feet ofcabinets and installed smoke de-tectors around his house with Vel-cro.

“I looked around and said, ‘Wait

a minute, that treatment costs$100, and I can buy those cabinetsfor $500,’” Mr. Rodríguez said. “Iknow. I worked construction. Let’ssay they did $2,000 worth of work,because prices are high now andyou have to pay for labor. But$5,000?”

Mr. Rodríguez wasn’t the onlyhomeowner who complained after

the devastating storm — theworst to hit Puerto Rico in 89years — that federal taxpayerswere being charged far more foremergency home repairs thanresidents ever saw in improve-ments to their homes.

Extravagant markups, over-head and multiple levels of mid-dlemen have helped lead to huge

costs in the FEMA-financed re-pair program. Known as Tu HogarRenace — Your Home Reborn —the program is spending $1.2 bil-lion in Puerto Rico to repair up to120,000 homes.

More than 60 percent of whatFEMA is spending in the pro-gram, the largest emergency

$3,700 Generators and $666 Sinks: FEMA Contractors Ran Up Puerto Rico Costs

By FRANCES ROBLES


WASHINGTON — Paul Man-afort, President Trump’s formercampaign chairman, repeatedlylied to federal investigators inbreach of a plea agreement hesigned two months ago, the spe-cial counsel’s office said in a courtfiling late on Monday.

Prosecutors working for thespecial counsel, Robert S. MuellerIII, said Mr. Manafort’s “crimesand lies” about “a variety of sub-ject matters” relieve them of allpromises they made to him in theplea agreement. But under theterms of the agreement, Mr. Man-afort cannot withdraw his guiltyplea.

Defense lawyers disagreed thatMr. Manafort had violated thedeal. In the same filing, they saidMr. Manafort had met repeatedlywith the special counsel’s officeand “believes he has providedtruthful information.”

But given the impasse betweenthe two sides, they asked JudgeAmy Berman Jackson of theUnited States District Court forthe District of Columbia to set asentencing date for Mr. Manafort,who has been in solitary confine-ment in a detention center in Alex-andria, Va.

The 11th-hour development inMr. Manafort’s case is a fresh signof the special counsel’s aggressiveapproach in investigating Rus-sia’s interference in the 2016 presi-dential race and whether anyonein the Trump campaign knewabout or assisted Moscow’s effort.

Striking a plea deal with Mr.Manafort in September poten-tially gave prosecutors access toinformation that could prove use-ful to their investigation. But theirfiling on Monday, a rare step in aplea deal, suggested that theythought Mr. Manafort was with-holding details that could be perti-nent to the Russia inquiry or othercases.

The question of whether Mr.Trump might pardon Mr. Man-afort for his crimes has loomedover his case since he was first in-dicted a year ago and has lingeredas a possibility. A former lawyerfor Mr. Trump broached theprospect of a pardon with one ofMr. Manafort’s lawyers last year,raising questions about whetherhe was trying to influence Mr.Manafort’s decision aboutwhether to cooperate with investi-gators.

The filing Monday suggestedthat prosecutors do not considerMr. Manafort a credible witness.Even if he has provided informa-tion that helps them develop crim-inal cases, by asserting that he re-peatedly lied, they could hardlycall him to testify.

Mr. Manafort had hoped that inagreeing to cooperate with Mr.Mueller’s team, prosecutorswould argue that he deserved alighter punishment. He is ex-pected to face at least a decade-long prison term for 10 felonycounts including financial fraud

MANAFORT’S LIESBROKE PLEA DEAL,PROSECUTORS SAY

MORE CHARGES POSSIBLE

Mueller’s Office OpposesLeniency for a Trump

Campaign Chief

By SHARON LaFRANIERE


Late EditionToday, clouds and sunshine, windy,high 46. Tonight, partly cloudy,breezy, colder, low 34. Tomorrow,windy, clouds and sunshine, high 44.Weather map appears on Page A24.

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