PRICES MAY VARY OUTSIDE METROPOLITAN WASHINGTON AREA
HIGH 68, LOW 56
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
CLOSING LOOPHOLE: The Biden
administration announced that sales
at gun shows will now have to have
federal background checks too.
GUN CONTROL
Gun shows,
online lose
background
exemption
Expansion targets
sales ‘loophole’
BY STEPHEN DINAN
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Biden administration has final-
ized the largest expansion of gun-sales
background checks since the advent of
the federal check system in the 1990s,
moving to close the “gun show loophole”
and online sales that have avoided checks
in the past.
The new rule being announced
Thursday expands the definition of who
is considered a firearms dealer and says
every dealer must conduct a background
check regardless of the sale venue. That
means sales at gun shows or conducted
over the internet must now be included.
It is not a universal background check,
meaning some transactions such as gifts
or occasional sales are still exempt. But
administration officials said they expect
the rule will cover tens of thousands of
sales each year that currently escape
background checks.
Biden officials called the new rule
overdue but historic.
“Countless families and communities
will be spared the horror and heartbreak
of gun violence by this new rule,” Vice
President Kamala Harris said in preview-
ing the rule for reporters.
The rule comes amid a flurry of
executive activity on issues important
to President Biden’s political base and
the 2024 election. He has recently at-
tempted a major student loan forgive-
ness program and is pondering action
on immigration.
At issue is language defining who is
considered “engaged in the business” of
dealing firearms.
Those operating out of traditional
stores have been covered, but Biden
» see GUNS | A4
SOUTH KOREA
Yoon suffers setback as opposition scores big victory
BY ANDREW SALMON
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA | South Korean
voters dealt a blow to conservative Presi-
dent Yoon Suk Yeol on Wednesday, with
exit polls showing he will face a left-wing
opposition-dominated National Assem-
bly for the final three years of his term.
Projections by the country’s three
main broadcasters give the opposition
Democratic Party of Korea between 168
and 197 seats in the 300-seat unicameral
legislature, with the upstart Rebuilding
Korea Party, a party formed in March by
former Justice Minister Cho Kuk, set to
win 12 to 14 more seats and expected to
ally with the DPK in the new Assembly.
POLITICS
Trump distancing
himself from Arizona
abortion ruling. A3
INDEX Commentary B1 | Comics B12 | Dear Abby B13 | Editorials B2 | Horoscope B13 | Inside the Beltway A2 | Letters B2 | Life B13 | Nation A6 | Politics A3 | Puzzles B12 | Region A10 | Sports B16 | World A8
HOUSE
Lawmakers derail vote to renew FISA
BY KERRY PICKET
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
A bill to reauthorize the government’s
top spying power was blocked from
reaching a floor vote on Wednesday by a
group of Republicans who wanted more
restrictions placed on the FBI.
The uprising against the bill came
hours after former President Donald
Trump called upon House Republicans
to “KILL FISA” because the FBI used it
to spy on his 2016 presidential campaign.
It was too soon to tell if they killed
the legislation to renew the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act’s spying
STATE VISIT: Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida met with President Biden on Wednesday. The visit shows ties between
the U.S. and Japan are deepening. Mr. Biden will host Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Thursday.
DIPLOMACY
Biden seeks to build coalition with
Japan, Philippines to counter China
BY JEFF MORDOCK
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
President Biden is employing some
personal diplomacy this week as he
intensifies his efforts to build a net-
work of defense alliances in East Asia
to challenge China’s growing influence
and power.
This week that goal hits a crucial
milestone. Mr. Biden on Wednesday
showcased deepening ties with Japan by
hosting Prime Minister Fumio Kishida
for an official state visit. On Thursday,
Japan outreach could face challenges
Mr. Yoon’s
right-wing People
Power Party was
projected to secure
just 85 to 105 seats,
including those
obtained through
proportional rep-
resentation by
Yoon its satellite party,
the People Future
Party. Mr. Yoon’s
single five-year term ends in May 2027,
while the lawmakers elected Wednesday
will sit for four years.
NATION
White House finalizes
strict limits on PFAS
in drinking water. A6
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
Group of Republicans opposed bill
after Trump called upon them to ‘kill’ it
program known as Section 702. But 19
Republicans and 209 Democrats maimed
it by voting against a measure that would
have set up a vote on the bill.
Time is running out to settle the dis-
pute as the legislation expires on April 19.
The bill, dubbed the Reforming Intel-
ligence and Securing America Act, was
intended to reauthorize and overhaul
Section 702, which allows the govern-
ment to collect troves of data — emails,
Mr. Biden and Mr. Kishida will meet with
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos
Jr., whose own country has clashed with
China repeatedly in recent months over
conflicting sovereignty claims in the
South China Sea.
Mr. Kishida’s trip is the fifth official
state visit of the Biden presidency and
the fourth honoring a key Indo-Pacific
ally, following previous visits honoring
the leaders of Australia, India and South
Korea. The trilateral summit on Thurs-
day is an unprecedented move to discuss
advancing joint cooperation on security
“Our party did our best to engage in
politics that reflect the will of the people,
but the exit poll results are disappoint-
ing,” Han Dong-hoon, the PPP’s interim
leader, told reporters as the election
results were rolling in Wednesday. All
told, opposition parties have about 180
seats in the current Assembly, and the
enhanced majority may severely limit
Mr. Yoon’s agenda in the coming years.
Of the 300 seats, 254 were determined
through direct votes in local districts,
and the other 46 to the parties accord-
ing to their proportion of the vote. The
final voter turnout for South Korea’s 44
WORLD
EU lawmakers support Investigators focus on
migration law overhaul ship’s electrical system
to disrupt far right. A8 in bridge collapse. A10
R ★★ washingtontimes.com $1.50
texts and phone calls — from foreigners
living abroad. Americans’ communica-
tions sometimes get scooped up too.
The fight over the bill pits national
security hawks who defend the anti-
terrorism tool and privacy hawks who
want to prevent FBI abuses of the spy
power.
The privacy hawks — Democrats and
Republicans who don’t trust federal law
enforcement — demand that the law
ASSOCIATED PRESS
and defense alliances and bolster the
Pentagon’s options in defending Taiwan.
Thursday’s meeting is perhaps Mr.
Biden’s most aggressive effort so far to
rally Indo-Pacific allies, in the absence
of an Asian version of NATO, to reverse
China’s attempts to establish itself as the
dominant maritime power in the region.
The three-sided diplomacy won’t
result in a full-fledged military alli-
ance, but it will likely feature stron-
ger cooperation on maritime security,
» see ASIA | A9
million eligible voters was tentatively
estimated at 67%, the highest for a par-
liamentary election since 1992, according
to the National Election Commission.
While the loss will likely have larger
implications for the conservative presi-
dent’s domestic policies, the opposition
gains will bring new challenges for
diplomats in South Korea, Japan and
the U.S.: In a bold initiative for a South
Korean president, Mr. Yoon has tried to
cool Seoul’s long-heated relations with
America’s other key ally in the region,
Japan, during his first two years in office.
That outreach has irked many voters
here, who customarily view Japan as an
» see SOUTH KOREA | A5
REGION
include a new warrant requirement for
when the FBI searches for Americans’
data in the FISA database. The law allows
the government to only target foreigners
abroad, but sometimes Americans’ data
is inadvertently captured when they
communicate with a foreign target.
The current version of the bill, writ-
ten by House Permanent Select Commit-
tee on Intelligence lawmakers, does not
include the warrant requirement.
The program has been controversial
from its start in 2007, and Congress re-
quired it to be renewed every five years
» see SPYING | A5
MEDIA
NPR under
scrutiny
after essay
goes viral
Producer’s piece
raises bias questions
BY SUSAN FERRECHIO
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
National Public Radio’s long-standing
liberal tilt has gone off the rails, a veteran
insider said in an essay that has raised
new questions about political bias at the
taxpayer-funded radio and television
network.
NPR is slated to receive more than $91
million in 2024 from the taxpayer-funded
Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Uri Berliner’s viral essay about his ob-
servations as a longtime NPR producer
and editor warned against defunding
the organization. But at the same time,
he made the case for it, chronicling
NPR’s lurch to the far left after Donald
Trump’s presidential victory in 2016 and
its dedication to “identifying and ending
systemic racism” following the death
of George Floyd, a Black man killed in
police custody in 2020.
NPR’s news coverage after 2016,
Mr. Berliner wrote in The Free Press,
“veered toward efforts to damage or
topple Trump’s presidency,” while race
and identity “became paramount in
nearly every aspect of the workplace.” At
the same time, NPR began to completely
shut out viewpoint diversity.
Mr. Berliner’s piece triggered new
calls to yank NPR’s public funding or at
least alter the funding formula to provide
local public radio with more control over
its coverage.
NPR received $9.43 million in direct
payments in 2024 and cites the figure
to claim a mere 1% of its budget came
from taxpayers.
A much bigger pot of federal money
— $81.77 million — also will end up at
» see NPR | A5
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOGRAPHS
CASTING BALLOTS: Voters young and
old voted in the parliamentary election
in Seoul, South Korea. The Democratic
Party of Korea scored a major victory.
VOLUME 41, NUMBER 74
7 02803 87040 7
A2 | POLITICS ☆R THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

greatness of our nation, from machinists in response for the committee.

INSIDE
IIN
NSIDE TTHE
HE
BELTWAY
BY JENNIFER HARPER
HISTORIC FRANKLIN LETTER FOR SALE
There are historic personal letters — and then
there are really historic personal letters. The
Raab Collection — an international firm that buys
and sells important historical documents — has
unveiled a remarkable letter wrote on Dec. 3, 1777,
by Founding Father Benjamin Franklin. He was in
France at the time, securing clandestine supplies
and troops for the American cause.
As far as historic letters go, this one is not
only rare, but also features the grand and beauti-
ful penmanship of yore — particularly Franklin’s
signature itself.
The letter is now on sale, valued at $120,000.
Find the details of this rare communication and
more at Raabcollection.com.
Interestingly enough, Apple TV+ will release
a new historical drama series titled “Franklin”
— which focuses on Benjamin Franklin’s diplo-
matic mission to France in the 1770s and stars an
effective Michael Douglas as the revered Founding
Father.
“Diplomacy must never be a siege — but a se-
duction,” the veteran actor says during the produc-
tion itself, which debuts on Friday.
POMPEO SPELLS IT OUT
“Donald Trump is the right person to once
again be president of the United States. The secu-
rity and prosperity of our children depend on it,”
said Mike Pompeo in a detailed written statement
shared with the Beltway.
“As CIA Director and Secretary of State,
I served under President Trump to help him
put America First — and he delivered amazing
outcomes for the American people. He kept us
safe and prosperous. Period. The four years since
THE RAAB COLLECTION
A letter written on Dec. 3, 1777, by Founding Father
Benjamin Franklin, who was in France at the time, is
up for sale. It is valued at $120,000.
have demonstrated how crucial his leadership was.
President Biden’s weakness and radical agenda
have and will imperil the future of the American
people,” Mr. Pompeo said.
“As America approaches this enormously con-
sequential election in November, it is important
that we remember where America was just four
years ago because of President Donald Trump’s
leadership,” he said, citing eight specific challenges
to the U.S. that he says Mr. Trump addressed
while in office.
His list includes fighting terrorism and counter-
ing the threat or aggression by ISIS, Iran, Hamas
and Russia.
“Americans, not illegal immigrants, were
protected. President Trump had built a sovereign
border regime that didn’t allow millions of illegals
— and dozens and dozens of terrorists — to cross
our border each year only to be released and cause
mayhem here. We put America first,” Mr. Pompeo
said.
Mr. Trump also supported U.S. businesses,
challenged China, and saw to it that NATO
received funding from non-U.S. members — and
that effective deterrence was in place in Eastern
Europe, Mr. Pompeo said.
“President Trump deserves the support of
all Americans who believe in the goodness and
Michigan, to farmers in Kansas, to people simply
seeking to build a better life for their families. He
has my full support, and I hope every American
who cares about getting our country back on track
will join me. This is not a close call,” Mr. Pompeo
concluded.
Find more of his outreach at CAVPAC.com.
THE NPR HEADLINES
A veteran editor at National Public Radio
stepped forward this week to cite left-leaning bias
at the broadcaster in a lengthy analysis published
online by The Free Press, a media company that
offers investigative stories and provocative com-
mentary, according to its website — and found at
TheFP.com.
Headlines followed. Here’s a sample:
“NPR editor rebukes own outlet’s coverage of
Hunter Biden laptop, COVID lab leak and Rus-
siagate” (Fox News); “Senior NPR editor claims
public broadcaster lacks ‘viewpoint diversity’”
(The Guardian); “NPR editor says network
‘turned a blind eye’ to Hunter Biden laptop story
because ‘it could help Trump’” (New York Post);
“NPR defends its journalism after senior edi-
tor says it has lost the public’s trust” (National
Public Radio); “NPR journalist blows whistle
on network’s obsession with DEI and progres-
sive diktats and reveals how stories like Hunter
Biden laptop were ignored: ‘Here’s how we lost
America’s trust’” (Daily Mail); “NPR editor slams
‘viewpoint diversity’ lack at progressive network”
(The Wrap).
HOW MUCH?
The Republican National Committee contin-
ues to monitor consumer issues, checking the
escalating prices of everyday items over President
Biden’s time in office. Here are a few examples
that the committee released Wednesday:
“Since Biden took office, overall prices have
shot up by 19.4% — a massive hit on hardworking
Americans,” said Jake Schneider, director of rapid
He has pored over the consumer price index,
and here’s a sampling of what he found:
“Since President Biden arrived, eggs are up
49%, gas by 48%, flour by 34%, baby food by 31%,
sugar by 29%, steak by 25% and pet food by 24%.
“Overall, grocery prices have surged by 21%
since Biden took office,” Mr. Schneider said in a
statement.
“That’s a massive drag on Americans who are
already paying more for just about everything
during the Biden administration. These unend-
ing price hikes (which Biden promised would be
“transitory”) have decimated Americans’ finances.
Nearly two-thirds of Americans reported living
paycheck-to-paycheck last year — an increase
from 2022 — as credit card debt hits record highs
and savings accounts dwindle. That’s Bidenom-
ics!” Mr. Schneider concluded, exclamation point
and all.
POLL DU JOUR
• 65% of Hispanic adults living in the U.S.
support providing a path to U.S. citizenship for all
people currently in the U.S. illegally.
• 64% support giving President Biden the au-
thority to close U.S. borders if there are too many
migrants trying to enter the country.
• 59% support allowing refugees fleeing crime
and violence in Latin America to claim asylum in
the U.S.
• 42% support building a wall or fence along
the entire U.S.-Mexico border.
• 38% support sending all undocumented
immigrants in the U.S. back to their country of
origin.
• 29% support government policymakers bas-
ing laws and policies on their religious views.
• 29% support making all abortions illegal at
any time, under any circumstance.
SOURCE: AN AXIOS/IPSOS POLL OF 1,012 LATINO/HISPANIC
AMERICANS CONDUCTED WITH NOTICIAS TELEMUNDO
MARCH 22-28 AND RELEASED WEDNESDAY.
• Contact Jennifer Harper
at jharper@washingtontimes.com.

HOUSE

Greene doesn’t drop ouster threat, despite Johnson’s ‘kitchen cabinet’ spot offer
BY ALEX MILLER
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene refused to drop her
push to oust House Speaker Mike Johnson after they
faced off in a tense closed-door meeting, but she still
stopped short of forcing a vote to remove him from
the chamber’s top post.
Instead of giving a solid red line, Ms. Greene said
she would be watching how Mr. Johnson handled a
pair of divisive issues: renewing the government’s
most powerful spying powers and sending more aid
to Ukraine.
The Georgia Republican has accused Mr. Johnson
of eschewing the GOP’s agenda in favor of Democrats’
policy goals since winning the gavel in October,
including passing a colossal $1.2 trillion spending
bill last month.
“This is not going to be tolerated by Republicans
and it’s not the way to win elections,” Ms. Greene
said. “Our Republican voters do not want to vote
for a Democrat agenda. They want to vote for a
Republican agenda.”
Ms. Greene said that her ouster threat, which she
filed last month, was not a personal slight against the
speaker, who considers her to be a friend who shares
the same conservative philosophy.
“We’re both conservatives, you know, but we do
disagree sometimes on strategy,” said Mr. Johnson,
Louisiana Republican. “And with regard to what we
put on the floor and when … Marjorie is frustrated
by the last appropriations package, the spending bills,
and you know what, so am I.”
But Ms. Greene characterized her discussion with
the speaker as one where Mr. Johnson “made excuses”
and didn’t offer promises for how he would handle
the pair of hot-button policy and spending issues.
She said he offered her an advisory position on
a “kitchen cabinet.” She did not refuse the informal
post, but said she would wait and see what the posi-
tion would entail.
Ms. Greene would not confirm if she had enough
support to oust Mr. Johnson the same way his pre-
decessor, former Rep. Kevin McCarthy, was ejected
from the speaker job.
She noted that no one was trying to stop her and
that she was hearing “a lot of agreement” from her
colleagues about Mr. Johnson’s shortcomings.
Other Republicans, regardless of their view of Mr.
Johnson’s performance as speaker, argue that the tim-
ing is wrong to invite a chaotic race to replace him.
“It’s not the time,” said Rep. Ralph Norman, South
Carolina Republican. “As much as I disagree with
Mike Johnson’s handling of things … you’ve got a
situation where the House has to function and you’ve
got to have a speaker.”
A solid chunk of Republicans are not buying into
Ms. Greene’s crusade.
Rep. Max Miller, Ohio Republican, said that Ms.
Greene was “acting as a party of one.”

INSIDE
POLITICS
HOUSE
McCarthy blames Gaetz’s ethics probe
Former Rep. Kevin McCarthy threw shade
at Rep. Matt Gaetz, saying he’s the only reason
he was ousted from the speakership because he
wouldn’t help the lawmaker get rid of an ethics
complaint.
After Mo Elleithee of Georgetown Univer-
sity’s Institute of Politics and Public Service
suggested that Mr. McCarthy, California Repub-
lican, was ousted because of the “concessions” he
made as speaker, the former congressman said he
wanted to set the record straight.
“I’ll give you the truth why I’m not speaker,”
he said at the event Tuesday. “It is because one
independent investigation.
Mr. Kaine, a member of the Senate Foreign
Relations and Armed Services committees, said
the Israeli strike that killed the workers “crystal-
lizes the frustration that is at a boiling point.”
More lawmakers are pushing Mr. Biden to put
added pressure on Mr. Netanyahu.
— Mallory Wilson
NATIONAL SECURITY
Biden mulls end to Assange prosecution
President Biden said Wednesday that his
administration is weighing whether to end the
prosecution of Julian Assange, the controver-
sial WikiLeaks founder who is facing criminal
charges for publishing thousands of confidential
U.S. military records and diplomatic cables.
Australia has been pressing the U.S. to end the
case and has ramped up pressure on Washington
and London to return the Australian citizen to his
home country. Mr. Assange has been in a London
prison since 2019. ASSOCIATED PRESS

person, a member of Congress, wanted me to
stop an ethics complaint.”
Mr. McCarthy said he doesn’t know whether
sexual misconduct allegations against Mr. Gaetz
are true, but, “Ethics is looking into it.”
— Mallory Wilson
DEMOCRATS ON ISRAEL
Kaine urges Biden to prod Netanyahu
Sen. Tim Kaine said President Biden took too
long to demand that Israeli Prime Minister Benja-
min Netanyahu allow more aid into Gaza.
Mr. Kaine, the Democrats’ vice presidential
nominee in 2016, said he agreed with Mr. Biden’s
notion that the current approach is “not work-
ing,” but he said Mr. Biden should have pushed
Mr. Netanyahu to open another aid crossing from
Israel to the Gaza Strip “months ago.”
His statement comes after a strike killed seven
World Central Kitchen aid workers Monday as
they were trying to bring food to civilians in
Gaza. The organization has since called for an
“We’re considering it,” Mr. Biden told
reporters.
— Jeff Mordock
ELECTIONS
Ohio warns Biden might not be on ballot
President Biden might not be able to get on
the Ohio ballot because of the timing of the
Democratic National Convention.
The Ohio secretary of state’s office pointed
out that Ohio has a deadline of Aug. 7 to certify
a presidential candidate, but the Democratic
convention in Chicago won’t start until Aug. 19 —
almost two weeks later.
The Biden campaign is reportedly working on
the issue and is confident the president’s name
will be on the ballot.
Alabama raised a similar issue about Mr.
Biden’s eligibility, citing a mid-August deadline,
though Mr. Biden has little hope of winning the
deep-red state.
— Tom Howell Jr.
President Biden and first lady Jill Biden hosted Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his
wife, Yuko Kishida, during a State Dinner at the White House on Wednesday.
WHITE HOUSE
Clintons, De Niro, Bezos among A-listers joining Biden at dinner for Kishida
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida prominent on the 200-person guest list is-
attracted some major star power to Wash- sued just before the state dinner.
ington for his state dinner at the White Guests were treated to a performance
House on Wednesday night. by Paul Simon and dined on dry-aged rib-
Among the notables were former Presi- eye steak, house-cured salmon, blistered
dent Bill Clinton and former Secretary of shishito, fricassee of fava beans and sesame
State Hillary Clinton, actor Robert De Niro, oil sabayon. Dessert included a salted cara-
Apple CEO Tim Cook, Amazon boss Jeff mel pistachio cake with matcha ganache and
Bezos and his finance, Lauren Sanchez and cherry ice cream with a raspberry drizzle.
Olympic figure skater Kristi Yamaguchi. The White House is hosting Mr. Kishida
Other notables include United Auto and his wife, Yuko Kishida, as President
Workers union leader Shawn Fain and Biden seeks to build a coalition in the
Democratic governors Roy Cooper of North Indo-Pacific to combat China’s military and
Carolina and Tony Evers of Wisconsin. economic aggression.
The names were among the most — Jeff Mordock

MALLARD FILLMORE / Bruce Tinsley
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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
Politics
ABORTION
Trump: Arizona’s near-total abortion ban is too tough
Former president says state court
erred in ruling, will be brought back
BY SETH MCLAUGHLIN
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Former President Donald
Trump is distancing himself from
an Arizona court ruling that up-
held a near-total abortion ban,
saying it went too far.
Mr. Trump had sought earlier
in the week to shift the discussion
away from abortion when he said
the issue should be left up to the
states to decide.
But the next day, the Arizona
Supreme Court thrust the issue
back into the spotlight when it
upheld a strict abortion ban that
was established in 1864.
“Yeah, they did,” Mr. Trump
said when asked whether the
court erred. “That’ll be straight-
ened out. I’m sure that the gover-
nor and everybody else are going
bring it back to within reason.”
The ruling redefined the po-
litical landscape in Arizona — a
battleground state where an open
Senate seat is up for grabs and
HOMELAND SECURITY
GOP pressuring vulnerable Senate Democrats on impeachment trial
Defectors needed
to prevent killing
of the charges
BY RAMSEY TOUCHBERRY
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Congressional Republicans
and GOP candidates are bearing
down on at-risk Senate Demo-
crats in hopes of convincing them
against derailing the impeach-
ment trial of Homeland Security
Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
Republicans will need sev-
eral Democratic defectors at next
week’s trial to prevent Senate Ma-
jority Leader Charles E. Schumer
from swiftly killing the charges,
which are related to handling
illegal immigration.
Democrats are expected to
bring up a motion to table or
dismiss, but Senate Republicans
hope to win over endangered Sen-
ate Democrats before the House
delivers the articles next week.
“It’s the No. 1 issue for voters
back home,” Montana Sen. Steve
Daines, chair of Senate Repub-
licans’ campaign arm, told The
Washington Times. “It’s very im-
portant that we have a trial, and
the American people see firsthand
what’s been going on.”
Democrats like Sens. Jon
Tester of Montana and Sherrod
Brown of Ohio are squarely in
Republicans’ crosshairs.
Mr. Mayorkas’ trial was origi-
nally set to begin Wednesday.
Around the same day, Mr. Tester
cut a new campaign ad distancing
himself from President Biden’s
handling of the southern border
and has reserved a total of $14.5
million in ad buys for his race,
according to ad-tracking firm
AdImpact.
“Jon Tester worked with Re-
publicans to shut down the bor-
der, target fentanyl traffickers
and add hundreds of new border
patrol agents,” the commercial
says. “He fought to stop President
Biden from letting migrants stay
in America instead of remain in
Mexico.”
Republican campaign staff-
ers and his GOP opponent have
dubbed him “two-faced Tester”
for saying he now wants to see
the impeachment articles before
voting to dismiss them.
“I’m going to give them a mo-
ment in the sun and read their
damn papers,” Mr. Tester said,
foreshadowing that he won’t
budge.
His GOP challenger, Tim
Sheehy, said Washington needs
“leaders with the backbone to
fight for Montana, restore ac-
countability in D.C. and seal the
border once and for all.”
Mr. Brown blamed the
pro-choice activists say they col-
lected enough signatures to put
an amendment on the ballot that
would enshrine abortion rights in
the state constitution.
“This was a huge shock to the
political system,” said Arizona-
based GOP strategist Barrett Mar-
son. “I think that Arizona went
from lean Trump to lean Biden,
quite literally, overnight.”
Indeed, the ruling is manna
from heaven for Mr. Biden and
Democrats. Mr. Biden beat Mr.
Trump in Arizona four years ago,
and their rematch there is ex-
pected to be another tight contest.
As the president struggles to
gin up excitement about his re-
election bid, the ruling is helping
Team Biden keep the focus on
an issue that energizes their base,
and away from simmering voter
concerns over inflation and the
chaos at the U.S.-Mexico border.
They say Mr. Trump cannot
escape the reality that his appoint-
ment of conservative justices to
Kennedy, other Republican lawmakers unload on Mayorkas about border chaos
BY STEPHEN DINAN
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Republicans challenged
Homeland Security Secre-
tary Alejandro Mayorkas on
Wednesday, telling him that
he’s failed the American public,
which no longer trusts him to
manage the border.
On a day when Mr. May-
orkas was supposed to be fac-
ing the start of impeachment
proceedings in the Senate, he
instead appeared for two hear-
ings where Republicans evis-
cerated him for the ongoing
chaos at the border.
“It gives me no joy to say
this but most Republicans don’t
trust you and the vast majority
of the American people don’t
trust you. That’s why you’ve
been impeached,” Sen. John
Kennedy, Louisiana Republi-
can, told him.
He said Americans think
Mr. Mayorkas and President
Biden are allowing more illegal
immigrants in because they
skew the allocation of political
power through the divvying
up of legislative seats in the
apportionment process. Even
though they cannot vote, they
are counted by the Census Bu-
reau, and those counts are used
to decide which states get more
seats in Congress and more
votes in the Electoral College.
“The only people I know
who are better off in this coun-
try today than they were four
years ago are illegal immigrants.
And that’s a result of your poli-
cies,” Mr. Kennedy said, though
he repeatedly added that his
feelings weren’t personal. “I
don’t hate anybody. I look for
grace wherever I can find it.
And I certainly don’t hate you.”
Mr. Mayorkas called Mr.
Kennedy’s comments insulting.
“The notion, senator, that
we intend to allow illegal
postponement of the articles on
the “dysfunction of the House”
and assailed a Senate trial as a
“distraction.”
“I just know that we should be
doing a bipartisan immigration
bill,” he said.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin, Wis-
consin Democrat, said the exact
wording of how the articles would
be dispensed will determine her
position. She was informed by a
reporter that it would be a motion
to table or a similar motion that
ultimately quashes the articles.
The Arizona Supreme Court’s ruling on a near-total abortion ban has
energized the state’s Democratic base for the November elections.
the Supreme Court led to the
overturning of Roe v. Wade, the
1973 decision that established a
constitutional right to abortion,
and opened the door for states to
adopt strict abortion rights.
Mr. Biden tried to seize on the
situation at a White House press
conference Wednesday, although
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas appeared for two hearings Wednesday where he was eviscerated for border chaos.
immigration is nothing short
of preposterous,” he said. “It
is disrespectful to the extraor-
dinarily hard work that we
perform and far more impor-
tantly that the personnel in
the Department of Homeland
Security and across this ad-
ministration perform to stem
illegal immigration.”
He said the rate of illegal
immigration has been coming
down in recent weeks, with the
Border Patrol now apprehend-
ing about 3,800 people a day.
That’s far below the 10,000-per-
day rate reached at points in
December, which set new re-
cords for border chaos.
Still, during appearances in
the House and Senate, Mr. May-
orkas did acknowledge a “cri-
sis” at the border — something
“I have not heard what the
question will be before the Sen-
ate,” Ms. Baldwin said. “I’m not
convinced that that will be the
motion before us.”
Her Republican opponent,
Eric Hovde, said in a campaign
video this week that illegal im-
migration is “creating a massive
financial strain on our local gov-
ernments across the country.”
Senate Democratic leadership
stayed the course with their strat-
egy, pledging to rapidly derail
the articles despite the increased
☆R
ASSOCIATED PRESS
he made a gaffe that drew atten-
tion again to his age. Asked if he
had a message for Arizonans,
Mr. Biden replied, “Elect me. I’m
in the 20th century,” he said, be-
fore quickly correcting himself.
“Twenty-first century, not back
then. They weren’t even a state.”
He was referring to an abortion
he and other top Biden officials
had refused to do for most of
the last three months.
Mr. Mayorkas testified on
a day that he was supposed to
face the start of impeachment
proceedings in the Senate. The
House had been scheduled to
send over the two articles of
impeachment Wednesday eve-
ning, but delayed that decision
after it became clear Senate
Democrats were going to use
a parliamentary tactic to try to
derail a trial.
Given the partisan break-
down in the Senate, it is un-
thinkable that Mr. Mayorkas
would be convicted and re-
moved even if a trial were to
be held.
Republicans made their
case anyway.
political pressure.
“Our plan over here has not
changed,” said Senate Majority
Leader Charles E. Schumer, New
York Democrat. “The Senate is
ready to go, whenever the House
is. We want to address this issue
as expeditiously as possible.”
The House approved two ar-
ticles in February against Mr.
Mayorkas, making him the first
sitting Cabinet member to be
impeached. The charges are for
willfully subverting immigration
enforcement laws and breaching
law dating to 1864, decades before
Arizona gained statehood.
Mr. Biden’s campaign blamed
Mr. Trump for the ruling, noting
that he appointed three conserva-
tive justices to the Supreme Court
who ruled in favor of overturning
Roe.
“Donald Trump owns the suf-
fering and chaos happening right
now, including in Arizona, be-
cause he proudly overturned Roe
— something he called ‘an incred-
ible thing’ and ‘pretty amazing’
just today,” said Biden campaign
spokesperson Michael Tyler.
“Trump lies constantly — about
everything — but has one track
record: banning abortion every
chance he gets.”
Vice President Kamala Har-
ris plans to hammer home that
message when she travels Friday
to Tucson, Arizona, marking her
second trip to the state in as many
months to “highlight how extrem-
ists in states across the country
have proposed and enacted abor-
tion bans that threaten women’s
health, force them to travel out of
state to receive care, and criminal-
ize doctors.”
The Arizona law mandates a
Rep. Michael Guest of Mis-
sissippi pointed out that Mr.
Mayorkas kicked off his testi-
mony by complaining that his
department was underfunded,
yet Congress has given Home-
land Security more money than
Mr. Mayorkas requested.
On immigration detention
beds in particular, he pointed
to Mr. Mayorkas’ repeated re-
quests to slash the number of
beds below the levels Congress
has allocated.
Rep. Michael Cloud, Texas
Republican, challenged Mr.
Mayorkas’ assertion that Con-
gress is to blame for the chaos.
He pointed out that the Biden
administration has the same
tools as the Trump adminis-
tration, which used them to
achieve the least amount of
the public trust by lying to Con-
gress and the public about the
border and his efforts to control it.
Mr. Mayorkas and the White
House have denied the accusa-
tions, saying that he’s worked to
secure the border within the laws
Congress has written.
Democratic Sens. Bob Casey
of Pennsylvania and Jacky Rosen
of Nevada, both facing reelection,
were steadfast in opposing a full
trial. Ms. Rosen called it “political
theater.”
Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan,
POLITICS | A3
two-to-five years prison sentence
for those who assist in an abor-
tion. The law has an exception
when it comes to saving the life
of the mother.
The turn of events is proving
to be a challenge for Kari Lake, the
front-runner for the GOP Senate
nomination who during her failed
2022 gubernatorial bid said she
would be “thrilled” to have a “great
law that’s already on the books.”
Ms. Lake staked out a different
position this week, saying she
opposed the ruling and calling on
lawmakers to pass an “immediate
common sense solution.”
For his part, Mr. Trump has
celebrated the role he played in
overturning Roe.
At the same time, he has shied
away from supporting a national
abortion ban, while arguing that
state laws should include excep-
tions for cases of rape, incest and
the woman’s life.
He also blamed the GOP’s dis-
appointing showing in the 2022
midterm elections on candidates
who promoted strict abortion
limits which did not sit well with
the broader electorate, including
young women.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
illegal crossings in decades.
Mr. Cloud asked Mr. May-
orkas four times whether Con-
gress has stripped any of those
authorities, and each time Mr.
Mayorkas evaded.
“You can’t get a straight
answer out of this guy,” said
Rep. John Rutherford, Florida
Republican.
For his part, Mr. Mayor-
kas complained that Congress
was so late in getting the 2024
spending bill done that it’s now
too late to complete the hiring
surge he had planned to get
more help for the border.
He also chided Congress
for cutting money from a fund
used to pay localities to house
and feed newly arrived ille-
gal immigrants as they spread
across the country.
chief of Senate Democrats’ cam-
paign arm, criticized the delay of
articles by House Republicans as
a “political charade.”
Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah is
the lone Republican who’s sig-
naled he’ll vote with Democrats to
kill the articles. That would mean
likely three Democrats would
need to flip in the GOP’s favor
for a full trial.
“Clearly, it’s a political en-
deavor at this stage, to some
degree,” Mr. Romney told The
Times.
A4 | POLITICS ☆☆ R THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

ECONOMY

Wall Street takes tumble after high inflation report burns hopes
Many traders, investors seek cut on high interest rates
BY STAN CHOE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK | A washout on
Wall Street sent stocks sinking
Wednesday, as worries rose that
what seemed like a blip in the
battle to bring down inflation is
turning into a troubling trend.
The S&P 500 dropped 0.9%,
and the vast majority of stocks
within the index fell. The Dow
Jones Industrial Average tumbled
422 points, or 1.1%, and the Nas-
daq composite sank 0.8%
Treasury yields also leaped in
the bond market, raising the pres-
sure on the stock market, after a
report showed inflation was hot-
ter last month than economists
expected. It’s the third straight
report to suggest progress on
bringing high inflation down may
be stalling. That hurts hopes that
January’s and February’s dis-
appointing inflation data may
not have been as bad as they
seemed because of some techni-
cal reasons.
“There are still embers of
inflation here and there in the
economy,” said Joe Davis, chief
global economist at Vanguard.
For shoppers, that’s painful
because of the potential for even
higher prices at the store. For
Wall Street, it raises fears that the
Federal Reserve will hold back
on delivering the cuts to interest
rates that traders are craving and
have been betting on.
The S&P 500 had already
leaped more than 20% since Hal-
loween in part on expectations
that the Federal Reserve would
lower its main interest rate, which
is sitting at its highest level in
more than two decades. Such
cuts would relax the pressure
on the economy and encourage
investors to pay higher prices for
stocks, bonds, cryptocurrencies
and other investments.
But the Fed has been waiting
for more evidence to show infla-
tion is heading sustainably down
toward its goal of 2%. After an
encouraging cooling last year, the
fear now is that inflation may be
stuck after January’s, February’s
and March’s inflation reports all
came in hotter than expected,
along with data on the economy
generally.
“Two data points don’t make a
trend, but maybe three do,” said
Brian Jacobsen, chief economist
at Annex Wealth Management.
“If we get one more reading
like this, Fed chatter will shift
from when to cut to whether to
hike.”
Prices for everything from
bonds to gold fell immediately
after the morning’s release of the
inflation data.
The yield on the 10-year Trea-
sury jumped to 4.54% from 4.36%
late Tuesday and is back to where
it was in November. The two-
year yield, which moves more on
expectations for Fed action, shot
even higher and rose to 4.97%
from 4.74%.
Traders sharply cut back on
bets that the Fed could begin
cutting rates in June. They now
see just a 17% chance of that,
down from nearly 74% a month
ago, according to CME Group’s
FedWatch tool.
Perhaps more importantly,
traders shifted more bets toward
the Fed cutting rates just twice
over the course of this year. At the
start of the year, they were fore-
casting six or more cuts through
2024.
High interest rates work to
undercut inflation by slowing the
economy and hurting investment
prices. The fear is that rates left
too high for too long can cause a
recession.
Wall Street’s biggest losers on
Wednesday included real-estate
investment trusts, utility compa-
nies and other stocks that tend
to get hurt most by high interest
rates.
Real-estate stocks in the S&P
500 fell 4.1% for the biggest loss by
far among the 11 sectors that make
up the index. That included a
6.1% drop for office owner Boston
Properties and a 5.3% tumble for
Alexandria Real Estate Equities.
Homebuilders also slumped
because higher interest rates
could chill the housing industry
by making mortgages more ex-
pensive. D.R. Horton fell 6.4%,
Lennar sank 5.8% and PulteGroup
dropped 5.2%.
All told, the S&P 500 fell
49.27 points to 5,160.64. The Dow
dropped 422.16 to 38,461.51, and
the Nasdaq composite fell 136.28
to 16,170.36.
Critics had already been say-
ing the U.S. stock market looked
too expensive by several mea-
sures. They said either interest
rates needed to fall or profits
for companies needed to rally to
make stock prices look more rea-
sonable. The hope on Wall Street
is that the resilient U.S. economy
could help prop up profits, even
if it does diminish hopes for rate
cuts.

Giving Ukraine Russia’s seized billions would sound death knell for dollar

C
onfidence in
Western financial
markets has already
been shaken enough
by the 20% devaluation of
the dollar over the last few
years. But now the European
Commission wants to hand
Ukraine $300 billion seized
from Russia. Doing so likely
would sound the death knell
for the dollar and eventually
the euro.
Treasury Secretary Janet
Yellen, who has worked for
literally decades to under-
mine the strength of the
dollar, recently urged world
leaders to take this disastrous
step of outright theft.
But financial leaders world-
wide, including those who
adamantly support Ukraine,
are sounding the alarm, citing
the unprecedented fallout that
would stem from further vio-
lating the sacrosanct nature of
the dollar.
When Russia invaded
Ukraine two years ago, the
U.S. and its European allies
seized $300 billion in Rus-
sian Central Bank assets.
Relative to the size of the
Russian economy, that’s the
equivalent of $4 trillion in
U.S. financial holdings.
The goal was to instigate
panic in Russian markets,
culminating in bank runs and
general unrest, perhaps even
leading to the ouster of Presi-
dent Vladimir Putin himself.
It didn’t work.
Instead, American banks
had a cliffhanging spring
last year that included the
collapse of Silicon Valley, Sig-
nature and Silvergate banks,
while countless regional
banks held on thanks to emer-
gency loans from the Federal
Reserve.
Apparently not content
with sowing chaos in do-
mestic financial markets, the
federal government’s push to
steal Russian financial assets
would plant the seeds of pan-
demonium abroad.
The European Union is in
lockstep with the Biden ad-
ministration’s plan to transfer
the frozen Russian assets to
Ukraine to buy weapons —
which, of course, would be
sold by the EU and the U.S.
Some member states of the
EU want to just hand over all
$300 billion instantly to the
corrupt oligarchs in Ukraine.
Others want to start with
just the interest payments
accruing on these financial
assets. (Of course, the frozen
assets aren’t actually accruing
interest now, so any payments
to Ukraine would actually
be more deficit spending by
Western governments.)
Just sending the interest
payments would be crossing
a terrible threshold, further
violating financial custodial
agreements of dollar- and
euro-denominated assets.
The message from the EU
and the Biden administra-
tion is crystal clear: Western
financial markets are now a
dangerous place to park your
money. This could fatally
undermine global confidence
in American and European fi-
nancial management because
the safety of your assets will
have become dependent upon
your standing in Washington
and Brussels.
That’s a concern for cor-
porations, but it could be an
existential threat to countries
that own a large share of
international financial assets.
The ever-present threat of
theft, couched as financial
sanctions, means nations
effectively lose their au-
tonomy, forced to kowtow to
the whims of American and
European bureaucrats.
The Biden administra-
tion has already threatened
sanctions on Uganda over its
LGBTQ policy, but that’s just
the beginning. Similarly puni-
tive financial ideas have been
floated regarding abortion
and environmental policies.
Now sanctions are
becoming just the first step
to seizing all of a country’s
financial assets, and the rest
of the world is waking up to
the racket.
A few months ago, the
Indonesian president gave
a speech saying his country
needed to diversify its dollar
holdings and dollar-denom-
inated assets, ominously cit-
ing, “Look what happened to
Russia.” The Federal Reserve
recently refused to disclose
how much foreign exchange
reserves and gold have been
withdrawn from the United
States since the Russian asset
seizure.
The de-dollarization trend
is decades old, a result of
dysfunctional government
crippling economic growth
while inflation erodes the
currency’s value. The dollar
fell from 73% of currency re-
serves to 55% in 2021, but the
seizure of Russian financial
assets gave this trend a shove
into overdrive.
The dollar’s share of cur-
rency reserve plummeted
another 8 percentage points
in just two years, falling to
47% in 2023.
It’s not just reserves,
but international trade, too.
Brazil has begun conducting
some of its trade in Chinese
yuan, and projections are
for China’s share of trade
to triple in the next decade.
Other countries, including
their central banks, are di-
vesting their dollar holdings,
preferring gold or other real
assets.
The Fed’s interest rate
increases have buoyed the
dollar, but that is poised to
reverse as the central bank
readies a pivot to interest rate
cuts in this election year.
Similarly, the turmoil
around the globe has
prompted a “flight to safety”
where investors buy assets
perceived to be safe, such as
U.S. Treasuries. But the talk
of seizing foreigners’ assets
is exposing these dollar-de-
nominated loans as less than
safe. Indeed, they’re more of
a liability.
If the people running our
country were intentionally
trying to destroy the dollar,
it’s not clear what they would
be doing differently.
• E.J. Antoni is a public fi-
nance economist and the Rich-
ard F. Aster Fellow, and Peter
St. Onge is a visiting fellow, at
The Heritage Foundation.

GUNS Failing to register as a dealer would

From page A1
officials say that misses perhaps 20,000
other people who make a business out
of buying and selling at gun shows and
using online methods.
“Under this regulation, it will not
matter if guns are sold on the internet,
at a gun show, or at a brick-and-mortar
store: if you sell guns predominantly to
earn a profit, you must be licensed, and
you must conduct background checks,”
Attorney General Merrick Garland said.
Officials said they carved out excep-
tions so people can manage their collec-
tions, including selling them off, without
having to worry about being considered
a dealer.
Background checks are supposed to
weed out people who are ineligible to
purchase a gun, including felons, im-
migrants without documentation, fugi-
tives and those with domestic violence
records.
The administration has been work-
ing on the rule for months, including
releasing a draft proposal last summer.
The final rule, which is being submitted
for publication in the Federal Register on
Thursday and will take effect in about
a month, hews closely to the original
proposal, officials said.
Gun rights groups vehemently op-
pose the idea. They worry it is a step
toward the creation of a national gun
registry and say criminals will find ways
to get firearms no matter what.
Gun background checks are supposed to weed out people who are ineligible to purchase a gun. The new rules from the Biden
administration are expanding the checks. There are still exceptions to the checks so they are not universal.
“Most mass shooters, including those
inspired by Islamic terrorist groups,
pass background checks to acquire fire-
arms,” the National Rifle Association’s
Institute for Legislative Action argues
on its website.
Biden officials said they anticipate
legal challenges but said they believe
they are on firm ground under a 2022
law passed by Congress in the wake of a
mass shooting that killed 10 Black people
at a market in Buffalo, New York, and an-
other mass shooting at Robb Elementary
School in Uvalde, Texas, that killed 19
students and two teachers.
But it was another shooting, 2019’s
massacre in Midland and Odessa, Texas,
which killed seven people and wounded
25, that drew attention to unlicensed
dealers.
Seth Aaron Ator, who bought the
weapon, was a prohibited purchaser
because of mental illness and had failed
a background check before. But he was
able to buy an AR-style semi-automatic
rifle from a man who did not perform
ASSOCIATED PRESS
background checks.
The seller, Marcus Anthony Braziel,
pleaded guilty to dealing firearms with-
out a license and a tax evasion charge and
was sentenced to two years in prison.
The crux of the new rule is trying
to define who is considered to be in
the business of dealing firearms. The
policy lays out some tests, including that
someone is repeatedly advertising sales,
reserves space at shows or flea markets,
keeps profit and loss records, or uses
credit cards for sales.
be met with jail time and fines.
Officials said the public comments
on the draft rule ran about two-to-one
in favor of the idea.
Requiring background checks for
all gun purchases is almost universally
popular, with a 2022 Gallup survey find-
ing 92% support for the idea.
Wednesday’s announcement comes
just days after the Justice Department
released a report on firearms trafficking.
After studying nearly 10,000 trafficking
investigations by the Bureau of Alco-
hol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives,
analysts concluded that private transac-
tions were involved in more than 40%
of them.
Gun show and flea market sales were
relatively small, however, at just 3%.
Some 3.6% of trafficking cases in-
volved online marketplace sales, 2.7%
involved social media and 1% involved
peer-to-peer apps.
Estimates vary on the number of
gun transactions that happen without
a check.
One study of a prominent online
marketplace, done by gun-control
group Everytown for Gun Safety, iden-
tified nearly 1.2 million ads for firearms
sales that would not have needed to go
through a background check.
Another study, which surveyed
Americans who had recently acquired
firearms, found that 22% of the transac-
tions didn’t go through a background
check. That included both sales and
gifts.

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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024 ☆R FROM PAGE ONE | A5

SPYING fact that Mr. Page had served as a source

From page A1
or so as a way of forcing a recurring
debate on how it is working.
This time around that debate has
been shaped by the FBI’s use of FISA
to target the Trump campaign in 2016.
Mr. Trump drove home the point
in a post on Truth Social Wednesday
morning.
“KILL FISA, IT WAS ILLEGALLY
USED AGAINST ME, AND MANY
OTHERS,” he wrote. “THEY SPIED ON
MY CAMPAIGN!!!”
A 2019 report by the Justice Depart-
ment inspector general found at least
17 bungles by the FBI in its application
under FISA to conduct surveillance on
Carter Page, a foreign policy adviser to
the 2016 Trump campaign, over pur-
ported ties to Russia.
Among those bungles was an FBI
lawyer altering an email to conceal the
for the CIA. That information could have
cut against the government’s case that he
deserved to be probed.
The court that oversees FISA, in
two opinions unsealed last year, also
said Section 702 had been used to vet
some would-be immigrants and probe
Black Lives Matter activists, political
donors and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on
the Capitol.
FBI Director Christopher A. Wray has
told lawmakers he has cleaned things
up. He said the court has found 98%
compliance with the changes the FBI
has already put in place.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, who
supported the legislation as is, has
labored to bring Mr. Trump and GOP
lawmakers critical of the bill to his
side.
“Here’s the thing about FISA, he’s
not wrong. Of course, they abused FISA,
the whole Carter Page investigation,
that whole fiasco was built on a false
premise — the fake Russian dossier and
all the other things,” Mr. Johnson said
before the bill was derailed. “But these
reforms would actually kill the abuses
that allow President Trump’s campaign
to be spied on.”
Mr. Johnson could bring FISA back
to the floor under rules that require a
two-thirds majority to pass rather than
a simple majority vote.
Republicans who voted against the
rule pushed back on Mr. Johnson, includ-
ing veiled threats to toss him out of the
speaker post just like his predecessor,
Rep. Kevin McCarthy.
“If Speaker Johnson is unwilling to fix
FISA Section 702, we are left wondering
what he is indeed willing to fix. We didn’t
fix the budget or the border,” said Rep.
Matt Gaetz of Florida, who led the eight
Republicans who helped eject Mr. Mc-
Carthy in October.
“Now, the very authorities that we
saw weaponized against President
Trump and the American people are
poised to get enhancements under
this reauthorization, rather than any
of the reforms that are so desperately
needed.”
Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jor-
dan, who spearheaded the push to fur-
ther rein in FBI powers, said he spent
three hours with Mr. Johnson at a brief-
ing by intelligence officials about the
vital role FISA plays in fighting terrorism
and international crime such as drug
smuggling.
“Nothing in there changed my per-
spective on wanting to require a war-
rant,” said Mr. Jordan, Ohio Republican.
The FISA fight also split former
Trump administration officials.
The Intelligence Committee’s bill
garnered endorsements by former
Trump administration officials, in-
cluding former Attorney General Wil-
liam P. Barr and Mike Pompeo, who
served as CIA director and secretary
of state.
“This legislation directly addresses
FISA abuses by reducing the number
of FBI personnel who can authorize a
U.S. person query by more than 90%,”
they wrote in a recent op-ed for Fox
News. “Furthermore, it statutorily ties
FBI leadership’s querying compliance
directly to their compensation and as-
sesses escalating penalties for an FBI
agent’s subsequent abuses.”
However, other former Trump ad-
ministration officials, acting Director
of National Intelligence Ric Grenell
and National Security Council of-
ficial Kash Patel, called for a warrant
requirement.
“Remember, the F in FISA is ‘Foreign.’
Absent a dramatic reform of FISA 702,
we call upon Congress to let it lapse —
better to have no authority for 7 days or
so than another 365 days of spying on
Trump and his supporters,” they said
in a joint statement.
“President Trump has been 100%
right on this issue — stop spying on
Americans and get a warrant.”

NPR He detailed how NPR refused to

From page A1
NPR in 2024 by way of direct CPB grants
provided to public radio stations, who
must use the money to buy NPR content.
The conservative watchdog Media
Research Center said Mr. Berliner’s
article confirmed its long-standing be-
lief that NPR provides liberal content
that interests only a small slice of the
American public.
“What we’ve always called for here
is to take the taxpayer money away,
because it’s unfair, really, for them to
take my tax dollars and slap me in the
face with it,” said Tim Graham, Media
Research Center’s Newsbusters execu-
tive editor. “But that’s what they do to
Republicans.”
Mr. Berliner criticized NPR’s dogged
pursuit of the Trump-Russia collusion
claims that reporters quietly dropped
after the claims were debunked.
provide coverage of the bombshell con-
tents of Hunter Biden’s discarded laptop
computer, which were exposed ahead of
the 2020 presidential election. Emails,
photos and other documents included
not only evidence of Hunter Biden’s
deeply troubling behavior but also al-
legations that the former vice president
was involved in his son’s business deals.
At the time, Terence Samuels, NPR’s
managing editor for news, said the story
did not merit NPR’s attention and cov-
erage would be a waste of time for
listeners.
In the newsroom, Mr. Berliner re-
vealed, a veteran reporter said NPR
should not cover the laptop story be-
cause “it could help Trump.”
Mr. Berliner wrote that he investi-
gated the political affiliation of news-
room staff and found 87% were Demo-
crats and none was Republican.
NPR’s chief news executive, Edith
Chapin, rejected Mr. Berliner’s claims
about the newsroom, according to a
story published by NPR’s media reporter.
“We are proud to stand behind the
exceptional work that our desks and
shows do to cover a wide range of chal-
lenging stories,” she wrote. “We believe
that inclusion — among our staff, with
our sourcing, and in our overall cover-
age — is critical to telling the nuanced
stories of this country and our world.
“None of our work is above scrutiny
or critique. We must have vigorous dis-
cussions in the newsroom about how we
serve the public as a whole.”
NPR’s listener profile in 2023 was
beginning to match its newsroom. It
included 11% who described themselves
as very or somewhat conservative, 21%
who said they were in the middle politi-
cally and 67% who identified as very or
somewhat liberal.
Howard Husock, who served on the
CPB board from 2013 until 2018, said the
numbers do not surprise him because NPR
is no longer adequately serving listeners.
Rather than leading the coverage of
the opioid epidemic that has devastated
many of their listening areas, or breaking
the story about the subprime mortgage
crisis or other critical issues, he said,
NPR clings to reporting on established
progressive storylines that often focus
on diversity, equity and inclusion.
“It’s very dispiriting because taxpay-
ers should not be supporting a service
that they don’t listen to and that doesn’t
try to reach them,” he said.
NPR’s studios are in New York,
Washington and Los Angeles and it
maintains 16 international bureaus. But
none of its studios are in the southern
United States, Mr. Husock pointed out.
Its radio shows are syndicated to
1,500 local member stations that must
pay annual fees to NPR paid for with
the CPB grants.
Mr. Husock has proposed an alterna-
tive to ending NPR’s federal funding.
Rather than eliminating it, he pro-
posed, the federal funding formula
should be made more flexible so that
member stations can use the money not
just to pay NPR dues, but to also provide
local coverage that is now sorely missing
in many regions.
The current formula requires 75% of
CPB funding to go to public television,
which Mr. Husock said is outdated and
should be divided more evenly because
public radio produces significant online
content.
Mr. Husock believes there is little
interest in Congress to strip out the fund-
ing entirely as lawmakers in both parties
make regular appearances on their local
NPR and PBS affiliate stations.
House Republicans tried to strip
funding for the CPB in the fiscal 2024
government spending bill, but the money
was restored in the final version signed
by Mr. Biden last month.
“They are not going to zero it out,”
Mr. Husock said. “But you can tweak
it in ways that would really make a
difference.”

SOUTH KOREA shoulder with opposing party workers and volun-

From page A1
unrepentant, ex-imperialist power. It has gratified
Tokyo, which questions some Korean historical
claims and says it has offered multiple remunera-
tions and apologies.
Warming South Korean-Japanese ties have been
welcomed in Washington, which has long sought to
upgrade trilateral cooperation against the regional
threats posed by China and North Korea.
As president, Mr. Yoon retains control over
the defense and foreign ministries, but his politi-
cal brokering ability will be weakened if exit polls
are accurate.
“Constitutionally, the president has authority
over foreign and national security policy,” said
Moon Chung-in, who advised previous govern-
ments on North Korean policies. “But the Assembly
can, as in the U.S., intervene by controlling budgets
and if the opposition coalition has a majority, the
ruling party will have limited leverage.”
Mr. Moon, a professor emeritus at Seoul’s Yon-
sei University, reckons that won’t suit Mr. Yoon,
whom critics say finds it difficult to compromise.
The president “would have to bargain with the op-
position,” Mr. Moon said. “But given his style, that
is unlikely. I see a collision course.”
The result will be felt well beyond South Korea.
“As the Assembly has many tools for policy
intervention, the U.S. and Japanese governments
will have serious concerns about the ability of the
Yoon government to deliver,” Mr. Moon said.
‘Punishing’ the government
Asked about the campaign, most voters did not
mention foreign policy, while those who did were
strongly opposed to Mr. Yoon’s unconventional
policies.
“I am a regular voter for the DPK, but this time
I voted especially to punish the government,” said
Mr. Chang, a 40-something design firm CEO, who
Many voters in South Korea cast their ballots for the Democratic Party of Korea in Wednesday’s elections.
The party’s success will pose a problem for the president during the last years of his term.
like several voters, asked The Washington Times
not to use his full name. “That includes Yoon try-
ing hard to please Japan, and letting the Fukushima
water out.”
Many Koreans were infuriated when the Yoon
administration took Tokyo’s side last year in
its release of irradiated coolant water from the
earthquake-stricken Fukushima Nuclear Plant
into the Pacific. Before its release, the water was
filtered and treated under United Nations auspices,
and no dangerous radioactivity has been detected
since the release.
Other voters backed Mr. Yoon’s desire to move
beyond past grievances with Tokyo.
“The leftists still go on and on about anti-Japan,”
said Jun Arum, a 37-year-old housewife who voted
for the PPP. “It is too backward — and not based
ASSOCIATED PRESS
on truth, even.”
Although it’s a prime concern for Washington,
the threat posed by a nuclear-armed North Korea
does not factor into domestic politics as an electoral
concern, Mr. Chang said.
“If we have a war with North Korea, it is going
to be like a world war,” he said. “I don’t think it’s
only a matter of [South] Korea.”
Personalities and policies
A week of campaigning saw intense but good-
natured electioneering in one of Asia’s most vibrant
democracies.
In Seoul, open-topped trucks roamed the streets,
blaring music and slogans, while campaigners
on their rear decks danced. On street corners,
party workers and volunteers — often shoulder to
teers — waved placards showcasing their respec-
tive candidates’ mug shots, under electioneering
banners slung from lamp posts and trees.
For many voters, the election was less about
approval of policy positions and more about dis-
approval of political personalities. Angry citizens
voted to oppose key politicians — notably Mr. Yoon
and DPK leader Lee Jae-myung. Mr. Lee, whose
win Wednesday could boost a widely expected
presidential run in 2027, faces multiple court chal-
lenges, but — like former President Donald Trump
in the U.S. — so far has repelled all legal attacks.
“I don’t like either party, but my city’s former
mayor is a nasty guy, and I don’t believe him or
his party,” said PPP voter Lee Sung-min, a food
and beverage manager in Seongnam City, the DPK
leader’s political base. “I’ve heard more than two
dozen allegations, including from people in the
neighborhood office.”
“I want Yoon Suk Yeol out,” shot back DPK voter
Lim Ji-young, an office worker in Seoul. “He has not
done anything as president. He has to concentrate
on the economy.”
The government has struggled to deal with a
strike by trainee doctors that started Feb. 20, and
Mr. Yoon, whose approval ratings have rarely risen
above the mid-30% range, also has been hit by flak
aimed at his wife, Kim Keon-hee. Wildly unpopular,
she stands accused of accepting a pricey Dior bag
from a person seeking access to her husband.
Even PPP voters concede the first couple have
issues, including an incident when Mr. Yoon was
caught swearing and criticizing U.S. lawmakers in
a hot mic moment after a meeting with President
Biden at the United Nations in 2022.
“The Yoon government has lost voters’ credit:
They should apologize over the Dior bag issue and
the Biden issue,” said Ms. Park, a wealthy business-
woman in her 60s who voted PPP. “Koreans are
very soft toward those who bend a knee, but these
two pretend nothing happened, and that gives the
other party more issues, more stories.”

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A6 | NATION
Nation
IDAHO
Prosecutor:
Man built
‘alternate
reality’
Daybell accused
of three murders
BY REBECCA BOONE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BOISE, IDAHO | An Idaho man charged
with three murders in an unusual dooms-
day-focused case crafted an alternate
reality so that he could fulfill “his desire
for sex, money and power,” a prosecutor
told jurors Wednesday morning.
“When he had a chance at what he
considered his rightful destiny, he made
sure no person and no law would stand
in his way,” prosecutor Rob Wood said.
Chad Daybell, 55, is facing charges
of first degree murder, insurance fraud,
and conspiracy to commit murder and
grand theft in connection with the
deaths of Tammy Daybell, 7-year-old
Joshua “JJ” Vallow and 16-year-old Tylee
Ryan. Last year, their mother, Lori Val-
low Daybell, received a life sentence
without parole for
the killings.
Prosecutors
say the couple
justified the three
killings by creat-
ing an detailed and
apocalyptic belief
system, part of an
Daybell elaborate scheme
to eliminate any
obstacles to their
relationship and to obtain money from
survivor benefits and life insurance. Val-
low Daybell referred to her two younger
children as zombies, one friend testified
during her trial.
“The evidence will show that this
was a convenient narrative,” Mr. Wood
told jurors. “This narrative gave them
the pretext to remove people from this
world for their own good.”
Mr. Wood also described the basics of
the case against Mr. Daybell for jurors,
structuring his presentation like chapters
in a book — an apparent reference to the
defendant’s previous work as an author.
Mr. Daybell was a member of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and
self-published fiction loosely based on
its teachings.
In fall 2019, prosecutors say he
tried to fraudulently collect on his
late wife’s life insurance policy, and
Vallow Daybell continued to collect
both children’s Social Security benefits
after they died.
Mr. Daybell has pleaded not guilty to
the charges; the trial is expected to take
more than two months. Prosecutors said
they will seek the death penalty if Mr.
Daybell is convicted. Mr. Daybell’s de-
fense attorney John Prior did not return
a phone message requesting comment.
A judge has issued a gag order in the
case, barring attorneys from talking to
the media until the trial is over.
The grim story began in the fall of
2019, when extended family members
reported the two children missing and
law enforcement officials launched a
search that spanned several states. The
subsequent investigation took several
unexpected turns.
Vallow Daybell and Mr. Daybell were
having an affair when both of their
spouses died unexpectedly, investiga-
tors said. Vallow Daybell’s husband was
shot to death by her brother Alex Cox
in Arizona in July 2019; the brother told
police it was in self-defense.
Mr. Wood told jurors that the evi-
dence in the case will show that Mr.
Daybell and Vallow Daybell manipulated
Cox into doing their bidding by promis-
ing him spiritual rewards.
Several months later, in October
2019, Tammy Daybell died. Mr. Daybell
initially told police she was battling an
illness and died in her sleep, but an
autopsy later determined she died of
asphyxiation. Vallow Daybell and Mr.
Daybell married just two weeks after
Tammy Daybell died, surprising family
members and drawing suspicion from
authorities.
Friends later told detectives that Val-
low Daybell and Mr. Daybell believed
they had been reincarnated and were
tasked with gathering people before a
biblical apocalypse.
Mr. Wood said Mr. Daybell described
both children as being possessed before
they disappeared, and that he repeatedly
predicted to friends that Tammy Daybell
would soon die.
Six former Mississippi police officers were sentenced in state court Wednesday for torturing Michael Corey Jenkins (center) and
Eddie Terrell Parker. The judge gave the six men yearslong state sentences, which will run concurrently with their federal ones.
MISSISSIPPI
Six former officers sentenced in
state court for torture of Black men
BY MICHAEL GOLDBERG
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BRANDON, MISS. | Already sentenced
to federal prison, six former Mississippi
law enforcement officers who pleaded
guilty to a long list of state and federal
charges for torturing two Black men
were sentenced Wednesday in state
court.
The six White former Mississippi
law enforcement officers who attacked
Michael Corey Jenkins and Eddie Ter-
rell Parker in January 2023 had already
been sentenced to federal prison terms
ranging from about 10 to 40 years.
In March, U.S. District Judge Tom
Lee called their actions “egregious and
despicable” as he gave sentences near
the top of the federal guidelines to five
of the six men.
Rankin County Circuit Judge Steve
Ratcliff on Wednesday gave the men
yearslong state sentences that were
shorter than the amount of time in
federal prison that they had already
received, but longer than what state
prosecutors had recommended.
Time served for the state convictions
will run concurrently, or at the same
time, as the federal sentences, and the
men will serve their time in federal
penitentiaries.
The case drew outrage from top law
enforcement officials in the country,
including Attorney General Merrick
Garland, who said the officers committed
ENVIRONMENT
Biden administration sets strict limits on
‘forever chemicals’ in national drinking water
BY MICHAEL PHILLIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
The Biden administration on Wednes-
day finalized strict limits on certain
“forever chemicals” in drinking water
that will require utilities to reduce them
to the lowest level they can be reliably
measured.
Officials say this will reduce exposure
for 100 million people and help prevent
thousands of illnesses, including cancers.
The rule is the first national drinking
water limit on toxic PFAS, or perfluoro-
alkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances,
which are widespread and long lasting
in the environment.
Health advocates praised the Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency for not
backing away from tough limits the
agency proposed last year. But water
utilities took issue with the rule, say-
ing treatment systems are expensive to
install and that customers will end up
paying more for water.
Water providers are entering a new
era with significant additional health
standards that the EPA says will make
tap water safer for millions of consum-
ers — a Biden administration priority.
The agency has also proposed forcing
utilities to remove dangerous lead pipes.
McAlpin Elward
Dedmon Middleton
Opdyke Hartfield
a “heinous attack on citizens they had
sworn an oath to protect.” In the epi-
sode’s grisly details, local residents saw
echoes of Mississippi’s history of racist
atrocities by people in authority.
Utility groups warn the rules will
cost tens of billions of dollars each and
fall hardest on small communities with
fewer resources. Legal challenges are
sure to follow.
EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan
says the rule is the most important action
the EPA has ever taken on PFAS.
“The result is a comprehensive and
life-changing rule, one that will improve
the health and vitality of so many com-
munities across our country,” said Mr.
Regan.
PFAS chemicals are hazardous be-
cause they don’t degrade in the environ-
ment and are linked to health issues such
as low birth weight and liver disease,
along with certain cancers. The EPA
estimates the rule will cost about $1.5
billion to implement each year, but doing
so will prevent nearly 10,000 deaths over
decades and significantly reduce serious
illnesses.
They’ve been used in everyday prod-
ucts including nonstick pans, firefighting
foam and waterproof clothing. Although
some of the most common types are
phased out in the U.S., others remain.
Water providers will now be forced to
remove contamination put in the envi-
ronment by other industries.
“It’s that accumulation that’s the
☆R
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOGRAPHS
The first defendant to be sentenced
Wednesday was Brett McAlpin, the
fourth highest-ranking officer in the
Rankin County Sheriff’s Office. McAl-
pin had previously been sentenced by a
federal judge to about 27 years of federal
imprisonment. He was sentenced in state
court Wednesday to 15 years on one
charge and five years on another.
The defendants include five former
Rankin County sheriff’s deputies —
McAlpin, 53; Hunter Elward, 31; Christian
Dedmon, 29; Jeffrey Middleton, 46; and
Daniel Opdyke, 28 — and a former police
officer from the city of Richland, Joshua
Hartfield, 32, who was off duty during
the assault.
All six of the former officers pleaded
guilty to state charges of obstruction of
justice and conspiracy to hinder prosecu-
tion. Dedmon and Elward, who kicked in
a door, also admitted to home invasion.
The charges followed an Associated
Press investigation in March that linked
some of the officers to at least four vio-
lent encounters since 2019 that left two
Black men dead.
The former lawmen admitted to
breaking into a home without a warrant
and torturing Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Parker
in an hourslong attack that included
beatings, repeated uses of stun guns and
assaults with a sex toy before one of the
victims was shot in the mouth.
The terror began on Jan. 24, 2023, with
a racist call for extrajudicial violence,
according to federal prosecutors.
problem,” said Scott Belcher, a North
Carolina State University professor who
researches PFAS toxicity. “Even tiny,
tiny, tiny amounts each time you take
a drink of water over your lifetime is
going to keep adding up, leading to the
health effects.”
PFAS is a broad family of chemical
substances, and the new rule sets strict
limits on two common types — called
PFOA and PFOS — at 4 parts per trillion.
Three other types that include GenEx
Chemicals that are a major problem in
North Carolina are limited to 10 parts
per trillion. Water providers will have
to test for these PFAS chemicals and
tell the public when levels are too high.
Combinations of some PFAS types will
be limited, too.
Environmental and health advocates
praised the rule, but said PFAS manufac-
turers knew decades ago the substances
were dangerous yet hid or downplayed
the evidence. Limits should have come
sooner, they argue.
“Reducing PFAS in our drinking
water is the most cost effective way to
reduce our exposure,” said Scott Faber, a
food and water expert at Environmental
Working Group. “It’s much more chal-
lenging to reduce other exposures such
as PFAS in food or clothing or carpets.”
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
IDAHO
Definition
of ‘woman’
codified into
state law
Preferred pronoun
compelling banned
BY VALERIE RICHARDSON
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Biden administration officials are still
unclear on the definition of “woman” and
may want to check in with Idaho.
Idaho Gov. Brad Little has signed
without comment legislation that codi-
fies in state law biological definitions
for “woman,” “man,” and other sex-
based terms, making his state the fifth
to exclude men who identify as women
from being legally recognized as female.
The Republican governor’s decision
to sign House Bill 421 was cheered by
the right-tilting Independent Women’s
Voice, which has advocated for model
legislation based on its Women’s Bill of
Rights that “codifies the common public
understanding of sex-based words.”
“Thank you Governor Little for
standing with women and signing the
codification of sex-based terms in law, in-
spired by Independent Women’s Voice’s
Women’s Bill of Rights,” said former
All-American swimmer Riley Gaines,
an IWV ambassador.
“Idaho’s action on this issue should
be celebrated and is a sharp rebuke of
an aggressive attempt to erase women’s
rights,” Ms. Gaines said in a statement.
“Thank you for saying ‘NO’ to this dis-
criminatory effort to rewrite women’s
rights and allow men to take our op-
portunities and infiltrate our spaces.”
House Bill 421, signed into law on
Tuesday, takes effect July 1. The measure
declares that there are only two sexes,
male and female; that everyone is either
male or female, and gives biological
definitions for sex-related terms includ-
ing “mother,” “father,” “girl” and “boy.”
“In no case is an individual’s sex
determined by stipulation or self-iden-
tification,” reads the legislation, which
passed the House and the Senate with
no Democratic votes.
Four states — Kansas, Tennessee,
Oklahoma and Nebraska — adopted
similar measures last year. Five states
— Alabama, Arizona, Iowa, Kentucky,
Louisiana, and Mississippi — are con-
sidering such legislation.
At least two Biden administration
officials — Health and Human Services
Secretary Xavier Becerra and Educa-
tion Secretary Miguel Cardona — have
struggled when asked by Republicans
to define “woman,” a question spurred
by the White House’s effort to include
gender identity in policies and laws
related to sex.
House Bill 538, which Idaho’s gover-
nor signed into law on Monday, forbids
government entities from compelling
their employees to use someone’s op-
posite-sex pronouns. The measure also
bans schools from adopting students’
opposite-sex pronouns and names with-
out parental consent.
Mr. Little last week signed House
Bill 668, which bans public funding
from covering “gender-affirming care.”
The state previously approved a ban on
gender-transition drugs and surgeries for
minors, which is now in court.
The bills were approved over the
objections of transgender rights advo-
cates, who protested earlier this month
by dropping 48,000 paper hearts from
the fourth floor onto the capitol rotunda.
The American Civil Liberties Union of
Idaho accused the Republican-controlled
Legislature of giving in to the “hateful
demands of far-right extremists at the
expense of the safety, security, and health
of Idaho’s transgender community.”
“Idaho’s legislators are using LGBTQ+
people, communities of color, and immi-
grants as political scapegoats, creating a
less inclusive, less safe, and less vigor-
ous Idaho,” the ACLU posted on X. “It
is supremely un-American, and we will
not stop resisting.”
Idaho was the first state to pass leg-
islation barring male-born scholastic
athletes from participating in female
sports, a bill approved in 2020 sponsored
by Republican state Rep. Barbara Ehardt,
a former NCAA Division I basketball
player and coach.
Another 23 states have since passed
similar Save Women’s Sports bills. The
Idaho law remains on hold following a
federal court injunction that was upheld
in August by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals.
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
CULTURE
Marriage Pact draws students looking for fun, or a backup plan
BY LEANNE ITALIE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK | It’s the stuff of movies:
Two friends vow to marry each other if
they’re not hitched by a specified future
date or age.
Well, the Marriage Pact, an annual
matching ritual that has become popular
on nearly 90 college campuses around
the U.S., has turned that dusty cliche
into fun.
And a few couples have found last-
ing love.
Nearly half a million students have
participated since the pact was first
rolled out at Stanford University in
2017. Born of an economics project by
two students there, the pact involves an
algorithm that rates matches based on
such statements as “I prefer politically
incorrect humor” and “I pride myself on
telling hard truths.”
Unlike dating apps and services, each
student gets just one name, a percentage
MICHIGAN
Ford recalls nearly 43,000
SUVs due to gas leaks
DETROIT | Ford is recalling nearly
43,000 small SUVs because gasoline
can leak from the fuel injectors onto
hot engine surfaces, increasing the
risk of fire. But the recall remedy
does not include repairing the fuel
leaks.
The recall covers certain Bronco
Sport SUVs from the 2022 and 2023
model years, as well as Escape SUVs
from 2022. All have 1.5-liter engines.
Ford says fuel injectors can crack,
and gasoline or vapor can accumu-
late near ignition sources, possibly
touching off fires.
Dealers will install a tube to let
gasoline flow away from hot surfaces
to the ground below the vehicle.
They’ll also update engine control
software to detect a pressure drop in
the fuel injection system.
If that happens, the software
will disable the high pressure fuel
pump, reduce engine power and cut
temperatures in the engine compart-
ment, according to documents posted
Wednesday on the National High-
way Traffic Safety Administration
Receive a free 5−year warranty with qualifying
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The Marriage Pact, which started as an economics project of two Stanford University
students, has since drawn almost half a million students to participate, mostly for fun.
But it has also spawned long-term relationships and even marriages.
on the quality of the match and an email
address to contact the other person.
“The idea is, if you think about
website.
Owners were to be notified by let-
ter starting April 1.
— Associated Press
INDIANA
Knife-wielding woman
fatally shot by officers
NORTH VERNON | A 23-year-old
woman has been fatally shot after po-
lice say she advanced with a large knife
toward officers in southeastern Indiana.
North Vernon officers and Jennings
County sheriff’s deputies responded
about 7 p.m. Tuesday to a reported
disturbance at a home and encoun-
tered Rachel Blake in a bathroom, state
police said Wednesday.
Officers said Ms. Blake refused
commands to drop the knife and that
despite police using Tasers to disarm
her, she approached them with the
weapon.
Two North Vernon officers fired
shots, striking Ms. Blake at least once,
according to state police.
Ms. Blake was pronounced dead at
the scene.
State police are investigating the
shooting.
— Associated Press
ASSOCIATED PRESS
everybody who goes to your col-
lege, surely there’s someone who is a
good backup plan for you,” said Liam
BRIEFLY
THE NATION
NEW YORK
Former Trump executive
sentenced to five months
NEW YORK | Allen Weisselberg, a
retired executive in Donald Trump’s
real estate empire, was sentenced
Wednesday to five months in jail for
lying under oath in his testimony in
the fraud lawsuit brought against the
former president by New York’s at-
torney general.
Weisselberg, 76, pleaded guilty last
month to two counts of perjury in
connection with the suit. He admitted
lying when he testified he had little
knowledge of how Mr. Trump’s Man-
hattan penthouse came to be valued on
his financial statements at nearly three
times its actual size.
It is Weisselberg’s second time be-
hind bars. The former Trump Organi-
zation chief financial officer served 100
days last year for dodging taxes on $1.7
million in company perks, including
☆R
McGregor, one of the students who came
up with the pact. “Not a Prince Charm-
ing, you know, not your perfect person
necessarily, but maybe somebody whose
number you should have.”
The questions, he said, “are selected
based on ‘Hey, what do we need to
know to have a 50-year relationship with
someone? Can we make it a great one?’”
Many students do it with friends just
for fun and don’t follow up. Others are
ghosted after trying to make contact. A
tiny fraction land in long-term relation-
ships, and even marriage.
Count Max Walker and Melia Sum-
mers in that last group. The two were
New York University students when
they did the pact in fall 2020. It was just
a lark for both. He was in New York and
she was at NYU’s Abu Dhabi campus.
They chatted online for months. Then
Ms. Summers took a semester to study
in New York.
Their first in-person date, for pizza,
was nearly a year after their match.
a rent-free Manhattan apartment and
luxury cars.
Weisselberg’s plea agreement
does not require him to testify at Mr.
Trump’s hush-money criminal trial,
which is scheduled to start with jury
selection Monday.
— Associated Press
GULF COAST
Schools, government offices
close for severe weather
Schools and government offices
were closed Wednesday in some Gulf
Coast states, where severe storms were
expected to bring the potential for tor-
nadoes and devastating wind gusts.
Severe thunderstorms were
expected across parts of Louisiana,
Mississippi, Alabama, and the Florida
Panhandle, and there was the potential
for tornadoes, a few of which may be
strong, and damaging winds, which
may exceed 75 mph, the National
Weather Service warned.
Heavy rain, tornadoes, hail and
damaging wind gusts were all possible
across the Gulf Coast and the Deep
South on Wednesday, according to
meteorologist Ashton Robinson Cook
with the NWS Weather Prediction
NATION | A7
Wedding bells are to ring June 29. The
quality of the match, according to the
algorithm, was 99.65%
Take that, Tinder.
“We liked the same music. We did
the same sports. We’re both from rural
places,” Ms. Summers said. “It was kind
of funny, right? It’s someone saying that
they can find your, like, ultimate match.
I didn’t really know if I was ready for my
ultimate match at the time, but I thought
that was kind of a funny promise. And
also, my friends were doing it, and we
thought it’d be kind of interesting to do
it together.”
The two plan to move to Knoxville,
Tennessee, after the wedding so Mr.
Walker can attend law school there.
Mr. McGregor, who runs the pact,
said it spread quickly after word got out.
Students from 15 other schools tried in
the beginning to get in on the Stanford
pact because it wasn’t available on their
campuses. That’s not allowed. A campus-
specific email address is required.
Center.
— Associated Press
KANSAS
Bill would criminalize coercing
someone to have an abortion
TOPEKA | People who make physi-
cal or financial threats against others
in Kansas to force them to get an
abortion could spend a year in prison
and be fined up to $10,000 under
one of several proposals pushed
through the Republican-controlled
Legislature.
Abortion opponents in Kansas
pursued the measure against abor-
tion “coercion,” increased reporting
on abortion and aid to anti-abortion
centers providing free counsel-
ing, supplies and other services to
pregnant women and new mothers
because of the state’s unusual legal
climate.
While the Legislature has strong
anti-abortion majorities, the state Su-
preme Court declared in 2019 that the
state Constitution protects abortion
rights, and Kansas residents decisively
affirmed that position in a statewide
August 2022 vote.
— Associated Press
A8 | WORLD
World
MIDDLE EAST
Airstrikes kill Hamas
leader’s family members
Militant group says three sons, four
grandchildren slain in Israeli attack
BY TIA GOLDENBERG, KAREEM CHEHAYEB
AND WAFAA SHURAFA
ASSOCIATED PRESS
TEL AVIV, ISRAEL | In a sign the war
is getting increasingly personal, Israeli
aircraft killed three sons of Hamas’ top
political leader in the Gaza Strip on
Wednesday, striking high-stakes targets
at a time when Israel is holding delicate
cease-fire negotiations with the militant
group. Hamas said four of the Qatar-
based leader’s grandchildren were also
killed.
Ismail Haniyeh’s sons are among the
highest-profile figures to be killed in the
war so far. Israel said they were opera-
tives of the Palestinian militant group
that both the U.S. and Israel consider a
terrorist organization, while Mr. Hani-
yeh accused Israel of acting in “the spirit
of revenge and murder.”
The deaths threaten to strain the in-
ternationally mediated cease-fire talks,
which appeared to gain steam in recent
days even as the sides remain far apart
on key issues.
The deaths also come as Israel is
under intensifying pressure, increasingly
from its top ally, the U.S., to change tack
in the war, especially when it comes to
humanitarian aid for desperate people
CYBERSECURITY
U.S. official: Deterrence working despite major hacks
BY RYAN LOVELACE
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The U.S. Cyber Command’s top of-
ficial insisted Wednesday that efforts
to deter Chinese and Russian cyberat-
tacks are working despite mounting
hacks from those adversaries that have
hammered American businesses and
targeted critical infrastructure in recent
years.
Americans, an official acknowledged
in testimony on Capitol Hill, see constant
alerts of China and Russia’s hackers
burrowing into infrastructure and break-
ing into people’s emails for leverage in
potential crises or wars.
But Air Force Gen. Timothy Haugh
said what people do not see, and he
cannot publicly disclose, are the several
ways in which the U.S. Cyber Command
he leads has deterred China and Russia’s
digital operations.
“I do believe that both the PRC and
Russia understand our capabilities and
I’d like to be able to walk through with
you, in the closed session, some exam-
ples of that,” Gen. Haugh told senators
on Wednesday.
Lawmakers at a Senate Armed Ser-
vices Committee budget oversight
EUROPEAN UNION
EU lawmakers back migration law overhaul to disrupt far right
BY LORNE COOK
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BRUSSELS | European Union law-
makers approved Wednesday a major
revamp of the bloc’s migration laws
aimed at ending years of division over
how to manage the entry of thousands
of people without authorization and —
it’s hoped — depriving the far right of a
vote-winning campaign issue ahead of
June elections.
The members of the European Par-
liament voted on the so-called Pact on
Migration and Asylum, regulations and
policies meant to help address the thorny
issue of who should take responsibil-
ity for migrants when they arrive and
whether other EU countries should be
obliged to help.
The proceedings were briefly inter-
rupted by a small but noisy group of
demonstrators in the public gallery who
wore shirts marked “This pact kills” and
shouted, “Vote no!”
The 27 EU member countries must
now endorse the reform package, pos-
sibly in a vote in late April, before it can
take effect.
European Parliament President Ro-
berta Metsola, a former lead lawmaker
on migration who helped pave the way
for the reform package, posted “History
in Gaza.
Mr. Haniyeh said Hamas, which
launched the Oct. 7 rampage into Israel
that ignited the current round of fighting,
would not give in to the pressure leveled
by the strike on his family.
“The enemy believes that by targeting
the families of the leaders, it will push
them to give up the demands of our
people,” Mr. Haniyeh told the Al Jazeera
satellite channel. “Anyone who believes
that targeting my sons will push Hamas
to change its position is delusional.”
Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV station aired
footage of Mr. Haniyeh receiving the
news of the deaths through the phone
of an aide while visiting wounded Pal-
estinians who have been transported
to a hospital in Qatar, where he lives
in exile. Mr. Haniyeh nodded, looked
down at the ground and slowly walked
out of the room.
Al-Aqsa TV said Hazem, Ameer and
Mohammed Haniyeh were killed in
the strike near the Shati refugee camp
in Gaza City, where Ismail Haniyeh is
originally from. Hamas said three of
Mr. Haniyeh’s granddaughters and a
grandson were also killed. Hamas did
not disclose their ages. The brothers
were traveling with family members in
a single vehicle targeted by an Israeli
General rejects senators’ claims of not
countering actions by Russia, China
hearing expressed concern that the U.S.
cyber defenses are failing to counter
sophisticated cyber adversaries. U.S. of-
ficials told Congress earlier this year that
China was hacking into key infrastruc-
ture computer networks and “lurking”
to wreak havoc at a later date.
Software giant Microsoft, meanwhile,
said it had discovered Russian hackers
peering through its executives’ emails
to learn what cybersecurity defenders
knew about their tactics.
Sen. Angus King told Gen. Haugh
on Wednesday he has concerns that
U.S. officials have no effective deter-
rence strategy in cyberspace, which the
Maine independent said should include
an offensive capability that would make
America’s enemies think twice about
attacking.
“We tend to patch, defend, sanction
after the fact, but we really don’t have
a deterrence strategy,” Mr. King, who
caucuses with Democrats, said at the
hearing.
Gen. Haugh, who said he could talk
made,” on social media after the votes.
“It has been more than 10 years in the
making. But we kept our word. A balance
between solidarity and responsibility.
This is the European way,” she wrote.
German Interior Minister Nancy Fae-
ser described the result as a “major and
very important success.”
“After years of tough negotiations,
we have agreed on this comprehensive
package. We have thus overcome a deep
division in Europe,” said Ms. Faeser,
whose country has been a top destina-
tion for people seeking refuge, in a writ-
ten statement.
“We continue to protect people flee-
ing terrible wars, terror, torture and mur-
der. But this responsibility for refugees
will be spread across more shoulders in
future,” she added.
The plan was drawn up after 1.3
million people, mostly those fleeing
war in Syria and Iraq, sought refuge in
Europe in 2015. The EU’s asylum sys-
tem collapsed, reception centers were
overwhelmed in Greece and Italy, and
countries further north built barriers
to stop people entering. The chaos also
is credited with fueling the success of
a string of conservative parties across
Europe, many running on a platform of
restricting immigration.
Few have admitted to being happy
Palestinians visit the graves of their relatives who were killed in the war between Israel
and Hamas on the first day of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr in Gaza. Three sons and
four grandchildren of a top Hamas leader were killed Wednesday.
drone, Al-Aqsa TV said.
The Israeli military said Mohammed
and Hazem Haniyeh were Hamas mili-
tary operatives and that Ameer Haniyeh
was a cell commander. It said they had
conducted militant activity in the central
Gaza Strip, without elaborating. It did
not comment about the grandchildren
killed.
Earlier, Israeli War Cabinet minister
Benny Gantz claimed Hamas has been
defeated militarily, although he also said
Israel will fight it for years to come.
“From a military point of view, Hamas
is defeated. Its fighters are eliminated or
in hiding” and its capabilities “crippled,”
Mr. Gantz said in a statement to the
media in the southern Israeli city of
Sderot.
But, he added, “Fighting against
Hamas will take time. Boys who are
more frankly about the Cyber Com-
mand’s operations in a classified set-
ting, said the Pentagon wants its digital
warriors to practice what he called “in-
tegrated deterrence” — working with
private industry and foreign allies to
swell their collective digital defenses
while working to develop capabilities
other countries cannot match.
The push for integrated deterrence
in cyberspace is part of the Pentagon’s
planned Cyber Command 2.0, the de-
velopment of the next generation of
America’s cyber defenders.
Gen. Haugh told cyber lawyers at
a department conference on Tuesday
that preparing for Cyber Command 2.0
means studying how it generates forces,
structures its headquarters and manages
its architecture.
Cyber Command has been tasked
with evaluating its past, present, and
“whether or not we should consider a
cyber service,” Gen. Haugh said at the
conference. He told the cyber lawyers
that the department has brought in an
with the new policy response to one
of Europe’s biggest political crises, and
even the lawmakers who drafted parts
of the new regulations are unwilling to
support the entire reform package.
“I’m not going to open a bottle of
champagne after this,” Dutch lawmaker
Sophie i’nt Veld, who drew up the as-
sembly’s position on migrant reception
conditions, told reporters on the eve
of the plenary session in Brussels. She
said she planned to abstain from some
of the votes.
Among those who opposed parts of
the new pact were representatives of
France and Spain’s far-right parties, as
well as the Polish nationalist party Law
and Justice and the ruling Fidesz Party of
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban,
who predicted the pact will encourage
more human trafficking and undermine
national immigration laws.
Swedish parliamentarian Malin
Bjork, who worked on refugee reset-
tlement, said that the pact does not
respond to “any of the questions it was
set to solve.”
She said the reform package “un-
dermines the individual right to seek
asylum” in Europe because it would
build on plans that some EU countries
already have to process migrants abroad.
Italy has concluded one such deal with
☆R
ASSOCIATED PRESS
now in middle school will still fight in
the Gaza Strip.”
Gantz reiterated the Israeli govern-
ment’s commitment to go into Rafah, the
city at the far southern tip of the Gaza
Strip where more than half the territory’s
2.3 million people are now sheltering and
the last main Hamas units are battling
Israeli forces.
For Palestinians, the strike on the
Hamas leader’s family darkened an
already grim Eid al-Fitr holiday, which
ends the holy fasting month of Ramadan.
Palestinians marked the holiday by visit-
ing the graves of loved ones killed in the
war. In the Jabaliya refugee camp near
Gaza City, people sat quietly by graves
surrounded by buildings destroyed by
Israel’s offensive, which was launched
in response to the deadly Hamas attack
on Oct. 7.
outside think tank to look at the ques-
tion and the options and to brainstorm
solutions.
The possible creation of a Cyber
Force as an independent military ser-
vice captured attention in Washington
last month when the Foundation for
Defense of Democracies, a conservative
think tank, called for the establishment
of such a force to stand alongside the
Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force
and Space Force.
While the Pentagon works on plan-
ning its digital future, Cyber Com-
mand is also making changes now
to more quickly respond to foreign
cyberattacks.
Gen. Haugh told the cyber lawyers
on Tuesday that Cyber Command has
been given the green light to place of-
ficers with every federal agency that
has oversight of a segment of criti-
cal infrastructure, which includes such
things as water systems, power grids and
transportation networks.
The cyber command officers’ place-
ment, he said, will allow the people
detecting foreign threats to more quickly
share information with federal officials
who have the authority to respond to
domestic attacks.
Albania. Ms. Bjork’s Left group voted
against the pact.
The new rules include controversial
measures: facial images and fingerprints
could be taken from children from the
age of 6, and people may be detained
during screening. Fast-track deportation
could be used on those not permitted
to stay.
On the other side of the ledger, coun-
tries can be obligated to help their EU
partners by offering to house people
eligible for asylum or, failing that, to
pay the costs of lodging them elsewhere.
Migrant and human rights groups
mostly slammed the reform package, as
they’ve done in the past.
In a joint statement, 22 relief groups,
including the International Rescue Com-
mittee and Oxfam, said the pact “leaves
troubling cracks deep within Europe’s
approach to asylum and migration,
and fails to offer sustainable solutions
for people seeking safety at Europe’s
borders.”
However, they did note that part of
the reforms governing the resettlement
of migrants to Europe from outside the
bloc “offers a glimmer of hope for many
refugees across the globe.”
Eve Geddie from Amnesty Interna-
tional described it as “a failure to show
global leadership.”
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
BRIEFLY
THE WORLD
ISRAEL
Minister warns Iran
against direct attack
JERUSALEM | Israel’s foreign
minister threatened Wednesday that
his country’s forces would strike
Iran directly if the Islamic Republic
launched an attack from its territory
against Israel, as tensions between the
rival powers flare following the killings
of Iranian generals in a blast at the
Iranian consulate in Syria.
“If Iran attacks from its territory,
Israel will respond and attack in Iran,”
Israel Katz said in a post on social
media in both Farsi and Hebrew.
The remarks came after Iran’s Su-
preme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
reiterated early Wednesday a promise
to retaliate against Israel over the
attack on its consulate in Damascus
earlier this month.
Tehran holds Israel responsible for
the strike that leveled the building, kill-
ing 12 people. Israel has not acknowl-
edged its involvement, though it has
been bracing for an Iranian response
to the attack, a significant escalation in
their long-running shadow war.
Ayatollah Khamenei spoke at a
prayer ceremony celebrating the end
of the Muslim holy month of Rama-
dan, saying the airstrike was “wrong-
doing” and akin to an attack on Iranian
territory.
— Associated Press
RUSSIA
Crackdown targeting
more Kremlin critics
TALLINN, ESTONIA | Russian authori-
ties have put more Kremlin critics on
a wanted list as its crackdown against
dissent reaches unprecedented
levels since Moscow sent troops into
Ukraine more than two years ago.
Independent Russian news outlet
Mediazona reported Tuesday that it
found women’s rights activist Darya
Serenko and prominent journalist and
author Mikhail Zygar in the Interior
Ministry’s database of individuals
wanted on criminal charges. The
entries don’t specify the charges or
when they were added to the list. Both
Ms. Serenko and Mr. Zygar have long
left Russia.
The Kremlin’s crackdown against
opposition activists, independent
journalists and government critics has
intensified during the war. Hundreds
have faced criminal charges over pro-
tests and remarks condemning the war
in Ukraine, and thousands have been
fined or briefly jailed.
Ms.Serenko, a longtime activist and
author, co-founded the Feminist Anti-
War Resistance group shortly after
Russia invaded Ukraine in February
2022 and moved to Georgia during the
crackdown. Mr. Zygar, an author and
a founding editor in chief of Russia’s
independent TV channel Dozhd, also
left Russia after the invasion and was
declared a “foreign agent.”
Unconfirmed Russian media
reports earlier this year said Mr. Zygar
could be facing charges for report-
ing about Russian army atrocities in
Bucha, a suburb near Kyiv occupied
for several weeks by Moscow’s forces.
COLOMBIA
— Associated Press
Former president Uribe
slams prosecution
BOGOTA | Colombia’s influential
former President Alvaro Uribe on
Wednesday denounced as “political
vengeance” a move by national pros-
ecutors to bring him to trial in a case
of witness tampering that has shad-
owed his legacy.
Mr. Uribe insisted in a video
message that there was no evidence
against him, a day after prosecutors
announced their intention to formally
charge him with bribery of witnesses
in criminal proceedings and proce-
dural fraud. That would make Mr.
Uribe the first former president to face
trial in Colombia. The case against the
conservative former president derives
from allegations made a decade ago by
an opposition senator that Mr. Uribe
was tied to the creation of a paramili-
tary group. The former president was
accused of bribing former paramilitar-
ies to change their testimonies.
Mr. Uribe accused the senator of
slander, but that case was dismissed,
and the Supreme Court instead
opened a criminal case against Mr.
Uribe for allegedly manipulating
witnesses.
— Associated Press
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024 ☆R WORLD | A9

INSIDE THE
RING
BY BILL GERTZ
TAIWAN TO CONDUCT WAR GAMES
Taiwan’s military, facing extensive military
coercion from the Chinese army over the past
two years, plans to hold war games from April 19
through April 26 that simulate a Chinese military
exercise-turned-attack, the island’s defense min-
istry said this week.
Tung Chih-hsing, a military officer in charge
of the ministry’s joint combat planning depart-
ment, told reporters on Wednesday in Taipei
that the exercises will include practice on how
military forces can quickly respond to a Chinese
exercise around the island that suddenly be-
comes an actual attack.
Since August 2022, China’s warplanes and
warships have routinely conducted extensive
activities in the skies over Taiwan and in the
waters surrounding the democratic-ruled island.
The flights have included hundreds of aircraft,
many that cross the median line that serves as an
unofficial border between the two states and vio-
late the fragile status quo that has kept the peace
since the late 1970s.
China’s military activities require Taiwan’s
military to respond, giving Chinese military ana-
lysts a chance to study Taipei’s defenses as part
of pre-invasion or pre-blockade planning.
Mr. Tung said the annual exercises known
as “Han Kuang” this year will include setting
up kill zones at sea designed to break a Chinese
blockade.
The exercises also will simulate Chinese mili-
tary drills that become attacks.
The computerized war games will be con-
ducted using U.S.-built Joint Theater Level
Simulation software, which will be used to assess
and respond to what the military calls “gray
zone” tactics — those below the level of direct
conflict — and naval blockades and other pos-
sible Chinese invasion scenarios, Mr. Tung said.
The war games will combine naval, air and coast
guard forces, shore-mounted anti-ship weapons,
and drones to set up a maritime “attack-and-kill
chain,” he said.
“In addition, [we will] use naval and air forces
and coast guard ships to jointly carry out escort
operations” to make sure sea and air links from
the island to the outside world remain open, Mr.
Tung said.
The Chinese army held its largest exercises
in decades around Taiwan following the August
2022 visit to Taiwan by then-House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi.
China has vowed to take over Taiwan in the
coming years, either peacefully or through mili-
tary action.
INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES TO REPORT ON CHINESE CORRUPTION
U.S. intelligence agencies are working on a
report expected to reveal extensive corruption
and hidden wealth held by Chinese Com-
munist Party leaders, including President Xi
Jinping, who also holds the post of party gen-
eral secretary. The report is required in law by
a section of the fiscal 2023 National Defense
Authorization Act signed by President Biden
in December.
Angela Sohn, spokeswoman for the Office
of the Director of National Intelligence, said
work on the report is underway. The office “is
aware of and working to fulfill this require-
ment,” she told Inside the Ring.
Section 6501 of the over 1,000-page act
mandates that Avril Haines, the director of
national intelligence, has a year from De-
cember to complete and make public the
unclassified report, together with Secretary of
State Antony Blinken, on “wealth and corrupt
activities of the leadership of the Chinese
Communist Party.”
Those targeted in the report include Mr. Xi
and senior officials of the 98 million-member
party. They include the 205-member Central
Committee, the 25 most senior officials of the
Chinese Communist Party in the Politburo,
and the highest-ranking party organ, the
seven-member Politburo Standing Committee,
the collective leadership headed by Mr. Xi.
U.S. spy agencies will also assess and
report on the regional party secretaries in 29
locations in China and whether they have any
hidden wealth or links to corruption.
The report is likely to upset the Biden ad-
ministration’s effort to stabilize relations with
Beijing. As part of new detente and engage-
ment policies, the administration has sought
to limit criticism of Beijing under the rubric
of “responsible competition” that officials say
seeks to avoid future conflict.
Corruption is said to be widespread within
the Chinese communist system. Mr. Xi him-
self has launched numerous political purges of
suspected corrupt party and military officials.
Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Wednes-
day in a meeting with former Taiwanese Presi-
dent Ma Ying-jeou that outside inference will
not stop a planned “family reunion” between the
mainland and Taiwan.
China claims Taiwan as its territory. The
United States says it does not support “indepen-
dence” for Taiwan but also has not recognized
Chinese sovereignty over the island.
Chinese nationalist forces fled the mainland
to Taiwan in 1949 when the communists took
power, but now favor engagement and greater
contacts with Beijing.
XINHUA VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
Chinese President Xi Jinping is among the
targets of an inquiry by U.S. intelligence agencies
into corruption and hidden wealth in China.
The ODNI, in its annual threat assessment
made public last month, said Chinese leaders
are “almost certainly” dealing with “the ongo-
ing impact of corruption on the military’s ca-
pabilities and reliability, judging from a purge
of high-level officers, including the defense
minister, in 2023.”
Corruption is among several problems
facing Chinese leaders, the assessment stated:
“Xi continues to regularly reprimand, publicly
warn, investigate, and conduct firings based on
the dangers of corruption.”
One of the most notorious examples of
hidden wealth was the case of former Prime
Minister Wen Jiabao, who amassed a fortune
of $2.7 billion by funneling money to family
members. The case was exposed by The New
York Times in 2012.
“Public anger over corruption terrifies Xi
and the rest of the Chinese Communist Party’s
leadership,” former diplomat and retired Ma-
rine Corps Col. Grant Newsham stated in his
book, “When China Attacks.”
Mr. Newsham said he was skeptical of
Mr. Xi’s yearslong anti-corruption campaign,
one that appears more focused on sidelining
potential rivals than ending illicit activities.
The problem of corruption in China is too
deep-seated within the communist system for
CHINESE TO VISIT NORTH KOREA
Amid growing North Korea-Russia ties, China’s
government this week dispatched a high-level
delegation to Pyongyang in an apparent effort to
woo the regime of Kim Jong Un back into its orbit,
according to published reports in Beijing.
Zhao Leji, the No. 3 official in China, is leading
a “goodwill visit” to North Korea, Pyongyang’s
official Korean Central News Agency and China’s
Foreign Ministry disclosed. Mr. Zhao is the highest-
ranking official to visit North Korea since President
Xi Jinping traveled there in June 2019.
Mr. Xi to root out, he argues.
The leak of more than 11 million legal and
financial records from around the world in
2016, known as the Panama Papers scandal,
also revealed evidence that leading Chinese
government families used offshore companies
to hide large amounts of money. In the early
2010s, both The New York Times and the
Bloomberg news service were harassed for re-
porting Chinese leaders’ corruption, including
vast overseas wealth reportedly maintained by
Mr. Xi.
“The United States must expose ruling-
class corruption, perhaps starting with the
top 500 CCP leaders and their families, and
trumpet it repeatedly and widely,” Mr. New-
sham said. “That corruption is the juice that
speeds along the [Belt and Road Initiative] and
Chinese influence efforts in the Pacific, Africa,
Latin America and elsewhere.”
The CIA Open Source Enterprise, which
tracks publicly available material, has cata-
loged numerous cases of Chinese corruption.
But its reports, once made available to the
public, are now secret.
The legislation requiring the report was
added to the annual Defense Authoriza-
tion Act last year by the staff of Sen. Marco
Rubio of Florida, the ranking Republican on
the Senate Intelligence Committee. A Rubio
spokeswoman did not immediately respond to
a request for comment.
Paul Berkowitz, a China expert and former
congressional aide, said the report could help
explode the foundational myth of humble, self-
sacrificing Chinese Communist Party leaders.
The Rubio legislation will reveal their enor-
mous individual wealth, somehow compiled
while living on government salaries, he said.
“Author Edgar Snow breathlessly de-
scribed in his book ‘Red Star Over China’ how
Mao’s guerrilla army supposedly paid for the
chickens they took from defenseless peas-
ants,” Mr. Berkowitz said. “Those chickens are
about to come home to roost.”
At the Chinese Foreign Ministry, spokeswoman
Mao Ning told reporters Tuesday that the visit
“reflects the deep friendship between our two coun-
tries and the great importance China attaches to it.”
Chinese leaders in the past have described the
relationship between the two communist regimes
to be “as close as lips and teeth.”
North Korea’s ties with Russia have deepened
in recent months as Pyongyang has been supplying
Moscow with weapons and ammunition for use in
the war on Ukraine. In exchange, North Korea has
received large amounts of aid from Russia.
• Contact Bill Gertz on X @BillGertz.

ASIA
From page A1
military exercises and information shar-
ing, among other items. Talks with Mr.
Kishida on Wednesday appeared to re-
sult in some steps to bolster the defense
partnerships between the two nations.
The two leaders agreed to modernize
their militaries’ command-and-control
structures into what Mr. Biden called
the “most significant” upgrade to their
alliance since the mutual defense treaty
decades ago.
“Over the last three years, the part-
nership between Japan and the United
States has been transformed into a truly
global partnership,” he said, standing
alongside Mr. Kishida in the White
House Rose Garden press conference.
The two allies are establishing a mili-
tary-industrial council to determine how
Japan and the U.S. can produce defense
weapons to improve cooperation and
anti-missile defenses along with Australia.
About 54,000 U.S. troops are in Japan,
but under the old system, major decisions
have been made in coordination with the
U.S. Indo-Pacific Command thousands of
miles away in Hawaii. The new structure
will give Japan joint operational command
for self-defense.
During the news conference, Mr.
Kishida said Japan will continue to call
on China to “fulfill its responsibilities as
a major power,” while working to build
a “constructive and stable” relationship
with Beijing’s Communist regime. ASSOCIATED PRESS

“We agreed that our two countries
will continue to respond to challenges
concerning China,” he said. “And we con-
firmed that unilateral attempts to change
the status quo by force by coercion is
absolutely unacceptable where it may be.”
Fortifying the front
Mr. Biden sees Japan as a corner-
stone of his Indo-Pacific strategy, and
Mr. Kishida appears happy to go along
with the plan. He has committed to in-
creasing his country’s defense spending
by 2% of its GDP by 2037 and buying
American-made Tomahawk missiles
to bolster Japan’s long-range “counter-
strike” capabilities.
The Philippines is also seen as a key to
fortifying the front line in an increasingly
tumultuous region. Beijing has lodged ex-
tensive sovereignty claims over the South
China Sea, one of the world’s major ship-
ping lanes, inflaming tensions with the Phil-
ippines and other countries in the region
such as Vietnam, Taiwan and Malaysia.
Last week, six warships and four
Earlier this month, warships from Australia, Japan and the Philippines conducted a joint patrol in the South China Sea. China has harassed the Philippine Navy here.
aircraft from Australia, Japan, the Philip-
pines and the U.S. conducted a joint patrol
in the South China Sea, where Beijing has
harassed the Philippine Navy resupply
missions to a disputed outpost. Manila
pitched the idea of joint patrols with allies
as a show of deterrence against China.
Ahead of his departure for Wash-
ington, Mr. Marcos said there would be
an agreement on the South China Sea
issues, but the talks would largely focus
on improving economic ties with the
U.S. and Japan.
“The main intent of this trilateral
agreement is for us to be able to con-
tinue to flourish, to be able to help one
another, and of course to keep the peace
in the South China Sea and the freedom
of navigation,” he said.
As the water run-ins with China have
escalated, Mr. Marcos has worked to
deepen his military ties with the U.S.
and Japan. He has doubled the number
of Philippine bases American soldiers
can access under a defense cooperation
treaty and has initiated talks with Tokyo
for an access agreement that would allow
Japanese forces to deploy on Philippine
soil as well.
Under former President Rodrigo
Duterte, who left office in 2022, Manila
tilted strongly toward Beijing in hopes of
halting its expansion desires. Mr. Marcos
has taken a sharply different tack.
An Asian NATO
Coalition-building has become key to
Mr. Biden’s China containment strategy
because of the lack of a formal security
coalition in the region that would mirror
NATO in Europe.
Since taking office, he has worked to
strengthen the Quad partnership which
unites the U.S., Japan, India and Austra-
lia. He also formed the AUKUS defense
partnership with Australia and Britain,
and promoted the trilateral relationship
among the U.S., Japan and South Korea,
which culminated in a historic Camp
David summit.
Smaller countries worried about
China’s military and economic aggres-
sion also have suggested an interest in
working in a U.S. coalition. Vietnam last
year upgraded its ties with the U.S. to a
“comprehensive strategic partnership,”
which puts Washington among its high-
est tier of allies.
It is not clear whether former Presi-
dent Donald Trump, the presumptive
Republican nominee, would keep those
alliances going should he defeat Mr.
Biden in November.
Mr. Trump has suggested an increas-
ingly hawkish tone toward China, at least
economically. Earlier this year, he said
he might impose a 60% tariff on Chinese
goods if elected, but he also questioned
the value of U.S. troops deployments
in South Korea and Japan and pressed
both allies to pay more for the security
American forces provided.
During his administration, Mr. Trump
began imposing tariffs on China aimed
at curbing the import of Chinese goods
in 2018. Mr. Biden has largely kept those
tariffs in place, but in recent months has
tried to tone down the angry rhetoric
and increase official contacts with China.
Mr. Kishida last week dismissed the
notion that a leadership change in Wash-
ington could reshape the alliances.
“Regardless of the outcome of the
upcoming presidential election in the
United States, because of this more
complicated international situation, the
Japan-U.S. alliance grows in importance
even more,” he said in an interview with
PBS last week. “And I believe this is a
notion shared as a common recognition
within the U.S., going beyond party lines,
in a bipartisan way.”
A10 | REGION
Region
MARYLAND
Investigators focus on ship’s electrical system in bridge collapse
NTSB chair testifies of data assistance from Hyundai
BY LEA SKENE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BALTIMORE | During the ini-
tial stages of a federal probe
into the deadly collapse of Balti-
more’s Francis Scott Key Bridge,
investigators are focusing on
the electrical power system of
the massive container ship that
veered off course.
Jennifer Homendy, chair of
the National Transportation
Safety Board, said her agency is
gathering data with assistance
from Hyundai, the manufacturer
of equipment in the ship’s engine
room.
Testifying before a U.S. Sen-
ate committee Wednesday morn-
ing, she said investigators have
also requested assistance to ex-
amine its circuit breakers.
“That is where our focus is
right now in this investigation,”
Ms. Homendy said. “Of course,
VIRGINIA
Youngkin amends ‘skill games’ legislation, takes other action on bills
BY SARAH RANKIN
ASSOCIATED PRESS
RICHMOND | Virginia Gov.
Glenn Youngkin has proposed
a rewrite of legislation intended
to legalize and tax skill games,
adding stiff new restrictions that
industry supporters argued would
still amount to a de facto ban of
the slots-like gambling machines
hosted by small businesses.
The governor put forward
amendments late Monday that
overhaul a measure the General
Assembly sent him in March,
calling for a higher tax rate on the
receipts from the machines, and
a provision allowing localities to
Black candidates move up on kidney transplant list
Priority credit
given to mitigate
racial inequity
BY LAURAN NEERGAARD
ASSOCIATED PRESS
PHILADELPHIA | Jazmin
Evans had been waiting for
a new kidney for four years
when her hospital revealed
shocking news: She should
have been put on the trans-
plant list in 2015 instead of
2019 — and a racially biased
organ test was to blame.
As upsetting as that noti-
fication was, it also was part
of an unprecedented move to
mitigate the racial inequity.
Ms. Evans is among more than
14,000 Black kidney trans-
plant candidates so far given
credit for lost waiting time,
moving them up the priority
list for their transplant.
“I remember just read-
ing that letter over and over
again,” said Ms. Evans, 29, of
Philadelphia, who shared the
notice in a TikTok video to
educate other patients. “How
could this happen?”
At issue is a once widely
used test that overestimated
how well Black people’s kid-
neys were functioning, mak-
ing them look healthier than
they really were — all because
of an automated formula that
calculated results for Black
and non-Black patients differ-
ently. That race-based equa-
tion could delay diagnosis of
organ failure and evaluation
for a transplant, exacerbating
other disparities that already
make Black patients more at
risk of needing a new kidney
but less likely to get one.
A few years ago, the
that’s preliminary. It could take
different roads, different paths as
we continue this investigation.”
The NTSB chief said they’ve
zeroed in on the electrical sys-
tem. The ship experienced
power issues moments before
the crash, as evidenced in videos
showing its lights going out and
coming back on.
Ms. Homendy said informa-
tion gleaned from the vessel’s
voyage data recorder is relatively
basic, “so that information in
the engine room will help us
tremendously.”
Investigators are also examin-
ing the bridge design and how it
could be built with better pier
protection “under today’s stan-
dards,” Ms. Homendy said.
The container ship Dali was
leaving Baltimore, laden with
cargo and headed for Sri Lanka,
when it struck one of the bridge’s
supporting columns last month,
prohibit them.
The proposed changes also
add placement restrictions on
the arcade-style games, banning
them within about a half-mile of
churches, day cares and houses of
worship, and seemingly exclud-
ing them in many metro areas
that already host a gambling
establishment.
While skill-games support-
ers vowed to fight the proposed
changes, Youngkin spokesman
Christian Martinez said in a state-
ment “the added protections” the
governor is seeking address “seri-
ous concerns with the regulatory
structure, tax rates, the number of
machines, impact on the Virginia
PENNSYLVANIA
Jazmin Evans had been waiting for a new kidney for four years when it was revealed that a racially
biased organ test was to blame for not putting her on the transplant list in 2015 instead of 2019.
National Kidney Foundation
and American Society of
Nephrology prodded labo-
ratories to switch to race-
free equations in calculating
kidney function. Then the
U.S. organ transplant network
ordered hospitals to use only
race-neutral test results in
adding new patients to the
kidney waiting list.
“The immediate question
came up: What about the peo-
ple on the list right now? You
can’t just leave them behind,”
said Dr. Martha Pavlakis of
Boston’s Beth Israel Deacon-
ess Medical Center and for-
mer chair of the network’s
kidney committee.
Dr. Pavlakis calls what
happened next an attempt at
restorative justice: The trans-
plant network gave hospitals a
year to uncover which Black
kidney candidates could have
causing the span to collapse into
the Patapsco River and sending
six members of a roadwork crew
plunging to their deaths.
Divers have recovered three
bodies from the underwater
wreckage, while the remain-
ing three victims are still unac-
counted for.
Crews have been working
to remove sections of the fallen
bridge and unload containers
from the stationary Dali.
Officials said they expect to
open a third temporary shipping
channel by late April, which will
allow significantly more com-
mercial traffic to pass through
the Port of Baltimore. The East
Coast shipping hub has been
closed to most maritime traffic
since the bridge collapse blocked
access to the port.
Federal safety investigators
remain on scene in Baltimore.
They’ve conducted numerous
Lottery and broader public safety
implications” of the legislation.
The skill-games bill was one of
dozens Mr. Youngkin took action
late Monday, as he ran up against
a deadline to complete work on
measures sent to his desk during
the regular session that ended
March 9.
The Republican governor ve-
toed measures that would have
set up a prescription drug af-
fordability board and allowed all
localities to hold a referendum
on raising sales taxes to help fund
school construction.
He amended a Democratic
priority measure that aimed
to protect the right to access
qualified for a new kidney
sooner if not for the race-
based test — and adjust their
waiting time to make up for
it. That lookback continues
for each newly listed Black
patient to see if they, too,
should have been referred
sooner.
Between January 2023 and
mid-March, more than 14,300
Black kidney transplant can-
didates have had their wait
times modified, by an average
of two years, according to the
United Network for Organ
Sharing, which runs the trans-
plant system. So far more
than 2,800 of them, including
Ms. Evans, have received a
transplant.
But it’s just one example
of a larger problem permeat-
ing health care. Numerous
formulas or “algorithms”
used in medical decisions
☆R
The bow of the container ship Dali remains stuck underneath sections
of the fallen Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore.
interviews, including with the
ship’s pilots and crew mem-
bers, Ms. Homendy said during
her testimony. She testified at
a hearing on her nomination to
continue serving as board chair
contraception in a way support-
ers said gutted its intent. And he
signed off on measures expanding
the state’s revenge porn law and
establishing 18 as the minimum
age for marriage.
Of the 1,046 bills sent to him
this year by the Democratic-
controlled General Assembly, he
signed a total of 777, amended
116 — including the state budget
— and vetoed 153, his office said.
Mr. Youngkin has vetoed more
bills in this year alone than any of
his seven immediate predecessors
did over their entire four-year
terms, according to an accounting
by the nonpartisan Virginia Public
Access Project.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
— treatment guidelines, di-
agnostic tests, risk calcula-
tors — adjust the answers
according to race or ethnicity
in a way that puts people of
color at disadvantage.
Given how embedded
these equations are in medi-
cal software and electronic
records, even doctors may
not realize how widely they
impact care decisions.
Change is beginning,
slowly. No longer are obste-
tricians supposed to include
race in determining the risk of
a pregnant woman attempting
vaginal birth after a prior C-
section. The American Heart
Association just removed race
from a commonly used calcu-
lator of people’s heart disease
risk. The American Thoracic
Society has urged replacing
race-based lung function
evaluation.
MAXAR TECHNOLOGIES VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
for a second term.
She said the board’s prelimi-
nary report on the crash will
likely be released early next
month.
Safety investigators
Lawmakers will reconvene in
Richmond next week to consider
his amendments. They could also
attempt to override his vetoes,
though Democrats would need
Republicans to join with them to
reach the necessary two-thirds
vote threshold.
The skill games debate is a
rare issue that has not fallen along
partisan lines. A coalition formed
to push for legalization this year
centered the voices of the small-
business owners who hosted the
machines in establishments like
gas stations and restaurants and
shared in their profits before a ban
first passed in 2020 took effect.
Rich Kelly, a restaurant owner
VIRGINIA
Ex-assistant principal
charged with neglect
after boy shot teacher
BY BEN FINLEY AND DENISE LAVOIE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEWPORT NEWS, VA. | A for-
mer assistant principal at a Vir-
ginia elementary school has been
charged with felony child neglect
more than a year after a 6-year-
old boy brought a gun to class
and shot his first-grade teacher.
A special grand jury in
Newport News found that
Ebony Parker showed a reckless
disregard for the lives of Rich-
neck Elementary School students
on Jan. 6, 2023, according to in-
dictments unsealed Tuesday.
Ms. Parker and other school
officials already face a $40 mil-
lion negligence lawsuit from the
teacher who was shot, Abby Zw-
erner. She accuses Ms. Parker
and others of ignoring multiple
warnings the boy had a gun and
was in a “violent mood” the day
of the shooting.
Criminal charges against
school officials following a school
shootings are quite rare, experts
say. Ms. Parker, 39, faces eight
felony counts, each of which is
punishable by up to five years
in prison.
The Associated Press left a
message seeking comment Tues-
day with Ms. Parker’s attorney,
Curtis Rogers.
Court documents filed Tues-
day reveal little about the crimi-
nal case against Ms. Parker, listing
only the counts and a description
of the felony charge. It alleges
that Ms. Parker “did commit a
willful act or omission in the care
of such students, in a manner so
gross, wanton and culpable as
to show a reckless disregard for
human life.”
Newport News police have
said the student who shot Ms.
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
previously laid out a prelimi-
nary timeline leading up to the
crash, which federal and state
officials have said appeared to
be an accident.
Less than an hour after the
Dali left Baltimore’s port in the
early hours of March 26, signs
of trouble came when numerous
alarms sounded.
About a minute later, steering
commands and rudder orders
were issued, and at 1:26 a.m.
and 39 seconds, a pilot made a
general radio call for nearby tug-
boats. Just after 1:27 a.m., the pilot
commanded the ship to drop an
anchor on the left side and issued
added steering commands.
About 20 seconds later, the
pilot issued a radio call reporting
that the Dali had lost all power
approaching the bridge.
Around 1:29 a.m., when the
ship was traveling at about 8
mph, recordings for about 30
seconds picked up sounds con-
sistent with it colliding with the
bridge.
and the president of the coali-
tion, said Monday in a statement
that Mr. Youngkin’s amendments
were “devastating” and would
effectively ban the machines by
prohibiting them within 35 miles
of any casino, racetrack or gam-
bling “satellite facility.”
Virginia has casinos in Bristol,
Danville and Portsmouth, and al-
lows wagers on live horse races
and another form of slots-like
betting in historical horse race
wagering parlors around the state.
Mr. Youngkin’s proposed tax
rate — 35% according to the gov-
ernor’s office — would also make
skill games the highest taxed good
in Virginia, Mr. Kelly said.
Zwerner retrieved his mother’s
handgun from atop a dresser at
home and brought the weapon to
school concealed in a backpack.
Ms. Zwerner’s lawsuit de-
scribes a series of warnings that
school employees gave admin-
istrators before the shooting.
The lawsuit said those warnings
began with Ms. Zwerner telling
Ms. Parker that the boy “was in
a violent mood,” had threatened
to beat up a kindergartener and
stared down a security officer in
the lunchroom.
The lawsuit alleges that Ms.
Parker “had no response, refus-
ing even to look up” when Ms.
Zwerner expressed her concerns.
When concerns were raised
that the child may have trans-
ferred the gun from his backpack
to his pocket, Ms. Parker said his
“pockets were too small to hold
a handgun and did nothing,” the
lawsuit states.
A guidance counselor also
asked Ms. Parker for permission
to search the boy, but Ms. Parker
forbade him, “and stated that
John Doe’s mother would be ar-
riving soon to pick him up,” the
lawsuit stated.
Ms. Zwerner was sitting at a
reading table in front of the class
when the boy fired the gun, police
said. The bullet struck Ms. Zw-
erner’s hand and then her chest,
collapsing one of her lungs. She
spent nearly two weeks in the
hospital and has endured mul-
tiple surgeries as well as ongoing
emotional trauma, according to
her lawsuit.
Ms. Parker and the lawsuit’s
other defendants, which include
a former superintendent and the
Newport News school board,
have tried to block Ms. Zwerner’s
lawsuit.
 COMMENTARY
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
Biggest corporate welfare scam of all time
P
By Stephen Moore
resident Biden
keeps lecturing
corporate America
to “pay your fair
share” of taxes. It
turns out that he’s
right: Some com-
panies really are
getting away with
not paying taxes.
But it isn’t the Big Tech companies
in Silicon Valley, or the Wall Street
financial company “fat cats,” or big
banks, or Walmart. They pay billions
in taxes.
The culprits here are the very com-
panies that Mr. Biden is in bed with:
green energy firms.
It turns out that despite all the
promises over the past decade about
how renewable energy is the future
of power production in America, the
biggest tax dodgers in the country
by far are the wind and solar power
industries. Over the past several de-
cades, the green energy lobby — what
Japanese
religious
freedom and
Prime
Minister
Kishida
Leader has taken a strange
and indefensible turn
By Newt Gingrich
J
apanese Prime Minister Fumio
Kishida’s visit to Washington is
an important step in the Free-
dom Alliance’s effort to contain
China.
Specifically, Mr. Kishida must
achieve the combined goals of main-
taining political and national freedom
— as well as freedom of navigation.
Japan is the United States’ strongest
Pacific ally. Its economy is far stronger
than any other American ally in the re-
gion. Its scientific research capabilities
make it a full partner in developing
better health care, stronger military
capabilities, and more advanced space
programs.
For example, it is exciting that two
Japanese astronauts will collaborate
with the American space program and
become the first non-Americans to
land on the moon.
The collaborative effort on joint
defense industrial production will
significantly strengthen the alliance
of free nations and help the United
States sustain its worldwide defense
obligations in an increasingly danger-
ous world.
Mr. Kishida will no doubt be
warmly welcomed when he addresses
a joint session of Congress on Thurs-
day. The world is growing increas-
ingly treacherous. There are wars in
Ukraine and Gaza and serious Chinese
threats to Taiwan and the South China
Sea. American legislators know that
this visit by our strongest ally in the
Pacific is historically important.
In this totally appropriate focus
on the positive side of the Japanese-
American relationship, however, I
hope some members of Congress will
raise the issue of religious liberty in
their meetings with Mr. Kishida.
Japan’s prime minister is an im-
portant ally of the United States, but
on the issue of religious liberty, he
» see GINGRICH | B4
▶ Editorial: Biden revives student loan scam / B2 LEGAL ADS INSIDE B5
☆ R SECTION B
It isn’t Silicon Valley companies or Wall Street; it’s green energy firms
alive. Over the past two decades, the They never seem to want to cut the
GREEN ENERGY GRAVY TRAIN renewable energy lobby has collected
more than a quarter-trillion dollars
umbilical cord.
What have we gotten for this
Total annual cost of energy tax credits before and after
the Inflation Reduction Act in billions of dollars. in subsidies — payments that we’ve mountain of taxpayer-funded green
$140 been assured over and over would be energy largesse? Nothing, really.
Billions of dollars temporary. The argument for these We still get 80% of our energy from
120 Post-IRA estimate grants, loans, tax abatements, and fossil fuels and nuclear power. Wind
(FY25 budget) other sweetheart deals is that these and solar are stuck at less than
Pre-IRA estimate were “infant industries” in need of a 10%. This is some investment we’re
100 head start program for CEOs. Except making.
(FY24 budget)
these companies have never even Meanwhile, Mr. Biden keeps rail-
80 reached puberty after all these years. ing against companies that pay no
What’s worse, Mr. Biden keeps income tax. He has advocated a man-
60
spoiling the child with lavish gifts datory 15% minimum corporate tax.
for bad performance. A new report But guess what industry is explicitly
by tax expert Adam Michel at the exempt from the minimum? The
40 Cato Institute finds the green energy green energy lobby.
subsidies — mostly created by Biden It’s just a reminder that a lot of
20 policies like the so-called Inflation people are getting really, really rich
Reduction Act — will drain the Trea- off climate change hysteria.
0 sury of as much as $1.8 trillion over The green in green energy doesn’t
2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029 2030 2031 2032 2033 10 years. stand for a cleaner environment. It
SOURCE: U.S. Treasury, Office of Tax Analysis THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Cato report finds that since stands for the color of money: yours
its passage, “the estimated cost of the and mine.
I call the climate change-industrial income taxes. IRA’s new and expanded energy tax
complex — isn’t paying their fair But they wade in rivers of fed- credits have nearly tripled.” Stephen Moore is a senior fellow at
share. That’s because the vast major- eral direct and indirect subsidies These tax shelters are just a form The Heritage Foundation and an
ity of these companies pay almost no that keep these zombie companies of aid to dependent corporations. economist with FreedomWorks.
A choice no woman wants to make
Pro-life movement, you're not there yet
By Kelly Sadler House on the back of Mr. Trump, does he sincerely believe Mr. Trump is not
A
ardently pro-life?
s a woman who has suffered through infertility and has gone through the It was Mr. Trump who nominated the three Supreme Court justices who
in vitro fertilization process, I find abortion abhorrent. Still, that does overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. It was Mr. Trump who reinstated
not negate my sympathy or empathy for women who are faced with the Mexico City policy that barred federal funding going to organizations
a choice no woman wants to make: whether to go through an abor- abroad that perform abortions. It was Mr. Trump who blocked federal funds
tion or not.
To save America, Republicans
for Planned Parenthood and other centers unless they stopped providing
abortions or referring people for
must win elections. To do this, they There would be no Planned Parenthood if there abortions.
need to recognize where voters are So, to the pro-life community, is
and meet them there — including on weren’t a demand. Unfortunately, there is a he so bad?
the topic of abortion.
On Monday, former President
Donald Trump did just that, saying
demand. We, as conservatives, must recognize
this fact. We must address it. As I was talking
Let’s debate the meaning of abor-
tion “rights.” It was never a consti-
tutional right, but it’s an unfortunate
to my editor this week, murder is outlawed, but
states should decide what is to be ac-
cepted, putting the decision closer to murder still exists. This is an issue of the soul.
reality we need to address. Nowhere
did our Founders believe this “right”
the people. He reiterated his belief in could come up. Nowhere in the Bible
exceptions for rape and incest and to save the life of the mother. He declined is it explicitly clear that abortion is the 11th Commandment.
to endorse a 15-week federal ban, earning the ire of many in the pro-life com- It’s nuanced, it’s personal, and it’s a plague on our society that shows us
munity, including his former vice president, Mike Pence.
Mr. Pence said that the former president’s stance was a “slap in the face to
the millions of pro-life Americans who voted for him in 2016 and 2020.”
how sick we are.
There would be no Planned Parenthood if there weren’t a demand. Unfor-
tunately, there is a demand. We, as conservatives, must recognize this fact.
We must address it. As I
was talking to my editor
this week, murder is
outlawed, but murder
still exists. This is an
issue of the soul.
No woman gets an
abortion because she
wants to. Those who
do suffer psychological
trauma and feel they
can’t get help from
anyone. Those who do
fear they’ll be alone and
desperate. We all prob-
ably know a woman who
has made this choice,
and it’s heartbreaking.
In our communities,
we must help these
women. We must show
them there are other
options. We must guide
them to pregnancy
centers, which can help
them with health care,
their career, financial
management, adoption
and child care options,
and material support
for things like diapers,
clothing and formula.
We must show them
that they’re not alone.
Is the pro-life move-
ment ready? That’s the
question. Donald Trump
just gave us the road
map — it’s up to us, in
our towns and cities, to
make a difference. Will
you show up to vote
in November? If not,
you are guaranteeing
Mr. Biden’s victory —
which, as I asked earlier,
will that further your
ILLUSTRATION BY HUNTER
cause?
Hearts and minds
Others were harsher. need to be won, but they haven’t been yet. It’s up to us to help convince the
Pro-life advocate Lila Rose slammed Mr. Trump, saying he “supports kill- wary, show compassion and empathy, debate, and hold firm in our stance. It’s
ing some preborn children and will even make that his position in an attempt not productive to throw away an election because we haven’t won 100%.
to get pro-abortion votes,” warning that support from the pro-life movement Pro-life movement, you’re not there yet. But don’t help reelect President
won’t materialize if he doesn’t backtrack on his position. Biden.
Although I admire Ms. Rose, does she sincerely believe reelecting Presi-
dent Biden will further her cause? And to Mr. Pence, who rode to the White Kelly Sadler is the commentary editor for The Washington Times.
B2 | EDITORIAL ☆R THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

COMMENT & ANALYSIS

Biden revives student loan scam
Taxpayer giveaway to college-educated debtors harms education

P
resident Biden won’t take no for
an answer. The Supreme Court
struck down his attempt last year
to purchase college-age votes with an
unlawful loan forgiveness scheme, but
the Big Guy is doing the same thing all
over again.
“While a college degree still is a
ticket to the middle class, that ticket
is becoming much too expensive —
much too expensive,” Mr. Biden told a
Wisconsin audience on Monday.
Never mind that what he has in mind
will only drive tuition rates skyward.
Massachusetts can’t get a committee to
consider the debt forgiveness legisla-
tion she has been pursuing. Congress
hasn’t touched the student loan pro-
gram since 2010.
It’s rather undemocratic, perhaps
one could even say authoritarian, to
have a president spend half a trillion
dollars of public money without a
single vote in favor of the idea.
The plan does appeal to a key con-
stituency, however. Democratic admin-
istrations are beholden to the whims of
teachers unions at the primary school

Life is unfair; student

Republicans wasted no time in filing level and to the left-wing academic fac-
lawsuits to stop the White House from ulties of higher education. Mr. Biden’s
implementing the proposed $475 billion $2 trillion coronavirus spending ex-

rule without a vote in Congress. Mr.
Biden’s press secretary, Karine Jean-
Pierre, said Monday that legal niceties
are “not going to stop the president
from acting and taking action, like he
is today.”
As many as 30 million potential
loans shouldn’t be
travaganza, for example, included a
$12 billion bailout for colleges that even
rewarded Ivy League institutions sitting
on billion-dollar endowments.
As long as colleges and universities Thrifty and prudent paying the bill
can count on Uncle Sam to pick up the for the elite upper class
tab, they have no incentive to reduce

voters would be able to pocket indi-
vidual debt relief of up to $20,000.
The proposal ignores laws governing
repayment to add carveouts that, for
example, subsidize those enrolled in
degree programs “for which total costs
exceed the financial benefits provided
to students.”
Loan repayments will be made for
college graduates who discover “too
late that their postsecondary programs
did not adequately prepare them for
the workforce.” The idea is to convert
student loans into student grants by
making loan forgiveness — an option
meant for extreme and unforeseen
circumstances — the default option
favoring those who make bad decisions.
Even with the Senate under Demo-
cratic control, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Socialism is failing U.S. education system
Let’s not blame America’s failed
education system on illegals: The
Department of Education is perfectly
capable of failing on its own (“New
estimate says U.S. now has 13.7 mil-
lion illegal immigrants, up 37% under
Biden,” web, March 28).
Such is the promise of social-
ism when it centrally controls the
production of goods and services
such as education. Mao demon-
strated that by betting “all in” with
his version of socialist-communism.
What happened? Tens of millions of
people died.
Criminalizing abortion is the wrong path
A lot of pro-lifers are upset at Don-
ald Trump for his stand on abor-
tion (“Trump declines to endorse
a national abortion ban and says it
should be left to the states,” web,
April 8). Despite the belief that sup-
porting a national ban would be
election suicide, I don’t believe that’s
his only reason.
Mr. Trump has been consistent
in saying that controversial moral
issues should not be dictated by
the federal government, but rather
should be guided by local communi-
ties. He understands that leaving the
The abortion party
The wolves are circling their prey.
With the approach of the 2024
presidential election, the Demo-
cratic Party is poised to hand their
voters the Roe v. Wade consolation
prize: unlimited opportunity to kill
your baby, in utero or during birth,
preferably with taxpayer money.
Although they control both the
Senate and the White House, the
Democrats have failed to produce
anything for the American people
in the past three years. Instead,
we see inflation, record spending,
high prices, rampant crime and
a wide-open border. The Biden
administration’s goal has been to
ignore the real problems and focus
on sustaining the party.
The end of Roe v. Wade was
U
tuition rates from the absurd levels ndeterred by the Supreme who are likely to make less money
Court’s rejection of his previ- over the course of a career pay for the
they have set. In Ms. Warren’s home ous scheme to shift the cost of choices of those who will make more.
state, Harvard charges $82,000 per student loans from those who That’s precisely why there has been
year, despite a $51 billion endowment incurred them to those who did not, and will be no legislated amnesty of
that could comfortably cover the cost of President Biden announced on Monday forgiveness; the majority of voters
that he is preparing a proposal — ap- know that it is their ox that is being
its educational offerings in perpetuity. propriately scheduled to be unveiled gored.
Why bother, though, when federally during campaign season later this fall There is already a system in place
subsidized loans enable more impor- — that would once again shift costs to forgive loans. It’s not a great system,
tant priorities, like paying top college from the relatively well-off and those but giving a wheelbarrow of cash to
educated beyond their intelligence to everyone who decided — and let’s be
administrators between $2 million and the thrifty and prudent. clear, in each instance, a decision was
$9 million a year? Under his plan, 4 million borrow- made to take out a loan and a commit-
The better way to discount the ers who have been ment was made
repaying their to repay that loan
“ticket price” of colleges is to cut off student loans — or — to get a student
AALTERNATIVE
LTERNATIVE
VE
HYPOTHESIS
the federal subsidies and tax endow- perhaps not repay- loan won’t make it
ments that aren’t used to reduce tuition. ing their loans better.
The status quo won’t change until ivory — for 20 years or Finally, it is
BY MICHAEL MCKENNA
more could have fundamentally
towers are pressured to set competitive their debt com- unfair and inequi-
rates. Otherwise, they’ll continue pletely canceled. An additional table to those who did and are doing
padding their own administrative 10 million borrowers would get $5,000 the right thing and either have paid off
salaries at taxpayer expense. or more of their obligation forgiven. or are paying off their loans. It takes,
The scheme would fully eliminate ac- on average, a little more than 20 years
crued interest on the loans for for people to pay off their debt. As a
23 million borrowers. practical matter, that means that about
This whole exercise is, of course, 20 million Americans have paid off
the rankest sort of campaign propa-
ganda. In case you missed that, the
their loans in the last 10 years.
What should we say to those
White House fact sheet had separate people? Thank you for working
sections on what the
proposed plan would do
diligently for 20 years
The federal student and honorably discharg-
For example, math is the language Happiness”? Jefferson’s government for Black borrowers and ing your debts; if you had
of science, and it is basic to under- did not guarantee happiness. It only Hispanic borrowers. No loan program timed it a little better, you
standing cause and effect. Together, protected each individual’s right to word yet on what White is, at its very could have gotten some of
they prepare young people for gain- pursue it. borrowers might get. core, regressive that free cash Uncle Joe
ful employment in technology, en- Parents in 1776 had the same For contextual pur- and inequitable. is about to hand out. Let’s
gineering and related professions. responsibility we have today: to poses, about 46 million Essentially, the not even get started on
The National Assessment of Edu- prepare our children to be all they Americans owe about what we might say to the
cational Progress reports that just can be, whether in trades or in pro- $1.75 trillion in student
cash flows from ROTC students or those
26% of eighth grade students are fessions. It’s a responsibility that loans. That’s about the working class making it through school
proficient in math; 31% are proficient is foremost in the philosophy of $700 billion more than to the propertied on their GI Bill benefits.
in reading. individualism but notably absent in Americans owe in credit and college- What kind of moral
Was Thomas Jefferson prescient the philosophy of socialism. card debt, but it is much educated class. hazard do we create for
when he wrote in the Declaration less than the $20 trillion or Loan amnesty of the next group who is
of Independence about “unalien- JOE BOYETT so in mortgage debt that thinking about taking out
able Rights” and “the pursuit of Montgomery, Alabama Americans hold. About any stripe will a loan? Should they as-
55% of students went into make it even more sume that at some point,
some debt to pay for col- regressive and some of their debt and
lege, and the average debt
is about $28,000.
inequitable. all of the interest on that
debt will disappear, cour-
issue to the states allows those with stigma of being unwed and pregnant The federal student loan program is, tesy of the magic government money
radical abortion views to move or now allows many women to accept at its very core, regressive and inequi- machine? Is that a wise and prudent
travel to a state that supports their a surprise pregnancy. Liberalizing table. Essentially, the cash flows from way to proceed?
views. adoption procedures has encour- the working class to the propertied and More terribly, what do we say to
Abortion has been a fact of life aged many other women not to college-educated class. Loan amnesty those who, for financial or other rea-
as long as human history has been abort. of any stripe will make it even more re- sons, decided to forego their academic
recorded. Criminalizing it nation- It’s up to us in the pro-life move- gressive and inequitable. A little more dreams because they chose not to
wide would only again drive it un- ment to persuade others to em- than one-third of Americans have a incur student loan debt for financial,
derground. That’s a radical solution brace life for the unborn and to college degree; two-thirds don’t. Those family or other reasons? Tough luck?
no one should support. ensure that options are available to two-thirds pay federal taxes that sup- Your timing is terrible? Maybe next
As the science of the unborn support women through unwanted port the federal student loans. time?
advances, support for some restric- pregnancies. Not that it is dispositive in every How is any of that fair?
tion on abortion is increasing to instance, but there is a wealth of data
the point that regulating abortion KATHY DeMAY that indicates that, over the course of a Michael McKenna is a contributing edi-
has majority support. Removing the Knightdale, North Carolina career, a worker with a bachelor’s de- tor at The Washington Times and a co-
gree earns about $1 million more than host of the podcast “The Unregulated.”
one without such a degree. So, those He paid off his student loans.
their wake-up call to opportunity. Next year, Virginia Democrats
They finally figured out their best plan to add an abortion-until-birth
chance of winning the presidency amendment to the state constitu-
this year is to satisfy the hunger of tion. If this happens, more babies
their constituents for unrestricted will be killed and will suffer egre- Published by The Washington Times LLC
abortions. They have nothing else gious pain as they’re delivered
to offer. — and legal protections for the THOMAS P. McDEVITT, Chairman
President Biden and the abor- unborn will be eliminated.
CHRISTOPHER DOLAN, President & Executive Editor
tion lobby already demand that all For wolves, prey represents sur-
Democratic candidates for office vival in the natural world. But that’s NEWS EDITORIAL AND OPINION
adhere to the radical agenda of where the comparison between CATHY GAINOR, Managing Editor CHARLES HURT, Opinion Editor
unlimited abortion. In 2022, they them and the Democrats ends. The ANN WOG, Managing Editor Digital
BUSINESS
rammed a bill through the House, latter will sacrifice these helpless, JOHN BOURANTAS, Assistant Managing Editor RAYNARD BOLDING, Chief Financial Officer
where it was supported by all ex- nascent humans for the survival STEPHEN DINAN, Assistant Managing Editor ADAM VERCAMMEN, Chief Revenue Officer
TONY HILL, Advertising Director
cept one member of their party. of their party. It should be enough S.A. MILLER, Assistant Managing Editor
DESHONDA MURRAY,
And Sens. Bernie Sanders and to stop anyone with a conscience DAVID R. SANDS, Assistant Managing Editor
Director of Human Resources and Building Operations
MARIA STAINER, Assistant Managing Editor
Elizabeth Warren even threatened from voting for them. JORGE CARRASQUILLO, Information Technology Director
JOSEPH SZADKOWSKI, Assistant Managing Editor
to change the rules of the Senate in
order to pass the bill with a simple CAROLE RABEL NICOTERI
majority. The wolves are salivating. Vienna, Virginia
Submissions: Op-eds may only be submitted by e-mail
to commentary@washingtontimes.com
Letters to the Editor must be original, exclusive to The Washington Times and sent via email. We prefer
letters that are fewer than 350 words. Please include your name, address and daytime telephone number.
E-mail: yourletters@washingtontimes.com
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
Niggling thoughts
Moving on from the White House can be a relief
By David Keene
P
resident Biden is not the first presi-
dent propped up by staffers when
their boss’s failing health compro-
mised his abilities — when he was
no longer capable of doing his job.
President Franklin Roos-
evelt is blamed for mistakes
made by staffers after his
health failed in his final years as commander
in chief.
In Woodrow Wilson’s final year as
president after he suffered a major stroke,
historians now agree that Wilson’s wife
made major policy decisions her husband
was incapable of making.
As I’m sure you’ve observed, some
senior presidential aides see themselves as
the author of most of what their boss does
and regard him as a necessary pain in the
backside anyway, so they may not regard
his deterioration as the serious problem you
and others working with you do. But others
had to have been troubled about the pos-
sible consequences of assisting in a cover-
up. It must be the same today.
Assume for a minute that you are a
junior- or middle-level functionary in the
White House who interacts with President
Biden often enough to realize that his cogni-
tive abilities and awareness are slipping.
You have spent months or even years as a
loyal supporter ready to fight any criticism
of him. But now, you are beginning to realize
the country you love is in the hands of a
chief executive incapable of doing the job
you help elect him to do.
You are almost certainly a partisan be-
liever in the superiority of your president’s
policies over those of the intraparty con-
tenders he beat to win your party’s nomina-
tion, and without question, anything anyone
from the other party might offer.
You may have worked on Capitol Hill
and know the difference between a func-
tional and dysfunctional elected official. The
House and Senate include many fully ca-
pable men and women of both parties with whom it
is a pleasure to work. They also include people who
don’t know when to leave and are no longer capable
of doing their jobs.
Lawmakers must take action against foreign legal meddling
U.S. needs bipartisan support to regulate third-party litigation funding
By Bob McEwen
C
ongress can’t agree on much these days,
but one of the rare exceptions is bipartisan
support for the regulation of foreign third-
party litigation funding. Although the
threat is largely unrecognized by the public, this
practice could provide unvetted foreign investors
free access to our court system and pose a serious
threat to the American economy and national
security.
An upswing in mass tort litigation in recent
years, which can involve thousands of cases
brought against defendants that are typically large
corporations or other similar entities, has given
rise to third-party litigation funding. As more of
these cases work their way through the courts, it
has become increasingly clear that many of these
cases are not particularly concerned if actual
damage was done to individual claimants but are
being advanced in the profit-driven interest of
mass tort litigators and their financial backers.
Attracted by the chance to obtain massive set-
tlements or judgments and by steady returns that
are insulated from market fluctuations, significant
investments are now made by outside parties in
these efforts. As a result, such lawsuits are now
swamping the legal system and harming American
companies. In fact, multidistrict litigations con-
stitute a significant portion of the lawsuits going
through the federal courts, now making up 73% of
the pending federal civil caseload in 2022, double
the number of just 10 years ago.
Many of these cases are highly technical, mak-
ing it difficult for courts to adjudicate them fairly.
This can also lead to big settlements over barely
legitimate claims that don’t reflect the actual
value of the intellectual property involved. This
harms the American economy by transferring
money from productive companies that could oth-
erwise spend it on innovation, reinvestment and
job creation to lawyers and their financial backers.
It’s bad enough when domestic investors dive
into mass torts. But now, patent infringement suits
appear to be an emerging target for foreign inves-
tors and companies, both for their own gain and
perhaps that of foreign governments. This could
result in a new level of damage that not only costs
American companies a lot of capital, but also
makes them less competitive in the international
economy and benefits countries such as China
that actively work to steal intellectual property as
they battle the United States for market share.
All of this puts America’s national security at
risk. Not only could a foreign adversary use such
lawsuits as a vehicle to potentially gain access to
“highly confidential documents containing propri-
etary information regarding sensitive technolo-
gies,” it could also be used as a tool of industrial
sabotage to weaken our defense capabilities.
By diminishing the innovation and production
of technologies that have helped the United States
maintain a competitive edge against its enemies,
such lawsuits could give our adversaries a huge
advantage on future battlefields.
Recognizing these threats, the House Com-
mittee on Oversight and Accountability held
Regardless of party, voters elect a president
not just because of his record, but because voters
sensed in him an ability to handle challenges that
no one could have predicted when they cast their
ballots. A president cannot be a “potted plant,” but a
leader who can make major decisions in real time.
Your family and friends in Washington and back
ILLUSTRATION BY LINAS GARSYS
home sleep better at night believing that the world
is a better and certainly a safer place because you
and your boss are on the job.
But Wilson didn’t run for reelection, and
a hearing this past fall delving into the lack of
transparency and accountability in the third-party
litigation funding system. As a former member
of Congress, I was pleased to see lawmakers
expose how allowing both domestic and foreign
third-party litigation funders to invest in court
cases anonymously sets the stage for abuse of the
system and subversion of the legal process for
financial or political gain.
After the hearing, Democratic Sen. Joe Man-
chin III of West Virginia and Republican Sen.
John Kennedy of Louisiana introduced legislation
designed to address this problem.
The Protecting Our Courts From Foreign
Manipulation Act, and its companion bill in the
House of Representatives, would require disclo-
sure of foreign persons engaged in funding civil
☆R
Roosevelt died before he could.
As President Biden seeks reelection, you must be
wondering how his doing so can be good for him,
the party he heads or, ultimately, the country we all
care about.
You’re part of his team and can no doubt repeat
the talking points favoring him marching into battle
one last time. He’s not really in bad
shape at all. He’s better than any of the
alternatives in either party. His agenda
and yours are more important than any-
thing else and justify working to reelect
him regardless of any doubts you might
harbor.
But as you turn out the lights in
your office and head home, how do you
dispel the doubts and the niggling feel-
ing you are participating in an effort to
reelect a president incapable of provid-
ing the judgment and leadership that
may be needed to protect the nation’s
very survival?
I’ve been there. I came to Washing-
ton in 1970 to work in the Nixon White
House for then-Vice President Spiro
Agnew. I was part of the team assem-
bled to defend my boss and his boss as
Watergate and associated investigations
blew up around us. I did my job then
as you are doing yours now, but even
then, I lost more than a few nights’ sleep
wondering if fighting to keep a damaged
and increasingly weakened presidency
was good for the country.
Finally, President Richard Nixon, as
loath to give up the power of the office
he held as anyone else, decided to sur-
render the presidency and retreat to
San Clemente. Prolonging the inevitable
was bad for the country, and he knew
it. Eventually, he decided to do what he
had to. It was sad for those of us who
had worked to defend him, but most of
us were relieved.
Maybe at some point, your president
will realize that like it or not, he can no
longer provide the leadership needed by
a great nation and retire to Delaware. If
he does, I bet it’ll be a relief.
David Keene is editor-at-large at The Washington
Times.
ILLUSTRATION BY LINAS GARSYS
litigation, ban foreign governments and sover-
eign wealth funds from participating in litigation
finance, and require the Department of Justice’s
National Security Division to report on foreign
third-party litigation funding in the federal
judiciary.
It is important that these pieces of legislation
make their way through the Senate and House and
to the president’s desk. If nothing is done, many
believe it is just a matter of time before the lack of
transparency and regulations controlling third-
party litigation funding by foreign nations or com-
panies results in serious damage to U.S. interests.
Bob McEwen represented Ohio in Congress for six
terms and served on the House Select Committee on
Intelligence.
OPINION | B3
Trump’s
abortion
statement
Ceding the moral high ground
By Cal Thomas
F
ormer President Donald
Trump issued a lengthy state-
ment on abortion on Mon-
day. It is the latest of several
positions he has taken on an issue that
continues to be hotly debated. Each
statement is supposedly a matter of
Mr. Trump’s “conviction,” though
some have been contradictory to pre-
vious statements.
These have included his long-
standing pro-choice position before he
ran for president, to pro-life, and now
pro-life with important caveats. His
statement is clearly one that conforms
more to polls than principles, which is
nothing new.
Mr. Trump starts with his sup-
port for in vitro fertilization treat-
ments, a subject raised in the Alabama
Legislature, which first passed a law
that criminalized the procedure if an
embryo is subsequently destroyed but
was then quickly reversed following
an uproar. Mr. Trump says he favors
IVF treatments for couples who want
them.
Mr. Trump then takes the argu-
ment where it should go when he
notes that many Democrats who sup-
port abortion access, even in some cases
for late-term abortions, are the true
radicals.
Next, Mr. Trump takes credit for the
Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe
v. Wade, which
he should, but
then says he fa- This is an
vors each state argument
deciding for it- that must be
self what their won mostly by
laws should be.
That should
persuasion.
be seen as a Abortion, like
starting point, rampant crime
not the end of and many
the debate. The other cultural
Civil War was challenges that
fought over
whether indi- face us, is not
vidual states
should decide
the cause of our
decadence but a
to embrace reflection of it.
slavery or not. Here, a definition
Either all life is
“endowed by
of decadence
our Creator,” can help focus on
or we are our deplorable
evolutionary condition as a
accidents who nation: “moral
can do what degeneration
we want to one
another. or decay.”
“This is all
about the will of the people,” Mr. Trump
says. “You must follow your heart, or in
many cases, your religion or your faith.
Do what’s right for your family and do
what’s right for yourself.”
With that last line, Mr. Trump loses
the moral argument about the value of
human life. If each pregnant woman
gets to decide for herself (and a man
has no legal say), then we are back in
the pro-choice position.
The abortion pill and telemedicine
abortions have changed the debate.
Women who opt to have an abortion
can now do it at home.
This is an argument that must be
won mostly by persuasion. Abortion,
like rampant crime and many other cul-
tural challenges that face us, is not the
cause of our decadence but a reflection
of it. Here, a definition of decadence
can help focus on our deplorable condi-
tion as a nation: “moral degeneration or
decay.”
Look around. See what is happening
in our big cities, in public schools, at the
border, our declining military power
and standing in the world, the rede-
fining of what it means to be a man
or a woman. America’s decline is
noticeable to all, with eyes to see and
ears to hear. These things cannot be
fixed overnight but incrementally.
Near the end of his statement, Mr.
Trump says: “That’s where we are
right now. And that’s what we want,
the will of the people.”
He’s right that’s where we are
right now, but he is wrong when
he says it’s all about the will of the
people. People can be led to do
what is right (see the end of slavery
and the Civil Rights Movement, for
example). If one has no right to be
born, no other rights matter.
Mr. Trump’s statement, while
welcome in part, cedes the moral
high ground when he says abortion is
up to individuals. That puts us back
to where we started, with the 1973
Supreme Court decision.
Readers may email Cal Thomas at
tcaeditors@tribpub.com. Look for
Cal Thomas’ latest book, “A Watch-
man in the Night: What I’ve Seen
Over 50 Years Reporting on America”
(HumanixBooks).
B4 | OPINION ☆R THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

CIA wants more power to spy on Americans Anti-Israel

Intelligence agencies misunderstand the Fourth Amendment propaganda
in Washington

A
By Andrew P. Napolitano defense secrets to Moscow — surely the judge would have signed a surveil-

mericans need to be aware of the unbridled propensity of federal

intelligence agencies to spy on all of us without search
warrants as required by the Fourth Amendment to the
Constitution.
These agencies believe that the Fourth Amendment —
which protects the individual right to privacy — regulates
only law enforcement and does not apply to domestic
spying.
There is no basis in the constitutional text, history or judicial interpreta-
tions for such a limiting and toothless view of this constitutional guarantee.
lance warrant. But to the government, following the Constitution is too
limiting.
Thus, by acquiring bulk data — fiber-optic data on hundreds of millions of
reveals leftists’
Americans acquired without search warrants — the government avoids the
time and trouble of demonstrating probable cause to a judge. But that time
delusions
and trouble were intentionally baked into the Fourth Amendment so as to
keep the government off our backs.
Some of it glorifies rape,
Not to be outdone by its principal rival, the FBI soon began doing the same terrorism and genocide
thing: gathering bulk data without search warrants.
When Congress learned of this, it enacted legislation that banned the By Michael Lucchese
warrantless acquisition of bulk data. Apparently, Congress is naive enough to

S
The courts have held that the ince Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack
Fourth Amendment restrains on Israel, various leftist groups
government — all government. across the United States have been
Last week, the CIA asked staging protests in support of the
Congress to expand its current “liberation” of the Palestinian people.
spying in the United States. They see anti-Israel activism as a way
Here is the backstory. to express some kind of solidarity with
When the CIA was created “oppressed peoples” fighting “colonizers.”
in 1947, members of Congress Too many have even resorted to violence.
who feared the establishment Washington has seen more than its share
here of the type of domestic of anti-Israel demonstration, but one inci-
surveillance apparatus that dent in my neighborhood drove home the
the Allies had just defeated in absurdity of leftist activism. I live in a quiet
Germany insisted that the new part of Northeast Washington called Ecking-
CIA have no role in American ton, far from the National Mall and the other
law enforcement and no legal usual scenes of protest. A few weeks ago,
ability to spy win the U.S. The though, that changed overnight.
legislation creating the CIA As I walked out of my apartment one
contains those unambiguous morning, I noticed someone had affixed a
limitations. number of posters to streetlamps around the
Nevertheless, we know that neighborhood. Some are emblazoned with
CIA agents are present in all fatuous slogans such as “Free Palestine!” or
50 of our state legislatures. “Hands Off Rafah,” while others try to make
They didn’t arrive there until more complex points. Although one rather
after Dec. 4, 1981. That’s the doubts how effective this propaganda will be,
date that President Ronald these posters showed me just how delusional
Reagan signed Executive anti-Israel leftists have become.
Order 12333, which purports to One of the more ridiculous posters reads
give the CIA authority to spy “Queers for Palestine.” Upon encountering
in the United States — suppos- ILLUSTRATION BY GREG GROESCH
it, I wondered if the person who made it
edly looking for narcotics from knows that homosexuality is legally banned
foreign countries — but keeps from law enforcement whatever it finds. believe that the CIA, the FBI and the National Security Agency, their cousin in the Gaza Strip. Hamas has been known to
Stated differently, while Reagan purported to authorize the CIA to defy the with 60,000 domestic spies, will actually comply with federal law. imprison and execute gay people. Even in the
limitations imposed upon it by the Constitution and by federal law, he insisted Last week, that naivete was manifested front and center when the CIA sent West Bank, gay Palestinians face persecu-
on a “wall” of separation between domestic spying and law enforcement. a letter to both congressional intelligence committees addressing its spying tion from both vigilante Islamists and their
So, if the CIA using unconstitutional spying discovered that a janitor in on foreign persons and the Americans with whom they communicate, and own government. Whatever the “Palestinian
the Russian Embassy in Washington was really a KGB colonel who abused asking to expand that reach in the U.S. struggle” may be, it is certainly not a cam-
his wife in their suburban Maryland home, under E.O. 12333, it could continue The timing of the CIA’s letter coincides with a decision Congress must paign for gay rights.
to spy upon him in defiance of the Fourth Amendment and the CIA charter, make in the next 10 days — whether to reenact Section 702 of the Foreign Another quotes a line from a Tupac
but it could not reveal to Maryland prosecutors — who can use only evidence Intelligence Surveillance Act, allow it to expire on April 19 or expand it as Shakur rap to criticize the U.S. government:
that was lawfully obtained — any evidence of his domestic violence. the CIA has requested. Section 702 permits warrantless spying on foreigners “They got money for wars, but can’t feed the
All this changed 20 years later when President George W. Bush demolished and the Americans whom intelligence agencies suspect communicate with poor.” On the face of it, it is simply absurd to
Reagan’s “wall” between law enforcement and domestic spying and directed them. Section 702 is an unconstitutional free pass for domestic spying. suggest that the United States spends more
the CIA and other domestic spying agencies to share the fruits of their spying So, notwithstanding the persistent efforts of members of Congress from on the military than on fighting poverty. Just
with the FBI. both parties to limit and in some cases to prohibit the warrantless acquisi- last year, entitlement spending — “feeding
Thus, thanks to Reagan, Mr. Bush, and their successors looking the other tion of bulk data by the CIA from Americans, the practice continues, the CIA the poor” — was about 55% of the federal
way, CIA agents have been engaging in fishing expeditions on a grand scale in defends it and presidents look the other way. budget.
the U.S. for the past 20 years. Congress knows about this because all intel- Congress created the CIA monster, which today is so big and so powerful Meanwhile, over 80% of Gaza’s popula-
ligence agencies are required by statute to report the extent of their spying and so indifferent to the Constitution and the federal laws its agents have tion lives in poverty, but Hamas directs its
secretly to the House and Senate intelligence committees. sworn to uphold that it can boast about its lawlessness, have no fear of massive influx of cash from Iran and other
This, of course, does not absolve the CIA of its presidentially authorized defying Congress and always escape the consequences of all this largely sources to building its terror network and
computer hacking crimes; rather, it gives Congress a false sense of security unscathed. Even President Harry Truman, who signed the 1947 legislation killing Israelis.
that it has a handle on what’s going on. into law, later acknowledged as much and condemned what the CIA had The most chilling poster simply declares
What’s going on is not government lawyers appearing before judges asking become. “Freedom by Any Means.” Regardless of
for surveillance warrants based upon probable cause of crime, as the Consti- I suspect the CIA and its cousins will get away with this because they spy what one believes about the conflict, noth-
tution requires. What’s going on is CIA agents going to Big Tech and paying on Congress and possess damning personal data on members who regularly ing can justify the horrific means Hamas
for access to communications used by ordinary Americans. Some Big Tech vote to increase their secret budgets. employed on Oct. 7 and since. Nearly 1,200
companies told the CIA to take a hike. Others took the CIA’s cash and opened When will we have a government whose officials are courageous enough people, overwhelmingly civilians, were killed
the spigots of their fiber-optic data to the voracious federal appetite. to uphold the Constitution? by the terrorists on that dark day. There are
If government lawyers went to a judge and demonstrated probable cause hundreds of eyewitness reports of terrorists
of crime — for example, that a janitor in the Russian Embassy was passing To learn more about Judge Andrew Napolitano, visit https://JudgeNap.com. committing sexual assault. The 133 hostages
still held by the terrorists likely face the
same kind of torture. The poster’s slogan
straightforwardly glorifies rape, terrorism
Gingrich and genocide. “Freedom by Any Means” is a
despicable thing to believe.
From page B1 Pasting these posters on public lampposts
is technically an illegal act of vandalism —
has taken a strange and indefensible which means, of course, that the agitators in
turn. my neighborhood can even claim the noble
Mr. Kishida has had a strange pat- mantle of “civil disobedience” for them-
tern of hostility to several religious selves. The late writer Tom Wolfe famously
organizations, including the Unifica- described this kind of leftist activism as
tion Church. He aggressively tried “radical chic.” Causes like “Palestinian libera-
to break ties between the late Prime tion” become a fashionable way for members
Minister Shinzo Abe’s supporters of the powerful classes to signal their virtue
and the church. Importantly, the to the world. It is an activism so abstract it
church, founded in 1954 by the Rev. becomes essentially meaningless.
Sun Myung Moon, has been a leading For all their slogans, though, the leftist
opponent of the Japanese Commu- residents of Eckington are hardly poster
nist Party and engaged in a 30-year children of the revolution. The median home
struggle to weaken the Communists’ price here is nearly double the national
efforts to subvert democracy in median, and one house on my block sold
Japan. recently for $1.2 million. A local film-
At one point, the Kishida gov- maker even wrote and directed a poi-
ernment engaged in a lengthy and gnant movie, “Residue,” about how bad
expensive process of requiring every gentrification is getting in our neighbor-
element of the church to fill out long hood. Eckington is not home to the noble
questionnaires and undergo investi- proletariat struggling against capitalism
gation. On Oct. 18, when nothing il- and empire — this neighborhood is fast
legal could be found, Mr. Kishida an- becoming colonized by the rich and
nounced that the Unification Church entitled.
could not be dissolved because no A real revolutionary spirit would look
criminal law had been broken. The to the ways it could uplift the afflicted in
very next day, however, he suggested our own neighborhood. Between 2022 and
he would use civil settlement cases 2023 alone, the homelessness rate in D.C.
to try to dissolve the church. increased by 18%. Last year, one-third of
This was disturbing because Washington residents experienced food in-
there was no provision for using civil security. Violent crime in the nation’s capital
settlements to dissolve a church. In is up by 39%, in stark contrast to other parts
Japan, the cause must be criminal. of the country. We have plenty of our own
The prime minister himself has ac- problems here at home, and I sincerely wish
knowledged there is no such criminal ILLUSTRATION BY HUNTER
my left-wing neighbors would turn their
case. attention to these concerns.
The Rev. Moon, a fierce propo- president’s political opponents with Going to the moon together is impor- government reaffirm its commitment By now, many of the anti-Israel posters
nent of religious freedom, founded the power of government. So, I am tant. Defense-industrial cooperation to the rule of law and to the princi- around the neighborhood are starting to
The Washington Times, which is keenly focused on opposing efforts is important. ples of religious freedom, which are tear away at the edges. A few have been
owned by a commercial enterprise to replace the rule of law with the But beyond all those alliance the heart of a truly free society. pasted over by new posters declaring
affiliated with the global spiritual rule of power. activities, a deep commitment to This visit is an opportunity for environmentalist or pro-abortion mes-
movement in over half a dozen I hope members of the House and the rule of law and religious liberty American leaders to deliver that sages. At the end of the day, all that is
countries. Senate who have a chance to chat is key to the American-Japanese message to Prime Minister Fumio left is a fading reminder that activism is a
As Americans, we have watched with Mr. Kishida will remind him of relationship. This has been true Kishida. delusional hobby.
our own court system and the rule of the importance of the rule of law and since Japan adopted a constitution
law be undermined by the political the vital basis of religious liberty as designed to preserve freedom after For more commentary from Newt Michael Lucchese is a Krauthammer Fellow
party in power. The Biden admin- the ultimate foundation of freedom. World War II. Gingrich, visit Gingrich360.com. Also, at the Tikvah Fund, and the CEO of Pipe
istration is trying to destroy the Military cooperation is important. It is vital that the Japanese subscribe to the Newt’s World podcast. Creek Consulting.
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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024 ☆R LIFE | B13

Spouse endures second

loss after wife’s passing
DEAR ABBY: I ABIGAIL
am trying to come VAN BUREN
to terms with the
passing of my DEAR ABBY what to say or do, so
wife, “Charlotte,”
a month ago. Many old
friends and family have
been supportive. What
hurts, in addition to my
grief, is the silence from a
particular couple.
For years, we were very
close with this family when
we both had young boys
growing up. We celebrated
all the joys and life-chang-
ing events together, includ-
ing going out to dinner
every Friday and vacation-
ing together. Once our
boys were on their own, we
gradually saw less and less
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOGRAPHS
of the couple, but still kept
Glass Animals, which includes songwriter and producer Dave Bayley (left) and Drew McFarland, conceived their latest album after a feverish Mr. in touch occasionally.
Bayley experienced a storm in a house in Los Angeles. The love he saw expressed in the aftermath of the storm was the inspiration for the album. When Charlotte passed,
they were two of the first
people I notified. They were
MUSIC out of town at the time, so I
postponed her memorial a
wife’s passing, they (as
many other people)
may not have known
they did nothing.
If you wish to talk with
them, by all means, call them.
But when you do, do not
expect them to offer more
than cursory condolences.
Concentrate instead on the
friends who have shown they
ARE willing to be there for
you.
DEAR ABBY: I met a man
online and have been dat-
ing him off and on for the
past four years. His parents
have been living with him
since the pandemic, and
I have yet to be invited to
his home or to meet them.
He is from Bolivia and says
his parents want him to
marry a Catholic Bolivian
girl — and someone without
children. I am divorced,
American and the mother
of two.

Turning love on its side day so they could attend. I

felt they were so important
to us that they should be
there.
He tells me he’s afraid
that if I meet them, our
relationship will be over.
He keeps saying they are
BY MARK KENNEDY
ASSOCIATED PRESS Glass Animals endure crisis, come up to him to ask about his
songs and lyrics.
I have not heard one
word from this couple!
moving back to Bolivia, but
they are still here. I also

NEW YORK | Glass Animals’
latest album was born thanks to
a massive storm, a house on a cliff
and an existential crisis. What
emerged from that? A 10-track
collection exploring love.
The indie-pop band’s front-
man, songwriter and producer
Dave Bayley found himself in
an Airbnb house high on stilts
below Mulholland Drive in Los
Angeles, alone, sick with fever
and wondering about Glass Ani-
mals’ place in the universe.
Then came a powerful storm:
Trees tumbling down the hill,
roads flooded and his rented
house perched precariously.
“My existential crisis went to
the next level,” Mr. Bayley said,
laughing.
But in the dazed calm that
followed, Mr. Bayley saw peo-
ple emerge from the storm and
embrace — families, couples,
friends, neighbors. “I felt like
I was sitting in space in this
house, looking down on the
whole city.” A musical concept
was born.
A few furious weeks of writ-
ing produced the 10-track “I Love
You So F------ Much,” a follow-
up to their third album, 2020’s
“Dreamland,” which sold more
than 12 million copies. The new
collection comes out July 19 via
Republic Records.
There are songs about longing
create 10-song collection
and ones about past relation-
ships. One compares love to
being hogtied and thrown into
the trunk of a Corolla. “Each try
to kind of touch on a different
side of love,” Mr. Bayley said.
“I love trying to build a whole
world.”
The anthemic “Creatures in
Heaven” is the first single, a mem-
ory of a tender, intimate moment.
“You held me like my mother
made me just for you/You held
me so close that I broke in two.”
The album title — which can
be read passionately or exasper-
atedly, or a million ways in be-
tween — comes from the crazy
nature of love. “Everything is
always chaotic. You just have
to kind of embrace it for what
it is and love it,” he said. “That
is what pulled me out of that
dark spot.”
“Show Pony,” the first song,
is a table of contents for the
album, a tune about a complex,
up-and-down relationship that
Mr. Bayley grew up witnessing
(“All those times he did what he
pleased/Boy, those scars must
really run deep”).
Several songs lean on space
imagery — especially “A Tear in
Space (Airlock)“ — or the need
to flee — “On the Run” — or the
dangerous push-pull of adoration
in “Wonderful Nothing.” There
are some gorgeous lines, like:
“I think we’re formed/from old
Lego/in a bedside drawer/where
the stray things go.”
Mr. Bayley has become a more
confessional writer with each
passing Glass Animals album.
On “How to Be a Human Being,”
he wrote each song from the
perspective of someone else. The
last tune, “Agnes,” was about a
friend of the band who died by
suicide. It was Mr. Bayley’s most
personal song at the time.
He pushed that envelope on
the next album with the single
“Heat Waves,” a hypnotic, hazy
tune that honors a departed
friend whose birthday brings
grief each passing June. It hit No.
1 on Billboard’s 2022 year-end
Hot 100 Songs chart, propelled
by praise on TikTok.
Mr. Bayley put it at the end
of the album, “Dreamland,” for
a reason: It was so personal that
he was scared. “The response
from people was so supportive
and positive. It kind of gave me
the courage to try and push it
more, be more personal and more
open.”
“Heat Waves” led to new fans
— and a Grammy nomination —
and people now not only recog-
nize Mr. Bayley in the street but
“The questions are often very
deep, really big. So I’ll just like be
in my pajamas walking my dog
and I got this question, ‘What do
you mean by this line in the song
“Agnes?’”
“I’m like, ‘Whoa, it’s 8:30 in the
morning. I just had some cereal
and I haven’t showered yet.’ But
it’s wonderful. It’s kept me on my
toes for sure.”
The band — which includes
Drew MacFarlane on guitar and
keyboards, Edmund Irwin-Singer
on bass and keys, and drummer
Joe Seaward — will hit the road
to support the new album.
The fall tour kicks off Aug. 7
in Charlotte, North Carolina, and
hits such cities as New York City,
Philadelphia, Toronto, Cincinnati,
Nashville, Kansas City, Salt Lake
City, Seattle, Dallas, Phoenix, Red
Rocks Amphitheatre outside Den-
ver, and Austin, Texas.
Glass Animals will spend
October and November in Eu-
rope, playing Paris, Brussels,
Warsaw, Berlin, Milan, Zurich,
Amsterdam, Dublin, Manchester,
Glasgow and ending at London’s
massive O2 arena on Nov. 7.
The band will mix it up, vary-
ing each show’s setlist depending
on the vibe. Some bands pre-
program everything they do live,
but not Glass Animals, who like
to react to the crowd, even swap-
ping out songs moments before
going on.
They live a mile away, and
I haven’t received a dinner
invitation or even a phone
call. I’m shocked by their
lack of caring, knowing I am with him and studying for
home alone and devastated his architectural exams.
over Charlotte’s passing.
A simple phone call to ask
how I’m doing would be
helpful. What do you think
about this? — ABANDONED
IN NEW YORK
DEAR ABANDONED:
I am sorry for the loss of
your wife. Because it is so
recent, your pain must be
overwhelming. Regarding
this couple, I suspect that
once your sons were grown,
their friendship with you was aspects of his life. Because
already on the wane.
While it would have been
compassionate for them to
have stepped up when they
received the news of your
TODAY’S BIRTH-
DAY (April 11). Get
ready for a year of
HOROSCOPE to make your vision
adventurous explo-
ration, driven by
intuition and curiosity, of
which you have plenty. New
destinations and uncharted
intellectual territory will
be sources of exhilaration,
discovery and change. More
highlights: brushes with
fame, intensive study, invites
that expand your network,
have never met his friends.
He says he never does
anything with his friends,
between his parents living
After all these years, I
have yet to meet one of
his friends. What should I
do? — OFF THE RADAR IN
WISCONSIN
DEAR OFF THE RADAR:
Recognize that this man
may not have been entirely
truthful with you about his
circumstances. Bluntly put,
he may be married, or he
may not be who he has repre-
sented himself to be in other
your relationship hasn’t
progressed after four years of
dating (off and on), what you
should do is MOVE ON.
ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION
HOLIDAY 22). There’s no rea-
MATHIS son to wait around
happen. Start tweak-
ing elements of the
current design for comfort,
style and efficiency. In acti-
vating these changes, you’ll
make happiness accessible
for now and for later.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23).
You strive to give your best to
all and treat everyone with a
quality of attention intended

‘Little Monsters’ on Blu-ray scares up vintage fun family or point of view.

Gemini and Virgo adore you.
to convey respect. The most
telling mark of character is
Your lucky numbers are 1, 14, how a person treats those

D
irector Richard Alan
Greenberg’s 1980s
kids cult horror com-
edy returns to the
Blu-ray format encased in shiny
metal in Little Monsters: Steel-
book Edition (Lionsgate Home
Entertainment, rated PG, 101
minutes, 1.85:1 aspect ratio,
$19.96).
Answering definitively the
question of whether monsters
live under a child’s bed, years
before Pixar’s animated confir-
mation, the movie introduces
Brian Stevenson (the charming
Fred Savage), an 11-year-old
new to the Boston area, with
his 6-year-old brother, Eric
(Ben Savage), and his parents,
Glen (Daniel Stern) and Holly
(Margaret Whitton).
After several unsettling
nights of sleep and being
blamed for mishaps he did not
cause, Brian sets a trap with
Doritos and eventually corners
a horned, blue-skinned monster
named Maurice (comic Howie
Mandel) causing havoc in Eric’s
bedroom.
As the pair quickly become
friends, Maurice tempts Brian
to come to his world under the
bed — a wonderland of arcade
games, unlimited treats and
colorful creatures while also
serving as a hub for monsters
visiting children’s bedrooms
around the world.
After Brian works with
Maurice to cause chaos over
multiple nights, drama ensues
when Brian realizes he is turn-
ing into a monster himself.
The underworld’s leader,
Boy, wants Brian to fully
convert into a night beast, and
TTHE
HE W
WORLD
ORLD OOFF
ZADZOOKS!
BY JOE SZADKOWSKI
his main minion, Snik (a live-
action, cigarette-smoking Sully
from “Monsters Inc.”) kidnaps
Eric to force the issue. Brian
must assemble a team of class-
mates to rescue his brother.
The film thrives due to
cute, practical special effects
highlighting the monsters in
action; the old-school makeup
effects; some gross humor; and
Maurice acting like a younger
brother of Beetlejuice.
“Little Monsters” is made
for brave 9-year-olds who
appreciate mild frights, cool-
looking monsters and laughter.
But it may be a tough sell for
today’s sophisticated youth —
and is perhaps better enjoyed
as a nostalgic jaunt for adults
who loved the film as tweens
back in 1989.
Although the packaging
promises the film has been digi-
tally restored, the screen-filling
movie does not look as polished
as one would have hoped.
Considering the amount of
slight scratches and white pops
on the imagery, inexcusable
for any level of “restoration,”
one must wonder how bad the
film looked in its previously
released iterations.
The colors are strong but
sometimes saturated enough
to wash out flesh tones, and at
many points viewers will find
the clarity akin to seeing the
movie in a theater back in the
day.
Best extras: Lionsgate gives
viewers an excellent selection
of bonus content duplicated
from its 2020 Blu-ray Collec-
tor’s Series release led by a
geek-ified optional commentary
track with Jarret Gahan, former
editor-in-chief of the shuttered
CultofMonster.com.
A nonstop, sometimes me-
andering, dive explores making
“Little Monsters” touching
on the origins of the concept,
casting and cast credits, original
script comparisons, themes in
the film, shooting locations,
anecdotes and the history of
the movie’s studio Vestron
Pictures.
Specifics include that the
movie played on only 179
screens, as opposed to 500 to
800 for an average family film
back then; the Savage parents
actually own the leather jacket
worn by Maurice, and the
screenwriters disliked the final
film.
Equally interesting is an
entertaining 18-minute in-
terview to support the 2020
release with an enthusiastic Mr.
Mandel, who hated the makeup,
loved the character and had a
great time reminiscing about
the movie.
Also available are interviews
with a 2019 stuntman turned
Academy Award-winning
makeup effects maestro Robert
Short and producer Andrew
Licht, and 30 minutes of vintage
on-set interviews with cast and
crew including the Savages.
One more vintage extra
and absolutely fascinating for
lovers of the history of home
entertainment is a nine-minute
promotional film geared toward
video stores to buy extra copies
of the VHS version of the film
(for only $89 each) reinforced
with footage on free point of
purchase items for the retailers,
a call-in contest and kids offer-
ing reviews of the movies.
So, fans already get a pretty
thorough immersion into the
production and watch the
best-looking version of the
film available (meh), but the
Walmart exclusive Steelbook
case should cement the deal.
The brightly colored
container boasts neon pinks,
purples and blues as the front
offers headshots of a confident
Brian with arms crossed and a
wild-eyed Maurice with mouth
open and wearing his leather
jacket and skeleton earring.
The back offers torso shots
of the rescue party of Brian
and his friends Kiersten and
Todd in the underworld with
a full-body shot of the beastly
Snik standing behind them and
blocking their escape.
The interior spread is not
as impressive, with the right
side showing the movie title
design and the left displaying
a publicity shot of Maurice
resting his arm on Brian’s head
all set in front of a silvery-white
background.
3, 28 and 39. they perceive as having less
ARIES (March 21-April power or status.
19). Your search for grace SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov.
and transcendence will lead 21). Success will depend
you to others who are search- on whether you can bridge
ing, too. With so many eyes a gap between you and the
on the situation, the spiritual other person. Understanding
treasure will be found. You’ll where the other person is at
feel it before you see it. is crucial information to get
TAURUS (April 20-May before the construction of
20). If you are asleep or said bridge.
awake, you are still you, SAGITTARIUS (Nov.
proving that it takes no effort 22-Dec. 21). With work,
for you to be yourself. What raw talents and half-baked
does take work is enacting notions will come together to
the various roles and fulfill- create something remarkable.
ing the responsibilities you These things take time. The
have taken on. Don’t confuse daily results may not look
the true self with its roles. like much, but it all adds up
GEMINI (May 21-June rather quickly.
21). It’s good to make a big CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan.
deal over the little things 19). You won’t wait until you
you enjoy. You’ll get even have a reason to diversify.
more delight when you look You’ll do it now. By seeking
back on them. These are the advice, friendship and news
textures that make the story from a variety of sources,
interesting, the spices that you increase your knowledge
give your memories their kick. of the world, make more ac-
CANCER (June 22-July curate predictions and thus,
22). When your people are grow your power.
having fun, so are you. When AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb.
they aren’t, it’s hard for you to 18). Stress can interfere
enjoy yourself. You can’t con- with performance or it can
trol the enjoyment of others, enhance it. It’s all about the
but if it’s your party, you can level. Say yes to things that
control the guest list. So, think are a little bit much and
of your life as your party. decline the propositions that
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22). present enormous challenge
Some wax poetic about how or none at all.
every rose has its thorns. PISCES (Feb. 19-March
You’re in the mood to see 20). You have made connec-
this as a rather dramatic tions in life transcend time
stance considering the num- and space. Today you will
ber of lovely blossoms out send and receive messages to
there with absolutely smooth someone regardless of where
stems. Love and beauty don’t the other person is in the
have to hurt. world or beyond.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. CREATORS.COM
B14 | SPORTS ☆R THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL
Top-rated prospect Holliday
makes MLB debut for Orioles
BOSTON | After his rapid rise to the
majors, Jackson Holliday was given a
particularly meaningful number with
the Baltimore Orioles.
Baseball’s top-
ranked prospect
made his big
SPORTS league debut
BRIEFS Wednesday night
at Fenway Park,
starting at second
base and batting
ninth against the Boston Red Sox. He
struck out swinging his first time up.
The 20-year-old infielder, selected
No. 1 overall in the 2022 amateur draft
out of high school in Oklahoma, is a
son of Matt Holliday, a seven-time
All-Star and the 2007 NL batting
champion.
Holliday will wear No. 7 for Bal-
timore. His father wore that number
during seven seasons with the St.
Louis Cardinals and one with the
Colorado Rockies. But it hadn’t been
worn by a member of the Orioles since
former manager Cal Ripken Sr. was
still coaching in 1992.
One of his sons, Billy Ripken, was
the previous Baltimore player to wear
that number, in 1988. The Ripken fam-
ily, Orioles royalty, gave its blessing to
the young Holliday.
NFL
Ex-Raven Suggs faces charges
from drive-thru incident
SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ. | Former NFL
linebacker Terrell Suggs has been
arrested after allegedly threatening
another man and showing a handgun
during a dispute in a Starbucks drive-
thru line.
Scottsdale Police arrested Suggs on
Tuesday at about 3 p.m. and charged
him with threatening and intimidating
and disorderly conduct with a weapon.
The former Baltimore Ravens player
was released Wednesday morning.
The incident on March 10 began
after a black Range Rover driven by
Suggs passed the ordering speaker at
Starbucks and had to back up to place
his order, backing into the other ve-
hicle, the police report said. The other
vehicle didn’t receive any damage, and
both men got out of their vehicles and
argued before returning and collecting
their orders.
Suggs allegedly flipped off the
other driver and threatened to kill him
before driving off. He stuck a handgun
out of his window without pointing it
at the other man and then left, police
said.
COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Edey joins Sampson as
two-time Wooden winners
LOS ANGELES | Zach Edey of Purdue
became the second two-time John R.
Wooden Award winner as the nation’s
top men’s college basketball player on
Wednesday.
The 7-foot-4 center joins Virginia’s
Ralph Sampson, who won in 1982
and ‘83. Edey led the nation in scor-
ing and set school records for career
points and rebounds. The Canadian
led the Boilermakers to the national
championship game, where they lost
to UConn.
Iowa’s Caitlin Clark won the
women’s Wooden Award on Tuesday.
Edey and Clark, along with Legends
of Coaching honoree John Calipari,
will be presented their trophies on Fri-
day at the Los Angeles Athletic Club.
Voting took place from March
18-25 by a national panel of voters who
cover the sport and former winners.
Arkansas hires Calipari
to coach the Razorbacks
FAYETTEVILLE, ARK. | Arkansas hired
John Calipari as men’s basketball
coach on Wednesday, a day after the
Hall of Fame coach stepped down
from the Kentucky program he led to
the 2012 NCAA championship.
The 65-year-old Calipari signed a
five-year contract with an annual base
salary of $7 million through April 2029
with a maximum of two automatic
rollover years for NCAA Tournament
appearances that would extend the
contract to 2031.
The deal includes a $1 million
signing bonus and features retention
bonuses of $500,000 each year of the
contract along with one-time bonuses
for making the NCAA Tournament,
reaching the second round, Sweet
16, Final Four and winning a national
championship.
Kentucky had been paid Calipari
$8.5 million annually.
Calipari is the winningest active
coach in men’s college basketball, with
a career record of 855-263 in stops at
Massachusetts, Memphis and Ken-
tucky. He has led his programs to six
Final Fours and three national champi-
onship games. He has won numerous
awards, including AP Coach of the
Year in 2015.
From wire dispatches and staff reports.
OLYMPICS
Track and field to be first Olympic sport to pay medalists
BY JAMES ELLINGWORTH
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Track and field is set to become the
first sport to introduce prize money at
the Olympics, with World Athletics say-
ing Wednesday it would pay $50,000 to
gold medalists in Paris.
The move is a symbolic break with
the amateur past of the Olympics in
one of the games’ most-watched events.
The governing body of athletics said
it was setting aside $2.4 million to pay
the gold medalists across the 48 men’s,
women’s and mixed events on the track
and field program for this year’s Paris
Olympics. Relay teams will split the
$50,000 between their members. Pay-
ments for silver and bronze medalists are
planned to start from the 2028 Olympics
in Los Angeles.
World Athletics President Sebastian
Coe told reporters that the move is
meant “to recognize that the revenue
share that we receive is in large part
because our athletes are the stars of
the show.”
The prize money will come out of
the share of Olympic revenue that that
the IOC distributes to World Athletics.
However, the move could upset the
balance of power in the Olympic move-
ment ahead of the Paris Games. Coe said
World Athletics only gave the Interna-
tional Olympic Committee “a heads-
up” of its intentions on Wednesday
morning, shortly before it published its
announcement.
In response, the IOC said it was up
to each sport’s governing body to de-
cide how to spend its share of Olympic
revenue.
“The IOC redistributes 90% of all
its income, in particular to the National
Olympic Committees (NOCs) and In-
ternational Federations (IFs),” the IOC
said. “This means that, every day, the
CAPITALS
From page B16
has over his 15 years in the NHL, skat-
ing more than 26,600 shifts comprising
23,700 minutes of ice time. And Orpik
thinks his 2018 Stanley Cup-winning
teammate has gotten better about pick-
ing his spots.
“He has the ability to be physical
when he has to be; he probably is a little
bit more in the playoffs than he is regu-
lar season,” Orpik said. “It’s impossible
to play that way with the minutes he’s
playing, so I think he’s gotten smarter
GOLF
From page B16
affect them. Three players were among
the top four on the final leaderboard.
And just like last year, there is no
animosity inside the ropes.
Phil Mickelson and Joaquin Niemann
from LIV Golf played a practice round
with Akshay Bhatia, the final player into
the field because of his Texas Open vic-
tory last week. Xander Schauffele told
of running into Dustin Johnson and the
two decided to play a practice round,
no different from what would have hap-
pened long before LIV began luring away
players with guaranteed riches.
But the future remains murky.
Augusta National and the other three
organizations that run majors have seats
on the OWGR board that reviewed LIV’s
application to join and get world ranking
points. The vote was unanimous not to
award points until certain enhancements
were met.
LARSON
From page B16
In Larson’s previous trip to Indianap-
olis Motor Speedway, a sunny October
day, he needed roughly 2 1/2 hours to
pass the race’s three-phase rookie test
before spending the rest of the afternoon
running flat out in little or no traffic. He
also detected some spots where over-
confidence — or wind gusts — could
take drivers for a wild ride into the
concrete walls.
Larson, who finished second in a
NASCAR race at Martinsville, Virginia
this past weekend, said it would have
been more “overwhelming” had he been
dealing with rookie orientation during
Wednesday’s test.
He returned to the Arrow McLaren
NATIONALS
From page B16
Despite the offensive outburst, San
Francisco failed to homer for the sixth
straight game. It’s the Giants’ longest
Lamont Marcell Jacobs poses with his gold medal following the men’s 100-meters
final at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. World Athletics said Wednesday it would
pay $50,000 to Olympic track and field gold medalists in Paris this summer.
equivalent of $4.2 million goes to help
athletes and sports organizations at
all levels around the world. It is up to
each IF and NOC to determine how to
best serve their athletes and the global
development of their sport.”
The modern Olympics originated as
an amateur sports event and the IOC
does not award prize money. However,
many medalists receive payments from
their countries’ governments, national
sports bodies or from sponsors.
“I’m probably the last generation
to have been on the 75-pence (95-cent)
meal voucher and second-class rail fare,
competing for my own country. So be-
lieve me, I do understand the nature of
the transition we’ve been in,” Coe said.
The British runner won gold in the
1,500 meters at the 1980 and 1984 Games
in an era when Olympic track was on
as he’s gotten older, too, which is kind
of learning when to kind of go at it a
little bit harder and then when to maybe
conserve his energy.”
While Carlson is known more for his
offense — 670 points in 1,005 regular-
season games — his defensive acumen
is often underappreciated, given how
many tough matchups the Natick, Mas-
sachusetts, native by way of New Jersey
has been tasked with throughout his ca-
reer. Ryan Callahan felt more than a few
shoves in front of the net from Carlson
over the years, especially in Capitals-
New York Rangers playoff series.
“He definitely had some snarl to his
LIV eventually decided to withdraw
its application, and several players de-
cried the world ranking as no longer
relevant.
It is to Ridley and the Masters. The
top 50 at the end of the year and a week
before the Masters still get invitations.
Bryson DeChambeau said the majors,
including the Masters, should invite the
top 12 from the LIV points list.
Ridley wasn’t buying that.
“I think it will be difficult to establish
any type of point system that had any
connection to the rest of the world of golf
because they’re basically — not totally,
but for the most part — a closed shop,”
Ridley said. “There is some relegation,
but not very much.
“But I don’t think that prevents us
from giving subjective consideration
based on talent, based on performance
to those players.”
That’s what led Augusta National to
offer an invitation to Niemann. The club
did not cite anything he did on LIV — the
Chilean has two LIV wins this year — but
No. 17 Chevrolet in February on Phoe-
nix’s 1-mile oval and acknowledged he
nearly spun out the car that his NASCAR
team, Hendrick Motorsports, also is
backing. Larson called it a good sign to
be running on the car’s edge.
With the May 26 double nearing, the
higher stakes come with more compli-
cated lessons.
“I think I’ve definitely learned stuff
but when the packs are that small, you
don’t know if what you’re learning is
reality,” Larson said. “I’m also kind of
learning to get in front of people and
getting familiar with my mirrors, com-
munication and tying that all together,
seeing runs develop behind me and
knowing when to lift, when to tuck into
line all of that kind of stuff.”
Wednesday’s weather conditions
didn’t help.
drought since Sept. 10-16, 2018.
Giants relievers Ryan Walker, Landen
Roupp and Erik Miller pitched the final
three innings, holding Washington
hitless.
The Nationals finished with four hits
in the game.
☆R
ASSOCIATED PRESS
the verge of opening up to professional
athletes.
“It’s a completely different planet
from when I was competing, so it’s very
important that this sport recognizes the
change in that landscape and the added
pressures on many competitors.”
The United States Olympic and
Paralympic Committee awarded
$37,500 to gold medalists at the last
Summer Games in Tokyo in 2021.
Singapore’s National Olympic Council
promises $1 million for Olympic gold,
a feat only achieved once so far by a
Singaporean competitor.
In sports like tennis and golf, the
Olympic tournament is the only time
in a season that many pro players com-
pete for free, with medals on offer but
no prize money. But Coe didn’t want to
speculate on whether other events could
game,” said Callahan, now an ESPN
analyst. “As a teammate, when you see
an offensive guy, a defenseman like that
who puts up those points but also has
that little bit of a bite to his game, it drags
the rest of the guys to have that compete
and have that bite.”
With that bite, Callahan pointed
out, also comes Carlson being a reli-
able player whose consistency makes
him predictable and easy to work with.
Watching some highlights recently, Bru-
ins defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk no-
tices his former teammate “making these
typical big-time John Carlson plays” to
keep the Caps in the playoff race.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Defending Masters champion Jon Rahm
watches his tee shot on the fourth hole
during Wednesday’s practice round.
Rahm is one of 13 LIV golfers invited.
his willingness to travel outside LIV and
win the Australian Open, along with a
top finish in the Australian PGA.
Talor Gooch did not get an invita-
tion. He won three LIV events last year
and later suggested Rory McIlroy would
The cool, breezy overcast day also
led to intermittent track closures for
rain showers. Larson was so busy
checking off boxes during the first
two hours of testing, he couldn’t
consult with his 500 teammates —
Pato O’Ward of Mexico, American
Alexander Rossi — British driver
Callum Ilott, who replaced the injured
David Malukas for the testing or
driver coach Tony Kanaan, the 2013
Indy winner.
Malukas is recovering from offsea-
son wrist surgery following a mountain
biking accident. Ilott replaced him for
the races in St. Petersburg and at the
Thermal Club.
Larson also is figuring out the logis-
tics for balancing next month’s practices,
qualifying runs and race weekend fes-
tivities in Indy with his full-time Cup
Nationals catcher Keibert Ruiz
missed the game due to illness.
The Nationals recalled catcher
Drew Millas from the Rochester Red
Wings and optioned RHP Joan Adon
to the Triple-A affiliate. Millas went
1 for 3 with a stolen base. He was
SPORTS | B15
follow track and field’s lead.
“I’ve always made it a point not to
speak on behalf of other sports,” Coe
said.
The move by World Athletics could
be seen as an indicator of Coe’s inten-
tions for the Olympics as a whole if he
makes a run for the IOC presidency.
“I haven’t ruled it in, and I certainly
haven’t ruled it out,” Coe said last year
when asked whether he would consider
running for the IOC’s top post when
Thomas Bach’s term ends in 2025. The
IOC typically disapproves of any public
campaigning for the presidency and
Coe’s comments drew criticism from
Bach.
There’s no sign yet of any other
Olympic sport following track’s lead.
World Athletics is an outlier financially
since it gets almost all its funding from
its own events like the world champion-
ships. The governing bodies for many
smaller sports depend on their IOC
payments to survive the four-year cycle
until the next Games.
World Aquatics, which oversees
events like swimming, diving and
water polo, told The Associated Press
it considered introducing Olympic prize
money in the run-up to the last Sum-
mer Olympics in Tokyo but instead
opted to increase prize funds at its own
competitions. Its world championships
paid $20,000 per individual gold medal
this year.
Olympic gold medalists in track and
field will still earn less prize money than
at World Athletics’ own world champi-
onships. Last year’s edition in Budapest
paid out prize money down to eighth
place with $70,000 on offer for individual
gold medalists.
Athletes will have to pass “the usual
anti-doping procedures” at the Olympics
before they receive the new prize money,
World Athletics added.
“There’s no moment too big for him,”
Shattenkirk said. “Nothing seems to faze
him. That usually comes with experience,
but he seemed to have that from the start.”
T.J. Oshie, who has played with him
since 2015 after sharing the Sochi Olym-
pic experience, saw that from afar when
he was with St. Louis in previous years
and thought Carlson had the ability
to be a “mainstay” in Washington. He
has been, skating nearly 30 minutes —
including the final 4:38 — in a crucial
victory at Detroit on Tuesday.
“He doesn’t seem like he’s slowing
down all that much,” Orpik said, “even
at this age.”
have an asterisk next to his name if he
won the Masters because all the best
aren’t there.
Gooch is unlikely to be missed,
not with Scottie Scheffler going for
a second green jacket, with McIlroy
chasing the career Grand Slam, Tiger
Woods playing for only the second time
this year and a host of others from all
tours chasing one of golf’s most prized
possessions.
And then the PGA Tour will head to
Hilton Head and LIV Golf will make its
way to Australia, and they all have to
wait until the next major May 16-19 at
the PGA Championship.
“There’s a lot of people a lot smarter
than me that could figure this out in a
much more efficient way,” Jon Rahm
said. “But the obvious answer is that
there’s got to be a way for certain players
in whatever tour to be able to earn their
way in. That’s the only thing can I say.
I don’t know what that looks like. But
there’s got to be a fair way for everybody
to compete.”
duties for two weekends in Charlotte,
North Carolina.
IndyCar veterans believe Larson,
who is the current points leader among
NASCAR drivers, has plenty of time to
fine-tune his strategy.
“If we get one or two more hours run-
ning, we’ll be fine,” O’Ward said during
the team’s lunch break. “I mean there’s
plenty of time to do running during the
month and the weather’s going to be
different. There’s plenty of time to get
spun up.”
The versatile Larson is trying to
become the fifth driver to attempt the
double.
“He (Larson) is a true racer, the guy
wants to drive anything,” said O’Ward,
a four-time IndyCar winner who is sec-
ond in IndyCar points. “I have a massive
respect for that.”
optioned back to Rochester following
the game.
Nationals right-hander Jake Irvin (0-1,
5.73 ERA) is scheduled to start a three-
game series at Oakland on Friday night
opposite Athletics right-hander Paul
Blackburn (1-0, 0.00 ERA).
SPORTS
THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2024

GOLF
ON WASHINGTONTIMES.COM
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■ Comics B12 ■ Dear Abby | Horoscope B13

☆ washingtontimes.com/sports SECTION B

Masters to serve as reunion of the world’s best players

BY DOUG FERGUSON “If we felt that there were a player
ASSOCIATED PRESS LIV, PGA Tour golfers to play together, or players, whether they played on the

but for how long remains the question

ASSOCIATED PRESS
“I believe everyone agrees there’s
excitement in the air this week,” Masters
chair Fred Ridley said. “The best players
in the world are together once again.”
AUGUSTA, GA. | More than golf’s first
major championship of the year, the
Masters represents unification. This is
the first time since July at the British
Open the best players regardless of
their tours compete against each other
— same course, same tournament, same
television network.
“I believe everyone agrees there’s
excitement in the air this week,” Masters
Chairman Fred Ridley said Wednesday.
“The best players in the world are to-
gether once again.”
Still unclear at Augusta National is
for how much longer.
Saudi-funded LIV Golf has 13 players
at the Masters, seven of them former
champions who can play as long as
they want. That’s down from 18 a year
ago. Only nine LIV players are assured
of being back to Augusta National next
year, depending on how they fare in the
majors this year.
Ridley offered little hope the pathway
for LIV to Augusta National was about
to get wider.
He said the Official World Golf Rank-
ing was a “legitimate determiner” of the
best in golf, bad news for a rival league
that does not get world ranking points.
And while the Masters annually reviews
its criteria for invitations, Ridley an-
nounced no new changes.
Instead, he leaned on the Masters
being an invitational, and the club alone
decides who it deems worthy of getting
that elegant, cream-colored invitation
in the mail.
LIV Tour or any other tour, who were
deserving of an invitation to the Masters,
we would exercise that discretion with
regard to special invitations,” Ridley
said.
The battle is for a green jacket, but
that might not be the only competition.
It will be difficult to look at a leader-
board without considering who is with
LIV Golf. That much hasn’t changed
from last year — the first Masters since
LIV was launched — and LIV certainly
showed the 54-hole, no-cut league didn’t
» see GOLF | B15

AUTO RACING CAPITALS

Larson gets
Indianapolis
500 prep
No slowing down
crash course
NASCAR star set
for weekend double
BY MICHAEL MAROT
ASSOCIATED PRESS

INDIANAPOLIS | Kyle Larson embraces

the challenge of racing in any car on any
track at any time.
He’s now facing his trickiest quest
yet — preparing for his Indianapolis 500
debut next month.
Larson returned to the historic 2.5-
mile oval Wednesday for the first of
two days of open testing and spent
his time on the track trying to learn as
much as possible.
The 2021 NASCAR
Cup champion is
going to attempt to
complete the Me-
morial Day week-
end double — 1,100
miles of racing in
Indianapolis and
Larson Charlotte, North
Carolina, on the
same day.
“I went out there, I was starting to
get like tighter and tighter (steering)
and then (Josef) Newgarden passed me
and I got like super tight,” Larson said,
referring to last year’s first-time Indy
winner. “So I don’t know if that amount
of tight was real but I would assume
it’s probably more real than not having ASSOCIATED PRESS

another car out there.”
It didn’t take Larson long to show
what he’s already deciphered. He posted
the second-fastest lap in morning prac-
tice, 226.384 mph, albeit with a tow. Only
Newgarden, at 228.811, was quicker.
But Larson may be better suited
to successfully completing the Indy-
NASCAR double than today’s more
specialized drivers.
His busy schedule and willingness
to compete in so many formats rekindle
images of the days race fans watched A.J.
Foyt and Mario Andretti competing on
nearly any circuit.
Still, getting acclimated to the nu-
ances of the faster, lighter IndyCars is
a challenge.
» see LARSON | B15
Capitals defenseman John Carlson recently passed the 1,000-games milestone and still shoulders a heavy workload at age 34 a decade after playing in the Sochi Olympics.
BY STEPHEN WHYNO
ASSOCIATED PRESS
John Carlson has played more hockey
than anyone in the NHL this season
not named Drew Doughty, and that
volume has not gone unnoticed around
the league.
“He’s playing a lot of minutes,” De-
troit winger Patrick Kane said. “As time
goes on, you don’t get any younger, but
he seems to be keeping his endurance
and stamina up and obviously capability
for the team, as well.”
A decade since playing with Kane
for the U.S. at the Sochi Olympics, Carl-
son recently passed the 1,000-games
Capitals’ Carlson still going strong at
age 34 a decade after Sochi Olympics
milestone and is still shouldering a heavy
workload at age 34. While Washington’s
longtime No. 1 defenseman isn’t quite
sure how he has been able to log so many
minutes for so long — “I don’t know,
I think you just do it” — more than a
half-dozen of his teammates from the
2014 Games believe Carlson’s durability
and longevity are a credit to his smarts
and the ability to do everything on the
ice, from scoring and setting up goals to
preventing them by opponents while not
letting all the shifts take a toll.
“His brain is just elite at how he plays
the game offensively, defensively, so I
think he’s able to be super efficient,” said
winger James van Riemsdyk, now with
Boston. “His physical tools kind of speak
for themselves, but you don’t play that
long and that high of a level, especially
at this age, unless you have a really good
hockey sense.”
Carlson is averaging nearly 26 min-
utes of ice time a game for the Capitals,
who lean on him in all situations as
they’re trying to return to the playoffs.
Veteran Max Pacioretty, who got to
know Carlson in Sochi and is teammates
with him again, compared him to Hall of
Famer and seven-time Norris Trophy
winner Nicklas Lidstrom.
“He doesn’t expend useless energy,”
Pacioretty said. “He knows when to use
it, kind of when to be a little bit more
reserved, and I think that’s a skill that
so few people have.”
Retired defenseman Brooks Orpik
knows all about needing to pace oneself
throughout a long season, as Carlson
» see CAPITALS | B15

NATIONALS

Nationals’ bats stifled by Hicks as Giants avoid the sweep

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Nationals pitcher Patrick Corbin gave
up 11 hits and seven runs with two
strikeouts in 5⅔ inning of a 6-1 loss to
the Giants on Wednesday.
BY BEN ROSS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN FRANCISCO | Nick Ahmed and
Tyler Fitzgerald had three hits apiece
and Jordan Hicks allowed one run in
six innings as the San Francisco Giants
avoided a three-game series sweep with
a 7-1 win over the Washington Nationals
on Wednesday.
Hicks (2-0) has allowed one earned
run or less in each of his first three
starts this season after signing a $44
million, four-year contract with San
Francisco this offseason. The 27-year-old
right-hander allowed four hits and had
two strikeouts.
“I feel like I’m in a good spot,” Hicks
said. “Not trying to do too much. ...
Sinker was right where I want it to be.”
Giants manager Bob Melvin added:
“Really, really good starts. Every one
of them.”
Ahmed drove in two runs and scored
three times, while Fitzgerald stole two
bases and scored twice.
“He’s got the best speed on our team
and he needs to play too,” Melvin said of
Fitzgerald. “It’s good that he got a really
good game under his belt.”
Joey Gallo homered for Washington,
his third of the season.
San Francisco banged out 12 hits and
went 6 for 8 with runners in scoring posi-
tion after going 1 for 16 with runners in
scoring position in the first two games
of the series.
“It’s a huge relief,” Fitzgerald said.
“We know we’re better than what we’ve
been playing. It’s super early, but you
definitely want to win these games.”
The Giants also stole their first three
bases of the season while snapping a six-
game skid against Washington.
The Nationals stole two bases in the
loss, giving them a MLB-best 25 this
season.
Patrick Corbin (0-2) gave up 11 hits
and seven runs with two strikeouts in
52⁄3 innings.
“His line won’t look good, but I
thought he pitched better than what
his line says,” Nationals manager Dave
Martinez said. “So we’ll get him back
out there and get him going. When he
threw the ball down, it was effective.
When he throws the ball up, he gets hit
pretty hard.”
» see NATIONALS | B15