alarms pentagon to counter iran bolton s ......2019/01/14  · pulling out american troops. at mr....

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VOL. CLXVIII . . . No. 58,207 © 2019 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 2019 U(D54G1D)y+"!%!#!=!} PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. — After a painful midterm election for Florida Democrats that showed this crucial swing state drifting away from them, a group of party activists gathered at a Cu- ban restaurant last month to re- ceive some bitter medicine — and a sober warning — to go with their croquettes and plantain chips. Democrats started organizing Latino voters too late, didn’t tailor their message for an increasingly diverse community and ulti- mately took Latino support for granted, a Florida pollster told about 50 members of the Demo- cratic Hispanic Caucus of Brow- ard County. Democrats will lose again in 2020 if they don’t move swiftly to win over Hispanics, the pollster, Eduardo Gamarra, told the group. “You just need to start now.” With the swearing-in last Tues- day of two newly elected Republi- can leaders, Gov. Ron DeSantis and Senator Rick Scott, Florida has become a more reliably red political bastion, making the path to Electoral College victory that Democrats Seek a Hook as Florida Drifts Away By PATRICIA MAZZEI and JONATHAN MARTIN Continued on Page A10 KIANA HAYERI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Afghan children as young as 8 are in prison for plotting suicide attacks. Officials worry about what to do when they grow up. Page A6. ‘The Taliban Made Me Fight’ SAN JUAN, P.R. — Liz G. Ro- dríguez Quiñonez grew up schooled in being able to throw her body to the floor in the middle of the night, in the event that stray bullets from a nearby shootout came crashing through her win- dow. But it was only this past fall when Ms. Rodríguez, who oper- ates a food truck in a town just east of the Puerto Rican capital, experienced her first murder: Standing by the stove in her truck one morning in September, she heard a series of pops, then screaming, and realized that the man who was the intended target of the gunfire was standing right behind her truck. She ducked — thanks to the training from her youth — but there was no hope for the man, who died only a few feet away. It was not yet noon. “I saw the dead body. He was around 30 years old. It was horri- ble,” Ms. Rodríguez, 30, said with a shudder. Puerto Rico has long had one of the highest murder rates in the country, almost all of it attributa- ble to gang violence. But a recent string of brazen daylight killings, some of them captured on video and widely shared on social me- dia, have shaken the population and worried local and federal law enforcement officials who thought they had seen everything in the roiling, populous city of San Juan. On Jan. 6, several men engaged in a morning shootout on the serv- ice road of a major thoroughfare in Isla Verde, near the airport, leav- ing one man dead. On Wednesday San Juan Sun Is Now No Foil For Murderers By ALEJANDRA ROSA and FRANCES ROBLES Continued on Page A15 Lin-Manuel Miranda is bringing the show to Puerto Rico, and putting a spot- light on the territory’s needs. PAGE C1 ARTS C1-8 An Island Visit for ‘Hamilton’ Eight Democrats with backgrounds in science won House seats in November, campaigning on issues like offshore drilling and climate change. PAGE A9 NATIONAL A9-15 Bringing Science to Congress A new gathering of migrants forming in Honduras is giving President Trump ammunition in his standoff with Con- gress for a border wall. PAGE A8 INTERNATIONAL A4-8 New Caravan, Old Battle Lines New England scored on its first four possessions and reached the A.F.C. championship game with ease. PAGE D1 SPORTSMONDAY D1-6 Patriots Dominate Chargers At Rivendale Farms, outside Pitts- burgh, robots milk the cows and may soon start pulling weeds. PAGE B1 BUSINESS B1-5, 8 The High-Tech Small Farm Debates on race, gender and sports follow Serena Williams from the U.S. Open to Australia. PAGE D1 In Spotlight, on Court and Off PG&E, in a wildfire-linked financial crisis, also plans to tell employees that it faces a potential bankruptcy. PAGE B3 California Utility Chief Exits French fishermen suspect smugglers are breaking into their boats, seeking safer passage for migrants to get to Britain. France Dispatch. PAGE A4 Breaching the English Channel Israel’s prime minister acknowledged an attack on Iranian weapons ware- houses, confirming a campaign to curb Iran’s influence. PAGE A4 Israel Confirms Strike in Syria David Leonhardt PAGE A21 EDITORIAL, OP-ED A20-21 Calls for action have followed a film that explored abuse accusations against the R&B star, but hurdles remain. PAGE C1 In Pursuit of R. Kelly A Trump administration order was intended to force transparency, but the rollout is turning into a fiasco. PAGE A14 Decoding Hospital Price Lists After 15 years of renovations, a cen- turies-old church welcomes back its 40 or so remaining members. PAGE A17 NEW YORK A17-19 Relic of Old Brooklyn Reopens THREAT TO TURKEY President Trump warned of sanctions if the country attacks Kurds. PAGE A7 TOM BRENNER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Secret Service officers guarded the White House on Sunday as a winter storm arrived. Page A15. Snow Falls on a Shutdown NEWS ANALYSIS WASHINGTON — So it has come to this: The president of the United States was asked over the weekend whether he is a Russian agent. And he refused to directly answer. The question, which came from a friendly interviewer, not one of the “fake media” journal- ists he disparages, was “the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked,” he declared. But it is a question that has hung over his presidency now for two years. If the now 23-day government shutdown standoff between Mr. Trump and Congress has seemed ugly, it may eventually seem tame by comparison with what is to come. The border wall fight is just the preliminary skirmish in this new era of divided govern- ment. The real battle has yet to begin. With Democrats now in charge of the House, the special counsel believed to be wrapping up his investigation, news media outlets competing for scoops and the first articles of impeachment already filed, Mr. Trump faces the prospect of an all-out political war for survival that may make the still-unresolved partial gov- ernment shutdown pale by com- parison. The last few days have offered plenty of foreshadowing. The newly empowered Democrats summoned the president’s long- time personal lawyer to testify after he implicated Mr. Trump in an illegal scheme to arrange hush payments before the 2016 election for women who claimed to have had affairs with him. Legal papers disclosed that Mr. Trump’s onetime campaign chairman shared polling data with an associate tied by pros- ecutors to Russian intelligence. New reports over the weekend added to the sense of siege at the White House. The New York Times reported that after Mr. Trump fired the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, in 2017, the bureau opened an investigation into whether the president was working for the Russians. And The Washington Post reported that Mr. Trump has gone out of his way as president to hide the details of his discussions with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia even from members of his own administration. What all this adds up to re- mains unclear. Whether it will lead to a full-blown impeachment inquiry in the House has yet to be decided. But it underscores the chance that with candidates already lining up to take him on in 2020, Washington will spend the months to come debating the future of Mr. Trump’s presidency and the direction of the country. “The reality,” said Andy Sura- bian, a Republican strategist and former special assistant to Mr. Trump, is “that the next two years are going to be nonstop political war.” The White House has begun recruiting soldiers. The new White House counsel, Pat Cipol- Trump Faces ‘Nonstop’ War For Survival Political Fight for Wall May Be Just the Start By PETER BAKER Continued on Page A12 WASHINGTON — Not so long ago, left-wing activists were dis- missed as fringe or even kooky when they pressed for proposals to tax the superrich at 70 percent, to produce all of America’s power through renewable resources or to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Then along came Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — and her social- media megaphone. In the two months since her election, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has had the uncanny ability for a first- term member of Congress to push the debate inside the Democratic Party sharply to the left, forcing party leaders and 2020 presiden- tial candidates to grapple with is- sues that some might otherwise prefer to avoid. The potential Democratic field in 2020 is already being quizzed about her (Senator Kamala Harris praised her on “The View”), emu- lating her digital tactics (Senator Elizabeth Warren held an Insta- gram chat in her kitchen that looked much like one of Ms. Oca- sio-Cortez’s sessions) and em- bracing some of her causes. Ocasio-Cortez Helps Propel Her Party to the Left By SHANE GOLDMACHER Continued on Page A19 Late Edition WASHINGTON — Senior Pen- tagon officials are voicing deep- ening fears that President Trump’s hawkish national securi- ty adviser, John R. Bolton, could precipitate a conflict with Iran at a time when Mr. Trump is losing leverage in the Middle East by pulling out American troops. At Mr. Bolton’s direction, the National Security Council asked the Pentagon last year to provide the White House with military op- tions to strike Iran, Defense De- partment and senior American of- ficials said on Sunday. The request, which alarmed then-Defense Secretary Jim Mat- tis and other Pentagon officials, came after Iranian-backed mili- tants fired three mortars or rock- ets into an empty lot on the grounds of the United States Em- bassy in Baghdad in September. In response to Mr. Bolton’s re- quest, which The Wall Street Jour- nal first reported, the Pentagon of- fered general options, including a cross-border airstrike on an Irani- an military facility that would have been mostly symbolic. But Mr. Mattis and other military lead- ers adamantly opposed retaliat- ing, arguing that the attack was insignificant — a position that ulti- mately won out, these officials said. Such a strike could have caused an armed conflict and could have prompted Iraq to order the United States to leave the country, said a senior American official, who spoke on the condition of ano- nymity to discuss internal policy deliberations. Since Mr. Bolton took over from H.R. McMaster in April, he has in- tensified the administration’s pol- icy of isolating and pressuring Iran reflecting an animus against Iran’s leaders that dates back to his days as an official in the George W. Bush administra- Continued on Page A11 BOLTON’S REQUEST TO COUNTER IRAN ALARMS PENTAGON STRIKE OPTIONS SOUGHT Fears That a Hawk Will Precipitate a Conflict in the Middle East By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK LANDLER John R. Bolton asked for mili- tary options last year. ANDREW HARNIK/ASSOCIATED PRESS lawful. Nearly three decades later, President Trump has nominated Mr. Barr to return as attorney general. But unlike the self-re- strained Mr. Bush, Mr. Trump rev- els in pushing limits — a tempera- ment that, when combined with Mr. Barr’s unusually permissive understanding of presidential power, could play out very differ- ently for the rule of law than it did last time. “There are concerns about his independence, given his long- standing and expansive views of executive power,” said Senator Di- anne Feinstein of California, the ranking Democrat on the Judicia- WASHINGTON — The meet- ing of President George Bush’s cabinet on Jan. 8, 1991, was even more high-stakes than usual. Iraq had invaded Kuwait. Half a million American troops were deployed and ready to attack. But many lawmakers were demanding a vote before any war. Rejecting mainstream constitu- tional views, William P. Barr, the deputy attorney general, told Mr. Bush that he wielded unfettered power to start a major land war on his own — not only without con- gressional permission, but even if Congress voted against it. “Mr. President, there’s no doubt that you have the authority to launch an attack,” Mr. Barr said, as he later recalled. Ultimately, Mr. Bush was cau- tious about invoking that maxi- malist theory of executive power and asked lawmakers for support anyway — a prudent step that Mr. Barr, whom Mr. Bush soon elevat- ed to attorney general, also rec- ommended. Congress’s vote en- sured the Persian Gulf war was Continued on Page A11 Barr Could Embolden a Limit-Pushing President By CHARLIE SAVAGE Attorney General Pick Has Expansive View of Executive Power Today, mostly sunny, another cold day, high 35. Tonight, clear, season- ably cold, low 26. Tomorrow, mostly sunny, not as cold in the afternoon, high 39. Weather map, Page A16. $3.00

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Page 1: ALARMS PENTAGON TO COUNTER IRAN BOLTON S ......2019/01/14  · pulling out American troops. At Mr. Bolton s direction, the National Security Council asked the Pentagon last year to

VOL. CLXVIII . . . No. 58,207 © 2019 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 2019

C M Y K Nxxx,2019-01-14,A,001,Bs-4C,E2

U(D54G1D)y+"!%!#!=!}

PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. —After a painful midterm electionfor Florida Democrats thatshowed this crucial swing statedrifting away from them, a groupof party activists gathered at a Cu-ban restaurant last month to re-ceive some bitter medicine — and

a sober warning — to go with theircroquettes and plantain chips.

Democrats started organizingLatino voters too late, didn’t tailortheir message for an increasinglydiverse community and ulti-mately took Latino support forgranted, a Florida pollster toldabout 50 members of the Demo-cratic Hispanic Caucus of Brow-ard County.

Democrats will lose again in

2020 if they don’t move swiftly towin over Hispanics, the pollster,Eduardo Gamarra, told the group.“You just need to start now.”

With the swearing-in last Tues-day of two newly elected Republi-can leaders, Gov. Ron DeSantisand Senator Rick Scott, Floridahas become a more reliably redpolitical bastion, making the pathto Electoral College victory that

Democrats Seek a Hook as Florida Drifts Away

By PATRICIA MAZZEIand JONATHAN MARTIN

Continued on Page A10

KIANA HAYERI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Afghan children as young as 8 are in prison for plotting suicide attacks. Officials worry about what to do when they grow up. Page A6.‘The Taliban Made Me Fight’

SAN JUAN, P.R. — Liz G. Ro-dríguez Quiñonez grew upschooled in being able to throwher body to the floor in the middleof the night, in the event that straybullets from a nearby shootoutcame crashing through her win-dow.

But it was only this past fallwhen Ms. Rodríguez, who oper-ates a food truck in a town justeast of the Puerto Rican capital,experienced her first murder:Standing by the stove in her truckone morning in September, sheheard a series of pops, thenscreaming, and realized that theman who was the intended targetof the gunfire was standing rightbehind her truck. She ducked —thanks to the training from heryouth — but there was no hope forthe man, who died only a few feetaway.

It was not yet noon.“I saw the dead body. He was

around 30 years old. It was horri-ble,” Ms. Rodríguez, 30, said with ashudder.

Puerto Rico has long had one ofthe highest murder rates in thecountry, almost all of it attributa-ble to gang violence. But a recentstring of brazen daylight killings,some of them captured on videoand widely shared on social me-dia, have shaken the populationand worried local and federal lawenforcement officials who thoughtthey had seen everything in theroiling, populous city of San Juan.

On Jan. 6, several men engagedin a morning shootout on the serv-ice road of a major thoroughfare inIsla Verde, near the airport, leav-ing one man dead. On Wednesday

San Juan SunIs Now No FoilFor Murderers

By ALEJANDRA ROSAand FRANCES ROBLES

Continued on Page A15

Lin-Manuel Miranda is bringing theshow to Puerto Rico, and putting a spot-light on the territory’s needs. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-8

An Island Visit for ‘Hamilton’Eight Democrats with backgrounds inscience won House seats in November,campaigning on issues like offshoredrilling and climate change. PAGE A9

NATIONAL A9-15

Bringing Science to CongressA new gathering of migrants forming inHonduras is giving President Trumpammunition in his standoff with Con-gress for a border wall. PAGE A8

INTERNATIONAL A4-8

New Caravan, Old Battle Lines

New England scored on its first fourpossessions and reached the A.F.C.championship game with ease. PAGE D1

SPORTSMONDAY D1-6

Patriots Dominate ChargersAt Rivendale Farms, outside Pitts-burgh, robots milk the cows and maysoon start pulling weeds. PAGE B1

BUSINESS B1-5, 8

The High-Tech Small Farm

Debates on race, gender and sportsfollow Serena Williams from the U.S.Open to Australia. PAGE D1

In Spotlight, on Court and OffPG&E, in a wildfire-linked financialcrisis, also plans to tell employees thatit faces a potential bankruptcy. PAGE B3

California Utility Chief Exits

French fishermen suspect smugglersare breaking into their boats, seekingsafer passage for migrants to get toBritain. France Dispatch. PAGE A4

Breaching the English Channel

Israel’s prime minister acknowledgedan attack on Iranian weapons ware-houses, confirming a campaign to curbIran’s influence. PAGE A4

Israel Confirms Strike in Syria David Leonhardt PAGE A21

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A20-21

Calls for action have followed a film thatexplored abuse accusations against theR&B star, but hurdles remain. PAGE C1

In Pursuit of R. Kelly

A Trump administration order wasintended to force transparency, but therollout is turning into a fiasco. PAGE A14

Decoding Hospital Price Lists

After 15 years of renovations, a cen-turies-old church welcomes back its 40or so remaining members. PAGE A17

NEW YORK A17-19

Relic of Old Brooklyn Reopens

THREAT TO TURKEY PresidentTrump warned of sanctions if thecountry attacks Kurds. PAGE A7

TOM BRENNER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Secret Service officers guarded the White House on Sunday as a winter storm arrived. Page A15.Snow Falls on a Shutdown

NEWS ANALYSIS

WASHINGTON — So it hascome to this: The president ofthe United States was asked overthe weekend whether he is aRussian agent. And he refused todirectly answer.

The question, which camefrom a friendly interviewer, notone of the “fake media” journal-ists he disparages, was “the mostinsulting thing I’ve ever beenasked,” he declared. But it is aquestion that has hung over hispresidency now for two years.

If the now 23-day governmentshutdown standoff between Mr.Trump and Congress has seemedugly, it may eventually seemtame by comparison with what isto come. The border wall fight isjust the preliminary skirmish inthis new era of divided govern-ment. The real battle has yet tobegin.

With Democrats now in chargeof the House, the special counselbelieved to be wrapping up hisinvestigation, news media outletscompeting for scoops and thefirst articles of impeachmentalready filed, Mr. Trump facesthe prospect of an all-out politicalwar for survival that may makethe still-unresolved partial gov-ernment shutdown pale by com-parison.

The last few days have offeredplenty of foreshadowing. Thenewly empowered Democratssummoned the president’s long-time personal lawyer to testifyafter he implicated Mr. Trump inan illegal scheme to arrangehush payments before the 2016election for women who claimedto have had affairs with him.Legal papers disclosed that Mr.Trump’s onetime campaignchairman shared polling datawith an associate tied by pros-ecutors to Russian intelligence.

New reports over the weekendadded to the sense of siege at theWhite House. The New YorkTimes reported that after Mr.Trump fired the F.B.I. director,James B. Comey, in 2017, thebureau opened an investigationinto whether the president wasworking for the Russians. AndThe Washington Post reportedthat Mr. Trump has gone out ofhis way as president to hide thedetails of his discussions withPresident Vladimir V. Putin ofRussia even from members of hisown administration.

What all this adds up to re-mains unclear. Whether it willlead to a full-blown impeachmentinquiry in the House has yet tobe decided. But it underscoresthe chance that with candidatesalready lining up to take him onin 2020, Washington will spendthe months to come debating thefuture of Mr. Trump’s presidencyand the direction of the country.

“The reality,” said Andy Sura-bian, a Republican strategist andformer special assistant to Mr.Trump, is “that the next twoyears are going to be nonstoppolitical war.”

The White House has begunrecruiting soldiers. The newWhite House counsel, Pat Cipol-

Trump Faces‘Nonstop’ War

For SurvivalPolitical Fight for WallMay Be Just the Start

By PETER BAKER

Continued on Page A12

WASHINGTON — Not so longago, left-wing activists were dis-missed as fringe or even kookywhen they pressed for proposalsto tax the superrich at 70 percent,to produce all of America’s powerthrough renewable resources orto abolish Immigration andCustoms Enforcement.

Then along came AlexandriaOcasio-Cortez — and her social-media megaphone.

In the two months since herelection, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez hashad the uncanny ability for a first-term member of Congress to pushthe debate inside the DemocraticParty sharply to the left, forcingparty leaders and 2020 presiden-tial candidates to grapple with is-sues that some might otherwise

prefer to avoid.The potential Democratic field

in 2020 is already being quizzedabout her (Senator Kamala Harrispraised her on “The View”), emu-lating her digital tactics (SenatorElizabeth Warren held an Insta-gram chat in her kitchen thatlooked much like one of Ms. Oca-sio-Cortez’s sessions) and em-bracing some of her causes.

Ocasio-Cortez Helps Propel Her Party to the Left

By SHANE GOLDMACHER

Continued on Page A19

Late Edition

WASHINGTON — Senior Pen-tagon officials are voicing deep-ening fears that PresidentTrump’s hawkish national securi-ty adviser, John R. Bolton, couldprecipitate a conflict with Iran at atime when Mr. Trump is losingleverage in the Middle East bypulling out American troops.

At Mr. Bolton’s direction, theNational Security Council askedthe Pentagon last year to providethe White House with military op-tions to strike Iran, Defense De-partment and senior American of-ficials said on Sunday.

The request, which alarmedthen-Defense Secretary Jim Mat-tis and other Pentagon officials,came after Iranian-backed mili-tants fired three mortars or rock-ets into an empty lot on thegrounds of the United States Em-bassy in Baghdad in September.

In response to Mr. Bolton’s re-

quest, which The Wall Street Jour-nal first reported, the Pentagon of-fered general options, including across-border airstrike on an Irani-an military facility that wouldhave been mostly symbolic. ButMr. Mattis and other military lead-ers adamantly opposed retaliat-ing, arguing that the attack wasinsignificant — a position that ulti-mately won out, these officialssaid.

Such a strike could have causedan armed conflict and could haveprompted Iraq to order the UnitedStates to leave the country, said asenior American official, whospoke on the condition of ano-nymity to discuss internal policydeliberations.

Since Mr. Bolton took over fromH.R. McMaster in April, he has in-tensified the administration’s pol-icy of isolating and pressuringIran — reflecting an animusagainst Iran’s leaders that datesback to his days as an official inthe George W. Bush administra-

Continued on Page A11

BOLTON’S REQUESTTO COUNTER IRANALARMS PENTAGON

STRIKE OPTIONS SOUGHT

Fears That a Hawk WillPrecipitate a Conflict

in the Middle East

By ERIC SCHMITTand MARK LANDLER

John R. Bolton asked for mili-tary options last year.

ANDREW HARNIK/ASSOCIATED PRESS

lawful.Nearly three decades later,

President Trump has nominatedMr. Barr to return as attorneygeneral. But unlike the self-re-strained Mr. Bush, Mr. Trump rev-els in pushing limits — a tempera-ment that, when combined withMr. Barr’s unusually permissiveunderstanding of presidentialpower, could play out very differ-ently for the rule of law than it didlast time.

“There are concerns about hisindependence, given his long-standing and expansive views ofexecutive power,” said Senator Di-anne Feinstein of California, theranking Democrat on the Judicia-

WASHINGTON — The meet-ing of President George Bush’scabinet on Jan. 8, 1991, was evenmore high-stakes than usual. Iraqhad invaded Kuwait. Half a millionAmerican troops were deployedand ready to attack. But manylawmakers were demanding avote before any war.

Rejecting mainstream constitu-tional views, William P. Barr, thedeputy attorney general, told Mr.Bush that he wielded unfetteredpower to start a major land war onhis own — not only without con-gressional permission, but even ifCongress voted against it.

“Mr. President, there’s no doubt

that you have the authority tolaunch an attack,” Mr. Barr said,as he later recalled.

Ultimately, Mr. Bush was cau-tious about invoking that maxi-malist theory of executive powerand asked lawmakers for supportanyway — a prudent step that Mr.Barr, whom Mr. Bush soon elevat-ed to attorney general, also rec-ommended. Congress’s vote en-sured the Persian Gulf war was Continued on Page A11

Barr Could Embolden a Limit-Pushing PresidentBy CHARLIE SAVAGE Attorney General Pick

Has Expansive Viewof Executive Power

Today, mostly sunny, another coldday, high 35. Tonight, clear, season-ably cold, low 26. Tomorrow, mostlysunny, not as cold in the afternoon,high 39. Weather map, Page A16.

$3.00