Donald Trump, Primary Elections, Santa Fe: Your Tuesday Briefing

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/22/briefing/donald-trump-primary-elections-santa-fe.html

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Good morning.

Here’s what you need to know:

• Hours after Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the U.S. was putting its trade war with China “on hold,” the U.S. trade representative, Robert Lighthizer, warned Beijing that the Trump administration might still impose tariffs.

That type of mixed message has weakened the U.S. position, several people involved in the talks said, even though President Trump promoted the negotiations as a success on Monday, saying that China would buy more American agricultural goods.

While the Trump administration has shifted from threats to conciliation, Beijing has stuck to a single strategy: Rebuff the offers and avoid specific pledges.

China announced today that it was carrying out a pledge to cut tariffs on imported cars and car parts.

• After rereading Mr. Trump’s book “The Art of the Deal,” our business columnist writes that the president’s negotiating playbook is on display: “Start with a headline-grabbing demand, beat chest loudly, then accept whatever is actually practical and call it a win.”

• Republican congressional leaders will be able to view some of the most highly classified information related to the Russia investigation under an agreement the White House brokered on Monday.

The deal comes as President Trump escalates his campaign against the Justice Department. Mr. Trump’s demand for an investigation into the F.B.I.’s scrutiny of his campaign “is the culmination of a lot of moments in which he has chipped away at prosecutorial independence, but this is a direct assault,” a professor at New York Law School said.

Our chief White House correspondent analyzed the White House’s two-pronged strategy for dealing with the special counsel’s investigation: Limit it and attack those who are conducting it.

• Separately, South Korea played down questions about whether the meeting between Mr. Trump and the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, would actually take place, calling it a “99.9 percent done deal.” The South’s president, Moon Jae-in, is in Washington today.

• They were once the most powerful brand in Democratic politics.

But ahead of midterm elections this fall, Hillary and Bill Clinton have been far less conspicuous than in past campaigns. She is distrusted on the left and faces raw hatred on the right, and he has largely been sidelined by new scrutiny of his treatment of women.

Mrs. Clinton plans to endorse Andrew Cuomo for governor of New York this week, but elsewhere on the campaign trail, she and her husband aren’t always welcome.

• The Clintons’ former political backyard, Arkansas, is one of three states holding primary elections today. Here’s what to watch for.

• Students in places like Parkland, Fla., who have spoken out against gun violence have been celebrated by many for their leadership. That’s less true in parts of the country with bedrock support for gun rights.

Our reporter visited a rural Kentucky town where two students were killed in a school shooting in January. He talked with teenagers who have called for more gun restrictions, as well as with people — including the students’ relatives — who disagree with them.

• The guns used in last week’s school shooting in Santa Fe, Tex., were bought legally by the suspect’s father, the police said. Texas is one of 14 states where parents can be liable for crimes committed with their firearms by children. Although the father appears to be immune from prosecution under that law, we looked at how it’s applied in Texas and elsewhere.

• The Supreme Court ruled that companies can use arbitration clauses in employment contracts to prohibit workers from banding together to take legal action over workplace issues. The decision could affect 25 million employment contracts.

• The Volcker Rule was one of the most powerful actions the federal government took to try to prevent a repeat of the financial crisis.

Now the law, which prohibits banks from making speculative but profitable wagers, could be softened as part of the White House’s deregulatory push.

• Barack and Michelle Obama will produce TV shows and films for Netflix.

• U.S. stocks were up on Monday. Here’s a snapshot of global markets today.

Tips, both new and old, for a more fulfilling life.

• Want to discover Tokyo? Here are six tips to do so on a budget.

• Our critic selected 20 great wines for under $20, ready for the summer.

• Recipe of the day: Into weeknight project cooking? Order delivery and make a delicious black bean soup.

• Welcoming a bringer of disaster

The Kilauea volcano in Hawaii has already laid waste to dozens of homes this month.

Yet some in the area welcome the eruption, expressing reverence for Pele, Hawaii’s goddess of volcanoes and fire, and thanking her — even when lava destroys their homes.

• In memoriam

Dovey Johnson Roundtree, an unsung lawyer, won advances for black people and women at the bar of justice, challenging the Jim Crow society she knew too well. She was 104.

Robert Indiana, a Pop artist, created the bold rendering of the word “love” that became one of the most recognizable artworks of the 20th century. He was 89.

• Lunchtime for lanternflies

The invasive insects, which turned up in Pennsylvania in 2014, eat everything in sight. Scientists worry that the U.S. is looking delicious.

Here’s more from this week’s Science section.

• Best of late-night TV

After hearing that groups of women in Britain are stuffing MDMA into Brie, Stephen Colbert had a pun-filled warning about drugs and cheese, including … “am-feta-mines.” (Geddit?!)

• Quotation of the day

“God made you this way and loves you this way, and the pope loves you this way.”

— Juan Carlos Cruz, a gay man and a survivor of sexual abuse, describing his conversation with Pope Francis.

• The Times, in other words

Here’s an image of today’s front page, and links to our Opinion content and crossword puzzles.

• What we’re reading

Alan Henry, a Smarter Living editor, recommends this piece in The Los Angeles Review of Books: “An entertaining history of why public transit stations, fast food restaurants and other public spaces play loud, pre-romantic Baroque classical music to dissuade loitering and other unwanted congregations — and why it’s so surprisingly effective (although personally, I love it!).”

Sherlock Holmes is “the most famous fictional character of the past two centuries, rivaled only by Dracula and James Bond,” a reviewer for The Times once argued.

Even so, the creator of the character, Arthur Conan Doyle, couldn’t wait to kill him off. Doyle was born in Edinburgh on this day in 1859.

Although Doyle wrote four novels and 56 short stories featuring the great detective and his companion Dr. John Watson, by 1893 he was bored of his creation.

In “The Final Problem,” Doyle sent his protagonist plunging over the Reichenbach Falls with his arch-nemesis, Prof. James Moriarty, seemingly to their deaths. (More than 20,000 outraged readers canceled their subscriptions to The Strand Magazine when the story was published.)

Doyle later said of Holmes, “I have had such an overdose of him that I feel towards him as I do towards pâté de foie gras, of which I once ate too much.”

Although he eventually resurrected Holmes, Doyle also had time for pursuits worthy of his eccentric sleuth: He helped popularize skiing, tried his hand (unsuccessfully) at politics and was knighted for his report on the Boer War.

He also had a deep interest in the supernatural and helped popularize a famous hoax of the early 20th century: a series of photographs of garden fairies.

Charles McDermid wrote today’s Back Story.

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