The Finance 202: Farmers stick with Trump despite shutdown and trade war. For now.

at the White House during which he lashed out at critics large and small on Twitter and faced deeper scrutiny of his relationship with Russian leaders.” Poll: Trump's losing. TSA staff spread thin “Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport said it didn’t have enough TSA staff to work all checkpoints and said its Terminal B screening point would remain closed Monday after shutting down Sunday. Meanwhile Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the world’s busiest airport by passenger traffic, reported delays of more than an hour at checkpoints early Monday... The TSA’s unplanned absence rate hovered at around 5% the week leading up to Friday, when the agency’s workers missed their first paycheck. On Monday, the rate was 7.6%, up from 3.2% on the same day a year ago.” — Senate GOP struggles with Russian sanctions vote. CNN's Donna Borak, Ted Barrett and Jeremy Herb: “Senate Republican leaders are facing serious concerns from rank-and-file members about a Democratic bill that would reverse the Trump administration’s plan to ease sanctions on three companies with ties to Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, a close Kremlin ally. A key vote on the measure, which Minority Leader Chuck Schumer can force under the 2017 Russia sanctions law, is expected at some point Tuesday, and will give Democrats another chance to blast Republicans over [Trump’s] relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin… “The growing concerns about potential Republican defections come amid a new wave of questions about Trump’s relationship with Putin in the wake of a bombshell New York Times report that the FBI in 2017 decided to investigate why Trump took actions that seemed to benefit Russia.” — Stocks fall for just the third time in January For investors, cash is king. Don't fear a recession, Morgan Stanley says. “To play these next moves, Wilson and the strategists warn investors that the S&P should hit resistance and they should lighten up if it gets to 2,600 to 2,650. But once the market responds to the worsening earnings picture and returns to recent lows in the 2,400 area, investors should jump back in and buy cyclical names.” — Yellen warns of a slowdown. More Yellen: Fed may be done hiking — May's Brexit deal faces certain defeat. Bloomberg's Thomas Penny and Robert Hutton: “Prime Minister Theresa May is set to see her Brexit deal rejected in the biggest Parliamentary defeat for a British government in 95 years after her last


No wonder there’s a shutdown: New poll shows how much Republicans and Democrats really disagree on immigration

This past weekend, the partial shutdown affecting a quarter of the federal government became the longest on record. Most Americans do not support the shutdown: In a recent NPR-Ipsos poll, 71 percent said Congress should pass a bill to reopen the government while budget talks continue. And more Americans blame President Trump: In a new Washington Post poll, 53 percent said Trump and congressional Republicans were responsible for the shutdown, while only 29 percent blamed congressional Democrats. Yet Trump appears unwilling to change course. Last week, he walked out of a negotiating session with congressional Democrats when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told him that they would not fund a border wall. Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) won’t consider House-approved bills that would reopen the government because Trump won’t support them. Why is there such difficulty finding a path forward? The roots of the shutdown can be traced to the fraught issue of immigration. A new GW Politics Poll shows just how hard it will be to reopen the government if that depends on a bipartisan immigration compromise. 1. Republicans identified immigration as the most important issue for Congress this year. The GW Politics Poll interviewed 1,920 registered voters in December, before the shutdown, about what issues should be priorities for Congress this year. For Republicans, immigration was the top issue: Eighty percent said “dealing with the issue of immigration” should be a priority for Congress this year. Immigration was followed closely by “defending the country from future terrorist attacks” (79 percent said it was a priority) — an issue the Trump administration has misleadingly tried to link to border security — and by “strengthening the nation’s economy” (78 percent said it was a priority). By contrast, only 41 percent of Democrats said immigration was a priority. Thus, it’s clear that a president who prioritizes support from the GOP base has an incentive to focus on immigration. 2. Republicans are deeply concerned about immigrants entering the country. During the 2018 campaign, Trump focused on a caravan of Central American migrants headed to the U.S. border to seek asylum. The GW Politics Poll asked respondents how concerned they were that some of these migrants might gain entry to the United States. There was a remarkable partisan divide on this question: Sixty percent of Republicans were very concerned, and 21 percent were somewhat concerned. But only 19 percent of Democrats


Belarusan model who touted evidence of Trump-Russia ties pleads guilty in Thailand

MOSCOW — A model whose alleged affair with a Russian oligarch made her an unexpected player in probes into Moscow’s influence, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Thailand to charges linked to a “sex training” seminar, setting the stage for her deportation. The model and self-described sex expert from Belarus, Anastasia Vashukevich, claimed that she recorded meetings between Russian metals magnate Oleg Deripaska and unspecified Americans in 2016 to discuss Russian interference in the U.S. election. Vashukevich posted video of Deripaska meeting with a senior Russian official on a yacht, but Deripaska has denied wrongdoing, and no evidence has emerged that she possessed any new details about the election. On Tuesday, Vashukevich and seven Russians pleaded guilty to conspiracy and soliciting prostitution, clearing the way for them to be released after nine months in a Thai jail. Vashukevich’s claims about recording Deripaska were notable because the oligarch has ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and used to work with President Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort. Manafort has pleaded guilty in the United States to crimes stemming from his work as a political consultant in Ukraine before joining Trump’s campaign. Soon after Vashukevich’s apparent connection to Deripaska came to light early last year, she and several Russians were arrested while conducting what she described as a sex training seminar for Russian tourists in the Thai resort town of Pattaya. In jail, she pleaded for U.S. help, saying she had information on ties between Russia and Trump. On Instagram, she claimed that she was “the only witness and the missing link in the connection between Russia and the U.S. elections.” But none of the alleged recordings were ever made public. Vashukevich had long promoted herself as an expert on sex and the art of seduction, and she wrote a book on her alleged liaison with Deripaska titled “A Diary About Seducing a Billionaire.” Deripaska has said that Vashukevich was making up stories, and he won a court case against her in which he argued that Vashukevich was violating his privacy. On Tuesday, a lawyer for one of the seven people arrested alongside Vashukevich said that all eight of them pleaded guilty, prompting the Thai court to suspend their sentences and order their release. Their prison terms were waived in view of time served. They were then returned to a prison in Pattaya, a beach city south of Bangkok, where their shackles were removed,


Affected by the shutdown? Give your bank a call to see if it can help.

Financial institutions are treating the partial government shutdown like a natural disaster, providing affected customers with everything from no-interest loans to fee waivers. Some institutions are even proactively reaching out to customers they believe are feeling a financial pinch from the shutdown. Bank of America said it has emailed every customer — close to 260,000 — who receives federal payroll funds direct-deposited in their account. The bank is encouraging people to call its “Client Assistance Program” at 844-219-0690. For personalized assistance, the bank suggests that customers schedule an appointment to meet with a specialist at a local branch. But what if your bank isn’t contacting you directly? Then you make the call — something people often don’t do until things are pretty bad. In my experience, many folks tell themselves there’s no point in contacting their lenders when they’re in financial trouble. They reason that they won’t get meaningful assistance, so why bother? However, these are extraordinary times, much like when a hurricane hits. Call anyway, because staying silent will for sure not get you the help you need. In fact, there is even pressure on financial institutions to help those who are suffering from this shutdown mess through no fault of their own. Federal and state regulators — including the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the National Credit Union Administration — issued a joint statement encouraging the institutions they oversee to work with consumers impacted by the federal shutdown. “Affected borrowers may face a temporary hardship in making payments on debts such as mortgages, student loans, car loans, business loans or credit cards,” the statement said. “As they have in prior shutdowns, the agencies encourage financial institutions to consider prudent efforts to modify terms on existing loans or extend new credit to help affected borrowers.” Chase is telling customers whose income has been bottlenecked by the shutdown to call to discuss its hardship programs. Chase has a special-care line at 1-888-356-0023. “We are proactively waiving overdraft fees and monthly account fees for our deposit accounts (checking, savings) where we know you’re a federal government worker,” Trish Wexler, Chase’s chief communications officer, said in an email. “We started doing this in mid-December, right after the shutdown began. The way we’re determining who’s a federal worker is to look for direct deposits into the account (as of November 2018) from a federal government paycheck.” Wexler said impacted customers who have a


The real shutdown ‘charade’

bills would rightly and effectively reopen parts of government being held hostage by the president’s insistence on getting funding for an explicit number of miles of his “beautiful,” campaign-slogan, 30-foot wall , instead of agreeing to funding to fix border security by a variety of means. The charades occurring are not being perpetrated by House Democrats. They are occurring in Mr. McConnell’s Senate, which has decided to no longer fulfill its duties as half of one of our three independent branches of government but to instead remain idle and silent until the executive branch tells it exactly what to do, and still more so by the president himself. President Trump masquerades as a master negotiator who stands his ground. Instead, he seems a puppet of ultra-conservative talk-show hosts and a single-minded, slogan-focused base who pull his strings and get him to change his position so often that poor Pinocchio, and his ever-lengthening nose, has become hopelessly tangled in his puppeteers’ strings. Bill Hafker Regarding the Jan. 11 Allowing national parks to limp along unfunded and unmanaged is a basic failure to uphold the core American value of preserving and protecting these iconic landscapes. One needs only to witness the recent wreckage at Joshua Tree National Park to understand the significance of this failure. I should know; I’ve spent years working to keep Joshua Tree National Park’s desert park safe, wild and beautiful. It’s no mere coincidence that the Trump administration, which diced our national monuments into bite-size pieces for the fossil-fuel industry, created conditions that allowed vandals to chop down Joshua trees to make room for four-wheelers. This travesty is part of a long series of anti-public-lands decisions by President Trump’s Interior Department. When our government doesn’t act to protect our beloved public lands, we start to lose them. Using fee funds to reopen parks is not a long-term, sustainable solution. Until this shutdown ends, acting interior secretary David Bernhardt must protect all national parks by temporarily closing them. Then, he must make amends. That means halting all plans to reduce the size of our national monuments and supporting permanent reauthorization of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. If Mr. Bernhardt doesn’t protect our parks and public lands, he is unfit for office. Mark Butler The writer, superintendent of Joshua Tree National Park from 2011 to 2014, is an executive council member of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks.


Trump administration recalls tens of thousands of federal workers as it seeks to blunt shutdown’s impact

The Trump administration on Tuesday said it is calling back tens of thousands of federal workers to fulfill key government tasks, including disbursing tax refunds, overseeing flight safety and inspecting the nation’s food and drug supply, as it seeks to blunt the impact of the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. The nearly 50,000 furloughed federal employees are being sent back to work without pay - part of a group of about 800,000 federal workers who aren’t receiving paychecks during the shutdown, which affects dozens of federal agencies large and small. A federal judge on Tuesday rejected a bid by unions representing air traffic controllers and other federal workers to force the government to pay them if they are required to work. The efforts by the Trump administration to keep the government operating during the partial shutdown came as the White House and Congress made no progress toward resolving their underlying dispute. President Trump had extended an unusual invitation to rank-and-file House Democrats in an attempt to woo them and cause a divide within the Democratic camp over the shutdown, but they quickly rebuffed the outreach as Democratic leaders voiced concerns the meeting would be little more than a photo opportunity that bolsters Trump. With Democrats in the House pushing forward on bills to reopen the government, Trump trying a new strategy virtually everyday to win funding for his proposed border wall, and usual deal-makers like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) largely sitting out the battle, there appeared no path toward opening the government as the partial shutdown entered its 25th day. The differing developments left a discordant image of Washington. As political leaders were paralyzed, the federal government itself was looking for ways to show flexibility in determining who can and can’t work. Tens of thousands of Internal Revenue Service workers will come back to work for tax filing season later this month under the agency’s new emergency plan for the government shutdown released Tuesday, but the agency will remain unable to conduct audits or other key functions. The IRS’s new plan for the shutdown calls for keeping 46,000 IRS employees on the job during filing season, meaning that close to 60 percent of the agency’s workforce will be working despite the lapse in the agency’s funding. At the start of the government shutdown in late December, fewer than 10,000 IRS workers — about 12 percent of its


Brexit has achieved the opposite of its goal

Andy Burnham is MANCHESTER, England — Right now, politics in the United States and the United Kingdom couldn’t be more in sync. Faced with a crisis, both countries are locked in political paralysis. Populist, right-wing movements that fed off disillusionment with Washington and Westminster have made both places even more dysfunctional than they were before. In the United Kingdom, supporters of Brexit promoted it as a statement of their country’s strength and independence. But it has achieved the opposite. It has weakened the bonds between our four “home” nations —England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland — and raised again the prospect of the break-up of the United Kingdom. On Tuesday, British Prime Minister Theresa May’s deeply flawed Brexit deal was voted down in Parliament 432 to 202. After such a crushing defeat, we cannot let May continue rowing us blindfolded to God knows where. Starting tonight, she and the rest of the country need a change of course. I had a ringside seat when things started to go wrong. At the time of the Brexit referendum in 2016, I was the shadow home secretary, May’s opposite number in the House of Commons. Days after the British people voted to leave the European Union, I brought a motion calling on May, who was then home secretary, to give immediate status to all E.U. nationals living in the United Kingdom on the basis that they had been invited in by us, had made our country their home and were contributing to our economy and public services. It would be a big gesture that would set a constructive tone for the difficult discussions that lay ahead with the other 27 E.U. member states. Members of Parliament on all sides backed this motion. Even Boris Johnson, who led the Brexit campaign as London mayor, stood up to offer his support. But May, with her eyes on the prize of the leadership of the Conservative Party, instructed her members of Parliament not to support it and started ramping up anti-E.U. rhetoric. In retrospect, this hardline approach was a major strategic mistake. It played right into the E.U.’s goal of making an example of the United Kingdom. This is how we ended up with the flawed deal that Parliament just rejected. The E.U.’s insistence on making the United Kingdom agree to a detailed divorce settlement while offering only vague promises about the future was never going


Pompeo said the U.S. will hold Khashoggi’s killers accountable. Is he serious about it?

he delivered it to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who the CIA has concluded was the author of the Khashoggi murder. How is it possible for the crown prince to hold himself responsible? To suppose that he will is ludicrous. Yet Mr. Pompeo continues to describe the “investigative process and the judicial process” the Saudis claim to have undertaken as fully credible. “Their continued commitment to continue to pursue all those connected is something that they have not wavered from,” Mr. Pompeo assured reporters. Even setting aside the culpability of the crown prince, that’s an extraordinary assertion given what we know about the Saudi “process.” The regime has claimed that 21 people have been connected to the murder, but only 11 have been charged in court. Those excused appear to include two close aides to Mohammed bin Salman: Saud al-Qahtani, who has been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for his role in the affair, and Ahmed al-Assiri, the former deputy chief of intelligence. The Post’s David Ignatius reported last week that Mohammed bin Salman remains in contact with Mr. Qahtani and is pressing ahead with a campaign to silence dissent. According to the family of Loujain al-Hathloul, one of the detained female activists, Mr. Qahtani was present last summer when she was subjected to torture that included waterboarding and electric shocks, and he personally threatened to rape and kill her. Meanwhile, news accounts from Turkey say that Salah Muhammed al-Tubaigy, a forensic specialist who reportedly dismembered Mr. Khashoggi’s body with a bone saw, is living quietly with his family in a villa in Jiddah. Mr. Pompeo no doubt is aware of all this. Yet when he was asked whether he felt assured that the Saudis were going to get to the bottom of the Khashoggi case, he responded: “They are still working through their fact-finding process.” The Trump administration, he added, was doing the same. In reality, what the administration appears to be doing is what it has done all along: help the Saudi regime protect Mohammed bin Salman and others responsible for the murder from serious consequences — particularly from Congress. The new House Democratic leadership should not allow that to happen. The Senate passed a resolution last year holding Mohammed bin Salman responsible for the Khashoggi murder; House Democrats should now work to assure that he and all other senior officials involved face consequences, including U.S. sanctions.


Turns out Republicans don’t care about the dignity of a paycheck after all

that back pay may arrive weeks after mortgage payments and other bills come due. And not only because many have had to turn to the “handouts” — free meals, trips to food pantries, unemployment insurance — that the GOP has spent decades stigmatizing. But also because they truly do find meaning, pride and feelings of self-worth through their jobs — i.e., all those psychic benefits of employment that Republicans usually talk about. Consider the legions of federal employees who safeguard the natural world through their work at the Environment Protection Agency or the National Park Service; who help businesses make informed decisions through data they collect for the Census Bureau; who inspect food for the Food and Drug Administration to prevent outbreaks of salmonella, E. coli or listeria. These public servants took such positions not just for the paycheck. They took them because they find meaning in the work that they’re currently barred from doing. Being told to stay home — or even to report to work, but indefinitely forgo compensation for their labor — is not just financially painful. It’s demoralizing. And finally, there are the federal contract workers who have also been laid off during the shutdown. Historically, these workers have gotten zero back pay after the government reopens, in part because getting them made whole is complicated. Unlike those on federal payrolls, the government doesn’t necessarily know who all of these contract workers are, making it challenging to cut them a check directly. It’s also not clear how to get private contractors to reimburse such workers for the lost time without amending thousands of existing contracts. A group of Democratic senators including Tina Smith (Minn.) and Chris Van Hollen (Md.) is developing legislation that aims to address this problem. In the meantime, these workers are not on “vacation.” Many — such as Larry Howard, a furloughed National Zoo guest-services contract worker who makes $13.50 an hour — live paycheck to paycheck. About a third of the estimated 1 million contract employees at unfunded agencies make under $15 per hour, according to the labor organization Good Jobs Nation. These workers, like their counterparts on federal payrolls, would like to show up for their jobs and get paid. They’d like elected officials to see the dignity in their work, too. Or at least, said Howard: “I’d like them to treat us as well as they treat the pandas.” crampell@washpost.com


Cold weather to descend on Kansas City just in time for Chiefs-Patriots

victory. Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes obviously does not have as much experience as Brady, this being his second NFL season and first as a starter. The coldest game he started this season was a 23-20 overtime win over the Ravens in Kansas City on Dec. 9, when the temperature was 27 degrees (he completed 35 of 53 passes for 377 yards, with two touchdowns and an interception). His coldest college game at Texas Tech was a 38-degree contest at Iowa State in November 2016 (he completed just 18 of 36 passes for 219 yards, with a touchdown and two interceptions). Wind has more of an effect on scoring than temperature, and Sunday’s forecast calls for the barest of breezes. As noted by John Ewing of the Action Network, the over has gone 114-80-2 (58.8 percent) in NFL games played in temperatures lower than 30 degrees since 2003. In the playoffs since 1985, the over in such games has gone 14-8-1 (63.6 percent). But in the last 23 regular season and playoff games played in extreme cold — less than 10 degrees at kickoff — the under has gone 16-6-1 (78.6 percent), according to Pro Football Reference (11 of the last 14 super-cold games have gone under). The total for Sunday’s game sits at 55.5 as of this writing on Tuesday morning. Should the Chiefs win and advance to their first Super Bowl in 49 years, they will get an astronomical salute in the form of a total lunar eclipse that’s set to begin in full at 10:41 local time, or about 90 minutes after the end of the game (assuming no overtime). Such eclipses — which occur when the Earth lines up between the sun and the moon — also are known as the “blood moon,” because of the reddish cast the moon takes on. Then again, the Chiefs very well could lose. If so, that red moon in the sky likely will be the last thing anyone in Kansas City wants to see. Read more: 6 things that could decide NFL’s conference title games, including Tom Brady’s road struggles The biggest takeaways from the Patriots’ 41-28 win over Chargers Sarah Thomas makes more NFL history as first female on-field official in playoff game Tom Brady seems to think that ‘everyone thinks we suck’ To Alshon Jeffery, Eagles’ loss to Saints is ‘on me.’ To some Bears fans, it’s ‘karma.’


The Technology 202: Venture capitalists balk at proposed export limits on AI, quantum computing

said in a statement. The comments highlight a broader issue that’s fueling tension between Silicon Valley and the Trump administration. The same technology behind products we use everyday is increasingly of national security interest. AI is powering applications ranging from Netflix recommendations, to your iPhone’s Siri voice assistant, to image recognition on social networks and recruiting software. “Almost everything is using AI in one way or another,” said Jeff Farrah, NVCA’s general counsel. “So then is everything subject to export controls?” The government’s efforts to restrict AI could be at odds with Silicon Valley’s business interests — especially in China. While artificial intelligence is now a Pentagon priority, it’s also the next big thing in Silicon Valley and driving a wave of investment in new companies. Defense officials believe the U.S. is in an artificial intelligence arms race with China, but investors and industry executives are trying to make inroads into one of the world’s most lucrative markets. Unnecessary export controls on AI would create new hurdles for businesses, NCVA argues, potentially requiring them to go through lengthy licensing processes when they want to sell new products in other countries or work with foreign citizens on research. What’s more, artificial intelligence and quantum computing are evolving so quickly that even many people in the industry haven’t reached a consensus on definitions for the technology. Still, the technology industry is very wary of leaving that task up to the government. “There’s not a lot of faith from people in the industry that the government will get this right,” Farrah said. Though the Trump administration appeared to want to move expediently on this rulemaking when it was announced last year, the government shutdown could derail those plans. It’s unlikely that the agency has the staff and resources to do a substantive review of comments, said Melissa Duffy, a partner at the Dechert law firm focused on international trade. “I think the shutdown has surely put a dent in the process and slowed things down,” Duffy said. The Commerce Department’s request for comment comes during a broader trade spat with China and as the United States is using increasingly aggressive tactics to deter theft of intellectual property. Silicon Valley is already concerned about how the fallout from the trade war will affect technology companies’ bottom line. Apple’s decision to slash its quarterly revenue forecast because of a downturn in sales of iPhones in


How government workers are impacted by the shutdown

The partial government shutdown is now the longest in American history, and hundreds of thousands of people are feeling the strain. These are their stories. 'If we don't work, we don't get paid' Pablo Lazaro is a cook at the National Museum of the American Indian. As a contract worker, he is not entitled to back pay when the shutdown ends. He already works a second job at Reagan National Airport to make ends meet. 'It's really terrifying' Nicole Bryner works at the Smithsonian and her daughter goes to school in a federal building. The shutdown means the school is closed and Nicole isn’t getting a paycheck, but the school bills are still coming. 'Why am I nonessential?' Amy McCarthy is a consumer safety officer at the Food and Drug Administration in northern Ohio. Out of work and behind on her bills, she says she may have to leave government service after 12 years if the shutdown goes on much longer. 'This thing is a national disaster' John Boyd is a fourth-generation farmer in southern Virginia. He was already struggling to sell his soybeans because of the international trade war; now, the shutdown means he can’t collect his bailout checks from the government. 'It will affect my ability to get care' Violet Kuchar is a financial management officer with the Peace Corps. A Stage 4 cancer patient, the shutdown is forcing her to wrestle with complex insurance issues and delay the search for new treatments. 'It's causing a lot of agitation' Richard Heldreth is the local union president at the Hazelton Federal Correctional Complex in West Virginia. He says unpaid prison workers are demoralized, and the number of assaults on correctional officers has increased since the shutdown. 'All of us deserve a little bit more respect' Tony Mazzoccoli is the director of strategic planning at the State Department. He describes the pressure the shutdown is putting on his colleagues and the message it sends to civil servants throughout the government.


Unlocking a kingdom’s long-hidden treasures

its own aspirations for greater openness. The killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in Istanbul in October led to international criticism of the crackdown and of the crown prince, who was widely blamed for ordering the killing. Saudi Arabia says Mohammed did not know about the plot, although it involved his most senior aides. After the killing, some foreign companies and organizations distanced themselves from Mohammed’s initiatives, including projects promoting the arts, tourism and culture that have been embraced by thousands of Saudis. “Tourism has great potential in the kingdom because it is so underdeveloped,” said Kristin Smith Diwan, a scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington. “Saudis are especially hungry for more public spaces and cultural growth. But there are social barriers and fears to overcome in attracting an international clientele.” “Jailing women activists doesn’t help,” she said, referring to the nearly eight-month detention without trial of Saudi Arabia’s most prominent women’s rights advocates. “Brutally killing a prominent journalist doesn’t help.” Saudi officials are pressing ahead with the crown prince’s initiatives and hoping that high-profile cultural events might temper the criticism from abroad. The government recently introduced an electronic visa system that allowed hundreds of foreign visitors in December to attend a motor-sports event in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, that included concerts by Western and Arab musicians. The plans to develop Al-Ula are the centerpiece of the tourism initiative. Officials leading the development effort believe that they can lure a mix of cultural tourists and eco-travelers from the West, visitors from the Persian Gulf, and Saudis eager to broaden their view of national heritage to include a pre-Islamic history suppressed for decades by the country’s leaders and religious conservatives. “We always knew we had an important historical site. But nobody knows about us,” said Ahmed al-Imam, a tour guide from Al-Ula whose family has lived for generations in the area, a place rich with culture but struggling with high unemployment. “We are hoping for more opportunities,” he said. A royal commission created by the crown prince is working quickly to prepare the site to receive visitors within the next few years. Resorts are being planned, residents are receiving training to work with tourists, and teams of archaeologists and researchers are conducting surveys of historical sites and environmental features over roughly 9,000 square miles. A winter festival, currently underway, is a soft opening of sorts for


Migrating snow geese are a beautiful sight but a scientific concern

spooked by an eagle soaring or a fox prowling nearby. As snow geese fans savor the scene, farmers and wildlife biologists watch the annual arrival with concern. Sometimes, there can be too much of a good thing. “Snow geese have insatiable appetites,” said Ronald Ketter, who volunteers with waterfowl surveys at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Cambridge, Maryland. “Unlike Canada Geese, which tend to clip off vegetation leaving roots intact, snow geese often rip out plants by the root.” In large numbers, snow geese can have a significant negative impact on wetland and farm vegetation. From early winter through March, these beautiful, feathered herbivores (plant eaters) devour fall’s leftover corn and wheat and gobble up new stems of winter plantings. They often leave behind muddy bare patches of ground. The population of snow geese throughout North America has risen from less than 1 million in 1970, according to several estimates, to at least 13 million, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says. “The typical flock size at Blackwater is around 2,000 snow geese, but as many as 11,000 have been present,” he said. After a mild start to the season this year, snow geese began showing up at the refuge January 6. Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge in Smyrna, Delaware — one of the first stops on the migration route — has had 200,000 snow geese visit before they spread out for other areas. “Cold weather and accompanying ice and snow to our north will typically push birds south as they search for food and open water,” said Paul Peditto, Maryland’s Wildlife and Heritage Service director. “The more severe that cold weather is, the more dramatic migrations to more southerly locations can be.” And, after finding new food sources, the snow geese return well-fed to the Arctic, where their huge numbers have stripped much of the plant life from their nesting sites. “Any population can reach a point where it is overabundant, stressing its own resources as well as those of other animals,” said Josh Homyack, a wildlife biologist with Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources. U.S. and Canadian wildlife biologists are working together to balance the welfare of these birds, the habitat and environmental concerns they pose, and the role of hunters in keeping snow geese populations in check. They’re finding that it’s an ongoing, complicated task. But that humongous wave of soaring snow geese is marvelous to see. kidspost@washpost.com


Aboard the ‘canna crawl’ bus, marijuana patients find community, resources

For the first time in five years, Joppa, Md., resident Brandon Bevins feels good. There’s still some pain, but after being diagnosed with bladder cancer at 31, he feels like he’s turning a promising corner. And he owes it all to the medicinal cannabis community, he said. “When you get sick, man, it really beats you down,” the former nightclub promoter said. “We take care of each other.” On a recent Tuesday, Bevins boarded a bus leaving from Towson to embark on a “canna crawl” with about 20 other Marylanders who have found long-awaited relief with medicinal marijuana. The bus tour was like a pub crawl but meant for the state’s cannabis patients to tour and shop at different dispensaries. Some of the passengers said they had years of experience experimenting with the drug as medication outside of the law. Others described themselves as marijuana “virgins” who once stigmatized the controlled substance but have come to view it through an enlightened lens since it became legal at the state level for certified patients to purchase in December 2017. “I didn’t know about cannabis as medication,” said Bethany “Betty” Jane, who organized the event and holds a medical marijuana certification for chronic pain. A former journalist, she now runs the “Mary Jane Chronicles” website, which houses a blog as well as a calendar of events she coordinates for patients to connect and find resources. “Here you can say, ‘I’m hurting,’ and there’s so much support,” the 53-year-old Ellicott City resident said, adding that she’s planning to host more social events through her business in 2019. “We really need events for people to get community support.” Under Maryland law, patients must be certified by a registered medical provider to be able to buy medical marijuana grown by licensed operators and sold at licensed dispensaries. During the day-long canna crawl, certified patients traveled to dispensaries across Baltimore County, including Chesacanna and KIP in Cockeysville, Your Farmacy in Lutherville-Timonium (where patients had the opportunity to medicate) and Blair Wellness Center in Towson. Along the route, they shopped for products including pre-rolled marijuana cigarettes, balms and oils, and enjoyed day-of discounts, specials and, in some cases, free “swag bags” filled with goodies and informational packets. The crawlers also met with staffers at each dispensary to discuss symptoms and treatment options and bonded with other patients, some of whom have become friends online through marijuana-centered Facebook


A critically acclaimed National Gallery show must come down, so workers are moving the art without pay

In normal times, such moves would occur without a hitch. But these are not normal times for the federal cultural institutions caught in the political impasse. While about a quarter of the federal government shut down Dec. 22, the National Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian museums stayed open through December, using reserve funds to keep operating during the busy holiday season. As the shutdown rolls toward its second month, long-planned exhibition deadlines are being affected, both for shows closing and those being moved elsewhere, according to Smithsonian spokeswoman Linda St. Thomas. Furloughed workers have been allowed to work only because the shows must be taken down. “They have to get ready for new things coming in,” St. Thomas said. “They want to be ready for action as soon as the shutdown ends.” An exhibition of modern Japanese photography is set to close Jan. 24 at the Smithsonian’s Freer/Sackler galleries; a show of Diane Arbus photographs ends Jan. 27 at the Smithsonian American Art Museum; and two exhibitions are nearing their end at the Hirshhorn Museum: “Charline von Heyl: Snake Eyes” (Jan. 27) and “Sean Scully: Landline” (Feb. 3). Other activities at the museums have also been hampered. The National Museum of African Art agreed to lend 23 works to the Block Museum at Northwestern University for a groundbreaking show on medieval Africa. The touring exhibition debuts next week. The government shutdown meant that those pieces didn’t arrive as expected last week, said curator Kathleen Bickford Berzock, who has spent seven years on the show, “Caravans of Gold, Fragments in Time: Art, Culture, and Exchange Across Medieval Saharan Africa,” which will be on view in Washington next year. “It’s heartbreaking,” Berzock said. “We have a huge amount of sympathy for our colleagues at the African Art Museum. We’re appreciative of everything they’ve done.” The Smithsonian ended up bringing in furloughed workers to take care of the loans, and the works are now expected to arrive before the show opens. But the delay has increased the Block’s costs and forced its staff to scramble to complete the installation. The shutdown also is having financial repercussions at the Smithsonian, which lost about $1.5 million in revenue during the first 10 days of the closure, a spokeswoman said. If the closure continues, it expects to lose $920,000 a week through January, from food and beverage sales, Imax theater admission and parking fees. peggy.mcglone@washpost.com


The shutdown is giving some Trump advisers what they’ve long wanted: A smaller government

you notice what percentage of this agency was viewed as nonessential?’ ” said anti-tax activist Grover Norquist. Former White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon called shutdowns “blunt-force measures that certainly show what’s essential and what’s not.” Some argue that furloughed employees are not suffering significant harm. About 420,000 employees are still working without pay during the shutdown because their jobs are considered essential to public safety or national security. An additional 350,000 are on furlough. Both groups are expected to get back pay when the government reopens. “It’s inconvenient that they’re not getting paid,” Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign adviser, said of the furloughed workers. “But it’s for time they’re not even going into the office.” He said, though, that while conservatives want to rein in the size of government, a shutdown is not an optimal path: “We prefer to use a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer.” Trump has been unfazed about leaving so much of the government dormant. On Monday his standoff with congressional Democrats, already the longest shutdown on record, dragged into its 24th day. He has received scattered briefings on how the shuttered agencies are coping, according to two senior administration officials. He has shown fleeting interest in the minutiae as Vought has outlined which services are being affected. On Sunday, Trump reinforced his downplaying of the shutdown’s effects, tweeting, “The damage done to our Country from a badly broken Border - Drugs, Crime and so much that is bad - is far greater than a Shutdown.” The closure of 10 Cabinet agencies and dozens of smaller ones has rattled many Americans and curtailed services such as food safety inspections and approvals of low-income loans. The political costs for the Trump administration could mount starting this week, as federal courts run out of money to operate on Friday and the Coast Guard misses its first paychecks. Airports have begun closing terminals as baggage screeners call in sick instead of reporting to their jobs. There is a growing sense within the White House that a protracted shutdown will produce a cascade of unanticipated effects that could eventually damage the president politically. But for now, Trump’s conservative allies have few qualms about Washington’s empty streets and dark offices. The small-government contingent “is not a voice of constraint here,” said a former senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations. “There is


The Washington Post launches Arabic- language Global Opinions page

The Washington Post Opinions section today announced the launch of an Arabic-language page, helping expand the reach of Post journalism to readers around the world. This online destination will host high-quality translations of Global Opinions columns, editorials and op-eds that are relevant to the Arabic-speaking audience. “The mission of the Global Opinions section has always been to give readers around the world a platform where they can find a variety of perspectives on the most pressing issues affecting their region,” said Fred Hiatt, editorial page editor at The Post. “This page will make it easier for more readers to access free and independent commentary about the cultural and political topics that most impact them. The importance of this has become more evident since the murder of our own colleague Jamal Khashoggi, who saw very clearly the need for a forum such as this.” The Arabic-language page is The Post’s first designated destination for translated pieces as The Post continues to expand its offerings in different languages. It will feature commentary by writers world-wide, including those based in the Middle East and North Africa. Over the past year, The Post’s Opinions section has also experimented with translating op-eds in other languages including Spanish, Turkish, and Farsi. Read the Arabic version of the announcement below.


The biggest offseason roster question for each of the NFL’s 28 eliminated teams

what the team called a mutual decision. Owner Mike Brown could opt for a more widespread organizational reset that also would include a change at quarterback. The structure of Andy Dalton’s contract, with no guaranteed money remaining, means that he could be traded without the Bengals incurring any so-called dead money on their 2019 salary cap. Green Bay Packers (6-9-1) The Packers’ offseason is all about ensuring that whichever coach they hire to replace the fired Mike McCarthy is on the same page with Aaron Rodgers. It seemed, especially in McCarthy’s final season, that there was a disconnect between coach and quarterback. That simply cannot happen with Green Bay’s next coach. The Packers can’t waste any more of Rodgers’s prime, and they need him to get back to being a player who negates the deficiencies elsewhere on the roster. Miami Dolphins (7-9) Coach Adam Gase failed to make things work with Ryan Tannehill. Now Gase has been fired and the Dolphins’ new regime, with General Manager Chris Grier being given additional front office authority, must decide whether to stay the course with Tannehill or start over at quarterback. Atlanta Falcons (7-9) The defense and running game must be repaired. Matt Ryan and the passing game were fine. But the Falcons ranked 28th in the league in total defense and 27th in rushing offense. Even in a pass-happy league, the Falcons need to be better balanced to get back to having success. Washington Redskins (7-9) The quarterback situation is a quandary, with the uncertainty about Alex Smith’s return and the salary cap constraints created by his big contract. The Redskins probably must prepare to play without Smith by getting a QB to go with Colt McCoy and, possibly, Josh Johnson. Adding a No. 1 wide receiver certainly wouldn’t hurt. Carolina Panthers (7-9) The main issue is getting QB Cam Newton healthy. Newton was on the fringes of league MVP conversation early in the season but his ailing shoulder contributed to the Panthers’ downward spiral in the season’s second half. Newton sat out the final two games. The Panthers must make sure his shoulder is sound, and they probably have to add a better option as their backup quarterback, just in case. Cleveland Browns (7-8-1) Things are looking up for the Browns. That hasn’t been said very often over the years. Baker Mayfield is the real deal and looks like an honest-to-goodness


Trolling Trump and feeding furloughed workers: How brands are wading into the chaos of the shutdown

of the shutdown dispute. “Walls shouldn’t block access to parks, and federal workers shouldn’t be left out in the cold,” Boyle said. “Work together to open our parks.” During the lapse in government funding, the National Park Service has taken the unprecedented step of diverting entrance-fee revenue to staff operations at its most popular sites, as piling trash and vandalism threaten the country’s iconic public lands. Some critics say that move could be illegal. Photos of trees cut down by visitors at Joshua Tree National Park have sparked outrage as parks have been left understaffed and the administration struggles to manage federal lands. In response, REI has urged people to volunteer for restoration efforts at national parks once the shutdown ends. And the North Face has called for donations to the National Park Foundation, as Adweek earlier reported. While some brands are advocating to protect vulnerable land, jabbing at the president in the process, others are offering to help financially struggling federal employees who aren’t being paid. Food industry megabrand Kraft said it would open a store in Washington on Wednesday to offer free food to federal workers. “We know feeding a family can be stressful. And while we can’t do anything about the whole paycheck thing, we’ll do what we can to see that family dinners remain business as usual,” the company said in a Facebook events page. Kraft will offer its macaroni and cheese, salad dressing, cheese, mayo and barbecue sauce. The company said it won’t charge the workers any money, instead asking them to donate to their favorite charity once their work lives return to normal. Kraft’s move follows Sweetgreen’s tweet over the weekend to offer federal workers “some small relief” by providing a salad dinner on the house to people who showed their federal government identification. Other companies are expressing their frustration over the shutdown with Internet-inflected sarcasm. “Due to a large order placed yesterday, we’re all out of hamberders. just serving hamburgers today,” Burger King said on Twitter, mocking Trump’s now-deleted tweet from Tuesday in which he misspelled “hamburgers.” The president’s tweet highlighted a fast-food feast he hosted at the White House for the Clemson University Tigers on Monday. Because of the shutdown, he said, he paid for the food himself. Trump said he served 300 hamburgers to the national college football champions — including 11 Burger King Whoppers, according to a Washington Post analysis.


Melania Trump’s office cut in half and White House residence has skeleton crew during shutdown

As the longest government shutdown in history continues, President Trump is not the only member of the first family affected; first lady Melania Trump also has a skeleton crew. The White House residence staff — who cater to the first family and maintain the White House — is down to 21 people from its usual 79, according to a shutdown memo from the Office of Management and Budget. The first lady’s staff, which promotes her work, has been cut from 10 to five, according to her spokeswoman. The effect of the diminished ranks was on display at President Trump’s Monday night buffet of fast food served to the visiting national college football champion team, the Clemson Tigers. No floral arrangements graced the buffet, where blooms crafted by the White House florist’s office would typically appear. The White House florists, alas, are deemed nonessential. Chief usher Timothy Harleth, the residence’s top executive and manager, helped light a pair of ornate candelabras, taking on a job more often delegated to a butler. Some functions that Melania Trump oversees have been shuttered entirely, including White House tours. The first lady has been particularly involved in the operations of the White House Visitor Center, aides have said. But since the shutdown began, there are no groups of gawking tourists filing through the executive mansion. A call to the White House visitors information line directs callers with scheduled tours to contact the congressional office that arranged it. Congressional offices say they were informed that tours have halted during the shutdown and that people who had scheduled tours are getting cancellation notices. Melania Trump’s spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, said the first lady — who hasn’t held any public events this year — is spending the shutdown plotting out future events and the direction of her Be Best initiative. “We are in the planning phase for 2019 in terms of ‘Be Best’ and annual functions at the White House,” Grisham wrote in an email. The first lady and her aides are “using this time for meetings and planning/strategy sessions.” The White House residence staff, who typically serve across multiple presidential administrations, have been through shutdowns before. Former White House head florist Laura Dowling wrote about the 2013 shutdown, when budget disputes closed the government for days. Dowling, along with “middle managers and curators,” had to vacate. “We had four hours to shut down our operations, retrieve flowers from


Secret Service officer in D.C. reportedly finds gun, drugs in car with child

just off New York Avenue in Northwest Washington, according to D.C. police. The shooting occurred shortly after 3 p.m. at Tyler House in the 1200 block of North Capitol Street, near the Sursum Corda public housing complex and across the street from the Truxton Circle neighborhood. It is also near NoMa, the upscale area near Union Station. The shooting was a homicide, said Officer Sean Hickman, a police spokesman. Authorities said a suspected gunman was seen running through a parking lot after the shooting. Police closed M Street between 1st and North Capitol streets. The area around Tyler House has been known for violence. In 2013, 13 people were struck in a drive-by shooting there. The area of North Capitol Street near New York Avenue has also been a trouble spot, even as New York Avenue serves as one of the major commuter routes in and out of the city. In June 2016, frustrated residents vented to police after four people were shot outside Big Ben Liquor store, a fixture on the corner with its red facade and turret over the entrance, during an evening commute. A police commander told residents at a community meeting: “Obviously, that corner is a long-term, open-air drug market.” — Peter Hermann VIRGINIA Woman killed in Alexandria identified Authorities have identified a 35-year-old woman who was killed in Alexandria’s first homicide this year. The incident happened just before midnight on Friday in the unit block of South Van Dorn Street, according to Alexandria police. When police arrived, they found the victim, Somaya Hussein Ahmed of Alexandria. Police did not say how she was killed. Police said they arrested and charged Daniel Kankam, 44, of Alexandria with murder in her death. Officials also said the two knew each other. Anyone with information is asked to call 703-746-6751. Last year, four homicides occurred in Alexandria, according to tracking by The Washington Post. — Dana Hedgpeth THE REGION Earthquake reported off Ocean City A 4.7-magnitude earthquake was reported Tuesday night in the Atlantic Ocean, centered about 130 miles east-southeast of Ocean City, the U.S. Geological Survey said. The 6:30 p.m. quake was felt along the Atlantic coastline of Maryland, Virginia and Delaware, but no damage was reported. Reports to the geological survey’s “Did You Feel It” site also indicated that the quake was felt in the Washington area. Reports of earthquakes beneath the floor of the Atlantic off


Is the tech backlash going askew?

alternative approach taken in Europe, which has ramped up an aggressive attack of U.S. technology companies, applying the kind of expansive view of competition law urged by Wu and others. European businesses are still largely no-shows in the digital revolution, the result not of monopolies but of the micromanagement of employment, investment and infrastructure by regulators. Rather than freeing up local innovators to benefit European consumers, the European Union seems content simply to fine successful U.S. businesses. The European approach highlights another problem with calls for U.S. antitrust enforcers to punish platform companies just for their size. Looking ahead to the technology drivers of the near future, such as artificial intelligence and autonomous vehicles, any hopes for the United States to lead internationally depend on heavy investment today in research and development. Many of the highest-risk bets are being placed by, you guessed it, today’s “monopoly” companies. So what should U.S. regulators do? The starting point is vigilance in applying tried-and-true tools to new harms. The Federal Trade Commission, for example, has already brought over 150 enforcement actions against tech companies in the last decade for violations of consumer protection laws, reaching settlements that in many cases include decades of ongoing oversight and reporting. The trade agency is gearing up a broad review of Facebook to see whether the company’s many embarrassing failures of the past few years amount to violations of a 2011 consent decree or, indeed, new violations. And the commissioners recently told Congress that they want additional resources and authority to better enforce existing law, joining a bipartisan call for targeted legislation, particularly on consumer data collection and use. Tech’s loudest critics argue that the gears of government are turning too slowly. But that’s actually another reason why calls to simply throw out measured approaches to regulating competition are dangerous, despite their populist appeal. Even assuming new standards could be developed that wouldn’t stall the innovation engine driving the U.S. economy, rewriting federal competition law, realistically, would take Congress and the courts decades to hammer out. Fortunately, the next wave of disruptive technology is always coming. It won’t fix everything. But if history is any guide, it will fix an awful lot — and do so without breaking everything that’s actually working. Blair Levin is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Larry Downes is project director at the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy.


Discover the world of amateur space enthusiasts in a ‘dreamlike journey, which blurs the line between science and fiction’

When he was a child, photographer Robert Ormerod loved space and science fiction. But because such interests weren’t thought of as “cool” by his peers, it made him self-conscious, and he veered away from them. However, his interest stayed lodged in the back of his brain, and he says that he “never stopped being awed and gaining comfort from the night sky.” And so, after some time working as a photographer, he began to rediscover that early love for the stars and space. “I started to think about the tiny percentage of the human race who have been to space, yet so many are fascinated and dream of it," Ormerod told In Sight. "There’s a huge disconnect there, so I decided I wanted to find and photograph some of the people who have such a passion for something which is considered so out of reach for the ordinary person.” And thus began his exploration of amateur space enthusiasts, taking him from Oman to Utah to his homeland of Scotland. Ormerod began his exploration by photographing a small rocket festival in Scotland called International Rocket Week. The festival is put on by a dedicated group of amateurs. Ormerod says the experience hooked him, but it took him a few more years to tackle the project on a bigger scale. Once he decided to dedicate himself to the project, he prepared himself by reading as widely as he could and scouring the Internet for events where he could find his subject matter. As he found and documented people and places, Ormerod found that he was also having a great time. “Looking back, I loved every minute of it," he told In Sight. "Meeting such talented, interesting and passionate people was great. Seeing some astoundingly beautiful and otherworldly landscapes was a highlight. Standing under some night skies which will forever be etched in my mind was another — they were so crammed full of stars that it really showed you your place.” Ormerod plans to continue work on his project. Looking back on what he has already done, Ormerod says that he just wants to show that space and science are a lot more accessible than many of us think. He also says: “With this project, I really wanted to explore the in-built human curiosity to understand our place in the universe. I wanted to show how we as humans relate to the


Sears survives bankruptcy auction and will keep 400 stores open

Sears — the iconic retail chain that was forced into bankruptcy in October — avoided a total shutdown after billionaire Eddie Lampert, the company’s chairman and largest shareholder, won a bankruptcy auction for Sears Holdings Corp., according to a person familiar with the matter. Last week, Lampert upped his offer to more than $5 billion as part of a pitch to keep about 400 stores open nationwide. The proposal was made through Lampert’s hedge fund, ESL Investments, and will save as many as 45,000 jobs. Reuters reported the bankruptcy auction concluded early Wednesday morning, with Lampert ultimately prevailing with a $5.2 billion takeover bid. But it remains to be seen how Lampert will turn his remaining stores into lasting footprints in a retail landscape that looks far different from the one Sears once conquered. A Sears Holdings spokesman declined to comment Wednesday. For much of its 126-year history, Sears was a ubiquitous presence in American retail, selling everyday items such as toys, clothes and even houses through its cavernous showrooms and signature catalogues. But it eventually lost its hold on shoppers, who turned to big-box competitors such as Walmart or online behemoths such as Amazon. (Amazon founder and chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos owns The Washington Post.) About five years ago, the company had 2,000 Sears and Kmart stores. When Sears merged with Kmart in 2005, Sears Holdings boomed to become the nation’s third-largest retailer, with $55 billion in annual revenue and 3,500 stores. Lampert had said he could return Sears and Kmart to their former glory by combining the companies, selling off some of their most lucrative assets and then using the profits to revamp the stores for e-commerce. But the company hasn’t turned a profit since 2010, and Lampert sold off many of its brands, including Craftsman tools. Massive showrooms fell into disrepair, and the stock price took a nose-dive. On Wednesday afternoon, the share price was 75 cents. When Sears filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, the company had about $5.6 billion in outstanding debt. It said it would close 142 unprofitable stores at the end of 2018 — with dozens more closures announced in the past few months. As part of the bankruptcy process, Lampert stepped down from his role as chief executive but stayed on as chairman of the board. To stay afloat, Sears will have to find a way to make up for its


The Technology 202: In the Trump era, the most contrarian venture capitalists are investing in government tech

Congress remain locked in a stalemate over funding for a border wall. Trump has tweeted that he knows technology “better than anyone,” and technological solutions will only secure the border in conjunction with a physical wall. Stephens’s firm has a history of investing in businesses that have experience working with the federal bureaucracy. Its portfolio includes companies such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX and the spy-software company Palantir. He hopes that plays to his advantage since it’s not a playbook that many other venture capital firms have been able to replicate. The government is making a broad push into emerging technologies, as policymakers from Capitol Hill to the White House are increasingly alarmed at the rising threat China poses to U.S. dominance in technology. The Pentagon in particular is making artificial intelligence a huge priority — and defense contractors in the Washington area may not be best suited to meet these needs, according to Katherine Boyle, a principal at venture capital firm General Catalyst and former Washington Post reporter. In fact, the government’s needs are changing so much that Boyle believes the next big defense contractor could emerge from Silicon Valley -- the hub for the country’s best engineers in this space. “We’re moving away from hardware and battleships,” she said of government contracts. “We’re moving toward a software-based defense system.” The Pentagon said last year it would invest up to $2 billion over the next five years toward new programs advancing artificial intelligence. Much of that funding will go to dozens of new Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency products. The Pentagon also has bolstered programs that make it easier for early-stage start-ups to do business with the government, such as the Defense Innovation Unit. Christopher Kirchhoff, a founding partner of the initiative, said at a Council on Foreign Relations event on Tuesday that for many years, the Pentagon held a “monopoly” on advanced technology. Now, he said, “the locus of innovation has shifted from East to West. If the Pentagon doesn’t focus on what technologies are being developed in Silicon Valley, then it is no longer on the cutting edge.” Stephens said programs like the Defense Innovation Unit have been a good first step and show that the government realizes it needs to work with the technology industry. But he said the Pentagon needs to be more focused and make larger investments in a handful of companies, rather than cutting


Drivers, is your morning commute better? Thank the shutdown.

super-congested highways and roads — fewer traffic jams. According to an analysis done by the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, there has been “considerable reduction in congestion on the region’s major roadways during the morning commute” with the federal government closed. Travel time along Interstate 270 from Interstate 70 and Interstate 370 — a distance of about 24 miles — went from 49 minutes last January to 29 minutes this month. The times were compared on Wednesdays and Thursdays each year. Along the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, between Maryland 198 and U.S. 50, about 16 miles, the commute is four minutes less. And along the Beltway from Interstate 270 to Interstate 66, the travel time dropped by nine minutes. The lighter traffic in the mornings, transportation experts said, is typical of what’s seen in the region in July and August. But while drivers in the morning are able to get to destinations faster, evening commutes weren’t much shorter, the study found. “Work trips make up a higher share of all trips during the morning rush hour, which explains the major drop in traffic that we are seeing due to the shutdown’s impact on our region’s economy,” said Kanti Srikanth, the transportation planning director at the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. “On the other hand, the afternoon rush hour includes a lot of nonwork trips — school pickups, errands and evening activities.” According to the study’s authors, the D.C. region has more than 361,000 federal workers, and about 40 percent of them are affected by the partial shutdown. There’s another 400,000 federal contractors in the region. To be sure, the analysis points out that an extended holiday break with some schools in the area not going back into session until Jan. 9 could also have had an effect on traffic. Other factors — like weather, crashes, fuel prices and construction — could have an impact and were not considered in the analysis. The analysis also found that drivers were able to go faster on some major commuter routes with less traffic on the roads. And for some drivers, the lower level of congestion means their commutes are also less costly. Along the section of Interstate 66 that runs from Northern Virginia into the District, where peak tolls for solo drivers have at times exceeded $40, there have been reports of fees during the shutdown at $3 and $7 during the morning commute.


Nearly 10,000 companies contract with shutdown-affected agencies, putting $200 million a week at risk

government shutdown, according to an analysis of government contractor data by The Washington Post. The data, although incomplete and frozen by the shutdown, still shows a snapshot of the risk to contractors, their employees and communities. The overall average value of their work: about $200 million a week. No one knows how many workers are affected, and overall estimates of total federal contract workers range from hundreds of thousands to millions. It’s also unknown how many have had to stop work, but company and industry officials say financial pressures on contractors are building. At R3 Government Solutions, an Arlington, Va.-based company that helps federal agencies with workforce planning and managing information technology resources, a few of its contract workers serving FEMA have been sent home without pay, said Chairman and Chief Operating Officer Glenn Hartung. He has kept others on payroll for fear that they will be poached by a competitor. “The people that are being furloughed are without pay, and the people that we’re paying we’re not sure how long we can continue to do that,” Hartung said. “It’s basically kind of a turmoil.” Agency contractors include large corporations that are not threatened. “We are watching the situation carefully, but the impact thus far on our operations has been negligible,” said Jeff Davis, a vice president at General Dynamics, where subsidiaries have worked with affected agencies like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Environmental Protection Agency and Transportation Security Administration. But the shutdowns may be creating more stresses at smaller companies, where federal contract work easily plays a larger role. About two-thirds of contracts with agencies affected by the shutdown were worth less than $10,000 a week, according to estimates from contracting data. At New Editions Consulting, a Falls Church, Va., company that helps make government websites more accessible to people with disabilities, about eight of 60 workers were told to halt work on a federal contract but were put on other work. The reassignments affect the company’s overhead and profit margins, since the work can’t be billed to the government. “These people have families; they have kids; they have mortgages,” said the company president, Shelia Newman. “So I’m going to keep them on as long as I can.” Other companies have scheduled necessary training for workers idled by the shutdown or considered suggesting they take vacation days. Contract workers, unlike employees of the federal agencies impacted by the


In rare rebuke of Trump administration, some GOP lawmakers advance measure to oppose lifting Russian sanctions

The Senate on Tuesday advanced a resolution to oppose a Treasury Department plan to lift sanctions against Russian companies controlled by a Vladimir Putin ally, with 11 Republicans voting to advance the Democratic measure in a rare example of bipartisanship. The resolution, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), seeks to block the Treasury Department from removing sanctions the Trump administration imposed last year on companies controlled by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, including the aluminum producer Rusal. The Senate voted 57 to 42 to approve a motion to proceed to debate on the resolution. “Why would we vote to relax sanctions on three essential Russian companies when Putin has not stopped or even curtailed his malign activities? This is sort of a kiss-up to Putin,” Schumer told reporters shortly before the vote. Treasury notified Congress on Dec. 19 that it intended to lift the sanctions because Deripaska has agreed to reduce his stake in En+ Group, the holding company that controls Rusal, from about 70 percent to 44.95 percent. This would protect the companies “from the controlling influence of a Kremlin insider,” which had been the goal of punishing the firms, Treasury said. Deripaska will remain under personal sanctions, along with a half-dozen other oligarchs and more than a dozen government officials the Trump administration targeted in April, for furthering “the Kremlin’s global malign activities, including its attempts to subvert Western democracy, its support for the Assad regime, its malicious cyber activities, its occupation of Crimea, and its instigation of violence in Ukraine,” Treasury said. “This shouldn’t be a political issue,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters after meeting with Republicans shortly before the vote. “We have been tougher on Russia, with more sanctions than any other administration.” Under the Treasury plan, Russia’s state-owned VTB Bank or another Treasury-approved entity will take ownership of a block of Deripaska’s shares in En+ that had been pledged against a loan. The Obama administration added VTB Bank to a sanctions list in 2014, as punishment for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Trump administration issued sanctions against VTB’s chairman, Andrey Kostin, last year, as part of the actions against Deripaska and others. According to Treasury, Glencore, the Swiss mining and trading company, will swap its shares in Rusal for shares in En+, which will dilute the holdings of all shareholders, including Deripaska. Finally, the Russian businessman will donate about 3 percent of


The problem with Brexit is that there’s no obvious next step

a win set of agreements that both parties can live up to. The European Union thinks that it has gone as far as it reasonably can, but the United Kingdom clearly believes that this isn’t nearly far enough. Both sides have come to an impasse over an issue that played a relatively minor role in the debates leading up to Brexit: the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. There’s no clear solution to the border issue The border problem is straightforward, even if the solutions are not. When both the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland were members of the European Union, the border between Northern Ireland (which is still part of the U.K.) and the Republic of Ireland, became increasingly less important in politics and economics. Free movement of goods back and forward across the border helped to create deep economic ties, while free movement of people helped soften political divisions between unionists (who want Northern Ireland to stay part of the U.K.) and republicans and nationalists (who want Northern Ireland to be part of the Republic of Ireland). When the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, all that changed. The Republic of Ireland, which feared a resurgence of paramilitary violence, insisted that the U.K. would have to protect the special nature of the border between the North and the Republic as part of the deal for leaving the E.U. Thanks to assiduous Irish diplomacy, other E.U. member states agreed to support this demand, and the U.K. obliged, albeit in somewhat vague terms, accepting a “backstop” under which the open border would be preserved as long as the E.U. and U.K. failed to reach a more satisfactory deal over their new relationship. However, as the U.K. began to realize what the demand meant in practice, it started to try to wriggle out of its commitment. The reason U.K. negotiators have been backpedaling is that it’s hard to see how one could keep the current border arrangements without either Northern Ireland or the United Kingdom as a whole remaining part of the European Union’s current market institutions. Unionists fear that if Northern Ireland alone were part of these arrangements, its union with the U.K. would be weakened, while the reason that many conservatives wanted Brexit was to escape E.U. market rules. Both Unionists and conservative Brexiters have enough votes to veto any deal. The


Britain is left without a Brexit plan. It’s headed toward disaster.

by many supporters, that any divorce would involve major economic and political costs. The deal she eventually struck would allow for a transition period during which Britain and the E.U. would negotiate the details of their future trade relationship, while providing that London would regain control over the movement of people across its borders. Britain’s economy would take a hit from Ms. May’s plan, but the biggest sticking point is how to manage the border between British Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, an E.U. member, so as not to endanger the peace accord that ended decades of violence in the North. To avoid the imposition of a hard border, the E.U. insisted on a “backstop” under which, if no other arrangement were agreed upon, Britain would remain in the E.U. customs union indefinitely. That, in turn, would mean London would have to continue observing E.U. regulations without having input into them and would find it hard to strike trade deals with other countries. While rejecting that solution, opponents to the left and right of Ms. May have offered no workable alternatives. Instead, they have tried to leverage the Brexit debate to oust the prime minister. Rivals in her Conservative Party tried and failed to do that last month; on Wednesday, the opposition Labour Party will get its chance when Parliament considers its no-confidence motion. Ms. May said that, if the government survives that vote, she will consult with parliamentary leaders on new ideas for a Brexit deal. If there is broad support for any proposals, she said, she will take them to Brussels. The danger is that there will be no majority in Parliament behind any new proposal — and that E.U. leaders will be unwilling to show flexibility. A statement by European Council President Donald Tusk said the rejected accord “remains the best and only way to ensure an orderly withdrawal.” If those facts don’t change, Britain’s best alternative may be to suspend the withdrawal process and hold another referendum — one in which voters can choose based on the known terms and costs of a deal, rather than the false promises of 2016. Ms. May, who opposes that option, said following her parliamentary defeat that “every day that passes without this issue being resolved means more uncertainty, more bitterness and more rancor.” That is true, but further disorder for a vital U.S. ally now is unavoidable.


Man slain in shooting near New York Avenue

This story has been updated A man was fatally shot Tuesday afternoon at an apartment complex just off New York Avenue in Northwest Washington, according to D.C. police. The shooting occurred shortly after 3 p.m. at Tyler House in the 1200 block of North Capitol Street, near the Sursum Corda public housing complex and across the street from the Truxton Circle neighborhood. It is north of the NoMa neighborhood, near Union Station. The victim was identified as Davane Williams,22, of Northwest. Police said the victim was unconscious. Authorities said a suspected gunman was seen running through a parking lot after the shooting. Police closed M Street between 1st and North Capitol streets. The area around Tyler House has seen previous violence. In 2013, 13 people were struck in a drive-by shooting there. The area of North Capitol Street near New York Avenue has also been a trouble spot, even as New York Avenue serves as one of the major commuter routes in and out of the city. In June 2016, frustrated residents vented to police after four people were shot outside Big Ben Liquor store, a fixture on the corner with its red facade and turret over the entrance, during an evening commute. A police commander told residents at a community meeting: “Obviously, that corner is a long-term, open-air drug market.” peter.hermann@washpost.com


China’s advances seen to pose increasing threat to American military dominance

as a global military player, following Beijing’s establishment of permanent external facilities in the Horn of Africa and the South China Sea. According to the report, China’s Communist Party leaders remain largely focused on preserving internal stability. But they also are increasingly concerned with dominance across East Asia, driven in large part by Beijing’s goal of reunification with Taiwan. China has sought to demonstrate regional primacy by challenging other nations’ claims to disputed islands in the South China and East China seas, and building its first-ever locally designed and produced aircraft carrier. It has also developed new long-range bomber capabilities and constructed military outposts in disputed areas, allowing it to project military power in new ways. Outside of Asia, China established its first foreign military base, in Djibouti, and used naval assets to evacuate civilians from Yemen. Beijing has powered its advances with massive increases in its military budget, which grew at an average annual rate of 10 percent from 2000 to 2016, the DIA said. While the rate of China’s spending growth has slowed, it remains robust at up to 7 percent a year. The report also said that China has acquired technology “by any means available” in its long-running effort to modernize its armed forces, an effort the DIA said has put the Chinese military “on the verge of fielding some of the most modern weapon systems in the world.” Defense officials say that two areas where China may be pulling ahead of the United States are hypersonic glide vehicles and intermediate- and long-range missiles. China is developing additional capabilities that can be used to attack and jam satellites after testing an antisatellite missile system in 2014, according to the DIA, which said Beijing also was researching and possibly developing antisatellite lasers. In cyberspace, the Chinese may be combining cyberreconnaissance, cyberattack and cyberdefense into one organization known as the Strategic Support Force, which could centralize command and control and reduce bureaucracy in cyberwarfare, according to the report. Beijing has identified controlling the “information domain” as a prerequisite to achieving victory in modern war, the report says. China is also overhauling its defense industrial base to help deliver cutting-edge technologies to Chinese forces and at times sell them to others. Among the disciplines the DIA says China has targeted for development are hypersonic missiles, nanotechnology, high-performance computing, quantum communications, space systems, artificial intelligence, autonomous systems and robotics. missy.ryan@washpost.com paul.sonne@washpost.com


Brexit vote: British Parliament rejects Theresa May’s Brexit deal, leaving withdrawal from E.U. and prime minister’s political future in doubt

then introduced a motion of no confidence, to be debated and voted upon Wednesday. Afterward, leaders of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, which props up May’s minority government, announced that they would support the prime minister, thereby making her ouster unlikely. Rob Ford, a professor of politics at Manchester University, said these were indeed strange times. “Normally, if you were looking at a defeat of 50-plus votes on the No. 1 item on the government’s agenda, then that would be it. Game over. The prime minister would be gone, and the government would probably fall immediately. But that’s clearly not going to happen,” Ford said. May called Tuesday’s vote in Parliament the most important in a generation. She told lawmakers that the choice was plain: support her imperfect compromise deal — the only one Europe will abide, she stressed — or face the cliff edge of a no-deal Brexit. Staring directly at Corbyn, May said anyone who thought they could go to Brussels and get a better deal was deluding themselves. But the vote against her plan was decisive. Moments after the result came in, May said, “The government has heard what the House has said tonight.” She has until Monday to return with a Plan B. Her office has been tight-lipped about what alternatives she might offer. May said she would reach out to members of Parliament to find out what kind of Brexit deal, if any, they would endorse. “What Theresa May does now will become less and less relevant to what outcome we get. The key thing to be watching is what Parliament does next and what Labour does next,” Ford said. Other European leaders, who expected the deal to fail, were stunned by the scale. Yet they said they saw little they could do to try to ease any agreement through the British Parliament. “Maybe we’ll make improvements on one or two things,” said French President Emmanuel Macron. “But I don’t really think so, because we’ve reached the maximum of what we could do with the deal, and we won’t, just to solve Britain’s domestic political issues, stop defending European interests.” Guy Verhofstadt, the Brexit coordinator for the European Parliament, sounded especially frustrated. “The House of Commons today said they don’t want this deal. I want to know what deal the House of Commons really does want. Because otherwise you can’t make an agreement.” At least


U.S. lettuce industry, wary of E. coli, wants FDA back on the job

The leafy greens industry has already made changes. Lettuce sold at stores is now more likely to be clearly labeled to reveal its origin. There are new requirements for cleaning farm equipment. And in Arizona and California, required buffer zones between fields and concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) have tripled, from 400 feet to 1,200 feet. “Everybody recognizes that it’s not good enough to do business as usual,” said Scott Horsfall, CEO of the California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement. Many consumers have been reluctant to consume romaine since the most recent disaster two days before Thanksgiving, when the FDA and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that 32 people in 11 states had been sickened by contaminated lettuce. Initially unable to pinpoint the source of the problem, the FDA and CDC asked retailers to pull all romaine from the shelves and told consumers to throw away any lettuce they had purchased. In Yuma, where fields had already been planted, countless heads of romaine were simply plowed back into the soil. In December, the FDA revealed that a soil sample from an irrigation reservoir on a farm in Santa Barbara County, Calif., had tested positive for the E. coli strain associated with the recent outbreak. But that didn’t solve the case. The FDA said that “our traceback work suggests that additional romaine lettuce shipped from other farms could also likely be implicated in the outbreak.” The two previous romaine outbreaks last year also generated murky assessments. The first, which occurred late 2017 into January 2018, caused illness in both Canada and the United States. Neither country could identify the source. The bacterial strain in those cases had the same genetic fingerprint as the strain in the most recent outbreak, suggesting a common California origin. In between those two events was the Yuma outbreak, which began in March. In a report published by the FDA on Nov. 1, the agency identified 36 growing fields on 23 farms in the Yuma growing region (which includes Southern California’s Imperial Valley) as potential sources of the contaminated lettuce. None tested positive for the specific E. coli strain that caused the illnesses, but the growing season was over by the time the investigation was done. The FDA did find the dangerous bacterial strain in three samples of water taken from an irrigation canal in Wellton, Ariz., east of Yuma. Several of the farms


It’s 2019 and Taco Bell will now serve you a frozen margarita with your Crunchwrap Supreme

It’s late. You’ve had a few drinks. Your stomach is growling, and the only thing that can scratch the itch is a cheesy Crunchwrap Supreme with extra Fritos and a three-cheese blend. Taco Bell has long been America’s go-to destination after a few beers or margaritas — check out all those online listicles ranking “Drunk Taco Bell Menu Items That’ll Totally Satisfy Your Drunchies” and “6 Top Items To Get At Taco Bell After A Field Trip To The Bars” — but the country’s fourth-largest fast-food chain has decided it’s time to cut out the middleman: A new Taco Bell Cantina in Old Town Alexandria will sell you beer, frozen margaritas and boozy slushies alongside the usual menu of Doritos Locos tacos and seven-layer burritos. The first Cantina opened in Chicago in June 2015, and while a national rollout has been slow, it’s about to explode. Last summer, as Taco Bell opened its first Cantinas in Manhattan, Nation’s Restaurant News reported that the company planned to open 1,000 new restaurants by 2022, and “300 will be either urban or Cantina concepts.” Alexandria’s Cantina, the first in the Washington area, debuted a few days before Christmas. You might expect it to hum later at night, but there wasn’t an open table in the building at dinner time on a recent Friday. The crowd ranged from middle-aged couples to 20-somethings who looked like they just rolled out of bed, rocking sweatpants and the popular Adidas slides-and-socks combo. Despite the glowing Taco Bell sign facing King Street, the Cantina’s interior decor is a far cry from the fluorescent lighting and swiveling plastic chairs found at most of the chain’s locations. Call it Generic Fast-Casual: a vaguely industrial vibe with exposed ductwork and tile walls; bar stools lining counters that resemble the granite breakfast bars found in upscale condo buildings; customers queuing up to order through a bank of touch screens instead of cashiers. (The only time you need to interact with a human is to have your ID checked before picking up alcoholic drinks.) The result is a weird dining limbo: You’re definitely not in a restaurant with a drive-through window, but it doesn’t quite feel classy enough for date night, either, unless you both really love Gorditas. Though the Cantina has a full liquor license, the adult beverages are surprisingly limited. There are four beers on tap — Miller Lite, Dos Equis,


The Daily 202: The 11 GOP senators who broke with Trump over relaxing sanctions against a Putin-linked oligarch

the administration from easing sanctions on Russian targets. The Treasury Department notified Congress last month that it intends to lift sanctions against the holding company that includes the aluminum giant Rusal because Putin pal Oleg Deripaska has agreed to reduce his ownership stake from about 70 percent to 45 percent. The announcement on Dec. 19 said this divestment will protect the companies “from the controlling influence of a Kremlin insider.” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin insisted during a visit to the Capitol on Tuesday that this is not a favor to Putin. “Under the Treasury plan to reduce Deripaska’s ownership, Russia’s state-owned VTB Bank or another Treasury-approved entity will take ownership of a block of Deripaska’s shares … that had been pledged against a loan,” explains business reporter Jeanne Whalen. “The Obama administration added VTB Bank to a sanctions list in 2014, as punishment for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Trump administration issued sanctions against VTB’s chairman, Andrey Kostin, last year, as part of the actions against Deripaska and others.” Rubio thinks the idea that Deripaska will no longer control his own company is a joke. Cotton agrees. “The proposed deal doesn’t fully account for the way that power and influence work within Vladimir Putin’s corrupt inner circle,” he said. “I don’t believe Deripaska will be denied operational control of these companies and I therefore believe they should remain subject to sanctions.” Moran focused on the bigger picture. Daines made a similar point. “This resolution helps keep pressure on the Kremlin for their aggressive actions towards Eastern Europe, the Middle East and around the world,” said the Montanan. Gardner, who has carved out a niche on foreign policy, said he will continue “to support maximum economic sanctions until Russia fundamentally changes its behavior.” Collins, a member of the Intelligence Committee, also stressed that Deripaska would maintain too much control, especially “given his ties to Putin.” -- The 57-to-42 vote also reflected the role reversals of the parties vis-a-vis national security in the Trump era. “Senator Romney believes the U.S. should maintain strong sanctions on Russia for its bad behavior, including its interference in our elections,” his spokeswoman Liz Johnson said in an email. “His vote was in line with longstanding U.S. policy and will help preserve our leverage to gain concessions from other bad actors. The Senator expects the Administration to reimpose sanctions if these companies don’t comply.” Meanwhile, Sen. Kirsten


The Cybersecurity 202: A bump in Washington-area cyber startups could bring new blood to government

firms that dot Silicon Valley. Investors injected $302 million into cybersecurity firms in the District, Virginia and Maryland in 2018 compared with $242 million in 2017 and just $208 million in 2015, according to the Strategic Cyber Ventures data. That’s a lot of new money for Washington, but nothing compared to California, where just two big cybersecurity companies, CrowdStrike and Tanium, took in $575 million in new venture capital funding in 2018, according to the data. Things look very different if you look at the broader cybersecurity industry, however. There’s a supply of about 91,000 cyber workers in the Washington and Baltimore metro areas compared with just about 29,000 between the Silicon Valley and San Francisco metro areas, according to a heat map maintained by the Commerce Department’s National Institute of Cybersecurity Education and several partners. The raw data for the Strategic Cyber Ventures post came from the research firm Pitchbook, which culls investment information from numerous sources, including self- reporting by companies. Government has tried in the past to mirror industry’s fast-paced tech and cyber sectors, especially the Defense Department, which launched a Silicon Valley outpost in 2015 called the Defense Innovation Unit. It’s been tougher, however, to lure private-sector talent from across the country into government. Yet cyber workers from consumer-focused VC-backed firms could bring useful experience and expertise to government, Chris Ahern, a principal at Strategic Cyber Ventures, told me. For example, a worker who’s used to designing cyber tools for the convenience-obsessed consumer market could be highly valuable to government, which is known for its often clunky and outdated computer systems, Ahern told me. “As the federal government builds out different cyber dashboards and operational tools, they’ll be able to produce things that are much more user-friendly,” he said. PINGED: The bad news continues to accumulate for Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, a company that U.S. officials have said could be a platform for Chinese spying. Federal prosecutors are conducting a criminal investigation of the company over alleged theft of trade secrets from American business partners The 2014 lawsuit alleged that while both companies were collaborating, Huawei employees sought information about a T-Mobile testing robot nicknamed “Tappy” and other technology, according to the Journal. “In one alleged instance, two Huawei employees slipped a third one into a testing lab to take unauthorized photos of the robot,” the Journal reported. “One employee also tried to hide the fingerlike


The next president must make climate change the top priority

the blueprint. I was also the first governor to use executive authority to cap carbon pollution from all its largest sources. And this year we are pursuing a comprehensive suite of policies to achieve 100 percent clean electricity, increase energy efficiency in old buildings and promote net-zero energy in new buildings, require clean fuels and zero-emission vehicles, and eliminate climate super-pollutants. Other states have been tremendous leaders in advancing climate solutions. The all-out national effort that we need can take some of its inspiration from strategies that have been pursued in our states. But to win a national mandate for action everywhere, we must nominate a candidate who will deploy clean energy and cut carbon pollution on the ambitious scale required, even if it means deferring other worthy goals. This will be hard. The oil companies, the big polluters and the climate deniers are incredibly powerful. They will do everything they can to protect their profits. But our next president must summon the full energies of our nation to realize what the science is demanding of us. We must strive to achieve net-zero carbon pollution by midcentury, create a 100 percent clean-energy grid, and deploy new strategies and massive investments to transition off fossil fuels and decarbonize transportation, buildings and industries. The reason I believe we are going to succeed in this — the reason I’m optimistic — is that this is a matter of character as much as it is a matter of science. This is an issue of the basic, fundamental character of the American people. And I know something about the American people. We are optimists, can-do people. We invent, we create, we build. We do not shy away from a challenge. This is our nature. Confronting climate change will require a full-scale mobilization — a national mission that must be led from the White House. This is the challenge we face and the choice facing American voters in 2020. Read more The Post’s View: More studies show terrible news for the climate. We should be alarmed. Post Opinions Staff: Here are 11 climate change policies to fight for in 2019 Larry Hogan and Ralph Northam: States can lead the way on climate change. Let’s get to work. Eugene Robinson: Climate change is real. Welcome to the new normal. The Post’s View: It’s time to face the inescapable truth: We’re running out of time on climate change