The Technology 202: Silicon Valley pans White House bias tool as a gimmick

on U.S. suppliers for wireless chips, antennas and handset operating software -- and the ban could weaken its ability to produce the latest equiptment. Huawei says the ban, which hasn’t yet taken effect, could threaten U.S. jobs. “This decision is in no one’s interest,” spokesman Chasen Skinner said in an email to my colleagues. “It will do significant economic harm to the American companies with which Huawei does business, affect tens of thousands of jobs, and disrupt the current collaboration and mutual trust that exist on the global supply chain.” Representatives for U.S. suppliers, who did not want to be identified, told my colleagues they were uncertain about the lasting impact of the Huawei ban on their operations. Those companies would have to apply to the government for special approval to continue supplying Huawei, Center for Strategic and International Studies adviser William Reinsch, a former Commerce Department official in the Clinton administration, told my colleagues. “That doesn’t mean every license would be denied, but it would be on a case-by-case basis,” he said. “It also gives the government an intelligence bonanza” in the form of a list of every U.S. supplier to Huawei. NIBBLES: Facebook said it shut down 265 fake accounts run by a social media company in Israel for "coordinated inauthentic behavior," signaling the increasingly global nature of social media disinformation, Facebook’s announcement was atypical because it singled out a company that appeared to profit from its disinformation efforts. Archimedes Group, the affected company, claims the ability to “use every tool and take every advantage available in order to change reality according to our client’s wishes.” The accounts were on Facebook and Instagram, which the social network also owns. Archimedes Group is banned from both services. “We’re taking down these Pages and accounts based on their behavior, not the content they posted,” said a post by Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of global cybersecurity policy. “As in other cases involving coordinated inauthentic behavior, the individuals behind this activity coordinated with one another to mislead others about who they were and what they were doing, and that was the basis for our action.” Archimedes Group maintained 65 Facebook accounts, 161 Facebook pages, 23 Facebook groups and four Instagram accounts. It also had posted 12 Facebook events. About 2.8 million accounts followed at least one of the pages set up by the Archimedes Group. Facebook said the company’s accounts bought $812,000


The U.S. sanctions a key organizer of the murder of Boris Nemtsov

On Thursday, the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control issued its long-awaited annual designations under the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012, otherwise known as the Magnitsky Act, a federal law that places travel and financial sanctions on those responsible for “gross human rights abuses” in Russia. The decision had been delayed by at least six months; the Magnitsky designations are normally issued in December. But the scope of the latest rollout has eclipsed any criticism of its timing. The designations target five Russian citizens, all of them linked to human rights violations under the terms of the Magnitsky Act — but one name stands out above others. Maj. Ruslan Geremeyev, an officer in the Russian Interior Ministry, a former deputy commander of the North Battalion, and a close confidant of Moscow’s viceroy in Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, has been sanctioned for his alleged role in organizing modern Russia’s most high-profile political assassination: the February 2015 killing of former deputy prime minister and opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, just a few hundred feet from the walls of the Kremlin. “We are focused on holding accountable those responsible for atrocious acts within Russia, including the extrajudicial killing of Boris Nemtsov,” Treasury Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Sigal Mandelker said as she announced the decision. The significance of Geremeyev’s designation is difficult to overstate. Not only is this the first instance of U.S. sanctions issued specifically over the assassination of Nemtsov. The Treasury’s designation makes official what the media and human rights groups have long taken as a given: that Russian government structures were intricately involved in the killing of President Vladimir Putin’s leading political opponent. If a key enforcer of the Kremlin-backed regional leader was a low-level organizer in the murder, then who was the ultimate mastermind? Even with the law’s tough legal requirements, it is not surprising that the U.S. government has met the standard of evidence needed to make the designation. Geremeyev had provided apartments and a car for the now-convicted perpetrators of Nemtsov’s assassination; he was seen with them on closed-circuit TV cameras the day before and two days after the murder; and, according to witness testimony, he behaved as their superior. So compelling was the evidence that, on two separate occasions, Russian investigators attempted to issue an indictment against Geremeyev — and both times were prevented from doing so by Gen. Alexander Bastrykin, Putin’s


Are the U.S. and China heading for a deal — or a divorce?

Treasurys, making it the largest single foreign holder of the government securities. As post-Mao China embarked on economic reforms starting in the late 1970s, U.S. presidents of both parties celebrated the potential gains for American companies and anticipated that Chinese political liberalization would follow. But under Xi, China has taken an authoritarian turn, while Trump has emphasized the need to resolve long-standing U.S. complaints about Chinese trade-secret theft and discrimination against foreign companies. Washington also now sees China much more as a strategic adversary than a potential partner, further encouraging advocates of decoupling. The Commerce Department action against Huawei capped years of U.S. government unease about the security implications of doing business with the company, the largest telecommunications equipment maker in the world. Both the Obama and Trump administrations worried that Huawei could engineer technological back doors in its equipment that would permit Chinese officials to spy on Americans or, in times of conflict, disrupt or paralyze critical U.S. networks. “Huawei is engaged in activities that are contrary to U.S. national security or foreign policy interest,” the Commerce Department said in announcing that it was adding the company and its affiliates to the “entity list.” As a result, any company that wants to sell American technology to Huawei must first obtain a government license — a requirement that threatens to sever the Chinese company’s U.S. supply lines. On Wall Street, investors broadly took the latest trade-war drama in stride, though companies that supply Huawei took a beating. The Dow Jones industrial average rose almost 215 points, or 0.8 percent, to close at 25,862.68. “The US-China economic relationship is too important — and has the potential to generate too much wealth — to be sacrificed for short-term protectionism,” Jim Glassman, head economist with JPMorgan Chase Commercial Banking, wrote Thursday in a research note. “Neither side would benefit from disrupting the flow of trade or reversing the integration of the global economy.” That may or may not be the Trump administration’s view. Over the past year, the administration has taken a number of steps to slow or reverse economic integration between the United States and China. The screening process for Chinese companies’ proposed U.S. investments has gotten tougher. New regulations to limit the export to China of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing and robotics are being drafted. And Washington is getting stingy with visas for Chinese academics, students and


Food as medicine: Doctors are prescribing broccoli and bananas alongside beta blockers

Adrienne Dove pulled up to the checkout line of the Giant grocery store in Southeast Washington with a cart filled with cabbage, bananas and bagged string beans. The register rang $20.60. Instead of cash or card, Dove paid with a Produce Rx voucher from the store pharmacy. The Giant in the most impoverished part of the District is the latest frontier in the “food as medicine” movement. Hospitals and local governments across the country have been writing and filling prescriptions for healthy food in an attempt to address the root causes of diabetes, hypertension and other costly illnesses. The federal farm bill that was passed late last year included more than $4 million in grants for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to distribute to governments that run prescription produce programs, but the money has not yet been distributed. The goal, backed by some research, is to improve health and reduce costs by subsidizing fresh produce such as broccoli and grapefruit in addition to insulin and beta blockers. “What we are hoping to find is there is a return on investment for the health-care system: a reduction in ER visits, medication compliance,” said Lauren Shweder Biel, executive director of DC Greens, a nonprofit group that is managing the District’s Produce Rx pilot. “That’s the holy grail for systems like this.” Improved diet is also a target. “I was trying to manage my patients’ diabetes and high blood pressure, but when they were telling me they were eating Top Ramen, doughnuts and bagels because it keeps them full, all I could say was ‘That’s too bad, here’s some more drugs,’ ” said Rita Nguyen of the San Francisco Department of Public Health, who now oversees an expanding produce prescription program at six clinics. In the nation’s capital, the Produce Rx program started last month and provides 500 Medicaid patients $20 weekly vouchers for produce at the Giant in Ward 8 through the end of the year. Ward 8 is the poorest, sickest part of the city and has the highest rates of death for diabetes and heart disease. It’s also a food desert, and the Giant is the only full-service grocery store. The Produce Rx program, which includes the costs of vouchers and evaluating patient outcomes, has received $500,000 from the District government and about $150,000 from AmeriHealth Caritas, a Medicaid-managed care organization. AmeriHealth Caritas patients are the only ones now eligible


One man’s crusade to help humans and bears coexist

for killing them.” The fence works pretty well, and Andrews is busy improving it when a grim discovery comes to light. Millie, who has two female cubs, has been shot: “Lead pellets struck her head-on, shattering the bridge of her nose and burying themselves in the skin around her eyes. In their wake came darkness and scalding pain. Tasting blood and seeing almost nothing, she ran blindly with the cubs at her heels.” Saving Millie, it soon becomes clear, is not possible. Her wounds will suppurate and be infected until she is in ceaseless pain and unable to spare a thought for her cubs; she has to be put down. The remainder of the book follows two efforts: to place Millie’s cubs in a zoo or comparable facility because, without their mother to teach them, they will never learn to live in the wild; and to identify the shooter (since grizzlies are a protected species, whoever wounded Millie committed a crime unless it was a case of self-defense). A leitmotif in “Down From the Mountain” is the disruption caused by climate change. An elderly rancher tells Andrews that spring now comes a month earlier than it did when he was young. And whitebark pine nuts, an oil-rich component of grizzlies’ diet, are scarce these days. Beetles that eat pine bark used to be held in check by early hard freezes, which killed larvae before they could produce the internal antifreeze that gets them through the winter. With hard freezes becoming increasingly rare, more larvae are growing into adult beetles that systematically eat bark, girdling and killing the trees, “turning whole slopes from green to red.” Andrews writes precise and evocative prose. Setting the scene early in the book, he compares certain parts of “Montana’s western rampart” to coastal Washington state. “This lush, plentiful inflection is nowhere stronger than in the Mission Valley, where cattails choke the sloughs and fruit trees sprout unbidden. In the mountains grow healthy, if isolated, groves of red cedar. Bracken ferns sprout in the shelter of their boughs, rising plumelike from the duff.” Later, while viewing footage from a trail camera that shows what the doomed Millie looks like after being shot, he laments “the ruined geometry of her face.” At times Andrews admits to being discouraged. “If one person in a hundred leaves corn, chicken coops, or garbage cans unprotected, then takes a potshot at


Hogan administration seeks input from transit groups on plan to widen Beltway

MARYLAND Hogan seeks input from transit groups Republican Gov. Larry Hogan’s administration is seeking input from transit advocates as it tries to move forward with a controversial plan to use toll lanes to widen the Capital Beltway and Interstate 270. The Managed Lanes Transit Workgroup — which includes officials from eight local transit organizations, including Metro — will discuss how easing congestion on those overloaded arteries could ultimately connect transit riders with more options, the Maryland Department of Transportation said Friday. The group’s inception follows public meetings in which expansion opponents criticized the project for potentially razing homes and not doing enough to prevent cars from clogging the road again. — Erin Cox Second swastika found in Montgomery school Education officials in suburban Maryland said Friday they are investigating an incident involving a swastika drawn in a boys’ restroom — the second hate symbol discovered this week at Silver Creek Middle School in Montgomery County. The image found Friday was again etched in pencil on a wall, and for a second time school leaders called police and central-office administrators, officials said. Building services staff quickly removed it. School administrators will meet with parent representatives and central-office staff of the Kensington school Monday to create a plan to address the issue, Principal Traci Townsend wrote in a letter to parents. “As we wrap up the school year, it is critical to ensure that our students are educated about and understand the hurtful impact of anti-Semitic and racist images and words,” Townsend wrote. “Our goal is to bring our community together, to address the issue, and not allow these hateful acts to divide us.” — Donna St. George THE REGION Names sought for Potomac dolphins An environmental and research group is asking the public to help name two dolphins living in the Potomac River. The dolphins, known as D1 and D2, are believed to be mature adults. Officials with the Potomac Conservancy said roughly 1,000 dolphins have been identified swimming in the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay. The deadline for the naming contest, which is being run by the Potomac-Chesapeake Dolphin Project, is May 24. — Dana Hedgpeth


A credit card interest cap could actually jeopardize benefits to Americans

IN 1978, the Supreme Court essentially gutted all state usury laws, freeing interest rates and sparking a credit card boom. Around that time, 38 percent of U.S. households had a credit card; as of 2014, 71 percent did, according to WalletHub . Total revolving debt rose from $48 billion — 2 percent of gross domestic product — in 1978 to $1 trillion — about 5 percent of GDP — today. The first thing to understand about the new 15 percent credit card interest cap proposal from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) is that it would reverse this court ruling, effectively substituting a federal usury law for the previous state ones — and would authorize states to set their own caps lower than the federal one. Therefore, it would also reverse the 1978 ruling’s consequences, both the ones consumers dislike (higher rates for consumer credit) and the ones they do like (greater access to credit cards), although, to be sure, the precise magnitude of these effects is unknowable. The Sanders-Ocasio-Cortez bill posits that the costs to consumers of the 1978 ruling have outweighed the benefits — that banks exploit market power to charge exorbitant interest rates that reached a recent median of 21.36 percent (on 100 popular cards), up from 12.62 percent about a decade ago, according to CreditCards.com. This, combined with a banker-backed 2005 law that made it harder for distressed debtors to liquidate debt in personal bankruptcy, has created “debt traps” for working people, as Ms. Ocasio-Cortez puts it. No doubt credit card issuers are driven by profit, not compassion; equally undoubtedly, thousands of Americans have gotten in over their heads with high-interest, revolving credit card debt. But does mitigating these risks justify jeopardizing the benefits of the credit card boom — such as convenience, rewards programs and increased liquidity — for millions of households, probably the majority, who manage debt well? The answer is less clear than the bill’s sponsors claim. For big banks, the credit card business is indeed more profitable than others; yet much of the large spread between their cost of funds and interest rates they charge reflects overhead, including such costs as managing billions of transactions and covering unsecured losses. Meanwhile, only 2.5 percent of customers are delinquent on their cards, well below historical rates. Mr. Sanders and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez tout cards issued by nonprofit credit unions, whose rates are


Changing face of America will test housing market

expenses like the mortgage. Yet mortgage underwriting rules typically only consider the income of the person who is named on the mortgage. Hispanic borrowers tend to be self-employed. Yet mortgage underwriting rules remain challenging for those who don’t collect a regular paycheck from a full-time employer. And Hispanics on average use cash more than credit when making purchases. Yet mortgage underwriting relies heavily on credit history to assess future credit worthiness. Because of the disconnect between how Hispanic households manage their finances and how the rules of underwriting work, mortgage lenders consistently fail to accurately assess the credit risk of a large number of Hispanic borrowers. And the result is as one would expect: only 47 percent of Hispanics own a home, compared with the non-Hispanic homeownership rate of almost 68 percent. Why does that matter? It matters because too many Hispanics are missing out on homeownership, one of the primary vehicles of economic and social mobility in this country. Through the simple act of paying down their mortgage each month, Americans have long been able to build the wealth needed to climb into the middle class. Indeed, for many working-class families, which are often less comfortable investing in the stock market, homeownership has been their primary means of building wealth.It is not surprising the median net worth of a homeowner is 44 times that of a renter, according to a 2017 Federal Reserve report. If the mortgage market doesn’t figure out a way to serve the Hispanic community substantially better, the nation as a whole will bear significant economic consequences. If homeownership rates across ethnic groups were to remain what they are today, then over the next 40 years the national homeownership rate would decline to a rate not seen since the years following World War II. This would in turn mean a drop in the broader economic and social benefits that flow from homeownership: less labor force participation, less productivity and less of the social and economic investment that a family so often makes in their home and community when they become homeowners. Not only would this be economically and socially disruptive, but it would be a significant lost opportunity, as the Hispanic community is fast becoming one of the nation’s most powerful economic engines. While the number of businesses in the United States declined in the years following the financial crisis, the number of Latino-owned businesses grew


Trump administration pulls $929 million from California high-speed-rail project

your agency — or the taxpayers — might benefit from partially constructed assets sitting stranded in the Central Valley of California … one of the nation’s most economically distressed regions,” Kelly wrote. “This infrastructure legacy would forever be a travesty.” Kelly said that Newsom was seeking “a pragmatic approach to using the funding now committed to this project to get high-speed trains on the ground in California as soon as possible.” That means first finishing “an early high-speed rail link” between Merced and Bakersfield in the central valley, continuing regional projects in the north and south of the state, and securing environmental clearances for “segments from San Francisco to Los Angeles/Anaheim,” Kelly said. But on Thursday, a statement from the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) said “California has abandoned its original vision of a high-speed passenger rail service connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles, which was essential to its applications for” federal grant money. In a letter to California officials, FRA Administrator Ronald L. Batory said the state had originally proposed an “800-mile, statewide system” with speeds up to 220 miles per hour “connecting the Bay Area, the Central Valley, Sacramento, and Southern California.” Batory said the first phase, as described by California rail officials when they applied for federal funds, was to involve “the construction of approximately 520 miles between San Francisco and Anaheim, connecting two metropolitan regions and more than 25 million people.” Now, the inaugural stretch would be between Merced and Bakersfield. That “dramatically reduced scope … is simply not consistent” with what California originally promised, Batory said. He also said California “was plainly unable, and, even if it were able, appeared unwilling, to comply with the required amounts and timelines for the State contribution required” by its federal commitments. The Trump administration has sent mixed messages on the value of high-speed rail, and of rail generally. In the first weeks of his administration, echoing campaign rhetoric about plans for far-reaching infrastructure spending, Trump seemed to bemoan the fact that America lacked high-speed rail lines. At a White House meeting with aviation industry executives, Trump noted that China and Japan “have fast trains all over the place. We don’t have one. I don’t want to compete with your business — but we don’t have one fast train.” But Trump’s budget proposals have called for cutting money for rail and transit projects as well as federal backing for Amtrak.


Olympian Allyson Felix tells Congress of racial disparities in maternal mortality

swelling feet, Felix hadn’t experienced anything abnormal during her pregnancy. But then the doctor stepped out of the office. “Those moments sitting in her office alone felt like one of those moments in life that are full of anxious anticipation,” Felix told the committee. “One of those moments that people describe as time standing still. … Those few moments lasted an eternity.” Felix was told she needed to go to the hospital. She explained that she first had to tend to an ESPN photo shoot, but the doctor told her not to wait. At the hospital, doctors explained that both Felix and her daughter were both at risk, and she was stunned. “Mothers don’t die from childbirth, right? Not in 2019,” she said, “not professional athletes, not at one of the best hospitals in the country, and certainly not to women who have a birthing plan and a birthing suite lined up. I thought maternal health was solely about fitness, resources and care. If that was true, then why was this happening to me?” Camryn was born about 10 hours later and had to spend the next month in a newborn intensive care unit. Felix has since learned that she’s not alone, that African American women face pregnancy complications at much higher rates, that some 50,000 American women will experience a life-threatening condition related to childbirth or pregnancy and that figure is increasing, and that African American women are nearly three times more likely to die from complications than white women. “I was not aware that I was more at risk,” Felix told the committee. “I think that says a lot. It’s not really talked about … but it is a real issue. I think had I been more aware, maybe I would’ve had better questions to ask. Maybe when I first saw my swollen feet, I would’ve rushed in.” Camryn is nearly 6 months old, and Felix has resumed her running career. She is training for next summer’s Tokyo Games, which would mark her fifth Olympics. She plans to compete at the U.S. championships this July in Des Moines, most likely in the 400 meters. A top-three showing would qualify her for the world championships, which begin in September in Doha, Qatar. Regardless of her future track performances, Felix says she wants to use her platform to raise awareness on the risks and dangers faced by African American women


An alleged war criminal is on trial. He might have been your Uber or Lyft driver.

assist law enforcement if they choose to investigate, said Campbell Matthews, a spokeswoman for Lyft. Ali, who was known in Somalia as “Colonel Tukeh,” was able to pass background checks because he has faced no criminal charges in the United States. No criminal court has jurisdiction to try him, CNN reported. Checkr, a consumer reporting agency, performs background checks for Uber and Lyft. The agency looks for information about where each applicant has lived, worked or encountered law enforcement, according to Checkr’s website. The search includes sex-offender databases, global watch lists and a national criminal database. “Under federal law, consumer reporting agencies that process background checks rely on criminal records that have been filed in a court of law rather than unverified sources like Google search results,” David Patterson, a spokesman for Checkr, said in a statement. “Most employers don’t request background checks that include civil lawsuits between private parties because the information is too subjective to use for a hiring decision.” Warfaa alleges in his lawsuit that he is a member of Somalia’s Isaaq clan, which in the 1980s established an opposition force to Mohamed Siad Barre’s military-controlled government. Warfaa, then 17, was working as a farmer in the village of Jifo Uray in December 1987 when Ali called a public meeting there and accused the opposition group of stealing a water tanker, Warfaa claims. Ali threatened to kill everyone in the village if the tanker was not returned, the lawsuit alleges. Warfaa says he and other men were brought to the headquarters of the army’s 5th Brigade a few days later and detained. He says soldiers twice brought him to Ali’s office, where his hands and feet were chained while Ali interrogated him about the missing water tanker. Ali was also in the room while Warfaa was tortured at least nine times, the lawsuit says. Warfaa claims soldiers sometimes tilted his body into an excruciatingly painful shape that was meant to look like the wings of the army’s MiG aircraft. The soldiers also took his clothing and kicked him repeatedly in the head, Warfaa says. In March 1988, Warfaa alleges, Ali shot him in the wrist and leg at least five times while the opposition force attacked the brigade’s headquarters. When Warfaa collapsed unconscious, he claims, Ali told his bodyguards to bury Warfaa. The bodyguards, however, let Warfaa go free in exchange for a bribe from Warfaa’s family,


A mystery illness killed a boy in 1969. Years later, doctors believed they’d learned what it was: AIDS.

known death from a strain of the human immunodeficiency virus, HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. “Every time this date comes around, I think about this young man and the hell he went through,” said Memory Elvin-Lewis, a microbiologist who was central to the case. “It’s burned in my brain.” For some, the assertion that Rayford died of AIDS may never be fully proved. Anthony Fauci, a renowned AIDS expert and head of infectious-disease research at the National Institutes of Health, said the inferior state of antibody tests at the time make the case of Robert R. both fascinating and frustrating. “It certainly could be true, and may even be likely that it’s true,” Fauci said, “but the absolute nailed-down proof isn’t there.” Robert was already struggling when he arrived at St. Louis’s City Hospital in late 1968. Then 15, the boy was suffering from swollen legs and genitals, fatigue and hemorrhoids. But according to doctors at the time and journalists who went back over the case years later, neither Rayford nor his family were very forthcoming with information. “He would never say a word to me,” said Elvin-Lewis, now 85 and still working. The uncommunicative Rayford might have had a mental disability, doctors said later. When they found he had chlamydia, a sexually transmitted bacterial infection, he dodged questions about his sexual activity or would say only that he had been with a neighborhood girl. But there was physical evidence he had engaged in homosexual activity, willingly or not. More frustrating, his doctors couldn’t come up with a clear diagnosis, and none of their treatments worked. Over 15 months, he was moved twice to other hospitals and his case attracted several specialists. One of them was Elvin-Lewis, a newly hired microbiologist at Washington University Dental School with an expertise in chlamydia. She was surprised to find the infection spread through Rayford’s body in a way she had never seen. And yet, the boy’s own defenses were barely fighting the bacteria. His immune system seemed strangely inert. Three months after turning 16, Rayford died of pneumonia. The mystery only grew when the autopsy revealed numerous internal lesions known as Kaposi’s sarcoma, which were almost unheard of in a black teenager. Elvin-Lewis and a lymphologist named Marlys Witte, who didn’t respond to a request for an interview, had tissue samples gathered and preserved in sucrose-potassium glutamate in the hopes that medical


Ireland and Britain declare climate emergencies, but will it make a difference?

BERLIN — Ireland became the second country on Thursday to declare a climate emergency, following Britain’s lead earlier this month. The measures come amid global youth protests demanding more climate action and as researchers fear that 1 million species may be on the brink of extinction because of human activity. In a declaration passed unanimously Thursday without a vote by the Irish Parliament, lawmakers also stressed threats to biodiversity, which researchers say have ripple effects on humans who depend on the global food chain. Both the Irish and British declarations are largely symbolic and do not force governments to take specific actions to increase biodiversity or pursue more emissions cuts than previously planned. Opposition Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, who supported the move, warned that “declaring an emergency means absolutely nothing unless there is action to back it up. That means the Government having to do things they don’t want to do.” Earlier this month, British Labour Party opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn took a more positive stance and celebrated Britain’s declaration, saying: “This can set off a wave of action from parliaments and governments around the globe.” Corbyn also lashed out at President Trump, who has withdrawn the United States from the Paris climate agreement. “We pledge to work as closely as possible with countries that are serious about ending the climate catastrophe and make clear to U.S. President Donald Trump that he cannot ignore international agreements and action on the climate crisis,” Corbyn said. French President Emmanuel Macron said last year that he would not negotiate trade deals with countries that did not comply with the agreement, which would include the United States. But overall, the European Union has been split over whether to pursue tougher goals to limit the impact of climate change, with countries such as the Netherlands or Portugal arguing in favor. But other nations — especially in Central or Eastern Europe where unemployment is higher and economic growth weaker — have soured on the idea of further joint measures. The fault lines have not only run between countries but also within. In France, protesters forced Macron to reverse taxes designed to decrease carbon emissions in recent months. Meanwhile, Europe’s largest economy, Germany, has been preoccupied with shutting down its nuclear power plants since the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, which has resulted in a revival of coal energy there. Researchers’ climate change models predict


Warming oceans have created a golden age for big-wave surfing, leaving surfers conflicted

experience the world that I’ve been able to grow up in, underneath and above with the ocean, because it’s all so beautiful and powerful.” A wave that crashes on Maui’s northern shore typically originates more than 2,000 miles away in the north Pacific, near the Aleutian Islands. Storms there swirl, and the wind energy is transferred to the ocean surface. A swell ripples across the ocean, often traveling at 30 mph or more and arriving three to five days later at the Hawaiian Islands, where surfers bob in the water waiting for the perfect ride. As it nears the shore, the swell experiences friction along the sea floor, which John Marra, the Honolulu-based regional climate services director for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, likens to tripping. “They’re hitting the reef or a knob of rocks and just turning over,” he said. Scientists have been studying each of these delicate, interconnected parts to understand the impact climate change will have on waves. The warming ocean affects wind patterns. The wind drives swells. The reef trips the swell and creates the waves that make surfers pop up onto their boards. The historical data is somewhat limited, and because the ocean is vast, complex and varying, there isn’t a consensus on the changes that are afoot. Nothing will be universal across the globe, and while some areas might see smaller waves, others — particularly those at high latitudes — could see more pronounced effects. A study published this year from University of California Santa Cruz researchers spelled it out simply, saying the warming ocean is “changing the global wave climate, making waves stronger.” The study noted that wave power — the transfer of energy from wind to sea — increased by an average of 0.47 percent per year from 1948 to 2008 and has risen by 2.3 percent annually since 1994. The researchers further estimated that global wave power could increase anywhere from 32 to 122 percent this century, which could produce wave heights that grow 16 to 48 percent. A 2014 study by Canadian scientists projected increases in wave heights for about 50 percent of the Earth’s oceans and found that the one-in-10-year extreme wave heights could double or triple in frequency this century. “From a big-wave surfer’s perspective, we are entering sort of a golden age,” explained Mark Sponsler, the respected surf forecaster who founded the site stormsurf.com, “in the


SpaceX is suing the government once again, but the reason is a secret

Elon Musk’s SpaceX is suing the federal government again. But this time, it wants its protest of a government contract to stay under seal, meaning its allegations would not become public. In a motion filed with the Court of Federal Claims on Friday, the company said the privacy was necessary because the suit contains “confidential and proprietary information and source selection information not appropriate for release to the public.” SpaceX also filed its complaint against the government, with multiple exhibits attached, under seal. Whether the complaint and other documents remain under seal will be up to the court. The Court of Federal Claims hears suits against the federal government including bid protests and contract claims. It was not clear from the filing what government procurement program the company is gearing up to challenge, but it comes as the Air Force is getting ready to award major launch contracts potentially worth billions of dollars to two companies. Last year, SpaceX lost out on an initial round of funding the Air Force awarded to help companies develop their rockets to meet the strict requirements of launching national security satellites. Musk said the company had submitted a bid for that contract, but its proposal “missed the mark,” according to a Pentagon review. While SpaceX lost out on the funding, three of it competitors — the United Launch Alliance (ULA), Northrop Grumman and Blue Origin — shared more than $2 billion for their rockets. SpaceX did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The court filing was first reported by GeekWire. The Air Force is expected to pick two companies next year that would split Pentagon launches. But that procurement has already touched off a political battle in Washington. Since it lost on the early round of funding, SpaceX had been concerned that it would be at a disadvantage when it came time to choose the two providers. Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, meanwhile, has been lobbying the Pentagon and members of Congress to slow down the procurement since its rocket won’t be ready to fly by next year. (Bezos owns The Washington Post.) SpaceX has sued the government over procurements multiple times in the past. In 2014, it sued the Air Force over the last round of military launch contracts, saying it should be allowed to compete against ULA, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing, that held a monopoly on the


Tyreke Evans dismissed from NBA for violation of league’s drug policy

The NBA announced Friday that Indiana Pacers guard Tyreke Evans has been “dismissed and disqualified” for at least two years after he violated the terms of the league’s anti-drug policy. Per league rules, the NBA, the Pacers and the National Basketball Players Association are not allowed to disclose information surrounding the ban, other than to announce it. The nature and length of Evans’s ban applies to “drugs of abuse” rather than marijuana or a first-time performance-enhancing drugs violation. Included on the NBA’s “drugs of abuse” list are cocaine, heroin, codeine, methamphetamine, LSD and painkillers such as OxyContin and Percocet. “We take these matters seriously and will reach out to Tyreke to offer our support,” the Pacers said in a statement. Evans, 29, endured a down season in 2018-19, averaging 10.2 points, 2.9 rebounds and 2.4 assists. The 2010 rookie of the year, who has played for four teams in the past three seasons, posted career lows in scoring, rebounding, field-goal percentage and player efficiency rating. The Pacers suspended Evans for one game in October as punishment for being late to practice, and he missed time in March for what the team called “personal reasons.” After winning 48 games, Indiana was eliminated by the Boston Celtics in the first round of this year’s playoffs. The NBA’s rigorous anti-drug policies will require Evans to clear numerous hurdles to return to the court. He won’t be eligible for reinstatement until 2021, and both the NBA and the National Basketball Players Association must sign off on his return. Those parties will weigh a number of factors, including the circumstances around his initial ban, his behavior during the ban, and whether he has received treatment. Evans also must prove he hasn’t failed a marijuana or other drug tests for at least a year before applying for reinstatement. Former Milwaukee Bucks guard O.J. Mayo received a similar ban in 2016. Despite making a significant comeback effort, the 31-year-old Mayo has yet to return to the NBA. Chris Anderson, however, engineered a successful return. The longtime center was issued a two-year in 2006, at the age of 27, but was later reinstated in 2008. He went on to win a title with the 2013 Miami Heat and continued playing until 2017, when he retired at 38. Evans, the No. 4 pick in the 2009 draft, just completed a one-year, $12.4-million contract with the Pacers and was set


Trump dishonors the military he claims to love

a flower-print hijab and an unarmed old man with his sniper’s rifle, and that he stabbed to death a captured, wounded Islamic State fighter who appeared to be about 15 years old. — Army Maj. Mathew L. Golsteyn. He is accused of murder for killing an Afghan prisoner who was a suspected bomb maker. According to prosecutors, Golsteyn and two other soldiers then disposed of the body in a burn pit. Golsteyn admitted to the killing on television but claims it was justified. — Nicholas A. Slatten. He is an Army veteran who was found guilty of first-degree murder for his actions as a contractor in Iraq in 2007: He and other Blackwater contractors opened fire in a crowded square in Baghdad, killing 14 unarmed Iraqi civilians, including 10 women and two children. — Four Marines who were found guilty of dereliction of duty after they were videotaped urinating on the corpses of dead Taliban fighters. Obviously, the severity of these offenses varies greatly — from the relatively minor (the urination) to the horrifying crimes of which Gallagher is accused. What all these cases have in common is that the military chain of command thought it was imperative to bring charges to maintain good order and discipline, while right-wing commentators have rallied to the defense of the accused. Guess which side Trump is on? Having no honor of his own, Trump doesn’t understand the importance of Mattis’s injunction to keep one’s honor clean — to maintain the thin line that separates professional, disciplined soldiers from the Mongol hordes of the 13th century or the German SS. Trump is telling the troops: Don’t listen to your superiors. Ignore the rules of engagement. Feel free to commit atrocities in the expectation of a presidential pardon. There is no more corrosive message a commander in chief could send, which is why so many veterans who served honorably are so appalled by what Trump is doing. If Congress had any honor of its own, Trump’s incitement of unlawful behavior by the troops under his command would be yet another count in the articles of impeachment against him. Read more: Waitman Wade Beorn: I led a platoon in Iraq. Trump is wrong to pardon war criminals. Max Boot: Trump shows his contempt for the men and women in uniform David Von Drehle: Trump loved to call Mattis ‘Mad Dog.’ But this nickname fits him more.


Maryland’s small colleges saw the future, and it was bleak. Now, they’re selling liberal arts with a twist.

Teaching and an associate professor of biology at Goucher. Because employers seek workers who can operate in teams, the college requires students to work collaboratively at times. In Bowen’s mind, the college has not left behind its commitment to the liberal arts, only made its curriculum more engaging and relevant to students such as Olivia Baud, a senior international relations and Spanish major. She took the beginning Integrative Data Analytics class and said she appreciated learning math that could be useful in her future. “Learning how to properly analyze information and working with data in a real-world context has been important,” she said. Not all of the changes have gone well. Senior Julian Fernandez said some students from his year were in the middle of college when a new set of criteria for graduation were introduced. That made it confusing for students trying to figure out which courses were needed to complete the diploma. Today’s seniors had the choice of sticking with the former graduation requirements or moving to the new ones. St. John’s College in Annapolis, a tiny institution with two campuses, wasn’t going to change its curriculum, which is dedicated to teaching the classics. So it took another bold approach, dropping its tuition from $52,000 a year to $35,000. “We just took a look at what the future was going to look like. Things had gotten out of control, and we had to do something about it,” said Carol Carpenter, vice president for communications. “We don’t believe American families can pay the sticker price.” St. John’s leadership believes that small colleges can no longer rely on tuition dollars to keep them afloat. Instead, colleges will have to rely on philanthropy, Carpenter said. St. John’s has used its tuition drop to launch a capital campaign that has so far raised $200 million toward its goal of $300 million. A year after cutting tuition costs, applications are up 13 percent and the percentage of admitted students who are committed to attending has risen as well. St. John’s decision came, Carpenter said, after college leaders saw the results of a survey published in the Chronicle of Higher Education that showed that 60 percent of parents were unaware that most four-year private colleges discount their published price so that incoming freshmen pay far less. Some families — particularly those with children who would be first-generation college students — have less experiences and


A Montgomery developer has a plan to ease traffic on I-270: Build a monorail

with lawmakers, mayors and business leaders. He said his company owns property across the Washington region but nothing that would benefit financially from a monorail station. As a Potomac resident and Montgomery native, he said, he simply believes monorail has been “overlooked” and “discounted” as a way to help the region out of its traffic mess. “This doesn’t make me any money,” Eisinger said. “I’ve spent a ton of money on this.” Even as Eisinger points to examples of extensive monorail lines in other parts of the world, including Brazil and China, the technology has not won widespread support among U.S. transportation planners. Most monorails in the United States carry travelers in short loops around amusement parks or between airport terminals. The most well-known systems are the privately funded lines linking Disney World resorts and Las Vegas casinos. Seattle also operates a one-mile monorail built for the 1962 World’s Fair. Transit experts say monorail hasn’t caught on in the United States for several reasons. Its primary benefit is being elevated, which gives it a smaller footprint and saves the high costs of building bridges or tunnels to separate trains from cars. But far fewer companies make and service equipment for the systems than for more traditional light-rail or heavy-rail subways, experts say, which would leave governments with few competitive options for service and parts long-term. They are also seen as less flexible because monorail trains require highly precise equipment to switch tracks. “The idea does come up, but it hasn’t gained traction,” said Art Guzzetti, a vice president of the American Public Transportation Association. Paul Lewis, a vice president for the nonpartisan Eno Center For Transportation, said monorail systems, particularly the stations, often are expensive to build. Moreover, he said, connecting monorail to Metro would require passengers to switch trains, which would reduce ridership by adding time and inconvenience to their trips. By the time commuters drove to a monorail station, parked, rode the monorail and Metro, and then walked or took a bus to their final destination, he said, it might be far more convenient and even faster to drive, especially if they could use express toll lanes. Lewis also suspects it would be “way more cost effective” to expand MARC commuter rail or bus service, particularly buses in the express toll lanes. Transportation planners “consistently write off monorail not as a goofy idea for theme parks, but because


Noseda and the NSO rise to ‘Unexpected’ challenge at Carnegie Hall

NEW YORK — It takes lot of different things to be a star musician, and one of the least discussed is the ability to come through when the stakes are high. Gianandrea Noseda, the music director of the National Symphony Orchestra, has this ability in abundance. He seems to thrive in demanding situations: premieres at the Metropolitan Opera; performances at Carnegie Hall. On Sunday, his Carnegie Hall performance was with the NSO — after not quite two seasons as music director, a chance to show New York what he was up to. It wasn’t planned to happen quite this way. Originally announced for this May afternoon was a touring concert production of Verdi’s too-little-known opera “I Vespri Siciliani” with the forces of the Teatro Regio in Turin, Italy, where Noseda was music director for 11 years. But the downsides of European state subsidies for opera houses made themselves felt last April when a political decision led to the departure of Noseda’s boss, the cancellation of the “Vespri” tour and, finally, Noseda’s resignation. And since Noseda and the NSO had already planned a mini-festival called “Unexpected Italy” for this spring, featuring offbeat Italian pieces or pieces with unusual Italian connections, they were able to fill the empty Carnegie Hall date with the first program — Liszt’s “Dante” symphony and Rossini’s “Stabat Mater” — which opened at the Kennedy Center on Thursday night and traveled to New York on Sunday. It has been a while since the NSO awakened so much eager expectation in New York. Although among the best-paid orchestras in the country, it has not been particularly highly regarded artistically. When it last played in the hall, in 2013, it was under Christoph Eschenbach, who is both familiar and controversial. (Some find him brilliant, others are left cold.) Noseda, by contrast, is extremely popular in New York, and his appearances are relatively rare; the hall was strikingly full, and the audience was enraptured. Let’s be fair — they were enraptured Thursday night at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall as well. Noseda is a born conductor of opera and vocal music, and the “Stabat Mater” is right in his wheelhouse. But New York felt like a bigger deal for everybody. How much change can a music director create in an orchestra? There’s no simple answer. Cosmetically, quite a bit: In his two seasons with the orchestra, Noseda has already overseen the


NFL and NBA players were not impressed with the ‘Game of Thrones’ finale

season is A-- CHEEKS.” “I went into this episode knowing it was going to be bad,” added the forward. “I didn’t know it could become this bad. This is next level a--ery.” The episode wasn’t even over before free agent wide receiver Dez Bryant began to complain about it, tweeting, “I’m really upset about game [of] thrones right now!!!!!” He followed that with, “The way Jon snow is going out is very very very very very very lame!!!!!!” To a Twitter user who said of the show’s producers that “they ruined a great story in 6 episodes,” Bryant wholeheartedly agreed. “Man I 100000000000% AGREE WITH YOU!!!!!!!!” he tweeted, and he retweeted another person who griped, “Stupidest episode was the last episode of course. I want EIGHT YEARS of my life back.” Bryant wasn’t the only NFL player expressing some issues with the handling of Jon Snow, a.k.a. Aegon Targaryen, who had the clearest claim to the Iron Throne (or, as it became, the Molten Puddle) but who was exiled up North with nary a peep about his regal heritage. “Jon Snow deserved better! Us as fans deserved better!” tweeted Detroit Lions cornerback Quandre Diggs. When he asked, “And didn’t nobody mention that Jon really the king?” Chiefs linebacker Darron Lee replied, “My whole point exactly! Why even reveal it on the show if it didn’t matter anyway?” For the Sacramento Kings’ Buddy Hield, “GoT” would have been better off just ending with Arya’s assassination of the Night King. “Episode 3 should have been the last one,” he tweeted. At least some athletes did, in fact, stick up for the show, including Malcolm Miller of the Toronto Raptors, who must have wasted very little time catching up after his team defeated the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals. That contest went to double overtime and didn’t end until well after the “GoT” finale began airing, but Miller — who didn’t get any playing time in the game — was able to hop on Twitter late Sunday night to ask, “Oh y’all wanted some happy ending? Have you learned nothing watching this show all this time?” Read more: Kawhi Leonard’s Raptors cheated death in double OT, but have they found a winning formula? Thomas Boswell: For the Nationals, things can’t get much worse and should soon tick up Cleveland Marathon runner, 22, dies after collapsing near finish line


Sprinter Dutee Chand is India’s first openly gay athlete

Chand’s family have not accepted her news. “My eldest sister feels that my partner is interested in my property,” she said. “She has told me that she will send me to jail for having this relationship.” Chand’s announcement was, according to one observer, “huge” for the country. Payoshni Mitra, an Indian researcher who is an advocate focusing on gender issues in sports, tweeted that she had “always been proud” of Chand and “admired her courage.” She added, “It is not easy to come out in certain societies. This is huge for India!” A year after she became the first Indian sprinter to reach the final at a global athletics event, Chand was banned from competition by the Athletics Federation of India in 2014 after tests showed that her natural testosterone level was above those set for women by the International Association of Athletics Federations, the governing body of track and field. She was banned for a year and told that she could return to the national team if she lowered her testosterone level. She refused and alleged in an appeal before the Court of Arbitration for Sport that the policy was discriminatory. The court struck down the rule in 2015, saying that science had not determined natural testosterone’s role in athletics. Chand began competing again and won silver medals in the 100- and 200-meter races at the Asian Games last year. A new IAAF rule, however, shows that gender remains an unsettled issue in athletics and earlier this month, the court dismissed an appeal by Caster Semenya, a two-time Olympic champion runner from South Africa who is believed to have an intersex condition that causes her body to naturally produce testosterone at levels much higher than most women. By a 2-1 vote, the three-judge panel agreed that IAAF rules are discriminatory in nature, “but the majority of the Panel found that, on the basis of the evidence submitted by the parties, such discrimination is a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of achieving the IAAF’s aim of preserving the integrity of female athletics,” the court said in its executive summary. Chand is presently training for the World Championships and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Read more from The Post: Court decides against Caster Semenya’s appeal of controversial rule Jerry Brewer: Caster Semenya ruling shows how far we have to go in understanding gender South African track body will appeal Caster Semenya ruling


Washington Post Publisher and CEO Fred Ryan delivers Wake Forest University’s commencement address

initially been hailed worldwide as a reformer, but quickly revealed himself to be anything but. Under his influence, Saudi Arabia has created a humanitarian disaster in Yemen, imprisoned and brutalized women simply for demanding the right to drive, and unleashed a reign of terror upon the Saudi people. Like any good journalist, Jamal Khashoggi was committed to telling the truth—including the truth about these abuses. But his courage came at a cost. Last fall, Jamal was brutally murdered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul by trained assassins acting on orders of the crown prince. Today, we should ask ourselves what Jamal’s killing means for the rest of us, and how we can respond. First, we can commit to paying attention to stories like Jamal’s and never turning a blind eye to abuses of press freedom. Because even when threats to journalists happen far away, they end up affecting us at home. To make important decisions, we need accurate information not only about our own countries, but also from abroad. In this way, an attack on a journalist anywhere is an assault on liberty everywhere. Above all, Jamal’s story should remind us of the power of the truth. It is so powerful that people will kill to keep it hidden. It is so powerful that people like Jamal Khashoggi will give their lives in order to bring it to light. During your years at Wake Forest, you’ve embraced the motto “Pro Humanitate”—for humanity. In countless ways, you’ve lived out this calling, and I know many of you leave here committed to bettering yourselves so that you can better the lives of others. Exactly how this unfolds will be unique to each of you. You’ll fulfill this mission in different regions of the country and different parts of the world. In pursuit of this calling, you’ll follow a wide variety of personal goals and professional paths. But allow me to offer some advice that will apply to all of you, everywhere—whether you become a journalist, teacher, lawyer, doctor, artist, consultant, or entrepreneur. And that is: Embrace your role as a seeker and a steward of the truth. Always explore for new facts and new perspectives. Go to trusted news sources for the information that is most important to you. Be skeptical of information that seems too good to be true. When speaking of others, especially if you’re attributing motives, use sensitivity and


How a trip to the grocery store changed my relationship with my teenagers

“We’re out of sandwich bags. Again!” my 17-year-old huffed with the amount of exasperation one might reserve for an issue far more troubling than swaddling ham and cheese on wheat bread inside foil or plastic wrap. “We don’t have any good snacks either,” his 13-year-old brother added. He didn’t mean a piece of fruit or yogurt. He was referring to the kind of treat that listed sugar as its top ingredient, or a salty wonder that left a coating of neon orange dust on his fingers. With an alarming frequency, these complaints, grumbled amid a cacophony of drawers closed with a bang and pantry and refrigerator doors slammed shut, had become the soundtrack to my first waking moments. Friends and neighbors told me I should be grateful my boys were fixing their own breakfasts and lunches, allowing me to enjoy another 15 minutes of sleep, but these crack-of-dawn skirmishes were exhausting — and undeserved. I hadn’t stopped grocery shopping. For years, I’d been doing the bulk of it, which, for a family of five, sometimes involved one large shop and two smaller visits for milk, bread, fruit, and vegetables per week. My husband helped out when asked or needed. But because I have a more flexible schedule, the bulk of it fell to me. I always made sure the big things — hot dinners complete with side dishes — and staples — toilet paper and soap — were on hand, as well as all the boys’ favorites. So how had it come to this? I spent days puzzling over a solution. And then I did something I’d avoided for the better part of a decade: The next time I went grocery shopping I took them with me. I’d abandoned this when they were younger because it was painful for me and nearly every other customer at the market. I still had flashbacks of my boys weaving precariously past shoppers pretending our cart was a runaway train. I winced as I recalled heads of iceberg lettuce and bouquets of broccoli sailing over the produce section as they attempted to sink three-pointers in my cart. Then there were the checkout stand showdowns over candy bars and beef jerky. Was I up for all that again? I had no choice. When I told them the new plan, they flinched. “No, Mom, please! We hate grocery shopping!” they whined. “Do you think I enjoy


China has a new facial recognition app — this time for pandas

BEIJING — Can’t tell Bei Bei apart from Bao Bao? Fear not. Chinese tech whizzes, who have perfected facial recognition technology for humans to frightening levels of accuracy, have now come up with an app that can tell one white-faced, black-eyed bear from another. “You no longer need to worry about making the pandas angry by calling them by the wrong name,” the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding wrote on Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter, as it announced its new “giant panda facial recognition” app. Visitors to the panda base in the Sichuan capital of Chengdu, one of China’s top tourist attractions, will be able to scan the panda’s face with the mobile app to get information about that particular bear. “It’s good news for those with ‘face blindness’ for giant pandas,” the research base said, apparently without irony, in its statement announcing the breakthrough. The panda facial recognition technology is the result of two years of research and the analysis of about 120,000 images and 10,000 video clips of the black-and-white furballs. Scientists at the Chengdu base and Sichuan Normal University, with help from Singapore Nanyang Technological University, have created a database containing 10,000 marked and annotated panda photos. It’s not just a gimmick for tourists, though. Researchers say the technology will help them analyze data on pandas both in captivity and the wild. “The app and database will help us gather more precise and well-rounded data on the population, distribution, ages, gender ratio, birth and deaths of wild pandas, who live in deep mountains and are hard to track,” said Chen Peng, a researcher who co-wrote a paper on “Giant Panda Face Recognition Using Small Database.” “It will definitely help us improve efficiency and effectiveness in conservation and management of the animals,” Chen told the official Xinhua News Agency. Facial recognition technology is widely used in China, especially by police and immigration authorities, and there is an all-encompassing network of facial recognition cameras to keep tabs on the population. Police picked a wanted fugitive out of a crowd of 60,000 people at a pop concert in the city of Nanchang last year. In the city of Zhengzhou, billboard-size screens show the faces and ID cards of jaywalkers. Some public restrooms in Beijing use facial recognition to limit the amount of toilet paper dispensed to each person, while a KFC outlet in Hangzhou has rolled out


Cleveland Marathon runner, 22, dies after collapsing near finish line

A 22-year-old participant in the Cleveland Marathon died Sunday after collapsing near the finish line. The cause of death for the runner, Taylor Ceepo, was not immediately known. According to the Akron Beacon Journal, Ceepo was a quarter-mile from the finish line when she collapsed around midday. Temperatures in Cleveland were in the 80s on Sunday. A spokesman for the hospital to which Ceepo was taken told Cleveland.com that she was dead on arrival. He could not divulge any symptoms she may been exhibiting. Ceepo was a recent graduate of Walsh University, about an hour’s drive south of Cleveland in Canton, Ohio, where she played on the soccer team. “It is my sad duty to inform you that a beloved member of our Walsh family, Ms. Taylor Ceepo, collapsed today while running the Cleveland marathon and has passed away,” Vice President of Student Affairs Amy Malaska said in a statement. " . . . Her mother, dear friends and her boyfriend (also a Walsh student) were with her. Our love and deepest sympathies go to her family and loved ones." A Catholic university, Walsh organized a Mass on Sunday evening, inviting students, faculty and staff to come and mourn. “Your Walsh family will keep you all in prayer,” Malaska said in her statement. Ceepo was from Medina, Ohio, close to Akron, according to Cleveland.com. Listed as a midfielder on her Walsh athletics player page, she lettered in soccer from 2015 to 2017, before graduating several weeks ago, per Malaska’s statement, with a major in biology and minors in psychology and chemistry. Read more: Sally Jenkins: Brooks Koepka passes his toughest test yet, and his reward is a second PGA Championship Barry Svrluga: Horse racing is a sport without a rider Thomas Boswell: For the Nationals, things can’t get much worse and should soon tick up


Congress can seek justice for Jamal Khashoggi’s murder. It’s clear Trump won’t.

a House subcommittee on Thursday. “Ms. Pelosi said how unacceptable it was. Seven or eight months later, we see that nothing has been done.” The Trump administration has imposed sanctions on 17 Saudis it says were involved in the murder, and Congress passed legislation — vetoed by Mr. Trump — that would have ended U.S. support for the Saudi military intervention in Yemen. But the administration has defied a legally binding congressional request that it determine whether Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bore responsibility for the murder, and legislation that would punish the crown prince and his regime has stalled. Ms. Cengiz pointed out that basic questions about the murder have yet to be answered. “We still do not know why he was killed,” she said of Khashoggi, a prominent journalist who contributed columns to The Post. “We don’t know where his corpse is.” Though Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claims that the administration is still investigating the case, it’s obvious that Mr. Trump is determined to bury it. The problem with that policy is not just its moral depravity; it is also an invitation to Mohammed bin Salman and other despots to murder more journalists and other opponents. “If Jamal’s murder passes with impunity, then me speaking here today puts me in danger,” said Ms. Cengiz. “It places everyone who shares these universal values in danger.” Congress still has an opportunity to act. Sen. James E. Risch (R-Idaho), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been working on legislation that he hopes could pass Congress and escape Mr. Trump’s veto. To do so, it would omit direct sanctions on the crown prince and restrictions on U.S. arms sales. But if it conditions U.S. visas for the Saudi elite and their families on tangible reforms, including the release of political prisoners, it could prove useful. A bill in the House, sponsored by Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-N.J.), would require the director of national intelligence to provide Congress with a list of individuals responsible for Khashoggi’s death and deny them entry into the United States unless steps on human rights are taken. Nothing Congress can do can erase Ms. Cengiz’s terrible loss. But it still has the chance to restore the hope that she and many others in the Middle East once had that the United States would not tolerate without consequence the murder and dismemberment of a critical journalist.


Running and aging usually don’t mix. But at 62, quitting isn’t an option for me.

times or more a year — are verging on old. Just 6 percent are ages 55 to 64, according to the National Sporting Goods Association. Less than 3 percent are 65 and up. (The percentages are nearly the same for women and men). I have my hand raised. At 62, I’m still running three times a week, sometimes four. To a startling degree, my life is still organized around running. During the school year — I am a professor in the Business School at George Washington University — if I haven’t gotten in a run before or after class, I feel like I’ve cheated. My Saturdays are diminished if I haven’t joined the Pacemakers for a group run, usually eight to 10 miles at a pokey pace. To satisfy me, even our family vacations incorporate some running adventure. (Case in point: next January’s Caribbean running cruise hosted by Bjorn Grass, the world record holder for marathons run completely at sea). The hold that running has on me is common among Pacemakers, especially of a certain age. We feel lucky beyond belief. To be running at this stage of the game with much younger friends is a gift that we do not take lightly. We’re beating the odds and know it. Sure, our ranks are thinning. That focuses us on our good fortune even more. Every couple of months, we lose a friend to a joint replacement or another health issue. Other friends just drift away, lured inexplicably by stamp-collecting and mah-jongg. For the rest of us, quitting isn’t an option. Not yet. Ex-baseball pitcher Jim Bouton wrote in “Ball Four,” his classic sports memoir, that “you spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.” That’s as true of aging runners as washed-up knuckleballers. Mostly, we’re hooked on the community that is running — the people you meet and the bonds that are formed. For Patrick and me, the Pacemakers are home base. Started 20 years ago by Bob Hilson, a former Baltimore Sun reporter, and several colleagues in the newsroom, the group launched over lunch hour. The newbie runners ran the street behind the newspaper building for two miles before turning around. Over the years, the group has grown steadily. Now, close to 300 runners receive Hilson’s weekly emails. The Pacemakers


‘This terrible disease’: Ovarian cancer is deadly, but new tests, treatments start to emerge

new treatments. This year, in an effort to raise public awareness, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention beefed up its consumer website on ovarian cancer and has plans to launch broadcast ads. Compared to other cancer success stories, ovarian cancer historically has had a shortage of good news. It is deadlier and underfunded. Until recently, the disease has not benefited from new treatments for more than 40 years. About 22,240 U.S. women were diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2018, and 14,070 women died the same year, according to government surveillance data. The reason: More than three-fourths are diagnosed when the cancer has advanced, and survival rates are low: Just 47 percent of patients survive five or more years. That means that unlike the 3.4 million pink-clad U.S. breast cancer survivors who make up an army of activists marching for research money and attention, there are starkly fewer women living with ovarian cancer — just 225,000 in the United States — who are around to represent their cause. Even their signature color — teal — is understated. “Sometimes it’s hard feeling like a stepchild in a teal dress,” says activist Ellen Engle, a project manager from Potomac, Md., who was diagnosed with Stage 4 ovarian cancer four years ago at age 47. She’s an administrator of the Ovarian Cancer Support Group on Facebook. “We hear so many stories of women having their symptoms dismissed,” she says. “They’re told they’re going through menopause or have irritable bowel syndrome.” Engle leaves educational cards warning women about the often overlooked symptoms of ovarian cancer — abdominal bloating, changes in appetite, pelvic pressure, lower back pain or frequent urination — in women’s bathroom stalls at airports, fast-food restaurants, even a recent Elton John concert. Another common story is that women chalk up persistent stomach bloating symptoms to gluten or lactose sensitivities that they try to treat with probiotics or elimination diets, says Bobbie Rimel, a gynecologic oncologist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. “I see so many people in my practice who let this ride out for five or six months because they thought they could figure it out,” she says. “But I end up figuring out it’s cancer, and it’s really sad.” Yet the onus isn’t only on patients and doctors to be more vigilant. The field has lacked good diagnostic tools. The most commonly used test, developed in the early 1980s


Stripped of women’s records, transgender powerlifter asks, ‘Where do we draw the line?’

I mean, I’ve had to work my ass off.” Sports organizations and governing bodies increasingly are grappling with gender issues, evolving definitions and identifications. At the high school level, transgender athletes have won track races and wrestling matches. Transgender athletes have made headlines in cycling and high-level rugby, where at times they have collectively drawn the ire and condemnation from other competitors and event organizers. Tennis legend Martina Navratilova, who in 1981 risked backlash from fans and sponsors when she came out as a lesbian while at the height of her career, offended many in the LGBTQ community with some of her comments on the subject. She wrote a piece in the Sunday Times this year, saying, “It’s insane and it’s cheating” and once tweeted (and deleted), “You can’t just proclaim yourself a female and be able to compete against women. There must be some standards, and having a penis and competing as a woman would not fit that standard.” She later apologized for saying transgender athletes are cheating, noting that “all I am trying to do is to make sure girls and women who were born female are competing on as level a playing field as possible within their sport." For many, the issue revolves around biological advantages, testosterone and equality. The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) has struggled in recent years to settle on a fair playing field and has overcome legal challenges to institute a rule that puts a limit on testosterone levels for female competitors in some events. “In sports, it’s traditionally been viewed very simply. There are two categories: male and female. The complication is that biology and reality is not that simple,” said Roger Pielke Jr., director of the Sports Governance Center at the University of Colorado, a critic of the IAAF’s controversial rule and the organization’s research on the subject. “ … I think the first thing to understand is it’s complicated and there are legitimate perspectives on all sides of these issues. Society is obviously changing and evolving, and sport has to accommodate.” The International Olympic Committee updated its rules in 2016 to allow transgender female athletes to compete against women as long as they can maintain a certain testosterone level. But USA Powerlifting has opted to follow its own more rigid guidelines, barring those competitors from the female classification. In explaining its decision earlier this year, the organization said, “Men


Theresa May offers Parliament a vote on a second Brexit referendum

LONDON — British Prime Minister Theresa May urged British lawmakers on Tuesday to back her “new” Brexit deal, which would include a binding vote by Parliament on whether to hold a second Brexit referendum. In a speech in London, May said lawmakers will have “one last chance” to deliver Brexit in a vote early next month. But, more accurately, it probably will be May’s last chance. She has signaled that she will step down if her thrice-rejected divorce deal fails again in the House of Commons, as it is widely expected to do. In a sign that the British public has already moved on, many of the questions May fielded during Tuesday’s news conference had to do with when she will resign and what might happen after that. Parliament is scheduled to vote again on the Brexit deal she negotiated with the European Union during the first week of June — which, coincidentally, is when President Trump will be making a state visit to Britain. “What I’m doing today is setting out what I believe is a new Brexit deal that can command a majority in the House of Commons,” she said. Offering a binding vote on a second referendum, as well as on whether Britain should remain in a temporary customs union with the E.U., represents a shift in strategy for May. She said she recognized “the genuine and sincere strength of feeling” on the referendum issue. But she also reiterated her long-held views that a second referendum was not her preferred way out of the Brexit impasse. Extending the Brexit debate, she said, “risked opening the door to a nightmare future of permanently polarized politics.” May hopes that with those additional voting opportunities and some tweaks to her deal — including pledges on environmental protections and workers’ rights — she can win support from enough lawmakers to get it over the line. But early indicators were not looking good. Some Conservative lawmakers who had previously backed May said they would now oppose her. The Scottish National Party and Change UK said they would not back her. Nigel Dodds, the deputy leader of Northern Ireland Democratic Unionist Party, which props up May’s Conservatives, said the proposal had “fundamental flaws.” The opposition Labour Party has been internally divided on whether to push for a second referendum, with leader Jeremy Corbyn reluctant to embrace the idea. In a speech that was


The Muhammad Ali strategy for 2020

In his May 17 Friday Opinion column, “Can voters get fired up about decency?,” Michael Gerson laid out a central challenge facing the Democratic Party presidential nominee: whether to copy President Trump’s pugnacity. But maybe this is not an either-or proposition. Consider the middle road charted in Muhammad Ali’s advice to float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. A dominant sense of civic responsibility guiding the modest butterfly on the campaign trail will need to be set aside every time Mr. Trump lies so that the bee can deliver truth’s swift sting. Flexibility, in other words, will be the hallmark of the successful candidate — that and being quick on her feet. Benjamin Sloan


Despite national security concerns, GOP leader McCarthy blocked bipartisan bid to limit China’s role in U.S. transit

other means to surveil unsuspecting Americans. “We really need to wake up. We need to understand what a threat this is and do something about it,” Rep. Daniel Lipinski (D-Ill.) said last Thursday at a House Transportation Committee hearing about public transit and rail sectors. “We can’t just sit here and talk about it and then years from now when it happens say, ‘Well, I remember talking about it.’ ” A BYD official who testified Thursday insisted that the company is not controlled by the Chinese government, noting that Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway owns a stake in the firm. The official — Zachary Kahn, North America government relations director for BYD Motors — emphasized BYD’s civic ties to the towns of Lancaster and Palmdale in and near McCarthy’s inland Southern California district, including support for the Boy Scouts and the California Poppy Festival. He said BYD employs 775 union members as part of its U.S. workforce, most of whom work at the Lancaster plant. Fast Company last year called BYD “The Biggest Electric Vehicle Company You’ve Never Heard Of.” Forbes in 2017 listed BYD’s billionaire chairman and president, Wang Chuanfu, as one of the richest men in China. The company has promoted its ties to McCarthy in the past. At an October 2017 ribbon-cutting to expand its Lancaster plant, McCarthy was seated on the stage next to the billionaire, according to a photograph posted on BYD’s website. “I am proud that BYD has chosen to expand their facility here in Lancaster,” the website quotes McCarthy as saying. “As BYD continues to develop cutting edge technology that helps transform the transportation industry here in the Antelope Valley and around the country, this investment will help create jobs in our community, keep Lancaster on the forefront of technological advancement, and put emission-free vehicles on our streets.” One month before the event, BYD’s Li made several political donations that benefited groups tied to McCarthy, according to the Federal Election Commission. She gave $1,350 to Kevin McCarthy for Congress, $2,700 to California Victory 2018 and $1,350 to the Great America Committee. Li had never given McCarthy or either of the political action committees money before that time, according to the Federal Election Commission. Frank Girardot, spokesman for BYD Motors, said the donations were made as part of a political fundraising event, and he disputed any impropriety. “If you’re going to characterize this as being


Trump's war-crime pardons would insult millions of service members

service members have so nobly defended. War is hell, but there are rules, and the Defense Department maintains a 1,193-page Law of War Manual. The purposes are worth recalling: to protect combatants, noncombatants and civilians from “unnecessary suffering”; provide some basic protections to those who fall into hands of the enemy; facilitate restoration of peace; help commanders ensure the disciplined and efficient use of military forces; and preserve the “professionalism and humanity of combatants.” Mr. Trump, in pursuit of some hazy notion of military toughness, shows little respect for these principles. On the campaign trail in 2016, he declared that “torture works” and that he would resume the use of waterboarding in interrogations. In 2015, he declared that the families of terrorists should be killed. This month, Mr. Trump signed a full pardon for former Army 1st Lt. Michael Behenna of Oklahoma, who had served in Iraq with the 101st Airborne Division and was convicted of unpremeditated murder. Military intelligence professionals had interrogated a man on suspicion that he was a member of al-Qaeda with knowledge of a roadside bombing in which two U.S. soldiers were killed. They ordered Mr. Behenna to drive the suspect home. He took the detainee to a railroad culvert, stripped him naked, interrogated him at gunpoint and then shot him in the head and chest, saying it was self-defense. Among those, the New York Times reports that Mr. Trump is now considering for clemency is Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher of the Navy SEALs, who is scheduled to stand trial soon on charges of shooting unarmed civilians in Iraq and killing an enemy captive with a knife. Others, according to the Times, are believed to include a former Blackwater security contractor, Nicholas A. Slatten, found guilty in the 2007 shooting of dozens of unarmed Iraqis; Maj. Mathew L. Golsteyn, an Army Green Beret charged with killing an unarmed Afghan in 2010; and a group of Marine Corps snipers charged with urinating on dead Taliban fighters. Pardons in these cases would undermine discipline in the ranks, impede cooperation with citizens and fighters of other nations, and insult millions of service members who have behaved honorably. They would undermine the standing of the United States as a power that believes in — and follows — the rule of law. They would not project strength but rather show weakness, corroding the “professionalism and humanity” of the armed forces.


Fahrenheit Asian is a delicious mother-daughter reunion, with the best mapo tofu in the D.C. area

its invitation impossible to ignore. I broke the joint on my wooden chopsticks and started plucking out squares of tofu, each one coated in oil and a light sprinkling of ground Sichuan peppercorns. The tofu had the texture of custard yet was firm enough to stand up to the meaner ingredients. The complexity was impressive: There was sweetness, pungency, meatiness and the clean, cooling rush of pine needles. If I’ve had a better mapo tofu, I couldn’t remember when. Strictly speaking, Fahrenheit isn’t a Sichuan restaurant. As a kind of risk management, the family has opted to take a wider, pan-Asian approach to the establishment, which explains why you’ll find a spicy Thai soup and jajangmyeon, the noodly Korean comfort food, on the menu. (The latter is a Sichuan-influenced impostor, without a trace of earthiness or umami, trying to pass itself off as jajangmyeon.) Mother and daughter are far more successful in their experiments in fusion, starting with their soups, which split the difference between Sichuan hot pots and Korean bone broths. One afternoon before leaving on a flight for France, where my first meal would be a tasting menu at the Michelin three-star Paul Bocuse in Lyon, I found myself staring into a pot of beef broth, which roiled atop a potable burner on my table at Fahrenheit. Slices of beef, still pink and semi-frozen, were shaved over a marsh of ingredients already submerged in the soup. Whatever morsel you plucked from the liquid — a shriveled length of freshly simmered beef, or wide, translucent strips of mung-bean noodles — each was bathed in broth, at once sweet and spicy and savory. The skill required to develop this kind of depth of flavor, I thought, would impress even those Michelin inspectors who cling to their clean, clarified bowls of consommé. The family sometimes reimagines dishes that you didn’t realize needed reimagining. The onion pancake, its surface blistered and browned like a Neapolitan pizza, is paired not with a standard soy sauce-based condiment. Instead, it arrives with a lacquered dipping sauce, built with fermented soybean paste, which anchors the airy appetizer to the dark, compound earth. Then there is Fahrenheit’s pan-fried pot stickers: The kitchen rolls out its own wrappers, thin and wide, which are stuffed with your choice of filling. The large, delicately draped dumplings sport a crispy edge and, when dipped in a black vinegar-infused sauce, explode like


Weeks after insemination, panda life goes on, zoo says

On its face, it seems unlikely that any report of behavior in the Washington region can be more poignant than a statement the National Zoo released on Monday about the recent activities of its two giant pandas. It said that the breeding period of the female, Mei Xiang, was finished. But, the zoo said, that was not yet true of the male, Tian Tian. And usually in the afternoons, the zoo said, Tian Tian will peer in the windows between his yard and Mei Xiang’s. The zoo said he was “probably looking for her.” For males, according to the zoo, that season of desire typically begins in November and concludes in June. But female giant pandas, the zoo says, spend only 24 to 72 hours yearly in a state in which they can become pregnant. In those brief hours of opportunity, at 9 p.m. on March 28, the zoo inseminated Mei Xiang artificially. As expected, no indications have yet emerged regarding the result of the procedure. So at the zoo, it is a time of waiting, and of preparing Mei Xiang for tests to determine whether a new cub is forthcoming. And, it is also maybe a time for Tian Tian to look into the window and think panda thoughts. martin.weil@washpost.com


The Energy 202: EPA blocks a dozen products containing pesticides thought harmful to bees

Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, B.C. “It’s not something they do very often.” The decision follows five years of litigation in which the beekeepers and environmentalists pressed the agency to mount a response to the use of neonics as regulators in Europe and Canada have taken steps toward banning the chemicals. Finally, at the end of 2018, three agribusinesses — Bayer, Syngenta and Valent — agreed to let the EPA pull from shelves the 12 pesticide products used by growers ranging from large-scale agricultural businesses to home gardeners. The legal settlement also compels the EPA to analyze the impacts of the entire neonic class on endangered species. Two of the pesticide makers, Bayer and Valent, say their products are tested and safe to use, noting that the environmentalists and beekeepers won their case on the technical grounds that the EPA did not follow the right steps under the Endangered Species Act when registering their products. “Neonicotinoids are rigorously tested before going to market to ensure they can be used safely and effectively,” said Steve Tatum, a spokesman for Valent, which makes four of the delisted products. Bayer noted its two products targeted by the EPA action are not sold in the United States. But spokesman Darren Wallis added: “Growers rely on these critical pest-management tools because of their performance against destructive pests, as well as their favorable human and environmental safety profile.” Concern over neonics has grown since 2006, when beekeepers first started witnessing the sudden and mysterious collapse of honeybee hives across the nation. Researchers have shown the compounds to be harmful to bees in laboratory tests. But they have had less luck pinning down the pesticides’ effects on beekeepers’ colonies when they go about their work pollinating apple orchards and other farms. In his second term Barack Obama, who had earlier approved installing a beehive on the South Lawn of the White House, launched an initiative to promote the health of honeybees and other pollinators. But Rebecca Riley, legal director of the nature program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said that the agency has failed often in the past to adequately consider the potential impact of its pesticide approvals on endangered animals — something every federal agency is supposed to do. “EPA for years has been ignoring this requirement of the law,” she said. That has led to a number of lawsuits, such as one the NRDC


Mysterious spike of ozone-destroying chemical is traced to east China

A troubling spike in emissions of a globally banned chemical that damages the Earth’s protective ozone layer has been traced to two provinces in eastern China, according to a study published Wednesday that has alarmed scientists who monitor the planet’s atmosphere. The study, published in the journal Nature, comes one year after another report revealed that air samples had shown a startling excess of a type of chlorofluorocarbon known as trichlorofluoromethane, or CFC-11, since 2012. This manufactured chemical, once widely used to blow polyurethane into a rigid insulating foam, leaks into the air and destroys ozone molecules in the upper atmosphere. The ozone layer is critical to life, limiting the amount of harmful ultraviolet solar radiation that reaches the planet’s surface. CFC-11 is also a potent greenhouse gas, with roughly 4,750 times the heat-trapping potential of carbon dioxide. The new report underscores the need for enforcement of international environmental agreements even when the hazards are clear and profound. And it is a reminder that China’s intensifying environmental challenges have global consequences. “This is a huge problem,” a State Department official said Wednesday. The official said the department plans to review the report but has not yet concluded that China is the source of the new emissions. “If it’s a problem in another country, we’re also going to be suffering,” the official said. Any production and use of CFC-11 is a violation of the Montreal Protocol, a 1987 agreement that phased out such chemicals in favor of ones that do not damage the atmosphere. The global accord was reached after scientists revealed the existence of an expanding hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica. Last year’s report The researchers based their conclusion on air samples from monitoring stations in South Korea and Japan. Those sampling stations, which feature instruments that can tease out the molecular components of the air, showed periodic spikes in CFC-11. The researchers combined that data with weather forecasts and observations of wind patterns and ran a series of computer models to pinpoint the most likely origin of the emissions. The results pointed to the two Chinese provinces. “When the wind is blowing in a straight line from that source to the measuring station, you see a spike,” said lead author Matt Rigby, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Bristol. “We hope to work with Chinese colleagues in the future to see if similar signals are visible


Family of U-Md. student who died of adenovirus takes step toward suing school

Ian Paregol said. “He shouldn’t have been allowed to continue in the first place.” In the fall, Loh had agreed to retire at the end of this academic year following the death of 19-year-old football player Jordan McNair. Athletic trainers waited more than an hour to call 911 after McNair showed signs of exhaustion. His death in June exposed deep problems within the athletic department, and a leadership crisis erupted. The University System of Maryland Board of Regents later decided to have Loh remain through 2020 while the governing board searches for a successor. Paul Stackpole, a board spokesman, said the group “is not considering the employment status” of Loh. “Student health and safety is the first order of leadership and the highest priority at all of our campuses,” Stackpole said. The chancellor of the university system “has asked all USM presidents to review their policies, processes, and communications related to incidents of infectious diseases and environmental hazards to ensure best practices in responding to these matters.” A University of Maryland spokeswoman declined to answer questions. After The Post published its report May 16, Loh released a statement saying, “I have offered condolences on behalf of the University to Olivia’s parents and continue to think of her family.” Loh has stood by the college’s response to the adenovirus outbreak, saying, “Our approach to reporting, testing, cleaning and communicating about the virus was coordinated with health officials, and exceeded” guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Adenovirus is not governed by mandatory state or federal reporting requirements. That means doctors or hospitals are not required to alert health officials or the public when the virus is discovered. Ultimately, the University of Maryland had the discretion of when and how to share that information. Adenovirus can produce symptoms similar to a cold or flu. But certain pernicious strains can sicken healthy individuals and be dangerous to people with weakened immune systems — people like Olivia Paregol, who was on medication for Crohn’s disease, an incurable digestive tract condition. She had battled respiratory problems all fall semester after living in Elkton Hall, a mold-infested dorm from which students had to be temporarily evacuated. Mold does not cause adenovirus, but the director of the university health center, in emails to administrators, acknowledged that “mold can cause respiratory irritation that may increase susceptibility of any viral infection.” Olivia Paregol showed up at


Five legal principles for the Green New Deal

until mid-century to achieve net-zero emissions, to avoid catastrophic changes in the climatic system. A congressional punt, which would delegate to the executive branch the work of developing a plan, proposing it, taking comments, finalizing it and then defending it in court, would occupy at least half of that time. And it would leave decisions about whether the agencies’ eventual plan is even legal to agency heads appointed by the White House and the Supreme Court. Neither of those seems like a good option at the moment. If Congress is going to legislate it must answer questions both major and minute about how and when we will reduce our climate footprint and increase our resilience to climate impacts. The Waxman-Markey bill (which stalled in the Senate in 2010) gives some idea of what this could look like. That bill detailed a renewable electricity standard for utilities, a cap on nationwide greenhouse gas emissions, a cap-and-trade program, new energy efficiency standards, a worker transition program, and funding for research and development of new technologies. The GND should seek to go even deeper and address areas left alone by Waxman-Markey — for instance, prohibiting fossil fuel production on public lands, and requiring that states, cities and corporations assess, disclose and prepare for climate risks. And in every instance it should be as specific as possible. Congress should establish near-term, binding deadlines for administrative action and compliance by entities regulated by the GND. Other statutes have done this: The Clean Water Act of 1972 gave polluters five years to install specific pollution control technologies. The Clean Air Act of 1972 required that states achieve compliance with air quality standards by 1977. The Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 required that the largest power plants deal with acid rain pollution by 1995. The Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 set numerous deadlines for the Department of Energy to establish energy efficiency standards for residential and commercial appliances. The Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments of 1994 established permitting deadlines for hazardous waste facilities. Of course, federal agencies miss deadlines. States miss deadlines. Cities miss deadlines. Companies miss deadlines. Everyone misses deadlines. Congress must counteract this tendency with what are known in the field as “hard hammers.” A civil penalty of $50,000 per day of noncompliance should be enough to motivate polluters, as might an absolute prohibition against operating for those who fall too far