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Late Edition
VOL. CLXVIII . . . No. 58,186
Search for Survivors in Indonesia
A tsunami hit the country’s most populous islands, Java and Sumatra, above, without warning Saturday, killing at least 280. Page A7.
Anti-Semitism Accusations Roil Women’s March Shutdown Fury
Deep Rift Overshadows
By FARAH STOCKMAN
Within days of Donald J.
Protests Next Month
Trump’s election, a diverse group
of women united by their concern
about the incoming administra-
tion gathered at a restaurant in
New York to plan a protest march
in Washington. They had seen the
idea floating on Facebook and
wanted to turn it into a reality.
The unity did not last long.
Vanessa Wruble, a Brooklyn-
based activist, said she told the
group that her Jewish heritage in-
spired her to try to help repair the
world. But she said the conversa-
tion took a turn when Tamika Mal-
lory, a black gun control activist,
and Carmen Perez, a Latina crimi-
nal justice reform activist, replied
that Jews needed to confront their
own role in racism.
The women who gathered that
night would go on to organize one
of the biggest protests in Ameri-
can history, remarkable not just
for its size, but for its inclusive na-
ture. The event on Jan. 21, 2017, in-
spired thousands of women who
had never been involved in poli-
tics before to pour their energy
into helping Democrats win elec-
tions this past fall.
But the divisions apparent at
that very first meeting continue to
haunt the Women’s March organi-
zation, as charges of anti-
Semitism are now roiling the
movement and overshadowing
plans for more marches next
month.
Ms. Wruble was pushed out of
the organization shortly after the
march, and she now asserts that
her Jewish identity played a role.
She went on to help found an orga-
nization called March On, which
supports local female activists.
The rift is now so dire that there
will be two marches on the same
day next month on the streets of
New York: one led by the Wom-
Devastating Arsenals, Bought With Plastic and Nary a Red Flag
Two days before Omar Mateen
killed 49 people and wounded 53
more at the Pulse nightclub in
Orlando, he went
on Google and
ANDREW typed “Credit
ROSS SORKIN card unusual
spending.”
DEALBOOK Mr. Mateen had
opened six new
credit card accounts — including
a Mastercard, an American Ex-
press card and three Visa cards
— over the previous eight
NEW YORK A15-17
A Mass Migration (Next Door)
The American Museum of Natural His-
tory must move millions of dead fish, like
these blue sharks. Grace Notes. PAGE A17
Your Friendly Medieval Melee
For the local chapter of a group that
lovingly recreates the Middle Ages, the
weekend is for taking up arms. PAGE A15
Nxxx,2018-12-24,A,001,Bs-4C,E2
© 2018 The New York Times Company
In Washington
Shifts to Shrugs
en’s March group, which is billed
as being led by women of color,
and another by a group affiliated
with March On that is emphasiz-
ing its denunciation of anti-
Semitism.
Ms. Mallory, meanwhile, who is
now co-president of the Women’s
Vanessa Wruble, who is Jewish, was pushed out of the group.
months. Twelve days before the
shooting, he began a $26,532
buying spree: a Sig Sauer MCX
.223-caliber rifle, a Glock 17 9-
millimeter semiautomatic pistol,
several large magazines, thou-
sands of rounds of ammunition
and a $7,500 ring for his wife that
he bought on a jewelry store
card. His average spending
before that, on his only card, was
$1,500 a month.
His web browsing history
chronicled his anxiety: “Credit
card reports all three bureaus,”
INTERNATIONAL A4-8
A Finnish Bubble of Joy
Polling suggests that Kauniainen, a
small suburb of the Finnish capital, is
the most satisfied town in the world’s
happiest country.
NATIONAL A9-14
Migrant Tent City to Close
All 2,500 detained children should be
out of a camp in the Texas desert by
mid-January, its operator said. PAGE A10
Red-Hots, Cones, Green Cards
For undocumented immigrants, buying
forged documents from street vendors
is as easy as getting a hot dog. PAGE A9
NEW YORK, MONDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2018
FERDI AWED/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES
March group, has been criticized
for attending an event by Louis
Farrakhan, the leader of the Na-
tion of Islam who has been widely
reviled for making anti-Semitic
remarks. Ms. Mallory has called
Mr. Farrakhan “the GOAT,” or
“greatest of all time,” on social me-
dia.
The accusations of anti-
Semitism, which were outlined in
an article this month in Tablet, an
online Jewish magazine, have
prompted some women to recon-
Continued on Page A13
KHOLOOD EID FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
“FBI,” and “Why banks stop
your purchases.”
He needn’t have worried. None
of the banks, credit-card network
operators or payment processors
alerted law enforcement officials
about the purchases he thought
were so suspicious.
Mass shootings routinely set
off a national debate on guns,
usually focused on regulating
firearms and on troubled youths.
Little attention is paid to the
financial industry that has be-
come an instrumental, if unwit-
PAGE A4
BUSINESS B1-6
That Book Is Out of Stock
A backlog at the presses, along with high
demand for popular hardcover titles, has
hurt publishers at peak season. PAGE B1
Put a Gigantic Bow on It
Yes, there are people who give a car
worth $80,000 or more to someone
special during the holidays.
By NICHOLAS FANDOS
As a partial shutdown of the fed-
eral government entered its sec-
ond day on Sunday and the
prospect of a quick resolution to a
dispute over President Trump’s
border wall slipped further out of
grip, a normally fevered Washing-
ton found itself mustering little
more than a collective shrug.
Ringing in the new year with
the government shuttered? So be
it.
That sense of resignation — and
the decision to lay down political
cudgels mere hours into the shut-
down — was all the more striking
when compared with the modern
playbook for such crises, per-
fected in the 1990s but already put
to use twice this year: use every
tool at your disposal to pin blame
on the other side, and then maxi-
mize the political pain to get your
way.
Instead, on Saturday, with
Christmas approaching and the
president unmoved, the Senate
simply adjourned, choosing to
leave the political battlefield unoc-
cupied until at least Thursday af-
ternoon. Negotiations between
Senate Democrats and the White
House essentially ceased on Sun-
day, with the two sides still at log-
gerheads over Mr. Trump’s de-
mand for a $5 billion down pay-
ment for a wall along the southern
border.
And though a few Democrats
Continued on Page A14
WHAT SHUTDOWN? Holiday
plans, not a wall, preoccupied
people at a border bridge. PAGE A14
ting, enabler of carnage.
A New York Times examina-
tion of mass shootings since the
Virginia Tech attack in 2007
reveals how credit cards have
become a crucial part of the
planning of these massacres. The
Times reviewed hundreds of
documents including police re-
ports, bank records and investi-
gator notes.
There have been 13 shootings
that killed 10 or more people in
the last decade, and in at least
Continued on Page A12
ARTS C1-6
Comedy, Critiquing Itself
Hannah Gadsby took a critical look at
the genre, and Michelle Wolf made
Washington nervous. Jason Zinoman
looks back at the best, and most impor-
tant, performances of 2018.
The Art of a Kingpin’s Wife
The former spouse of the Colombian
drug lord Pablo Escobar writes in a new
book about how “The Dance,” a paint-
ing by Salvador Dalí, may have helped
save her life.
EDITORIAL, OP-ED A18-19
PAGE B1 Susan E. Rice
Trump Fixates STUNG BY REBUKE,
On Fed’s Chief PRESIDENT FORCES
As Stocks Dive
Aides Try to Ease Fears
of Another Firing EXIT PLANNED BY JAN. 1
By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM
WASHINGTON — President
Trump has unabashedly hitched
his political fortunes to a rising
stock market. Now, with stock
prices in retreat, he has become
increasingly fixated on the idea
that one man is to blame for the re-
cent rout: Jerome H. Powell,
chairman of the Federal Reserve.
After the Fed raised its bench-
mark interest rate on Wednesday,
the fifth consecutive quarterly in-
crease, Mr. Trump fretted to aides
that Mr. Powell would “turn me
into Hoover,” a reference to the
man who was president in the
early years of the Great Depres-
sion.
Mr. Trump has said choosing
Mr. Powell for the Fed job last year
was the worst mistake of his presi-
dency, and he has asked aides
whether he has the power to fire
him.
But the volatile stock market,
which just posted its worst week
since 2008, is falling in part be-
cause of Mr. Trump’s own policies,
including an escalating trade war
with China, a shutdown of the fed-
eral government and the fading
effects of the $1.5 trillion tax cut
Mr. Trump ushered in at the end of
2017. While the Fed’s rate in-
creases have upset investors —
who seem to have a darker view of
economic growth than the central
bank does — some analysts said
Mr. Trump’s musings about the
Fed would only exacerbate anxi-
eties.
“If Powell gets terminated,
what we’ve seen happen in the
markets in the past few weeks will
look like a walk in the park,” David
Rosenberg, chief economist at
Gluskin Sheff, said in an email on
Sunday. “The dollar will go into a
tailspin, and even confidence in
the Treasury market will erode,
especially among foreign cred-
itors.”
Mr. Trump’s economic advisers
scrambled over the weekend to re-
assure markets that Mr. Trump
was not, in fact, planning to fire
Mr. Powell. Treasury Secretary
Steven Mnuchin tweeted what he
said was a quote from Mr. Trump
accepting that he did not even
have the power to do so.
“I totally disagree with Fed pol-
icy,” Mr. Mnuchin quoted Mr.
Trump as saying. “I think the in-
creasing of interest rates and the
Continued on Page A11
As Supreme Court Tips Right,
Chief Justice Steers to Center
By ADAM LIPTAK
WASHINGTON — In his first 13
years on the Supreme Court, Chief
Justice John G. Roberts Jr.’s main
challenge was trying to assemble
five votes to move the court to the
right, though there were only four
reliably conservative justices.
Now he faces a very different
problem. With the retirement of
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy and
his replacement by Justice Brett
M. Kavanaugh, the chief justice
has the votes he needs on issues
like abortion, racial discrimina-
tion, religion and voting. At the
same time, he has taken Justice
Kennedy’s place as the swing vote
at the court’s ideological center,
making him the most powerful
chief justice in 80 years.
But all of that new power comes
at a dangerous time for the court,
whose legitimacy depends on the
public perception that it is not a
partisan institution. “We don’t
work as Democrats or Republi-
cans,” Chief Justice Roberts said
in 2016, and he reiterated that po-
sition in an extraordinary rebuke
of President Trump last month.
PAGE C1
SPORTSMONDAY D1-6
What Child Is This?
A street in Naples, Italy, is famous for its
handmade Nativity scenes, but now
soccer players like Luis Suárez (and his
PAGE C1 victim) are crashing the crèche. PAGE D1
U(D54G1D)y+,!$!=!#!{
PAGE A19
Today, clouds then sunshine, rain or
snow showers early morning, high
45. Tonight, mostly clear, low 32. To-
morrow, sunshine and some clouds,
high 41. Weather map, Page A20.
$3.00
MATTIS OUT EARLY
Deputy Named as Acting
Defense Secretary —
Allies Voice Alarm
By HELENE COOPER
and KATIE ROGERS
WASHINGTON — Less than
two hours after Defense Secretary
Jim Mattis went to the White
House on Thursday to hand a res-
ignation letter to President
Trump, the president stood in the
Oval Office and dictated a glowing
tweet announcing that Mr. Mattis
was retiring “with distinction” at
the end of February.
But Mr. Trump had not read the
letter. As became apparent to the
president only after days of news
coverage, a senior administration
official said, Mr. Mattis had issued
a stinging rebuke of Mr. Trump
over his neglect of allies and toler-
ance of authoritarians. The presi-
dent grew increasingly angry as
he watched a parade of defense
analysts go on television to extol
Mr. Mattis’s bravery, another aide
said, until he decided on Sunday
that he had had enough.
In a tweet later that morning,
the president announced that he
was removing Mr. Mattis from his
post by Jan. 1, two months before
the defense secretary had
planned to depart. Mr. Trump said
that Patrick M. Shanahan, Mr.
Mattis’s deputy and a former Boe-
ing executive, would serve as the
acting defense secretary, praising
him as “very talented” and adding
that “he will be great!”
Mr. Trump’s sudden announce-
ment that he was firing a man who
had already quit was the exclama-
tion point to a tumultuous week at
the Pentagon, where officials have
been reeling from day after day of
presidential tweets announcing
changes in American military pol-
icy.
Mr. Mattis had wanted to stay
through a NATO defense min-
isters meeting scheduled for Feb-
ruary, hoping to enshrine recent
moves by the alliance to bulk up
its security compact as a bulwark
against Russia. But Mr. Mattis’s
resignation letter did him no fa-
vors on that count: It had become
hard to envision how he could con-
tinue for two months to represent
a president whose own views to-
Continued on Page A11
DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Chief Justice John G. Roberts
Jr. was confirmed in 2005.
He seemed to underscore that
point again on Friday, joining the
court’s four-member liberal wing,
all appointed by Democratic pres-
idents, to reject a request from the
Trump administration in a case
that could upend decades of asy-
lum policy. This month, he drew
sharp criticism from three conser-
vative colleagues for voting to
deny review in two cases on ef-
forts to stop payments to Planned
Continued on Page A10