November 7, 2018

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Wednesday November 7, 2018 vol. CXLII no. 96

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BEYOND THE BUBBLE

Midterms: Hugin ’76 loses bid against Menendez, Cruz ’92 bests Beto, Polis ’96 elected first openly gay gov. in Colo.

Democrats take the House, flip 3 seats in New Jersey delegation, lose the Senate

By Zack Shevin Contributor

Voters in the 2018 midterms gave the country varied results — and Princetonians were in the mix across the board. Texans re-elected Republican Sen. Ted Cruz ’92 for another term, and Coloradans chose Democrat Jared Polis ’96 for their next governor. Polis will be the nation’s first openly gay governor.

In New Jersey, incumbent Democrat Sen. Bob Menendez kept his Senate seat after a feisty challenge from U. Trustee Bob Hugin ’76 in a race that even dredged up Hugin’s past opposition to female membership in Princeton’s eating clubs.

On-campus polling stations in Carl Icahn Laboratory and the Computer Science building were open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Senate: Menendez’s win, over Hugin as well as six non-major-party candidates, secured his seat for a third term in office. At the time of publication, Menendez was ahead by nearly 10 percentage points, 53.1 percent versus 43.7 percent, with 98 percent of votes counted.

Over the summer, Hugin polled within two points of Menendez. As Election Day drew near, Menendez pulled ahead, leading by 15 points in one recent Quinnipiac poll.

COURTESY OF FLICKR

COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Sen. Bob Menendez wins reelection.

U.S. Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman wins reelec-

FiveThirtyEight’s last midterm forecast before Election Day gave Menendez a 94.6 percent chance at victory, expecting him to win 54.2 percent of votes.

Neither candidate is a stranger to controversy. Menendez was indicted on federal corruption charges in 2015. Though those charges were dismissed in 2017 when a mistrial was declared, the Senate Ethics Commit-

ON CAMPUS

tee “severely admonished” Menendez for his actions.

Hugin’s controversies stem both from his past work with a pharmaceutical company and his time at the University. Hugin has been accused of price gouging for life-saving cancer drugs during his time as CEO of Celgene. Also, while in leadership positions at Tiger Inn, he made statements against the inclusion of gay

students and women at University eating clubs. Hugin has since disavowed those statements.

In the weeks leading up to the election, the Newark-based StarLedger editorial board published an endorsement of Menendez entitled “Choke it down, and vote for Menendez,” which referred to the Senate race as “the most depressing choice for New Jersey voters in a generation,

ACADEMICS

with two awful candidates whose most convincing argument is that the other guy is unfit to serve.”

Paul Durst, asst. director of STEM education at the University’s Council on Science and Technology, said the Senate race “a choice between two candidates that were flawed.”

Durst voted for whom he felt aligned with his values and viewpoints, making decisions based on candidates past statements and publically stated positions.

“I personally feel that Menendez has done a lot of good for the state, and he has the potential to do more, compared to some of the other positions that Hugin was taking, that I felt were a little more worrisome and his alignment with values that I wasn’t really excited about,” he said.

Daniel Schwartz ’19 is originally from Massachusetts but chose to register in New Jersey, where he said he feels his vote holds more weight.

He put the candidates’ scandals aside when casting his vote.

“If it was the case where one of them had a huge amount of controversy and the other was totally uncontroversial, it would be different,” he said. “Because there were controversies on both sides, I chose the candidate whose policies I thought I could support more.”

The Star-Ledger editorial enSee ELECTION page 5 ON CAMPUS

Peers proud of Rhodes Gel’man awarded to Venkatesh ’19 discusses Staff Writer

HANNAH HUH :: PRINCETONIAN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Students crowded into Whig Hall to watch the midterm election results.

Students come together to watch the midterm elections

By Roberto Hasbun and Regan McCall Staff Writer and Contributor

Students were all eyes Tuesday night as the country’s fate unfolded.

Hundreds crowded into Whig Hall to watch the midterm election results and eat 1,000 Chick-filA nuggets, 30 boxes of pizza, and 200 doughnuts. It was an event organized by the American WhigCliosophic Society, with the help of Undergraduate Student Government and the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students through the Vote100 campaign.

Fox News was shown on the third floor, CNN on the second and first floor, and finally MSNBC in the basement. Raffles were drawn every 30 minutes, and prizes includes Michelle Obama ’85 tour tickets and a basketball signed by Ted Cruz ’92.

Lena Hu ’20, co-president of the Whig-Clio society, said that planning for the event with USG and ODUS began a month ago. “We had

In Opinion

individual volunteers too,” she said.

“The vision was to create a welcoming space for a campus-wide bipartisan election watch party. We also grad students and parents.”

Hu also emphasized how the Vote100 campaign has yielded a higher voter turnout. “Princeton had the lowest voter turnout for the 2014 elections in the Ivy League.

Now we have tripled that,” she said.

Julia Walton ’21 came to the midterm election watch party with her friends. “There is good food and a welcoming atmosphere,” she said “It is a fun way to watch the results. I think it is a good idea to have multiple channel networks so that we can get all of the coverage.”

“I am surprised by how many people showed up. There is a great emphasis on being engaged with the government, and these type of events [show] us that we can make a difference and be more engaged,” Megan Bequette ’22 said.

See PARTY page 5

Senior columnist Kaveh Badrei argues that Shiru Coffee would compromise Princeton students’ privacy, while Editorial Assistant Samuel Aftel comments on the hatred across the country and the globe.

PAGE 4

Molecular biology concentrator Samvida Sudheesh Venkatesh ’19, known for her relentless and humble approach to her scientific research, was awarded a 2019 Rhodes Scholarship on Oct. 26.

Venkatesh is a senior science writer for The Daily Princetonian.

Venkatesh’s friends, professors, and mentors consistently said that they are not surprised she was honored with such a recognition.

“She has plenty to brag about, but we have to do all the bragging for her!” said Colin Yost ’19, one of Venkatesh’s closest friends on campus.

With a focus on using data, algorithms, and models to understand biological processes — a field known as computational biology — Venkatesh, a Forbes College RCA, is a former participant in the University’s Integrated Science Curriculum program. Her Rhodes Scholarship will enable her to continue her studies as a master’s student at the University of Oxford, in Oxford, England, studying biochemistry. Venkatesh said she will dedicate the coming years to the kinds of interdisciplinary science she pursued at the University, as well as pedagogical studies.

The Rhodes Trust offers around 100 total scholarships to students across the world every year.

According to a press release from the University, Venkatesh is one of five recipients of the prestigious scholarship who hail from India.

Venkatesh was initially inspired to apply for the scholarship after learning more about previous cohorts of Rhodes Scholars.

“They’re a group of intellectually oriented, academically high-achieving people, but they also really want to make a difference in the world,” she said. “It sounds cheesy, but these are people who care, and who want to lead something in some way. I thought, ‘I want to do that!’”

The Rhodes Trust website describes scholars as individuals known “not only for their outstanding scholarly achievements, but for their character, commitment to others and to the common good, and for their potential for leadership.”

For many who know Venkatesh in a personal or academic capacity, learning that she had been named a Rhodes Scholar was welcome news but not a huge shock.

“From the beginning, I kind of felt in my heart that she was going to get [the scholarship],” said Jamie O’Leary ’19, a close friend and former roommate of Venkatesh’s. “I am absolutely thrilled, but not that surprised.”

“The dedication and class with which she handles herself was so abundantly clear during the Rhodes application process,” said Yost. “This is such a well-deserved award for her.”

In the process of obtaining her graduate degree at Oxford, Venkatesh will continue her research in cancer genomics, which she began during the summer of 2017 in the lab of Ahmed Ahmed, professor of gynecological oncology at Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Women’s and Reproductive Health.

Instead of taking classes, she will be conducting this independent research full-time.

See RHODES page 3

Today on Campus

4:30 p.m.: Valerie B. Jarrett, former senior advisor to President Obama and former chair of the White House Council on Women and Girls, discusses the midterm elecitons.

Robertson Hall, Arthur Lewis Auditorium

Russia, Trump

By Kris Hristov Staff Writer

The force that keeps post-Soviet states trapped in bad governance, known as “Good Soviet Union,” is equivalent to President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again,” according to political science professor Vladimir Gel’man.

In a lecture on Tuesday, Gel’man discussed the causes and solutions to “bad governance” in post-Soviet states like Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan. Gel’man is a professor of political science and sociology at the European University at St. Petersburg, Russia, and professor of Russian politics at the Aleksanteri Institute of the University of Helsinki.

According to Gel’man, bad governance is a norm among states, rather than an exception.

He defined bad governance as the absence of governmental transparency, an underperforming economy, and the centralization of power into a vertical authority, which then extracts resources and money from the populace while dealing with internal struggles for power.

“People will usually engage in a high degree of corruption when faced with no constraints,” Gel’man explained.

According to Gel’man, although dictatorships are not inherently “bad,” autocratic states See RUSSIA page 5

WEATHER

By Hannah Wang

HIGH

62˚

LOW

39˚

Mostly sunny chance of rain:

10 percent

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The Daily Princetonian

Wednesday November 7, 2018 ON CAMPUS

NED BLESS :: PRINCETONIAN CONTRIBUTOR

Kirkpatrick said about his book, “I set out not to write a ‘poor buggers’ book.”

Kirkpatrick ’92 speaks on Egypt, U.S. influence

By Ned Bless Contributor

When New York Times international correspondent David Kirkpatrick ’92 interviewed Egyptian then-president Mohamed Morsi in September 2011, he tried to begin with some small talk. Kirkpatrick asked Morsi for his thoughts about his time in graduate school at the University of Southern California. Confused, Morsi turned to his translator, who relayed the president’s thoughts to Kirkpatrick.

“The president is not sure how this is relevant to the interview,” the translator said.

“Or is this socializing?”

Kirkpatrick, who served as the Times bureau chief in Cairo from 2011 to 2015, had a frontrow seat to the tumultuous period in Egypt that began with the ouster of former president Hosni Mubarak in February 2011 and continued through the military takeover in July 2013.

That takeover removed Morsi and installed General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as the new head of the Egyptian government.

On Tuesday, Nov. 6, Kirkpatrick gave a lecture at the University about his experiences speaking with both civilians on the ground in Egypt and the decision makers in Egypt and the United States throughout his time as Cairo bureau chief.

Those experiences shaped his reporting in his new book, “Into the Hands of the Soldiers.”

“Everything in the region we see today, ” Kirkpatrick explained, “[is] shaped by the aftershocks of what happened in the Arab Spring, and especially what happened in Egypt.”

In the book, Kirkpatrick tried to avoid writing the “typical” work about the Middle East — the kind that he said is written all too often by Western journalists. In these works, journalists live in a foreign country for a time, and after they witness civil strife and unrest, they write a book that focuses on the “poor buggers” living in a “god-forsaken country.”

According to Kirkpatrick, former President Barack Obama’s criticism of the “poor buggers” genre in his memoir “Dreams from My Father” inspired him. “[His criticism] was really memorable to me because I thought he captured the way that a certain sort of fatalism can border on racism,” Kirkpatrick said. “I set out not to write a ‘poor buggers’ book.”

Kirkpatrick also focused on his personal relationships with the major actors involved.

He conducted interviews with Morsi and his advisers, as well as senior officials in both the State Department and U.S. military who had lead the United States response to the events in Egypt.

For instance, Kirkpatrick recalled how the United States first came out in favor of Mubarak stepping down and giving up power. It was Thanksgiving of 2011, and up until that point the United States had been reluctant to call

for Mubarak’s removal, largely because of its close relationship with the Egyptian military.

After a series of crackdowns by the Egyptian military, however, the White House finally released a statement on Thanksgiving calling for “the full transfer of power to a civilian government.”

“But it put out that statement [on Thanksgiving] only because the more senior officials … had gone home to have dinner with their families,” he explained.

The next morning, former national security adviser Tom Donilon was furious that the more junior officials had put out such a statement, but by then it was too late — it had become U.S. policy to support Mubarak’s ouster.

Kirkpatrick gave also insight into the tensions within the U.S. government about how to treat Morsi after he came to power. The White House and State Department both wanted to try to work with Morsi’s government. But the military was extremely skeptical of Morsi’s government and their intentions. Kirkpatrick recalled former director of defense intelligence Michael Flynn saying that he viewed the Muslim Brotherhood — which Morsi is affiliated with — as “tantamount to al-Qaeda.”

In speaking to one of the top civilian officials at the Pentagon, Kirkpatrick learned that the Egyptians felt that they were hearing two very different things from different U.S. policymakers, making it difficult to know where the country stood.

These divisions within the U.S. government were further displayed as the coup, which would eventually oust Morsi, was brewing. According to Kirkpatrick, the State Department did little to stop it, as they favored the military returning to power in the summer of 2013. At that same time, however, Obama was still advising Morsi on how to act.

Kirkpatrick concluded his talk on a somber note. He recalled how, six weeks after Sisi came to power, government forces confronted anti-government protesters in Rabaa alAdawiya Square in Cairo, killing as many as 1,000 people in the process. According to Kirkpatrick, this was the largest single-day massacre of civilians in recent history and was even larger than the massacre at Tiananmen Square.

“When the anniversary of Tiananmen Square rolls out, we do a special section in The New York Times, and there are loud proclamations from the White House and the State Department,” he said. “You don’t hear that much about the massacre at Rabaa al-Adawiya, and I have to suspect that part of the reason is because American officials … feel somewhat complicit.”

The lecture was delivered at 4:30 p.m. in Robertson Hall and was sponsored by the Bobst Center for Peace and Justice.

Wednesday November 7, 2018

Venkatesh ’19: Science’s goal to help humanity

The Daily Princetonian

COURTESY OF OFFICE OF COMMUNICATIONS

Venkatesh is a Forbes College RCA and a molecular biology major.

RHODES Continued from page 1

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“Eventually, since I want to get a Ph.D., it’s important to get hands-on research experience, and I think this is a really good way of doing it,” she said.

Her academic focus lies primarily in the nexus of computation and biology, and she credits the Integrated Science Curriculum that she took as a freshman for introducing her to the field. “[ISC] really opened my eyes to the idea that science could be so interdisciplinary,” said Venkatesh. “I knew before then that I wanted to do biology, but I discovered through ISC that I really enjoyed using computational tools to study biology.”

It was also through ISC that chemistry professor Michael Hecht first took note of Venkatesh’s scientific proclivity and talent. “[ISC] is a course that a lot of people struggle with, but she was a student who got the reputation of thriving in that environment.”

Hecht has since taught Venkatesh in a graduate chemistry course, describing her as “one of the top two students in the course” and “an excellent scientist.”

“She’s very deep and broad, intellectually — deep in the sense that she has a keen understanding of complicated things, but also broad in the sense that she moves very comfortably from computation and data science to experimental lab work,” said Hecht.

Yost echoed this observation and added that it made her exactly the kind of student that the Rhodes Trust seeks out every year.

“You can talk about the intricate details of molecular biology with her, and she will demonstrate a deep, nuanced knowledge — and then you can zoom out and ask her how the sociopolitical realities of Britain will affect the study of biology, and she will also be able to talk about it in a nuanced way,” Yost said. “Samvida truly embodies the general scholarly mindset.”

During her time at Princeton, Venkatesh’s active involvement with scientific research has taken her from the International Genetically Engineered Machine synthetic biology competition to the Mount Sinai Undergraduate Research Symposium. After interning in the lab of physics professor Thomas Gregor, she joined the lab of molecular biology professor Ileana Cristea, where she is taking a computational approach to studying viral infections and hostpathogen interactions.

“I have rarely seen this level of performance from any undergraduate or graduate student,” said Cristea of Venkatesh’s work in the lab. “She is extraordinarily reliable, and no challenge seems hard enough for her.”

Venkatesh’s passion for science is not confined to laboratories. She also expressed a strong interest in science communication and education — one that has led her to become a head peer tutor at the McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning, as well as a science writer for the ‘Prince.’

“I’ve always been interested in science, but I also enjoy studying other things, like language and linguistics,” Venkatesh said. “My love for a lot of diverse subjects is what led me to education.”

She hopes to teach or write about science more extensively in the future, stressing the critical role that education plays in advancing scientific knowledge and progress.

“Science isn’t just done by people in labs, especially biology. Its final goal is to help humanity in some way…. I think there’s a very tangible connection between science and the way people live their lives, so it’s im-

portant that people can contribute to science, and the only way they can do so is if they have a better understanding of what science itself does.”

Several individuals noted that the people-oriented mindset that Venkatesh brings to her studies consistently permeates other aspects of her life.

“No matter how busy Samvida is, no matter how many incredible things she is doing at once, she always has time for friends,” O’Leary said, adding, “She never makes it known how much she actually has going on.”

Hecht, who was also the former head of Forbes Residential College, said that it is nearly impossible for residential college heads to get to know all of their students, but that Venkatesh has stood out to him ever since she was a freshman.

“The students I do get to know are the ones who are outgoing and special in some way. And I got to know Samvida,” Hecht said.

Hecht also mentioned that many members of Venkatesh’s freshman year zee group were similarly “outgoing and special.” Venkatesh herself said that some of her fellow zees still comprise “[her] closest friend group today” and represent “an integral part of [her] social and even academic life at Princeton.”

Both O’Leary and Yost were members of that zee group.

“Samvida has really been the rock of our group. People coalesce around her because she is such a great friend and leader…. She is an incredible role model,” O’Leary said.

“She is a person with a lot of integrity,” Yost said, observing that Venkatesh is “very much a team player” who has always supported everyone around her in both an academic and a social capacity.

Hecht also called Venkatesh a leader, “but not in the sense of someone who marches at the front of the parade and gets everyone to follow.

She takes care of her people. It’s what a good leader does.”

Venkatesh describes her work as a residential college adviser at Forbes as one of her most meaningful extracurricular activities and “a chance to experience Princeton again.”

“First-years come in with all these ideas and ambitious plans about what they want to get out of Princeton, and it’s really nice to see that and be a part of it and help them in some ways,” she explained.

“Samvida does a great job of creating community,” Yost said. “Watching her create a community for underclassmen as an RCA has been incredible.”

“I know her zees call her ‘Momvida,’” added O’Leary.

As Venkatesh contemplated the next few years of her life, pursuing graduate studies at Oxford and beyond, she expressed gratitude for the people who have made the journey possible for her.

“My family has always been super supportive. I’m sure it wasn’t easy for them when I wanted to study in the U.S., but they wanted what was best for me, and they’ve always wanted that…. [My professors] have been so wonderful and helpful across all my classes, and I have good relationships with many of them because they are all so eager to mentor.”

She also enjoined Princeton students to prioritize sleep as she has done because “it’s what makes us run!”

Venkatesh said she hopes her Rhodes Scholarship win will encourage more people to seek out similar opportunities because now they know that they do not have to be “special in an unattainable way” in order to succeed.

“The Rhodes Scholar is such a fancy title, but we are all real, human, ordinary people,” she concluded.

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Wednesday November 7, 2018

Opinion

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{ www.dailyprincetonian.com }

A place for privacy Kaveh Badrei

Senior Columnist

S

hiru Café, a Japanbased chain with locations at Brown and others under construction at Yale and Amherst, could soon open in Princeton. Shiru offers coffee, refreshments, and pastries to students — for no charge. Students can drink free coffee and eat free pastries without spending any money. All they have to do to enjoy their tasty treats is submit private, personal information to the coffee shop.

At Shiru, customers fill out a “résumé” with their name, email address, major, class year, and professional interests or technical skills.

Upon completing this “résumé,” students can then enjoy free coffee, refreshments, and space to work.

The café makes money from its corporate sponsors, including Microsoft, PricewaterhouseCoopers, the Japan Railways Group, Philip Morris Japan, and Mitsubishi Fuso, which receive data from the café that can be used to advertise to prospective hires. Shiru does not share identifying personal information with sponsor companies. Instead, it gives sponsors “aggregate data” about the students who frequent the shop en masse. Given this information, companies can decide how to promote or market themselves to students through targeted information campaigns or recruitment events held in the café.

For those of us concerned about personal privacy rights and data protection, the idea of a café where customers surrender private and personal information for a cup of coffee or a croissant is not only invasive but dystopian. While I am sure many will be drawn to the prospect of free coffee on Princeton’s campus, I must reject the idea because of its dangerous implications. Privacy must become a priority for our gen-

ILLUSTRATION COURTESY OF VICTOR GUAN

eration, which seems to remain passive or frighteningly ignorant of this invasion of individual rights. But it seems the case of Shiru Café is one more case of expediency over principles. To surrender information for coffee seems to me myopic. If we are willing to make decisions out of short-sighted convenience today, then what will be the implications of tomorrow?

This invasion of privacy has already become normalized on the internet. Every one of our searches on websites like Google and Amazon are recorded and categorized on databases of personal information, data that can be linked back to each of us based on our computer, phone, or tablet’s IP address. But while this truth can seem distant and unimportant for people who have nothing to hide while using the internet, we can see the effects of it in the now regular practice of individually targeted advertising. The sites we search and frequent and the topics we look up contribute to the advertisements we see. We make purchases and subscribe to publications based on our own personal trends.

This reality may again seem in-

significant, but I can’t help but fear the dystopian destiny of this largely benign practice. Increasingly, our lives are becoming documented in databases with every search and purchase we make online. While today that information funnels targeted advertising to us for items to buy on Amazon, the future may not be so benign. I suspect the next iterations of this phenomenon will spell the individually targeted projection of news, current events, facts, and truth. This fate is inextricably linked to our complete willingness to not only allow for invasive privacy measures but also hand over our own personal data to corporations, websites, and companies — a virtual practice that could become reality at Shiru Café’s new Princeton location.

In a sense, this dystopian future has already come to pass. The alleged manipulation of Facebook profiles, events, and links by Russian operatives during the 2016 election included such things as targeted articles meant to foment certain feelings in supporters of both Clinton and Trump respectively, the creation of fake events meant to amass support or distrust of a certain candidate,

vol. cxlii

and the circulation of news stories meant to spread false and unaccountable information. The age of targeting truth based on our personal information has become the reality. This sense of manipulated privacy would not have been possible 10 years ago.

There must be a stronger emphasis for our right to privacy both on the internet and in our day to day lives. The potential introduction of Shiru Café in Princeton frightens me because it inches towards the line between virtual and real in this invasion of personal privacy. Many will contend that the information required for the Shiru “résumé” is not any more sensitive that what can be found on TigerBook, LinkedIn, or Facebook for those who choose to have profiles. Sponsors of the café display their logo in the store, and baristas who serve coffee and pastries on the one hand are also employed to disseminate information about sponsor groups and hold events for company representatives to interact with students. In the time we live in, buying and drinking a cup of coffee has become not only an invasion of privacy but also a capitalistic act meant to ingrain in students the corporate system of society.

I will only ask those who seek to defend the pay-with-personalinformation institution to observe the principles of the situation and imagine the dystopian turns this fun and trendy idea could spell in the near future. Shiru Café exposes a deep and carefree willingness of our generation to surrender essential privacy rights in exchange for expediency and ease. By acquiescing now to this invasion of privacy and personhood, students surrender an essential element of the defense of personal privacy. Before running blindly to the calls of free coffee and sweets, I would only ask my fellow students to think deeply about the principled choice at hand.

Kaveh Badrei is a junior Wilson School concentrator from Houston, Texas. He can be reached at kbadrei@princeton.edu.

When synagogues and grocery stores are sites of butchery: The vulnerable lives of Trump’s America Sam Aftel

Editorial Assistant

H

ate is on the rise in the United States, and the last few weeks have made that undeniable.

The Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services recently announced its plan to “define sex as either male or female, unchangeable, and determined by the genitals that a person is born with,” according to the The New York Times, which could effectively render transgender, nonbinary, and agender identities legally void.

Last week, a series of pipe bombs were sent to prominent Democrats, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, by a militant supporter of President Donald Trump.

On Oct. 24, a white supremacist, in an apparent hate crime, shot and killed two black grocery store customers in Kentucky but refrained from targeting white people because “whites don’t shoot whites.”

On Oct. 27, a fervent xenophobic anti-Semite invaded a Pittsburgh synagogue and massacred 11 Jewish Americans as they were observing Shabbat, later telling law enforcement: “I just want to kill Jews.”

On top of it all, these tragic events come on the heels of Trump’s senseless, racist fearmongering about the “caravan” of migrants who have courageously escaped the violence of Honduras, and the president’s recent preposterous announcement that he plans to end U.S. birthright citizenship via an executive order.

The broad-based hate that is plaguing American life is no accident. Such increasing hate is a product of a sociopolitical environment, led by Trump, that has renormalized and weaponized racism, xenophobia, and white supremacy.

It is no coincidence that hate crimes have substantially increased since the 2016 presidential election; the campaign and subsequent election of Trump enabled the simmering hate and white supremacy of American life to boil over into the political mainstream. Trump, more than any other modern presidential candidate, explicitly appealed to the worst instincts of the nation’s body politic — and, in the process, further endangered the lives of Americans living on the margins.

Not surprisingly, as president, he has doubled down on his whitenationalist ideology. Through words and actions, he has attacked Latino immigrants, women, Muslims, journalists, black people, poor people, Jews, LGBTQ+ people, and, not to mention, the rule of law, basic human decency, and American democracy itself.

While the president’s moral destruction is the most active ingredient in the increasing white-nationalist terror plaguing the country, “everyday Americans” are also responsible for this destruction. As much as it is politically taboo to criticize “the American people,” Trump is simply a product of the hatred and ignorance of much of the country’s electorate. At a time when national unity is vital, we must first address why such unity is so hard to achieve, which necessitates an interrogation of the hate-motivated violence of run-of-the-mill Americans; although they are not the only ones who commit these acts, white

Americans, given our disproportionately substantial history of hatred and supremacist politics, must be the focus of this interrogation.

As writer Ta-Nehisi Coates has explained multiple times, racial terror against black people — and other nonwhite populations — has often been at the hands of “workingclass” white Americans. This demographic, much like white populations across the class spectrum, as Coates put it, has been erroneously rendered “blameless” for supporting the racist fascism of Trump.

It wasn’t bombastic white billionaires from Manhattan who slaughtered Emmett Till; lynched Jesse Washington; massacred nine black people attending a Bible study; drove Sandra Bland to hang herself in a Texas jail cell; slayed Trayvon Martin, whose only crime was being a black male carrying Skittles; gang-raped and murdered Brandon Teena for being trans; pistol-whipped and left for dead Matthew Shepard because he was gay, and on and on.

These atrocities were committed by ordinary white people.

In short, presidents did not throw joyous afternoon picnics and hoist their amused five-year-old daughters on top of their shoulders to give them a better view at the sites of lynchings. Rather, everyday white people — men and women, adults and children, teachers and lawyers, police officers and firefighters, ministers and doctors — led these spectacles of genocidalmob butchery. Therefore, if you’re looking to root out hatred in the United States, start on Main Street, not Pennsylvania Avenue.

Some may say — understandably — that amid national tragedy, bringing up these societal ills only

stokes further division among Americans. And importantly, as a white male who goes to Princeton and who, for the most part, has been insulated from the worst instincts of everyday Americans and the victimization they perpetrate, I am not the ideal messenger for this issue, to say the least.

Nonetheless, I think for all Americans to heal and unite in this moment of tragedy, people who, intentionally or accidentally, obtain unwarranted hegemonic power in our society must acknowledge their complicity in the dehumanization of the “other” in U.S. life, a dehumanization that, right now, seems viciously acute.

Of course, most white Americans are not “bad” people. But all white people — including, of course, myself — must more thoroughly consider how our whiteness continues to be weaponized to subjugate and, in some cases, murder those marginalized by white hegemony.

Unity, for it to be genuine, does not involve whitewashing differences of human identity and social location. On the contrary, unity necessitates coming to terms with how supremacist identities and social locations have perpetrated violence and systematic dispossession; it also necessitates moving forward by consistently acknowledging this fact.

Before we celebrate our common humanity, we must examine why, for most of U.S. history, so many people were not considered human enough to be celebrated.

All in all, Trump has, time and time again, proven himself fundamentally incapable of exuding moral leadership and uniting Americans across lines of identity and ideology — even in times of grave

editor-in-chief

Marcia Brown ’19 business manager

Ryan Gizzie ’19

BOARD OF TRUSTEES president Thomas E. Weber ’89 vice president Craig Bloom ’88 secretary Betsy L. Minkin ’77 treasurer Douglas J. Widmann ’90 trustees Kathleen Crown Stephen Fuzesi ’00 Zachary A. Goldfarb ’05 John Horan ’74 Joshua Katz Rick Klein ’98 James T. MacGregor ’66 Alexia Quadrani Marcelo Rochabrun ’15 Richard W. Thaler, Jr. ’73 Lisa Belkin ‘82 Francesca Barber David Baumgarten ’06 Gabriel Debenedetti ’12 Michael Grabell ’03 Kavita Saini ’09 Abigail Williams ’14 trustees emeriti Gregory L. Diskant ’70 Jerry Raymond ’73 Michael E. Seger ’71 Annalyn Swan ’73 William R. Elfers ’71 Kathleen Kiely ’77

142ND MANAGING BOARD managing editors Isabel Hsu ’19 Sam Parsons ’19 head news editor Claire Thornton ’19 associate news editors Allie Spensley ’20 Ariel Chen ’20 Ivy Truong ’21 associate news and film editor Sarah Warman Hirschfield ’20 head opinion editor Emily Erdos ’19 associate opinion editors Jon Ort ’21 Cy Watsky ’21 head sports editors David Xin ’19 Chris Murphy ’20 associate sports editors Miranda Hasty ’19 Jack Graham ’20 associate street editors Danielle Hoffman ’20 Lyric Perot ’20 digital operations manager Sarah Bowen ’20 chief copy editors Marina Latif ’19 Arthur Mateos ’19 Catherine Benedict ’20 head design editor Rachel Brill ’19 associate design editor Charlotte Adamo ’21 cartoons editor Tashi Treadway ’19 head photo editor Risa Gelles-Watnick ’21

NIGHT STAFF copy Seoyoung Hong ’21 Catherine Yu ’21 design Ava Jiang ’21 Quinn Donohue ’20

national crisis, like the moment we are living through right now.

Instead of turning to a politics of solidarity and hope, Trump has employed a politics of cynicism and a white-identity politics that aims to sow further racial division and violently subvert the humanity of those outside the orthodoxy of heteronormative, male-centric, Christian-passing whiteness. Thus, at this time, we must look elsewhere — that is, beyond the Oval Office — for national unity, empathy, and hope. I think we must start by looking for these things within ourselves.

Samuel Aftel is a junior from East Northport, N.Y. He can be reached at saftel@princeton.edu.

Wednesday November 7, 2018

Kipnis blames loss on N.J. gerrymandering ELECTION Continued from page 1

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dorsed Menendez because he would be less likely to support President Donald Trump’s policies. Hugin donated $5,400 to the Trump campaign and $233,200 to the Republican National Committee in 2016.

The debates leading up to election day revolved heavily around Trump, making the Senate race feel like a referendum on the presidency.

Cristina Hain ’21, who voted for the first time in Icahn Laboratory Tuesday morning, said that President Donald Trump was “the main influencer” of her vote. Too young to vote in 2016, she used the midterms to express her disapproval.

Jim and Eva, town parents who have lived here for 20 years, agreed.

“This is the first real chance we’ve had, as a nation, to register our approval or disapproval on [Trump’s] performance,” Jim said.

“This is our opportunity to provide a check,” Eva added. “Even though we’re not voting on the president, we’re voting on folks who could provide counterbalance.”

Jim added, “We need a balance.

We need some voices, some way to make sure that we don’t go too far in a radical direction that’s going to hurt a lot of people.”

“From what I’ve heard, it’s record early voting turnouts and could be record midterm election turnouts in quite some time. That seems to signify that, yes, people are viewing this as their chance to voice their views on whether they agree with what [Trump] is doing.”

Hugin attempted to change this narrative during his opening statements at the NJTV debate, saying, “Bob Menendez is going to try to make this a debate about Donald Trump. That’s because he doesn’t want to take about anything about his record of corruption and failure. But this election is about Bob Menendez and Bob Hugin.”

The Menendez campaign clearly endorsed making the midterms about Trump, even making the WiFi password at the Menendez victory party “DumpTrump2018.”

At 10:08 a.m. on Election Day, Trump tweeted his endorsement of Hugin, concluding with “Get out and Vote for Bob.” Minutes later, the “Menendez for NJ” campaign account replied, “Thank you.”

In his victory speech, Menendez promised not to back down in his opposition to the Presidency.

House: New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District contains 10 of Mercer County’s 12 municipalities, including the town of Princeton as well as portions of Middlesex County, Somerset County, and Union County.

In NJ-12, Democratic incumbent Bonnie Watson Coleman defeated Republican challenger Daryl Kipnis for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, capturing 68.3 percent of the vote compared to his 31.7.

Coleman, first elected to Congress in 2014, served in the N.J. General Assembly from 1998 to 2015.

Coleman currently serves as a

The Daily Princetonian

member of the House of Representatives’ Homeland Security Committee and the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. She is a ranking member of the Transportation and Protective Security Subcommittee. She is a co-founder of the Congressional Caucus on Black Women and Girls.

In her first two terms in Congress, she advocated for gun safety and environmental protection. She has also written and introduced legislation, including the Healthy MOM Act, the End For-Profit Prisons Act, and the SAFER Pipelines Act. Kipnis has never served in public office, though he ran for state senate in 2017. A graduate of Rutgers University and Seton Hall Law School, he is a practicing attorney.

Kipnis’s campaign centered on first amendment freedoms, preserving the right to bear arms and the individual’s right to medical freedom, and promising to fight against “excessive and unfair taxation.”

Kipnis was a pro-Israel and proDACA candidate. If elected, he also hoped to improve District 12’s infrastructure and introduce legislation that would ease the suffering of college students with student debt.

Prior to Election Day, FiveThirtyEight’s midterm election forecast gave Coleman a 99.9% chance at victory in NJ-12, the 84th-most Democratic district out of 435 nationally.

At an anti-Kavanaugh rally near Princeton’s campus in early October, Coleman expressed hope to “make this state purely blue.”

Coleman’s hope was nearly achieved, with Menendez’s Senate victory and 10 of New Jersey’s 12 House seats won by Democrats.

As of publication, Republican Tom MacArthur was leading in New Jersey’s 3rd District, but the race was too close to call. Prior to this election, Republicans held five seats.

Democrats Jeff Van Drew, Tom Malinowski, and Mikie Sherrill flipped formerly Republican-held seats in Districts 2, 7, and 11.

Kipnis said that, though unhappy with the results, he is proud to have been a part of this election.

“I’m proud to have done my part.

I’ve stood up for what I believe in, I put myself out there to be a friend to everyone regardless of party affiliation,” he said. “Maybe I’ll get that chance again someday, maybe not, but I’m proud to have done what I did.”

Kipnis blamed his election loss on Coleman’s incumbency coupled with “partisan gerrymandering.”

“The district was drawn in such a way that favors the Democrats so heavily that it makes it an extremely difficult, uphill battle for anyone who is not a Democrat to challenge for a seat,” he said. “As long as there’s partisan gerrymandering in the country, it really hurts people getting their say, because you end up with someone who goes to one extreme. Not everybody in the district believes the district ought to be run one way, and you can end up electing somebody who will only do things one way.”

Coleman did not respond to requests for comment.

Boyle: Watching the polls close is a great start PARTY

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Even as the event itself came to a close, students remained caught up in conversation and the excitement of the night. Late-night refills of snacks kept energy levels up as polls closed across the country.

Juan José López Haddad ’22 stopped by toward the end of the night.

“I can’t believe that so many people are still here,” he said. “It’s amazing that we’re all here together watching history.”

As 10 p.m. neared, there was an overwhelming consensus within the audience to stay until every poll had closed. All around students remained enraptured, coming together on the second floor, so they could join in on the final moments together. The raffles continued, and more food was promised to those who wished to stay.

Caoimhe Boyle ’22 shared her ex-

citement about the students who chose to stay.

“This election is so important for our country’s future and I’m just really happy that our student body cares,” she said. “We’re looking at an event that will seriously affect our government and we need to take part in it, and watching the polls close is a great start.”

At the official end of the night, the polls were still open, and students continued watching the multiple projector screens, waiting for the final news. Many had laptops and readings out, keeping up with their work as they kept up with the political climate. Regardless of the final outcome of the election, the students at the watch party were united in their understanding of civic engagement and their duty as citizens.

The event was an initiative created by the Whig-Clio society with the help of USG and ODUS through the Vote100 campaign. It ran from 6 to 11 p.m. on Nov. 6.

page 5

Gel’man: ‘Good Soviet Union,’ ‘Make America Great Again’ equivalent

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According to Gel’man, bad governance is the norm, not the exception, among states.

RUSSIA

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tend to have bad governance.

Bad governance has emerged in recent years due to various factors, but Gel’man noted that the bad governance now seen in Russia and other post-Soviet states is particularly encouraged by the con-

cept of the “Good Soviet Union.”

The concept states that the former USSR provides a normative ideal to strive for. A false pretense of bygone “good old days” is used to legitimize policies that encourage bad governance.

“Good Soviet Union” according to Gel’man, is the functional equivalent of “Make America Great Again.”

“Nobody believes that these countries could be governed in a different way,” Gel’man said. “If you do not believe that bad governance can be overcome in the foreseeable future, you will just follow the preservation of the status quo.”

While democratization appears to be a viable option, examples like Moldova and Ukraine demonstrate that democracy may not improve governance — it merely shuffles around the existing people in power.

However, the situation is not entirely hopeless, Gelman said.

He pointed to Estonia’s government, which restructured its state apparatus by bringing in young professionals and providing them with the high degree of social mobility needed to move the country away from bad governance. This same model was successfully implemented in Georgia.

Gel’man said that internal resolve within a nation can improve governance, but that international support alone will not fix the problem.

The lecture, “Political Foundations of Post-Soviet Bad Governance,” was sponsored by the Program in Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies. The panel was held in the Louis A. Simpson Building at 4:30 p.m.

Campus Tour Daniel Te ’21

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Sports

Wednesday November 7, 2018

page 6

{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } WOMEN’S SOCCER

Women’s soccer beats Penn 1–0 for NCAA bid, Ivy co-championship

By Jack Graham Staff Writer

Women’s soccer (11–3–2 overall, 5–1–1 Ivy) edged out Penn (13–2–1 overall, 5–1–1 Ivy) on Saturday 1–0, earning the Tigers the title of co-champion of the Ivy League and securing a berth to the NCAA Division I Tournament. This is the second year in a row that the team has won the conference and advanced to the tournament.

The Tigers finished this year’s conference season 5–1–1, closing out the season with a four-game win streak against Columbia, Cornell, Harvard, and Penn.

The team needed to win on Saturday to earn a share of the title as well as a chance at a tournament slot. In the event of co-winners of the Ivy League, the head-to-head winner is used to determine who advances to the NCAA tournament, rather than goal differential. This put extra pressure on the Tigers. A win was crucial for not just the league championship, but also for the second year in a row of tournament play.

The pressure on both teams resulted in a hotly contested match.

“It was typical of a must-win game. Very emotional and very physical,” said head coach Sean Driscoll. “It’s not very often that there is a championship game in the Ivy League like Saturday’s.”

From the starting whistle, the game was a back-and-forth between the two teams. Both

teams had shots on goal and numerous fouls until the 31st minute, when senior forward Mimi Asom scored Princeton’s only championship goal in the game.

Asom took control of a long ball from Princeton’s defensive half while under pressure from Penn defense. She cut right and hit a rocket on the ground across the goal box, hitting net in the bottom left corner.

Asom’s goal on Saturday moved her into third place for most points in a career, with 95.

She overtook Linda DeBoer ’86.

She currently sits in third place for most goals in a career, as well, at 43 goals.

The half saw four shots for the Tigers and three for Penn. Both teams’ keepers had two saves each. Penn committed nine fouls, one more than Princeton’s eight in the first 45.

The second half was even more competitive than the first. Penn threw eight shots at Princeton, but none of them found the net.

The Tigers had six shots in the second half but were unable to increase their lead.

The Tigers held out and finished the game 1–0. Princeton keeper Natalie Grossi had yet another clean sheet during the game and saved four shots. Saturday marked Grossi’s 25th career clean sheet and her 10th this season. She currently holds the record for most shutouts in program history.

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Women’s soccer celebrates after winning the Ivy League title Princeton will face Texas Tech on Friday evening for the first round of the NCAA tournament.

Texas Tech finished its season 13–5–2 and 5–3–1 in the Big 12.

“They are very athletic and have great front-runners. They run a 4–4–2 formation which will be challenging for us, especially dangerous in the final third,” said Driscoll. “But this is a great opportunity for us — we like to travel and do really well on the road.”

At the beginning of this year’s season, Driscoll noted that the team faced an uphill battle for the

Ivy League championship due to its success last year. They had a bull’s-eye on their back. Now that the regular season was a total success and is over, the team can relax a little bit.

“Winning the league can be a big relief especially with the pressure we had,” the coach added.

“The NCAA tournament becomes even more fun because you are not just representing your school, but are showing the country what the Ivy League is capable of.”

This is Driscoll’s third NCAA tournament and Ivy League championship in his four years

as Princeton coach.

“The Elite Eight last year was amazing and definitely the greatest experience I’ve had as a coach,” he said.

Despite a very quick turnaround and a difficult travel schedule this week, the coach is sure that the team will perform well.

“We just need to have fun, enjoy the game, and embrace the spotlight. The [players’] success this season has been a testament to their character, quality, and talent,” said Driscoll.

FOOTBALL

Football: Looking back at Dartmouth, anticipate square off against Bulldogs

By Jack Graham

Associate Sports Editor

It’s an exciting time to be a Princeton football fan. Last Saturday, Nov. 3, the Tigers took down Dartmouth 14–9 in a thrilling showdown of unbeaten teams. This Saturday, Princeton plays Yale for a chance to earn a bonfire and secure at least a share of the Ivy League title.

Here’s a list of takeaways from the Dartmouth game and things to think about before the Yale game.

Princeton’s defense is good — like, really good Entering Saturday’s game against Dartmouth, Princeton’s defense was allowing only nine points per game. However, the unit had often been overshadowed by the Tigers offense’s averaging 50 points per game. After Saturday, that should no longer be the case. While Princeton floundered offensively for much of the game, the defense completely stifled Dartmouth, not allowing a point after the opening possession. Two main factors account for Princeton’s dramatic reversal from last year, in which the team had one of the worst defenses in the Ivy League. First, the unit has remained relatively healthy and has received valuable contributions from players who missed significant time last season with injury. Senior linebackers Mark Fossati and Mike Wagner both suffered season-ending injuries in 2017 and now lead the team in tackles and sacks respec-

tively. Second, Princeton’s secondary, which struggled due to its inexperience in 2017, has improved greatly. Senior safety Ben Ellis, junior safety TJ Floyd, and sophomore cornerback Delan Stallworth were all first-year starters last year and have each played well in 2018. Floyd leads the team in interceptions with six, and Ellis is third in tackles.

Bob Surace isn’t afraid to gamble Analytically-minded football fans have long been frustrated by the unwillingness of risk-averse coaches to attempt fourth-down conversions even when the statistics say it’s clearly the right move. Nobody could make any such accusations against Princeton coach Bob Surace ’90. Princeton has attempted 21 fourth down conversions this season and converted 17 of them. In the fourth quarter against Dartmouth, Princeton attempted three fourth down conversions in one drive. The final one, a 4thand-inches from the Dartmouth 5 with Princeton trailing 9–7, came up short, but Princeton scored a touchdown on the next drive anyways.

John Lovett isn’t (totally) unstoppable Before suffering an injury to his non-throwing hand against Lehigh, senior quarterback John Lovett was essentially unstoppable. Not only was he accurate throwing the ball and running it, but he played mistake-free football, committing no turnovers through his first five

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games. Against Dartmouth, Lovett scored both Princeton’s touchdowns but failed otherwise to have his usual impact. Windy conditions limited his ability to throw downfield and the Dartmouth defense contained him on the ground relatively well, holding him to 70 yards on 22 carries.

He also threw a costly interception in the end zone that ended a long Princeton drive in the second quarter without points and lost a fumble near midfield later in the quarter. Lovett has also played the past few games with a cast on his left hand, though besides the fumble against Dartmouth and the inability to take snaps under center, it has not drastically affected his play.

Despite injuries, Yale remains potent Yale was voted to finish first in the Ivy League preseason media poll by a wide margin and looked solid, barring a lopsided loss against Dartmouth, until the Bulldogs lost their starting quarterback, Kurt Rawlings, to injury. Backup Jimmy Check was ineffective, and the Bulldogs picked up their second Ivy League loss against Columbia, effectively, but not mathematically, ending their hopes of defending their Ivy League title.

Yale turned to freshman quarterback Griffin O’Connor last week against Brown, and he dazzled in his debut with four touchdown passes in a 46–16 win over Brown.

Yale’s defense has also been stellar recently, holding its last three opponents to an average of 12

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The Tigers travel to New Haven this weekend to take on Yale.

points.

Lots on the line Even with a loss, Princeton would have a good shot to win at least a share of the Ivy League title. That said, the team has much to play for. A win would give Princeton its first bonfire, earned by beating Harvard and Yale in the same season, since 2013. Princeton has come close in recent years to that bonfire. In 2016, the Tigers beat Yale and lost to Harvard in overtime, and in 2017, they beat Harvard and lost to Yale narrowly despite leading

24–14 at halftime. No current students have witnessed a bonfire in their time here, and the prospect of one has even those normally not interested in football excited. Also, the Tigers are two wins away from their first undefeated season since 1964. Players and coaches have cited their ability to take things one week at a time as a prime reason for the team’s success. However, with the toughest game of the season out of the way, the prospect of making history must have at least crossed their minds.

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Heisman Trophy winner Dick Kazmaier ‘52 wore number 42, now Princeton football’s only retired number.