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Cuellar sworn into Congress Zapata representative takes oath S P ECIAL T O T HE T I ME S
WASHINGTON — Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Zapata, was sworn into his seventh term in the United States House of Representatives by Speaker Paul Ryan on Tuesday. The Speaker of the
House led today’s traditional swearing-in ceremony on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.Cuellar recited the oath that every member of Congress has sworn since 1884: “I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitu-
tion of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will Cuellar continues on A11
U.S. House Office of Photography / Courtesy
Rep. Henry Cuellar stands by House Speaker Paul Ryan as he takes the official oath of office as the 115th Congress formally convened on Tuesday in Washington, D.C.
IMMIGRATION
DOOR SHUT ON MIGRANTS
TEXAS
Wine growers fear new herbicides Grapes dying from damage By Elena Mejia Lutz THE TEXAS TRIBUNE
Bob Owen / San Antonio Express-News
Alejandra Flores, right, from Honduras, huddles with her sons Alexande Josue Romero, 3, and Brision Josue Romero, 10, left, with other immigrants on the Hidalgo International Bridge in the early hours on Dec. 27, hoping to be let in the U.S. after a 22 day journey from their home in Honduras, spending Christmas on the road.
Many pleading for asylum are turned back to Mexico By Aaron Nelsen SA N A NT ONI O E XPRE SS-NEWS
R
EYNOSA, Mexico — On a recent December morning, Guatemala native Celinda Aracely Rodriguez limped across an international bridge to seek asylum in the United States. But immigration officials sent her back to Mexico instead. In Reynosa, within steps of the bridge, Rodriguez, 30, was snatched by a smuggler who is holding the woman until she
can pay to cross the river, according to her mother, Rubiluz Lemus. “I don’t know if they are good coyotes or bad ones,” said Lemus, 50, from an immigrant shelter in Reynosa, voicing fears that the smuggler might want more than just the usual money for getting someone into the United States illegally. “What if they have bad intentions?’ Asylum-seeking immigrants have clogged international Migrants continues on A11
Courtesy photo
Central American immigrants are released at a bus station in downtown Laredo on Dec. 29 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
As Paul Bonarrigo watched his grapevines dwindle, he was confident that heavy-duty herbicides, probably sprayed on crops by a nearby farmer, were drifting into his vineyards. For the past two years, his 44 acres in Hale County — once sprawling vineyards providing fruit for Bonarrigo’s Messina Hof Winery — have not produced any grapes as they wither from chemical damage. Other Texas winegrowers have seen similar damage, and they blame it on dicamba and 2,4-D, two high-volatility herbicides commonly used on cereal crops, pastures and lawns. Now, the state’s vintners are alarmed that use of the chemicals may soon expand to include 3.7 million acres of cotton fields in the High Plains, where cotton is being invaded by weeds immune to the Roundup pesticide long used. The wine industry contributed close to $2 billion to the Texas economy in 2013, according to a report by the Texas Wine and Grape Growers Association. Bonarrigo said he thinks the industry is now in jeopardy. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently approved Monsanto’s new formulation, called XtendiMax with Wine continues on A11
ABORTION
Federal judge mulling fate of Texas fetal remains rules By Will Weissert A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
AUSTIN, Texas — Abortion providers told a federal judge Tuesday that Texas’ attempt to require burial or cremation of fetal remains was “government interference” without public
health benefits, while state lawyers countered that clinics want to be allowed to continue disposing of such remains in landfills. The question of what becomes of tissue left over from abortions and miscarriages is the latest legal battle over abortion
in Texas, which saw the U.S. Supreme Court last summer strike down much of its larger abortion restrictions that had been among the nation’s toughest. At issue are state health department rules banning hospitals and abortion clinics from
disposing of fetal tissue as biological medical waste, which usually means incineration, followed by disposal in sanitary landfills. Earlier legal challenges blocked similar measures in Louisiana and Indiana. Texas’ rules seek to require fetal remains to
be buried or to be cremated then buried or scattered. Many abortions occur less than 10 weeks into pregnancy, when the amount of tissue can be smaller than a dime. The new regulations would have taken effect last month, but Austin-
based U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks put them on hold while he considers a lawsuit from national activists. Those groups say the rules are meant to shame women who seek abortions and make it harder for doctors to provide them. The health Abortion continues on A11
Zin brief A2 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES
CALENDAR
AROUND THE WORLD
TODAY IN HISTORY
SATURDAY, JANUARY 7
A S S O C I AT E D P R E S S
Book Sale. 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
Today is Wednesday, Jan. 4, the fourth day of 2017. There are 361 days left in the year.
Laredo Northside Market Association’s Farmers Market. 9 a.m.-1 p.m. North Central Park. For more information on vendor’s spaces please contact Erna Pelto at 956-763-9138.
Today’s Highlight in History: On Jan. 4, 1967, “The Doors,” the self-titled debut album of the rock group featuring the song “Light My Fire,” was released by Elektra Records.
MONDAY, JANUARY 9 Chess Club. Every Monday, 4-6 p.m. LBV-Inner City Branch Library, 202 W. Plum St. Compete with other players in this cherished game played internationally. Free instruction for all ages and skill levels. Chess books and training materials are available.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 11 Book Room open. 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
Diary of a Mortar Shell in Damascus / AP
This frame grab from video provided by Diary of a Mortar Shell in Damascus, a Damascus-based media outlet, shows Syrian residents filling up buckets of spring water from a pipe.
MONDAY, JANUARY 16 Chess Club. Every Monday, 4-6 p.m. LBV-Inner City Branch Library, 202 W. Plum St. Compete with other players in this cherished game played internationally. Free instruction for all ages and skill levels. Chess books and training materials are available.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 18 Book Room open. 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 21 Harry Potter Book Club. 3 p.m. McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco. Free and family friendly. Children and adults are welcome. United ISD 6th Annual 5K Run, Walk and Health Fair. Registration will be from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m. at the SAC, 5208 Santa Claudia Lane. Special ceremony dedicated to Adriana Rodriguez and Karina Villarreal will be held at 8:30 a.m. with the race at 9 a.m. Fee is $25 and includes a goody bag, T-shirt, and certificate of completion. Medals will be awarded to the top male and female winners in each age division. All proceeds to benefit United ISD students with scholarships to college. For more information call, 956-473-6201 or visit www.uisd.net
MONDAY, JANUARY 23 Chess Club. Every Monday, 4-6 p.m. LBV-Inner City Branch Library, 202 W. Plum St. Compete with other players in this cherished game played internationally. Free instruction for all ages and skill levels. Chess books and training materials are available.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 25 Book Room open. 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
THURSDAY, JANUARY 26 Villa San Agustin de Laredo Genealogical Society. 3-5 p.m. St. John Neumann Parish Hall. Meet and greet membership drive. The speaker’s subject is “How I Traced My Family Roots.” Open to the public. For more information, contact Sylvia Reash at 763-1810. Spanish Book Club. 6-8 p.m. Joe A. Guerra Public Library - Calton. For more information, contact Sylvia Reash at 763-1810.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 28 United ISD Zumba Master Class event. Registration at 8 a.m. at the United 9th Grade Campus (gym), 8800 McPherson Road. Zumba class to be held from 9 to 11 a.m. and will be taught by elite Zumba instructors from the city. Fee is $20 and includes a goody bag and T-shirt. All proceeds to benefit United ISD students with scholarships to college. For more information call, 956-473-6201 or visit www.uisd.net.
MONDAY, JANUARY 30 Chess Club. Every Monday, 4-6 p.m. LBV-Inner City Branch Library, 202 W. Plum St. Compete with other players in this cherished game played internationally. Free instruction for all ages and skill levels. Chess books and training materials are available.
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 1 Book Room open. 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
WATER CRISIS IN SYRIAN CAPITAL BEIRUT — Residents of Damascus are scrambling for clean water after the government attacked rebels holding the city’s main source in a nearby valley, leading to an accidental outage that has stretched on for nearly two weeks. The cut-off is a major challenge to the government’s effort throughout the nearly 6-year-old civil war to keep the capital as insulated as possible from the effects of the conflict tearing apart much of the country. “I have stopped cleaning the house, washing dishes or clothes. We no longer take showers,” said Mona Maqssoud, a
Haiti certifies presidential win for businessman PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A businessman from northern Haiti who has never held political office was certified as the official winner of the November presidential election Tuesday following a ruling by an electoral tribunal that found no evidence of large-scale voter fraud. The Provisional Electoral Council published final results showing that Jovenel
50-year-old resident of Damascus. She said residents have relied on water tankers that come by occasionally and give 20 liters (5 gallons) of water to each house, but that hasn’t been enough. “We begged the drivers (to return) to our neighborhood, but they refused.” The cut-off, since Dec. 22, is the longest Damascus has seen, say residents, who are accustomed to intermittent outages. The opposition has long controlled Wadi Barada, the valley northwest of Damascus. — Compiled from AP reports
Moise easily won a first-round victory with more than 55 percent of the votes, the same as the preliminary results that were announced in late November. His nearest challenger, Jude Celestin, had nearly 20 percent. Release of the results came hours after a special electoral tribunal dismissed allegations of massive fraud, announcing that it had found some irregularities in the Nov. 20 election but not enough to affect the outcome based on an analysis of 12 percent of the ballots. Moise, whose business
ventures include a large banana farm in the north of the country, pledged on Twitter that the five-year mandate that has been entrusted to him by the Haitian people will be a productive one. A 48-year-old chosen by former President Michel Martelly to run as the candidate of his Tet Kale party, Moise defeated 26 rivals in the first round and avoided a runoff. Several rivals challenged the results, but the electoral judges said they found “there was no massive fraud.” — Compiled from AP reports
AROUND THE NATION Sea turtles rescued off Cape Cod moved to Florida Keys MARATHON, Fla. — Fifteen critically endangered Kemp’s ridley sea turtles are warming up at the Florida Keys-based Turtle Hospital after being rescued from cold waters off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The juvenile turtles have pneumonia as a result of “cold stunning” but are expected to make a full recovery, officials said Tuesday. “Cold stunning” is a hypothermic reaction that occurs when sea turtles are exposed to cold water for a prolonged time. “They came in when the water was warm, and they didn’t go out with the Gulf Stream,” Turtle Hospital manager Bette Zirkelbach said of that warmer ocean current. “The cold weather moved in and the turtles didn’t get out in time.”
Larry Benvenuti / AP
In this photo provided by the Florida Keys News Bureau, one of 15 critically endangered Kemp's ridley sea turtles is shown.
The turtles, which range from two to 10 pounds each, were flown Monday night to the Florida Keys from Norwood, Massachusetts. They were transported in towel-lined boxes en route to the Turtle Hospital. “They’re going to be treated at the Turtle Hospital with broad spectrum antibiotics,”
Zirkelbach said. “We’re going to give them vitamins, a healthy diet, and we’re going to keep them in warm water, 75 degrees. That will warm them up and let those medications do their work.” The reptiles are likely to be released in waters off Florida after they recover. — Compiled from AP reports
On this date: In 1717, France, Britain and Holland formed a Triple Alliance against Spain. In 1896, Utah was admitted as the 45th state. In 1904, the Supreme Court, in Gonzalez v. Williams, ruled that Puerto Ricans were not aliens and could enter the United States freely; however, the court stopped short of declaring them U.S. citizens. (Puerto Ricans received U.S. citizenship in March 1917.) In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union address, called for legislation to provide assistance for the jobless, elderly, impoverished children and the handicapped. In 1943, Soviet dictator Josef Stalin made the cover of TIME as the magazine’s 1942 “Man of the Year.” In 1951, during the Korean War, North Korean and Communist Chinese forces recaptured the city of Seoul (sohl). In 1960, author and philosopher Albert Camus (al-BEHR’ kah-MOO’) died in an automobile accident in Villeblevin, France, at age 46. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson delivered his State of the Union address in which he outlined the goals of his “Great Society.” In 1974, President Richard Nixon refused to hand over tape recordings and documents subpoenaed by the Senate Watergate Committee. In 1987, 16 people were killed when an Amtrak train bound from Washington, D.C., to Boston collided with Conrail locomotives that had crossed into its path from a side track in Chase, Maryland. In 1990, Charles Stuart, who claimed that he’d been wounded and his pregnant wife fatally shot by a robber, leapt to his death off a Massachusetts bridge after he himself came under suspicion. In 1995, the 104th Congress convened, the first entirely under Republican control since the Eisenhower era. Ten years ago: Nancy Pelosi was elected the first female speaker of the House as Democrats took control of Congress. Harriet Miers resigned as White House counsel. Vincent Sardi Jr., owner of Sardi’s restaurant, the legendary Broadway watering hole, died in Berlin, Vermont, at age 91. Five years ago: Defying Republican lawmakers, President Barack Obama barreled past the Senate by using a recess appointment to name Richard Cordray the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. One year ago: Workers returned to their offices at the San Bernardino, California campus where 14 people were killed the previous month in a terror attack carried out by a county restaurant inspector Sayed Farook and his wife. The Justice Department sued Volkswagen over emissionscheating software found in nearly 600,000 vehicles sold in the United States. Today’s Birthdays: Actress Barbara Rush is 90. Football Hall of Fame coach Don Shula is 87. Opera singer Grace Bumbry is 80. Actress Dyan Cannon is 78. Author-historian Doris Kearns Goodwin is 74. Country singer Kathy Forester (The Forester Sisters) is 62. Actress Ann Magnuson is 61. Rock musician Bernard Sumner (New Order, Joy Division) is 61. Country singer Patty Loveless is 60. Actor Julian Sands is 59. Rock singer Michael Stipe is 57. Actor Patrick Cassidy is 55. Actor Dave Foley is 54. Actress Dot Jones is 53. Actor Rick Hearst is 52. Singer-musician Cait O’Riordan is 52. Actress Julia Ormond is 52. Tennis player Guy Forget (ghee fohr-ZHAY’) is 52. Country singer Deana Carter is 51. Rock musician Benjamin Darvill (Crash Test Dummies) is 50. Actor Josh Stamberg is 47. Actor Jeremy Licht is 46. Actor Damon Gupton is 44. Actress-singer Jill Marie Jones is 42. Alt-country singer Justin Townes Earle is 35. Christian rock singer Spencer Chamberlain (Underoath) is 34. Actress Lenora Crichlow is 32. Comedianactress Charlyne Yi is 31. Actresssinger Coco Jones is 19. Thought for Today: “Sometimes history takes things into its own hands.” — Thurgood Marshall, U.S. Supreme Court justice (1908-1993).
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 4 Book sale. 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited, no admission fee.
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6 Chess Club. Every Monday, 4-6 p.m. LBV-Inner City Branch Library, 202 W. Plum St. Compete with other players in this cherished game played internationally. Free instruction for all ages and skill levels. Chess books and training materials are available. Ray of Light anxiety and depression support group meeting. 6:30—7:30 p.m. Area Health Education Center, 1505 Calle del Norte, Suite 430. Every first Monday of the month. People suffering from anxiety and depression are invited to attend this free, confidential and anonymous support group meeting.
AROUND TEXAS Fossil could be reptile that swam 90M years ago DEL RIO — A fossil found in limestone along a remote South Texas riverbed could be that of a dolphin-like reptile that swam in oceans 90 million years ago, according to paleontologists. The discovery was made two years ago by petroleum geologist James Harcourt, who works for the Texas Railroad
CONTACT US Commission, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry. It went largely unnoticed until a photo of the fossil appeared on the cover of the commission’s 2016 annual report. The find is unique because it appears to be a nearly complete fossil of an ichthyosaur, which grew to about 6 feet long and had the sleek body of a dolphin and long, toothy jaws of a dinosaur, the Houston Chronicle reports. The fossil was found on private land near the border town of Del Rio as Harcourt
and some colleagues were studying the Eagle Ford formation, which is one of the state’s most productive shale oil basins. Harcourt spotted a row of bones imprinted on rock. When the surface dirt was cleared away, Harcourt and his colleagues realized the limestone held a large skull, long spine and ribs. “Very rarely do we get really complete skeletons out of the Eagle Ford,” said Josh Lively, a doctoral candidate at UT. — Compiled from AP reports
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THE ZAPATA TIMES | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 |
A3
LOCAL Texas sues FDA to make decision on execution drug By Michael Graczyk A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
HOUSTON — Texas filed a lawsuit Tuesday against a federal agency to force it to decide whether an impounded shipment of a drug used for executions should be delivered to the Texas prison system, which has carried out more lethal injections than any other state. A 1,000-vial shipment of sodium thiopental purchased by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice from an unidentified foreign drug supplier was detained in July 2015 at Houston Bush Intercontinental Airport. The drug package remains in federal custody. The Food and Drug Administration should decide within a “reasonable” time and 17 months was not reasonable, Attorney General Ken Pax-
ton said. “There are only two reasons why the FDA would take 17 months to make a final decision on Texas’ importation of thiopental sodium: gross incompetence or willful obstruction,” Paxton said. “The FDA has an obligation to fulfill its responsibilities faithfully and in a timely manner. My office will not allow the FDA to sit on its hands and thereby impair Texas’ responsibility to carry out its law enforcement duties.” An FDA spokeswoman, Lyndsay Meyer, said the agency “does not comment on possible, pending or ongoing litigation.” Federal officials said previously the drug has no legal uses in the U.S. Paxton said the FDA is withholding importation of the sodium thiopental based on allegations the drug violates new drug approval requirements.
Courtesy photo
Zapata County sheriff sworn into office Zapata County Sheriff Alonso M. Lopez, left, was sworn into office on Sunday, Jan. 1, 2017. He is pictured with Zapata County Chief Deputy Raymundo Del Bosque Jr.
Courtesy photo
Villarreal Elementary School students of the week The following are the Students of the Week for Villarreal Elementary School. Pictured, top row, from left: Giselle Gutierrez, Angel Jonguitud, Leonardo Zavala, Pablo Pitero, Nadina Rodriguez, Isis Rodriguez, Angel Sarmiento; middle row: Carlos Hinojosa, Jonathan Hernandez, Jesus Sanchez, Jocelyn De Los Santos, Alyssa Guerrero, Gregoria Trejo, Beida Davila, Fernando Gonzalez, Sophia Perez, Yazmin Angeles; bottom row: Jose Daniel Cavazos, Connie Sanchez, Marco Landa, Arianna Minor, Yael Quiroz, Karelly Alaniz, Reynaldo Diaz, Jorge Rodriguez, Cristian Garcia and Jayleen Hernandez.
Police investigating accidental poisoning that killed four kids By Claudia Lauer ASSOCIATED PRE SS
AMARILLO, Texas — A criminal investigation is underway into an accidental poisoning involving a professional-grade pesticide that left four children dead and an Amarillo woman in critical condition, police said Tuesday. Authorities are looking into why the family had the pesticide pellets, called Weevil-cide, which is only supposed to be sold to people with professional licenses or certification and is marketed for use in rodent control in commercial transport of commodities and animal feed. The father told first responders through a Spanish language interpreter that he had spread the pellets under the family’s mobile home after obtaining the product from a friend, Amarillo Fire Capt. Larry Davis
said. Davis said the product is not available for sale to the general public. Davis said the father does not have that certification as far as he knows. He did not know whether the friend who gave him the product had a certification. Amarillo police spokesman Officer Jeb Hilton says the department’s special crimes unit is investigating because of the child deaths. Once completed, the investigation will be turned over to the district attorney to determine whether charges will be filed. Hilton said other federal and state environmental regulation agencies may also investigate. Fire officials said the children who died were three boys, ages 7, 9 and 11, and a 17-year-old girl. Officials have said all four children lived at the home. The children’s mother,
Martha Balderas, 45, was in critical condition Tuesday at University Medical Center in Lubbock, according to a hospital spokesman. Five other family members, including the father and four other children, were being treated at BSA Health System in Amarillo and were in stable condition, hospital and fire officials said. Crews who responded to a 5 a.m. call to the home on Monday originally thought it was related to carbon monoxide poisoning. Authorities later determined that phosphine gas was likely released when the father took a garden hose at some point Sunday and tried to rinse away some of the pellets because family members had complained of the smell. The water started the chemical reaction that released the phosphine gas. A visitor arrived
early Monday, found everyone sick and called 911. Phosphine gas can cause respiratory failure and in severe cases can cause a pulmonary edema, which fills the lungs full of fluid. About 10 first responders from the police, fire and medical response departments were also taken to the hospital as a precautionary measure, Davis said. Two were kept overnight for observation because of headache and nausea but were in good condition Tuesday, he said. Chip Orton, emergency management coordinator for the city of Amarillo and Potter and Randall counties, says his staff was working with a number of state and federal agencies to decontaminate the home. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has hired a private contractor to help.
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A4 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES
COLUMN
OTHER VIEWS
The Snapchat presidency Normal leaders come up with policy proposals in a certain conventional way. They gather their advisers around them and they debate alternatives — with briefing papers, intelligence briefings and implementation strategies. President-elect Donald Trump doesn’t do that. He’s tweeted out policy gestures in recent weeks, say about the future of the United States’ nuclear arsenal. But these gestures aren’t attached to anything. They emerged from no analytic process and point to no implemental effects. Trump’s statements seem to spring spontaneously from his middle-of night-feelings. They are astoundingly ambiguous and defy interpretation. Normal leaders serve an office. They understand that the president isn’t a lone monarch. He is the temporary occupant of a powerful public post. He’s the top piece of a big system, and his ability to create change depends on his ability to leverage and mobilize the system. His statements are carefully parsed around the world because presidential shifts in verbal emphasis are not personal shifts; they are national shifts that signal changes in a superpower’s actual behavior. Donald Trump doesn’t think in that way, either. He is anti-system. As my “PBS NewsHour” colleague Mark Shields points out, he has no experience being accountable to anybody, to a board of directors or an owner. As president-elect, he has not begun attaching himself to the system of governance he’ll soon oversee. If anything, Trump is detaching himself. In a very public way, he’s detached himself from the intelligence community that normally serves as the president’s eyes and ears. He’s talked about not really moving to the White House, the nerve center of the executive branch. He’s sided with a foreign leader, President Vladimir Putin of Russia, against his own governmental structures. Finally, normal leaders promulgate policies. They measure their days by how they propose and champion actions and legislation. Trump doesn’t think in this way, either. He is a creature of the parts of TV and media where display is an end in itself. He is not really interested in power; his entire life has been about winning attention and status to build the Trump image for lowclass prestige. The posture is the product. When Trump issues a statement, it may look superficially like a policy statement, but it’s usually just a symbolic assault in some dominance-submission male rivalry game. It’s trash-talking against a rival, President Barack
“
DAVID BROOKS
Obama, or a media critic like CNN. Trump may be bashing Obama on Russia or the Mideast, but it’s not because he has implementable policies in those realms. The primary thing is bashing enemies. Over the past weeks, we’ve treated the president-elect’s comments as normal policy statements uttered by a normal president-elect. Each time Trump says or tweets something, squads of experts leap into action, trying to interpret what he could have meant, or how his intention could lead to changes in U.S. policy. But this is probably the wrong way to read Trump. He is more postmodern. He does not operate by an if-then logic. His mode is not decision, implementation, consequence. His statements should probably be treated less like policy declarations and more like Snapchat. They exist to win attention at the moment, but then they disappear. To read Trump correctly, it’s probably best to dig up old French deconstructionists like Jean Baudrillard, who treated words not as things that have meanings in themselves but as displays in an oppositional power struggle. Trump is not a national leader; he is a national show. If this is all true, it could be that the governing Trump will be a White House holograph. When it comes to the substance of actual governance, it could be that President Trump is the man who isn’t there. The crucial question of the Trump administration could be: Who will fill the void left by a leader who is all facade? It could be the senior staff. Trump will spew out a stream of ambiguous tweets, then the hypermacho tough guys Trump has selected will battle viciously with one another to determine which way the administration will really go. It could be congressional Republicans. They have an off-the-shelf agenda they are hoping that figurehead Trump will sign, though it has nothing to do with the issues that drove the presidential campaign. It could be the permanent bureaucracy, which has an impressive passiveaggressive ability to let the politicians have their news conference fun and then ignore everything that’s “decided.” It will be interesting to see if that brawl is just an escalating but ultimately harmless volley of verbiage, or whether it affects the substance of government policy and leads to nuclear war.
OP-ED
Math education needs to start earlier By Melissa E. Libertus and Roberta Michnick Golinkoff THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
Educators and parents alike are alarmed over the persistent gaps between 15-year-olds in the United States and their international peers on science and math outcomes. According to the latest results of the Programme for International Student Assessment, or PISA, released on Dec. 6, American adolescents rank a paltry 31st out of the 35 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries in math, and math scores have significantly declined since the last PISA in 2012. To combat this trend, forces have mobilized around STEM education stressing the experiences needed to build a foundation for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Fostering strong STEM education will safeguard our place in the world and ensure our children a place in tomorrow’s workforce. Yet our lagging international PISA scores highlight how we continue to miss an essential element in preparing our students for the future: Evidence suggests that the road to strong STEM education starts not in elementary or middle school, but at home and in preschool with very young children. Some parents and teachers talk about numbers and math frequently so that their children are hearing words such as “two,” “twelve,” “more,” “less,” “count,” and “add” repeatedly in various contexts. Other parents and teachers, however,
rarely use number and math words or engage children in meaningful math-learning activities. Failing to talk to our kids about math and introducing them to mathematical ideas and activities is what we call “The Great Shortchange” because it stunts children’s math growth and their future success. This is precisely where we need to act: We must bring math into our homes and preschools. To be specific, research indicates that some parents of toddlers use an average of more than 30 number words every hour (e.g., “Where are the three girls in the picture?”). Other parents, however, use only one number word every two hours, on average. This creates close to a 6,000 percent difference in math input at home. The results are even more worrisome when we look at preschool teachers. Some preschool teachers use more than 100 math words per hour, but others use only one - almost a 10,000 percent difference. Given these differences in children’s experience, it is no surprise that children who are exposed to more activities and talk related to math acquire new math concepts faster and enter kindergarten better prepared for learning math. Although some children can barely count to 10, others are already doing basic arithmetic. Crucially, math abilities at the start of school are among the strongest predictors of later math achievement. Researchers in early mathematics, among them Douglas Clements from the University of Denver, Herbert Ginsburg from Teachers
College at Columbia University, Kathy Hirsh-Pasek from Temple University, Nancy Jordan from the University of Delaware, Susan C. Levine from the University of Chicago, and Robert S. Siegler from Carnegie Mellon University, share our concern and contribute to the inquiry that speaks to these issues. So what can we do? Early math needs to be promoted in the same way that early language and emergent literacy have been promoted over the past decades. We need to foster the ABCs and the 1, 2, 3s (and higher). Parents and early childhood educators need to know that math learning starts early, that it is important, and that it cannot wait until children are in elementary school. Children enjoy learning to count and the meanings of number words (that the word “four” means there are four things); comparing number words and deciding which is larger; identifying, describing and constructing shapes (how many sides does a triangle have?); and understanding how much money a lollipop costs versus a toy truck. Numbers can be a natural part of parents’ talk with their children. At the grocery store, for example, parents can talk about the number of bananas in a bunch and how many would remain if you picked off two, the cost of a child’s favorite cereal, and what it means to be “on sale.” At home, they can count the number of plates needed to set the table, and they can weigh and measure flour and salt when they bake together. When children ask how long it takes for the
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DOONESBURY | GARRY TRUDEAU
cookies to bake in the oven, parents have another opportunity to use number talk. When traveling by car or bus and children ask the perennial “Are we there yet?,” parents can talk about the number of miles and minutes to reach their destination. Board games like Chutes and Ladders that require counting give numbers real meaning as they correspond to how many spaces children can advance with each throw of the dice. Building with blocks or doing puzzles together can fuel the spatial skills that undergird math knowledge. All of these activities can become part of the family and preschool routine and can teach children significant mathematical concepts in a playful way. They do not require workbooks, large amounts of time or inappropriate formal instruction. But they can go a long way toward closing the Great Shortchange and helping prepare the next generation of students to propel our country forward in math and to ensure that future PISA results are not as bleak as this year’s. Melissa E. Libertus is a research scientist at the Learning Research and Development Center and an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Pittsburgh. Roberta Michnick Golinkoff is the Unidel H. Rodney Sharp Professor of Education, Psychology and Linguistics at the University of Delaware. Her latest book is “Becoming Brilliant: What Science Teaches Us about Raising Successful Children.”
THE ZAPATA TIMES | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 |
A5
ENTERTAINMENT
Box office records made as musicals, plays say goodbye to 2016 By Mark Kennedy A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
NEW YORK — The year on Broadway came to an explosive and sparkly end for theater producers as many shows recorded their best weeks ever — and not just the fresh new offerings. Virtually every one of the 33 shows that ended the week — and year — on Sunday had reason to pop Champagne, thanks to relatively mild weather, extra performances and premium pricing. The total haul was $49,531,578 — more than $19 million more than the previous week and $6 million more than the same time last year. Some older Broadway shows roared into 2017 with brand new reasons to smile — “Jersey Boys” recorded $1,778,189 over nine performances, the best week in the show’s Broadway history, while “Chicago” pulled in $1,248,473 over nine performances, the highest grossing week in the show’s 20-year history. Disney’s “The Lion King,” now in its mature 19th year on Broadway, showed some bite by earning over $3 million for the first time in a single week, albeit across nine shows. Other shows that posted their best weeks included “Something Rotten!” ($1,478,302), “Paramour” ($1,908,018), “Matilda” ($1,902,366), “A Bronx Tale” ($1,293,145) and “Waitress” ($1,331,954). The return of “The Illusionists” earned $2,397,106 over an exhausting 17 performances, a record for the Palace Theatre and the franchise’s best week ever over the past three visits. Twenty-four shows last week earned over $1 million, led by “Hamilton,” “The Lion King” and “Wicked,” which each pulled in over $3 million. Attendance for the week was 357,995, or a robust 96 percent occupancy. The new numbers came a week after Broadway box offices failed to break any records over the Christmas holiday, despite mild weather and eye-popping hauls by huge hits like “Hamilton.” Revenues, attendance and the number of shows all dipped then.
Iconic sign could get extra security after ‘HOLLYWeeD’ prank ASSOCIATED PRE SS
LOS ANGELES — Days after a prankster scaled a fence and altered the iconic Hollywood sign to read “HOLLYWeeD,” the agency that maintains and secures landmark said it will explore boosting security. Chris Baumgart, chairman of the Hollywood Sign Trust, said he plans to meet with police officials to be debriefed on the matter and explore ways to prevent similar acts. “The surveillance system is like a chain,” Baumgart told the Los Angeles Times. “The
chain is only as good as its weakest link, so as we study this — the prankster coming in, how he (or) she slipped through — we will determine this week where the link was that was weak, then we will upgrade there.” Police began investigating after a person used giant tarps to turn two of the iconic sign’s white O’s into e’s sometime on New Year’s Eve or early New Year’s Day. The prankster, dressed in black, was recorded by security cameras and could face a misdemeanor trespassing charge, officials said Sunday. However, police have called off a
search for suspects. Investigators determined the sign had not been damaged, police spokesman Sal Ramirez said. The person scaled a protective fence surrounding the sign above Griffith Park and then clambered up the giant letters to drape the coverings, officials said. In 2014, the city replaced an old T-bar gate with a wrought-iron fence to keep trespassers out of the park and away from the Hollywood sign at night. In recent years, residents in adjacent Beachwood Canyon have
Damian Dovarganes / AP
The Hollywood sign is seen vandalized Sunday. Los Angeles residents awoke New Year’s Day to find a prankster had altered the famed Hollywood sign to read “HOLLYWeeD.”
pushed to close access to the sign. They complain that tourists, hikers and motorists clog the narrow, winding road leading to the sign. About 35 cameras are positioned to monitor the sign and surrounding areas, and a police officer sits in a guard house around the clock, Baumgart told the newspaper. The prank may have been a nod to California voters’ approval in November of Proposition 64, which legalized recreational marijuana, beginning in 2018.
Hikers and tourists in the hills spent Sunday morning snapping photos of themselves in front of the altered sign before park rangers began removing the tarps. Forty-one years earlier to the day — Jan. 1, 1976 — a college student similarly altered the sign, using curtains to make it read “HOLLYWEED.” His change coincided with the first day that California classified possession of up to one ounce of marijuana as a misdemeanor, rather than a felony.
Kelly leaving Fox News, will host 2 shows on NBC By David Bauder ASSOCIATED PRE SS
NEW YORK — Megyn Kelly, the Fox News star who’s had a contentious relationship with President-elect Donald Trump, said Tuesday that she’s leaving the network for NBC News, where she will host a daytime talk show and a weekend newsmagazine, as well as contribute to breaking news coverage. NBC News made the announcement Tuesday, ending months of speculation over whether she would re-up with Fox, where she has flourished while suffering bruised feelings in recent months, or start a new chapter in her career. Her contract with Fox expires this
summer. Her last show on Fox will be Friday night. Kelly’s Kelly departure deprives Fox News of its secondmost-watched host, behind only Bill O’Reilly, and a hole at 9 p.m. in its prime-time lineup. “While I will greatly miss my colleagues at Fox, I am delighted to be joining the NBC News family and taking on a new challenge,” Kelly said in a message on Twitter on Tuesday. Rupert Murdoch, executive chairman of Fox, said that “we thank Megyn Kelly for her 12 years of contributions to Fox News. We hope she enjoys
tremendous success in her career and wish her and her family all the best.” Kelly’s star power grew after she became a flashpoint in the presidential campaign after Trump objected to her questioning in the first Republican presidential debate a year and a half ago. He tweeted angry messages about her and boycotted another Fox debate after the network refused to replace her as one of the debate moderators. She also became a central figure in the downfall of former Fox News chief Roger Ailes, telling in-house investigators of inappropriate conduct by Ailes that supported women who had made similar accusations. Details about Kelly’s new jobs at NBC will be revealed in upcoming
months, said Andrew Lack, chairman of the NBC Universal News Group. “Megyn is an exceptional journalist and news anchor, who has had an extraordinary career” Lack said. “She’s demonstrated tremendous skill and poise, and we’re lucky to have her.” Kelly wasn’t immediately available for comment about what made her choose to leave Fox. But she said in an interview with The Associated Press in November that the factors she was weighing “mostly involve a 7-, 5- and 3-year-old,” her children. Her Fox show airs live at 9 p.m., giving her no time at home with her children in the evenings. As a star in demand, Kelly was no doubt able to
seek a schedule that would give her more time at home in the evening. A former lawyer who was raised in upstate New York, Kelly turned to television and got a job in Fox’s Washington office. She was noticed by Ailes, and given a daytime show. Her poise and sharpness, and willingness to ask tough questions of all political sides, made her a star and led Ailes to give her a coveted prime-time slot on cable news’ mostwatched network. NBC News had recently been experimenting with a new Sunday night newsmagazine, “Dateline NBC: On Assignment,” hosted by Lester Holt in a traditional format with a mix of news and feature stories, a template Kelly is expected to use.
Zfrontera A6 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES
RIBEREÑA EN BREVE PAGO DE IMPUESTOS 1 A partir del 7 de diciembre, los pagos por impuestos a la propiedad de la Ciudad de Roma deberán realizarse en la oficina de impuestos del Distrito Escolar de Roma, localizado en el 608 N. García St. MUSEO EN ZAPATA 1 A los interesados en realizar una investigación sobre genealogía de la región, se sugiere visitar el Museo del Condado de Zapata ubicado en 805 N US-Hwy 83. Opera de 10 a.m. a 4 p.m. Existen visitas guiadas. Personal está capacitado y puede orientar acerca de la historia del Sur de Texas y sus fundadores. Pida informes en el 956-765-8983. BOYS & GIRLS CLUB 1 La organización Boys & Girls Club invita a su evento Clays for Kids Skeet Shoot & Cook-Off en su décima edición, que se celebrará el sábado 28 de enero. Para registrarse o para mayores informes visite www.bgcazapata.com o llame a Mark Alvarenga al 956337-5751.
CONGRESO
Cuéllar realiza juramento Paul Ryan oficia ceremonia del representante del sur de Texas E SPECIAL PARA TIEMP O DE ZAPATA
WASHINGTON— Ayer el Congresista Henry Cuellar (D-TX28) realizó su juramento al séptimo periodo en la Cámara de Representantes de los Estados Unidos oficiado por el Presidente de la Cámara Paul Ryan. El Presidente de la Cámara de Representantes dirigió la tradicional ceremonia de juramento en el piso de la Cámara de Representantes de los Estados Unidos. Cuellar recitó el juramento que cada miembro del congreso ha jurado desde 1884” “Juro solemnemente que apoyaré y defenderé la Constitución de los Estados
Unidos contra todos los enemigos, foráneos y domésticos; que rendiré fe y lealtad a la misma; que tomó esta obligación libremente, sin ninguna reserva mental o propósito de evasión; y que emprenderé bien y con lealtad los deberes del cargo que estoy por aceptar: Con la ayuda de Dios”. “Tenemos mucho por lograr durante este siguiente Congreso”, dijo Cuellar. “Como representante del Sur de Texas y la frontera, me aseguraré de trabajar con Demócratas y Republicanos en el Congreso para continuar nuestro trabajo de proporcionar cuidado de la salud costeable y de calidad, oportunidades de educación
superior, expandir el comercio, mejorar la eficiencia gubernamental, y traer más trabajos y mejor pagados a Texas”. Cuellar fue elegido por primera vez a la Cámara de Representantes de los Estados Unidos en 2004 y actualmente es el integrante del Comité de Apropiaciones de la Cámara, el congresista con más antigüedad en la frontera de Texas, Director de la Delegación de Demócratas de Texas, así como Latiguero Senior y Director de Comunicación de la Coalición Blue Dog. Él anteriormente fungió como Secretario del Estado de Texas y durante 14 años representó a Laredo en la Cámara de Representantes.
Foto de cortesía
El congresista Cuéllar posa con el presidente de la Cámara de Representantes, Paul Ryan durante la ceremonia de juramento durante el inicio del periodo legislativo 115 del Congreso.
CONDADO DE ZAPATA
TAMAULIPAS
TOMAN POSESIÓN
Decreto subsidia pago de tenencia
TORNEO DE PESCA E SPECIAL PARA TIEMP O DE ZAPATA
1 El torneo Bass Champs será llevado a cabo el 21 de enero de 7 a.m. a 4 p.m. Registro en línea en www.basschamps.com LABORATORIO COMPUTACIONAL 1 La Ciudad de Roma pone a disposición de la comunidad el Laboratorio Computacional que abre de lunes a viernes en horario de 1 p.m. a 5 p.m. en Historical Plaza, a un lado del City Hall. Informes en el 956849-1411. GRUPOS DE APOYO 1 El grupo de apoyo para personas con Alzheimer se reunirá en su junta mensual, a las 7 p.m., en el Laredo Medical Center, primer piso, Torre B en el Centro Comunitario. Las reuniones se realizan el primer martes de cada mes en el mismo lugar y a la misma hora. 1 El grupo Cancer Friend se reúne a las 6 p.m. el primer lunes del mes en el Centro Comunitario de Doctors Hospital. Padecer cáncer es una de las experiencias más estresantes en la vida de una persona. Sin embargo, los grupos de apoyo pueden ayudar a muchos a lidiar con los aspectos emocionales de la enfermedad. 1 Grupo de Apoyo para Ansiedad y Depresión Rayo de Luz. En Centro de Educación del Área de Salud, ubicado en 1505 Calle del Norte, Suite 430. El grupo se reúne de 6:30 p.m. a 7:30 p.m. en 1505 Calle del Norte, Suite 430, cada primer lunes de mes.
Foto de cortesía
El domingo Paco Mendoza tomó juramento como Comisionado del Condado de Zapata del Precinto I, acompañado de familiares y amigos. Mendoza agradeció en redes sociales a los votantes que lo apoyaron en la campaña e indicó que aún había muchos retos por enfrentar.
Foto de cortesía
El Alguacil del Condado de Zapata, Alonso M. López, a la izquierda, tomó su juramento el domingo en la Corte del Condado. López fue fotografiado junto al Director Oficial del Condado de Zapata Raymundo del Bosque Jr.
GUERRERO HOY DESDE EL AYER
Frenan economía en la nueva ciudad Nota del editor: Esta serie de artículos sobre la historia de Ciudad Guerrero, México, fueron escritos por la guerrerense Lilia Treviño Martínez (1927-2016), quien fuera profesora de la escuela Leoncio Leal. Por Lilia Treviño Martínez TIEMP O DE ZAPATA
Durante los primeros años siguientes a la inauguración de la nueva Ciudad se alimentaron
grandes esperanzas de mejoramiento económico mediante empresas que manifestaban gran interés en instalar fábricas aprovechando la energía eléctrica generada por la gran Planta, pero una circunstancia adversa frenó el entusiasmo de quienes deseaban venir: fue hasta seis años después que las autoridades del municipio pudieron disponer del fundo legal que les correspondía. Cuando por fin, el
municipio tuvo autoridad sobre los terrenos del fundo legal, la noticia de la presa y su gran planta hidroeléctrica ya eran historia, el entusiasmo se había enfriado y los empresarios interesados en hacer inversiones las habían derivado hacia lugares más afortunados. En la actualidad y desde hace poco más de diez años, solamente funciona una fábrica maquiladora que proporciona empleo a un buen número de
personas, muchas de ellas precedentes del vecino estado de Veracruz, que han sido atraídas hasta esta ciudad precisamente por la oportunidad de ese trabajo. Podemos concluir que la economía estable en este municipio se basa en la ganadería, la pesca, el comercio, el turismo, las actividades de construcción y trabajos profesionales y artesanales.
CIUDAD VICTORIA, México— La semana pasada fue publicado el decreto mediante el cual se confirma el subsidio al pago de tenencia para el año 2017, propuesta hecha por el Ejecutivo del Estado. El gobierno de Tamaulipas anunció en noviembre que aplicaría un subsidio del 20 por ciento hasta el 100 por ciento en el pago de la tenencia vehicular durante el 2017 y en el pago por rezago existente por el mismo concepto dependiendo del modelo. Bajo el esquema anterior solo se subsidiaba a los vehículos de las personas físicas y morales sin fines de lucro con valor factura menor a 250.000 pesos y el pago de la tenencia era por 10 años. Mediante el acuerdo gubernamental publicado este miércoles los vehículos año 2011 y anteriores están exentos de pago y solamente pagarán tenencia los vehículos de las personas físicas y morales con fines de lucro con valor depreciado superior a los 250.000 pesos de los modelos: 2012 al 2017. Las personas físicas o morales que paguen tenencia y que este al corriente de sus obligaciones obtendrán un subsidio del 30 por ciento en 2017 mientras que las personas que paguen tenencia y que no se encuentren al corriente de sus obligaciones recibirán un subsidio del 20 por ciento por los ejercicios 2012 al 2016. En el caso de los vehículos de personas físicas con actividad empresarial y morales con fines de lucro con valor menor a 250.000 pesos solo pagarán tenencia los modelos 2012 al 2017. Las multas y recargos sobre tenencia se exentarán en un 100 por ciento. El esquema beneficia a la comunidad en general ya que al tomar el valor depreciado hará que un vehículo de 277.000 pesos que en 2016 pagó tenencia, en 2017 tendrá un valor de 249.000 y ya no pagará tenencia.
Sports&Outdoors THE ZAPATA TIMES | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 |
A7
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE: HOUSTON TEXANS
NCAA FOOTBALL: ALABAMA
Osweiler to start for Texans against Raiders
Lane Kiffin will not coach Alabama in national title game By Matt Murschel ORLANDO SENTINEL
Brock started first 14 games By Kristie Rieken A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
HOUSTON — Brock Osweiler will start at quarterback for the Houston Texans on Saturday in their wild-card game against the Oakland Raiders. Coach Bill O’Brien announced the decision on Tuesday with Tom Savage, who had started the past two games, still recovering from a concussion he suffered on Sunday. Osweiler started the first 14 games this season before being benched on Dec. 18 against Jacksonville after throwing interceptions on consecutive drives in the second quarter. But Osweiler got another chance after Savage got a concussion early in the second quarter of a loss to Tennessee on Sunday . Osweiler had struggled with inconsistency and turnovers before being benched, but was better on Sunday when he threw for 253 yards and a touchdown and ran for another score. “I thought Brock did some really good things on Sunday with his teammates and almost brought us all the way back,” O’Brien said. “Did a nice job and we
Eric Christian Smith / Associated Press file
Houston quarterback Brock Osweiler will get the starting nod in the Texans opening-round playoff game against Oakland.
have a lot of confidence in him that he’s going to go out there and play well on Saturday.” Veteran left tackle Duane Brown was also impressed with Osweiler’s work on Sunday. “I thought he played loose,” Brown said. “I thought he communicated well recognizing the front, getting us into the right plays, made some good throws. Had the touchdown run there, so I thought he played tough.” Savage remains in the concussion protocol and O’Brien said if he is cleared he will be the backup on Saturday. If not, Brandon Weeden, who hasn’t played since last season, will back up Osweiler. This game will be an opportunity for Osweiler to redeem himself after failing to live up to expectations in his first season
in Houston after signing a $72 million contract in the offseason. O’Brien thinks Osweiler benefited from taking a step back to observe things after he was benched and said he played more “freely” than he had in the past on Sunday. “I’m sure that in some ways it’s painful to go through that, but in some ways the backup position may have helped him,” he said. Osweiler has thrown for 2,957 yards with 15 touchdowns and 16 interceptions this season. This will be his first postseason start after he was benched in favor of Peyton Manning before the playoffs last season with the Denver Broncos. Savage played well when he took over for Osweiler against Jacksonville, throwing for 260
yards to help Houston rally for the win. But he failed to move the offense consistently last week against Cincinnati and couldn’t do much on Sunday before he was injured. He had just 25 yards passing. While Houston has decided on its starter, the Raiders are still dealing with questions at quarterback after Matt McGloin left with a shoulder injury in his first start since Derek Carr broke his leg the previous week. Rookie Connor Cook took over and could have to make his first NFL start on Saturday if McGloin can’t go. This will be the second time the Texans have played the Raiders this season after Oakland got a 27-20 win in Mexico City on Nov. 21. The Texans will need Osweiler to improve this week if they hope to win a playoff game for the first time since the 2012 season. Houston’s offense has often been ineffective this season with him at the helm and the team’s passing game ranks 29th in the NFL by averaging just 198.5 yards a game. O’Brien likes what he’s seen from Osweiler since his benching and is eager to see what he can do on Saturday. “He’s done a good job. He’s been a pro,” O’Brien said. “He really hasn’t changed his routine at all. He’s been in here studying like he’s the starter. He’s in here this morning getting ready ... he feels good and I think he’s ready to go.”
As top-ranked Alabama prepares for its rematch with secondranked Clemson in next week’s national championship game, the Tide will do so without offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin. The school announced Monday that Kiffin will not coach the offense heading into the team’s Jan. 9 showdown with the Tigers at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla. Instead, that job will fall to Steve Sarkisian, who was named Alabama’s new offensive coordinator after Kiffin took the head coaching job at Florida Atlantic in December. "We appreciate all that Lane has done for our football program over the last three years," Nick Saban said a statement. "We sat down following the Washington game and talked about the time demands of managing both jobs, and we recognized that it is best for our players, and for Lane, that we allow him to turn his full attention to his new head coaching role at FAU. "This wasn’t an easy decision and we appreciate the way Lane handled this in terms of doing what is best for our team. At the end of the day, both of us wanted to put our players in the best position to be successful. Obviously, we are in a unique situation here where we have our next offensive coordinator already on staff. We have full confidence that Sark will step in right away and make this a smooth
transition." Kiffin said in the statement, "After going through the last Kiffin couple of weeks, trying to serve the best interests of two universities as an offensive coordinator and a head coach, it became apparent that both programs would be better served by me giving all my time and efforts to being the head coach at FAU. "This was a very difficult decision, but it’s a decision made in the best interests of the program." Alabama is coming off a 24-7 win over No. 4 Washington in the Chickfil-A Peach Bowl on Saturday. The Tide finished with just 326 yards of total offense against the Huskies, the team’s second-lowest output of the season. Kiffin was asked last week about working with Saban on creating an effective balance between both jobs. "We went over the schedule to kind of find some time where maybe there were some bowl events that he didn’t need me at so I could spend that time, whether it was on the phone or flying coaches in here to interview coaches while we’re here. And usually that time’s at night," Kiffin said. But that struggle was obvious, with Kiffin showing up late to last Thursday’s Peach Bowl media day events. He also missed the shuttle back to the team hotel.
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE: DALLAS COWBOYS
How losing Tony Romo saved the Cowboys’ season By David Moore TH E DALLAS MORNI NG NEWS
The Cowboys chose to end the regular season the way Mariah Carey did 2016. Rather than focus on the team’s less than stellar performance in Philadelphia on New Year’s Day, Jerry Jones sought to put the season into context. To do that, the owner went back nearly five months to reflect on his thoughts. When Tony Romo went down on Aug. 25, Jones feared the worst. How could he not? What has taken place since that day qualifies as the most surprising season since Jones purchased the franchise. The postseason will define how this team is ultimately viewed. But what takes place over the next few weeks won’t erase what this steam has already accomplished. A team that ended last season 4-12 went 13-3 this time around. The ninegame improvement is the largest jump from one season to the next in franchise history. New England is the only team to finish with a better record than the Cowboys this season. The Patriots scored 191 more points than their opponents. Atlanta was next at 134 points followed by Dallas at 115 points.
Matt Rourke / Associated Press
Dallas enjoys a first-round bye in the playoffs this weekend after compiling a 13-3 regular-season record.
It’s a distant drop to fourth with Kansas City at 78 points. Jones was disappointed when the Cowboys were unable to win without Romo last season, but he had an inkling of what could unfold given how poorly backups performed in Romo’s previous absences. He knew why his team scraped together only four victories. He didn’t see 13-3 coming after Romo suffered an L1 compression fracture in his back during a preseason game against the Seahawks. "What’s surprising about this one is, if you start in Seattle when Romo got hurt, I thought we really had our hands full
because candidly, I thought we had more talent on our defense last year than we do this year as far as being able to really impact ballgames," Jones said. "What has been so surprising is the ability of this team to function without Romo." Dak Prescott has been a revelation. He emerged from the fourth round of the draft to start every game and finish with a quarterback rating of 104.9, the highest by a rookie in NFL history. He presided over 13 victories to equal Ben Roethlisberger’s NFL mark for a first year quarterback. Ezekiel Elliott exceeded expectations, which is saying something when you consider he was the
fourth player taken in the draft. He became just the fifth rookie to lead the league in rushing since the merger in 1970. Earl Campbell, George Rogers, Eric Dickerson and Edgerrin James were the others. Jones believes this team caught fire with the two rookies. "The fact we’ve had those young guys come in and really help that offense out, relative to Romo getting hurt, that’s been the big surprise," he said. The other is that a defense short on blue chip talent has been able to hold its own. The Cowboys led the league in run defense, allowing an average of just 83.5 yards a
game. The team allowed an average of 19.1 points to rank fifth in the league. Jones credits an often dominant offense for allowing the defense to get its footing. "It’s given our defense time to come on and where it has its assets gotten better," Jones said. "It’s maximized those. In its weakest spots it hasn’t gotten a bigger cavity. "It’s basically gone long on its assets and gone short on its weaknesses." Romo’s injury isn’t the only one the Cowboys have overcome this season. Left tackle Tyron Smith and receiver Dez Bryant have missed time on the offensive side of the ball. Starting left guard La’el Collins went
down early in the season to injury. Defensive ends DeMarcus Lawrence and Randy Gregory and linebacker Rolando McClain opened the season on suspensions. McClain hasn’t played a snap all season and Gregory has only been back for the final two games. Cornerback Orlando Scandrick has had to overcome two pulled hamstrings and plantar fasciitis while cornerback Morris Claiborne had the best season of his career cut short when a piece of bone was torn off his pelvis. He missed the final nine games of the regular season but hopes to return for the playoffs. Head coach Jason Garrett will tell you this is no time for reflection. But he’ll concede the team’s ability to overcome adversity is one of the qualities that has gotten them to this point. "We’ve had a number of guys out of the lineup," Garrett said. "We’ve had others step in and play and play at a high level. We’ve had some guys who had different roles coming into season and they’ve stepped up into larger roles and helped us win. "That’s something we pride ourselves on. We’ve done a good job of handling different adversity." If only Mariah Carey could say the same.
A8 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES
NATIONAL
Retreating after Trump tweet, GOP won’t gut ethics office By Erica Werner A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
WASHINGTON — The new GOP era in Washington got off to a messy start Tuesday as House Republicans, under pressure from President-elect Donald Trump, abruptly dropped plans to gut an independent congressional ethics board. The dizzying about-face came as lawmakers convened for the first day of the 115th Congress, an occasion normally reserved for pomp and ceremony under the Capitol Dome. Instead, House Republicans found themselves under attack not only from Democrats but from their new president, over their secretive move Monday to neuter the independent Office of Congressional Ethics and place it under lawmakers’ control. GOP leaders scrambled to contain the damage, and within hours of Trump registering his criticism on Twitter, they called an emergency meeting where House Republicans voted without opposition to undo the change. The episode, coming even before the new Congress was convened and lawmakers were sworn in, was a powerful illustration of the sway Trump may hold over his party in a Washington that will be fully under Republican control for the first time in a decade. GOP lawmakers who’ve felt unfairly targeted by the ethics office had defied their own leaders
Andrew Harrer / Bloomberg
Representative Bob Goodlatte is photographed on Tuesday.
with their initial vote to neuter the body, but once Trump weighed in they backpedaled immediately. “With all that Congress has to work on, do they really have to make the weakening of the Independent Ethics Watchdog, as unfair as it may be, their number one act and priority,” Trump had asked over Twitter Tuesday morning, in an objection that appeared focused more on timing than on substance. Trump, who will take office in a little over two weeks, said the focus should be on tax reform and health care, and he included the hashtag (hash)DTS, for “Drain the Swamp,” his oft-repeated campaign promise to bring change to Washington. Democrats and even many Republicans were quick to point out that the lawmakers’ plans for their ethics watchdog flew in the face of that notion. The measure was part of a GOP-written rules package that looked like it could fail after Trump
registered his objections amid a public outcry from good government activists. The stripped-down package was approved late Tuesday by the House, 234-193. “We were elected on a promise to drain the swamp, and starting the session by relaxing ethics rules is a very bad start,” said GOP Rep. Tom McClintock of California. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy mentioned Trump’s opposition in the emergency meeting, and some lawmakers said it had a powerful effect. “I do believe when President-elect Trump tweeted out...members got calls,” said Rep. Lou Barletta, R-Pa. Trump spoke by phone with House Speaker Paul Ryan on Tuesday after the ethics change was dropped. The Office of Congressional Ethics was created in 2008 after several bribery and corruption cases in the House, but lawmakers of both parties have groused about the way it operates. Lawmakers were especially incensed by an investigation of members of Congress from both parties who went on a 2013 trip to Azerbaijan paid for by that country’s government. Lawmakers said after the investigation was made public in 2015 that they had no idea the trip was paid for by the government, and the House Ethics Committee ultimately cleared them. Once the ethics controversy was dispensed with, Congress returned to the ceremonial business.
First lady to recognize school counselor of the year By Darlene Superville ASSOCIATED PRE SS
WASHINGTON — When Michelle Obama helps recognize the school counselor of the year later this week, it will also mark her final White House event as first lady, aides said Tuesday. Mrs. Obama has presided over a White House ceremony each January since 2015 honoring school counselors, who she says are often the “deciding factor” in whether a student attends college. She joked last year that Friday’s ceremony might be one of the last White House events “before they kick us out in January of 2017.” President Barack Oba-
ma’s term ends at noon on Jan. 20, exactly two weeks after Friday’s ceremony. School counselors from across the country are meeting at the White House at the end of the week to be recognized and to help honor Terri Tchorzynski, the 2017 School Counselor of the Year. She is a counselor at the Calhoun Area Career Center in Battle Creek, Michigan, according to the website of the American School Counselor Association. Before Mrs. Obama’s remarks at Friday’s event, guests will attend a panel discussion featuring Education Secretary John B. King Jr., former Education Secretary Arne Duncan and actress Connie Britton, who played a high
school guidance counselor on the network television series “Friday Night Lights,” among other participants, the White House said. Mrs. Obama established the recognition ceremony for school counselors to highlight the work they do with young people and the conditions under which they operate. The average counselor is responsible for more than 470 students, said Eric Waldo, executive director of Reach Higher, Mrs. Obama’s initiative to encourage students to continue their education after high school. Recognition for school counselors is part of that initiative.
THE ZAPATA TIMES | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 |
A9
BUSINESS
Ford cancels plan to build new Mexican plant, adds US jobs By Dee-Ann Durbin A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
FLAT ROCK, Mich. — The auto industry’s relationship with Presidentelect Donald Trump took a dramatic turn Tuesday as Ford Motor Co. decided to shift investment dollars targeted for Mexico to the U.S., while Trump threatened General Motors with a tax on some imported small cars. Ford is canceling plans to build a new $1.6 billion factory in San Luis Potosi, Mexico, and will instead invest some of that money in a U.S. factory that will build new electric and autonomous vehicles. Ford said last spring it would move production of the Ford Focus small car to the new plant from Michigan. Trump has repeatedly criticized the plan, and Ford was among the companies he threatened to hit with a 35-percent tariff on products made in Mexico and exported to the U.S. Trump added General Motors to that group today, saying in a tweet that the Cruze small cars GM makes in Mexico and sends to U.S. dealers could face “a big border tax!”
Ford CEO Mark Fields said Tuesday that market forces dictated Ford’s decision not to build the San Luis Potosi plant. Low gas prices and low interest rates have been hammering small-car sales. U.S. sales of the Focus were down 17 percent through November; by contrast, sales of Ford’s biggest SUV, the Expedition, were up 46 percent. Ford will still move production of the Focus to Mexico, but it will go to an existing plant in Hermosillo that makes midsize cars. Ford will hire around 200 workers in Hermosillo to expand production there. The Wayne, Michigan, plant that currently makes the Focus will get two new products next year, preserving jobs at the facility. Fields said Ford will invest $700 million in the Flat Rock plant to make hybrid, electric and autonomous vehicles. It will also hire around 700 workers starting in 2018. In announcing the Michigan expansion, Fields noted Trump’s promise to make the U.S. more competitive by lowering taxes and easing regulations. “This is a vote of confidence for president-elect Trump in some and of the policies he may be pursu-
ing,” Fields said at the company’s plant in Flat Rock. Workers lined up on the factory floor cheered the news. United Auto Workers Vice President Jimmy Settles, the union’s chief negotiator for Ford, told workers he cried when he heard about the investment. Flat Rock, which employs around 3,200 people, was threatened with closure during the recession. More recently, it has seen temporary layoffs because of slowing sales of one of its products, the Ford Mustang. The plant also makes the Lincoln Continental. Fields said Ford Executive Chairman Bill Ford called Trump Tuesday morning to tell him the news. Fields called Vice President-elect Mike Pence. The company also contacted the Mexican government, which issued a statement regretting Ford’s decision. “The jobs created in Mexico have contributed to maintaining manufacturing jobs in the United States which otherwise would have disappeared in the face of Asian competition,” the Mexico Economy Department said. Fields said Ford will save around $500 million
Jeff Kowalsky / Bloomberg
Piping stands on top of the Ford Motor Co. assembly plant in Flat Rock, Michigan, U.S., on Tuesday.
overall by canceling the San Luis Potosi plant. Rebecca Lindland, a senior analyst for Kelley Blue Book, said Ford’s decision stemmed from the convergence of politics and market realities. At the same time Trump was attacking Ford for shifting small-car production south of the border, U.S. demand for small cars plunged dramatically. “If the business case is there to make this decision, and then it can make somebody like Donald Trump look better, OK, go with it,” she said. Ford might not have changed its plans if Hillary Clinton had been elected, Lindland said. Unlike Trump, Clinton never threatened to tax imports from Mexico. Trump issued his threat to GM just hours before Ford’s announcement. GM countered that
Cruze sedans sold in the U.S. are built in Ohio. Only a small number of Cruze hatchbacks are imported to the U.S. from Mexico. Fields said he’s not worried about the possibility of tariffs. “I’m a strong believer that the right policies are going to prevail because we share the same aspirations that I think president-elect Trump does. We want a very strong U.S. economy,” he said. Among the new vehicles the Flat Rock plant will make is a fully electric SUV that will go 300 miles on a charge. That is due to go on sale in 2020. The plant also will make a hybrid autonomous vehicle that is scheduled to be released in 2021. Ford also said Tuesday it will release a hybrid version of its best-seller, the F-150 pickup, and a hybrid version of the
Mustang in 2020. Two new hybrid police vehicles also are coming over the next five years. Fields said the company is betting that electric and hybrid vehicle offerings will outnumber traditional gas-powered vehicles in 15 years. Trump may relax government fuel economy standards as part of his initiative to dilute some regulations. But Ford still needs to move headlong into electric and hybrid vehicles because it still has to meet California zero-emission vehicle requirements and comply with emissions standards worldwide, Lindland said. “All these worlds are colliding to make an announcement like we saw today from Ford possible,” she said. Ford shares rose 3.3 percent in afternoon trading, while GM shares rose less than 1 percent.
Here come ‘smart stores’ with robots, interactive shelves By Anne D’Innocenzio A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
LAS VEGAS — Tomorrow’s retail stores want to take a page from their online rivals by embracing advanced technology — everything from helpful robots to interactive mirrors to shelves embedded with sensors. The goal: Use these real-world store features to lure shoppers back from the internet, and maybe even nudge them to spend more in the process. Amazon’s new experimental grocery store in Seattle, opening in early 2017, will let shoppers buy goods without needing to stop at a checkout line. Sensors track items as shoppers put them into baskets or return them to the shelf. The shopper’s
Amazon account gets automatically charged. “Amazon, for good or bad, has been setting the path,” said Robert Hetu, research director at Gartner Research. “Each retailer is going to have to respond in some way. But it’s not one-size-fits-all.” Kroger, Neiman Marcus and Lowe’s are among the companies already experimenting with futuristic retail stores. Robots, for instance, could help guide shoppers to the right aisle, while augmented reality apps could help you see how a particular shade of paint will look in the living room — or how you might look in a pair of jeans. Many of these technologies will be unveiled or demonstrated at the CES gadget show in Las Vegas, which begins Tuesday with media previews. Plenty of retailers have
learned through trial — and error — that technology can’t get too far ahead of shoppers. It has to be easy to use and beneficial to shoppers in some way, whether it’s to save time or money. If retailers get it right, they might succeed in boosting spending at retail stores at a time when consumers increasingly prefer to shop online. Here are five technologies coming to a store near you. Smart shelves Web retailers have plenty of data on their customers. Some of these online technologies can even track shoppers from site to site to lure them back with what’s known as retargeting ads — promos targeted to what that shopper has looked at before, but didn’t actually
buy. Smart shelves with sensors promise the same kind of in-depth consumer behavior analytics at retail stores. At a Kroger store in Cold Spring, Ohio, shelves currently show digitized price tags and information about the products. The next step is to tie that to individual shoppers. For example, for a shopper who prefers gluten-free products, the price tags could light up in the aisle where all the gluten-free options are. The company says this will all be done with the customer’s permission. Perch Interactive, a startup that is working with chains like Sunglass Hut and fragrance maker Jo Malone, uses laser and motion sensors to detect when a product is picked up. Perch monitors the interactions and lets re-
tailers know what people pick up but don’t buy. It also offers recommendations: When a shopper picks up a Jo Malone product, an interactive display pops up to show a complementary fragrance. Robots Amazon and other retailers have long used robots in warehouses to help package and ship orders. But what about interacting with shoppers? Home improvement retailer Lowe’s is testing robots in one of its San Jose, California, store, and plans to roll them out to 10 more stores in the state this year. Besides scanning shelves for inventory, the robots can guide customers to specific products in both English and Spanish. Shoppers will also start seeing robots that interact
with them more deeply. Japanese joint venture SoftBank Robotics is testing a 4-foot humanoid robot called Pepper at two Westfield Malls in California. They greet shoppers and can do a little dance, but have the potential to send messages geared to people’s age and gender through facial recognition. SoftBank Robotics says it’s working with clothing retailers to help suggest outfits to shoppers. Interactive mirrors High-end clothing stores are testing interactive mirrors in dressing areas, a key place where shoppers decide whether to buy or not. Neiman Marcus has installed these outside fitting rooms at 20 stores to offer shoppers a 360degree view of what an outfit looks like.
A10 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES
NATIONAL
Quick decisions meant life or death in Southeastern storms By Jay Reeves A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
As an apparent tornado bore down on them, seven people in a mobile home in southeast Alabama made a life-or-death decision: Three ran into one bathroom for shelter and four ran in the opposite direction to another room seeking safety. The three, including Lawana Henrich, survived without a scratch, according to Coroner Robert Byrd. But a big hardwood tree that slammed into the mobile home killed the four others, including Henrich’s daughter and
sister, Byrd said. The tree toppled over during a wave of severe weather that brought heavy rain and strong winds to the Southeast, and it couldn’t have hit in a worse spot when it fell Monday night near Rehobeth, Alabama. “It was dead center,” Byrd said. “You think, ‘What’s the chance of four people being so close in one area?’ But they were.” Those four, a woman in Georgia, and a man who drowned in the Florida Panhandle died as a line of severe thunderstorms moved across the Southeastern United States from
Texas. Teams of surveyors were headed out Tuesday to assess apparent tornado damage at three sites in southeastern Alabama and southwestern Georgia, said Mark Wool, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Tallahassee, Florida. Wool said authorities believe a tornado is responsible for damage that left the four people dead in Alabama, but he said the weather service won’t be able to say for sure until experts visit the site. Byrd, coroner in Houston County, Alabama, said Michelle Lewis, 53, died along with her niece,
1 of the last remaining Shakers dies at 89, leaving just two By David Sharp A S S OCIAT E D PRE SS
PORTLAND, Maine — Sister Frances Carr, one of the last remaining members of a nearly extinct religious society called the Shakers, has died. She was 89. Carr died Monday surrounded by family and friends in the dwelling house at the Shaker community at Sabbathday Lake in New Gloucester after a brief battle with cancer, said Brother Arnold Hadd, one of the group’s two remaining members. “She had a death with dignity and love,” Hadd said Tuesday. “She was surrounded by love, tears and a lot of Shaker songs.” Their community at
Adam Nadel / AP file
In this Sept. 13, 1995 file photo, Sister Frances Carr, left, sings at the Warwick Hotel in New York.
Sabbathday Lake was settled in 1783 and was one of more than a dozen such communities created in the New World by the Shakers, formally known as the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearance. The group fled persecu-
tion in England. It practiced equality of the sexes, pacifism, communal ownership of property and celibacy. The Shakers’ numbers declined because members are celibate and the group stopped taking orphans like Carr, who arrived as a 10-year-old.
Elijah Baylis / The Clarion-Ledger/AP
Crews work to remove downed trees and debris on Highway 49 South in Covington County, Mississippi.
27-year-old Amanda Blair. Lewis was Henrich’s sister and Blair was Henrich’s daughter, Byrd said; both victims lived in the trailer where they died, he said. Byrd said the storm also killed two family friends, Terina Brookshire, 51, of Hartford, Alabama, and Carla Lambart, 53, who was originally
from Opp, Alabama. Byrd said Henrich, her husband and another man survived without injuries. Lawana Henrich saw a weather alert on television and heard the roar of a storm, and then told the others to seek shelter, he said. “She said it was just a matter of seconds when that tree fell,” Byrd said.
In Florida, the Walton County Sheriff’s Office said the body of William Patrick Corley, 70, was found Monday afternoon following flooding near the Shoal River in Mossy Head. Authorities said Corley’s car was partially submerged and his body was floating face-down nearby.
THE ZAPATA TIMES | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 |
A11
FROM THE COVER MIGRANTS From page A1 ports along the Southwest border in recent months, leading U.S. immigration officials to turn many people back to Mexico until they can schedule an appointment to have their case processed. Advocates cite federal immigration law, claiming that turning back asylum seekers is illegal. “When a noncitizen arrives at a U.S. port of entry or border and expresses a fear of return to his or her home country or otherwise expresses a desire to apply for asylum, it is unlawful for U.S. authorities to turn the individual back without first providing an opportunity for that individual to make his or her claim for asylum or other protection,” said Jennifer Chang Newell, senior staff attorney at the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project. Still others say the U.S. officials are flouting the nation’s international commitment to asylum-seekers, including the United Nations’ 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, and with little regard for their safety in gangcontrolled border communities in Mexico. “What protections are they taking to make sure these people are safe?” said Amy Fischer, policy director at RAICES. “There are serious consequences to turning away vulnerable populations, especially into areas that are extraordinarily dangerous.” But the sheer volume of more than 35,000 immigrants arriving at land ports in October and November has baffled port officials, who must still maintain the regular flow of commercial and pedestrian traffic. These immigrants, known as inadmissibles, who don’t have legal documents to enter the country but are openly presenting themselves to authorities asking for asylum, joined the swell of more than 90,000 immigrants caught
CUELLAR From page A1 well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.” “We have a lot to accomplish during this next Congress,” Cuellar said. “As the representative for South Texas and the border, I will make sure to work with both Democrats and Republicans in Congress to continue our work to provide affordable and quality health care, higher education opportunities, expand trade, improve govern-
WINE From page A1 VaporGrip Technology, which contains dicamba. The agency has also proposed to register Enlist Duo, a Dow AgroSciences formulation that contains 2,4-D. Both formulations will be used on cotton crops planted with seeds genetically engineered to resist the spray. Enlist Duo is already used on engineered corn and soybean crops in 15 states, and the EPA is proposing to approve it in 19 additional states — including Texas — and extend its use on engineered cotton seeds. “The approval of these formulations will wind up affecting every vineyard up there,” Bonarrigo said. The EPA is expected to issue a final decision on Enlist Duo’s proposal by early 2017. “I could see it basically killing the [wine] industry, honestly,” said Garrett Irwin, owner of the 20acre Cerro Santo vineyard in Lubbock County. “If we
illegally crossing the Southwest border since October, evoking comparisons to the spring of 2014 when Central American families overwhelmed authorities in the Rio Grande Valley. Non-Mexican families and unaccompanied children still make up a significant part of the immigrant flow trying to get into the United States via ports of entry from Tijuana to Matamoros: 14,718 out of the 35,134 reported as inadmissible from Oct. 1 to Nov. 30 were families traveling together and kids by themselves. In the Laredo Field Office alone, which includes 24 international bridges from Laredo to Brownsville, there was an increase of 354 percent in unaccompanied children crossing as inadmissible, growing from 289 in October 2015 and November 2015 to 1,312 in October and November this year. And more are on the way. U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, said the Costa Rica ambassador told him that roughly 40,000 immigrants from Haiti, Africa, Asia and the Middle East will enter Costa Rica next year en route to the U.S.-Mexican border. Seeking to address the influx, the Department of Homeland Security opened a temporary processing facility for up to 500 people in El Tornillo, near El Paso, and another by the DonnaRio Bravo International Bridge equipped to house up to 1,000 people. At the same time, each port has been forced to adjust operations to manage the flow of immigrants. The immigration agency said it processes people on a case by case basis because there is not enough room at its port facilities for them to wait safely. Those who are not considered a high risk are given a list of social services in Mexico, and an appointment to return to the port of entry for processing, according to CBP. “Once they’ve been processed, then we’re making
appointments, they’re giving them the appropriate documents so they go back to Mexico to find the people that can take care of them in Mexico,” said Director Field Operations David P. Higgerson during a press event at the the Donna holding facility. Yet advocates who work with immigrant communities in Tijuana, Nogales and Reynosa say some people are told to go back to Mexico without scheduled appointments or direction on where to go. There have also been reports of Mexican immigration officials refusing to let immigrants pass to the United States. Mexican immigration officials could not be reached for comment. In Reynosa, dozens of people lingering on the international bridge and others fortunate enough to find room at a migrant shelter said their asylum requests were ignored multiple times over a period of days. Some said immigration officials told them to try their luck at another international bridge. One early morning in December, before sunrise, Alejandra Flores, 25, sat on the bridge with her two sons, ages 3 and 10, in her lap. She was fleeing violence in Honduras, but said U.S. immigration officials told her to leave, without reviewing her case. She was denied twice more the following day. “I explained to them I had nowhere to go,” Flores said as tears filled her eyes. “They told me to go find a church.” With nowhere to turn, the family of three slept in a Reynosa park before returning to the bridge. Nearby a group of a dozen Eritreans, a small nation in the Horn of Africa, said they had attempted to cross the bridge several times each day for the past week. They had traveled 8,500 miles, spent $15,000 to get this far. They would keeping trying until they got through, they said. Families from El Salvador, Honduras and Guate-
mala at the Senda de Vida migrant shelter in Reynosa despaired over their situation. Jorge Alberto Sanchez, 57, said on his fourth attempt to plead his case he was forced to the Mexican side of the bridge. “They shouldn’t treat us this way, we’re people, not animals,” Sanchez said. Juan Matute, 62, wept as he held up police reports documenting the murder of his son and the disappearance of his grandson, which immigration officials refused to read, he said. His wife, two sons and two grandsons had been at the shelter for a month. “We don’t have money for a coyote to take us,” Matute said. “We can’t live in our country, they’re killing us.” An 8-year-old boy from Honduras found wandering the Texas side of the bridge on his own — no one seemed to know him — stood silently in the room. They all feared being kidnapped in Tamaulipas, which has the highest rate of disappearances in Mexico, according to the country’s National Security System. Many had been in Reynosa long enough to see Rodriguez set out for the bridge, only to be taken by smugglers. Rodriguez limps because she suffered a broken leg and hip in August when a smuggler transporting dozens of Central American families to the U.S. border flipped the van he was driving. Even as she tried to get into the United States two weeks ago, her body had not fully healed from the horrific accident that claimed the lives of six immigrants, including her 8-year-old daughter. Mexican immigration officials facilitated humanitarian travel documents for her mother to Reynosa, where Rodriguez endured painful rehab before she was released. Despite the pain, she still wanted to go to the United States. “She came for that American dream,” Lemus said. “If God opens that door for me, I’ll go, too.”
ABORTION From page A1 department has written that the rules will “protect the public by preventing the spread of disease while also preserving the dignity of the unborn in a manner consistent with Texas laws.” Sparks is expected to issue a larger decision on the rules’ fate by Friday. Amy Hagstrom Miller, who owns abortion clinics in five states including Texas, testified Tuesday that advocates have found just one Texas crematorium willing to work with abortion providers, and that anti-abortion activists could pressure it into rescinding the offer. State attorneys questioned that assertion, saying there are “at least 157 licensed crematoriums” statewide. But Hagstrom Miller said her clinics have in the past had problems with contractors providing everything from roofing services to security being criticized by anti-abortion activists — making many contractors in any field wary of working with abortion providers. “I find the interference by the government in women’s personal decision-making offensive,” Miller said. The new regulations were proposed at the behest of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in July, days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Texas’ larger anti-abortion laws that would have left the state with 10 abortion clinics, down from more than 40 in 2012. Critics say cremation and burial would cost more and force women to cover the additional expenses. Exactly how much more isn’t clear, though some estimates have put the figure at an extra $400 per fetus — perhaps doubling the existing costs of abortion. The state argued Tuesday that those estimates assume individualized burial or cremation being required for each fetus when the rules would instead allow groups of remains to be collected and stored for eventual mass burial or cremation, thus lowering the cost to perhaps less than an additional $0.60 per patient. But Hagstrom Miller said the rules were vague enough that they could be enforced many ways. The Texas Catholic Conference, meanwhile, has announced plans to allow free burial for fetal remains at Catholic cemeteries, to which Hagstrom Miller responded: “Not all of my patients are Catholic.” Tad Davis, who testified that he had performed thousands of abortions over 40-plus years in Austin, said the rule change “has no benefit for the patient or the state” and would be “another step in terms of making patients feel bad about everything.” “It would impose someone else’s beliefs on them,” Davis said. Davis said fetal tissue doesn’t increase infection risk more than any other type of tissue. He said women sometimes flush fetal remains down the toilet after sudden miscarriages without any public health threat and “don’t say they see it as undignified.”
ment efficiency, and bring more well-paying jobs to Texas.” Cuellar was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2004 and is currently a member of the House Appropriations Committee, the most senior congressman on the Texas border, chairman of the Texas Democratic Delegation as well Senior Whip and Chairman of Communication of the Blue Dog Coalition. He previously served as Texas Secretary of State and for 14 years represented Laredo in the Texas House of Representatives. In the 114th Congress,
Cuellar: 1 Secured language in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations bill that encourages federal agencies to support institutions and outreach programs that benefit minority students and communities, including Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), and other minority serving institutions. 1 Secured nearly $948 million in the fiscal year 2016 appropriations omnibus package for federal courthouse projects, including $135 million in
federal funding for the construction of a new federal courthouse for the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas in San Antonio, Texas. 1 Introduced and passed language in the Fiscal Year 2017 Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies bill to encourage the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to find ways to reduce veteran homelessness in rural and small communities including those on the U.S.Mexico border. 1 Introduced the Cross-
Border Trade Enhancement Act in the House, which later passed the Senate and was signed into law by President Obama. The bill promotes public-private partnerships to boost staffing and make infrastructure improvements at U.S. ports of entry without adding to the national deficit. 1 Successfully introduced and passed legislation to give the Starr-Camargo Bridge permanent operating authority. 1 Successfully advocated for and included language in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations bill to lift the outdated 1975
prohibition on the export of U.S. crude oil. 1 Included language in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations bill to secure $5.5 million to help address the damaging effects of citrus greening disease in the United States, including the Rio Grande Valley. 1 Included language in fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations bill to bring improved government accessibility to constituents by encouraging the government to improve its customer service and report back to Congress.
get the levels of damage that I’m afraid we’ll get, vineyards will not be able to recover or produce grapes at any sustainable level, and we’re just going to have to go away.” But regulators say the new pesticides are formulated to drift less than old versions, and agricultural groups say there should be little risk if cotton farmers follow the labels and keep their spray from drifting off property. “I don’t see this as being any more of an issue than what we have today,” said Steve Verett, executive vice president of the Plains Cotton Growers, which represents 41 counties and all 3.7 million acres of cotton in Texas High Plains. “I understand there are other sensitive crops as well. No matter what the product is or the farmer that’s spraying, they need to make sure that the product they’re spraying stays on their farm.” Since his vineyards are already suffering from dicamba damage being sprayed in small quanti-
ties, Irwin said a massive increase in spraying of the formulations on cotton fields could affect any other broadleaf crop — such as pecans — that is not genetically modified to resist the chemical. For grapevines, the pesticide buildup can stunt the whole vine, resulting in smaller leaves, grapes and clusters. Aware of the damage that pesticides can do, the EPA stated that both Xtendimax and Enlist Duo are updated versions of the old dicamba and 2,4-D, and they have new additives that lower their ability to vaporize and drift as gas to nearby crops. “Dicamba and 2,4-D pesticides are not labeled for use on [genetically engineered] cotton during the growing season,” said EPA spokeswoman Cathy Milbourn in an e-mail. “Under the pesticides law, the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act, the label is the law. The Xtendimax label requires very specific and rigorous drift mitigation measures.”
But Irwin said it is unlikely farmers will buy the new low-volatility formulations because they are the most expensive. Farmers will probably instead stick to old dicamba and 2,4-D pesticides when they plant genetically modified seeds. “I honestly don’t think farmers will buy the new formulations when older labels that cost less are available and just as effective as the new labels,” Irwin said. “In short, I think farmers will buy generic chemicals without the additives to save money because the cotton won’t know the difference.” Even if cotton growers do buy the new formulations, Irwin said, they “will do nothing to correct for negligence in spraying” by farmers who will not follow federal safety precautions. Although Roundup has not stopped working completely, Verett said, an invasive weed commonly known as pigweed has become very resistant to it, so he expects the new
technologies will find a good share of the market over the next few years. “Both of the [pesticides] will be competing for acres because there’s a need for it,” Verrett said. “We want to see the various tools be made available to our producers.” To avoid drift, the EPA doesn’t allow the pesticides to be applied from airplanes or sprayed when winds top 15 miles per hour. Specific nozzles must be used to limit drift. But Irwin said that he “highly doubts” that all farmers will change their nozzles on their spray rigs to approved anti-drift nozzles. “All of the touted safeguards that the chemical companies are saying will make these technologies safe are really just things that sound good to those who are only vaguely familiar with agricultural practices,” Irwin said. Bonarrigo said that even if the label is followed, formulations can vaporize the next day and the wind can blow faster than 15 mph in a different
direction, so the herbicide would spray to other people’s crops. Bonarrigo predicts a barrage of lawsuits between grape growers and cotton farmers. “You can follow the label, but policing the changing of the wind is virtually impossible,” Bonarrigo said. “The whole point is that before dicamba and 2,4-D-resistant cotton, before it was even thought of, we already had a major problem with herbicide damage on grapevines in the High Plains.” Another challenge faced by winegrowers is filing complaints to the Texas Department of Agriculture. Irwin said complaints about drift damage from off-label spraying filed with the department are fruitless. The department usually responds to complaints by sending a field expert to assess the damage and interview neighbors about the herbicides they use, but neighbors who unlawfully spray are almost never investigated, Irwin said.
A12 | Wednesday, January 4, 2017 | THE ZAPATA TIMES