Thursday Nov 14, 2024

Nogales Molinelli Denounces ‘Scandal’ in Which Not All Votes Will Be Counted

GOOD MORNING

The San Juan Daily Star, the only paper with

News Service in English in Puerto Rico, publishes 7 days a week, with a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday edition, along with a Weekend Edition to cover Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Man gets 31 years in 2021 El Hipopotamo killing

By THE STAR STAFF

Three years after the crime was committed, Geofley Jomar Pérez was sentenced Wednesday to 31 years in federal prison for the murder of 15-year-old Jesús Francisco Pérez and the kidnapping of three people.

The crime took place in October 2021 at the El Hipopótamo restaurant in Río Piedras.

Judge Pedro Delgado handed down the sentence during a hearing at the federal court in Hato Rey. Attorney Anita Hill Adames represented the accused, while the Public Prosecutor’s Office was represented by prosecutor Linet Suárez.

The judge listened to the statements of family members so that they could be considered ahead of sentencing.

“You really are a great danger,” said Jenny Francisco, the teenage victim’s sister, addressing the convict, one of five co-defendants in the case.

“You destroyed our family,” she added. “We will never be the same again. There is one missing at the table in my house.”

Madeline Pérez, the victim’s mother, stared at the convict and said: “I came to tell you that you completely destroyed my life. You took away the person I loved most in my life! Why didn’t you take him to a hospital? You didn’t think that you took the life of a child, a child!”

“We are completely destroyed,” she said. “This day

[in 2023], November 28, he turned 18 and I will not be able to celebrate his birthday.”

Pérez then sat down to catch her breath before leaving the stand.

The judge also received a written statement from one of the victims who survived the kidnapping.

“Since the day we were victims of these criminals, of these people who have no respect for human life, I am another person,” the statement said. “Part of me died.”

Video gaming operators call for protest on inauguration day

By THE STAR STAFF

Video gaming machine operators are planning a mass protest for governor-elect Jenniffer González Colón’s inauguration ceremony, they announced Wednesday. The operators have called for the resignation of Puerto Rico Gaming Commission Executive Director Juan Carlos Santaella Marchán.

Aníbal Villafañe Fernández, the coordinator of video game machine operators for the northern region of Puerto Rico, asked González Colón and her campaign manager, Francisco Domenech, to take steps to stop the intentions of the Gaming Commission and the Horse Racing Board to increase to 15 terminals the number of slot machines for the horse racing agencies of Camarero Racetrack, which they said do not contribute a single cent to the island Treasury. Otherwise, Villafañe Fernández said, the more than 1,500 gaming machine operators, employees, family members and clients will be called to a protest that will take place on inauguration day, Jan. 2, in front of the Capitol.

Villafañe Fernández stressed the call for the resignation

of Santaella Marchán, who he said “is openly paving the way to maintain ties with the administration of Camarero Racetrack, hold public hearings to approve nearly 5,000 new terminals to install more slot machines at horse racing agencies, whose operation and prizes do not pay taxes to the Treasury Department.”

“Likewise, his appointment to a position in the government should never be considered,” he added.

Geofley Jomar Pérez (Facebook via FBI San Juan)

The island’s video gaming machine operators have called for the resignation of Puerto Rico Gaming Commission Executive Director Juan Carlos Santaella Marchán.

$78.3 million federal investment targets docks, materials in transportation projects

By THE STAR STAFF

Resident Commissioner Jenniffer González Colón announced two new federal investments totaling nearly $78.3 million from the federal Department of Transportation (DOT) that will allow for improvements to dock infrastructure and reduce the environmental impact of transportation materials.

“As a member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the federal House of Representatives, I have promoted the inclusion of the island in programs and financing that allow the modernization and resilience of our infrastructure to have a solid base for our economic development and attract investment,” González Colón said. “Today we announced two new allocations of federal funds that, while guiding reconstruction, promote environmental protection. I congratulate the agencies that achieved approval of their proposals to use the funds that we made available from Congress.”

The DOT’s Maritime Administration has allocated

$53,526,756 of the total $78,287,326 injection to the Ports Authority under the Port Infrastructure Development Program funded by the federal fiscal year 2024 budget. Those funds are intended to reconstruct and modernize Piers D, N, and O at Puerto Nuevo in San Juan, including the demolition and disposal of existing platforms, reconstruction, and installation of new fender and bollard systems.

The island Highway and Transportation Authority, meanwhile, will receive $24,760,570 from the Federal Highway Administration, a DOT agency, under the low-carbon transportation materials grant program funded by the federal fiscal year 2022 budget.

The funds will be used to establish processes for implementing and using low-carbon materials in federally aided construction projects across the island. The uses may include determining the eligibility, availability and suitability of materials for use in eligible construction projects; processes for qualifying and using low-carbon materials; identifying local or regional

“substantially lower” embodied carbon thresholds; developing specifications; and placement costs associated with low-carbon materials during construction.

San Juan transfers properties to Calderón Foundation

By THE STAR STAFF

After assuming ownership of four properties located in Río Piedras, the Municipality of San Juan transferred them to the Center for Puerto Rico of the Sila M. Calderón Foundation Inc., Mayor Miguel Romero Lugo announced Wednesday. The mayor said that on Aug. 1 of this year, Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia signed Senate Joint Resolution 507, converting it into Joint Resolution 55-2024, which orders the Puerto Rico Land Administration to transfer, free of charge, four real estate properties located in Río Piedras to the Autonomous Munici-

pality of San Juan. The measure authorizes the municipality to enter into collaborative agreements on the properties with the Calderón Foundation in order for it to fulfill its purposes.

“The Municipal Administration is firmly committed to contributing to the improvement of communities by promoting the provision of educational and training services, along with social action, entrepreneurship and community empowerment programs, and care for survivors of gender violence, as well as collaboration to promote the revitalization of Río Piedras,” Romero said.

The transaction was made possible by the authorization

granted by the San Juan Legislature through Ordinance No. 16, Series 2024-2025, approved on Oct. 25. The transfer was made free of charge and for registration purposes, each property was valued at $1.00. Through the deeds granted on Wednesday, two properties located at 1002 Ponce de León Avenue and 1005 González Street, and the property located at 13 Romany Street, all in Río Piedras, were transferred.

“The properties are adjacent to the land occupied by the Foundation, so this transfer will contribute to the improvement of the facilities and services provided by the Foundation,” Romero said.

Bazaar tradition carries on at Union Church!

The oldest and best bazaar in Puerto Rico is around the corner, again. The Union Church of San Juan’s Annual Christmas Bazaar will be celebrated this Saturday November 16, 2024 from 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM. This year we are celebrating once more and will feature different artisans, vendors, new to you items, thrift shopping at the Thrift Boutique, traditional Puerto Rican Christmas food and the highly sought after Pecan Pies made by our loving volunteers, the Holly Rollers.

You can have your picture taken with Santa, activities for children, raffles as well as our now traditional Silent Auction which has been organized again by Jean

Cornelius, longtime volunteer and Marilyn Hitt, chairperson of the Bazaar efforts this year. Jean is well known for going around businesses and securing excellent value items for this silent auction.

For over six decades, this year being the 66th Bazaar, Christmas in San Juan begins with this tradition, no other Bazaar has been this consistent and all the funds collected go to support Union Church’s ministries.

We hope you will join us on Saturday, November 16th from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM at 2310 Laurel Street, Punta Las Marías, San Juan. Begin your Christmas Shopping with us and have fun with friends and family!

The San Juan

Governor-elect Jenniffer González Colón

Nogales denounces ‘scandal’ in which not all votes will be counted

By THE STAR STAFF

Citizen Victory Movement (MVC) Rep. Mariana Nogales Molinelli on Wednesday thundered against State Elections Commission (SEC) Alternate Chairwoman Jessika Padilla Rivera, who instructed SEC staff not to count the write-in votes for at-large House seats.

“It is incredible that the chairperson of the State Elections Commission has presented instructions contrary to the conversations with the commissioners,” the legislator stated in a video posted on her social networks. “I think I am going to show up there, and the scandal is going to be so big that the police should prepare to arrest me. I am sick of the cheating. I am sick of the inefficiency.”

In her statements, where she appeared upset by the instructions that she said were given in the SEC, she said that within 30 minutes of having made the statements through the live video, she would be presenting herself at SEC headquarters.

Comedian

By THE STAR STAFF

T“You’re going to have to listen to me,” she said. The post-election general scrutiny began Tuesday, but

the work was suspended due to a disagreement over the counting of the ballots.

According to a document posted by Nogales, the SEC instructions specify that only box 10 will be counted, which corresponds to the at-large Senate seat. In this contest, in which at least 82,467 votes were counted, Nogales’ counterpart in the Senate, Rafael Bernabe, and environmental activist Eliezer Molina faced each other. Bernabe or Molina could win a seat if, during the vote count, they obtain more than 57,555 votes, which is the amount obtained by Roxanna I. Soto Aguilú of the New Progressive Party (NPP), who appears in the 11th and last position among those who would advance to occupy at-large seats.

In the contest for at-large House seats, some 29,145 votes were registered, an amount that, even if it were awarded in full to Nogales Molinelli, would be insufficient to advance. As of midday Wednesday, the 11th position was occupied by José Aponte Hernández of the NPP with 62,863 votes.

who called Puerto Rico an ‘island of garbage’ isn’t apologizing

released Tuesday. “And right now that is happening. And, uh, I apologize to absolutely nobody.”

he comedian who called Puerto Rico a floating island of garbage is not apologizing, Politico reported earlier this week.

Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe is apologizing “to absolutely nobody” for referring to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” at Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally days before the election, according to Politico.

“I love Puerto Ricans, they’re very smart people. They’re smart, they’re street smart, and they’re smart enough to know when they’re being used as political fodder,” Hinchcliffe said at the beginning of the latest episode of his “Kill Tony” podcast, which was recorded the day after the rally and

“Not to the Puerto Ricans, not to the whites, not to the Blacks, not to the Palestinians, not to the Jews, and not to my own mother, who I made fun of during the set,” he added.

Hinchcliffe’s comments at the rally, which he delivered in a warm-up spot well before Trump took the stage, set off a media firestorm and fierce bipartisan backlash in the days that followed, with some predicting the blow-up could cost the now president-elect votes from Latin communities.

Trump, nonetheless, defeated his opponent Kamala Harris by a landslide.

Incoming House VP committed to governor’s work plan

By THE STAR STAFF

The incoming vice president of the island House of Representatives, Ángel Peña Ramírez, on Wednesday offered assurances on his commitment to the work agenda of governor-elect Jenniffer González Colón and incoming House Speaker Carlos “Johnny” Méndez Nuñez, which includes the creation of an energy czar, improving services for seniors, reforming the permit system, greater attention to people with special needs, and the search for a second operator for Puerto Rico’s electric power transmission and distribution network, among other initiatives.

“The agenda of the new majority of the House of Representatives, led by our speaker, Carlos “Johnny” Méndez, is to implement the proposals contained in the Action Plan for Puerto Rico, the government program of the New Progressive Party that was overwhelmingly approved at the polls,” said Peña, who was reelected last week for a fifth term as District 33 (Las Piedras, Juncos and San Lorenzo) representative, in a written statement. “The priorities are clear, to legislate the figure of the Energy

Czar, to whom we will give the power by law to review compliance metrics of all private operators, including the reconstruction work of the electrical infrastructure. Enough of the delays.”

“Reforming the permit system is a priority and our Governor-elect has been clear that this must be addressed in the first 100 days of the next Legislative Assembly,” Peña added. “In Puerto Rico, we need around 50,000 new housing units to meet demand. However, only 60 (approximately) new homes are built each month; that is not enough. There are many factors that delay the construction of new housing complexes, the most important of which is obtaining permits, which in turn increases costs associated with construction materials and labor due to delays in the issuance of these permits. We are going to work on this legislation now so that it is filed in January 2025 and worked on in a transparent but agile manner because the need is there.”

Peña said the treatment of older adults, including identifying resources to pay caregivers, will also be a priority in the new four-year term that begins in just over five weeks.

Citizen Victory Movement Rep. Mariana Nogales Molinelli

Stand-up comic and podcast host Tony Hinchcliffe (Wikipedia)

Rep. Ángel Peña Ramírez

Trump’s recess demand is early test of prospects for more radical second term

By CHARLIE SAVAGE

President-elect Donald Trump’s demand that Senate Republicans surrender their role in vetting his nominees poses an early test of whether his second term will be more radical than his first.

Over the weekend, Trump insisted on social media that Republicans select a new Senate majority leader willing to call recesses during which he could unilaterally appoint personnel, a process that would allow him to sidestep the confirmation process. His allies immediately applauded the idea, intensifying pressure on GOP lawmakers to acquiesce.

The demand to weaken checks and balances and take for himself some of the legislative branch’s usual power underscored Trump’s authoritarian impulses. While there is no obvious legal obstacle to Trump’s request, it would be an extraordinary violation of constitutional norms. There is no historical precedent for a deliberate and wholesale abandonment by the Senate

of its function of deciding whether to confirm or reject the president’s choices to bestow with government power.

Ed Whelan, a legal commentator who has supported Trump’s judicial nominees but been critical of Trump himself, sounded the alarm on Tuesday in an essay for the conservative National Review. The once and future president appeared to be contemplating “an awful and anti-constitutional idea,” he wrote.

Recess appointees who take office without Senate confirmation wield the full powers of their offices until the end of the next Senate session. Each congressional session typically lasts a year, so anyone who receives a recess appointment from Trump in early 2025 could remain in office until the end of 2026.

The U.S. Capitol in Washington on Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. President-elect Donald Trump’s demand that Senate Republicans surrender their role in vetting his nominees may pose the first test of whether his second term is more radical than his first. (Eric Lee/The New York Times)

The Constitution normally requires the president to obtain the Senate’s consent to appoint top officials to the executive

branch, in part to prevent the White House from installing unfit people to high office.

But in the early days of the country, when travel was by horse, the Senate was regularly out of session for months at a time and could not be readily recalled when a key vacancy arose and the country needed someone to fill it. As a result, the founders also wrote an exception into the Constitution, allowing presidents to temporarily fill vacancies without Senate confirmation when it was in recess.

The recess appointment clause is an anachronism in the modern era, since the Senate meets throughout the year and can easily reconvene when necessary. But even though the clause’s original purpose is obsolete, it remains part of the Constitution.

While some of Trump’s nominees are expected to be members of Congress who will presumably be easily approved by the Republican-controlled Senate, recess appointments would remove a critical check on Trump at a time when he has flirted with also giving some powerful roles to more extreme allies who could face trouble getting confirmed.

As Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers, essays in defense of the Constitution, the mere existence of this confirmation process would act as a safeguard against the appointment of “unfit” officials.

“A man who had himself the sole disposition of offices, would be governed much more by his private inclinations and interests, than when he was bound to submit the propriety of his choice to the discussion and determination of a different and independent body, and that body an entire branch of the legislature,”

Hamilton wrote.

The Supreme Court has said that Senate recesses of at least 10 days are sufficient to allow a president to sidestep confirmation for appointees. To set Trump up, the majority leader would have to be willing to bring up a motion to adjourn for at least that amount of time. The Senate would then hold a simple majority vote.

If no adjournment motion passes, the chamber would remain in session. If Republicans hold a narrow 53-47 majority, it would take four Republicans to break away and join Democrats to thwart Trump’s proposal.

There are several reasons to believe that guardrails and bulwarks that sometimes held Trump back in his norm-shattering first term will be weaker in his second term.

His initial team in 2017 was often dysfunctional, but those who stayed learned how to wield power more effectively. His own political appointees sometimes reined in his impulses, but this time, his allies are determined not to appoint officials who would see a duty to constrain him. His agenda was sometimes blocked by courts, but his appointments have shifted the judiciary in his direction.

And in Trump’s first term, Republican lawmakers who had independent standing demonstrated occasional willingness to denounce his rhetoric or check his more disruptive proposals. But over time, the Republican Party has become more accepting of Trump’s propensity to cross lines. And he wore down, outlasted or drove out his GOP critics — suggesting that Republicans in Congress may be even more pliable.

Trump’s demand that the Senate step aside and let him make mass recess appointments is a bold first move to test the waters.

While previous presidents have occasionally made some recess appointments, none has ever tried to systematically bypass Senate approval to unilaterally fill their administrations. It remains to be seen whether Republican senators, fearful of Trump’s ability to end their careers by backing a primary challenger, will give up one of the most important powers and prerogatives of their office.

On social media, Trump asserted that allowing him to make recess appointments would avoid what he portrayed as past delays in pushing through nominees, saying, “We need positions filled IMMEDIATELY!”

San Juan Daily Star

At Mar-a-Lago, ‘uncle’ Elon Musk puts his imprint on the Trump transition

By THEODORE SCHLEIFER

In nearly every meeting that President-elect Donald Trump holds at Mar-a-Lago in Florida, alongside him is someone who has been elected or nominated to nothing and, only a few months ago, had no meaningful relationship with him.

Elon Musk.

The world’s richest person has ascended to a position of extraordinary, unofficial influence in Trump’s transition process, playing a role that makes him indisputably America’s most powerful private citizen. He has sat in on nearly every job interview with the Trump team and bonded with the Trump family, and he is trying to install his Silicon Valley friends in plum positions in the next administration.

Trump announced Tuesday that Musk would help lead what he called the Department of Government Efficiency, a new body to “dismantle government bureaucracy.” But Musk’s true influence on the Trump transition effort goes well beyond that posting.

He has assumed an almost mythical aura in Trump’s inner circle. At Mar-a-Lago one recent evening, he walked into the dining room about 30 minutes after the president-elect did and received a similar standing ovation, according to two people who saw him enter.

Musk, often with his 4-year-old son X on his lap, has spent most of the last week at Mar-a-Lago, joining not just interviews but almost every meeting and many meals that Trump has had. He briefly shuttled back to Austin, Texas, where he has a $35 million compound, before returning Friday, where he ate in Mar-a-Lago’s dining room and on its patio, roamed the gift shop and spent time on the golf course — all alongside the president-elect.

“I’m happy to be the first buddy!” he replied to a social media follower this weekend.

This article is based on roughly a dozen interviews with Republican donors, politicians and friends of Musk, many of wwhom insisted on anonymity to talk about private conversations.

Publicly, over just the first week of the transition, Musk has endorsed Sen. Rick Scott of Florida to be the next Senate majority leader; urged Republican senators to embrace recess appointments for Trump; suggested that all government employees should submit a “weekly email of accomplishments”; called for the Department of Education to be closed; solicited recommendations for new administration roles that he could bring to Trump; wondered if Canada was “dying”; and posted plenty of Trump-themed memes.

Behind the scenes, Musk’s behavior has been far more hands-on than even some of his allies expected. His role, in the eyes of some Trump aides, even outstrips that of Howard Lutnick and Linda E. McMahon, the two formally appointed leaders of the Trump transition.

He has sat in on calls with foreign leaders, including President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Volodymyr

Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and plans to meet in person this week with President Javier Milei of Argentina when Milei visits Mar-a-Lago. Musk has also attended at least one national security meeting with Trump alongside the likes of Stephen Miller, a top aide, and Donald Trump Jr., according to a person briefed on the meeting.

Musk is generally not introducing new names for specific roles, according to people familiar with the process, typically evaluating only people whom the Trump transition team is already considering.

He has voiced support for Trump’s decision not to appoint Mike Pompeo or Nikki Haley to a senior national security position, although he unsuccessfully expressed concern about giving Rep. Elise Stefanik of NewYork a role that would take her out of Congress. (She has been offered the post of United Nations ambassador.)

Musk also has a good relationship with Brendan Carr, the commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission, who is seen as a front-runner to be the body’s next chair. The billionaire has recently voiced support for Carr in private conversations at Mar-a-Lago.

Karoline Leavitt, a Trump spokesperson, told The New York Times that Musk and Trump were “great friends and brilliant leaders working together to Make America Great Again.”

On a personal level, Trump seems to be taken with Musk, adopting him as a quasi member of the family. A photograph posted on social media by Tiffany Trump, Trump’s youngest daughter, featured the entire family, including grandchildren, at Mar-a-Lago with the message “Dad, we are so proud of you!”

Conspicuously, Musk was standing right in the mix, holding his son X.

“Elon, get in the picture with your boy,” Trump told him, according to a video of the moment posted online. “We have to get Elon with his boy — his gorgeous, perfect boy.”

On Sunday, Trump’s eldest grandchild, Kai Trump, put it a little more bluntly with a photo from the golf course: “Elon achieving uncle status.”

Trump has cultivated right-wing members of the tech world over the last year as he has adopted tech-friendly positions on cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and Big Tech antitrust legislation. But at the same time, his vice president-elect, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, has been a supporter of Lina Khan, the chair of the Federal Trade Commission and a target of some conservatives, including Musk.

Musk has said that he is recruiting an “A team” from the private sector to help overhaul the government and that he will ensure “that maniacally dedicated small-government revolutionaries join this administration.” It is unclear how these other tech executives and Musk himself, whose SpaceX has federal contracts, will avoid conflict of interests as they work with the administration.

Musk has recommended two fellow executives at SpaceX, Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy and Tim Hughes, for administration

Trump’s recess demand is early test of prospects for more radical second term

He did not acknowledge a major shift in 2019, engineered by Senate Republicans and led by Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, then the majority leader, that severely curtailed the ability of opposition lawmakers to delay confirmation votes and chew up

large amounts of Senate floor time. It changed the chamber’s rules for most executive branch appointments, reducing from 30 to two hours the amount of time lawmakers can debate before a final vote on a nominee.

roles, the Times has reported.

He has also been floating other friends and associates for gigs — or at least paved the way for them to have some influence. Joe Lonsdale, a tech investor close to Musk, is not planning to play a formal role in the Trump transition, according to a person briefed on the matter, and he has said publicly that he does not want to join the administration “full time” but would rather play a part-time advisory role.

Another friend of Musk’s, Ken Howery, served as ambassador to Sweden during the first Trump administration and has told others that he is interested in another diplomatic position. Another person who could have some influence is Marc Andreessen, a prominent tech investor who, like Musk and Howery, spent election night at Mar-a-Lago.

Musk has also encouraged Palmer Luckey, a co-founder of the military technology startup Anduril, to aid the administration in some way, saying on the social platform X that it was “very important” for “entrepreneurial companies like yours” to be involved. Luckey said in a television interview that he had spoken with the Trump transition team about how he could help.

The friend of Musk’s who currently appears to have the most direct influence is David Sacks, a former colleague dating to their years at PayPal.

Sacks, who hosted a fundraiser for Trump in San Francisco in June, has developed a direct line of communication by phone with the president-elect. Sacks, who took a photo with Musk and Trump on election night and spent much of the evening in the candidate’s vicinity, has publicly pushed for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be given a position in the administration.

Sacks, a venture capitalist, has told friends since Election Day that because he leads an active fund, it would not be practical for him to play a more formal role in the administration. But he, like Musk, helped tank the idea of neoconservatives like Pompeo winning administration roles.

Elon Musk speaks at a rally for former President Donald Trump at Madison Square Garden in New York, Oct. 27, 2024. Musk has taken a prominent role in President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team, sitting in on many job interviews and spending significant time at Mar-a-Lago. (Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times)

Crypto industry lobbies Trump and his allies to capitalize on election wins

By DAVID YAFFE-BELLANY, THEODORE SCHLEIFER and ERIN GRIFFITH

Acryptocurrency enthusiast as chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A presidential committee stacked with industry loyalists. And legislation to let crypto companies operate freely in the United States.

After years in the political wilderness, crypto executives are scrambling to execute a policy wish list that could fundamentally transform the industry’s standing in the United States. They are intensively lobbying Presidentelect Donald Trump and his allies, seeking to shape decisions about key personnel in the new administration and end a regulatory crackdown on crypto companies.

Many top executives are courting Howard Lutnick, a bitcoin enthusiast who heads the financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald and is a co-chair of Trump’s transition team, according to more than a dozen crypto executives, some of whom requested anonymity to discuss sensitive political maneuvering.

Coinbase, the crypto exchange, has been

coordinating with Trump’s transition team to arrange a conversation between Lutnick and Brian Armstrong, the company’s CEO, two people with knowledge of the discussions said. Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of Ripple, another crypto firm, said he had spoken with people close to Trump about personnel decisions for the new administration. Executives at Circle, a large U.S. crypto firm, have also communicated with the transition team, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

The industry’s top priority is reshaping the SEC, which has aggressively pursued crypto firms in court. Among the candidates to run the agency is Dan Gallagher, the chief legal officer for Robinhood, the finance and crypto app, three people with knowledge of the matter said. Another candidate backed by the industry is Chris Giancarlo, a former regulator who has served as an adviser to crypto companies, one of the people said.

After every election, corporate leaders put on a full-court press to influence the transition. But the crypto world has particular reason for optimism. During the campaign, Trump, once

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Former President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the Bitcoin Conference in Nashville, on Saturday, July 27, 2024. Trump, speaking at a Bitcoin conference, told cryptocurrency holders that he would end the “persecution” of their industry.

(Doug Mills/The New York Times)

an outspoken bitcoin skeptic, said he had been converted into a believer and promised to end the SEC’s legal crackdown. He and his family also started their own crypto business and stand to benefit personally from regulatory changes that industry executives have recommended.

industry’s allies in Congress, and the SEC sued large crypto companies like Coinbase, a legal offensive that threatened to push much of the industry offshore.

Now crypto executives are optimistic that the new leaders in Congress and the White House will advance many of the industry’s central aims.

“A lot of folks are trying to put together their wish lists and reach out to the campaign and the transition through different channels,” said Kristin Smith, CEO of the Blockchain Association, a crypto trade group. She said she was scheduled to speak at a crypto conference in Miami this week hosted by Lutnick’s firm and hoped to meet people in his orbit.

Other executives have been angling for introductions to Trump’s allies, calling anyone who might help them secure a spot on a crypto advisory council that the president-elect has promised to establish. Sen. Bill Hagerty, RTenn., has emerged as a key figure, helping introduce industry leaders to Trump’s team, two people with knowledge of the matter said.

In public and private, industry leaders have also recommended candidates to replace the SEC’s chair, Gary Gensler, a staunch crypto critic.

The result is likely to be a drastic shift in U.S. policy toward the crypto industry, which has been tarnished by financial scandals, corporate bankruptcies and white-collar frauds that cost consumers billions of dollars in lost savings. Before the election, a set of super PACs financed by crypto executives spent about $135 million to influence more than 50 congressional races, helping elect dozens of pro-crypto candidates.

On Monday, the price of bitcoin hit a new high of nearly $90,000, as investors expressed confidence that the industry’s political spending would translate to softer regulations.

The spending “sets a terrifying example of influence-peddling,” Lisa Gilbert, a co-president of the consumer group Public Citizen, said in a statement. “The sheer volume spent, and its effectiveness, teaches other corporate actors exactly the wrong lesson.”

Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for the transition, said in a statement that Trump’s personnel decisions for the new administration would be “announced when they are made.” A spokesperson for Coinbase declined to comment on Armstrong’s contact with Lutnick.

During the Biden administration, the crypto industry struggled to establish a foothold in Washington. The 2022 collapse of the FTX crypto exchange spooked some of the

On Thursday, Armstrong of Coinbase wrote on the social platform X that Trump should pick SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce to lead the agency. Peirce, a Republican, has repeatedly clashed with Gensler over his efforts to regulate the crypto sector.

In another post, Garlinghouse suggested three possible names for chair — Gallagher, Giancarlo and Brian Brooks, a former banking regulator who has worked for Coinbase and served as CEO of Bitfury, a bitcoin firm.

Coinbase and Ripple were two of the largest backers of the crypto super PAC Fairshake, which spent tens of millions to sway the election. Brooks, Giancarlo and Peirce declined to comment. Gallagher did not respond to a request for comment.

“The Biden administration’s war on crypto is coming to an end,” Garlinghouse said in an interview. “That’s good for America.”

In Congress, some crypto executives are pushing for a law that would facilitate the trading of stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency designed to maintain a constant price of $1. Other companies and investors have backed a bill that would make it harder for the SEC to pursue crypto firms in court for securities violations. Gensler has warned that the legislation would create regulatory gaps and put investors at “immeasurable risk.”

Oct CPI inflation up modestly, as expected

U.S. consumer prices increased as expected in October, and progress toward bringing inflation down has slowed since mid-year, which could result in fewer interest rate cuts from the Federal Reserve next year.

The consumer price index rose 0.2% for the fourth straight month, the Labor Department said on Wednesday. In the 12 months through October, the CPI advanced 2.6% after climbing 2.4% in September. The headline numbers were predicted by economists polled by Reuters. The up-tick in annual inflation also reflects last year’s low reading dropping out of the calculation.

CPI excluding food and energy increased 0.3% in October, rising by the same margin for the third consecutive month. In the 12 months through October, the so-called core CPI gained 3.3%. That followed a similar advance in September.

STOCKS: U.S. stock index futures turned 0.2% higher, pointing to a steady open on Wall Street BONDS: The 10year U.S. Treasury yield fell to 4.378% and the two-year yield fell to 4.273%FOREX: The dollar index softened more, off 0.2% and the euro was up 0.16%, a bit firmer

ELLEN

ZENTNER, CHIEF ECONOMIC STRATEGIST, MORGAN STANLEY WEALTH MANAGEMENT, NEW YORK

“No surprises from the CPI, so for now the Fed should be on course to cut rates again in December. Next year is a different story, though, given the uncertainty surrounding potential tariffs and other Trump administration policies. The markets are already weighing the possibility that the Fed will cut fewer times in 2025 than previously thought, and that they may hit the pause button as early as January.”

“The risk was that the inflation data would come in high and the Fed would have to reconsider its cut cycle and the market is already on edge about the inflationary possibilities for 2025, under a new administration. So the fact that it came in-line, gives markets a chance to breathe and focus on the other things that have been moving it lately. Any inflation surprise to the upside will kind of throw off the prevailing narrative in markets, which is that the Fed will continue cutting and that’s a positive for risk assets.”

“The latest CPI data matched expectations, showing a year-over-year increase of 2.6%. Inflationary pressures have persisted in key categories like shelter, transportation, and electricity, while the most significant relief has come from lower oil and gas prices. Discussions around ‘reflation’ have resurfaced and expected to continue going forward, driven by anticipation of Trump’s proposed economic policies. However, futures are currently pricing in a roughly 60% probability of another rate cut in December, following the cumulative 75 basis points of cuts at the last two FOMC meetings.”

MOST ASSERTIVE STOCKS

ing else is holding steady, if not ticking down a little bit month over month.

“Once you get up near 4.4% or 4.5% (on the 10-year Treasury yield), you start to see more buyers come in. As you push more into the high fours, that’s when you start to really see impacts on the broader economy if those rates are sustained. We think going forward yields will kind of stay in this range of four to four-and-three quarters at least for the next several months.

PUERTO RICO STOCKS

COMMODITIES

CURRENCY

given the potential for policy changes post-election So the market right now is making a lot of assumptions and what the policy mix will look like but nobody really knows where things will stand a year or two from now.”

“The fact that CPI came in as expected relieved some concerns the market had going into the report. You’re seeing Treasury yields move down, which is positive and helping stock futures.”

“The in-line number is allowing the market to breathe a little easier and to focus more on the positives of less regulation, a potential increase in business.”

“There’s really nothing here that would tell you inflation is re-accelerating or picking back up. And so the market is reflecting that sigh of relief that inflation if noth-

“A good portion of the move higher in yields reflects continued economic resilience and strength and the view that the Fed doesn’t need to reduce rates as much as previously thought to support what the summer looked like - a slowing economy. Recent data showed some stabilization and economic growth, so it is sustainable. There’s a lot of uncertainty though around that view particularly The

“I don’t think this report has any bearing on the December FOMC meeting and that’s what the market is reacting to as well. Right now, we’re on the glide path to another rate cut. It could get disrupted but right now it looks like we could get another rate cut.”

San Juan Daily Star

November 14, 2024

Russia launches missiles against Ukraine’s capital

By ANDREW E. KRAMER and MARC SANTORA

Russia ramped up its deep strikes into Ukraine on Wednesday with a volley of missiles aimed at Kyiv and a northeastern border area, ending a more than two-month pause in such attacks on the capital, the Ukrainian air force said.

The missile bombardment came as Russian forces sought to press their advantage in both soldiers and firepower across the eastern front. Ukraine’s military on Wednesday reported a wave of aerial bombing targeting its troops holding a pocket of Russian territory near the northern border that was captured last summer.

As air raid alerts wailed in Kyiv around 6 a.m. and civilians headed for hallways or basements for safety, the Ukrainian air force said it was tracking 96 aerial targets entering the country’s airspace. That included missiles, ending an unusual 73-day pause in Russia’s use of the weapons to strike civilian and military targets in the capital.

The air force said four missiles were aimed at Kyiv and two were short-range missiles fired into the northeastern border area.

The city has in that period come under numerous drone attacks. Scores of drones were also used in the attack Wednesday, the air force said.

Across Ukraine, the past few months have also seen a longer than usual break from large-scale missile attacks. The last major missile attack came Sept. 3, with a strike on a military academy in the eastern Ukrainian city of Poltava that killed more than 50 people.

Military analysts had speculated that Russia was stockpiling missiles for use after the onset of freezing weather, which can wreak additional havoc in a city after a strike if heating is knocked out and water pipes freeze. The season’s first snowstorm swept over central Ukraine on Wednesday.

Also Wednesday, Russia said a senior Russian naval officer was killed in the city of Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea after a bomb planted under his car exploded.

Russia’s Investigative Committee, which is responsible for investigating serious crimes, said it was considering the death as an act of terrorism. It did not name the officer.

An official at Ukraine’s domestic intel-

A woman carries a young patient outside after a Russian missile strike on the Okhmadyt Children’s Hospital in Kyiv, Ukraine, July 8, 2024. Russia ramped up its deep strikes into Ukraine with a volley of missiles aimed at Kyiv and a northeastern border area, ending a more than two-month pause in such attacks on the capital, the Ukrainian air force said. (Brendan Hoffman/The New York Times)

ligence agency, the SBU, speaking about clandestine operations on the condition of anonymity, said the killed officer had been in charge of cruise missile launches from the Black Sea, identifying him as Valeriy Trankovsky.

In Kyiv, explosions rang out early Wednesday and authorities said air defense systems were firing at incoming missiles and drones.

In the attack, Russia synchronized the arrival in the capital of fast-flying ballistic missiles and slower-moving cruise missiles, a common tactic. The Kyiv city military administration initially said North Koreanmade Hwasong ballistic missiles may have been used. But Ukraine’s air force later reported that two Russian-made Iskander-M ballistic missiles were shot down.

In Kyiv on Wednesday, falling debris started fires in the city’s suburbs and wounded one person, local authorities reported. Two short-range S-300 air defense missiles that had been repurposed by Russia for ground attack were also fired over Ukraine’s northeastern border, the air force said. It provided no details on what they targeted.

Russia also launched 90 drones, includ-

ing Iranian-designed Shahed one-way attack drones.

The pause in missile strikes had left residents of the capital on edge, as they anxiously waited for them to resume. The last significant damage from missiles in Kyiv came in July, when they hit a children’s hospital and a maternity clinic.

On the country’s northeastern border with Russia, Ukraine has been bracing for a combined North Korean and Russian ground offensive after at least 11,000 North Korean soldiers arrived in the area in recent weeks, joining Russian infantry units to create a combined force of about 50,000 soldiers, according to U.S. and Ukrainian officials.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was in Brussels on Wednesday for meetings with NATO and European officials to discuss Ukraine’s war against Russia, addressed the issue of the North Korean troops. They had been “injected into the battle,” he said, “which demands and will get a firm response.”

The troops assembled by Russia are expected to try to dislodge the Ukrainians from a pocket of Russian turf captured over the summer. Ground assaults and aerial

bombardments against Ukrainian positions have begun. On Tuesday, Russia dropped 50 guided bombs on the Ukrainian-controlled area, Col. Vadym Mysnyk, a military spokesperson, told Ukrainian media.

The missile bombardment of the capital also came as Russia presses attacks in eastern Ukraine, with much of the most ferocious fighting concentrated in the Donetsk region.

Russian troops are now threatening to encircle the Ukrainian garrison in the industrial town of Kurakhove, having reached the eastern edge of the city, according to soldiers, volunteers and combat footage.

On Monday, Russians tried an amphibious assault on the town across the freezing waters of a reservoir, using small inflatable boats, but were repulsed, according to the 46th Airmobile Brigade. The attack coincided with a mechanized assault. The brigade released video showing the destruction of three tanks and six infantry fighting vehicles. The extent of the fighting and reported damage could not be independently verified.

Russians are close to cutting off the main road supplying Ukrainian forces in the area, threatening large groups of soldiers who are defending the town. The approach to Kurakhove is lined with burned-out cars and the town itself has been steadily blasted into oblivion.

The blowing up of a dam on the northwestern edge of the reservoir, which Ukraine blamed on Russian forces, is now complicating efforts to evacuate the civilians in villages downstream, as floodwaters steadily rose this week.

But even without rising waters, the drones that saturate the skies increasingly made all movement in and around the town deadly, people in the area said.

“They strike anywhere,” said Yaroslav Chernyshov, 20, a volunteer with the charity Children New Generation, who was helping to evacuate civilians in the area. “Civilian cars are just as shattered as military ones.”

He said he recently lost a colleague in a drone attack during a mission to pick up a woman with a 2-month-old baby.

A colleague in a second car was hit by a drone and died, he said. “We tried to resuscitate him and managed to get him to a stabilization point alive, but sadly, he didn’t make it.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Free electricity, anyone? Britain tries new tricks to green its grid.

By SOMINI SENGUPTA

Were Heathcliff to roam the blustery moors around Wuthering Heights today, he might be interrupted by a ping on his cellphone saying something like this: The wind is raging, so power is cheap. It’s a good time to plug in the car.

OK. So the 18th century literary occupants of these windswept hills received no such pings.

But Martin and Laura Bradley do. They live in Halifax, an old mill town below the wuthering, or windy, heights of West Yorkshire. And when a squall kicks up, producing a surplus of electricity from wind turbines on the moor, their phones light up with a notification, like one that informed them of a 50% discount one Saturday in October.

The Bradleys plugged in their electric Kia, started a load of laundry and set to work on their most delectable energy-guzzling project: the Christmas fruitcake, which is made weeks in advance of the holidays. “As this takes four hours to cook in my electric oven, this is the perfect timing!” Laura Bradley said.

The phone alerts to the Bradleys and thousands of other people are part of Britain’s ambitious plan to shift the nation’s electricity system away from burning fossil fuels altogether by decade’s end. That would be five years faster than the United States, and a full decade ahead of the European Union, effectively making it the most ambitious target of any major industrialized economy.

That means building many more solar and wind projects, as well as loads of batteries and transmission lines. It also requires convincing millions of Britons of the benefits — most importantly to their pocketbooks.

That’s where the Wuthering Heights pings come in.

Octopus Energy, the country’s biggest electricity supplier, runs nine wind turbines on those hills. When it’s gusty, and power is abundant, it offers discounts. The Bradleys say they save upward of 400 pounds ($517) a year. Octopus says it not only attracts customers but also convinces communities that they benefit from new energy infrastructure.

“We’ve got these famously bleak, windy hills,” said Greg Jackson, the company’s CEO. “We wanted to demonstrate to people that wind electricity is cheaper, but only when you use it when it’s windy.”

It’s one of several creative experiments as Britain tries to convince a wary public that ditching fossil fuels can improve their lives.

Ripple Energy, a London startup, invites people to buy a piece of a wind turbine in exchange for discount energy bills. In the town of Grimsby, a local cooperative invests in small solar projects that reduce bills for charities nearby. In North London, a developer has teamed up with Octopus to sell homes that run entirely on electricity — and whose occupants get free electricity for at least five years.

Britain’s 2030 ambition is a test of how quickly a rich country can build a new energy system. It is all the more notable for happening in a country that birthed the Industrial Revolution, ultimately producing the climate crisis that afflicts the world today. Hitting the target faces many challenges.

There’s pressure on the government to enable developers to quickly build things like transmission lines. There’s pressure from communities to not spoil the countryside. And there’s pressure to overhaul regulations so that communities near the new infra-

structure — Scotland for instance, which produces most of the country’s offshore wind — can get lower electric bills and in turn attract new energy-intensive businesses.

Natural gas still accounts for a third of the electricity mix. Replacing that with renewables in five years is no small feat. One recent analysis concluded that solar and wind projects currently planned would make up less than half of the electricity mix by 2030 without an enormous infusion of capital.

An oil man turns to batteries

Signs of the transition are in plain view. Wind turbines roar like dragons off the Scottish coast. Solar panels line the rooftops of football stadiums. And on an industrial patch of West Yorkshire, where for decades, three enormous power plants burned enormous piles of coal, a former oil worker, Ricky Harker, has been installing giant batteries.

There are 136 batteries in all, each the size of a tractor-trailer and owned by SSE, an energy giant that produces a lot of wind power in the North Sea.

The batteries are designed to harness wind and solar power and store it until it’s needed in the grid. “It’s part of the jigsaw,” said Harker, the project’s manager. “Something we can’t do without.”

Harker embodies the transition. His grandfather was a coal miner. His father worked in a coal-burning steel plant. Harker, too, apprenticed there and then worked at an oil refinery, before an explosion killed five co-workers and literally drove him out.

“I’ve never run so fast in my life,” he said. “The next day I spoke to the police, grabbed my bags and left oil and gas.”

While the government’s emphasis is on accelerating renewables, it has no plans to leave behind oil and gas anytime soon. British homes are mainly heated with gas, and for the foreseeable future, gas will remain in the electricity mix as a reserve. The government has said it would allow already approved North Sea oil and gas projects to proceed, but not issue new permits.

In September, Britain closed its last coal-burning power plant. Its new Labour Party-led government has lifted restrictions on onshore wind projects, created a new entity called Great British Energy to invest 2 billion pounds in renewables and cleared the way for several stalled projects, including a 2,000-acre solar farm, Mallard Pass, which local communities complained would destroy farmland.

“If you want to get control over your energy security, and if you want energy independence, the way to do it is with clean energy,” Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, said in an interview.

The new energy curator

To convince people of the benefits, Chris Stark, the government’s adviser for the 2030 climate target, has been studying magazine advertisements from the 1960s. That was the last time Britain built a new energy system, laying down transmission lines across meadows and moors that the country relies on still.

The old ads are “really clear about why we’re doing it, why it’s good for the country, why it’s good for your kids, and that it’s not going to be a huge imposition on you,” he said. “It’s the sort of thing that we’ll need to do again.”

This month the government plans to outline what will need to be built where. Stark says that projects already planned are sufficient to meet the 2030 target. The challenge, he said, is “to do something which is genuinely new, which is to get our hands dirty and, in a sense, curate that energy system.”

But it will require more than building new things. It will require “a more flexible, smarter energy system,” Stark said.

The ‘zero bills’ inventor

A big part of that is tweaking the electricity system from the inside, which is what Greg Jackson of Octopus does, using software to profit from the peaks and troughs of power. Stark calls him the Willy Wonka of the energy transition, after the quirky chocolate-factory owner in the famous children’s book.

Jackson’s latest invention is the “zero bills” home. Residents pay nothing for light and heat for five years. And yet, Octopus still makes money.

How? The houses usually generate more electricity than they use, storing surplus in batteries. Octopus can sell that energy to the grid when demand and prices are high. (The free electricity doesn’t apply to car-charging, which takes a lot of power.)

There are only a few dozen zero-bills homes so far. Octopus aims to have 100,000 by 2030 by partnering with builders. Buyers get 10 years of free electricity.

“You’ve now got a highly variable system of electricity — wind, solar — replacing the old world,” said Jackson, the Octopus executive. “But we don’t have pricing system to reflect this.”

He is lobbying to change that. Step one, he says: Let sellers like Octopus offer lower prices to people living near new energy sources.

Persuading Grimsby

Climate change is a hard sell in a place like Grimsby, a former fishing town where jobs are tough to come by, aside from the offshore oil and gas industry.

Which is why Vicky Dunn, a longtime environmentalist, skipped the environmental pitch and asked two local secondhand shops, a youth shelter and a hospice if they would like to bring down their electricity bills by putting solar panels on their rooftops.

They did.

Several neighbors were keen to help. They loaned Dunn’s group bits of money to invest in the panels. The nonprofits saved on their energy bills, and the investors (many had put in as little as 100 pounds) earned 5% interest.

The intangible benefit, Dunn said, was winning over the community about the low cost of solar. “The energy transition is needed. But you have to take people with you,” she said.

From Dunn’s vantage point, the strength of these local projects is to show what’s possible. “It gives people something practical to do with the threat of climate change, instead of worrying,” she said. “Or moaning.”

Britain’s last coal-burning power plant, which closed in September, looms over a local resident working in his garden in Ratcliffe-on-Soar, England, on Oct. 7, 2024. Solar panels will eventually be built nearby. (Andrew Testa/The New York Times)

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL

Trump had it easy the first time

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

Idon’t know why people say that President-elect Donald Trump is going to face difficult challenges in foreign policy. All he needs to do is get Vladimir Putin to compromise on Russia’s western border. Get Volodymyr Zelenskyy to compromise on Ukraine’s eastern border. Get Benjamin Netanyahu to define Israel’s western and southern borders. Get Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, to define his country’s western border — that is, stop trying to control Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen. Get China to define its eastern border as short of Taiwan. And get the Houthis in Yemen to define their coastal border as limited to just a few miles off shore — without the right to stop all shipping into the Red Sea.

To put it another way: If you think the only border that will preoccupy Trump when he takes office Jan. 20 is America’s southern border, you’re not paying attention.

When Trump left office in 2021, before the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the war between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah, one could argue that we were still in the “postCold War” era, dominated by increasing economic integration and Great Power peace. Russia had taken a bite out of Ukraine but never attempted to devour the whole thing. Iran and Israel were hostile but never directly attacked each other.

Israel occupied the West Bank but never had a government whose official coalition agreement included formal annexation of the whole West Bank and now has members advocating the same for the Gaza Strip. America did not care for the Houthis in Yemen, but we had never sent B-2 stealth bombers to drop some of the largest payloads in our arsenal on them.

In short, a lot of bright red lines have been crossed since Trump occupied the big White House. And restoring them, and “making America great again,” will almost certainly require more subtle and sophisticated uses of force and coercive diplomacy than the isolationist Trump ever contemplated in his first administration or suggested in his campaigns.

In Israel, where I am right now, one of the farthest-right members of Israel’s far-right government, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, has not wasted any time, declaring Monday that Trump’s new presidency presents an “important opportunity” to “apply Israeli sovereignty to the settlements in Judea and Samaria,” using the biblical names for areas of the West Bank. He added, “The year 2025 will, with God’s help, be the year of sovereignty” in these occupied territories.

But Trump may be much more of a wild card for Israel today than Smotrich expects. He is the first U.S. president who overtly appealed to and benefited from votes from Arab and Muslim Americans who were unhappy with unconditional U.S. support for Israel in Gaza. He also comes in with as strong an isolationist mandate as any president since the end of the Cold War. On top of that, when Trump was president before, he put out a peace plan for a two-state solution in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, albeit one that strongly favored Israel. I was at a dinner in Haifa on Tuesday with Israeli Jews and Arabs together. The guests said that many Jewish Israelis think that because one of Trump’s sons-in-law is Jewish, he is ready

to be tough with Palestinians, while many Israeli Arabs think Trump will benefit them because he is the only one tough enough to stand up to Netanyahu and because his other sonin-law has a Lebanese American father. Somebody is going to be disappointed!

As for Trump’s Ukraine diplomacy, getting Putin to agree to some kind of cease-fire/peace agreement restoring a Russian border with Ukraine may be the biggest challenge of all, Russia expert Leon Aron from the American Enterprise Institute said, because “Trump wants peace in Ukraine, and Putin wants victory.”

Putin, Aron added, cannot afford to come back to the Russian people after some 600,000 of their compatriots have been killed and wounded in Ukraine and say, “Oops, sorry, we are not going to control Ukraine after all.” Putin cannot let this war end in defeat. But Trump cannot accept a peace that looks like a defeat for the West. Then he would look like a loser.

The fact that Putin had to effectively hire 10,000 North Korean forces to help fight his reckless war in Ukraine shows two things: how afraid he is to stop without a visible victory “and how afraid he is of a societal backlash if he is forced to send into the trenches raw 18-year-old ethnic-Russian conscripts, especially from Moscow and St. Petersburg where the Russian elite lives,” said Aron, author of “Riding the Tiger: Vladimir Putin’s Russia and the Uses of War.”

“Putin is not in a position to have a forever war,” concluded Aron. “He is running out of people.” All of which is to say that if Trump is capable of sustaining Ukraine in its current battlefield position for 12 more months, he might get the deal to end the Ukraine war in a year that he promised in the campaign to deliver in a day.

A Trump administration could cause a new and very different set of red lines to be crossed if it pulls back from NATO or expresses any diminished willingness to protect longtime allies.

Japan, Poland, South Korea and Taiwan have hostile nuclear-armed neighbors and the technology and resources to build nuclear weapons themselves. “They haven’t done it because they thought they didn’t need to — because they believed that the United States had their back, even in the ultimate nightmare of a nuclear war,” said Gautam Mukunda, the noted strategy expert and Yale University lecturer. “Think about that for a second: They had such total faith in the U.S. as an ally that for decades, they have, literally, bet the existence of their country on America’s word.” He added, “Given what Trump has said about alliances, could any responsible foreign leader keep making that wager?”

They have seen what happened to Ukraine after it gave the nuclear weapons stationed there back to Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union. If these countries lose faith in America’s promise — or that promise is withdrawn — and they develop their own nuclear weapons, that would be the end of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty that has limited the spread of nuclear weapons since World War II. That would erase the mother of all red lines.

That’s the thing about the world: It is always so much more complicated than it sounds on the campaign trail, and today more than ever. Or as boxer Mike Tyson is said to have observed, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”

Ricardo Angulo Founder PO BOX 6537 Caguas PR 00726 Telephones: (787) 743-3346 • (787) 743-6537 (787) 743-5606 • Fax (787) 743-5100

Dr.

Former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign event in Flint, Mich., Sept. 17, 2024. (Daniel Ribar/The New York Times)

WIPR y Para la Naturaleza estrenan serie sobre gastronomía sustentable

POR CYBERNEWS

SAN JUAN – La Corporación para la Difusión Pública (WIPR) y Para la Naturaleza anunciaron el miércoles el estreno de la serie Nueva Cocina Puertorriqueña, dedicada a la gastronomía sostenible con ingredientes frescos y técnicas que apoyan la agricultura y producción local.

La primera temporada, con 11 episodios, estrena el lunes 18 de noviembre a las 10:00 a.m. y se grabó en el Área Natural Protegida Las Lunas en Caguas.

“Es fundamental para nosotros brindar este espacio a las entidades sin fines de lucro que impactan a los sectores con mayores necesidades, ofreciendo contenido que educa, inspira y enaltece nuestras raíces”, expresó Jorge Pagán, presidente de WIPR.

La serie incluye chefs destacados como Wilo Benet, María Grubb, y José Enrique, quienes prepararán recetas utilizando productos locales y sostenibles,

con el objetivo de reducir la dependencia alimentaria y apoyar la agroecología en Puerto Rico.

“Nueva Cocina Puertorriqueña” se transmitirá los lunes a las 10:00 a.m. con repetición los domingos a las 4:00 p.m., ofreciendo una alternativa educativa que promueve el consumo de productos de temporada y técnicas de cocina respetuosas con el medio ambiente.

Descartan asesinato: Hombre fallece en Guaynabo tras disparo accidental con arma de fuego

GUAYNABO – La Policía investiga como incidente y no un asesinato, la muerte de un hombre de 56 años, reportada la mañana del miércoles en el barrio Sonadora Alta de Guaynabo, tras recibir un disparo accidental. Según el informe preliminar, una llamada al Sistema de Emergencias 9-1-1 alertó sobre una persona herida

de bala. Al llegar, agentes municipales y estatales encontraron el cuerpo de José Luis Peluyera Torres, quien, según se indicó, se encontraba en un gallerín detrás de su residencia y aparentemente se hirió accidentalmente al intentar guardar su arma de fuego en la cintura.

Paramédicos de Emergencias Médicas Municipales verificaron la condición de la víctima, pero ya no presentaba signos vitales. En la escena, las autoridades ocuparon un casquillo y el arma de fuego, la cual estaba debidamente licenciada.

El sargento Jesús Alicea Ortiz, de la División de Homicidios del Cuerpo de Investigaciones Criminales de Bayamón, junto al fiscal de turno, está a cargo de la investigación.

Se exhorta a cualquier persona con información adicional a comunicarse a la línea confidencial al 787-343-2020 o a través de X en @PRPDNoticias y en Facebook en www.facebook.com/ prpdgov.

Samantha Harvey’s ‘Orbital’ wins the Booker Prize

By ALEX MARSHALL

When Samantha Harvey started work on “Orbital,” a novel set aboard the International Space Station, she wrote 5,000 words then, suddenly, lost her nerve.

“I thought, ‘Well, I have never been to space. I could never go to space,’” Harvey recalled in a recent BBC radio interview: “‘Who am I to do this?’”

She only returned to the novel during the pandemic, after realizing she should stop worrying about “trespassing in space,” she said. Years later, that decision has paid off. On Tuesday, “Orbital” won the Booker Prize, the prestigious literary award.

Edmund de Waal, an artist and the chair of this year’s panel of judges, called “Orbital” a “beautiful, miraculous novel” in a news conference before Tuesday’s announcement. The book centers on astronauts and cosmonauts who circle the Earth, observing 16 sunrises and sunsets, and witnessing weather pass across fragile borders and time zones.

“Harvey makes our world strange and new for us,” de Waal said, adding that Harvey’s writing transformed the Earth into “something for contemplation, something deeply resonant.”

In her acceptance speech, Harvey said she wanted to dedicate the prize “to everybody who does speak for and not against the Earth, for and not against the dignity of other humans, other life, and all the humans who speak for and call for and work for peace.”

Harvey is the first female author to win the Booker since 2019, when Margaret Atwood’s “The Testaments” and Bernardine Evaristo’s “Girl, Woman, Other” shared the award. At 136 pages, it is also the second-shortest novel to win since the prize’s founding in 1969.

“Orbital” beat five other shortlisted titles. These include Percival Everett’s “James,” a retelling of Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” from the perspective of a Black man fleeing enslavement (which was British bookmakers’ favorite to win), and Rachel Kushner’s “Creation Lake,” about a spy infiltrating a group of environmental activists.

The other nominated titles were Anne Michaels’ “Held,” Yael van der Wouden’s “The Safekeep” and Charlotte Wood’s “Stone Yard Devotional.”

The Booker, which comes with a cash prize of 50,000 pounds, or $64,000, is awarded each year to the best novel

written in English and published in Britain or Ireland. Since 2014, when the prize became open to authors born outside Britain, Ireland, the Commonwealth and Zimbabwe, the Booker has gained a global following. Winning the prize leads to a jump in sales, and its winners regularly become literary sensations.

Last year, Paul Lynch won for “Prophet Song,” a novel that depicts Ireland descending into totalitarianism, followed by a civil war.

Reviewers in both Britain and the United States have praised “Orbital.” Joshua Ferris, in a review for The New York Times, said that although the novel is virtually plotless — instead featuring accounts of the astronauts’ daily tasks and pages of descriptions of what they see passing below — “sometimes, wonder and beauty suffice.”

During Thursday’s news conference, de Waal praised the novel for both its lyricism and acuity. In a typical sentence, Harvey describes astronauts watching Earth like “the face of an exulted lover; they watch it sleep and wake and become lost in its habits.”

Harvey, 49, is the author of four previous novels, including “The Wilderness,” about a man with Alzheimer’s, which was longlisted for the 2009 Booker Prize, and 2018’s “The Western Wind,” about the mysterious death of a village’s wealthiest resident in medieval England.

Harvey, 49, is the author of four previous novels, including “The Wilderness,” about a man with Alzheimer’s, which was longlisted for the 2009 Booker Prize, and 2018’s “The Western Wind,” about the mysterious death of a village’s wealthiest resident in medieval England. She also wrote “The Shapeless Unease: A Year of Not Sleeping,” a 2020 memoir about her struggles with insomnia.

Giant lamp installations to be featured in seasonal exhibition in Bayamón

By THE STAR STAFF

Event management company LEKTRIK Art will bring its giant lamps to Puerto Rico this evening at Parque de las Ciencias near Toroverde in Bayamón.

Seven countries have experienced the giant lamps handcrafted by the company in exclusive editions for each country they visit.

The event, from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., is for all ages to enjoy music, gastronomy and the exhibitions, which represent the flora, fauna and traditions of Puerto Rico along with im-

Harvey has said that while writing the novel she continually watched streaming video from the International Space Station showing Earth from space.

“To look at the Earth from space was a bit like a child looking into a mirror and realizing for the first time that the person in the mirror is herself,” she said during her acceptance speech.

Art

ages that represent Christmas around the world.

The exhibition, which represents an investment of some $1.5 million, consists of more than 70,000 lights and more than 600 lamps, each one handmade by artists from LEKTRIK Art, a Kissimmee, Florida-based custom lighting designer and manufacturer that is recognized in the major attractions industry. The company designs, manufactures and installs award-winning themed lighting displays around the world.

San Juan Daily Star

A LEKTRIK

lamp installation at Jungle Island in Miami (LinkedIn)

CON V E N C IÓN A D G

Agradecidos con Nuestros Socios

Queremos expresar nuestra más profunda gratitud a nuestros socios detallistas por su inquebrantable respaldo a la Asociación de Detallistas de Gasolina de Puerto Rico en cada evento y actividad que organizamos. Su participación en nuestra 65.ª Convención Anual fue fundamental para el éxito de este evento. Ustedes son el motor que nos impulsa a seguir luchando por los intereses de nuestra membresía.

Una vez más, hemos demostrado que ser socio de la ADG tiene grandes beneficios:

Presencia y acción en temas legislativos, gubernamentales y de la industria.

Asesoría legal especializada.

Suministro de rótulos y reglamentos actualizados.

Seminarios y charlas empresariales.

Convención anual con negociaciones exclusivas con nuestros suplidores, a precios especiales disponibles solo durante el evento.

Publicidad con la oportunidad de promocionar sus productos y servicios en nuestras redes sociales como Facebook e Instagram, además de un servicio de email blast dirigido a todos nuestros socios.

Participación en el Grupo de Compra, obteniendo descuentos en mercancía de los principales proveedores, además de recibir incentivos monetarios.

Oposición firme a la construcción de nuevas estaciones de gasolina.

Gestión ante la Junta de Calidad Ambiental, incluyendo adiestramientos, certificaciones y renovaciones.

Apoya a la única institución que te defiende y representa. No esperes a estar en una situación difícil para mostrar tu respaldo. Patrocina a la ADG en los buenos tiempos, y en los momentos difíciles, nosotros estaremos aquí para ayudarte.

Si aún no formas parte de nuestra Asociación, te invitamos a unirte llamando al 787-726-0961 o al 939-206-9802. Esta lista de beneficios reemplaza cualquier versión anterior al 7 de marzo de 2023. Algunas restricciones aplican.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE AIBONITO GLORIBÍ RODRÍGUEZ FUENTES Y LUIS DANIEL SOTO SANTIAGO Peticionarios EX-PARTE Civil Número.: AI2024CV00467. Sobre: EXPEDIENTE DOMINIO. EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS. A: PERSONAS IGNORADAS, SUCN. DE ROSA NILDA RIVERA BERRÍOS Y SUCN. MARIO COLÓN MALAVÉ, HC 02, BOX 7427, BARRANQUITAS, PUERTO RICO 00794. Por la presente se le notifica a usted que se ha presentado ante este Tribunal el expediente arriba mencionado, con el fin de justificar e inscribir a favor de la Promovente, el exceso de cabida que tiene sobre la siguiente finca: “RÚSTICA”: Predio de terreno radicado en el barrio Palo Hincado del término municipal de Barranquitas, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial CERO PUNTO DOS MIL QUINIENTOS CUARENTA Y CUATRO CUERDAS (0.2544 CDAS.), equivalentes a MIL PUNTO CERO CIENTO SESENTA Y TRES METROS CUADRADOS 1,000.0163 m.c.), en lindes por el NORTE, con Mario Colón Malavé; por el SUR, con camino municipal, por el ESTE, con Mario Colón Malavé y por el OESTE, con Solar número dos. Practicada la mensura correspondiente, la propiedad quedó con la siguiente descripción: RÚSTICA”: Predio de terreno radicado en el barrio Palo Hincado del término municipal de Barranquitas, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial UNO PUNTO CERO, CEINTO SESENTA Y NUEVE CUERDAS (1.0169 CDAS.), equivalentes a TRES MIL NOVECIENTOS NOVENTA Y SEIS PUNTO OCHO MIL DIEZ METROS CUADRADOS (3,996.8010 m.c.), en lindes por el NORTE, con Juana Ortiz Negrón; por el SUR, con camino municipal; por el ESTE, con Luis Santiago Santiago y por el OESTE, con José B. Hernández Padilla. Alega la parte Peticionaria que adquirió la finca descrita mediante escritura pública de compraventa número veintiséis, ante el Notario

Carlos E. Berríos Beauchamp, el día 20 de julio de 2022, en Barranquitas, Puerto Rico. Es abogado de la parte Peticionaria: LIC. JORGE M. DIAZ RODRIGUEZ, PO BOX 852, NARANJITO, P.R. 00719-0852, TELEFONO: 787) 869-4042, jorgemdiazrodriguez@gmail. com. Este Tribunal ordenó que se publique la pretensión por tres veces durante el término de veinte días en un periódico de circulación general diaria, para que los que tengan algún derecho real sobre el inmueble descrito, las personas ignoradas a quienes pueda perjudicar la inscripción, Sucn. Rosa Nilda Rivera Berríos y Sucn. Mario Colón Malavé, y en general, a todos los que desearen oponerse, entre ellos los colindantes, puedan efectuarlo dentro del término de veinte días a partir de la última publicación del presente edicto. Usted deberá presentar su posición a través del Sistema Unificado de Administración y manejo de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su posición en la secretaría del tribunal. Por tanto, libro la presente en Aibonito, Puerto Rico, hoy día 24 de octubre de 2024. ELIZABETH GONZÁLEZ RIVERA, SECRETARIA. MARITZA APONTE RODRÍGUEZ, SUBSECRETARIA.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE SAN JUAN ORIENTAL BANK

Parte Demandante V. JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE COMO MIEMBROS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE NORMA IRIS NEVÁREZ NEGRÓN; FULANO DE TAL Y FULANA DE TAL COMO MIEMBROS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE FERNANDO MELENDEZ NEVÁREZ; FERNANDO JOSÉ MELÉNDEZ DÍAZ Y NATALIA MARÍA MELÉNDEZ DÍAZ COMO MIEMBROS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE FERNANDO MELENDEZ NEVÁREZ

Parte Demandada Caso Núm.: SJ2024CV02513. Acción Civil De: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU., EL

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE P.R., SS. AVISO DE PÚBLICA SUBASTA. El que suscribe, Alguacil del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior de San Juan, hago saber a la parte demandada JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE como miembros de la Sucesión de NORMA IRIS

NEVÁREZ NEGRÓN; FULANO DE TAL Y FULANA DE TAL como miembros de la Sucesión de FERNANDO MELENDEZ

NEVÁREZ; FERNANDO JOSÉ MELÉNDEZ DÍAZ Y NATALIA MARÍA MELÉNDEZ DÍAZ como miembros de la Sucesión de FERNANDO MELENDEZ NEVÁREZ y al PÚBLICO EN GENERAL; que en cumplimiento del Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia expedido el 9 de octubre de 2024, por la Secretaría del Tribunal, procederé a vender y venderé en pública subasta por el precio mínimo de $84,000.00 y al mejor postor, pagadero en efectivo, cheque de gerente o giro postal, a nombre del alguacil del tribunal, la propiedad que se describe a continuación: COND. BORINQUEN TOWER I, APT. 1004, SAN JUAN, PR 00920, y que se describe de la siguiente manera: URBAN: Condominium Borinquen Tower on 1004, is situated on the tengh floor the building part of the building. It consist of regular shaped body measuring approximately 31 ‘0” long by 23’1 1/4” wide an open balcony 11 ‘11” long by 5’7”wide 61.10 bounding on the North, with an common public corridor, to which the entrance door of the apartment opens, on the South, with an exterior wall which de portees if from the common yard on the Southern side of the common yard on the southern side of the building where the balcony opens, on the East, with an party wall which separates it from apartment, on 1003, on the West, with a party wall which separates it from apartment on 1005. This apartment consists of two bedrooms with combination of living and dines room, gives access to the open balcony storage closets, kitchen equipped with cabinets with, a 30 gallon capacity water heater. Le corresponde una participación en los elementos generales de 0.4307% y 0.4821% en los elementos comunes limitados. Finca 23003 inscrita al folio 106 del tomo 746 de Monacillos, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección III. La finca antes descrita se encuentra afecta a los siguientes gravámenes: (i) Hipoteca constituida en garantía de un pagare, aff. #173, a favor de Doral Mortgage Corp., o a su orden, par $84,000.00, al 6.5%,

vencedero el 1 de septiembre de 2034, según Esc. #167, en San Juan, a 31 de agosto de 2004, ante Saideth Cristobal Martínez, inscrita al folio 66 del tomo 1005 de Monacillos, fin ca #23003, inscripción 9na., Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección III. (ii) Modificada la hipoteca de la inscripción 9na., por $84,000.00, la cual se cancela parcialmente par $3,170.00, para un nuevo principal de $80,830.00, con intereses al 4%, de 1 de mayo de 2012 al 1 de abril de 2017 y al 6.500% del 1 de mayo de 2017 hasta su vencimiento que será el 1 de abril de 2052, según Esc. #91, en San Juan, a 30 de marzo de 2012, ante Juan A. Martinez Romero, inscrita al folio 66 del tomo 1005 de Monacillos, finca #23003, inscripción 11 ma. y última, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección III. La hipoteca objeto de esta ejecución es la que ha quedado descrita en los incisos (i y ii). Será celebrada la subasta para con el importe de la misma satisfacer la sentencia dicta el 30 de julio de 2023, mediante la cual se condenó a la parte demandada pagar a la parte demandante la suma de $60,204.25 de principal, más $1,662.70 de intereses al 6.5%, computados desde el 1 de octubre de 2023 hasta el 4 de marzo de 2024, que continuarán acumulándose hasta el saldo total a razón de $10.7213048 diarios, más $408.55 de cargos por demora, $12.00 de otros cargos, $3,634.47 de balloon balance interest, $822.12 de balloon interest moratorium, $411.20 de balloon interest moratorium, $58.11 de reserve escrow y $8,400.00 de costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado, más cualquier otro desembolso que haya efectuado o efectúe la parte demandante durante la tramitación de este caso para otros adelantos de conformidad con el Contrato Hipotecario, incluyendo primas de seguro de hipoteca, prima de seguro de siniestro y cargos por demora. La PRIMERA SUBASTA será celebrada el día 27 DE NOVIEMBRE DE 2024, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en la oficina del Alguacil, sita en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, Puerto Rico. Servirá de tipo mínimo para la misma la cantidad de $84,000.00 sin admitirse oferta inferior. De no haber remate ni adjudicación, celebraré SEGUNDA SUBASTA el día 5 DE DICIEMBRE DE 2024, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en el mismo lugar, en la que servirá como tipo mínimo, dos terceras (2/3) partes del precio pactado para la primera subasta, o

sea, $56,000.00. Si no hubiese remate ni adjudicación en la segunda subasta, celebraré TERCERA SUBASTA el día 12 DE DICIEMBRE DE 2024, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en el mismo lugar en la que regirá como tipo mínimo, la mitad del precio pactado para la primera subasta, o sea, $42,000.00. El Alguacil que suscribe hizo constar que toda licitación deberá hacerse para pagar su importe en moneda legal de los Estados Unidos de América, de acuerdo con la Ley y de acuerdo con lo anunciado en este Aviso de Subasta. Los autos y todos los documentos correspondientes al procedimiento incoado estarán de manifiesto en la Secretaría del Tribunal durante horas laborables. Se entiende que todo licitador que comparezca a la subasta señalada en este caso acepta como bastante la titulación que da base a la misma. Se entiende que cualquier carga y/o gravamen anterior y/o preferente, si la hubiere al crédito que da base a esta ejecución continuará subsistente, entendiéndose, además, que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción cualquier parte del remanente del precio de licitación. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquirirá libre de cargas y gravámenes posteriores. Por la presente se notifica a los acreedores que tengan inscritos o anotados sus derechos sobre los bienes hipotecados con posterioridad a la inscripción del crédito del ejecutante o acreedores de cargas o derechos reales que los hubiesen pospuesto a la hipoteca ejecutada y las personas interesadas en, o con derecho a exigir el cumplimiento de instrumentos negociables garantizados hipotecariamente con posterioridad al crédito ejecutado, para que puedan concurrir a la subasta si les convenga o satisfacer antes del remate el importe del crédito, de sus intereses, costas y honorarios de abogados asegurados, quedando subrogados en los derechos del acreedor ejecutante. Vendida o adjudicada la finca o derecho hipotecado y consignado el precio correspondiente, en esa misma fecha o fecha posterior, el alguacil que celebró la subasta procederá a otorgar la correspondiente escritura pública de traspaso en representación del dueño o titular de los bienes hipotecados, ante el notario que elija el adjudicatario o comprador, quien deberá abonar el importe de tal escritura. El alguacil pondrá en posesión judicial al nuevo dueño, si así

se lo solicita dentro del término de veinte (20) días a partir de la confirmación de la venta o adjudicación. Si transcurren los referidos veinte (20) días, el tribunal podrá ordenar, sin necesidad de ulterior procedimiento, que se lleve a efecto el desalojo o lanzamiento del ocupante u ocupantes de la finca o de todos los que por orden o tolerancia del deudor la ocupen. Y PARA CONOCIMIENTO DE LOS LICITADORES Y DEL PUBLICO EN GENERAL y para su publicación de acuerdo con la Ley, expido el presente Edicto bajo mi firma y sello de este Tribunal. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, hoy 22 de octubre de 2024. EDWIN E. LÓPEZ MULERO, ALGUACIL AUXILIAR, TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA, SALA DE SAN JUAN.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA CENTRO JUDICIAL DE ARECIBO SALA SUPERIOR DE CAMUY

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO

Demandante V. ANTONIO HARRISON HERNÁNDEZ T/C/C ANTHONY HARRISON HERNÁNDEZ; JESSICA LYMARIS JIMÉNEZ TORRES Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Demandado Civil Núm.: CM2023CV00023. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS. AVISO DE SUBASTA. El que suscribe, Alguacil del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior, Centro Judicial de Camuy, Camuy, Puerto Rico, hago saber, a la parte demandada y al PÚBLICO EN GENERAL: Que en cumplimiento del Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia expedido el día 17 de septiembre de 2024, por la Secretaría del Tribunal, procederé a vender y venderé en pública subasta y al mejor postor la propiedad que ubica y se describe a continuación: RUSTICA: Solar radicado en el barrio Abra Honda del término municipal de Camuy, Puerto Rico, identificado con el número dos (2) en el plano de inscripción con una cabida superficial de 4,716.467 metros cuadrados. En lindes al Norte, con franja de terreno dedicada

a uso público; al Sur, con Providencia Cruz; al Este, con el solar marcado con el #3 y al Oeste, con solar marcado con el #1. Consta inscrita al folio 190 del tomo 298 de Camuy, finca número 7310, Registro de la Propiedad de Arecibo, Sección II. El producto de la subasta se destinará a satisfacer al demandante hasta donde alcance, la SENTENCIA dictada 18 de diciembre de 2023, notificada el 21 de diciembre de 2023, en el presente caso civil, a saber la suma de $113,126.75 de principal, 3.75% de intereses, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; más $664.91 por cargos por mora, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; más costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado. La adjudicación se hará al mejor postor, quien deberá consignar el importe de su oferta en el acto mismo de la adjudicación, en efectivo (moneda del curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América), giro postal o cheque certificado a nombre del alguacil del Tribunal. La PRIMERA SUBASTA se llevará a efecto el día 3 DE DICIEMBRE DE 2024 A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en el Centro Judicial de Camuy, Camuy, Puerto Rico. Que el precio mínimo fijado para la PRIMERA SUBASTA es de $120,217.00. Que de ser necesaria la celebración de una SEGUNDA SUBASTA la misma se llevará a efecto el día 10 DE DICIEMBRE DE 2024 A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en la oficina antes mencionada del Alguacil que suscribe. El precio mínimo para la SEGUNDA SUBASTA será de $80,144.67, equivalentes a dos terceras (2/3) partes del tipo mínimo estipulado para la PRIMERA subasta. Que de ser necesaria la celebración de una TERCERA SUBASTA la misma se llevará a efecto el día 17 DE DICIEMBRE DE 2024 A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA, en la oficina antes mencionada del Alguacil que suscribe. El precio mínimo para la TERCERA SUBASTA será de $60,108.50, equivalentes a la mitad (1/2) del tipo mínimo estipulado para la PRIMERA subasta. Si se declarase desierta la tercera subasta, se adjudicará la finca a favor del acreedor por la totalidad de la cantidad adeudada si ésta es igual o menor que el monto del tipo de la tercera subasta, si el Tribunal lo estima conveniente; se abonará dicho monto a la cantidad adeudada si esta es mayor, todo ello a tenor con lo dispone el Artículo 104 de la Ley Núm. 210 del 8 de diciembre de 2015 conocida como “Ley del Registro de la

Propiedad Inmueble del Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico”. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquiere libre de toda carga y gravamen que afecte la mencionada finca según el Artículo 102, inciso 6. Una vez confirmada la venta judicial por el Honorable Tribunal, se procederá a otorgar la correspondiente escritura de venta judicial y se pondrá al comprador en posesión física del inmueble de conformidad con las disposiciones de Ley. Para conocimiento de la parte demandada y de toda aquella persona o personas que tengan interés inscrito con posterioridad a la inscripción del gravamen que se está ejecutando, y para conocimiento de todos los licitadores y el público en general, el presente Edicto se publicará por espacio de dos (2) semanas consecutivas, con un intervalo de por lo menos siete días entre ambas publicaciones, en un diario de circulación general en el Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico y se fijará además en tres (3) lugares públicos del Municipio en que ha de celebrarse dicha venta, tales como la Alcaldía, el Tribunal y la Colecturía. Se les informa, por último, que: a. Que los autos y todos los documentos correspondientes al procedimiento incoado estarán de manifiesto en la secretaría del tribunal durante las horas laborables. b. Que se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante la titularidad y que las cargas y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes, si los hubiere, al crédito del ejecutante continuarán subsistentes. Se entenderá, que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. EXPIDO, el presente EDICTO, en Camuy, Puerto Rico, hoy día 30 de septiembre de 2024. WILFREDO OLMO SALAZAR, ALGUACIL REGIONAL. LUIS E. ROMÁN CARRERO, ALGUACIL, DIVISIÓN DE SUBASTAS, TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA, SALA SUPERIOR DE CAMUY.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE AGUADA. LIME HOMES, LTD.

Parte Demandante vs. DAVID RICO RAMIREZ

Parte Demandada CIVIL NÚM. ABCI201201127.

SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. EDICTO DE SUBASTA. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS ES-

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NFL pioneer finds her way after years on the back roads

By TASHAN REED / THE ATHLETIC

All Joe Headen could hear was yelling. The football coach at Susquehanna Township High School in Pennsylvania was walking out of a practice in 2010 when the sound of two adults going at it lured him back to the field. Once there, Headen found veteran defensive line coach Rick Pierce and first-year assistant defensive line coach Lori Locust in each other’s faces in a heated argument.

Pierce and Locust had a strong relationship, but Locust thought Pierce was taking it too easy on a star defensive lineman. Although Pierce vehemently disagreed, Locust did not back down. Headen let it play out without interrupting.

“Everybody’s like, ‘Coach, aren’t you going to do something?’ And I was like, ‘Nah, she’s got to earn her stripes,’” Headen said. “And, honestly, that was the moment I knew she was going to be all right.”

Locust grew up nearby as a Pittsburgh Steelers fan, and she pretended to be the Hall of Fame linebacker Jack Lambert in backyard pickup games as a child. But her connection to organized football was limited to fandom until the National Women’s Football Association, a professional women’s tackle football league, brought the Harrisburg Angels to her hometown in 2006. She tried out and made the team.

“I was like, ‘Wow, I get a chance to play football,’” Locust said. “And that translated a love of the game to a different love, right?”

In Locust’s fourth season, a torn ACL ended her playing career. She had grown up with Headen, and their sons played youth football together. Shortly after her injury, while they were sitting together at one of their practices, Locust told Headen of her desire to stay connected to the game. That is when he offered her the opportunity to transition to coaching.

“At that time, there were no female coaches in our area,” Headen said. “And it was one of those things where she just fit right in. She knew what she was doing. She knew what she was talking about. The respect factor was there. It wasn’t, ‘Oh, that’s Coach Locust or Coach Lo, my female coach.’ It was just straight Coach Lo.

“I didn’t realize how intense she was and how far she wanted to take it until we got to about the third year,” Headen said.

“She really got bitten by the bug, and that’s when she just started putting her nose to the ground and grinding like crazy.”

That tenaciousness drove Locust to pursue any coaching opportunity she could find. Over the next decade, she held nine coaching positions — including coaching at the high school, college and men’s and women’s professional levels.

In 2019, that near-decade of work culminated in Locust’s becoming the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ assistant defensive line coach, the first female position coach in NFL history. The number of women coaching full time in the NFL has now grown to 15, the most ever.

Though Locust is part of the push for more female coaches, she has made it clear that she and her colleagues are not looking for any handouts.

“You have to be the right fit,” said the 60-year-old Locust, now a defensive quality control coach for the Tennessee Titans. “I’ve never been one to be like, ‘Because I’m in, all women should be in.’ You still have to earn it.”

The track Locust took to get to where she is — and put herself on course for what she is still hoping to achieve — was filled with obstacles, ranging from unemployment to sleeping in her car to selling off most of her belongings. Navigating that has required unwavering perseverance.

“I never put parameters on how far I could go,” Locust said, “and I still don’t.”

Locust’s first role coaching men came in 2013 when she was hired as the tight ends coach for the Central Penn Piranha, a now-defunct semipro team. When team owner Ron Kerr initially brought her on, he received pushback from staff members and players alike.

There were times during practice when she dug in over mistakes. But there were also moments during games when she would take time on the sideline to calmly explain how to adjust hand placement while blocking. The players appreciated the balanced coaching style. They listened to her and respected her.

“She was better than some of our male coaches,” Kerr said. “I was like, ‘She’s not going to quit until she makes it.’”

Three years later, Locust was hired as the defensive line coach of the Central Penn Capitals of the American Indoor Football league. After she helped the Capi-

a defensive line coaching intern.

Two weeks before her Ravens internship began, the insurance company for which Locust worked told her they would not accommodate her temporary relocation to Baltimore. She was essentially forced to choose between making ends meet and chasing her dream. Though it meant being fired from her full-time job, she took a chance on football.

“It was extremely difficult,” Locust said. “I went to Baltimore with no job and no benefits and no income other than the internship.”

The experience strengthened Locust’s desire to coach, but the Ravens did not hire her to a full-time job afterward. After training camp ended that August, she returned to Pennsylvania with no plan for what would come next.

In December 2018, Locust received a call from the Birmingham Iron of the Alliance of American Football with an offer to become their assistant defensive line coach.

tals knock the Lehigh Valley Steelhawks out of the playoffs, the Steelhawks hired her in 2017 as their defensive line/linebackers coach and co-special teams coordinator.

Locust often roamed among the offensive, defensive and special teams meetings to expand her football knowledge. Growth wasn’t something she viewed as optional.

“She had this thirst to learn,” said Mike Clarke, the former Steelhawks executive vice president and general manager. “She just always wanted more.”

Locust received validation in 2017 when she was invited to the inaugural NFL Women’s Forum focused on increasing the number of women in football operations positions. The connections she made there helped earn her a spot with the league’s Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship.

She was on another trip, this time to Philadelphia to coach in the Globe Bowl, an annual international all-star game featuring college players and professional free agents, when she received a call from the Baltimore Ravens offering her a position as

Not long after Locust started, there were rumors that the league’s future was in jeopardy. Concerned, Locust reached out to Katie Sowers, then an offensive assistant for the San Francisco 49ers, to inquire about opportunities. Sowers had attended the NFL Women’s Forum that year and heard that Bruce Arians, who was the coach of the Buccaneers, had committed to hiring a woman for a full-time role on his coaching staff.

Locust was hired as the Buccaneers’ assistant defensive line coach in 2019. In 2021, Locust and Maral Javadifar, the assistant strength and conditioning coach, became the first female coaches to win a Super Bowl when the Bucs beat the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LV. It was a drastic reversal of fortunes that Locust described as “divine intervention.”

“I benefited from relationships,” Locust said. “I was around great male mentors that taught me like they would teach any other coach and treated me like they would treat any other coach. So it set the tone for me with the other coaches on staff and it set the tone with the players.”

The Buccaneers fired Locust after the 2022 season. “A lot of guys called me afterward and said, ‘Now you’re a real coach.’” Locust joked. “You’re not a real coach until you get fired and then hired back.”

Lori Locust, a defensive quality control coach for the Tennessee Titans, is one of the 15 women coaching full time in the NFL. (X via Coach Lo Locust)

The San Juan Daily Star

Answers to the Sudoku and Crossword on page 21