Monday Nov 2, 2020

Monday, November 2, 2020

San Juan The

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Sean Connery: From Tentative Secret Agent to Suave Bond P20

Only The Strong Survive Governor Says She’s Ready for Transition at La Fortaleza and to Act on Plebiscite Results

NOTICIAS EN ESPAÑOL P 19

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SEC: All Clear, No Complications in Early Voting

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Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

GOOD MORNING

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November 2, 2020

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.

Governor ready for transition process, advancing ‘Yes-No’ plebiscite results

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s the different political parties closed their political campaigns on Sunday, Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced announced that she is ready to start the transition process leading to a new governing administration in Puerto Rico, and with the results of the “Yes-No” statehood plebiscite.

The plebiscite will be held Tuesday along with the general election.

As provided by Article 5.9 of Law 51 of 2020, “no later than five days from the certification of the results of the plebiscite the governor will send a copy of the certification to each member of Congress.”

“We are already preparing the certifications to faithfully comply,” Vázquez said in a statement.

Likewise, Article 4.3 establishes that a transition plan to enforce the self-determination results will be delivered no later than 30 days after the certification of the results of the plebiscite to U.S. congressional leaders and to the U.S. president. The transition plan will be prepared by the governor and the resident commissioner with the advice of the Equality Commission.

The governor said she is ready to present and discuss the transition with the resident commissioner as soon as possible.

The plan will involve the participation of different members of the executive branch and the Equality Commission both in the negotiations to be carried out with the White House as well as with the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.

“This Thursday we will be meeting with our resident commissioner, Jenniffer González, to direct the process and establish the Transition Plan as dictated by law,” the governor said. “The resident commissioner will present the corresponding federal legislation, as provided by law, and the Equality Commission will advocate for its approval in Congress.”

“The voice and will of the people of Puerto Rico will be heard in Congress,” Vázquez added. “It will be the most genuine expression of a people in search of equality and that no U.S. citizen be treated differently for having been born and for living on this beautiful island. Let it be understood that it is not a favor or a gift but rather the claiming of a right.”

The governor reiterated her call that “this November 3 everyone must go out to vote, and especially, like me, vote YES for statehood.”

“The only party that will lead us to statehood is the New Progressive Party,” she said. “Statehood is the only alternative that guarantees permanent union with the United States of America and our U.S. citizenship.”

Meanwhile, Puerto Rican Independence Party gubernatorial candidate Juan Dalmau Ramírez held a virtual election campaign closing event.

“Given the reality that the country is still going through the COVID-19 pandemic, it is important that those of us who aspire to lead Puerto Rico assume the corresponding responsibilities and set the example,” he said. “That is why I have decided not to hold mass rallies or caravans and replace them with a virtual closing.”

Popular Democratic Party (PDP) gubernatorial candidate Carlos “Charlie” Delgado Altieri held a rally and a caravan that left the Peña de la Pava on highway PR-1.

Monique Guzmán, a 45-year-old Dorado resident, said she wanted the PDP to win to get the corrupt officials out of government. She said she is attracted by Delgado Altieri’s administrative skills. However, she said she was inclined to vote “Yes” in the statehood referendum because “I believe in the permanent union.”

George Muñoz, a 34-year-old from Vega Alta who said he is between jobs, said he was tired of the corruption in the governing administration and was going to vote “No.” “The U.S. has already said it will not pay any attention to the results because the process is designed to make the ‘Yes’ win,” he said.

“I am happy with the current status. We are not a colony,” said 56-year-old Rossana Berlingeri as she waved a PDP flag at passing cars in Dorado.

New Progressive Party (NPP) gubernatorial candidate Pedro Pierluisi held a “drive-in” campaign closing activity in the parking lot of Juan Ramón Loubriel Stadium in Bayamón, a traditional NPP bastion.

Alexandra Lúgaro, the gubernatorial candidate for the Citizen Victory Movement, also held a drive-in campaign closing, in the parking lot of Hiram Bithorn Stadium in Hato Rey. “Anyone who wishes to enter the event but has a fever will not be allowed to enter the premises,” Lúgaro said.

“We will have a group of ushers who will be conducting preventive rounds to make sure that spectators stay in their vehicles and wear masks.”

The candidate for governor for the Dignity Project, César Vázquez Muñiz, a cardiologist, held a “rally” on the premises of Plaza Escorial in Carolina.

Maribel Cruz Roldán, Vázquez Muñiz’s campaign director, chided the NPP and its candidate for emphasizing that the NPP was the only party that supported a permanent union with the United States.

“The Dignity Project has never said in its platform or in speeches that it supports separating from the United States,” she said. “We have a group of people from the traditional parties who are tired of the lies and abuse.”

Meanwhile, independent candidate for governor Eliezer Molina said he was going to be on Resistencia Street in Old San Juan starting in the mid-afternoon.

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Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Candidates give their all on final campaign weekend Political analysts, experts put their predictions on the table BBy PEDRO CORREA HENRY Twitter: @PCorreaHenry Special to The Star

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fter a weekend filled with drive-in events, convoys, and virtual campaign closings to prevent the spread of COVID-19, Puerto Rico voters are a day away from learning which gubernatorial candidate will be elected as the island’s first executive and which candidates will occupy the Puerto Rico Legislature starting in January.

With less than 24 hours until Tuesday’s general elections, political experts spoke on Sunday to the Star about the 2020 electoral campaign and how every gubernatorial candidate has projected throughout the race.

Political analyst Jorge Colberg Toro said the COVID-19 pandemic led politicians to rely on “media campaigns,” which the former Popular Democratic Party (PDP) representative at-large alleged has brought its ups and down as it has not led them to visit neighborhoods, speak with citizens, and see for themselves the issues islanders are confronting day by day, to which he added that “it has been absent and puts every candidate at a distance from the communities’ problems.”

Meanwhile, political science professor José Rivera González said the electoral race has been “extremely atypical” as it has proven to voters that “there are no ideologies that allow you to govern if you do not attend to the issues that concern Puerto Ricans on a daily basis.”

“This will greatly affect the mood of Puerto Ricans and, particularly, the voters,” Rivera said. “I imagine that the feeling of fatigue is there, but I do not know, in my opinion, if it will be enough to implement a substantial change in terms of the government that we are going to choose and the parliamentary majorities that will go to the Legislature.”

Meanwhile, international politics expert Alondra del Mar Hernández Quiñones said the current campaign has been “plagued with an absolutely strong tension that the electorate has to raise a flag.”

“Candidates have to look for these epic complaints so that people can go to the collective memory and continue to vote for personalities, rather than capabilities,” Hernández said.

Experts dive into gubernatorial candidates’ performance As for PDP gubernatorial candidate Carlos Delgado Altieri, Colberg Toro said his 20-year tenure as mayor of Isabela and his $27 million surplus in the city’s administration is his trump card.

He emphasized that “he maintained budgetary reserves for many years to turn to them and be able to take financing to carry out long-term projects.”

However, for Rivera González, Delgado Altieri represents “a bland candidate, who does not have much charisma.”

“It will be necessary to see how effective he is as governor (if he is elected), and how much moral authority he will have if, in effect, [former Gov.] Aníbal Acevedo Vilá is elected resident commissioner, because the [latter] is a shady figure in ethicalmoral terms,” the analyst said.

Meanwhile, Hernández Quiñones said the PDP gubernatorial candidate “regarding issues of public interest such as reproductive rights, gender perspective, church and state separation, which

are also constitutional issues, has shown an absolute inability to position himself for or against.”

“We have those ups and downs, which subtracts merits and strength from his authority,” the internationalist said.

As for New Progressive Party (NPP) gubernatorial candidate Pedro Pierluisi, Colberg Toro said that although he recognizes his experience and work as resident commissioner and his connections within the U.S. Congress, Pierluisi “must drag everything that has happened with the NPP during this four-year term.”

“It’s difficult for the party to ask for four more years after what we have lived through, and he carries that,” he said. “He’s been the party’s president for a while now, and there have been incidents on which he hasn’t taken action, and I don’t think he’ll be able to separate himself from such responsibility.”

Meanwhile, Rivera González said that “if Pierluisi had an ounce of integrity and common sense I would not have applied for what in effect is the NPP, which is a criminal and gangster organization.”

“His unsuccessful moves after the summer of 2019, trying to usurp power by imposing himself as the obvious person to replace [Gov. Ricardo Rosselló Nevares, who had resigned under pressure], having been appointed as secretary of State without confirmation from the Senate, left a bad taste in my mouth,” he said.

Hernández Quiñones said Pierluisi’s projection seems “desperate.”

“His demeanor and aggression that he shows each time he has to debate reflects previous concerns,” she said.

Regarding allegations that surfaced recently in which a former personal trainer accused him of sexual harassment, she said it would raise a flag with people who were unsure about voting for him.

“Nonetheless, the allegations would not affect the vote from most statehood and party supporters,” she said. “The NPP has also been a conservative party that creates doubts on issues such as violence against women in any of its iterations.”

About Puerto Rican Independence Party gubernatorial candidate Dalmau, Colberg Toro said his strength has been to be a “good, serious and respected senator” and his focus on attracting the millennial vote in the current race. However, he added that Dalmau’s campaign has been more focused on him than on the party and its legislative candidates.

“It catches my attention that, during recent decades, Dalmau has adopted an official speech where he says that a vote for him is not a vote for independence, when the party has been a national liberation party and its base has been to fight for independence,” Colberg Toro said. “I don’t know which effect this might have with voters.”

Rivera González said that out of all the candidates, Dalmau is “the most upright person on that gubernatorial candidates’ roster.”

“What concerns me is the party he belongs to, the party is

orthodox, dinosaur-like; it assigns itself the mantle to fight for independence, alienating those pro-independence supporters who ideologically combine with the center-left platform, and it has not only rejected them, it has been nullifying them over time,” he said.

Hernández Quiñones, meanwhile, said Dalmau has performed efficiently as he has used his platforms to appeal to the youth as has shown support in moments such as the University of Puerto Rico and May Day protests, “where traditional parties have remained neutral or have appeared to heavily criticize its political-community organization.”

“It has been a surprise because he has transformed his political strategy to make the independence movement more inclusive in ideological terms,” she said. “This is happening in a country where independence and anything involved with it creates much suspicion.”

As for Citizen Victory Movement (CVM) gubernatorial candidate Alexandra Lúgaro, Colberg Toro said “she remains strong in her postures and her ideals, yet there have been many occasions where she hasn’t been as honest with the people.”

Rivera González said that although Lúgaro might not break the bipartisan syndrome and has changed postures recently, she “has benefited much for having liberal, leftist, avant-garde candidates who were able to form the movement.”

Hernández Quiñones added that the CVM candidate has shown “political maturity” as she has used outlets to “recognize that she has made mistakes.”

“She understands the implications from earlier postures and so she thinks differently now,” the analyst said.

As for Project Dignity gubernatorial candidate César Vázquez, Colberg Toro said “he has been the only candidate to campaign with his legislative candidates.” Meanwhile, he deemed successful how Vázquez has been able to effectively uplift the conservative population on the island with a solid platform.

However, Rivera González said that “although his political campaign has been intriguing, no one wants to turn the island’s government into a theocracy.”

“No one is interested in going back to the past,” said the professor, describing the candidates’ proposals as “retrograde and medievalist.”

Moreover, Hernández Quiñones said citizens must be very careful with people who use religious beliefs to obtain power.

“That is why we need a [nonclerical] state, where everyone, independent of their religious and ideological beliefs, feels represented and no one needs to resort to groups that want to suppress freedoms and obtain rights with arguments that have no scientific basis,” she said.

As for independent Eliezer Molina, Colberg Toro deemed his candidacy “positive” because it has given a democratic platform to the average citizen and “picks up the people’s logic through his discourse.” Nonetheless, he criticized Molina’s proposals because “he doesn’t know how the government works.”

Meanwhile, Rivera González said Molina’s rhetoric is effective even though “the electorate doesn’t understand what he has to offer” and that “even though I don’t know him, his ego was too big to let him be part of a group,” noting that Molina would have fit with the CVM. Hernández Quiñones pointed out that Molina “is the first farmer to apply to be a gubernatorial candidate, yet Puerto Rico is used to seeing a person who speaks elegantly and wears a suit and tie.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

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SEC: Early voting goes off without complications

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

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tate Elections Commission (SEC) Chairman Francisco Rosado Colomer said Saturday that early voting on the island was conducted without major complications.

“Today we confirm the commitment of the officials, the electoral commissioners and the Commission to holding this event safely,” Rosado Colomer said in a written statement. “We are ready for the inmate vote tomorrow, Sunday, the hospital vote on Monday, and the general elections on Tuesday.”

He said 630 polling stations were set up across Puerto Rico to serve some 53,000 voters who requested early voting in person. At 9 a.m. Saturday, all the polling stations opened equipped with ballots, electronic counting machines and materials to ensure compliance with COVID-19 protocols.

Popular Democratic Party Electoral Commissioner Nicolás Gautier Vega commented on some incidents that occurred during the early voting.

“Incidents were reported including voters who did not appear on the lists of the voting centers despite having requested to vote in the district. These requests were not recorded, which is why they did not appear on the charts,” he said. “Meanwhile, those voters who for some

reason could not exercise their vote, it is important that they know that they can go to their respective voting centers, on Tuesday, November 3, and cast their vote, where they

will appear on the list and if they do not appear, they will be able to vote at a polling station [where their registration can be] added by hand.”

Regarding the operations at Roberto Clemente Coliseum in Hato Rey where, since last week, early voting has been handled in all its forms, Gautier Vega noted that “the work continues in an ordinary way.”

“At the moment, 364,766 ballots have been scrutinized out of a total of 800,000. This equates to 45 percent of the scrutiny,” he said. “[Sunday] the inmate vote will be conducted in penal institutions and on Monday, the voting of the voters in hospitals.”

GautierVega said the ballot containers and other materials for Sunday and Monday’s voting are completely ready.

Meanwhile, interim Advocate for People with Disabilities Gabriel Corchado Méndez alleged on Saturday that the SEC has failed to comply with the application of the ‘Vote by Phone’ process, and with the Braille templates for voting by blind citizens.

“We have also observed accessibility problems, as well as a lack of parking and easily accessible [polling stations],” Corchado Méndez said in a written statement. “We are denouncing this breach of the federal ‘Help America Vote Act’ by the State Elections Commission and we are informing the media so that people with disabilities can demand their rights.”

Sara Rosario re-elected to head Olympic Committee

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

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ara RosarioVélez was re-elected as president of the Puerto Rico Olympic Committee (COPUR by its Spanish acronym) this past weekend in a special meeting at the Casa Olímpica in Old San Juan.

President of COPUR Sara Rosario Vélez

Rosario Vélez is now in her third and final term as president.

“I have a new beginning in my heart, thanks to the unanimous support received from the delegates to lead in my last term the body that is always with the athletes, the Olympic Committee,” she said.

Meanwhile, the following were chosen for the board of directors: Víctor Ruiz Ramos, first vice president; Víctor López, second vice president; Carlos Beltrán Svelti, secretary general; Iván Santos Ortega, assistant secretary; Humberto Torres, treasurer; and Mildred Colón, deputy treasurer.

Lopéz was elected second vice president in favor of the Volleyball Federation delegate, César Trabanco, and Colón was left to fill the vacant position of assistant treasurer after the triathlon delegate, Fernando Delgado, withdrew his candidacy.

In an extraordinary meeting this Saturday, two members will be chosen from the group of delegates that represent sports federations in the Olympic program.

“This is a different time [from when] I arrived in 2012 due to the challenges we have, facing an economic crisis that the pandemic has worsened,” Rosario Vélez said. “However, I reaffirm my commitment and that of my executive committee to be there for our athletes in

the good and not so good. We will continue to work united to meet our goals.”

The delegate of the Canoeing Federation, Víctor Ruiz, led the Elections Committee along with Shotgun Federation delegate Manuel Guzmán and AndrésVargas, the delegate of the Weightlifting Federation. The legal adviser was Julio Eduardo Torres.

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The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

Inmate sues Treasury Dept. for excluding convicts from $1,200 stimulus aid

By THE STAR STAFF

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n inmate in Puerto Rico’s prison system has filed a class action suit in San Juan Superior Court against the island Treasury Department and its secretary Francisco Parés Alicea to stop the agency from excluding incarcerated people from funding granted by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. Earlier this year President Trump signed the CARES Act into law, awarding $1,200 to eligible individuals and up to $2,400 to couples to help them face economic challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The proposed class action suit, filed Oct. 30, would benefit some 8,900 inmates in local jails and 1,168 inmates held in the federal Metropolitan Detention Center who have yet to receive payments.

The plaintiff, Marcel Gabriel Rivera Kon-Kin, represented by his lawyer Diego H. Alcalá Laboy, wants the agency to comply with the guidelines already established in a federal class action suit filed on behalf of all persons jailed in mainland state and federal prisons.

In the federal case, Scholl v. Mnuchin, a U.S. Northern District of California court ruled that the Treasury Depart-

ment and the Internal Revenue Service illegally withheld the distribution of the CARES Act economic funds to thousands of prison inmates because of their conditions. The judge issued an injunction to stop the federal government from excluding inmates.

The local lawsuit demands that the Treasury Department correct the information published on the agency’s website to reflect that inmates can obtain CARES Act funds and the process that they must follow to receive them.

The suit also demands a mechanism to allow the prison population to obtain payment and to allow third parties to provide application information on behalf of inmates.

“The Treasury Secretary’s lack of action in this matter is of a high public interest and requires the immediate attention of the court,” the suit reads.

Rivera Kon-Kin is an inmate at the Bayamón 501 Correctional Institution. He has not been claimed as a dependent on any other Puerto Rico income tax return.

“He has not yet received the benefit of the Economic Impact Payment from the Puerto Rico Treasury Department,” the suit reads. “Mr. Rivera Kon-Kin needs this money as it would allow him to use it to financially assist family members who have suffered a significant decrease in their income as a result of the COVID19 pandemic.”

Judge Anthony Cuevas gave the Treasury Department until this week to answer the allegations.

Navy reports $300 million spent on Vieques cleanup

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

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o date, the U.S. Navy has spent some $300 million on its cleanup activities on Vieques, with around $60 million contributed to the local economy, the Navy reported over the weekend.

As of October the Navy has met the following milestones: * Conducted surface clearance of approximately 4,200 acres out of an estimated area of over 9,500 acres on the offshore island municipality to which access is restricted due to the presence of munitions on the surface. * Conducted subsurface clearance of some 462 acres, including 23 miles of roads and beaches. * Located and destroyed approximately 113,000 munitions and explosives of concern. * Picked up and processed 8.2 million pieces of Munitions Potentially Presenting an Explosive Hazard. * Processed over 19.1 million pounds of scrap metal generated through these and other activities, with over 17 million pounds recycled.

The U.S. Navy is the lead federal agency conducting work at the former Atlantic Fleet Weapons Training Area – Vieques Superfund site.

Representatives from the Naval Facilities Engineering Command Atlantic, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Commonwealth of Puerto Rico’s Department of Natural and Environmental Resources, United States Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and National Marine Fisheries Service work collaboratively to develop and implement measures that are protective of human health and the environment for certain areas of concern on Vieques.

The U.S. Navy has divided work at the site between two programs: The Munitions Response Program (MRP) and

the Installation Restoration Program (IRP).

All munitions-related work is carried out under the MRP. All typical chemical contamination investigations are covered by the IRP. Within the MRP, the site has been divided into multiple Munitions Response Sites located in east and west Vieques.

Under the IRP, the Navy conducts multiple environmental investigations to determine the nature and extent of contamination at identified areas of concern and solid waste management units (SWMUs), the EPA reported.

Multiple non-time critical removal actions, or shortterm cleanups, have been completed to remove solid waste piles/debris and munitions in the former Naval Ammunition Support Detachment (NASD). Records of Decision selecting final remedies for four areas of concern and two SWMUs have also been signed, including one upland MRP site within NASD. Within the former Vieques Naval Training Range (VNTR), multiple sites have been investigated or are currently under investigation to assess potential past chemical releases and evaluate potential hazards associated with munitions and explosives of concern.

The Navy is also conducting removal actions to address munitions and explosives of concern in multiple areas of eastern Vieques, including the former Live Impact Area, the Surface Impact Area, and removal of subsurface MEC from selected roads and beaches within the former VNTR. Seventy-three sites have been identified within the former VNTR and NASD, and of these, 51 sites were reviewed and determined to require no further action, four sites have a remedy in place with long-term monitoring and 18 sites are in the remedial investigation, feasibility study, proposed remedial action plan or record of decision phase.

“There is one large MRP site covering the entire underwater area,” the EPA said. “A Wide Area Assessment has been completed and a remedial investigation is planned to assess

the nature and extent of contamination that may be present in the underwater areas surrounding specific areas of the island.”

To support accelerated public access to the area around the historic Spanish lighthouse and adjacent beach, a munitions clearance interim action for the beach adjacent to the lighthouse, the trail between the two, and the nearby southern beach was completed in the summer of 2014. A munitions clearance interim action for the southwestern beach was completed in January 2015. These early interim actions allowed for accelerated public access to the area, which was opened in March 2015.

Navy contractors have hired and trained local residents to conduct site-related work, including training 31 people to be unexploded ordnance technicians. Vieques residents are employed on the site.

Correction and clarification

By THE STAR STAFF

A

statement in a story in Thursday’s edition titled “Judge pushes for proposed bankruptcy deal by February; denies probe into insider trading claims” incorrectly attributed a quote to National’s lawyer Marc E. Kasowitz. The statement should have read: LCDC lawyer Susheel Kirpalani said the payments may take National “to insolvency.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

7

Final weekend campaigning reflects both traditional barnstorming and 2020 chaos

By MAGGIE HABERMAN, THOMAS KAPLAN and MICHAEL D. SHEAR

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resident Donald Trump predicted “bedlam” and a lack of clarity about the presidential results until weeks after Election Day as he barnstormed Pennsylvania, while former Vice President Joe Biden made his first joint appearance with former President Barack Obama at an event in Michigan.

The last Saturday before Election Day offered traditional last-minute frantic campaigning in battleground states played against the backdrop of the extraordinary rancor, high stakes and sense of disruption reflecting a pandemic, an economic downturn and recurring protests and unrest at the close of Trump’s first term.

The dueling schedules showed the intensity with which the two campaigns are approaching the final days of the election and illustrated differences once again in their basic approach to the worst public health crisis in a century.

Biden talked about taking the coronavirus pandemic seriously, while Trump mocked his opponent for his focus on the virus and falsely accused him of favoring “deadly” lockdowns.

In remarks in Newtown and Reading, Pennsylvania,Trump stoked fears of an election left unsettled after voting closes on Nov. 3 and about the prospects that ballots would not count.

“You’re going to be waiting for weeks” as votes are counted, Trump declared in Newtown.

“Many, many days,” he went on. “So you’re going to be watching on Nov. 3. I think it’s highly likely you’re not going to have a decision, because Pennsylvania’s very big. We’re going to be waiting. Nov. 3 is going to come and go, and we’re not going to know. And you’re going to have bedlam in our country.”

At his next stop, in Reading, Trump derided a Supreme Court decision rejecting a request from Pennsylvania Republicans to decide whether the state could continue accepting ballots for three days after Nov. 3.

The question of how long ballots can be accepted in battleground states has been a dominant one as Nov. 3 approaches.

So has the question of whether Trump will try to declare victory if he is leading in specific states on Election Day, regardless of whether they have been called in his favor.

Trump barely addressed the coronavirus pandemic at his first two stops, other than to praise his administration, complain about Biden’s focus on the pandemic and to falsely claim once again that the country was “rounding the turn” as the number of daily new cases nationally has spiked to almost 100,000.

Obama, appearing with Biden at a drive-in rally in Flint, Michigan, for their first stop of the day, mocked Trump as heartless.

Noting Trump’s baseless claim a day earlier that doctors were profiting from coronavirus deaths, Obama said, “He cannot fathom — he does not understand — the notion that somebody would risk their life to save others without trying to make a buck.”

Trump is continuing to hold crowded rallies as the pandemic rages, and Obama ridiculed him for his fixation on crowd sizes, asking: “Did no one come to his birthday party when he

Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, exits his campaign jet at Flint Bishop International Airport in Flint, Mich., on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2020. was a kid? Was he traumatized?”

In the past two weeks, Obama campaigned solo for Biden in Pennsylvania and Florida, but Saturday was the first time in the general election that he and Biden had campaigned together in person.

At the event in Flint, Biden praised Obama and ripped Trump over the pandemic. He too invoked Trump’s baseless statement made at a rally Friday about doctors and coronavirusrelated fatalities.

“What in the hell is wrong with this man?” Biden asked.

“Excuse my language, but think about it. It’s perverted. He may believe it because he doesn’t do anything other than for money.”

And he spoke of the stakes for the nation in this year’s vote.

“I don’t care how hard Donald Trump tries,” Biden told the crowd. “There’s nothing — let me say it again — there’s nothing that he can do to stop the people of this nation from voting in overwhelming numbers and taking back this democracy.”

Where both Trump and Biden campaigned Saturday was as revealing as what both men said.

The two states were part of the so-called Blue Wall — Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which have leaned

President Donald Trump during a campaign rally at Keith House-Washington’s Headquarters near Newtown, Pa., on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2020.

Democratic in recent national elections but which were crucial to Trump’s victory in 2016 over Hillary Clinton.

Trump has struggled in all three states throughout the 2020 campaign and is pressing to keep at least one of the three as part of his map this year, in an election cycle marked by a pandemic and an economic recession. Pennsylvania is seen by Trump’s advisers as the likeliest state among the three for him to win.

In Newtown in Bucks County, Trump delivered a subdued speech, speaking from the teleprompter at first, to several hundred people seated in folding chairs arrayed in a field in front of a stage and a podium.

The speech took place in front of the farmhouse where George Washington planned the crossing of the Delaware River.

The small crowd sat close together, mostly unmasked. Unlike it has done at his other rallies, Trump’s campaign did not position energetic supporters in a stand behind him.

The president criticized Biden’s record on trade in a state hit hard in recent years by job losses, and he criticized Biden’s comments about restricting the practice of fracking. He also defended his record on the coronavirus.

“We have done an incredible job. At some point they are going to recognize that,” Trump said after mocking Biden for focusing too much on the virus. “We’ve done an A-plus job. I give ourselves a D, or maybe an F, in terms of public relations.”

After his third rally, in Butler, Pennsylvania, a CNN reporter posted on Twitter photos of crowds searching for buses to leave the event in 41-degree weather, an echo of the debacle in Omaha, Nebraska, this past week when the campaign’s outdoor rally ended and the buses were nowhere to be found on a frigid night.

A Trump campaign official on Saturday insisted there were dozens of buses and that it was simply taking awhile for the line to move.

Ending his day with a rally in Montoursville, Pennsylvania, Trump cackled about his supporters “taunting” Biden at his outdoor events by driving by and honking horns, and then cheered on his supporters who surrounded a Biden campaign bus in Texas. Biden campaign officials said they had to cancel a planned event because the Trump supporters tried to force the bus off the road.

Biden and Obama ended with a drive-in rally in Detroit, where hundreds of people waited in cars to see them on Belle Isle, a state park on an island in the middle of the Detroit River with expansive views of the skylines of Detroit and Windsor, Ontario.

Stevie Wonder performed before they addressed the crowd. In his speech, Obama added another jab as he talked about Trump’s “obsession with crowds,” asking, “Is Fox News not giving him enough attention?”

Biden mocked Trump for having written off as business expenses more than $70,000 paid to style his hair during “The Apprentice.”

“I tell you what, man,” Biden said. “I hardly have any hair, but I’d rather have what I have.”

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The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

Preaching or avoiding politics, conservative churches walk a delicate line

A changeable letter sign outside Elbridge Community Church in Elbridge, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2020. Tuning into conservative evangelical sermons across the country in the weeks leading up to Election Day on Nov. 3, 2020, reveals a complex relationship between the pulpit and politics.

By RUTH GRAHAM

T

he second weekend in October was “citizenship weekend” at Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas.

“Up and down the ballot, there are two very different visions for our nation, and every one of us need to vote biblical principles,” the Rev. Jack Graham, one of President Donald Trump’s evangelical advisers, told the congregation. The 45,000-member church has a committee urging members to be “actively involved in our government,” including by running for office. At one point, Graham told the congregation, 23 members of the church held some kind of elected office. Graham invited four to the stage that Sunday, all Republicans.

But Graham does not see it as his job to tell members how to fill out their ballots. “You preach on the issues; you don’t insult people by telling them how to vote,” Graham said in an interview. “People will figure out how to vote if you guide them from Scripture.” On Oct. 25, he preached on the importance of religious liberty.

Decades after the rise of the Christian right as a political influence, conservative evangelicals have a reputation for political activism. That reputation has only intensified in the Trump era. White evangelicals voted for Trump overwhelmingly in 2016 and have remained his most dependable supporters.

The president himself, who is not a frequent

churchgoer, has indicated that he assumes conservative evangelical pastors would be eager to speak even more directly — perhaps to endorse him — if freed by tax law to do so.

In 2017, he signed an executive order intended to loosen enforcement of the Johnson Amendment, the provision that forbids pastors at tax-exempt churches to endorse or oppose candidates from the pulpit. “We are giving churches their voices back,” he said at a Rose Garden signing ceremony, framing the change as a gift to religious conservatives.

But tuning into conservative evangelical sermons across the country in the weeks leading up to a hotly contested election reveals a complex relationship between the pulpit and politics. Some pastors grappled directly with the question of a Christian’s political obligations. Others edged close to an endorsement. But many barely hinted at political themes, perhaps gesturing broadly to “unity” or “justice.”

Compared with other Christian traditions, white conservative Protestant churches are notably unenthusiastic about engaging directly in some kinds of traditional political activities. If tax law changed, 45% of self-described liberal congregations would endorse specific candidates, compared with 11% of self-described conservative congregations, according to a forthcoming paper analyzing data from the National Congregations Study, an ongoing nationally representative survey

of about 1,200 leaders of religious congregations. Black churches, whose members are often theologically conservative and vote Democratic, are the most politically engaged.

But surveys about voter registration or lobbying — activities that liberal churches are likelier to engage in — do not capture the full portrait of churches’ political messaging.

“There’s a lot more political signaling going on than we pick up with these explicit collective actions,” said Mark Chaves, director of the National Congregations Study and a professor at Duke University.

Surveys do not capture, for example, an American flag displayed at the front of the church, prayers offered for police officers but not protesters (or vice versa), or passing references to “life” or “freedom” in a sermon.

As a pastor in the Christian Reformed Church, Keith Mannes would have said for most of his career that he did not preach about politics. He calls himself “a pretty conservative guy,” and he occasionally addressed abortion or homosexuality in his sermons, but he saw those topics as biblical, not political.

But in 2015 something changed when Mannes watched Trump slowly descend a gleaming escalator at Trump Tower to start his presidential bid. The gaudiness struck him as grotesque; the biblical term “mammon” came to mind.

After Trump became president, Mannes increasingly felt called to speak directly about what he saw as an ungodly alliance between white conservative Christians and Trump. But for several years, he tried to stay quiet. “It’s just in our bones that we don’t make trouble about politics,” Mannes said. “We don’t talk about that stuff from the pulpit.”

He delivered his last sermon at East Saugatuck Christian Reformed Church in Holland, Michigan, on Oct. 11. After years of trying to “avoid politics” in the pulpit to keep peace in the congregation, he approached church leadership to suggest it was time to part ways.

“You realize you’re extending all this energy just to make sure people don’t get upset,” he said. “I wanted to be able to speak openly in the world about what I believe.”

Pastors whose own political beliefs are in line with their congregations’ tend to feel more empowered to speak. In Apex, North Carolina, another evangelical pastor had watched in a very different mood as Trump descended the escalator at Trump Tower. “When he came down the escalator, I didn’t know much about him but I turned

to my wife and said, ‘Honey, that guy’s going to win,’” Rodney Finch recalled. Finch, the Black pastor of a large multiracial church he founded in 1995, said he had not been strongly engaged in politics before, but the moment was electrifying.

This election cycle, Finch is all in. On Oct. 4, he preached a Sunday sermon on voting. “The Bible is a voter’s guide,” he told the congregation. Without explicitly telling members how to fill out their ballots, he ticked off God’s priorities, in his view: abortion, support for Israel, religious freedom.

Finch is not alone in his awakening.

Just 1% of Protestant pastors say they have endorsed a candidate from the pulpit this year, according to a survey conducted this fall by LifeWay Research, which is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. That number is unchanged since 2016. But 32% of Protestant pastors said they have endorsed a political candidate away from the pulpit, ostensibly outside of their role as a pastor.

That is a 10 percentage point increase since the last presidential election cycle. Pastors who say they are voting for Trump are more likely to say they have made an endorsement.

Still, in many white conservative churches, “there’s a fear of being labeled ‘political,’” said Kaitlyn Schiess, the author of “The Liturgy of Politics: Spiritual Formation for the Sake of Our Neighbor,” a book urging evangelicals to engage more intentionally with politics. “As Christians, we’re supposed to be above that.”

“My job is to articulate to the members of our congregation a traditional, orthodox Christian worldview,” said Tim Breen, pastor of First Reformed Church in Orange City, Iowa, a congregation he described as “center right.”

“I don’t feel a call to recommend who to vote for or even necessarily how to vote.” Most of his congregation, he said, would not be able to guess whom he is voting for.

At Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlottesville, Virginia, churchgoers can participate in a class titled “The Bible, the Church and Politics” on Wednesday evenings leading up to the election. One session listed biblical priorities including a safety net for the poor, fair wages, “creation stewardship,” personal responsibility and “protection of the unborn.”

“The church is trying to balance, ‘How do we engage faithfully with social issues, but how do we not get swallowed up?’” said Trinity’s pastor, Walter Kim, the president of the National Association of Evangelicals, referring to the American church in general.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

9

Stanford study seeks to quantify infections stemming from Trump rallies

By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

A

group of Stanford University economists who created a statistical model estimate that there have been at least 30,000 coronavirus infections and 700 deaths as a result of 18 campaign rallies President Donald Trump held from June to September.

The numbers, which will surely reignite accusations from Democratic leaders and public health officials that the president is putting voters at risk for political gain, are not based on individual cases traced directly to particular campaign events.

Instead, the Stanford researchers, led by B. Douglas Bernheim, chair of the university’s economics department, conducted a regression analysis. They compared the 18 counties where Trump held rallies with as many as 200 counties with similar demographics and similar trajectories of confirmed COVID-19 cases before the rally date.

The events took place from June 20 to Sept.

12; only the first two — in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Phoenix — were held indoors. The president has held about three dozen additional rallies since the study ended in September.

Based on their models, the researchers concluded that on average, the 18 events produced increases in confirmed cases of more than 250 per 100,000 residents. Extrapolating that figure to the 18 rallies, they concluded that the gatherings ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and that the rallies had “likely led to more than 700 deaths,” though those deaths would not necessarily have occurred solely among attendees.

The paper, posted on academic websites and on Twitter by its authors days before the presidential election, is likely to be contentious.

Public health officials in states and counties where Trump has held rallies said in interviews this week that it was impossible to tie particular infections or outbreaks to the gatherings for several reasons: Caseloads are rising overall, rally attendees often travel from other locations, contact tracing is not always complete, and contact tracers do not always know where infected people have been.

Judd Deere, a White House spokesperson, dismissed the study as “a politically driven model based on flawed assumptions and meant to shame Trump supporters.”

“As the president has said, the cure cannot be worse than the disease,” Deere said in a statement Saturday. “This country should be open armed with best practices and freedom of choice to limit the spread of COVID-19.”

A rally for President Trump in Phoenix in June. Public health officials in states and counties where such rallies have been held said in interviews that it was impossible to tie particular infections to the gatherings.

The study is a “working paper” and has not yet been submitted for peer review, Bernheim said in an interview Saturday. He said it was common practice for economists to post their work online before submitting it to an academic journal so that other experts could comment on it. He said politics was not the motivation for it.

“The motivation for this paper,” he said, “is that there is a debate that is raging about the trade-off between the economic consequences of restrictions and the health consequences of transmission, and as an economist, I take that debate to be both important and appropriate.”

Since the president resumed holding political rallies in June, he has faced intense criticism over them. Public health officials in Tulsa, the site of the first rally, have said a subsequent surge in coronavirus cases was most likely tied to it.

A little more than two weeks after the event, Tulsa recorded 206 new confirmed coronavirus cases in a single day, a record high at the time. Herman Cain, a former Republican presidential candidate, died of COVID-19 after

attending the rally, although it is impossible to know whether he was infected there.

Around the country, state and local public health officials have also wrestled with the question of whetherTrump’s rallies have become so-called superspreader events. With thousands of people gathered together in close quarters, many not wearing masks, the gatherings provide a fertile environment for the virus to spread.

In Minnesota, for example, state officials traced 16 coronavirus infections and two hospitalizations to a Trump rally on Sept. 18 in the city of Bemidji, in Beltrami County. Trump’s Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, who wears masks and encourages his supporters to do so, held his own campaign even that same day in Duluth; it resulted in one coronavirus infection, but no hospitalizations.

But Doug Schultz, a spokesperson for the Minnesota Department of Health, said that the full extent of the spread that had resulted from those cases was difficult to quantify, because many people who develop COVID-19 are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms and do not

seek treatment, and even those who test positive may not respond to contact tracing inquiries.

“What we are seeing in Beltrami County are indicators of transmission, and this is likely just the tip of the iceberg,” Schultz said in an email.

ManyTrump supporters have complained that focusing on the risk posed by the president’s rallies ignores the risk posed by other large gatherings, like the Black Lives Matter protests over the summer. But Bernheim said that because the rallies are isolated events with a finite beginning and end, they are “cleaner events to study” than protests, which can occur over several days.

Assessing the risk of campaign rallies is “a noisy process,” Bernheim said, and focusing on a single event is misleading. His paper noted that there had been similar, smaller analyses — including one based on the Tulsa rally that found no significant effect. But, it said, “measuring the average treatment effect over multiple events, as in our study, produces more reliable results.”

10

Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Kentucky police training quoted Hitler and urged ‘ruthless’ violence Another says warriors “always fight to the death, they never quit” and that they must be willing to “commit to the fight.”

The title page indicates that the training was created by slideshow once shown to cadets training to join the a retired captain, Curt Hall, who could not be reached for Kentucky State Police includes quotations attributed comment. Local news reports, Hall’s LinkedIn page and a to Adolf Hitler and Robert E. Lee, says troopers should news release from the State Police in 2018 indicate that Hall be warriors who “always fight to the death” and encourages was an assistant commander at the police academy from each trooper in training to be a “ruthless killer.”

2005 to 2015 and later served as a commander in the interThe slideshow, which came to light on Friday in a report nal affairs department and as the commander of one of the from a high school newspaper, brought harsh condemnation agency’s 16 regional posts. from politicians, Jewish groups and Kentucky residents, but The lesson appears to be at least partially in line with not from the Kentucky State Police department itself, which “warrior training,” a controversial practice that often begins said only that the training materials were old. during basic training in academies and is modeled on miMorgan Hall, a spokeswoman for the Kentucky Justice litary boot camp, which many police departments embraand Public Safety Cabinet, which oversees the State Police, ce. Many of the nation’s police academies and departments said that the slideshow was “removed” in 2013 and was no have long emphasized a warrior mentality, experts have said, longer in use but declined to answer a list of questions, incluwith officers trained for conflict and equipped with the gear ding queries about how long the material was used and how and weapons of modern warfare. Critics have said the spemany cadets had seen the training. cialized training can lead officers to believe they are under Hall said in a statement that it was “unacceptable” that constant threat of being harmed and can intensify encounsuch material had ever been included in law enforcement ters with civilians. training. “Our administration does not condone the use of The slideshow was obtained by a lawyer who is suing this material,” she said. She added that the cabinet agency a Kentucky State Police trooper who shot and killed Bradley ”began an internal review” after learning about the material J. Grant, 37, in 2018. David Ward, the lawyer, said he had on Friday. received a copy of the slideshow after filing a public records request for documents that the trooper had seen when he was going through training at the academy in 2013.

Ward said he was shocked by the material, and that it seemed to coincide with the combative nature of the trooper’s encounter with Grant that preceded the fatal shooting. The State Police said at the time that Grant had confronted two officers with a shotgun before he was killed, but Ward said Grant had been pointing the shotgun at his own chin and asking officers to shoot him.

“This type of training — these quotes — creates a mind set that these troopers are at war, that they need to come to work ready for battle,” Ward said. “This type of mind set is likely to create an adversarial situation or a violent encounter, and I think that becomes even more likely when you encounter a person who is suffering a mental health crisis and is less likely to respond to verbal commands in a rational way.”

The slideshow was first reported by The Manual Redeye, a student newspaper at duPont Manual High School in Louisville, in an article written by the 16-year-old and 14-year-old sons of another lawyer involved in the lawsuit against the trooper.

“This is absolutely unacceptable,” Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky, a Democrat, said in a statement. “It is further unacceptable that I just learned about this through social media. We will collect all the facts and take immediate corrective action.”

The 33-slide presentation ends with a quotation usually attributed to Theodore Roosevelt about credit belonging to “the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is maIn a photo provided by Kentucky State Police, a slide in a training manual used by the Kentucky State Police rred by dust and sweat and blood.” includes a quote from Adolf Hitler encouraging the “regular employment of violence.”

It ends: “Questions??”

By NICHOLAS BOGEL-BURROUGHS

A

Kentucky State Police have assisted the Louisville Metro Police Department during protests over Louisville police officers’ killing of Breonna Taylor, a Black emergency room technician shot by the police when they raided her apartment in March. The state agency also helped to investigate the Taylor killing, providing a ballistics report to the state attorney general before he determined that the officers who shot Taylor were justified.

The quotations attributed to Hitler, the genocidal leader of Nazi Germany, and Lee, the Confederate general, are included among 33 slides that were shown to cadets in the Kentucky State Police Academy as part of a slideshow entitled “The Warrior Mindset.”

“The very first essential for success is a perpetually constant and regular employment of violence,” reads one quotation attributed to Hitler, who is quoted more than anyone in the training document. Some of the statements attributed to Hitler link to a website providing biographical information about him and listing books by and about him.

The training itself emphasizes that troopers must be ready to employ violence in order to do their jobs properly.

One of the slides that quotes Hitler — under the heading “Violence of Action” — also says troopers should “be the loving father, spouse, and friend as well as the ruthless killer.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

11

Do Dunkin’ and Arby’s go together? Private equity group bets $11 billion they do

By LAUREN HIRSCH

I

n one of the largest restaurant deals in more than a decade, Dunkin’ will join some of America’s best-known restaurant chains, including Arby’s and Buffalo Wild Wings, under a single privately held owner.

Dunkin’ Brands, the parent of Dunkin’ and Baskin-Robbins, agreed on Friday to sell itself for $11.3 billion, including debt, to Inspire Brands, the holding company that owns Sonic DriveIn and Jimmy John’s as well as Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings and others. Backed by the private equity firm Roark Capital, Inspire had already grown into one of the country’s largest restaurant operators since it formed less than three years ago. It employs more than 325,000 people, directly and via franchises, across more than 11,000 restaurants.

Buying Dunkin’ will more than double Inspire’s footprint, adding 12,700 Dunkin’ and 7,900 Baskin-Robbins outlets, which are all franchised. Inspire is paying a steep price: a 20% premium to Dunkin’s share price in the days before The New York Times first reported the talks. The shares were already trading near a record high, more than doubling since the pandemic hit in March.

“Dunkin’ and Baskin-Robbins are category leaders with more than 70 years of rich heritage, and together they are two of the most iconic restaurant brands in the world,” Paul Brown, the chief executive of Inspire Brands, said in a statement on Friday.

The deal is a bet that Dunkin’ will survive — and even thrive — as much of the industry has been ravaged, with about one in six restaurants having closed this year, some permanently.

Fast-food outlets have held up better than full-service restaurants, as takeout and drive-through options have proved to be more appealing than long meals in a room full of strangers.

Dunkin’ has drive-through windows in about 70% of its restaurants and was already investing in digital-ordering tools to promote “high-frequency, low-touch” service. A $100 million plan to “accelerate its beverage-led strategy,” as the company described it in 2018, has also paid off as the pandemic has scrambled people’s routines. Customers are coming in later than the traditional before-work rush and ordering more expensive drinks.

“This team’s grit and determination has enabled us to deliver outsized performance and made our brands among the most elite in the quick service industry,” Dunkin’s chief executive, Dave Hoffmann, said in a statement on Friday. “I am particularly proud of our actions since March of this year. During the global pandemic, we have stood tall. We’ve had each other’s backs and are now stronger than ever.”

The chain dropped the word “Donuts” from its name last year, and now generates more than half of its sales from drinks.

It serves more than 2 billion cups of coffee a year, with highermargin, espresso-based coffees growing in popularity over cheaper options.

“They’re not getting people on their way to work, but they are getting people that are sick of making coffee at home,” said Adam Werner, who works in the restaurants, leisure and hospitality practice at AlixPartners, a consulting firm. Happy to be out of the house, those people might also be enticed to “pick

Dunkin’ Brands is selling itself for $11.3 billion to Inspire Brands, whose chains include Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings and Sonic Drive-In. up a couple of doughnuts for kids that are home-schooling,” he added.

Dunkin’ Brands generated $74 million in profits in the third quarter, up about 2% from a year earlier. Still, it has been affected by the recession, announcing a plan in the summer to close 800 “low-volume, underperforming locations” this year.

Bill Rosenberg opened the first Dunkin’ Donuts in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1950. He turned it into a franchise business and passed it on to his son Robert in the 1960s. Since then, the chain has spent time as a publicly listed company as well as a part of larger corporations until, in 2005, a consortium of private equity firms — Bain Capital Partners, the Carlyle Group and Thomas H. Lee Partners — bought it for $2.4 billion from its parent at the time, France’s Pernod Ricard. The consortium owned it for six years before returning it to public investors.

The takeover by Inspire is the second time that Dunkin’ will be owned by private equity. In recent years, the private equity owners of consumer brands like Neiman Marcus, Payless ShoeSource and Toys “R” Us have been criticized for those leveraged buyouts, which left behind debt that limited the brands’ ability to respond to new needs before they succumbed to bankruptcy.

Inspire’s primary backer, Roark Capital, isn’t the stereotypical private equity firm. Roark, which is named for the protagonist in “The Fountainhead,” by Ayn Rand, is known for investing

in its companies’ digital abilities, managing them at arm’s length and holding investments for longer than the typical three to five years for private equity firms. In some cases, it has held on to companies for more than a decade.

Roark was founded in 2001 with a focus on franchised businesses. It bought Arby’s in 2011, turned the ailing business around and merged it with Buffalo Wild Wings in 2018 to form Inspire Brands, which is controlled by Roark but also raises its own funds from other investors. It acquired Sonic in 2018 and Jimmy John’s in 2019.

What it was missing, until now, was coffee.

With Dunkin’, Inspire is squaring off more directly against Starbucks and JAB Capital, the European private equity firm that owns Panera, Peet’s, Krispy Kreme and others. The digital investments that bolstered Inspire’s other portfolio companies could help Dunkin’ compete where it is already strong in the Northeast. But to grow to more than 17,000 locations, as Dunkin’ has cited as a long-term goal, it may need to go where it has not gone before, at least in earnest — west of the Mississippi, into Starbucks territory.

“The ability to expand on the West Coast is essential,” said Peter Saleh, an analyst at BTIG, a brokerage firm. He warned in a research note in October that Dunkin’ was “approaching saturation in its core Northeast markets.” Dunkin’ opened its first outlets in California in 2015.

12

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

Tiffany deal is a signature move by the Sun Tzu of luxury

The Tiffany & Co. store on Fifth Avenue in New York, Nov. 26, 2019. The final agreement for the LVMH Tiffany deal was announced on Oct. 30, almost a year after the companies first said they were merging.

By VANESSA FRIEDMAN and ELIZABETH PATON

T

he soap opera also known as the largest deal in luxury, the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton-Tiffany acquisition, finally has a happy ending.

The two companies originally announced their synergistic engagement in November only to engage in months of public mudslinging after the pandemic hit the luxury market and LVMH’s commitment turned wobbly. But Thursday they said they had agreed to new terms.

LVMH will acquire Tiffany for $131.50 a share, $3.50 less than the original price but $1.50 more than Tiffany’s reported bottom line. That will save Bernard Arnault, chairman of LVMH, and his shareholders the relatively low amount of $420 million off the original $16.2 billion price, and it will keep Tiffany from being left to fend for itself in an uncertain luxury environment.

It has been a drama-filled relationship, however, beginning in September when LVMH went public with the news that the French government — the government! — had asked it to wait on closing the deal.

Tiffany charged delaying tactics. LVMH accused Tiffany of being a “mismanaged business that over the first half of 2020 hemorrhaged cash.” Tiffany shot back that “LVMH’s specious arguments are yet another blatant

attempt to evade its contractual obligation to pay the agreed-upon price for Tiffany.” Tiffany filed suit in a Delaware court for breach of obligations. LVMH countersued, saying the damage to Tiffany in 2020 meant it was no longer the same company it had agreed to acquire. Luxury watchers looked on in slackjawed astonishment.

But for anyone who has tracked Arnault over the last 3 1/2 decades as he built the biggest luxury company in the world and became the richest man in Europe, the Tiffany mini-saga was not exactly a surprise.

Though he has crafted his 75-plusbrand empire largely by peaceful means, wooing families and seizing opportunities, Arnault had engaged in such high-profile public battles at least three times before. Extremely competitive, unafraid of a fight and undaunted by public opprobrium, he did not always emerge with the brand he wanted — though he always made money, solidifying his reputation as the Sun Tzu of luxury.

The wolf in cashmere Arnault’s journey to the pinnacle of luxury began with one of the biggest and most vituperative boardroom battles France had ever seen, in a nation where it was long considered unseemly to show naked ambition.

In 1984, Arnault, then a young real estate developer, heard that the French government was set to choose someone to take over the Boussac empire, a textile and retail

conglomerate that happened to own Christian Dior. Arnault had just returned from the United States, where his neighbor in Westchester County, New York, was John Kluge, who made billions by taking his company Metromedia private and then liquidating it.

Arnault had also closely watched the success investment firm KKR had with its aggressive leveraged buyouts.

With that in mind, Arnault won the bidding war for Boussac, buying the group for a symbolic 1 franc. He then acquired a nickname — “The Terminator” — after he laid off 9,000 workers in two years and offloaded most of the group’s assets, with the exception of Dior.

A flurry of new nicknames — the Wolf in Cashmere, the Machiavelli of finance — came in 1989 when Arnault stormed the LVMH citadel, two years after the merger between fashion house Louis Vuitton and Champagne and cognac producer Moët Hennessy.

LVMH had been created on the premise that the combined group would be too large for a hostile raider. Instead, the siege came from within. Arnault, who had invested in the business in 1988, had a divergent vision from Henry Racamier, Louis Vuitton’s revered septuagenarian president, and ultimately turned on the executive, stripping him of his power and ousting him from the board. The French press was aghast, but a pattern had been established.

A ‘creeping takeover’ In 1999 Arnault turned his eyes to another prize: Gucci, the Italian leather goods company, then run by Tom Ford and Domenico De Sole. He quietly amassed a 5% stake before what Vanity Fair called “an Ali-Frazier fight for the recherché set” broke out.

Gucci called it a “creeping takeover.”

Arnault upped his stake to 15%, then 27%, then 34.4% — all while insisting he wanted to be a supportive and passive partner. The two sides finally agreed that in return for board representation, Arnault would freeze his stake. De Sole faxed him the paperwork.

It came back unsigned. Then the guerrilla warfare began.

The fight dragged on into 2001 until finally, that September, they settled, and LVMH sold its shares — ultimately walking away with a $700 million profit.

“He was a really tough adversary,” said De Sole, now the chairman of Tom Ford International, who called the experience “brutal.” But afterward, he said, Arnault contac-

ted De Sole through one of his bankers and invited him to a private meeting, where he “was very rational and gracious.” The two are still in touch.

Handbags at dawn By 2013, Arnault had swept through much of Europe, snapping up bigger brands like Bulgari in 2011 and Loro Piana in 2013, as well as stakes in a slew of up-and-comers.

But there was one long-term target that LVMH had coveted secretively for more than a decade: Hermès.

The super-luxe, wildly successful Parisian leather house is run by the sixth generation of its founding family, which has been fiercely protective of maintaining control.

Although the company went public in 1993, the family retained a 78% stake.

In 2001, LVMH quietly bought an initial stake of 4.9% through subsidiaries and continued to accumulate shares by buying equity derivatives through financial intermediaries, always in holdings below 5%.

In October 2010, LVMH announced that it had acquired 14.2% of its rival. By December 2011, that had risen to 22.6%, prompting Patrick Thomas, then the Hermès chief executive, to react with a notoriously crude statement.

“If you want to seduce a beautiful woman, you don’t start by raping her from behind,” he said at a news conference, where he called on Arnault to reduce the LVMH holding to 10% in order to show that he was not intending a takeover attempt. Arnault did not, and in 2013 the LVMH stake in Hermès grew to 23.1%.

There was eventually a hearing before France’s stock market regulator, with Hermès claiming LVMH had built up its stake using a system that masked its true identity. The tit-for-tat legal battle gripped France, with LVMH again portrayed as the barbarian at the gate. In 2014, a French court ruled that LVMH had to sell down its stake and distribute its shares to investors. (Groupe Arnault, the largest shareholder in LVMH, retained an 8% position.)

Finally, in 2017, Arnault appeared to walk away, swapping out the last Hermès shares as part of a wider corporate restructuring at LVMH, in part to help pay for the 25% of Dior that it did not already own. Dior minority investors could choose payment in cash or stock of Hermès, helping Arnault cash out without paying taxes on a sale. In the end, Groupe Arnault had $5 billion in profit.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

13 Stocks

Big tech stocks may face post-election headwinds, no matter who wins

S

ome investors are betting the technology and communications stocks that drove a massive rebound in U.S. markets this year will face a tougher slog in coming months, no matter whether Republican President Donald Trump or Democratic challenger Joe Biden wins Tuesday’s election.\ Betting against big technology has been a risky proposition over the last decade, as stocks like Amazon, Google and Netflix have shot higher at the expense of so-called value and cyclical stocks such as banks and energy companies.

Recently, however, some fund managers say they are growing alarmed by what they see as a consensus in Washington to tighten regulations, and prospects that another large stimulus bill would bolster a rotation out of tech and into other sectors including economically sensitive value stocks.

“There will be a shift and it is starting, but it will take time,” said Max Gokhman, head of asset allocation at Pacific Life Fund Advisors, which cut its exposure to large-cap tech in September to neutral from overweight.

Should Biden win as polls suggest, technology companies could face higher tax rates and tax-motivated selling as well as increased regulation, investors said.

Both Trump and Biden have criticized large tech companies but stopped short of explicitly calling for them to be broken up. Trump has said “there is something going on in terms of monopoly” when asked about big tech firms.

Apple Inc AAPL.O, Microsoft Corp MSFT.O, Amazon. com Inc AMZN.O, Facebook Inc FB.O, and Google-parent Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O now make up approximately 23% of the total weight of the S&P 500, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices, giving their gyrations an outsized impact on broader markets.

Hedge fund manager David Einhorn of Greenlight Capital, a longtime tech bear, told clients in a letter this week that tech stocks were in the middle of an “enormous bubble” that popped when the S&P 500 hit its record high on Sept. 2, 2020.

Technology stocks tumbled in the past week’s selloff, though earnings results from companies like Facebook, Alphabet and Amazon have shown how the tech giants expanded their businesses this year.

“It has become more difficult for mega-cap tech to surprise on the upside,” analysts at UBS Global Wealth Management said in a note Friday.

Some investors pointed to recent hearings in Washington as a sign that increased regulations will come to the sector no matter which party takes control in Washington.

The Justice Department’s lawsuit against Google in late October marked the first time the U.S. government has cracked down on a major tech company since it sued Microsoft Corp MSFT.O for anti-competitive practices in 1998.

“This may be the only bi-partisan issue out there,” Pacific Life’s Gokhman said.

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14

Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

In Italy, like everywhere the virus goes, it’s the discontent that’s contagious

A nearly empty street in Milan on Oct. 26, 2020, the first day the city imposed new restrictions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

By JASON HOROWITZ

W

hen the coronavirus first hit Italy, overwhelming the country’s hospitals and prompting the West’s first lockdown, Italians inspired the world with their resilience and civic responsibility, staying home and singing on their balconies. Their reward for months of quarantine was a flattened curve, a gulp of normalcy and the satisfaction of usually patronizing allies pointing to Italy as a model.

Italy is now a long way away from those balcony days and its summer fling with freedom. Instead, as a second wave engulfs Europe and triggers new nationwide lockdowns, Italy has become emblematic of a despair, exhaustion and fear that is spreading throughout the Continent.

France has applied a new national lockdown to contain skyrocketing cases. Germany has put in place softer, but still severe, nationwide restrictions. Ireland has restricted movement and barred visits to other people’s homes. Throughout Europe, governments are scrambling to deliver relief, keep schools open and salvage their economies.

And everywhere, if people are not sick with the virus, they are sick of it. In Italy, the discontent is exploding.

The country that gave the Western world a preview of COVID’s awful human toll — that demonstrated the necessity, and success, of a national lockdown — now stands for something darker. Italy has become a symbol of Europe’s squandered advantages, the impotence of half measures in the face of a

virus that does not abide by compromises, and the social and political costs of not making good on promises of relief.

Italians, coming down hard from their summer euphoria, are exasperated.

“We’ve reached the end of our rope,” said Emanuele Tudini, whose wife applauded doctors from their apartment window and whose children drew “Everything Will Be OK” rainbows at the beginning of the crisis.

He spoke in his bar in front of the Pantheon in central Rome, where angry cooks in chef hats, restaurateurs and fellow bar owners protested new government restrictions that shut them down after 6 p.m. It was one of dozens of predominantly peaceful protests that have erupted across the country in recent days. “There’s a ton of rage and suffering.”

Italian hospitals, which delivered a searing global preview of the horror to come in March, are again under strain and intensive care units are filling up.

Milan, Italy’s economic engine, is the new capital of its contagion and seems on the brink of quarantine. The poorer and vulnerable south is exposed, and Neapolitans have rioted against early closures imposed to avoid a massacre. Romans are swinging erratically between last-days-of-disco day drinking and holing up during eerily quiet nights.

All around the country, unease is morphing into unrest, with violent protests breaking out Friday night in Florence.

Large crowds in Trieste chant that they just want to work. And demonstrators have taken to the streets in nearly every major

Italian city, from Palermo to Bologna to Verona.

Mobsters, hooligans and far-right extremists have exploited the frustration and anger, infiltrating protests in Naples, Turin and Rome and pushing burning dumpsters and tossing Molotov cocktails. The police, on edge and increasingly present, have put down the violence with water cannons.

Italians seem increasingly intolerant of a government that spins out ephemeral emergency decrees with the ease and frequency of a casino dealer.

In October, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, who first assured the arrival of a vaccine by December and now promises a “serene” Christmas, said, “I exclude lockdowns and say that after due consideration.”

This week he was less definitive, saying that Italy had entered something he called “Scenario 3” and urged Italians to follow the new measures or else the “virus will spread beyond control.” On Friday, the government prepared for “Scenario 4,” with lockdowns in the most infected regions.

But for many Italians the damage is already significant.

Conte announced more relief packages for businesses worth about 5 billion euros this week, and on Friday banned firings through March. The government insists that they are working to cut down on bureaucracy and that the aid will reach Italians much sooner. But its track record of delivering on promises is not promising.

Many workers say they haven’t received unemployment benefits since May. Business owners who once embraced the hashtag, “I Stay Home,” now defiantly type, “I Stay Open.” Education experts are vexed that keeping schools open seems less of a priority than it does in France or Germany.

And only last week, months after Conte’s committee of experts called for more medical staff, did his government get around to beginning the process of hiring thousands of medical workers and contact tracers.

The same government committee of experts in April urged the government to procure more buses to alleviate overcrowding on public transit. Instead, images of overcrowded buses packed Italian media. Conte has said avoiding crowded public transportation is the main driver of the current restrictions.

“The restaurants and bars are safer than the public transportation,” said Sergio Paolantoni, president of the association that organized the Rome protest at the Pantheon, which was coordinated with protests in 23 other cities around the country.

With tourism devastated and lunchtime traffic decimated by workers staying home, he said the 6 p.m. cutoff for restaurants amounted to a death blow. “It’s better to have a total lockdown instead of targeting only us,” he said.

Many Italians, though, believe that a return to a national lockdown was only a matter of time.

Fabiana Gargioli returned from the protest to her restaurant, Armando al Pantheon, to greet diners for lunch service and to turn away couples seeking to make dinner reservations.

She recalled joining millions of Italians in singing “The Sky is Always Bluer” from her balcony in March.

“Now it’s different,” she said. “The money is gone.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

15

England to shut pubs, restaurants and most shops as virus surges

By MARK LANDLER and STEPHEN CASTLE

P

rime Minister Boris Johnson on Saturday announced plans to shut down pubs, restaurants and most retail shops throughout England, a stark reversal in the face of grim projections that the country could face a deadly winter from the coronavirus unless it takes draconian action.

Johnson presented the measures as part of a new tier of restrictions that will cover all of England. But the steps, which would take effect Thursday and last until Dec. 2, amount to a nationwide lockdown — something Johnson resisted for weeks because of the damage he said it would do to the economy.

“We’ve got to be humble in the face of nature,” Johnson said at a hastily called news conference at No. 10 Downing St. “In this county, alas, as across much of Europe, the virus is spreading even faster than the reasonable worst-case scenarios of our scientific advisers.”

The measures, announced after a tense day of meetings of Johnson’s Cabinet, would bring England into line with France, Germany, Belgium and Ireland, all of which have shut down large parts of their countries in recent days amid a rapid-fire resurgence in infections.

As in March, when the virus first engulfed Europe, England has been slower to respond than some of its European neighbors.

That equivocation, critics say, has deepened the misery for the country, which has suffered one of Europe’s highest death tolls and heaviest economic blows from the pandemic.

Even as a second wave of infections swept in last month, Johnson was caught between a faction of his Conservative Party, which argued that another lockdown would devastate the economy, and his scientific advisers, who argued that it was unavoidable, given the exponential spread of the virus.

Under the current trajectory, the scientists said, hospitals would be stretched to capacity by the first week of December, even including the giant field hospitals that the government built, but never used, last spring.

Johnson had initially planned to roll out the new measures this coming Monday, but reports of the government’s deliberations leaked out Friday evening, forcing the prime minister to move up his timetable.

“They have no choice,” said Devi Sridhar, head of the global public health program at the University of Edinburgh.

“It’s better today than tomorrow, and it would have been better yesterday than today.”

The government said the measures would be voted on

by Parliament on Wednesday, and there were indications that some Conservatives would try to block them. But with an 80seat majority in Parliament and the support of the opposition Labour Party, there was little chance that these measures wouldn’t be adopted.

To cushion the economy from the worst effects of the lockdown, Johnson said the government would extend until December a wage-subsidy program for people whose jobs are threatened by the measures.

Under the plans, people would be required to stay at home unless their workplaces, such as factories or construction sites, need them. They would be allowed to go to school or college

and leave home for a few other reasons, like buying food or seeking medical attention. But nonessential shops would be closed, people would be urged not to travel, except for business, and pubs and restaurants would only be allowed to serve take out food.

Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have already instituted similar restrictions, leaving England as an outlier within the United Kingdom.

On Saturday, Britain reported 21,915 new infections, passing a grim milestone of 1 million people who have tested positive.

It admitted 1,444 patients to the hospital with symptoms of COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Nearly 1,000 patients are in intensive care units, while 326 people died on Saturday alone.

Britain’s total death toll from the virus is 58,925, one of the highest in Europe.

For weeks, politics has colored the debate over how to curb the virus. The leader of the opposition Labour Party, Keir Starmer, called on Johnson in mid-October to impose a two-week lockdown that scientists said would act as a “circuit breaker” on the chain of transmissions. He cited a report from SAGE that warned Britain faced a “very large epidemic with catastrophic consequences.”

Johnson accused Starmer of failing to take into account the economic fallout from such a lockdown, which has led influential Cabinet ministers, including the chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, to raise alarms.

Imposing the lockdown now, analysts said, could hurt Johnson within his party because it will look like he is buckling to pressure from the opposition. But polls indicate that the British public is more sympathetic.

Locking down the economy in November is also a way to salvage Christmas. By cutting the transmission rate, the government could relax restrictions in December to allow families and friends to celebrate together.

British papers have been full of headlines about whether Johnson will “cancel Christmas.” He has insisted that he wants university students to be reunited with their families during the holidays.

While medical experts generally applauded the planned lockdown, some questioned why the government did not act sooner, like during the midterm school break, which began earlier this month, as public-health experts proposed.

Others said the government still had not fixed its test-andtrace system, which continues to fall far short of its goals. Until it does that, experts said, Britain would not be able to identify or break the chains of transmission — setting the stage for further outbreaks after the lockdown is lifted.

“You use lockdowns to build up test and tracing,” Sridhar said. “We will be stuck in these cycles of lockdown and release until they decide we can’t live with this virus because it’s killing our economy.”

Demonstrators protest against coronavirus-related lockdowns in London, on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2020.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced plans on Saturday to shut down pubs, restaurants and most retail shops throughout England, a stark reversal in the face of grim projections that the country could face a deadly winter from the coronavirus unless it takes draconian action.

16

Monday, November 2, 2020

Russian provinces hit by a second wave of coronavirus

By ANDREW E. KRAMER

O

ne video shows bodies in plastic bags stacked in the basement of a hospital in the Siberian city of Barnaul after a morgue overflowed.

“Well, this is how it is,” said a voice on the video, one of dozens posted anonymously by desperate hospital workers amid a surge of COVID-19 cases in provincial Russian cities. “We’re overloaded.”

During the spring, the pandemic struck Moscow particularly hard while mostly sparing provincial locations. But now infections are rising in several of Russia’s far-flung regions, and hospitals and morgues are overwhelmed.

In his long tenure, President Vladimir Putin has centralized political power. But during the pandemic, he has delegated to regional authorities decisions on locking down businesses, shutting schools and taking other public health precautions.

Outside a hospital morgue last week in Barnaul, Russia.

The stated purpose was to allow local officials to tailor their responses to local circumstances, though political analysts also noted that it allowed Putin to deflect blame for unpopular shutdowns, or bad outcomes. Either way, the result has become a patchwork of rules throughout the country that are often poorly observed.

Russia has reported 1,579,446 cases, the fourth-highest number in the world, after the United States, India and Brazil.

On average over the past seven days, 16,546 people have been infected daily.

Overall, Russia’s health system has been coping. Tatyana Golikova, a deputy prime minister, said 80% of the beds in COVID-19 wards were occupied nationally. But some provinces have clearly lost control of the epidemic. Five regions reported that 95% of the beds were occupied.

Russia approved a vaccine for the coronavirus in August, before completing clinical trials, but it has not been administered widely. In Moscow, the health authorities said Friday that about

2,500 people in the city had received the vaccine under emergency-use approval.

In testimonials and videos from Russia’s regions, some harrowing accounts are emerging.

In Novokuznetsk, a Siberian coal mining town, a morgue worker posted a video in which he appeared to walk on bodies in bags. They were so tightly packed in a corridor that there seemed no other way to get through.

Stacked on the floor and piled on stretchers, a dozen or so were visible. One body was simply placed on the floor under a blanket, a pair of women’s shoes protruding.

“This is the hallway,” said the worker, who did not identify himself. “There are corpses all over. You can fall down walking here, you can trip over them. I have to walk on their heads.”

In Blagoveshchensk, a city in the Far East on the border with China, a local journalist, Natalya Nadelyaeva, described in despair having to wait in line at a morgue to pick up the body of her grandfather, then wait in another line at a funeral home to arrange burial. “The undertakers told me they just don’t have enough crews to bury everybody on time,” she said.

Overall, Russia’s reported mortality rate of 19 per 100,000 people is lower than that of most West European countries and the United States. One explanation is that wide testing in Russia turns up many mild or asymptomatic cases. But there have also been indications that mortality has been underreported.

In St. Petersburg, a news site, Fontanka.ru, reported Friday that it had obtained a document from the city’s crematorium seeming to contradict the official death count from COVID-19.

The document, called the “Account of Acts of Cremation of Bodies Infected with the New Coronavirus,” listed 2,194 more cremations than reported deaths from the virus from April until October, the site calculated.

Pileups have hit hospitals as well as morgues. In Omsk, a Siberian industrial city, two ambulance drivers this month picked up a 70-year-old woman and an 85-year-old man with severe COVID-19 symptoms but could find no hospitals with free beds.

After being turned away by multiple emergency rooms over 10 hours, they parked outside the regional Ministry of Health in protest, with their ailing patients still aboard.

At a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Putin discussed the rising cases in the Russian regions but said he did not plan a national lockdown. “We have to keep our hand on the pulse and react in time and effectively,” he said. Cities with high case counts have closed schools and asked businesses to voluntarily send employees home.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

17

As Tanzania’s president wins a second term, opposition calls for protests

By ABDI LATIF DAHIR

A

fter a pivotal poll marred by violence, opposition arrests and accusations of rigging, Tanzania’s electoral commission said late Friday that President John Magufuli had won a second five-year term — a move that led the opposition to call for peaceful protests on Saturday and urge the international community to reject the result.

Electoral observers, both foreign and domestic, said that the vote, held Wednesday, took place amid censorship of political speech that undermined the poll’s credibility and led to widespread fraud and irregularities.

Yet based on the country’s Constitution, once the electoral commission declares a candidate president, no court has the authority to investigate the vote. Given this, the opposition said that its only recourse was to hit the streets to demand an election rerun.

“If we accept this reality, we are going to send the country into a one-party system as Magufuli wants,” Zitto Kabwe, the leader of the opposition Alliance for Change and Transparency, or ACT Wazalendo, said on Twitter.

Tanzania, a nation of about 58 million people, was once seen as a paragon of stability and a growing democracy in East Africa. But over the past five years under Magufuli, the country’s fifth president, it made an about-face as he restricted political and civic freedoms and clamped down on the press and human rights organizations.

The win gives Magufuli a platform to continue with plans for ambitious mega-infrastructure projects, including reviving the national airline, building rail lines and constructing a much-criticized hydroelectric dam.

A former chemist and schoolteacher who has also held several Cabinet positions, Magufuli, 61, gained popularity as “the Bulldozer” for his handling of a program to build roads and for his tactics fighting corruption.

Magufuli has declared the country “coronavirus free” and has criticized the use of masks or social distancing practices.

The chairman of the National Electoral Commission said that Magufuli had received more than 12.5 million of the 14 million valid votes counted. His main opponent, Tundu Lissu of the Chadema Party, received 1.9 million votes, while Bernard Membe, a former foreign minister representing ACT Wazalendo, received just over 81,000 votes, according to the commission.

The governing Chama Cha Mapinduzi party, or Party of the Revolution, which has dominated Tanzanian politics since the nation secured independence in 1961, also won a majority of the parliamentary seats in the country’s more than 260 constituencies.

Yet even before the final figures were announced, the opposition had already dismissed the results.

Lissu, who was shot 16 times in an assassination

Tanzania’s electoral commission said that the country’s president, John Magufuli, had received over 12.5 million of the 14 million valid votes counted after Wednesday’s poll. attempt in 2017 and just recently returned home, on Thursday called on the international community to dismiss the figures. He said that his poll agents had been denied access to voting booths and were harassed and beaten by security officers.

“What happened yesterday was not an election,” Lissu told reporters. “It was not an election by any measure whatsoever, whether it’s in accordance with Tanzanian laws or international laws.”

The electoral commission has denied accusations of ballot tampering and stuffing, and called them unsubstantiated claims.

The ACT Wazalendo party said that five of its top leaders in Zanzibar, including its chairman, Seif Sharif Hamad, were arrested on Thursday and some badly beaten.

It said that the police had killed 10 people and injured 50 others in Zanzibar before and during the elections, and the party documented numerous cases in which its agents were denied entry into polling stations, along with instances of prefilled ballots and multiple voting.

Tibor Nagy Jr., the assistant secretary for the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs, said on Twitter that he was “concerned about reports of systematic interference in the democratic process,” and a State Department spokeswoman said that the United States would hold “accountable” those responsible for the “use of force against unarmed civilians.”

“It has been tragic to see Tanzania, once a promising democracy, slide into autocracy under John Magufuli’s leadership,” U.S. Rep. Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, said in a statement.

The Tanzania Elections Watch, an independent observer group made up of civil society leaders from eastern and southern Africa, accused the country’s security forces of creating “a climate of fear and intimidation” before and during the polls.

The elections were also marred by social media restrictions, with widespread disruptions in platforms like WhatsApp and Twitter experienced across the country. The authorities also directed telecommunication companies to suspend bulk voice and short messaging services.

Peter Micek, general counsel of the digital rights group Access Now, said that technicians from the Tanzanian telecoms regulator had installed equipment that would allow them to throttle entire networks, block websites and degrade traffic so that video or photos could not be transmitted.

“It appears the regulator rushed to have the technology in place for this week’s election and the aftermath,” Micek said in an email. Internet providers, he said, “knew the installation was coming for several months but were notified only last week of the impending installation and had little say in the process.”

18

Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL

America shocked itself and the world

By CHARLES M. BLOW

H

ow could we have been so blind? How could we have been so naive? How did we not believe that the worst was possible until we plummeted into it?

We didn’t believe that a demagogic tyrant-worshipper could rise to the presidency.

The founders of this country worried obsessively about the rise of a demagogue, and the power of foreign influence on our democracy. And yet somehow, over the years, after centuries of American presidents behaving in ways that at least demonstrated a fealty to the country and its institutions and the power of precedent and legacy, those fears waned to a whisper.

Having a demagogue, partially installed by a Russian disinformation campaign no less, who exalted our enemies in the world and hammered our friends, was somewhat unthinkable. This was America. We would only go so far. We might race up to the precipice, but we would never hurl ourselves into the abyss. Wrong.

With the election of Donald Trump, America did the unthinkable, shocking itself and the world: It put the most powerful country in the world under the control of a lying, grifting, shady carnival conductor. He

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had no experience in governance and no expertise.

His entire life was a game of smoke and mirrors, double talk and double-dealing.

Even Trump, not a student of history or much else, didn’t seem to grasp the awesome power he possessed until he systematically started to test all the fences supposedly restraining him, only to realize that the only thing holding many of them up was customs and conventions. Most could be run through or pushed down.

It was like a scene in the film “Jurassic World” where the scientist created a hybrid, Frankenstein dinosaur because people got bored of the conventional ones. Well, the dinosaur was clever enough to break out of its cage and run through the park, killing everything in sight. As one of the scientists said: “You made a genetic hybrid. Raised it in captivity. She is seeing all of this for the first time. She does not even know what she is. She will kill everything that moves.” He continued, “She is learning where she fits on the food chain and I’m not sure you want her to figure that out.”

Trump realized the power of the presidency, that it was uniquely at the top of the food chain, and so began his rampage.

We didn’t believe that in this era we could have a president who could be so regressive on issues of white supremacy, white nationalism and xenophobia.

To be sure, there have been other presidents

more racist than their predecessors.

Andrew Johnson assuming the presidency after Abraham Lincoln comes to mind. Although Lincoln had professed his white supremacy during the LincolnDouglas debates, he led the nation to emancipation and into Civil War in part over the issue of slavery.

Johnson’s racist Reconstruction plan after the war excluded Black electoral and governing participation, led to the rise of the Black Codes and led to his impeachment.

Lyndon B. Johnson being followed by Richard Nixon comes to mind. As a senator, Johnson had shepherded the Civil Rights Act of 1957, and as president he pushed through the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1968. In addition, he nominated the first Black justice to the Supreme Court: Thurgood Marshall. Nixon on the other hand, was different. As Tim Naftali, an associate professor of history at NYU, wrote last year in The Atlantic: “Nixon believed in a hierarchy of races, with whites and Asians much higher up than people of African descent and Latinos. And he had convinced himself that it wasn’t racist to think Black people, as a group, were inferior to whites, so long as he held them in paternalistic regard.”

But, in some ways, Americans came to see these occasional regressions as more minor — a hiccup, a stutter step in which the country took a small step back among much greater strides forward. We were not prepared for what Trump delivered: a generational retreat into darkness.

We had not seen a modern president so openly and blatantly court and even defend racists and xenophobes. We had not seen one refuse to clearly condemn white supremacist hate groups, instead retreating to a position of false obliviousness when condemnation was demanded. We have not seen a recent president who would stoop so low as to separate immigrant children from their parents, apparently with no plan to reunite them, as a matter of unwavering policy.

These are but two examples. But the list is legion.

I could enumerate them until my fingers blistered. But they would all illustrate the same point: We, America, let our guard down for a campaign cycle, believing, surely, that the most qualified woman to ever run would defeat the least qualified man to do so. We didn’t vote with the intensity the emergency required.

And in doing so, we allowed the country to be dragged to the brink of ruin.

We are now living the reality that the founders feared and that women, minorities and immigrants hoped was an artifact of former times.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

19

Exgobernadora Sila Calderón insta a votar por Delgado Altieri Por THE STAR

L

a exgobernadora Sila María Calderón instó el domingo a votar por el candidato a la gobernación por el Partido Popular Democrático (PPD), Carlos ‘Charlie’ Delgado Altieri.

“Es vital para Puerto Rico votar por Charlie Delgado Altieri. Por ello pido un voto para él”, dijo Calderón en declaraciones escritas.

“Los últimos cuatro años de gobierno han sido un desastre para nuestro país: corrupción rampante, faltas de respeto públicas y privadas a nuestra gente, ineficacia total en la distribu-

ción de los fondos federales a las familias que más lo necesitan y encima, ahora, un plebiscito amañado, y sin consenso, para llevarnos a la brava a convertirnos en algo que no somos”, dijo la exgobernadora.

“La única persona que puede salvarnos de este desastre se llama Charlie Delgado Altieri.

Puerto Rico merece buen gobierno después de todo lo que nos ha sucedido”, añadió Calderón.

“Conozco bien a Charlie hace más de 20 años cuando él ganó la elección como Alcalde de Isabela y yo como Gobernadora. Colaboramos juntos por el bien de su Municipio.

Es un hombre honrado, sensible y sumamente trabajador. Tengo la confianza de que hará un gran trabajo para nuestro país”, aseguró Calderón.

“Le pido a los puertorriqueños que no boten su voto, dándolo a uno de los partidos minoritarios que no tienen posibilidad de ganar.

Respetamos a todos; pero la realidad es que un voto por ellos es un voto por el PNP, que no se lo merece”, destacó la exgobernadora.

“Ya yo voté adelantado ayer por Charlie Delgado para Gobernador. Hazlo tú también”, concluyó Calderón.

López León hace llamado a comerciantes, residentes y estudiantes de Río Piedras Por THE STAR

L

a senadora y candidata a alcaldesa de San Juan por el Partido Popular Democrático (PPD), Rossana López León, instó este domingo a la comunidad riopedrense a votar el próximo martes y a apoyar iniciativas a favor de Río Piedras.

“Para darle a Río Piedras el cambio radical que necesita, como parte de mi campaña me reuní con la Junta Comunitaria de Río Piedras en la Casa Ruth Hernández y firmamos un convenio de trabajo para, entre otras cosas, otorgar una exención total del arbitrio municipal de construcción a proyectos dirigidos a estudiantes y exenciones de patentes municipales sobre negocios de alquiler por un periodo de cinco años”, señaló la candidata popular en declaraciones escritas.

López León añadió que hay disponibles gran cantidad de fondos federales de recuperación de los huracanes y de vivienda asequible para familias afectadas por los desastres.

“Como futura alcaldesa, me propongo darle alta prioridad a Río Piedras en la programación y uso de esos fondos. La participación ciudadana será parte esencial

de este esfuerzo. Me propongo también darle prioridad a los proyectos de Río Piedras ante el Gobierno Central, para que podamos aunar esfuerzos para su consecución”, detalló López León.

La candidata insistió en que existen otros temas, en que coincidió con los líderes comunitarios, como el regreso de la Policía de la Comunidad, la instalación de cámaras de seguridad y el mejoramiento de la iluminación en espacios públicos como medida para desalentar la actividad delictiva.

El centro riopedrense contará con una brigada asignada para su continuo mantenimiento de carreteras, aceras, limpieza, ornato y embellecimiento.

La energía renovable será parte de este trabajo con la participacion de la Corporación de energía de la Universidad de Puerto Rico en Mayaguez.

Además, López León se comprometió a mejorar la oferta del Centro de Diagnóstico y Tratamiento (CDT) haciendo una transformación del mismo y añadiendo especialistas de salud de diferentes profesiones.

Mientras que el problema de “personas sin hogar se atenderá bajo un solo sistema hasta su rehabilitación. Se promoverá la agri-

cultura urbana, la cultura con el ya inicio del estudio de la vivienda para artistas y el desarrollo de un programa de vivienda para universitarios graduados y el ofrecimiento de la experiencia de empleo, profesores y empleados de la Universidad de Puerto Rico”.

“El potencial crecimiento lo tenemos, como la proximidad a la Universidad de Puerto Rico, la disponibilidad de de solares para desarrollo, la ubicación céntrica

del centro urbano, concentración de jóvenes estudiantes y la inversión realizada en el Tren Urbano y su cercanía al edificio de Ciencias Moleculares, la Universidad Ana G. Méndez y todo el complejo del Centro Médico. La voluntad de lograr un cambio en Río Piedras, se inicia con la acción electoral. Por eso a todos les solicito su respaldo en las urnas este martes. Juntos vamos a llevar a Río Piedras a otro nivel”, finalizó López León.

20

Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Sean Connery: From tentative secret agent to suave Bond

The actor In “Goldfinger,” where he and the Bond persona finally melded.

By THOMAS VINCIGUERRA

I

n 1965, at the height of James Bond mania, Sean Connery told Playboy magazine that he had no problem with another actor assuming his signature role. “Actually, I’d find it interesting to see what someone else does with it,” he said. “Lots of people could play him.”

Strictly speaking, he was right. But by public reckoning, he couldn’t have been more wrong. In the popular imagination, the Scottish-born Thomas Sean Connery, who died Saturday at 90, will always be both the first and the best “Bond ... James Bond.”

It’s hard to believe that before Eon Productions perfected its Bond formula, the secret agent’s creator, Ian Fleming, gushed about perhaps casting Richard Burton or David Niven as 007. The former would have brought the necessary guts, the latter the requisite charm.

But for an enduring, vodka martinisoaked franchise built on one man’s tightly wound toughness, womanizing charisma, tongue-in-cheek one-liners and exquisite tastes, Connery was the Fleming word made cinematic flesh.

Critics and superfans endlessly argue the merits of the various Bonds. Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan, Daniel Craig and even the one-time George Lazenby all have their respective strengths.

Inevitably, they bow to the archetypal Connery. His appeal, wrote John Cork and Bruce Scivally in “James Bond: The Legacy,” “comes not just from good looks, it comes from a particular confidence, a certainty within himself.” They added that he had “a natural, authoritative grace, which was at once seductive and intimidating.”

Connery was not originally made of such stuff. He had done solid work in “Darby O’Gill and the Little People” (1959) and, briefly, “The Longest Day” (1962), playing a British Tommy. However, when it came to personifying the ultrasophisticated lodestar of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, he was still “a pretty rough diamond,” as production designer Ken Adam put it. Born in the Edinburgh slums, Connery was full of raw material. Producer Albert Broccoli called him “ballsy”; his partner, Harry Saltzman, said that the man moved “like a big jungle cat.”

Bond buffs credit the director of his early films, Cambridge-educated Terence Young, for rounding Connery into shape. Although neither muscleman nor indiscriminate lover, Young (aka the “Bond Vivant”) had a taste for high living, big spending, bonhomie and forthrightness. “He was completely ruthless in a gentlemanly sort of way,” said stuntman George Leech.

Connery’s start as Bond was a tad tentative. In the initial 007 outing, “Dr. No”

(1962), his boss, M. (Bernard Lee), asks, “Does ‘toppling’ mean anything to you?”

Connery answers diffidently: “A little. It’s throwing the gyroscopic controls of a guided missile off balance with a ... a radio beam or something, isn’t it?” He even screws up his eyes briefly, trying to recall what the term means. When he dallies with M.’s secretary, Miss Moneypenny (Lois Maxwell), his flirting is a bit too studied.

Connery improves in “From Russia With Love” (1963). Outwitted by the covert SPECTRE operative Red Grant (Robert Shaw), he sheepishly admits missing a vital clue to his enemy’s identity. “Red wine with fish,” Connery says with a sigh. “Well, that should have told me something.” But within minutes he stabs and garrotes Grant in what Bond fans have called one of cinema’s most brutal family-friendly fights ever. A sweating Connery then adjusts his tie and retrieves a few trinkets, including stolen money from the corpse. The punchline: “You won’t be needing this ... old man.”

By “Goldfinger” (1964), Connery and the Bond persona have melded seamlessly in the outsize blueprint for all future classic Bond productions. In the short teaser, our hero blows up a heroin plant with plastic explosives, shucks his scuba suit to reveal a white dinner jacket (with red boutonniere), seduces a traitorous tarantella dancer in her bathtub and, after savage fisticuffs, electrocutes a would-be assassin by knocking him and a space heater into said tub.

Connery utters fewer than 75 words in about 4 1/2 minutes. But the last three (“Shocking ... positively shocking,” said with soft reprobation as the assassin slowly simmers), combined with Connery’s self-assured sexuality and knockabout confidence, release a loud laugh from moviegoers and get them hooked.

So second nature is the persona that when the heroin plant explodes, the man who invariably saves the world reacts merely with an expression of bored, silent amusement and removes his just-lit cigarette from his mouth.

Hence Tom Jones, as Bondish a title singer as you can get, could warble in the 1965 outing, “He always runs while others walk / He acts while other men just talk / He looks at this world and wants it all / So he strikes like Thunderball!”

Connery didn’t want to continue to strike like thunder or, for that matter, lightning.

Also, he wasn’t crazy about swimming with live sharks. The Bond films, he said, “don’t tax one as an actor. All one really needs is the constitution of a rugby player to get through 18 weeks of swimming, slugging and necking.” After the release of “Thunderball” he griped, “What is needed now is a change of course, more attention to character and better dialogue.”

The dialogue in what he thought was his last Bond film, “You Only Live Twice” (1967), was just fine. “I like sake ... especially when it’s served at the correct temperature, 98.4 degrees Fahrenheit, like this is.” But character got short shrift. Stuffed with sumo wrestling; trap doors; an autogiro equipped with flamethrowers and missiles; a piranha pool; and, of course, a rocket base hidden inside a volcano, “You Only Live Twice” wasn’t exactly an actor’s breakthrough.

By this time, Connery’s boredom and even annoyance were obvious. And so he famously quit the series. Except for “The Molly Maguires” (1970), his next few films were unremarkable. Things weren’t going exactly as the freed agent had expected.

So for $1.25 million, 10% of the gross and financing for two films of Connery’s choice, Eon lured him back for “Diamonds Are Forever.” Grayer, wiser and somewhat heavier, Connery nonetheless seems to enjoy himself in this bit of 1971 nonsense, reconciled to his increasingly cartoonish legacy.

Stuffing a deadly cassette tape into a startled Jill St. John’s bikini bottom, he quips, “Your problems are all behind you now.” One of the screenwriters, Tom Mankiewicz, said, “There was an old pro’s grace about him.”

A dozen years later he returned yet again, to the non-Eon production “Never Say Never Again.” It was a pallid remake of “Thunderball.” But, Steven Jay Rubin wrote in “The James Bond Movie Encyclopedia,” “When he’s onscreen, the movie works. Fortunately, he’s onscreen a lot.”

Connery once described the part that has now made him immortal as “a cross, a privilege, a joke, a challenge. And as bloody intrusive as a nightmare.” But for those who cannot get enough beluga caviar or Walther PPKs, it remains a dream. Sean Connery as James Bond is forever.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

21

Lil Wayne, latest rapper in Trump’s orbit, sees backlash over photo

By JOE COSCARELLI

F

or as long as Donald Trump has been a brand name — representing playboy bling and New York business savvy in the 1990s up through his freestyle approach to presidential politics today — he has flirted with hip-hop. Sometimes, famous rappers reciprocate.

Yet even for a man who once palled around Manhattan nightclubs with Puff Daddy and Russell Simmons, and later hosted Kanye West in the Oval Office, Trump can still surprise with his Black celebrity alliances, judging by the reaction Thursday night to a photo op with Lil Wayne.

“Just had a great meeting with @realdonaldtrump,” the multiplatinum rapper posted to his nearly 35 million followers on Twitter after the two posed together in Florida, earning a retweet from the president. “He listened to what we had to say today and assured he will and can get it done.”

The photo immediately went viral on social media, but the backlash was swift as well, making Lil Wayne the latest in a recent line of rappers to align themselves, however briefly, with the president’s reelection campaign, only to face criticism from fans and fellow artists. Lil Wayne, like Ice Cube before him, had cited the president’s Platinum Plan, a two-page document rolled out in September that promised to “increase access to capital in Black communities by almost $500 billion” over the next four years.

Radio host Charlamagne Tha God, of The Breakfast Club on Power 105.1 FM in New York, responded in a segment Friday morning, calling Lil Wayne’s apparent endorsement a distraction. While he noted that Black voters are not monolithic, Charlamagne added, “Trust me when I tell you, Black people are not on the Trump administration’s agenda, nor will we ever be. All of our civil liberties are at risk.”

Representatives for Lil Wayne did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. Previously, before the 2016 election, Lil Wayne had distanced himself from politics and the Black Lives Matter movement, saying he preferred to focus on music. Asked about Trump specifically, the rapper responded with a laugh: “Who’s that?”

Lil Wayne, shown performing in February, posted a photo of himself with President Trump on Thursday.

Earlier in October, New York rapper 50 Cent also seemed to endorse Trump in a post on Instagram, claiming that Joe Biden would raise taxes. “I don’t care Trump doesn’t like black people,” 50 Cent wrote.

“62% are you out of ya [expletive] mind.”

(Instagram marked the post as “missing context” and in need of a fact-check.) But the rapper soon walked back his support for Trump, and on Thursday, he reacted negatively to Lil Wayne’s political post.

“Oh no,” 50 Cent wrote Thursday evening. “I WOULD HAVE NEVER TOOK THIS PICTURE.” Ice Cube, a founding member of N.W.A, who released a song called “Arrest the President” as recently as 2018, faced similar scrutiny after it was announced in October that he had consulted with the Trump administration on the Platinum Plan. He said later that he hoped to work with both sides and was not endorsing Trump, adding, “I don’t trust none of them.”

“Black progress is a bipartisan issue,” Ice Cube said. “I will advise anybody on the planet who has the power to help Black Americans close the enormous wealth gap.”

Trump has called himself the best president for Black Americans since Abraham Lincoln, despite a questionable record on race, including his pronouncement that there were “very fine people on both sides” after white supremacists rioted in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. His campaign has said that it hoped to slightly improve on its performance with Black voters in 2016, when Trump earned about 8% of the Black vote. Of course, plenty of rappers have endorsed Biden, including Cardi B, Offset and Snoop Dogg, while others, like Waka Flocka Flame and Lil Pump, who is of Mexican and Cuban descent, have signaled an openness to supporting the president.

In an interview, writer, filmmaker and activist Dream Hampton called it “the

hubris of the celebrity” for rappers to “kind of saunter in during the fourth quarter, talking about making demands.” She noted that while Black men will still overwhelmingly vote for Democrats — Biden holds a 78-11 percentage point lead among Black men, according to a recent Times/Siena poll — a macho affinity for Trump and the allure of economic success could explain his inroads with a certain segment of the hip-hop community.

“It’s the same reason they were referencing him in the ’90s — it’s about the lie of the American dream,” she said. “It’s about the lie of Black entrepreneurship somehow being a panacea to these larger social problems. Hip-hop became a standin for that, lifting up individual Black accomplishment.”

“There are real reasons to criticize Joe Biden, even in this eleventh hour,” Hampton added. “But we” — Black activists and organizers — “were already doing that.”

22

Monday, November 2, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

As tropical destinations reopen, here’s what travelers need to know

To reopen to tourists, Jamaica created what it calls Resilient Corridors, with a northern one that includes Montego Bay.

By ELAINE GLUSAC

W

ith travel to much of the world from the U.S. still shut down, countries in the Caribbean and Latin America are counting on their relative proximity to the United States (meaning short flights) and appeal as outdoor destinations (meaning social distancing) to restart tourism.

“We have a very interesting competitive advantage in these COVID times because we have such a natural setting, with over 30% of our land surface as protected areas,” said Ivan Eskildsen, Panama’s minister for tourism. That country reopened its borders to Americans on Oct. 12.

Most of the newly reopened destinations are requiring visitors to show negative coronavirus test results before entry. That has airlines, as well as airport-based testing services, jumping in: American Airlines announced that it will offer preflight testing for travelers bound to the Bahamas, Costa Rica and Jamaica from some airports beginning in October.

If testing is not enough to reassure tourists, the countries are using tactics like restricting visitor numbers, limiting where they can go and requiring medical insurance.

Many of the region’s resorts and hotels are relying on an old-fashioned strategy: deals, from 20% off in Mexico to

room upgrades in Costa Rica. Resorts “are offering much more attractive rates, many discarding their three- to sixmonth cancellations and eliminating minimum stays,” said Jack Ezon, founder of Embark Beyond, a New York Citybased travel agency.

Here’s how five tropical countries are handling reopening. All but Mexico have received the World Travel & Tourism Council’s Safe Travel certification for implementing public health protocols, including hotel staff training in COVID-19 prevention.

The Bahamas: Triple testing Across the 700 islands of the Bahamas, new rules take a cautious approach to reopening, with the focus on testing: All travelers over age 10 must submit negative results from a coronavirus test taken no more than five days before arrival and apply for a visa at a government website that includes a health checklist. Travelers must “vacation in place” at their resort or rental for up to 14 days, a restriction that will be lifted Nov. 1.

After that, the negative test must be no more than seven days old, and visitors will be subject to a rapid antigen test on arrival (or at the Miami airport for American Airlines passengers). Anyone staying longer than four days will be subject to a second and final antigen test four days after arrival.

“We do hope these new protocols will afford peace of mind for travelers seeking to book a trip for the holidays and beyond,” Joy Jibrilu, director general of the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism & Aviation, wrote in an email.

Still, the Bahamas’ largest resorts, Atlantis Paradise Island and Baha Mar, as well as the islands’ Hilton Hotels, have not announced reopening dates. There are deals on offer at some hotels — Hotels.com has the all-inclusive Warwick Paradise Island at half off, for about $300 a night — but the choices are limited for now.

The Ocean Club, A Four Seasons Resort on Paradise Island, not far from the shuttered Atlantis, never closed during the pandemic, attracting travelers via private charter flights and yachts. The resort closed two of its three restaurants and offers private dining across its 36 acres. Occupancy at the 107-room hotel, where rooms start around $800, was close to 70% in summer.

“They’re here to celebrate being alive,” said John Conway, the resort’s general manager.

Costa Rica: Medical insurance required Costa Rica reopened for tourism this summer by welcoming travelers from Europe and Canada. In August and September, about 6,000 visitors arrived. By comparison, the country drew 3.1 million travelers in all of 2019 — but the government said Costa Rica had experienced no travelrelated coronavirus transmission.

“Basically, tourism is about a tenth of our economy,” said Gustavo J. Segura, Costa Rica’s tourism minister. “We really needed economic reactivation. Through this gradual process, we’ve been able to prove international travel is not a problem.”

While some Americans from lower-transmission states have been able to visit Costa Rica since September, starting Nov. 1, despite the fact that U.S. cases are rising, Costa Rica will welcome all American travelers.

The government requires all visitors to complete a Health Pass online, provide negative test results taken within 72 hours of arrival, and buy travel insurance from one of two local agencies to cover accommodation and medical

Costa Rica is depending on its reputation as an outdoors-friendly location to draw visitors again.

The San Juan Daily Star expenses if the traveler contracts the coronavirus (the cost depends on age and length of stay, but a 45-yearold staying two weeks will pay roughly $10 a day). Travelers with international insurance policies must provide certification from the insurer, uploaded to the Health Pass, that the policy is effective in Costa Rica and covers medical and lodging expenses related to the virus, for a total of about $50,000. After Oct. 26, a negative test was no longer required.

The country is relying on its reputation for naturebased tourism, from the volcanic interior to the coasts, to attract visitors. Of its hotels, 94% have 40 or fewer rooms, making it easier to avoid other guests.

Jamaica: Stay within the ‘corridor’ Jamaica was among the earliest of the Caribbean islands to reopen to tourism, on June 15, restricting travelers to what it called a Resilient Corridor between Negril and Port Antonio. Since then, it has periodically updated its entry policies, now requiring everyone age 12 and older to show negative test results taken no more than 10 days before arrival and to fill out a travel authorization form, which includes a health questionnaire.

There are now two Resilient Corridors, with the second running between Milk River and Negril. Businesses within these zones have all received government training in safe practices.

With business down about 60% islandwide through September compared to last year, hoteliers have relied on discounts and perks to fill rooms. CheapCaribbean. com currently has three nights at the all-inclusive Grand Palladium Jamaica Resort and Spa from $450 a person, including flights.

At boutique hotel Rockhouse in Negril, occupancy has run from 60% to 90% recently, and rooms currently start at $95.

“It’s still challenging even at these relatively good occupancy levels,” Paul Salmon, chairman of Rockhouse, wrote in an email. “Nevertheless, we have been able to reemploy our full team and have been able to maintain, even when closed down for three months, health benefits and weekly payments for everyone throughout the crisis.”

Mexico: Capping the numbers Though land borders remain closed to all but essential travel, destinations in Mexico are open to U.S. visitors arriving via air. Travelers are not required to show a negative COVID-19 test or produce proof of insurance.

Instead, the Mexican government has been setting capacity limits for each state, based on its assessment of new coronavirus cases, hospital occupancy and case rates, according to the U.S. Embassy & Consulates in Mexico. In the state of Quintana Roo, destinations like Cancún and the Riviera Maya are limited to 60% occupancy. In Baja Sur California, Los Cabos resorts recently lifted their occupancy limits to 50%. In the state of Jalisco, home to Puerto Vallarta, occupancy is capped at 50%, while next door in Nayarit, it is 30%.

Most tourism destinations have implemented public health protocols with social distancing and ample supplies of hand sanitizer.

In Los Cabos, masks are required in public, including when entering a beach. Restaurants and activities

Monday, November 2, 2020

In San Miguel de Allende, statues are sporting masks as a reminder to wear one in public. such as boat tours are limited to 50% capacity and subject to sanitation inspections. Clubs and discos remain closed, and there is an 11 p.m. curfew that applies to resort bars as well as public ones.

Infection rates “have been a flat line in September and October, and that is encouraging us to keep the very conservative approach,” said Rodrigo Esponda, managing director of the Los Cabos Tourism Board.

In Guanajuato, the town of San Miguel de Allende has underscored its public mask mandate by strapping masks on its public statues. Visitors must show a hotel or rental reservation to gain access to the city.

Across popular Mexican tourism destinations, hotel deals tend to prevail at larger resorts. Occupancy caps have helped keep the rates up at Cabo luxury resorts like Las Ventanas Al Paraiso, a Rosewood Resort, where rooms in November start at $845, but in the same month

23

TRAVEL

the Grand Fiesta Americana Los Cabos All Inclusive Golf & Spa is offering half-off rates starting at $375 a room.

High-end resorts like Chablé Yucatán in the state of Yucatán, where rooms start at $680, have survived on a steady stream of Mexican visitors, with October and November trending 30% better than last year, even before American Airlines flights from Miami resumed service into nearby Merida in October.

Panama: Maintaining curfew When Panama reopened to international visitors Oct. 12, it maintained its countrywide Sunday quarantine, kept its beaches closed and retained its Monday through Saturday curfew of 11 p.m. to 5 a.m.

Now the country has reopened its beaches and dropped the Sunday quarantine, though the curfew will remain in effect.

Before arriving, travelers must complete a health affidavit confirming that they are healthy, will provide lodging details and comply with local sanitary measures.

Upon arrival, visitors must show a negative coronavirus test taken within the prior 48 hours. Passengers who have not been tested will undergo a test at the airport at their own expense ($50). All travelers will be temperaturescreened, and those with high temperatures will also be tested. Those who test positive will be quarantined for seven days, paid for by the government, before another test is administered.

In Panama, face coverings are mandatory in public.

Restaurant tables are separated by 6 feet. Tour operators and attractions are limited to 50% capacity.

In the run-up to the holidays, boutique hotels were offering 10% off nightly rates, according to Hotels.com, while bigger all-inclusive resorts could be booked at nearly half off, with free cancellation.

Nassau-Paradise Island in the Bahamas, where visitors will be tested repeatedly to prevent spread of the coronavirus.

24 LEGAL NOTICE IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE TENTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT OF FLORIDA, IN AND FOR POLK COUNTY. In Re: Petition for Temporary Custody Of

SHERIANICK ZOE ROSADO REYES by

ANNIE CAST AING and JORGE ROSADO

and In Re: Petition for Temporary Custody of

KAMILA ANNIERICK ROSADO ORTIZ by

ANNIE CASTAING AND JORGE ROSADO

Case No.: 2020DR-000414.

SEC. 01. SECOND AMENDED NOTICE OF ACTION FOR TEMPORARY CUSTODY OF MINOR CHILD BY EXTENDED FAMILY.

To: Rose Marie Ortiz Urb. Bonneville Heights Calle Naranjito Numero 3 Caguas, Puerto Rico 00725

YOU ARE NOTIFIED that an action for Temporary Custody of Minor Children By extended family has been filed against you and that you are required to serve a copy of your written defenses, if any, to Petitioners, Annie Castaing and Jorge Rosado whose address is c/o Ira A. Serebrin, Esq. 2109 Combee Road, Lakeland, FL on or before December 14, 2020 and file the original with the Clerk of this Court, at Post Office Box Drawer CC-5 before service on Petitioner or immediately thereafter. If you fail to do so, a default may be entered against you for the relief demanded in the Petition. Copies of all court documents in this case, including orders, are available at the Clerk of the Circuit Court’s office. You may review these documents upon request. You must keep the Clerk of the Circuit Court’s office notified of your current address. (You may file Designation of Current Mailing and E-Mail Address, Florida Supreme Court Approved Family Law Form 12.915.) Future papers in this lawsuit will be mailed or emailed to the addresses on record at the clerk’s office.

Dated: 10/22/2020.

STACY M. BUTTERFIELD, CLERK OF COURT. By: Debra R. Reed, Deputy Clerk. ***

LEGAL NOTICE

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO.

BOSCO IX OVERSEAS, LLC BY FRANKLIN @

CREDIT MANAGEMENT CORPORATION AS SERVICER Plaintiff, v.

BENJAMIN RODRIGUEZ RODRIGUEZ; WALESKA SANTIAGO AGUILAR;

Defendant CIVIL NO. 19-cv-1092 (PAD).

COLLECTION OF MONIES AND FORECLOSURE OF MORTGAGE. JURY TRIAL DEMANDED. NOTICE OF SALE.

TO: BENJAMIN RODRIGUEZ RODRIGUEZ; WALESKA SANTIAGO AGUILAR; AND THE GENERAL PUBLIC

WHEREAS: On July 29, 2020, this Court entered Judgment in favor of Plaintiff, against Defendants. On September 1st, 2020, this Court entered Order for Execution of Judgment.

Pursuant to the Judgment, the Defendants were Ordered to pay Plaintiff the amount of $52,792.01 of principal of the said mortgage note, accrued interest at the annual rate of 7.125% which continues to accrue, plus fees, costs and any other amount expressly agreed upon in the mortgage deed, plus 10% for agreed upon attorneys’ fees in the amount of $7,300.00, plus all expenses and advances made by the plaintiff. WHEREAS: Pursuant to the terms of the aforementioned Judgment and the Order for Execution of Judgment thereof, the following property belonging to the Defendants will be sold at a public auction: RUSTIC: Portion of land located in Barrio Leguisamo, in the municipality of Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, with a surface area of one rope, equivalent to 3,930.39 square meters. On the border: to the North, with a plot of land segregated from the main property, but according to the plan, with land belonging to María Selectre, de Aurora vda. de Rivera and a public plot; to the South, with the remainder of the main property; to the East, with the road (352) but according to the plan, with the public plot; and to the West, with a stream and land belonging to the main property, but according to the plan, with the remainder. The property is recorded at page 113 of volume 1224 of Mayagüez, property number 38163, Registry of the Property of Puerto Rico, Section of Mayagüez. The property is located at: RD 352 KM. 3.3 Bo. Leguisamo, Mayagüez, PR 00680. WHEREAS: The mortgage that encumbers the above described property is described as follows: MORTGAGE: For the amount of $73,000.00 with

annual interest of 7.125%, in guarantee of a promissory note in favor of R&G Premier Bank of Puerto Rico or to order, due on September 1, 2038. According to deed #158 executed in Mayaguez on August 21, 2008 before Christian M. Castillo Moreno. Recorded pursuant to Law 216 of December 27, 2010, know as Property Registry Expediting Act on page 58 of volume 1530 in Mayaguez, 6th and last entry, dated December 11, 2012. WHEREAS: The property is subject to the following junior liens: Entry 2017-061803MY01, dated June 2, 2017: Filed and pending: Foreclosure Notice issued on Civil Case #ISCI2017-00043(206) on the First instance Court, Mayaguez Part pursued by Scotiabank de Puerto Rico (Petitioner) vs Benjamin Rodriguez Rodriguez, his wife Waleska Santiago Aguilar, and the community property regime instituted by both of them (Defendants). Petitioner requests payment of debt guaranteed by mortgage recorded on the 6th entry, amounting $73,000.00 reduced to $52,792.01, plus interests, and other amounts, or its settlement via public auction of the plot.

Potential bidders are advised to verify the extent of preferential liens with the holders thereof. It shall be understood that each bidder accepts as sufficient the title and that prior and preferential liens to the one being foreclosed upon, including, but not limited to any property tax, liens (express, tacit, implied or legal), shall continue in effect it being understood further that the successful bidder accepts them and is subrogated in the responsibility for the same and that the price shall be applied toward their cancellation. The present property will be acquired free and clear of all junior liens. WHEREAS: For the purpose of the first judicial sale, the minimum bid agreed upon by the parties in the mortgage deed will be $73,000.00, for the property and no lower offers will be accepted. Should the first judicial sale of the above described property be unsuccessful, then the minimum bid for the property on the second judicial sale will be two-thirds the amount of the minimum bid for the first judicial sale, or $48,666.66. The minimum bid for the third judicial sale, if the same is necessary, will be one-half of the minimum bid agreed upon the parties in the aforementioned mortgage deed, or $36,500.00. (Known in the Spanish language as: “Ley del Registro de la Propiedad Inmobiliaria del Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico”, 2015 Puerto Rico Laws Act 210 (H.B.

staredictos@thesanjuandailystar.com

2479), Articule 104, as amended). WHEREAS: Said sale to be made by the appointed Special Master is subject to confirmation by the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico and the deed of conveyance and possession to the property will be executed and delivered only after such confirmation. The records of the case and of these proceedings may be examined by interested parties at the Office of the Clerk of the United States District Court, Room 150 or 400 Federal Office Building, 150 Chardon Avenue, Hato Rey, Puerto Rico.

NOW THEREFORE, public notice is hereby given that the Special Master, pursuant to the provisions of the Judgment herein before referred to, will, on the 4th day of December 2020 at 10:30 am, in his offices located at Mayagüez Street #134, San Juan, Puerto Rico, in accordance with 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2001, will sell at public auction to the highest bidder, the property described herein, the proceeds of said sale to be applied in the manner and form provided by the Court’s Judgment. Should the first judicial sale set hereinabove be unsuccessful, the second judicial sale of the property described in this Notice will be held on the 11th day of December 2020 at 10:30 am, in the Office of the Special Master located at the address indicated above. Should the second judicial sale set hereinabove be unsuccessful, the third judicial sale of the property described in this Notice will be held on the 18th day of December 2020 at 10:30 am, in the Office of the Special Master located at the address indicated above. In San Juan, Puerto Rico, this 9th day of October 2020. Victor Encarnacion Pichardo, Appointed Special Master.

Monday, November 2, 2020 POSESION DE VEHICULO).

NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: ADALJOEL ANTONIO NEGRON MARTINEZ, SU ESPOSA FULANA DE TAL, Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

PEREZ VENTO y su esposa MAGALY MODESTA VALDES GARCIA , por si y como co-administradores de la SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES compuesta por ambos

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 22 de octubre de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 26 de octubre de 2020. En Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, el 26 de octubre de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, Secretaria. LILI RODRIGUEZ RODRIGUEZ , Secretaria Auxiliar.

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 29 de octubre de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 29 de octubre de 2020. En BAYAMON, Puerto Rico, el 29 de octubre de 2020.

F/LAURA I. SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria. MARILYN COLON LEGAL NOTICE CARRASQUILLO , Secretaria Auxiliar.

Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL LEGAL NOT ICE DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de PriEstado Libre Asociado de Puer- mera Instancia Sala Superior to Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL de CAROLINA. DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de PriORIENTAL BANK LEGAL NOTICE mera Instancia Sala Superior Demandante v.

Estado Libre Asociado de Puerde CAGUAS. LUIS ANTONIO to Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL ORIENTAL BANK DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de PriQUIÑONES VARGAS, Demandante v. mera Instancia Sala Superior ANNETTE MARIE ABREU JORGE WENCESLAO de BAYAMON.

AMERICAS LEADING FINANCE, LLC Demandante v.

ADALJOEL ANTONIO NEGRON MARTINEZ, SU ESPOSA FULANA DE TAL, Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

PEREZ VENTO y su esposa MAGALY MODESTA VALDES GARCIA y la SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES compuesta por ambos; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA

DIAZ Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES POR ESTOS COMPUESTA; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Demandado(a) Civil: Núm. CA2020CV01413.

SALA: 408. Sobre: SUSTITUCIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE Demandado(a) Civil: Núm. CG2020CV00534. SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD Demandado(a) (EJECUCION DE HIPOTECA ROE, PERSONAS Civil: Núm. BY2020CV01882.

POR LA VIA ORDINARIA). NOSALA 506. Sobre: COBRO DESCONOCIDAS QUE TIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA DE DINERO POR LA VIA ORSE DESIGNAN CON POR EDICTO. DINARIA Y EJECUCION DE ESTOS NOMBRES GRAVAMEN MOBILIARIO (RE- A: JORGE WENCESLAO

FICTICIOS, QUE

(787) 743-3346

The San Juan Daily Star PUEDAN SER TENEDOR O TENEDORES, O PUEDAN TENER ALGUN INTERES EN EL PAGARE HIPOTECARIO A QUE SE HACE REFERENCIA

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 26 de octubre de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 27 de octubre de 2020. En CAROLINA, Puerto Rico, el 27 de octubre de 2020.

LCDA. MARILYN APONTE RODRIGUEZ, Secretaria. F/ DAMARIS TORRES RUIZ, Secretaria Auxiliar.

neral en la isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia o Sentencia Parcial, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha 27 de octubre de 2020. En Caguas, Puerto Rico, el 27 de octubre de 2020. Carmen A. Pereira Ortiz, Secretaria Regional.

Eneida Arroyo Velez, Secretaria Auxiliar.

LEGAL NOTICE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior de CAROLINA.

ERIKA RIVERA HERNANDEZ Y OTROS Demandante v.

CLAUDIO RIVERA TURT T/C/C Y OTROS

Demandado(a) Civil: Núm. CA2019CV03727.

SALA 403. Sobre: NULIDAD DE INSTITUCION DE HEREDOS Y LIQUIDACION Y PARTICION DE HERENCIAS. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: CLAUDIO RIVERA TURT T/C/C CLAUDE LEGAL NOTICE RIVERA, GUADALUPE Estado Libre Asociado de PuerRIVERA TURT T/C/C to Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL GUADALUPE RIVERA; DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Pri9330 ARTESIA BLVD mera Instancia Sala Superior 7 BELLFLOWER, de Caguas.

CALIFORNIA, ESTADOS ORIENTAL BANK DEMANDANTE Vs UNIDOS 90706-6272; Y ADMINISTRACION FULANA DE TAL Y JUAN DE ASUNTOS DE DEL PUEBLO COMO VETERANOS JOHN DOE POSIBLES HEREDEROS Y RICHARD ROE DESCONOCIDOS.

DEMANDADO Civil Núm.: CG2020CV01553.

Sala: 801. Sobre: CANCELACION DE PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: JOHN DOE Y RIHCARD ROE

EL(LA) SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 27 de octubre de 2020 este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia o Sentencia Parcial en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación ge-

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 27 de octubre de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Re-

The San Juan Daily Star solución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 27 de octubre de 2020. En CAROLINA, Puerto Rico, el 27 de octubre de 2020.

LCDA. MARILYN APONTE RODRIGUEZ, Secretaria. MARICRUZ APONTE ALICEA, Sec Auxiliar.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE UTUADO.

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO Demandante Vs.

ELVIN L. NIEVES PÉREZ Y EFRAÍN NIEVES DE JESÚS

Demandados CIVIL NÚM.: UT2019CV00618.

SALÓN: SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

A) EFRAÍN NIEVES DE JESÚS

POR LA PRESENTE: Se le notifica que contra usted se ha presentado la Demanda sobre Cobro de Dinero de la cual se acompaña copia. Por la presente se le emplaza a usted y se le requiere para que dentro del término de TREINTA (30) días desde la fecha de la Publicación por Edicto de este Emplazamiento presente su contestación a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración 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 alegación responsiva en la Secretaría del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de Utuado, P.O. Box 2555, Utuado, Puerto Rico 006412555 y notifique a la LCDA. GINA H. FERRER MEDINA, personalmente al Condominio Las Nereidas, Local 1-B, Calle Méndez Vigo esquina Amador Ramírez Silva, Mayagüez, Puerto Rico 00680; o por correo al Apartado 2342, Mayagüez, Puerto Rico 0068 1-2342, Teléfonos: (787) 832-9620 y (845) 345-3985, Abogada de la parte demandante, apercibiéndose que en caso de no hacerlo así podrá dictarse Sentencia en Rebeldía en contra suya, concediendo el remedio solicitado en la Demanda sin más citarle

Monday, November 2, 2020

JUDICIAL DE BAYAMÓN TRI- Secretaria Regional. Sara Rosa SANDRA FELICIANO BUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTAN- Villegas, Sec Trib Con I. SUAREZ, IVAN CIA SALA DE GUAYNABO. LEGAL NOTICE LOPEZ MERCED, LA CONSEJO DE TITULARES SOCIEDAD LEGAL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DEL CONDOMINIO DE PUERTO RICO REGIÓN DE GANANCIALES BOULEVARD DEL RIO I, JUDICIAL DE BAYAMÓN TRICOMPUESTA POR Demandante v.

BUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANACOSTA, MARIA AMBOS, SUCESIÓN DE SANDRA FELICIANO CIA SALA DE GUAYNABO. LÓPEZ NEGRÓN & SANDRA FELICIANO SUAREZ, IVAN CONSEJO DE TITULARES LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL SUAREZ COMPUESTA LOPEZ MERCED, LA DEL CONDOMINIO DE GANANCIALES Demandados POR JANE Y JOHN SOCIEDAD LEGAL BOULEVARD DEL RIO I, COMPUESTA POR Civil Núm.: GB2020CV00536.

DOE, SUCESIÓN DE Demandante v.

DE GANANCIALES SALA: 201. Sobre:Cobro de DiAMBOS IVAN LÓPEZ MERCED SANDRA FELICIANO COMPUESTA POR nero (Procedimiento Ordinario).

DEMANDADOS COMPUESTA POR JANE AMBOS, SUCESIÓN DE EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICSUAREZ, IVAN CIVIL NÚM.: AG2019CV01676.

Y JOHN ROE, SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO. TO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE LOPEZ MERCED, LA SANDRA FELICIANO Demandados EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDIC- AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE SOCIEDAD LEGAL SUAREZ COMPUESTA DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS Civil Núm.: GB2020CV00536.

TO. DE GANANCIALES POR JANE Y JOHN A: Juan C. Amador López EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIA- SALA: 201. Sobre:Cobro de DiCOMPUESTA POR DOE, SUCESIÓN DE DO DE PUERO RICO. nero (Procedimiento Ordinario).

80 AVE MONTEMAR EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICAMBOS, SUCESIÓN DE IVAN LÓPEZ MERCED A: Jane y John Roe AGUADILLA, PUERTO SANDRA FELICIANO como posibles herederos TO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE COMPUESTA POR JANE RICO 00603-5586 AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE SUAREZ COMPUESTA Y JOHN ROE, desconocidos de la POR LA PRESENTE se le DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS Demandados POR JANE Y JOHN Sucesión de Iván López EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIAemplaza y requiere para que Civil Núm.: GB2020CV00536.

DOE, SUCESIÓN DE conteste la demanda dentro de Merced.

DO DE PUERO RICO. SALA: 201. Sobre:Cobro de Dilos treinta (30) días siguientes POR LA PRESENTE, se le A: Iván López Merced, nero (Procedimiento Ordinario). IVAN LÓPEZ MERCED a la publicación de este Edicto. notifica que se ha presentado por si y en representación EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDIC- COMPUESTA POR JANE Usted deberá presentar su ale- una Demanda en cobro de diY JOHN ROE, de la Sociedad Legal de TO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE gación responsiva a través del nero por la vía ordinaria, en la Demandados AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE Sistema Unificado de Manejo y cual la parte demandante alega Gananciales compuesta Civil Núm.: GB2020CV00536.

DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS Administración de Casos (SU- se le adeuda la cantidad de por éste y Sandra EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIA- SALA: 201. Sobre:Cobro de DiMAC), la cual puede acceder $5,905.82. Por consecuencia, Feliciano Suarez.

DO DE PUERO RICO. nero (Procedimiento Ordinario). utilizando la siguiente direc- se le emplaza y requiere para POR LA PRESENTE, se le EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICA: Jane y John Doe ción electrónica: https:///unired. que conteste dicha Demanda notifica que se ha presentado TO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se dentro de los treinta (30) días una Demanda en cobro de di- como posibles herederos AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE represente por derecho propio, siguientes a la publicación de nero por la vía ordinaria, en la desconocidos de la DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS en cuyo caso deberá presentar este Edicto, radicando su ale- cual la parte demandante alega Sucesión de Sandra EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIAsu alegación responsiva en la gación responsiva a través del se le adeuda la cantidad de DO DE PUERO RICO. Feliciano Suarez. secretaría del tribunal. Si usted Sistema Unificado de Manejo y $5,905.82. Por consecuencia, POR LA PRESENTE, se le A: Sandra Feliciano deja de presentar su alegación Administración de Casos (SU- se le emplaza y requiere para notifica que se ha presentado Suarez, por si y en responsiva dentro del referido MAC), al cual puede acceder que conteste dicha Demanda una Demanda en cobro de ditérmino, el tribunal podrá dic- utilizando la siguiente direc- dentro de los treinta (30) días representación de la nero por la vía ordinaria, en la tar sentencia en rebeldía en ción electrónica: https://unired. siguientes a la publicación de Sociedad Legal de cual la parte demandante alega su contra y conceder el reme- ramajudicial.pr/sumac/, salvo este Edicto, radicando su alese le adeuda la cantidad de Gananciales compuesta dio solicitado en la demanda o que se represente por derecho gación responsiva a través del $5,905.82. Por consecuencia, por esta e Iván López cualquier otro sin más citarle ni propio, en cuyo caso deberá Sistema Unificado de Manejo y se le emplaza y requiere para Merced. oírle, si el tribunal en el ejerci- presentar su alegación respon- Administración de Casos (SU-

ni oírle. EXPIRO BAJO MI FIR- DILLA. MA y el Sello del Tribunal hoy PR RECOVERY AND 17 de septiembre de de 2020.

DEVELOPMENT JV, LLC DIANE ALVAREZ VILLANUEDEMANDANTE Vs. VA, Secretaria Regional. BrenJUAN C. AMADOR da de Jesus Velez, Sec Auxiliar LÓPEZ; JOSE AMADOR del Tribunal I.

LEGAL NOTICE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior de Guaynabo.

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO Demandante v.

CARLOS C. CORTES CORIANO, FULANA DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Demandado(a) Civil: Núm. GB2018CV01169.

SALA 201. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO (PROCEDIMIENTO ORDINARIO). NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: CARLOS C. CORTES CORIANO, FULANA DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 16 de octubre de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 16 de octubre de 2020. En Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, el 16 de octubre de 2020.

LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria. F/MAIRENI TRINTA MALDONADO, Secretaria Auxiliar.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMEPA INSTANCIA CENTRO JUDICIAL DE AGUA-

25

cio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. El sistema SUMAC notificará copia al abogado de la parte demandante, el Lcdo. José F. Aguilar Vélez cuya dirección es: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00936-8518, teléfono (787) 993-3731 a la dirección jose. aguilar@orf-law.com y a la dirección notificaciones@orf-law. com. EXTENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Aguadilla, a Puerto Rico, hoy día 16 de octubre de 2020.

En Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, el de octubre de 2020. SARAHI REYES PÉREZ, Secretaria Regional. Arlene Guzmán Pabón, Secretaria Auxiliar del Tribunal.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO REGIÓN JUDICIAL DE BAYAMÓN TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE GUAYNABO.

CONSEJO DE TITULARES DEL CONDOMINIO BOULEVARD DEL RIO I, Demandante v.

SANDRA FELICIANO SUAREZ, IVAN LOPEZ MERCED, LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES

COMPUESTA POR AMBOS, SUCESIÓN DE SANDRA FELICIANO SUAREZ COMPUESTA POR JANE Y JOHN DOE, SUCESIÓN DE IVAN LÓPEZ MERCED COMPUESTA POR JANE Y JOHN ROE,

siva en la secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Guaynabo y enviando copia a la parte demandante: Lcdo. Israel O. Alicea Luciano, Número RUA: 16,267, Capital Center Building, South Tower, 239 Arterial Hostos Ave., Suite 305, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918-1476, teléfono (787) 250-1420, correo electrónico: israel_alicea@yahoo.com. Se le apercibe que si dejare de comparecer se podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra de acuerdo con la súplica de la demanda, conforme a lo establecido en la Regla 45 de Procedimiento Civil de 2009.

EXPEDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Guaynabo, Puerto Rico hoy día 13 de octubre de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. Sara Rosa Villegas, Sec Trib Con I.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO REGIÓN JUDICIAL DE BAYAMÓN TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE GUAYNABO.

CONSEJO DE TITULARES DEL CONDOMINIO BOULEVARD DEL RIO I, Demandante v.

que conteste dicha Demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de este Edicto, radicando su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Guaynabo y enviando copia a la parte demandante: Lcdo. Israel O. Alicea Luciano, Número RUA: 16,267, Capital Center Building, South Tower, 239 Arterial Hostos Ave., Suite 305, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918-1476, teléfono (787) 250-1420, correo electrónico: israel_alicea@yahoo.com. Se le apercibe que si dejare de comparecer se podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra de acuerdo con la súplica de la demanda, conforme a lo establecido en la Regla 45 de Procedimiento Civil de 2009.

EXPEDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en GuayLEGAL NOTICE nabo, Puerto Rico hoy día 13 ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO de octubre de 2020. LCDA. DE PUERTO RICO REGIÓN LAURA I SANTA SANCHEZ, MAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Guaynabo y enviando copia a la parte demandante: Lcdo. Israel O. Alicea Luciano, Número RUA: 16,267, Capital Center Building, South Tower, 239 Arterial Hostos Ave., Suite 305, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918-1476, teléfono (787) 250-1420, correo electrónico: israel_alicea@yahoo.com. Se le apercibe que si dejare de comparecer se podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra de acuerdo con la súplica de la demanda, conforme a lo establecido en la Regla 45 de Procedimiento Civil de 2009.

EXPEDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Guaynabo, Puerto Rico hoy día 13 de octubre de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. Sara Rosa Villegas, Sec Trib Con I.

POR LA PRESENTE, se le notifica que se ha presentado una Demanda en cobro de dinero por la vía ordinaria, en la cual la parte demandante alega se le adeuda la cantidad de $5,905.82. Por consecuencia, se le emplaza y requiere para que conteste dicha Demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de este Edicto, radicando su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Guaynabo y enviando copia a la parte demandante: Lcdo. Israel O. Alicea Luciano, Número RUA: 16,267, Capital Center Building, South Tower, 239 Arterial Hostos Ave., Suite 305, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918-1476, teléfono (787) 250-1420, correo electrónico: israel_alicea@yahoo.com. Se le apercibe que si dejare de comparecer se podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su

contra de acuerdo con la súplica de la demanda, conforme a lo establecido en la Regla 45 de Procedimiento Civil de 2009.

EXPEDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Guaynabo, Puerto Rico hoy día 13 de octubre de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. Sara Rosa Villegas, Sec Trib Con I.

LEGAL NOTICE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior de San Juan.

DLJ MORTGAGE CAPITAL, INC Demandante (a) Vs.

ANTONIO NICOLAS MOREDA TOLEDO; ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, DEPARTAMENTO DE HACIENDA, ORIENTAL BANK, CITIBANK N.A., JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO POSIBLES TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARE EXTRAVIADO

Demandado (a) Civil Núm.: SJ2019CV01521.

Sala: 506. Sobre: CANCELACION DE PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO POSIBLES TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARE EXTRAVIADO

EL SECRETARIO (A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 13 de octubre de 2020 este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los diez (10) días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 16 de octubre de 2020. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 16 de octubre de 2020. Griselda Rodriguez Collado, Secretario Regional. f/ María L. Tolentino Morales, Secretaria Reg. Aux.

26

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

AJ Hinch hired by Tigers after suspension for Astros cheating

By DAVID WALDSTEIN

W

hen A.J. Hinch was suspended and fired in January for his role in the Houston Astros’ signstealing scandal, Detroit Tigers Chairman Chris Ilitch wondered from afar if, and how, Hinch would be welcomed back into baseball after serving his penalty.

Ilitch did not wait long to find out.

It may take years for the stigma of one of the most infamous cheating scandals in sports to fade from Hinch, the manager of the 2017 Astros team that was found to have cheated on its way to a championship. But less than 30 minutes after Hinch’s season-long suspension from Major League Baseball officially expired with the end of the World Series on Tuesday night, he had been contacted by Detroit.

And less than 72 hours after that, Ilitch introduced Hinch as the Tigers’ 39th manager during a news conference at Comerica Park on Friday.

“This is a man who had learned and grown from the experience,” Ilitch said, “and that resonated with me.”

Hinch, along with Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow, was fired by the Astros after an investigation by Major League Baseball determined that players on the team had illegally used a video feed to steal signs from opposing catchers. Soon after that, MLB suspended Hinch and Luhnow.

In only his second interview since the suspensions were handed down in January, Hinch, 46, expressed contrition during the news conference on Friday, taking full responsibility for what happened.

“That is our reality,” he said, “because wrong is wrong, and it was very wrong, and I’ll make sure that everyone knows that I feel responsible. Because I was the manager and it was on my watch, and I’ll never forget it.”

In five seasons with Hinch as manager, the Astros went 481-329, winning the World Series in 2017 and the American League pennant in 2019. But in an article in The Athletic last November, former Astros pitcher Mike Fiers, now with the Oakland Athletics, detailed how players had illegally stolen signs from a video feed and then banged on trash cans in the

A.J. Hinch was suspended by Major League Baseball and then fired by the Houston Astros in January for his role in a sign-stealing scheme from 2017. dugout to signal to their teammates at the plate what pitch was coming.

Hinch was not found to be directly involved in the caper, and was said to have generally frowned on it. But the report said he did not put a stop to it or overtly express his displeasure. On Friday, he never deflected responsibility or tried to diminish his role.

“I understand how wrong it was, and I’m sorry for that,” Hinch said as he sat between Ilitch and Al Avila, the Tigers’ general manager. “I’ll never forget the feeling that I’ve had the past year as I’ve navigated this with my family. But you quickly get to the exciting time of getting back and leading a group of men again and establishing what Tigers baseball is going to be all about.”

This is the third managerial position for Hinch. He also managed parts of two seasons for the Arizona Diamondbacks, in 2009 and 2010.

Alex Cora, who was Hinch’s bench coach in 2017 and went on to manage the Boston Red Sox to the 2018 World Series championship, was also suspended

by MLB and fired by Boston for his role in the Astros’ 2017 scheme. Hinch’s return

to baseball could help provide a pathway for Cora to return to MLB as well, and he has been reported to be a candidate for the Red Sox’s open manager position.

The Tigers, who last won the World Series in 1984, have not reached the playoffs since 2014, and they needed a new manager after Ron Gardenhire retired in September.

Avila said Hinch’s work with young Astros stars like Carlos Correa, José Altuve and Alex Bregman had made him a strong candidate to lead and develop the Tigers. He told Hinch during the interview process that the Tigers were past the rebuilding stage, had moved into the building stage and were close to “getting into the fun, pretty soon,” as Hinch put it.

With the introductory news conference over, Hinch’s next challenge will be to address his tainted past with his new players, some of whom — especially pitchers — may have been victims of the Astros’ misdeeds.

“Those are tough conversations, and I will have them one by one,” he said, and added: “There is a clear message that that is part of my story and part of my career. It’s not a part of the

players that I am going to be managing.”

Hinch said he had spent a good deal of time over the past nine months reflecting on what had transpired in Houston.

He also said he had contracted the coronavirus in September and called the experience “scary.”

Teams were not allowed to engage in formal conversations with Hinch until his suspension was over, so he was counting down the final outs of the World Series on Tuesday night, waiting to begin the next chapter of his life.

“I was ready for the World Series to be over as soon as possible,” he said.

About 30 minutes after the final out, his phone rang. After talking with Avila, Hinch jumped on a plane to Detroit on Wednesday morning and went through interviews over the next two days. Ilitch sat in on the interviews, and at one point Avila told Hinch he had canceled Hinch’s flight back home so they could continue to talk, and they soon reached an agreement.

“I believe to my core that A.J. is going to conduct himself in the appropriate manner,” Ilitch said. “Beyond appropriate manner, in all regards.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

27

Meet the Ebony Anglers, five black women catching fish and stares

By JOHNATHAN ABRAMS

T

he shooting stars that illuminated the dark sky on the journey to deeper waters had given way to a crisp morning when Gia Peebles felt her fishing rod tense.

She gritted her teeth. Her adrenaline surged. She braced herself, gripped her rod tighter and started reeling, all while fighting the waves and current. After a few minutes of coaxing, she spotted rainbow scales glistening on a king mackerel as it neared the water’s surface.

The captain, David Stone, hooked the hefty fish, plucking it from the ocean and plopping it onto the Cay Sea May’s deck.

Cheers erupted. Peebles exhaled.

Look at him, he’s a fatty,” Tiana Davis said.

“He is a fatty,” Bobbiette Palmer said.

“That’s your name: Fatty.”

Fatty mounted a final stand, furiously flopping. “Tell ’em what you’re talking about,” Lesleigh Mausi said. “Tell ’em why you’re mad.”

Soon, the 26-foot boat raced back to shore with the group’s haul to be weighed in at Chasin’ Tails Outdoors Bait & Tackle.

The Atlantic Beach King Mackerel Fishing Tournament had stretched for three weeks.

But this, the final day of the tournament, marked the first time that the Ebony Anglers could sync their schedules and sink their lines together.

As the women walked from the dock to weigh in, a few bystanders cast curious glances. It was probably the first time any of them had come across a team of all Black women in the mostly white, mostly male world of competitive fishing.

It’s one reason Peebles, 49, formed the team. She did not fish until she met her husband, William Peebles, a couple of decades ago. But in college, she competed in the Women’s College World Series four times after becoming the first Black woman to earn a softball scholarship at Cal State Long Beach. So the mix of relaxation and spurts of intense focus in competitive fishing appealed to her.

In June, Peebles noticed a swarm of activity near a pier where she and her husband own an Emerald Isle condo. She watched as teams disembarked after com-

From left, Glenda Turner, Bobbiette Palmer, Gia Peebles and Tiana Davis, four of the five members of the Ebony Anglers fishing team, watched the sunrise during the 2020 Atlantic Beach King Mackerel Fishing Tournament. peting in the Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament. Some women exited the boats, but all of them, Pebbles noticed, appeared to be white. Many Black people, Peebles said, are not exposed to the nautical lifestyle, and the high cost of entry to competitive fishing is a significant deterrent.

She first called Mausi, 47, a longtime friend, about collaborating. The two had fished casually a few times, and Mausi’s father was a professional angler.

Just the thought gave Mausi goose bumps. She brought along Davis, 44, who also had fishing experience. They next asked Glenda Turner, 56, a nail technician at Peebles’ beauty salon, to join.

Palmer, 37, a model Peebles knew from styling her hair, rounded out the team. She initially laughed when Peebles asked her about fishing, thinking Peebles was joking. But Palmer agreed, deciding that she wanted to get out of isolation during the pandemic and try something new.

“We instantly developed a bond,” Palmer said. “We’re all organized in our own ways, and we fill each other’s gaps. Our strengths and weaknesses, they complement each other.”

Palmer’s previous boating experiences consisted of a couple of cruises that left her sick. Turner offered her a motion sickness patch, and Palmer pushed through early stomach-churning outings with the team.

By July, the team had entered its first

tournament, the Carteret Community College Foundation’s Spanish Mackerel & Dolphin Tournament in Morehead City.

That weekend, the Ebony Anglers caught a 48-pound king mackerel to claim first place in the division. (The fish, however, was listed at just 43.06 pounds on a handprinted board naming the top finishers.)

“It just catches some off guard that here we are,” Peebles said. “We’re not only female, but we’re Black. We’re competing, and we’re doing it well. We’re actually winning.”

Fatty was their largest catch at the Atlantic Beach King Mackerel Fishing Tournament, weighing 29 pounds. The winning team, Pirate’s Pleasure, topped the leaderboard with a catch of 41.61 pounds. The Ebony Anglers did not place, though the team took solace in knowing it had competed much less than many of the 150 other boats.

After weigh-in, Peebles and her husband took some of the fish to a market for filleting. They caught a nap before the team reconvened for the tournament’s awards banquet. For the first time, the Ebony Anglers met some of the other competing teams.

Kelly Albritton, a former bail bondsman in Kinston, N.C., claimed third place in the tournament with a 39.51-pound king mackerel. He said he recognized the Ebony Anglers from the

weigh-in and introduced himself while clutching his trophy.

He said he couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw the group of Black women.

“I saw y’all go by and I said, ‘Go to hell!’ I said: ‘There are those girls. I have to come over there and say hi.’ I wanna know the story.”

The women described their backgrounds, how the team had formed, how they had fared during the tournament.

“Twenty-nine?” Albritton, his mouth hanging open, asked with excitement when they told him the size of Fatty.

“This country belongs to all of us, and I’m just really glad you gals are here. I’m so excited that y’all are into fishing,” he said.

At one point in life, Mausi said, she would have taken offense to being referred to as “girl” or “gal.” Here, she said, most people know one another. Outsiders will draw double takes, especially a fishing team of Black women.

“I think I have to meet people where they are,” said Mausi, who is from Detroit.

“I felt good that he came and addressed us and just wanted to know more. And I think that that is what is going to be the turning point in our country, when people of different cultures aren’t afraid to approach one another and just say, ‘I want to learn more about you.’”

A man from California sent a voicemail message saying he wanted to take the team out to dinner and talk fish. Several women have sent messages, inquiring about becoming part of their team.

“You can’t just join the Carolina Panthers,” Mausi said, referring to the NFL team. “We’re not a club. We really want people to understand this is a sport. We’re athletes, and we’re competitive.”

They hope to use the tournament as a tuneup to compete in next year’s Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament, where Peebles envisions her journey coming full circle.

“Hopefully, people are seeing us step into an arena that’s normally considered to be dominated by white males and it can inspire others,” she said. “Hopefully, we are making an impact on a lot of people, and people of color and, in particular, women of color to know they can step out of their box and do something that they never thought that they could do.”

28

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

Herb Adderley, a Packers Hall of Fame cornerback, dies at 81

By RICHARD GOLDSTEIN

H

erb Adderley, the Hall of Fame cornerback who played for coach Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packer teams that won five NFL championships in the 1960s, including the first two Super Bowls, and then helped take the Dallas Cowboys to their first Super Bowl victory in franchise history, died on Friday. He was 81.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, announced his death. No details were provided.

When Adderley arrived at the Packers’ 1961 training camp as a first-round draft pick and a former all-Big Ten running back at Michigan State, he expected to be a backup for the Packer stars Jim Taylor at fullback and Paul Hornung at halfback, and that is what he became.

Going into the annual Thanksgiving Day game between the Packers and the Detroit Lions, he had not run from scrimmage all season.

But Lombardi, who saw Adderley as the best pure athlete on the team, finally gave him a chance — in the defensive alignment. He inserted Adderley, who had played some defense in college, at left cornerback in the second quarter when the Packers’ secondary, already short-handed, lost cornerback Hank Gremminger to an injury.

“I was in a state of shock,” Adderley told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel long afterward. “I was shaking and nervous.

I had no time to ask anybody any questions. I didn’t know what I was doing.”

Nonetheless, he intercepted a fourthquarter pass from the Detroit Lions’ Jim Ninowski, helping the Packers rally for a 17-9 victory. In December, the Packers won their first NFL championship under Lombardi, routing the New York Giants, 37-0.

Adderley played for nine seasons with the Packers and three for the Cowboys. He had speed and decent enough size for a cornerback of his time, at 6-foot-1 and 205 pounds, and he intercepted 48 regular-season passes, running seven of them back for touchdowns. He took an interception 60 yards for a score when the Packers defeated the Oakland

Raiders in Super Bowl II. Adderley was selected for the NFL’s all-decade team of the 1960s, playing on a defense that included the future Hall of Famers Willie Wood at safety, Willie Davis at end, Henry Jordan at tackle and Ray Nitschke and Dave Robinson at linebacker. (Wood died in February at 83, and Davis died in April at 85.)

Adderley was an outstanding kickoff returner as well. He ran the ball back 103 yards against the Baltimore Colts and took another kickoff for a 98-yard score against the Los Angeles Rams.

He was among only a few Black players on the Packers when he joined the team. When the Packers faced the Washington Redskins in a 1961 preseason game in Columbus, Ga., where hotels were segregated, the entire team stayed at Fort Benning, an Army base. As Adderley recalled, Lombardi said, “I’d rather be here with all my players than be split up somewhere else.’”

Adderley said that landlords would not rent to the Packers’ Black players when he was a rookie, leaving him to live with Davis and running back Elijah Pitts in what he called a “shack” on the outskirts of Green Bay. Lombardi met with real estate agents after that, Adderley recalled, and “the following year, it was different. We had decent housing. He opened a lot of doors for Black folks and Black families — many that had nothing to do with the Packers.”

Herbert Allen Adderley was born in Philadelphia on June 8, 1939, the son of Charles and Rene Adderley. His father was a factory machinist. Herb was a multisport athlete at Northeast High School.

Playing for three seasons at Michigan State, he gained more than 800 yards rushing and was a pass-catching threat. The Packers selected him as the 12th overall pick in the 1961 NFL draft.

The Packers traded Adderley to the Cowboys in September 1970. He teamed with the future Hall of Famer Mel Renfro at cornerback when Dallas lost to the Baltimore Colts in the Super Bowl after the 1970 season and then defeated the Miami Dolphins in the next Super Bowl.

(A member of that Colts team, wide receiver Jimmy Orr, died on Tuesday.)

Herb Adderley during Super Bowl I in 1967 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where the Packers played against the Kansas City Chiefs. He played in the first two Super Bowls, both won by Green Bay. Adderley retired after the 1972 season with 1,046 yards in interception returns and 3,080 yards in kickoff returns.

In October 1984 he attended the Packers’ first full-scale reunion for players from the 1966 team, which defeated the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl I. “As far as I’m concerned I never played for the Dallas Cowboys,” he was quoted as saying in “Distant Replay” (1985), by former Packer guard Jerry Kramer and sports writer Dick Schaap, in telling of that gathering. “I’m the only guy in the country who has a Dallas Cowboys Super Bowl ring and doesn’t even wear it.”

Adderley’s survivors include his wife, Brenda, the Hall of Fame said.

After his playing days, Adderley owned a Philadelphia-based company that laid television cable lines around the country.

He was the lead plaintiff in a 2007 federal lawsuit against the NFL players’ union filed on behalf of 2,056 retired players who contended that the union had improperly failed to include them in marketing deals. The suit resulted in a $28.1 million judgment against the union; after the verdict was appealed, the retirees settled for a $26.25 million payout.

Robinson, the Packers’ left linebacker of the 1960s, once recalled Adderley’s combativeness, which could extend to confronting an opposing coach.

“Herb didn’t forget anything,” Robinson was quoted as saying on the Packers’ website. “He took everything personal. One time in Baltimore, Don Shula yelled at him from the sideline after a tackle, and Herb told Shula to put on a uniform and he’d hit him the same way.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

29

Sudoku How to Play: Fill in the empty fields with the numbers from 1 through 9.

Sudoku Rules: Every row must contain the numbers from 1 through 9 Every column must contain the numbers from 1 through 9 Every 3x3 square must contain the numbers from 1 through 9

Crossword

Answers on page 30

Wordsearch

GAMES

HOROSCOPE Aries

30

(Mar 21-April 20)

Push all other matters aside and you will be able to make a big dint in your pile of neglected chores and correspondence. It will be good to get back on top of things and to feel as if you’re back on track. As you move forward, don’t spend as much time on trivial concerns that give you no satisfaction.

Taurus

Gemini

(May 22-June 21)

You were expecting to feel more active and alert. It will be a disappointment therefore to find that you don’t have the energy to complete a task as quickly as you had hoped. Is it time to start thinking about taking better care of yourself? If you have got into any bad habits, make a resolution to quit these now.

Cancer

(June 22-July 23)

A partner or friend’s negative attitude is causing you too many problems. You’re tired of being in their company when all they do is complain and criticise. Mixing with cheerful people will lift your mood. Think about taking more exercise. Altering your daily routine will help keep you positive.

(July 24-Aug 23)

This isn’t a good time to ignore financial matters. If you’re struggling with debt, formulate a plan for paying it off. If you’ve kept up a subscription to a group or club you no longer bother with, cancel it. Bring security to the forefront of your mind and start watching your spending.

Virgo

Libra

(Sep 24-Oct 23)

Many of your friends are getting together in an event you would normally be excited about.

You don’t want to miss out but you’re wary of crowds. If there is reassurance that all safety measures are in place and will be followed, you might be persuaded to join them. Go with your instincts.

(April 21-May 21)

After some deep thought and careful assessment, a relationship or commitment will take on a new meaning. You’re doing some serious thinking. In this be careful not to be too critical of yourself. You may be seeing some aspects of your life differently now but it is natural that your outlook can change when new opportunities arise.

Leo

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

(Aug 24-Sep 23)

You’re ready to ease away from responsibility and into a more relaxed frame of mind. If someone is standing in your way of this intention, whether it is your boss, a workmate or a relative, you won’t feel any guilt about letting them know your plans. You’ve worked hard and you deserve a rest.

Scorpio

(Oct 24-Nov 22)

A challenge you take on will bring out the best in you. There is a fair amount of turmoil you will have to get through before results are seen. Persevere and you will be glad you did because even after some doubt about it, things will turn out for the best.

Sagittarius

(Nov 23-Dec 21)

Capricorn

(Dec 22-Jan 20)

Draw on your leadership qualities to help organise the work of a team. Even if you do happen to be a new member, people will be glad of your help to get things moving. Changes happening in your household will need some sorting through in your mind before you can work out how you feel about these.

New group and social commitments are starting to take up more of your time. Your happy and gregarious spirit will inspire others to get involved in community work. You share other people’s excitement about a project that’s attracting a lot of attention and you’re determined to make a success of this venture.

Aquarius

(Jan 21-Feb 19)

Changes occurring in your career will impact your family life and close relationships. You hadn’t realised how decisions recently made would affect other people. Before going any further you need to do some quiet thinking.

You want to feel certain about what is happening in this new phase of your life.

Pisces

(Feb 20-Mar 20)

Uncertain times are testing even for the most experienced. There may be a need to reorganise the logistics of a team project or community event. A postponement is causing major disruption to some carefully made plans. It may be that you will have to wait some time before you see some ideas being turned into reality.

Answers to the Sudoku and Crossword on page 29

Monday, November 2, 2020

31

CARTOONS

Herman

Speed Bump

Frank & Ernest

BC

Scary Gary

Wizard of Id

For Better or for Worse

The San Juan Daily Star

Ziggy

32

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, November 2, 2020

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