Monday Sep 21, 2020

Monday, September 21, 2020

San Juan The

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Star

How ‘Goodfellas’ Changed Hollywood

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What Puerto Ricans Stand to Lose with Justice RBG’s Passing González Colón’s Economic Plan Unveiled P4 Fingers Crossed: SEC Sends Ballots to Printer P5

Photo: T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York Times

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The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

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September 21, 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.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death leaves a vacancy on US Supreme Court. Here’s why Puerto Ricans should care

Today’s

Weather

By PEDRO CORREA HENRY Twitter: @PCorreaHenry Special to The Star

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INDEX Local 3 Mainland 7 Business 11 International 14 Viewpoint 18 Noticias en Español 19 Entertainment 20

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s the United States Supreme Court announced on Friday that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had passed away due to metastatic pancreatic cancer at the age of 87, her death has set the stage for a titanic political fight as it could shape high court determinations on reproductive rights, voting rights, civil liberties, LGBTQIAP+ issues and other matters that could affect generations to come.

Even though Bader Ginsburg’s last wish before her passing was that her successor would be chosen by the nation’s next president, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged earlier to President Donald Trump a swift vote for the next Supreme Court nominee, after saying back in February 2016 that a “vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president” after refusing to allow the Senate to vote on Barack Obama’s nominee Merrick Garland. Now, what implications does this determination have for Puerto Rico?

On one hand, former Puerto Rico Bar Association President Ana Irma Rivera Lassen told the Star that, for Puerto Rico, Bader Ginsburg’s death will have a great effect on Puerto Rico’s “colonial political-legal relationship and every other community where her opinion had an impact” as the next appointee might generate an “imbalance as her seat might be [filled] by a much more conservative person.”

The attorney said the pending determination might not only put voter distribution measures, reproductive rights and LGBTQIAP+ welfare in turmoil, but might also diminish the concepts of affirmative action for racial equality and against any other type of discrimination.

“Affirmative action recognizes that not everyone has equal access [to civil rights]. Everyone has the right to education, but not everyone has equal access to it; on many occasions, you would like to enroll in this school or that university, but they’re not available for you economically. Institutions could use affirmative action in order to provide equal access to everyone,” Rivera Lassen said. “Affirmative action is a very important tool [in the fight] for racial equality and every other variation of discrimination against vulnerable communities and identities. If the people who can use such a tool seem to be dwindling, I consider that this could get into controversies as we might see cases going to the U.S. Supreme Court so they rule against them.”

Meanwhile, Rolando Emmanuelli Jiménez called Bader Ginsburg’s death an “irreparable loss for rights in both the mainland and Puerto Rico” and told the Star that even though he doesn’t expect immediate changes in acquired rights as the U.S. Supreme Court can determine minimum requirements, Puerto Rican courts can establish additional prerogatives to enacted rights.

“The next appointee has to be [extremely] reluctant to consider eliminating the right to an abortion or recent rights enacted for the gay community, I don’t see that as I could see a civil war happening,” Emmanuelli said.

“Where I do see an impact is that Puerto Rico is under a stormy political process with the imposition of the PROMESA [Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act] law; there are many cases that could arrive at the Supreme Court and obviously, with a[nother] conservative vote on Puerto Rican issues, I don’t anticipate anything positive. We have to see the trajectory of the nominee that the president might end up choosing, but the person who gets appointed has some big shoes to fill.”

Rivera Lassen urged citizens to stay alert on the Supreme Court nominees and demand transparency during the pending appointment. Meanwhile, Emmanuelli told the press that citizens should stay calm as he used Chief Justice John Roberts, a known conservative, as an example of a judge who has ruled in favor of progressive measures since he was appointed in 2005.

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Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

González Colón unveils her economic development program

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

R

esident Commissioner Jenniffer González Colón unveiled part of her agenda Sunday for promoting the economic development of Puerto Rico in what would be her second four-year term in the United States Congress, targeting manufacturing, making the exemption from air transshipment rules permanent, and inclusion of the island in federal programs and funds, in addition to breaking down trade barriers.

“The best economic development plan that Puerto Rico has is statehood, and to open the way to it, we are working on a concerted strategy in various forums and areas,” González Colón said. “These proposals complement very well what would be our union with the United States. They are focused on bringing jobs here now, in the medium and long term, more investment here, more opportunities here, more creativity here, more aid here.”

Last Friday, President Donald Trump stated in a press conference that he planned to bring back “medical distribution and manufacturing to Puerto Rico at a much greater level than it had before.” That same day, he allocated an additional $10.2 billion for the reconstruction of the electrical grid on the island and more agreements are being negotiated to improve the infrastructure necessary to house the aforementioned industries.

“The [overall] $12.8 billion announced by the White House will upgrade our electrical distribution system and put us in a position of being more competitive, particularly in the area of pharmaceutical production,” González Colón said.

The resident commissioner also announced that the U.S. Department of Defense has awarded a $10 million contract to an industry on the island to produce medical equipment related to COVID-19. In August, Trump signed an executive order to increase domestic production of

essential medical supplies and eliminate dependence on drug production in foreign jurisdictions, such as China.

González Colón said the actions show the favorable environment regarding the island’s role in the national supply chain as well as her effectiveness in the U.S. capital as, since she was sworn in as a congresswoman, she has been working to maintain and increase the solidity of the pharmaceutical and manufacturing industries on the island.

Since last year, González Colón has advocated for the domestic production of pharmaceutical products being considered a matter of national security. And since February, she has focused her efforts on making Puerto Rico the national headquarters for the manufacture of medical supplies, she said.

Her efforts include filing her own legislation and, having joined other bills that would seek the same objective, she has won support in the House and Senate, and has presented initiatives in this area before the White House, in hearings and meetings in Congress and before various economic groups on the island.

“We cannot risk [losing] the progress we have made in directing the solidification of our economy based on a manufacturing industry,” the resident commissioner said.

“The progress we have made has been with hard work and a joining of wills. It cannot be spoiled; we must continue so that people here have real opportunities for progress.

We cannot break down to start from scratch. This is not the time to go back to the past; now we are building the future.”

González Colón promoted her MMEDS Act bill, which she considers comprehensive because it seeks to benefit Puerto Rico and any other area in the United States that is economically depressed. Under the legislation, the federal government would grant tax credits to manufacturers in exchange for their investment in the community so that good jobs are created and maintained. The initiative, the resident commissioner said, is the opposite of corporate maintenance whereby loans are given to companies without

requiring them to invest in their home base.

As an example of the excellence of the resources on the island, the resident commissioner highlighted the recognition of Coca Cola Puerto Rico Bottlers with the Coca Cola North America President’s Award for its excellence in the quality of its work, and the recent approval granted by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to the only pharmaceutical company led by women in the nation, GK Pharmaceuticals in Manatí, of an emergency use authorization for the production of one of the components of COVID-19 detection tests. González Colón noted that the authorization was obtained largely through her efforts.

The resident commissioner also seeks to ally the University of Puerto Rico, the island government and manufacturing companies to create what has been called a manufacturing board to develop intellectual property such as patents, something that will have an impact in the medium and long terms, which in turn will help with talent retention.

Intellectual property rights would be retained by the local government to use as incentives for further research.

To carry out this initiative, work would be done so that different universities in Puerto Rico are accessing federal funds to increase the capacity of their research and development centers.

One of González Colón’s commitments was to obtain an exemption from the air transshipment rules, which allows foreign airlines to conduct certain cargo and passenger transfer services at international airports in Puerto Rico.

This makes the island more attractive and competitive for doing business.

González Colón also announced that she will be promoting a transition from the Nutritional Assistance Program (PAN by its Spanish acronym) to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) since the nearly 1.5 million participants in PAN in Puerto Rico receive about 30 percent less in monthly benefits compared to the participants in SNAP, the program that applies in the states.

Luis Gutiérrez: Trump thinks Puerto Ricans are stupid

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

F

ormer Illinois congressman Luis Gutiérrez says President Donald Trump’s release of $13 billion to Puerto Rico for infrastructure and schools announced last Friday shows that Trump thinks that Puerto Ricans are too stupid to see that he is trying to buy them off.

“After Hurricane Maria Trump went to Puerto Rico and said Puerto Ricans are lazy and want the government to do everything for them, then he said he wanted to trade Puerto Rico for Green-

land, saying Puerto Rico was too poor,” Gutiérrez told the San Juan Daily Star. “Now his giving these $13 billion shows that he thinks Puerto Ricans are stupid.”

No Republican candidate in the past 96 years has won the U.S. presidency without winning Florida. And Puerto Ricans, more than one million of them, could be the voting bloc that decides who wins the state on Nov. 3.

But Democratic presidential candidate Joseph Biden is not likely to visit the island before election day, Gutiérrez said.

“I think it’s all about Florida, Florida, Florida. It’s all about mobilizing support there” said Gutiérrez, who visited the island last week. “There will be plenty of time to visit the island after the election.”

The former Democratic congressman from Puerto Rico said Florida isn’t the only state where the Puerto Rican diaspora could make the difference.

“Puerto Ricans can play a very instrumental role in Pennsylvania,” he said. “There is a very well established Puerto Rican community of hundreds of thousands.”

Biden came out with a program for Puerto Rico last week. First, he said Puerto Rico’s $72 billion debt should be audited.

“We have to find out exactly who benefited from getting us into such a bind,” Gutiérrez said.

Biden also said he would change the composition of the Fi-

nancial Oversight and Management Board (FOMB).

“Why do we have a law like PROMESA [the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act of 2016] that sets up a fascist economic regime with a board that looks out for the interests of the financial sectors they come from?” the former congressman said.

Biden has promised to put representatives from unions and teachers and other underrepresented sectors on the board, Gutiérrez said.

“PROMESA is absolutely ripe for re-examination. The right of a community to self-govern is at stake,” said Rhode Island Secretary of State Nellie Gorbea, who is of Puerto Rican extraction and is the first Latina elected to state government in Rhode Island. She is also on Biden’s Latino advisory board.

Biden also promised to create a commission on Puerto Rican affairs that reports directly to the White House.

“Biden has laid out a very compelling program to improve infrastructure and housing [on the island],” Gorbea said. “I’m excited that Puerto Rico is finally getting the attention it deserves, generating interest and turning out.”

The Rhode Island secretary of state added that the COVID-19 pandemic is a “gamechanger.”

“The pandemic has allowed us to really broadcast the variety of ways you can vote,” she said.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

5

Delgado forms labor affairs and legislation review committee

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

P

opular Democratic Party (PDP) candidate for governor Carlos “Charlie” Delgado Altieri on Sunday announced the creation of the Committee on Labor Affairs and Legislation Review, which will be in charge of transforming the laws that affect workers in the public and private sectors if Delgado is elected in November.

“This committee will hold meetings with the labor sector, organizations and associations of public and private managerial employees,” Delgado said during a press conference at the offices of the Independent Union of Industrial Development Employees in Hato Rey. “Its task will be to work on proposals to review, repeal, replace and amend labor laws that have shown that they do not benefit in the creation of jobs and violate the rights of workers. In addition, it will collaborate in the drafting of public policy with respect to our pensioners and any other sector that provides benefits to the communities.”

Delgado said the committee will also interact with business organizations in search of consensus in the drafting of the necessary bills to be filed at the start of the upcoming four-year term.

The PDP gubernatorial candidate announced that the committee will be made up of Frank Zorrilla, Ruy Delgado Zayas and union leaders Javier López López, Pedro Irene Maymí and Luisa Acevedo Zambrano.

Delgado said that if elected governor he will eliminate the so-called labor reform approved by the current New Progressive Party administration.

“I am going to reverse these extreme measures against the working class to adequately, efficiently and urgently provide the necessary funds for working people,” the candidate said. “The Second Transformation of Puerto Rico will be guided by social justice. Today unemployment has skyrocketed and the labor participation rate has dropped significantly. The misnamed ‘labor reform’ that this administra-

tion established in 2017 generated a decline in job creation and left the working class condemned to terrible working conditions, capriciously eliminating labor rights and harming the quality of life of thousands of workers and job applicants. A job, a well-paid job with benefits, is the best way to attack the country’s social problems.”

As part of his plan for improving working conditions and creating well paying jobs, Delgado said he will implement integrated strategies for the economic development of the island such as transforming the educational system to focus on entrepreneurship and trade; to implement an aggressive plan to attract manufacturing that has been, he said, attacked by the current administration, and create the Puerto Rico Economic Development Council, which will be in charge of implementing an economic development plan for the years 2021-2030, among other measures.

During the press conference, Delgado also announced the appointment of Rep. Carlos Bianchi as the new secretary general of the PDP. “I appreciate the availability of Carlos Bianchi to undertake this task as general secretary of our community,” Delgado said. “I know about your commitment to our causes of social justice on which our party was founded. We will work together for the well being of Puerto Rico.”

SEC sends election ballot documents to the printers. (Let’s hope for the best)

By THE STAR STAFF

S

tate Elections Commission (SEC) Chairman Francisco Rosado Colomer says all files have been delivered to begin producing and printing the ballots for Puerto Rico’s 2020 general elections.

The process began over the weekend, the SEC official said Sunday.

“The final version of the voting ballots in electronic format were delivered to the SEC by Dominion Voting Systems on September 18,” Rosado Colomer said in a written statement. “On Saturday, the ballots were uploaded to the

printer’s server along with the distribution file. The Office of Information Systems and Electronic Processing … was in charge of this work, but not before carrying out validation tests and integration of results files between the Electronic Scrutiny System and the Results Receipt and Disclosure System. Dominion and Rock Solid were involved in these tests.”

Rosado Colomer congratulated the SEC’s work team involved in the preparation of the electronic files of the ballots for complying with the delivery within the scheduled date, and the Administrative Board of Absentee Voting because it also sent a total of 438 notifications to download ballots to active voters covered by the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act. “Being able to complete this process on time allows us to demonstrate to the people of Puerto Rico our commitment to complying with the mandate of the law that establishes November 3 as the day of the 2020 General Elections,” the SEC chief said. “The officials of the Commission and the Electoral Commissioners are people committed, not only to the electoral system for which they feel great pride, [but] also to the institutional mission of guaranteeing all voters their right to vote equally, secretly, directly, freely and democratically through a transparent and efficient

process that continues to reaffirm the trust of our people in the electoral process.”

José Santana, manager of the Printech Plant, said the ballot printing jobs were slated to start Sunday.

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Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

PR entertainment industry on ‘red alert’ as artists demand financial aid amid pandemic

By PEDRO CORREA HENRY Twitter: @PCorreaHenry Special to The Star

“A

rts and entertainment are things that the country needs. The people’s mental health is in a precarious condition at this time and for this reason, we are bringing light to this crisis so the government will take care of it,” said Puerto Rico Public Event Producers Association (COPER by its Spanish acronym) President Nelson Torres Castro on Sunday as the local events industry demanded financial aid for more than 30,000 artists along with prompt action on a reopening plan that includes adequate public health guidelines.

Torres told the Star that the industry has joined with the International United Events Workers Movement (MUTE by its Spanish acronym) to urge the government to regularize work in the cultural sector in an appropriate way and to take steps to alleviate the serious situation cultural workers have been confronting since March. Last Thursday, artists began to gather at José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum Square in Hato Rey on “red alert” as 90 percent of the industry’s members are self-employed and are still waiting for unemployment aid.

“We have focused our demands in two directions. We submitted two plans to the Puerto Rican government: a recovery plan and a reopening plan. I mentioned the recovery plan first as we request a swift answer from the government.

Our recovery plan proposes that the government, with the Treasury Department, identify financial aid, incentives and rescue funds for the 45 specialties that our entertainment industry includes,” Torres said. “This is an industry that has lost over $156 million in six months and generates over $2.1 billion a year for our local economy.”

The COPER president said the reopening plan proposes safety protocols against the spread of coronavirus infections and would “bring back confidence on the part of the public” to attend entertainment shows, which have been shut down for six consecutive months. Likewise, Torres told the Star that ever since Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced announced that public events could be reincorporated gradually with gubernatorial approval, COPER has been holding conversations with La Fortaleza Chief of Staff Antonio Pabón Batlle and Economic Development and Commerce Secretary Manuel Laboy in order to analyze the proposals it has submitted since May. “I will meet with both secretaries in order for them to be intermediaries, to be enablers, to develop a uniform metric plan so that, by the time they consider a proposal, that proposal will comply with the government’s vision and we can take a step forward toward uniformity and swiftness,” Torres said. “Also, I would like to gather what plans the gubernatorial candidates have in store for the local arts, culture and entertainment in their government plans as we have to know what is in store for our industry when the next governor arrives in January.”

Last Thursday, artists gathered at José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum Square in Hato Rey on “red alert” as 90 percent of the industry’s members are self-employed and are still waiting for unemployment aid.

MUTE was created in Spain with the aim of uniting all those affected by the situation experienced by workers in the arts and culture in all parts of the world. In the case of Puerto Rico, the industry is demanding that the government immediately activate a recovery plan for the entertainment sector and begin implementing economic aid and incentives for its workers.

Waste-to-energy developer asks Judge Swain to reconsider ruling on PREPA agreements

By THE STAR STAFF

T

he developer of a waste-to-energy (WTE) plant planned for Arecibo wants U.S. District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain to reconsider last week’s ruling allowing the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) to reject some 27 power purchase operating agreements (PPOAs).

EIF PR Resource Recovery LLC (EIFPR) argued that the waste-to-energy project is a project that addresses the solid waste crisis that currently exists in Puerto Rico with the lack of legally compliant solid waste alternatives and the need for baseload types of energy sources for PREPA. When the project was seeking permits, it was opposed by various environmental groups.

PREPA filed the petition recently, arguing that the 27 PPOAs had not yet started or were too cumbersome for the utility. On Sept. 17, Swain issued an order in favor of PREPA’s petition after announcing it at a hearing the day before.

As part of its efforts to protect its proprietary rights as lender of the WTE project and with the intent of making it feasible for development, EIFPR said it had filed related reconsideration requests before the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau (PREB) and the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico.

On Aug. 24, the PREB issued a resolution on the Integrated Resource Plan in which it rejected the WTE plant. On Sept. 11, EIFPR and its collateral agent, V-Financial LLC filed a motion for reconsideration.

“The WTE project is based on state-of-the-art facilities that incorporate and utilize the Best Available Control Technology as defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) for the recovery of energy from non-hazardous solid wastes, thereby reducing the dependency on fossil fuel, in addition to reducing emissions of atmospheric contaminants,” the developer said in its petition.

The proposed project is consistent with Puerto Rico’s renewable and diversification energy objectives, environmental protection goals and baseload energy needs, among other

public policy declarations, the petition says.

“In addition to the energy-related benefits, the WTE project provides a sustainable alternative to the solid wastes disposal crisis in Puerto Rico,” the petition states. “As part of the hardships suffered after hurricanes Irma and Maria struck Puerto Rico in 2017, it is evident that Puerto Rico needs to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels and faces enormous amounts of waste generation that accentuate the waste disposal crisis.”

The WTE project would introduce a materials separation plan consistent with the public policy goal of 35 percent reduction and recycling, plus an 80 percent volume reduction of the waste that must be landfilled, according to the petition.

The proposed refuse-derived fuel WTE technology would be among the technologies capable of producing baseload power for PREPA at a competitive price that would be lower than PREPA’s existing power generation costs, the document states.

The project also represents a major annual greenhouse gas reduction of over 1.1 million tons per year of CO2-equivalent emissions, the petition adds.

In addition, PREPA must also consider other criteria including, but not limited to, system reliability, short and long-term risk, transmission needs and implications, distribution needs and implications, financial impacts on PREPA, and the public interest as set forth in the Energy Act, EIFPR’s petition states.

Where meeting the needs is associated with quantifiable costs, these costs are to be included in the calculation of the present value of revenue requirements, it says.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

7

Trump presses for new Justice ‘without delay’ as election-season battle looms

By PETER BAKER and MAGGIE HABBERMAN

P

resident Donald Trump pressed Senate Republicans on Saturday to confirm his choice to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg “without delay,” setting up a momentous battle sure to inflame the campaign as he seeks to force through an appointment in the weeks before the election Nov. 3.

Trump said he expected to announce his nomination in the coming week and told a campaign rally that it “will be a woman,” gambling that he can scramble the dynamics of a campaign in which he is currently trailing and at the same time seal his legacy by cementing a conservative majority on the Supreme Court with his third appointment in four years.

The president did not name his finalists, but in a telephone conversation Friday night with Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the majority leader, according to two people familiar with the call, Trump identified two women as candidates: Judges Amy Coney Barrett of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago and Barbara Lagoa of the 11th Circuit in Atlanta.

Trump offered praise for both judges when reporters asked about them Saturday afternoon before he flew to North Carolina for his rally. He called Barrett, who was a finalist for the last opening two years ago, “very highly respected” and said that while he did not know Lagoa, he had heard “incredible things” about her, noting that she is Hispanic and from Miami, in the battleground state of Florida.

The president rejected suggestions that he should wait to let the winner of the Nov. 3 contest fill the vacancy, much as McConnell insisted four years ago in blocking President Barack Obama from filling an election-year vacancy on the court.

“We won and we have an obligation as the winners to pick who we want,” Trump said. “That’s not the next president. Hopefully, I’ll be the next president. But we’re here now, right now, we’re here, and we have an obligation to the voters, all of the people, the millions of people who put us here.”

It was not clear, however, whether McConnell has the votes to push through a nomination by Nov. 3. In a message posted on Twitter on Saturday morning, the

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) addresses a weekly news conference following a Republican luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2020. president called on Republican senators to act “without delay,” but in speaking with reporters he did not seem certain that it would happen before the election. “I would think before would be very good, but we’ll be making a decision,” he said. “I think the process could go very, very fast.”

The White House has been working since spring on a plan to replace Ginsburg if the opportunity arose. The frontrunner appeared to be Barrett, a favorite of anti-abortion conservatives, and Trump reportedly told confidants in 2018 that he was “saving her for Ginsburg.” But as he indicated, he sees a nomination of Lagoa as a way to appeal to Hispanic voters, especially in Florida.

Some aides were still suggesting other candidates, including Judge Amul R. Thapar of the 6th Circuit, who had previously been seen as a favorite of McConnell’s.

The Senate leader made no comment on the names floated by the president in their phone call nor did he offer any of his own suggestions, said the people familiar with the conversation.

McConnell moved to stave off defections by sending a letter late Friday to Republican senators urging them to “keep your powder dry” and not “prematurely lock yourselves into a position you may later

regret.” At least two Republicans have said they oppose jamming through a nominee so close to a presidential election, meaning McConnell, with a 53-47 majority and Vice President Mike Pence as a tiebreaker, could afford to lose only one more.

Some Republican strategists said it would make more sense for the president to name a choice right away and proceed with hearings but to wait for a Senate vote until after Nov. 3 to give Republicans who have soured on Trump because of the coronavirus pandemic or other reasons an incentive to turn out to vote.

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the most endangered Republican up for election this year, said in a statement Saturday that the Senate could begin considering a nomination but should not vote before the election.

“In fairness to the American people, who will either be reelecting the president or selecting a new one, the decision on a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court should be made by the president who is elected on Nov. 3,” she said. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, concurred in an interview Friday shortly before news of Ginsburg’s death.

But other Republicans backed an early vote, including Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, the Senate Judiciary

Committee chair who had previously promised not to support confirmation of a Trump nominee in a presidential election year but flip-flopped Saturday to support the president’s effort to install his choice in the midst of a campaign.

Some Republicans, like Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, were agitating for quick action, arguing that a potentially messy pandemic election with the president already challenging the legitimacy of mail-in voting could wind up at the Supreme Court much as the 2000 election did.

A short-handed eight-member court could deadlock at 4-4 if Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the three remaining liberals, as he has on a few occasions.

“We risk a constitutional crisis if we do not have a nine-justice Supreme Court, particularly when there is such a risk of a contested election,” Cruz said Friday night on Fox News.

An all-out Supreme Court confirmation fight in the middle of an election would befit a year of seismic events that have rocked the country. The year started with only the third presidential impeachment trial in history, followed by a once-in-a-century pandemic, the most devastating economic

Continues on page 8

Supporters at President Donald Trump’s fly-in campaign rally at the Fayetteville Regional Airport in North Carolina, Saturday, Sept. 19, 2020. Trump told the audience here that he would nominate a woman to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court next week

8 From page 7 collapse since the Great Depression and an eruption of racial strife that resulted in violent clashes.

Ginsburg’s death at 87 produced an outpouring of grief and anxiety among her admirers, with crowds gathered spontaneously late into the night at the Supreme Court building. As a lifelong champion of women’s rights and only the second woman to serve on the court, she became an unlikely icon for the left late in life, called the Notorious RBG. No vacancy at the Supreme Court occurring so close to a presidential election in American history has been filled

by Senate vote before the election. The closest came in 1916 when Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes resigned 150 days before the election to run as the Republican candidate and his successor was confirmed before the balloting.

When a retirement opened up a seat before the 1956 election, President Dwight Eisenhower filled it with a recess appointment, reaching across the aisle to install a Democrat, William Brennan.

After winning a second term, Eisenhower formally nominated Brennan for the lifetime position. The recess appointment was not controversial, and Brennan was confirmed with almost no opposition.

For today’s partisans, the more memorable precedent was Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in February 2016, which came 269 days before the election. McConnell blocked President Barack Obama

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

from filling the seat with his nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, arguing that it was too close to the election.

“The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court justice,” McConnell said in a statement released after Scalia’s death.

“Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president.”

McConnell later amended his rationale, saying it was not just proximity to the election that justified blocking a nominee but the fact that the president and the Senate majority at the time were held by opposite parties.

Democrats led by former Vice President Joe Biden, their presidential nominee, demanded that Republicans respect the precedent they set of not acting so close to a presidential election — in this case much closer — and threw McConnell’s words back at him.

In a conference call with fellow Senate Democrats on Saturday, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the party leader, warned of possible retaliation if the Republicans forced a confirmation.

“Let me be clear,” he told fellow senators, according to a person on the call. “If Leader McConnell and Senate Republicans move forward with this, then nothing is off the table for next year. Nothing is off the table.”

Some Democrats have argued that if they take control of the Senate, they should consider eliminating the filibuster used by the minority party to block legislation and potentially even

A mourner writes a message on a sign placed at a makeshift memorial outside the Supreme Court building in Washington, on Saturday, Sept. 19, 2020, following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg a day earlier.

President Donald Trump holds a flyin campaign rally at the Fayetteville Regional Airport in North Carolina, Saturday, Sept. 19, 2020. add seats to the Supreme Court to offset what they consider Trump’s illegitimate appointments. The number of seats on the Supreme Court is set by law, not the Constitution, and has shifted over the years, but the last time a president tried packing the court by expanding it, Franklin Roosevelt suffered one of his biggest legislative defeats.

Trump views his conservative judicial appointments as one of his strongest arguments to motivate his base. Exit polls showed after the 2016 election that 26% of Trump’s voters considered the Supreme Court with its vacant seat the most important issue that year compared with just 18% of Hillary Clinton’s supporters.

At his campaign rally Saturday night in Fayetteville, North Carolina, the president boasted about his pending selection, firming up his commitment to picking a woman and leading the crowd in chants of “Fill that seat.” He “polled” the crowd, asking whether it preferred a woman or man and his supporters cheered for a woman.

As they assessed the political implications, Republican strategists said they also believed that the Supreme Court showdown could benefit their fight to hold the Senate majority since the decisive races are being waged in states that Trump is likely to carry, including Iowa, Georgia and Montana.

But it could present challenges for others facing tough races, like Collins, Graham and Sens. Cory Gardner of Colorado, Martha McSally of Arizona, Kelly Loeffler of Georgia and Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

Graham once agreed with Collins but reversed himself Saturday. In 2016, as

he helped block consideration of Obama’s choice, Graham said he would do the same if a Republican president had a vacancy in the last year of his first term, “and you could use my words against me and you’d be absolutely right.” In 2018, he reaffirmed that, saying that “we’ll wait to the next election” if an opening occurred in the last year of Trump’s term.

On Saturday, however, Graham said he had changed positions for two reasons: because Democrats eliminated the filibuster for circuit court appointments — something they actually did in 2013, three years before making his pledge — and because Democrats “conspired to destroy the life of Brett Kavanaugh” when he was appointed to the Supreme Court two years ago.

“In light of these two events, I will support President @realDonaldTrump in any effort to move forward regarding the recent vacancy created by the passing of Justice Ginsburg,” Graham wrote on Twitter.

Other Republicans were not quite as definitive. Loeffler said Trump “has every right to pick a new justice before the election” but did not say whether the Senate should vote by then. McSally said, “This U.S. Senate should vote on President Trump’s next nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court,” but did not commit to timing. Likewise, Tillis said that he “will support” whoever Trump nominates without saying when a vote should happen.

If the Senate does wait to vote until after the election, the outcome could vary depending on the result of the balloting. If Trump wins a second term and Republicans keep control of the Senate, he would be in a strong position to simply have his nominee confirmed.

But if the president loses or the Democrats capture the Senate, the Republicans can still try to force through Trump’s pick in the 10 weeks before Biden is inaugurated assuming McConnell can keep his majority in line. Given how much of a priority Trump and McConnell have made judicial appointments, they would have a strong incentive to try and it was not clear if enough Republicans would object to deter such a move.

Further complicating the scenario would be a victory by Mark Kelly, the Democratic candidate in Arizona, over McSally, who was appointed to fill an unexpired term. Kelly would be sworn in probably by late November, meaning McConnell would have only 52 Republican senators at that point.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

9

Shadow of Merrick Garland hangs over the next Supreme Court fight

By ADAM LIPTAK and SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

O

n a Saturday evening in February 2016, just hours after Justice Antonin Scalia died during a hunting trip, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican majority leader, interrupted a Caribbean vacation to draw a line in the sand.

“The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court justice,” he said. “Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president.”

At that very moment, McConnell changed the course of the court and every confirmation battle to come. By the time President Barack Obama nominated Judge Merrick Garland — a mild-mannered jurist with impeccable credentials, a moderate record and fans across the ideological spectrum — the Washington apparatus that gears up around Supreme Court nominations no longer felt quite the same.

What followed is already setting the tone for an even more brutal battle over who should succeed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday at 87.

Democrats knew going into the battle over Garland that the fight would not only be about the justice and his record but also be about the very process of “advice and consent” laid out for senators in the Constitution.

Republicans split on whether they should even take the customary introductory meetings with the nominee; McConnell refused to do so, although two endangered Republicans, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, said they would. (Both later lost their bids for reelection.)

Even Obama sounded tentative, knowing the White House had unusual hurdles to jump.

“I simply ask Republicans in the Senate to give him a fair hearing and then an up-ordown vote,” Obama said then. “If you don’t, then it will not only be an abdication of the Senate’s constitutional duty, it will indicate a process for nominating and confirming judges that is beyond repair.”

Republicans refused even to grant Garland a hearing, spurning Obama’s request and infuriating Democrats and especially the progressive left, which is now demanding farreaching measures — including expanding the size of the Supreme Court and adding Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., as states — should Democrats retake control of the Senate in the November elections.

“The ghost of Merrick Garland hangs very heavily over the Senate right now,” said Jim Manley, a former aide to Harry Reid, the

Democratic leader of the Senate during the Garland confirmation fight. “Everything that Democrats do they are going to base in part on Senator McConnell’s clear abuse of the process when they denied that man a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.”

McConnell’s move was “the opening act,” said Nan Aron, the president of the liberal advocacy group Alliance for Justice, in his bid to stock the federal judiciary with conservatives. After President Donald Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch to fill the Scalia vacancy, McConnell jammed through a rule change allowing Supreme Court nominees to be confirmed with a simple majority, instead of 60.

(Democrats had previously done the same for lower court nominees.)

That change — known in Senate parlance as “the nuclear option” — eased the path for the confirmation of both Gorsuch, 419 days after Scalia died, and Brett Kavanaugh last year. And it now leaves Democrats with scant ammunition to fight a Trump nominee to fill the Ginsburg seat. With Republicans holding a 53-47 Senate majority, four of them would have to defect in order to block confirmation.

Democrats, including Obama, now say McConnell must adhere to the principle he invented, that the Senate should not fill an open seat in an election year before a new president is sworn in. But McConnell is determined to secure a conservative majority on the court regardless of his own treatment of Garland and has dug in.

In selecting Garland, then 63, Obama took a calculated risk. The judge was a wellknown figure in Washington legal circles, a Harvard-educated lawyer who earlier in his career had left corporate law and taken a 50% pay cut to become a federal prosecutor. He had made a name for himself prosecuting and winning the conviction of Timothy McVeigh, who had bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995.

As the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit — sometimes called “the little Supreme Court” — Garland had drawn praise from members of both parties. But he was older, white and moderate, and his nomination did little to energize the more liberal flank of the Democratic base.

Shortly after Obama announced Garland’s nomination, McConnell appeared on the Senate floor to say it was dead on arrival.

He later called the judge to tell him much the same thing.

“The American people may well elect a president who decides to nominate Judge

Protesters outside of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) office in Louisville, Ky., March 21, 2016. The fight over the confirmation of Judge Garland in 2016 set the tone for an even more brutal battle over who should succeed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Garland for Senate consideration,” McConnell said on the Senate floor. “The next president may also nominate someone very different.

Either way, our view is this: Give the people a voice in the filling of this vacancy.”

McConnell himself was taking a gamble.

Had Hillary Clinton, who was then running to succeed Obama, won the presidency — as many Democrats and Trump himself expected — she would have been unlikely to choose a nominee like Garland, whose judicial record, particularly on cases involving national security and campaign finance, was not always pleasing to liberals.

Garland visited the senators who would see him, mostly Democrats, and he completed the detailed questionnaire that nominees provide to the Judiciary Committee before confirmation hearings. But the waiting was agonizing for him, and over time, it became clear that his nomination was not going anywhere.

“He’s a wonderful person who was put in a horrible position,” his good friend Washington lawyer Jamie Gorelick would later say.

The court is now short-handed again, as it was in 2016. Back then, the eight-member court deadlocked only four times, and the justices worked hard to find consensus, sometimes at the cost of extremely narrow decisions. At the time, the court was evenly split between its liberal and conservative wings.

The court faces a new kind of divide after Ginsburg’s death, with its Republican appoin-

tees outnumbering its Democratic ones 5-3.

That may leave less room for compromise. As always, there are hugely consequential cases on the docket: A week after the November elections, the court is set to hear oral arguments in a case, backed by the Trump administration, to overturn the Affordable Care Act. While the odds appear stacked against Democrats, Aron said in an interview Saturday that her group would “fight to win this one” and would remind voters at every turn that “Republicans played politics with the court.”

So far, two Republican senators — Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine — have said they would not vote to confirm a nominee before the election. Trump pressed Senate Republicans on Saturday to confirm his choice to replace Ginsburg “without delay” and said that he expected to name a candidate in the coming week.

Late Friday, not long after Ginsburg died, McConnell moved to stave off further defections by sending a letter to Republican senators urging them to “keep your powder dry.” People in Washington, and especially Democrats, remember well how satisfied McConnell was with his decision to keep Scalia’s seat vacant until after Trump moved into the White House.

“One of my proudest moments,” the majority leader said in a speech in 2016, “was when I looked Barack Obama in the eye and I said, ‘Mr. President, you will not fill the Supreme Court vacancy.’”

10

Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Joe Biden’s court vacancy plan: More talk of health care and the pandemic

Joseph R. Biden Jr. at campaign event in Tampa, Fla., this past week.

By SHANE GOLDMACHER, KATIE GLUECK and THOMAS KAPLAN

F

or months Joe Biden has condemned President Donald Trump as a failed steward of the nation’s well-being, relentlessly framing the 2020 election as a referendum on the president’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Now, confronted with a moment that many believe will upend the 2020 election — the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the prospect of a bitter Supreme Court confirmation battle — Biden’s campaign is sticking to what it believes is a winning strategy. Campaign aides said Saturday they would seek to link the court vacancy to the health emergency gripping the country and the future of health care in America.

While confirmation fights have long centered on hot-button cultural divides such as guns and especially abortion, the Biden campaign, at least at the start, plans to chiefly focus on protecting the Affordable Care Act and its popular guarantee of coverage for people with preexisting conditions.

Arguments in a seminal case that could determine the future of the health care law are set for a week after Election Day, with the administration supporting a Republican effort to overturn it. Biden will accuse the president, as he already has, of trying to eliminate protections for preexisting conditions during a pandemic, aides said, with the stakes heightened by a Supreme Court now short one of the liberal justices who had previously voted to keep the law in place.

Despite the Biden team’s confidence, the prospect of Trump’s

appointing a third justice to the Supreme Court in his first term injects a highly volatile element into the race just six weeks before the election. Court battles have long been seen as greater motivation for Republican voters than for Democrats, although the record sums of money flooding into Democratic campaigns in the hours after Ginsburg’s death offered progressives hope that they might be equally energized this time.

Still, Biden campaign officials said on Saturday that they did not see even a Supreme Court vacancy and the passions it will inevitably inflame as reason to fundamentally reorient the campaign’s approach. Biden has consistently led the president nationally and in polls of battleground states throughout the summer.

For Democrats, the focus on health care — overlaid by the pandemic — is a rerun of the successful playbook that helped power the party’s takeover of the House of Representatives in 2018 and a fidelity to Biden’s steadfast promise to defend Obamacare, a pledge that helped him navigate through the 2020 primaries.

“This is a choice between a court that will defend your health care and take your health care away,” said Heidi Heitkamp, a former Democratic senator from North Dakota, who lost in 2018 after voting against Trump’s last Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.

“The winds have shifted on Obamacare,” she said, linking the law’s future to the coronavirus crisis. “The pandemic is about health care. So it’s a continuing of a discussion about health care and who’s the candidate most likely to protect you and your health care.”

The Biden campaign could also still seize on the uncer-

tain future of abortion rights to mobilize younger voters, raising the specter of a Supreme Court tilted toward a 6-3 conservative majority.

“If you want something to fire up young people who weren’t all that interested this year, this is it,” John Anzalone, a pollster for Biden, said, noting that his research suggested that even apolitical young voters grasped abortion politics. “They know Roe v. Wade.”

Biden quickly called on Friday for the Senate to stop any nomination to the Supreme Court before the election, and Senate Democrats huddled on a Saturday afternoon conference call to plot their path forward. Trump pledged on Saturday to move forward “without delay,” saying that his nominee would “most likely” be a woman and that he expected to announce his pick in the coming days. Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, has vowed that there will be a floor vote.

The Biden campaign will have an unusually direct role in the confirmation fight through Sen. Kamala Harris of California, Biden’s running mate, who stopped by the steps of the Supreme Court on Saturday morning. As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Harris will serve as an interrogator for whomever Trump nominates. She has already shone in that role in some notable confrontations with past Trump appointees, including both of his attorneys general.

Biden’s advisers and allies believe that the political environment in the country has reversed years of conventional wisdom that court fights better mobilize conservatives than progressives. Democratic strategists said McConnell’s decision in 2016 to block President Barack Obama’s nomination of Judge Merrick Garland; the election of Trump; and clarifying court decisions on crucial issues involving immigration, gay rights and abortion had flipped that dynamic.

“Democrats should not approach this from a defensive posture,” said Guy Cecil, the leader of one of the party’s biggest super PACs, Priorities USA, noting that internal polling showed the court as the biggest motivating issue after a defeat of Trump. “Our goals of stopping this nomination and winning the election are aligned.”

Democratic donors poured unprecedented sums of money into campaigns and causes in the hours after Ginsburg’s death was announced, donating about $80 million online in the first 24 hours.

An avowed institutionalist and former Judiciary Committee chairman himself, Biden won the Democratic primary campaign in part by ignoring some of loudest voices on the left.

Just last week, the former vice president predicted in a CNN town hall that there would be “somewhere between six and eight Republicans who are ready to get things done” once Trump is gone. His instincts and his inclination to reach across the aisle, which have been pilloried by many on the left as naïve in this era of hyperpolarized politics, will be severely tested with the looming confirmation fight.

Some progressive groups are already mounting a pressure campaign on the Democratic Party and Biden to embrace adding new justices to the court as a countermeasure in 2021, presuming that the party seizes control of the White House and Senate in November.

Maurice Mitchell, the national director of the Working Families Party, urged Biden to say that he would “stop at nothing” to prevent a “hyperconservative court.”

“People ultimately want a fighter,” he said. “And this is an opportunity to demonstrate the fight that he has within him.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

11

After Trump’s TikTok ban, China readies blacklist of foreign companies

By KEITH BRADSHER and RAYMOND ZHONG

A

s the United States and China trade blows over technology, Beijing on Saturday moved to create a blacklist of foreign companies seen as threatening its national security or acting against Chinese business interests.

The plan for a blacklist, which was short on details and included no companies’ names, appeared to be retaliation for the Trump administration’s decision to ban the Chinese-owned apps TikTok and WeChat from U.S. app stores starting at midnight Sunday.

Tensions between Beijing and Washington have intensified in recent months, accelerating a downward spiral in economic and diplomatic relations. The confrontation now encompasses the two countries’ policies on trade and technology, as well as on Taiwan, Hong Kong, human rights and other issues.

Many recent U.S. actions have prompted countermoves by China. The People’s Liberation Army sent 19 fighter jets and bombers into the Taiwan Strait on Saturday and 18 the previous day to protest a visit to the island democracy, which China claims as its territory, by a senior State Department official.

Along with banning TikTok and WeChat, the Trump administration has prevented dozens of Chinese companies from buying U.S. products. The Commerce Department last year added the Chinese tech giant Huawei to its “entity list,” which curbed the company’s ability to use American-origin chips, software and other technology.

China’s Ministry of Commerce published rules Saturday that outlined a similar “unreliable entities list,” although it did not name any specific companies or individuals that would be included.

The rules, which went into immediate effect, indicate that overseas entities on the list might be barred from exporting or importing anything from China or investing in the country. The companies could also be fined, and their employees might be blocked from entering China or working there.

In a separate statement Saturday, the Ministry of Commerce condemned the Trump administration’s actions against WeChat and TikTok, saying that such “bullying” had damaged the United States’ image as a destination for foreign investment.

China is the world’s largest manufacturer by a wide margin, and it dominates the global supply of a long list of products that the United States needs, from rare earth metals to consumer electronics. But Beijing’s threat to curtail exports could hurt China’s own reputation as a reliable supplier.

Multinationals have made China their base for production as a way to produce goods quickly, inexpensively and efficiently. Foreign investment in China has not only created tens of millions of jobs in the country but also expanded its technological know-how.

Ker Gibbs, the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, expressed wariness about the new rules Saturday, while emphasizing that U.S. companies were committed to staying in China.

“Each side needs to safeguard their own security interests,

President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign event in Bemidji, Minn., Sept. 18, 2020. As the U.S. and China trade blows over technology, Beijing on Saturday moved to create a blacklist of foreign companies seen as threatening its national security or acting against Chinese business interests. but business needs a safe and reliable environment in order to continue to invest,” he said.

In an article that the Chinese Commerce Ministry published on its website Saturday, Liao Shiping, a professor at Beijing Normal University, said the blacklist did not mean that China was closing up its domestic market.

“Faced with the spread of protectionism and the continued worldwide decline of international investment, China is unswerving in continuing to expand liberalization,” Liao was quoted as saying.

The Chinese government first floated the idea of an unreliable entities list last year, after the Trump administration put Huawei on its own blacklist. U.S. officials have accused Huawei of stealing trade secrets and abetting espionage by Beijing, which the company denies.

Since then, the Commerce Department has added a variety of other Chinese organizations to its list, including makers of surveillance gear and companies helping the Chinese military construct artificial islands in the disputed South China Sea. The Trump administration significantly ramped up America’s tech fight with China on Friday when it laid out a timeline for curtailing TikTok and WeChat in the United States. President Donald Trump had issued executive orders taking aim at the two apps last

month, saying they gathered data on Americans that would be accessible to the Chinese government.

TikTok’s parent company, the Chinese internet giant ByteDance, has since entered into talks with Oracle and other U.S. companies about a possible acquisition and partnership, although the deal is still awaiting Trump’s approval.

WeChat, a messaging, social media and payment app that is ubiquitous in China, is set to be largely unusable in the United States after Sunday. That could deprive Americans with family, business or educational ties in China of a key tool for communicating with people across the Pacific. China has long blocked many Western internet services, including Facebook and Google.

Other foreign companies have much to lose if China decides to add them to its new blacklist.

Apple, for instance, assembles most of its products in the world’s most populous nation. Last year, the Greater China region accounted for one-sixth of the company’s sales.

Tesla recently opened a giant car plant in Shanghai. China last year accused FedEx of delaying shipments made by Huawei after the tech giant was blacklisted, prompting state media to suggest that Beijing put the delivery company on any list of unreliable entities.

12

Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Tax strategies to embrace, or avoid, before the November election

Left: President Donald Trump speaks to reporters during a press briefing at the White House on Sept. 16, 2020. Right: Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, speaks at a news conference in Wilmington, Del., on Sept. 2, 2020.

By PAUL SULLIVAN

I

n unpredictable times, the desire to create a better tax strategy becomes more urgent, but that could result in some regrettable changes to perfectly good plans.

For example, many advisers counseled their wealthy clients in 2012 that the estate and gift taxes exemptions were going down and that the rates on those taxes were going up.

But the opposite happened the next year, and people who had given away more than they might have otherwise were caught off guard.

This year, few respectable financial advisers are handicapping the election and what it might mean for taxes and investment returns next year. But that doesn’t mean they are not providing counsel.

“We can’t make predictions better than anyone else can,” said Ani C. Hovanessian, chair of the New York Tax and Wealth Planning Group at Venable, a law firm. “But if we fail to plan, we plan to fail. Individuals aren’t going to work with me because we’re frozen like a deer in the headlights.”

Here’s a look at different planning strategies that taxpayers may want to embrace, avoid or even hedge, all with an acknowledgment that no one knows what next year will bring.

What to do The main criterion for committing to a new plan now is that it is something you would have done eventually. Ad-

justments should not be something that springs to mind out of fear of the November election.

One easy change is converting an individual retirement account to a Roth retirement account. The money in a traditional IRA is taxed when it is taken out. With a Roth IRA, you pay the tax on the deposits, and the money grows tax free.

But a conversion requires the tax to be paid now, which can be a hard check to write, even if the long-term gain is better.

There are ways to offset the tax owed by claiming a loss this year. People who own rental properties that have generated passive income, or revenue that requires little to no effort to earn, can depreciate the value of the property and use that to offset the tax owed on a Roth conversion, said Stephen A. Baxley, director of tax and financial planning at Bessemer Trust.

Another simple change involves charitable giving. A provision in the CARES Act allows for 100% of charitable donations made in cash to be counted against your income this year. Normally, the deduction is capped at 50% of your income, with any amount more than that carried forward to subsequent years.

The provision was meant to spur immediate giving during the pandemic. But there are ways to comply with the spirit of the provision and not give entirely in cash.

Baxley said taxpayers could give 30% of their income in long-term appreciated stock and top that off with 70% in cash. Or they could also give 60% in cash to a donor-advised

fund — which allows them to make grants at a later time — and 40% in cash to a public charity.

Pairing these charitable contributions with a Roth conversion can also offset the cost, he said.

Giving to heirs before the end of the year also makes sense as a tax strategy, said Jeremy Geller, co-head of J.P. Morgan Private Bank in New York. And as the exemption level goes up each year, he advises clients to top the gift off annually.

What not to do Julio Castro, a partner and wealth and fiduciary adviser at Evercore Wealth Management, said he feared “impetuous planning.”

“We don’t want people freaking out ahead of the election and implementing planning strategies that don’t make sense for them,” Castro said. “There’s always a chance that things will change.”

It is easy enough to avoid a repeat of the giving mistake of 2012: Don’t give away more than you can afford. But a fear of increased income taxes by a new Congress could prompt people to change plans that still make sense.

“The only thing worse than making a decision driven purely by taxes is to make a decision driven by speculation of what the taxes might be,” said Bryan D. Kirk, director of estate and financial planning at Fiduciary Trust International.

One strategy to avoid is selling stocks and paying capital gains tax now, out of fear that the capital gains tax rate could go up next year. There is value in those unrealized capital gains, even if the prospect of the tax rate’s jumping to more than 40% from 20% is daunting.

What to consider In life, having an acceptable hedge is always a bonus.

Roth IRA conversions can fit in here. A good hedge would be to convert some portion now and more after the election. Another strategy would be to see how the public markets respond to the election. If stocks go down, complete the Roth conversion then; the lower market value will translate into a smaller tax bill.

There are risks. Income tax rates could actually fall, and “you could end up paying a lot of taxes you don’t need to pay,” said Kim Bourne, chief executive of Playfair Planning Services.

People looking to transfer money to heirs can make a loan to a trust now and then, depending on how the election goes, keep the loan in place or forgive it. If the loan is forgiven, that amount will count toward their gift exemption, said Alison Hutchinson, managing director at Brown Brothers Harriman.

One of her clients lent money to a trust she created for her children and grandchildren this month. The trust has to pay her a small amount of interest on the loan, but if it looks like the exemption levels for gifts are going down, her client will forgive the loan. Hutchinson said that process would be as simple as writing a letter to say she forgave it.

“We’re focused on flexible and resilient structures that can withstand different outcomes,” Hutchinson said.

Regardless of what changes you are considering, check with your adviser first.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

13 Stocks

Corporate debt frenzy rolls on as worries loom over markets

I

nvestors are gearing up for the year’s record-breaking pace of corporate bond issuance to continue in the coming week, even after the U.S. Federal Reserve rattled nerves at its September meeting with a gloomier-than-expected economic outlook.

The past week has seen roughly $42 billion of high-grade debt come to market in 39 deals, most of which were small and offered by first-time issuers.

“I would expect next week to be similar,” said Monica Erickson, portfolio manager, global developed credit, at DoubleLine.

The breakneck pace of fresh issuance illustrates how the Fed’s late March pledge to backstop credit markets and its policy of holding interest rates near zero have spurred borrowing by corporations this year. Companies had already issued $1.7 trillion in debt through the end of August, according to SIFMA, compared with $944 billion in the same period last year.

Demand is likely to stay elevated in the next few weeks, investors said, as historically low rates continue to drive a hunt for yield despite a cluster of economic and political concerns. Those include the Fed’s downbeat economic projections as well as worries over waning fiscal support and potential uncertainty around the U.S. presidential election.

“You have low interest rates, you have tight credit spreads: If I’m an issuer, I’m going to issue as much as humanly possible because it’s cheap debt,” said Nick Maroutsos, head of global bonds at Janus Henderson Investors. “That demand is there because people are craving any sort of return.”

Just over $18 billion in high-yield debt had priced in the week through mid-morning Friday, with two more deals in the pipeline from Aetheon United and PM General Purchaser, according to IFR Refinitiv. IFR’s data showed that Friday’s issuance was expected to drive the year-to-date total over $337 billion, past the previous annual record of $332 billion set in 2012.

Jason Vlosich, head fixed income trader at Brown Advisory, said he expects an additional $40 billion or so in new investment-grade deals through the end of the month. Bank of America in August forecast that this month’s investment-grade issuance was likely to be between $120 billion and $140 billion. September issuance stood at about $115 billion on Friday, according to Refinitiv IFR. In the coming week, investors will be watching earnings reports from Jefferies Financial Group JEF.N, which is typically seen as a preview of what’s to come from Wall Street banks, Nike NKE.N, cruise line Carnival CCL.N and retailers including Rite Aid RAD.N and Costco COST.O. The economic data calendar is comparatively light, with Markit’s Purchasing Managers’ Index on Wednesday and weekly jobless claims on Thursday.

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14

Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Russia is slow to administer virus vaccine despite Kremlin’s approval

A nurse administers the Russian coronavirus vaccine during a clinical trial in Moscow, Sept. 11, 2020. More than a month after becoming the first country to approve a coronavirus vaccine, Russia has yet to administer it to a large population outside a clinical trial, health officials and outside experts say.

By ANDREW E. KRAMMER

M

ore than a month after becoming the first country to approve a coronavirus vaccine, Russia has yet to administer it to a large population outside a clinical trial, health officials and outside experts say.

The approval, which came with much fanfare, occurred before Russia had tested the vaccine in late-stage trials for possible side effects and for its disease-fighting ability. It was seen as a political gesture by President Vladimir Putin to assert victory in the global race for a vaccine.

It is not clear whether the slow start to the vaccination campaign is a result of limited production capacity or second thoughts about inoculating the population with an unproven product.

The Russian vaccine is one of nine candidates around the world now in the late-stage clinical trials that are the only sure means to determine whether a vaccine is effective and find possible side effects.

A vaccine is considered the only way to halt the spread of the coronavirus, which has sickened more than 30 million people globally and slowed economies around the world since it first appeared in China late last year.

In one example of the limited scope of distribution, the company financing the vaccine pointed to a shipment sent this past week to the Crimean Peninsula. The delivery contained doses for 21 people in a region with 2 million.

The Russian Ministry of Health has not said how many people have been vaccinated in all of Russia. The minister, Mikhail Murashko, said last weekend that the first small shipments were being delivered this past week to the Russian provinces.

He did not say how many doses were shipped, describing the shipments only as “small amounts,” and also did not say when they would become available. He said the area around St. Petersburg, the Leningrad region, would be among the first to receive what he called “samples” of the vaccine.

Putin has said that one of his two adult daughters took the vaccine.

“Unfortunately, we have very little information,” said Dr. Vasily Vlassov, a professor of epidemiology and vice president of the Russian Association for Evidence-Based Medicine. His organization had opposed approval of the vaccine before testing it.

“We cannot understand how much is PR and how much is a violation of medical ethics,” he said of the announcement

that the vaccine had been approved for use outside a clinical trial. If few Russians are receiving the vaccine, the early approval appears less troubling, he said.

“Maybe nothing scary is happening in reality and only the announcement was scary,” he said.

Svetlana Zavidova, director of a pharmaceutical trade group, the Association of Clinical Trial Organizations, which also opposed the hasty approval, said the limited use was encouraging news, even as its reasons are unclear.

“Is it a question of limited production or more of a political decision?” she said. Either way, “of course, from my point of view, it is better they limit their activity to only clinical trials, as we said from the beginning.”

The trial in Russia began Sept. 9, and Russian officials have said they expect early results before the end of the year, though the Gamaleya Institute, the scientific body that developed the vaccine, has scheduled the trial to continue until May. Putin and senior health officials announced the approval of the Russian vaccine, called Sputnik V in reference to the satellite that won the space race, for emergency use on Aug. 11. China had earlier begun vaccinations outside trials starting with members of its army and has approved four vaccines for limited use.

On Sept. 14, the United Arab Emirates gave emergency approval for one Chinese vaccine, made by Sinopharm, for use on health workers.

Russia’s health minister said on Aug. 11 that people at high risk of infection, like doctors and teachers, would be vaccinated, and the Russian financial company sponsoring the vaccine said doses would be available in August.

But the rollout proved slower.

Murashko, the minister, said the delays were partly because of a need to test the distribution system for a vaccine that must be stored in a deep freeze, and also to train medical personnel. The delays have persisted even as the virus infects more than 5,000 people a day in Russia.

The Russian late-stage, or phase three, clinical trial is being carried out entirely in Moscow, where 30,000 people will receive the vaccine and 10,000 will get a placebo.

Russia’s health authorities have a history of approving medicines after limited testing. It is a legacy of the Soviet-era regulatory system, in which an oversight committee often deferred to the judgment of drug researchers, who were not motivated by profit, said Vlassov.

Regulators have, for example, approved a bestselling cold medicine in Russia, Arbidol, though the clinical trial to prove its efficacy was canceled.

But when medicines are tested, Russia has an exceptionally good track record on managing clinical trials, according to a database of U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspections of clinical trials around the world. The FDA found a lower percentage of trials with problems in Russia than in any other European country or the United States.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

15

Protests shake Bangkok, challenging old guard’s grip

By HANNAH BEECH

T

he monsoonal showers did not stop them. Nor did the specter of 8,550 police officers, whose armed presence evoked violently crushed protest movements in Thailand’s past.

Thousands of protesters gathered in Bangkok on Saturday, calling for change: change to Thailand’s militarydominated government, change to the army-drafted constitution and, most explosively, change to the exalted status of the monarchy.

“We have to conquer our fear because if we don’t come out to fight then our future will not improve,” said Rewat Chusub, a 41-year-old tailor sitting under a red umbrella with the gilded Grand Palace as a backdrop.

Even as rain occasionally poured down, muffling the sound system, a procession of speakers addressed a big tent’s worth of issues: the military’s monopoly on power, LGBTQ discrimination, social welfare, women’s rights and the economic impact of the coronavirus.

The most sensitive subject, the role of the monarchy, was brought up late Saturday, with speakers describing a climate of apprehension surrounding discussion of the royal family.

“We were ruled by fear,” said Arnon Nampa, a humanrights lawyer who was charged with sedition last month.

Arnon then referred to the disappearances of exiled activists who had criticized the royal family. Some were later found with their abdomens stuffed with concrete.

“Whoever spoke the truth about the monarchy was exiled or got murdered,” Arnon said.

The monarchy’s place in Thai society was raised publicly for the first time in rallies earlier this summer, shattering convention in a country where criticism of the monarchy had until recently remained taboo.

The weekend rally, which is to carry over into Sunday, is the largest since a military coup in 2014 ushered in yet another army-dominated government for Thailand. Under Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, the junta chief who remains as the nation’s leader after disputed elections last year, the government has tamped down on dissent by detaining activists and invoking states of emergency.

The country is currently under a state of emergency, called amid the coronavirus pandemic, meaning that the protest was technically illegal. Thammasat University, where the protest began, did not officially give permission for the demonstrators to gather there, but they congregated at a campus soccer field anyway, marching past water cannon trucks.

Later, the protesters pushed their way to Sanam Luang, a vast space in front of the Grand Palace that used to be accessible to the public until it was reclaimed for royal purposes in 2012. The protesters have referred to the space as “the people’s field,” rather than “the royal field,” as Sanam Luang means in Thai. An ultimatum Saturday by police to evacuate the grounds went unheeded, and as dark fell few security forces were seen in the immediate area.

Most protesters wore face masks to counter the coronavirus. Volunteers offered squirts of hand sanitizer. Umbrellas warded off a drizzle.

“These protests aren’t about who will be the leader of Thailand but about how we need to value democracy and human dignity for all Thais,” said Duanghathai Buranajaroenkij, a lecturer in human rights and peace studies at Mahidol University in Bangkok. “This is the first open public space to talk about everything, from LGBT issues to women’s rights. And nothing’s taboo, not the monarchy, not abortion, not sex.”

Some right-wing government supporters have, without evidence, accused the United States of funding the Thai demonstrations, prompting the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok to issue a statement denying any involvement in the protest movement. Similar charges were leveled against the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong, again without any proof that the United States was providing financial aid to the prodemocracy protests there.

“The United States does not support any individual or political party,” the statement said. “We support the democratic process and rule of law.”

The protests began earlier this year with students calling for an end to restrictive school rules, such as mandatory haircuts and the custom of bowing on the ground in front of teachers. But as Thailand emerged from its coronavirus

lockdown, with fewer than 60 deaths attributed to the virus, the student rallies broadened to encompass other demands.

At first, the largely leaderless movement focused on three reforms: fresh elections, a new constitution and an end to the persecution of political dissidents. But by August, some members of the protest movement began pressing 10 demands, including assurances that the monarchy will not be held above the constitution.

Although the mood remained relatively festive Saturday night, Thailand’s history of political bloodshed added a somber note to the rally. Some students said their parents had warned them against joining the overnight protest because they feared their children might be shot by soldiers.

The presence Saturday of so-called red shirt protesters, veterans of previous street rallies, also led to worries of political escalation.

In 2010, security forces used lethal force to clear out red shirt protesters who had occupied a central business district for weeks. About 100 people lost their lives in political violence that year. In 1992 and 1976, protesters, many of them university students, were targeted in massacres that have cast a shadow on military governments since.

“A lot of people may die,” said Panusaya Sithijirawattanakul, a student leader who has been critical of the monarchy’s lavish traditions, ahead of the rally. “But to have freedom we need to take great risks.”

Protesters break through a barricade during a rally at Sanam Luang in front of the Grand Palace in Bangkok, Thailand on Saturday, Sept. 19, 2020. The weekend rally heightened the focus on a once taboo issue: a rich and powerful monarchy that has rarely been challenged or criticized.

16

Monday, September 21, 2020

Violent attacks plague Afghanistan as peace talks in Doha slow

By MUJIB MASHAL, FATIMA FAIZI and THOMAS GIBBONS-NEFF

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iolence continued unabated across Afghanistan on Saturday as negotiators from the warring sides remained bogged down by disagreements over a framework for talks a week after historic negotiations began in Doha, Qatar.

More than a dozen civilians were feared dead in one airstrike by Afghan forces in the North. The deaths came as a week of discussions still had not finalized the rules for negotiations over contentious issues, like a cease-fire and the form of a future government. The slow pace highlighted how complicated the effort to end the Afghan war will likely be.

Officials from both sides said that while they had resolved most issues on how the negotiations should be conducted, they were stuck on which school of Islamic thought should be used for resolving disputes in a way that re-

spects minority sects in Afghanistan.

The civilian deaths were a stark reminder of the toll of each day’s delay in the talks.

Citing United Nations figures, Roland Kobia, European Union special envoy for Afghanistan, said the violence levels over the past five weeks had been “the highest in the last five years.”

The bloodiest attack Saturday occurred in the Khanabad district of northern Kunduz province. Local residents said the Afghan forces had carried out an airstrike targeting a Taliban gathering, with few initial casualties. But when local residents gathered to extinguish the resulting fire at a nearby house, the aircraft returned for another strike that killed more than a dozen civilians.

“I have lost four family members, two uncles and two cousins,” said Jawad, 25, who would not give his full name but said he lived in the Sayed Ramzan village that was targeted.

Afghan officials in Kunduz initially said

The opening session of talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban in Doha last week. Violence has continued across Afghanistan through the talks.

they had “killed and wounded 30 Taliban” in the strikes but later admitted privately that civilians were among the casualties. They would not discuss exact numbers.

“Initial reports indicate no harm was inflicted upon civilians,” the defense ministry insisted in a statement.

Also Saturday, in southeastern Paktika province, a deputy police chief was killed in an explosion while delivering support to his forces.

And in the same province, a wedding convoy struck a roadside bomb, wounding 19 people, including the bride.

One significant recent shift in insurgent tactics, particularly in targeted bombings and assassinations, is not to claim responsibility for the attacks, allowing the Taliban to exert pressure while maintaining deniability for the violence.

U.S. military officials also confirmed that a dozen rockets have been fired at two U.S. bases in southern Afghanistan over the past week, including six on Kandahar Air Field on Saturday and six on Sept. 11, the day before the Doha talks began and the 19th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.

“While we are still assessing the source of the attack, these actions are not consistent with the U.S.-Taliban agreement and have the potential to put the peace process in jeopardy,” Col. Sonny Legget, a spokesperson for the U.Sled and NATO coalition in Afghanistan said in confirming Saturday’s Kandahar attack.

A Taliban spokesperson would not confirm whether they were behind either the rocket attack on Sept. 11 or the one Saturday.

At the talks in Doha, chief negotiators from both sides have called for patience for what they say will be a complicated process.

Both sides have largely agreed to about 20 items on how negotiations should be conducted, most significantly committing to continuing with talks even when things get complicated on the battlefield.

But the sides remain stuck on which school of Islamic thought to use for resolving

disputes. While both sides largely agree on using the Hanafi school of Islamic thought, one of the four major Sunni schools that is also the foundation of the current Afghan Constitution, they are at odds on a formulation that does not alienate other sects, particularly the Shia.

The disagreement is largely political.

The Taliban want to appeal to their hard-line base with only a mention of the majority Sunni school. The Afghan government’s negotiating team, while agreeing on using the Hanafi school of thought, insists on a caveat that protects the unity of Afghanistan as an inclusive republic.

The talks are taking place in an environment of deep mistrust.

Afghan officials suspect the Taliban want a swift political settlement, fearing that the insurgents are seeking to run out the clock on the withdrawal of the U.S. troops, which is expected to be completed in the spring. Taliban officials say the government, which received a new five-year mandate last spring, is dragging out the peace process to complete its term in office.

The negotiators are also up against the high expectations of a civilian population crushed by the weight of the conflict.

“A week ago, an IED went off, and my wife lost her leg,” said Mohammad Shah, 27, who looked fatigued outside a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan.

“Civilians are the main victims of the current war. I am ready to sacrifice my entire family if peace comes to the country, but it won’t,” he said. “I have no faith in the peace process with the Taliban.”

Others, such as Hashmat Sayedkhil, an employee of the Afghan ministry of economy, were more hopeful.

“Obviously there is an opportunity, and both sides can show their commitment to the Afghan people,” he said. “We see a tiny light at the end of a dark tunnel, and we hope the Afghan people get to experience peace.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

17

Lost World War II submarine is found in southeast Asia

By DERRICK BRYSON TAYLOR

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n the murky waters of the Strait of Malacca, about 90 miles south of Phuket, Thailand, four divers discovered a World War II submarine that was scuttled 77 years ago, now teeming with marine life.

The wreckage, believed to be the USS Grenadier, was located last October by divers Jean Luc Rivoire, Lance Horowitz, Benoit Laborie and Ben Reymenants, the team announced this month.

Over the subsequent six months, the men — one of whom, Reymenants, assisted in the 2018 rescue of the boys soccer team that was trapped in a cave in northern Thailand — completed six carefully planned dives to study and identify the submarine, Horowitz, 36, said Friday from Phuket.

After taking measurements of several parts of the submarine, including the hatches and capstans, and comparing them with technical drawings from the National Archives and Records Administration, the men felt confident that they had located the Grenadier, he said.

“It was as good as we were hoping for, really,” Horowitz said of the team’s $110,000 expedition. “I think a lot of people dream of finding, or discovering, or stumbling upon something that has some historical importance to it.

It was a very powerful feeling; it was wonderful.”

The Grenadier, named after a deepsea fish with a long body and a short, pointed tail, is more than 300 feet long and weighs 1,475 tons, according to the Naval History and Heritage Command, which is responsible for the preservation, analysis and dissemination of U.S. naval history. The ship was found sitting upright more than 260 feet underwater, the divers said in a statement, adding that it was partly covered with fishing nets.

The next step for the divers is to have their findings verified by the naval history command. The data associated with each discovery — videos, photographs and measurements — is assessed against archival and historical records, according to Robert Neyland, head of the command’s underwater archaeol-

In a photo provided by Jean Luc Rivoire, Four divers believe they have located the USS Grenadier, which was scuttled off the coast of Thailand in April 1943 after being attacked by Japanese planes. ogy branch. The process to verify this submarine would most likely take a few months, he added.

“Confirming the identity of any potential discovery, as in the case of USS Grenadier, is a process that is given much weight by the U.S. Navy, as it not only affords legal protections to the site through the Sunken Military Craft Act, but the act can also provide closure to the families of those sailors lost in the line of duty,” Neyland said in an email.

Before the Grenadier met its demise, it sank six ships, according to the Navy.

On April 20, 1943, the submarine spotted two merchantmen and approached for an attack. The next day, while on the surface, the Grenadier spotted and was spotted by a Japanese plane.

As the ship submerged for safety, it was shaken by bombs, the Navy recounted, forcing the submarine to plummet to 267 feet below the surface.

While the hull and hatches were badly leaking, a fire had also broken out, causing more chaos, Lt. Cmdr. John A. Fitzgerald and five other men later recounted.

In the early morning hours of April 22, two Japanese ships were spotted in

the distance. Robert W. Palmer, one of the sailors aboard the Grenadier when it was struck, wrote in “The Silent Service in World War II” that the men then used several types of firearms — including 20 mm guns, rifles, pistols and Tommy guns — to fire at another plane, which ultimately dropped a bomb nearby.

Before scuttling the submarine, the men destroyed a coding machine with hammers, Palmer said, adding that the torpedo data computer and radio gear were all intentionally damaged by the crew. Documents, he said, were thrown overboard with weighted bags.

All 76 crew members survived the attack, but they faced an uncertain future.

After the skipper ordered all men into the water, they were picked up by a Japanese armed merchant ship, Palmer said. They were taken to a commandeered Catholic school in Penang, Malaysia, where they were tortured.

“Beating, burning, breaking fingers with bamboo or pencils between them were perpetrated on the men by Japanese soldiers who sneered and joked,” Palmer wrote. The captives were forced to sit or stand in silence in an atten-

tion position, he said; “any divergence resulted in a gun butt, kick, slug in the face or a bayonet prick.” The Japanese captors also used tactics like pushing the blade of a pen knife under the fingernails to get the men to talk about their submarine, he wrote.

“This was the beginning of 28 and a half months of similar treatment for most all of the crew and officers alike,” he said.

Four Grenadier crew members died in Japanese captivity.

“It’s amazing how the families of survivors have reached out to us since they’ve found out it’s been discovered,” Horowitz said Friday. “And it’s really brought them a lot of closure, and almost comfort.”

What will happen to the Grenadier isn’t exactly known. The submarine is still the property of the U.S. government, Horowitz said.

“Whether they want to preserve it as a heritage site or whether they want to try to salvage it or do more penetration of the sub to recover artifacts, that will ultimately be up to them,” he said. “We would just like it to be known for the historical value, the emotional value.”

18

Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL

Will the election turn on RBG?

By MAUREEN DOWD

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used to feel pretty optimistic that the country would get through the Trump years intact.

In 2016, America got mad — and went mad. This administration has unleashed so many fresh hells that a portrait of the past four years looks very Hieronymus Bosch.

But the idea of this country is so remarkable; surely it could withstand one cheesy con man who squeaked in.

Now we might have passed a point of no return. No matter who wins in November, can the harsh divisions abate?

The stunning news Friday night of the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg guaranteed a political bonfire. President Donald Trump is in a position to reshape the Supreme Court long past his time in office with a third justice, giving conservatives a 6-3 majority.

With Democrats still smarting over Republicans’ refusal to consider Barack Obama’s pick of Merrick Garland for the court, this will push them over the edge, and maybe to the polls, especially women. And Trump’s base could race to vote, because the president has talked about nominating Tom Cotton or Ted Cruz, aiming to have a court that would overturn Roe v. Wade. Mitch McConnell said Friday that Trump’s nominee — hopefully not Jeanine Pirro — will get a floor vote.

“We cannot have Election Day come and go with a 4-4

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Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in her chambers at the Supreme Court in Washington, Aug. 23, 2013. “Now we might have passed a point of no return. No matter who wins in November, can the harsh divisions abate,” writes New York Times opinion columnist Maureen Dowd. court,” Cruz told Sean Hannity.

Imagine a Bush v. Gore scenario with a 4-4 court.

As it turned out, the founders created a country painfully vulnerable to whoever happens to be president. They assumed that future presidents would cherish what they had so painfully created and continue to knit together different kinds of people from different areas with different economic interests.

But now that we have a president who takes those knitting needles and stabs the country mercilessly with them, we can see how fragile this whole thing really is.

All the stuff we took for granted — from presidential ethics to electoral integrity to a nonpolitical attorney general — is blown to smithereens. The president who does not believe in science has been conducting a science experiment for four years: What happens to a country when you have a president who is doing everything in his power to cleave it?

It wasn’t long ago that Obama started on the road to the White House with a stirring speech about ignoring those who would slice our nation into red states and blue states because this is the United States of America.

Now Trump blames the “badly run blue states” and “Democrat cities” for everything. He clearly doesn’t see himself as president of a majority of the country. Whenever he talks about the half of the country that didn’t vote for him, he paints a picture of a Scorsese urban hellscape the minute you cross state lines.

On Wednesday, the president offered the heinous hypothetical that the death toll from the coronavirus would not be as bad “if you take the blue states out.”

As the president of Red America, Trump “regularly divides the country into the parts that support him and the parts that do not, rewarding the former and reproving the latter,” The New York Times’ Peter Baker wrote.

The line between politics and governing can be blurry, certainly. But with Trump, there is no line.

Jared Kushner bragged to Bob Woodward that Trump can “trigger the other side by picking fights with them where he makes them take stupid positions.” Woodward writes that Kushner told an associate, “The Democrats are getting so crazy they’re basically defending Baltimore.”

This gleeful assessment from Kushner, a Baltimore slumlord, is the height of cynicism.

The anxiety about our fractious nature was reflected in the question of Susan Connors at Joe Biden’s CNN Town Hall Thursday night.

“Mr. Vice President,” she said, “I look out over my Biden sign in my front yard and I see a sea of Trump flags and yard signs. And my question is, what is your plan, to build a bridge, with voters from the opposing party, to lead us forward, toward a common future?”

Biden was soothing, reassuring that he could pick up those knitting needles once Trump was “out of the way, and his vitriolic attitude, and his way of just getting after people, revenge.”

But will it be so easy? The cultural ecosystem, and the fever swamps of social media that amplify Trump’s craziness, will remain. Fox News and Facebook will continue to validate the biases and conspiracy theories of a nation that’s increasingly proud of its ignorance, anti-intellectualism and denial of science.

Isn’t the simple fact that the race is this close, when Biden should be crushing Trump, given the president’s lethal negligence and willful subterfuge on the virus and his racial demagogy, proof that our realities are so disparate from one another that unifying will be akin to cleaning a dozen Augean stables?

After Woodward’s book revealed that Trump knew early on how dangerous the virus was but downplayed it, I heard from those two alternate universes.

“I can hardly breathe, it’s so incredible,” my friend Rita said angrily.

“He was just trying to buck people up,” my sister, Peggy, said placidly.

In Duluth, Minnesota, at a campaign stop Friday, a man in a MAGA hat jeered at Biden and told him he could never win. Biden approached the man from the alternate reality, elbow bumped him, chuckled and assured him that if he does win, Biden would work for him, too.

If McConnell has his way, that work wouldn’t include replacing RBG.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

19

Gobernadora anuncia fondo para préstamos dirigidos a impulsar a empresarios jóvenes Por THE STAR

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a gobernadora Wanda Vázquez Garced, junto con el Departamento de Desarrollo Económico y Comercio (DDEC), anunciaron este domingo la reactivación del Programa de Microempresas para Jóvenes Empresarios, cuyo fondo asciende a $1 millón a través de su Programa de Desarrollo de la Juventud (PDJ).

“Ante los retos que afrontamos, son más los jóvenes empresarios que se reinventan y crean modelos de negocios atemperados a la nueva realidad en la que vivimos.

Este incentivo y programa están a su disposición como una combinación ideal para echar andar sus planes de negocios que generan oportunidades de empleos e inversión local, apoyando a otros comerciantes puertorriqueños”, destacó Vázquez Garced en declaraciones escritas.

El secretario del DDEC, Manuel A. Laboy Rivera, junto al presidente del Banco de Desarrollo Económico (BDE), Pablo Muñiz, ofrecieron detalles de las ayudas.

“Nuestro norte es apoyar a los empresarios locales, la juventud tiene proyectos innovadores para emprender en la tierra que los vio nacer. Por eso, ofrecemos las herramientas que estos necesitan para impulsar sus planes de negocios. A través del Programa de Microempresas para Jóvenes Empresarios, hasta 100 jóvenes entre las edades de 21-29 años de edad puedan obtener un préstamo de $10 mil máximo para establecer su microempresa o mejorar su negocio. Los préstamos que ofrece el BDE, son garantizados por el Programa de la Juventud del DDEC.

Continuamos cumpliendo el compromiso de la administración de la gobernadora es educar a los jóvenes en temas relacionados al empresarismo para fomentar y guiar a aquellos con interés genuino en emprender”, manifestó Laboy Rivera.

Uno de los beneficios de este programa es que tiene mayor flexibilidad a la hora de evaluar el crédito del joven. Además, tiene interés fijo de 8 por ciento y moratorias de 6 meses en principales e intereses. Parte de los requisitos para solicitar este préstamo, es que los jóvenes cumplan con la edad –antes mencionada-, la documentación solicitada por la institución bancaria y un plan de negocios con proyección a dos años, agregó el secretario del DDEC. El Programa de Microempresas para Jóvenes Empresarios surge de la Ley 35 de 2003, la cual ordena al Programa de Desarrollo de la Juventud tener una iniciativa que ofrezca préstamos accesibles a los jóvenes para desarrollar su negocio. Esto hace sinergia con el decreto para Jóvenes Empresarios del Código de Incentivos. Ambos recursos están disponibles para que los jóvenes los soliciten.

El presidente del BDE, Pablo Muñiz, dijo que “jóvenes, sepan que el DDEC junto al BDE siempre estaremos de tu lado. Éste poderoso producto financiero que anunciamos hoy lo han disfrutado muchos jóvenes que hoy son grandes y exitosos empresarios. Esta iniciativa promueve la agenda de la gobernadora, de creación de empleos, impulso económico y su visión y compromiso con

las futuras generaciones. A estos jóvenes les digo que esta experiencia crediticia le abrirá puertas en nuestro Banco para otros préstamos. Para que tengan una idea, en el BDE ofrecemos financiamiento directo a los empresarios en los sectores de manufactura, comercio, turismo, agricultura y servicios, entre otros, hasta $1 millón bajo ciertos términos y condiciones. Adelante, a los participantes los felicito por poner en marcha su sueño empresarial”.

Mientras, el director del Programa de Desarrollo de la Juventud, Roberto Carlos Pagán, afirmó “tenemos la certeza que a través este programa los jóvenes, serán parte importante de la reactivación de la economía en diversos municipios cuyos consumidores dependen de las pequeñas y medianas empresas con soluciones innovadoras para atender sus necesidades. Nuestra isla tiene un talento increíble en su juventud y apostamos a que, a través de la creatividad, innovación y un espíritu inquebrantable lograremos fortalecer la economía local”.

Para más información puede enviarse un correo a través de juventud@ddec.pr.gov.

Comisionada Residente anuncia segundo programa de asistencia al agricultor por motivo de pérdidas sostenidas durante la pandemia Por THE STAR

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a comisionada residente, Jenniffer González-Colón anunció una nueva oportunidad de ayuda para los agricultores afectados por la pandemia del COVID-19 que incluye a Puerto Rico. Se trata del programa federal CFAP 2 que cuenta con una asignación adicional de $14,000 millones.

Dado a la necesidad que siguen teniendo los agricultores en toda la nación, el Departamento de Agricultura de los Estados Unidos (USDA) anunció un segundo programa conocido como CFAP 2, que continúa con el apoyo bajo el Programa de Asistencia Alimentaria por el Coronavirus, también conocido como CFAP regular (por sus siglas en ingles), que termina el próximo 9 de octubre para Puerto Rico, Louisiana, Oregon y Texas.

El periodo para solicitar CFAP 2 comienza este próximo lunes, 21 de septiembre y termina el 11 de diciembre 2020. El propósito continúa siendo la asistencia a los agricultores que enfrentan las interrupciones del mercado y los costos asociados. El periodo de pérdidas consideradas para asistencia económica bajo CFAP 2 comprende del 16 de abril al 31 de agosto de 2020. El periodo de cobertura original de CFAP regular comprende del 15 de

enero al 15 de abril de 2020. Los agricultores que solicitaron y recibieron fondos bajo CFAP regular y continúan enfrentando la disminución de las ventas relacionadas a la interrupción de la cadena de distribución y el aumento de los costos después del 16 de abril podrían ser elegibles para CFAP 2.

“Este cambio ofrece una nueva oportunidad para que los agricultores puedan recibir asistencia financiera dado los daños sostenidos por el COVID-19. Nuestros agricultores continúan siendo afectados por medidas de distanciamiento social que ocasionaron los cierres temporeros de comercios, escuelas y otros mercados a los que ellos suplen. Continuó exhortando a que los mismos se comuniquen con su oficina local de Farm Service Agency de USDA para recibir más información y procesar su solicitud”, comentó la comisionada.

Según la página de CFAP 2, hay sobre 230 variedades de frutas, vegetales y otros cultivos que son elegibles, incluyendo cultivos producidos en Puerto Rico. Algunos de estos son el plátano, guineo, acerola, aguacate, carambola, guayaba, limón, chinas, papaya, parcha, melon, piña, mango, toronja, coco, pitaya, yautía, malanga, berenjena, batata, cilantro, tomate, brocoli, entre otros.

Inicialmente, el programa original de CFAP se hizo

disponible con la información de pérdidas que se tenía al momento. Esto dejó a varios cultivos a nivel nacional- incluyendo varios cultivos importantes de la isla, fuera de la clasificación de elegible. Luego de conocer el impacto que esto pudiera tener, la oficina de la comisionada comenzó gestiones de abogar por la inclusión de cultivos adicionales directamente con USDA. Dicha agencia anunció dos rondas de cultivos adicionales, y ahora incluyó aún más tras anunciar CFAP 2.

“Ahora nuestros agricultores cuentan con más de sus cultivos señalados como elegibles para asistencia directa bajo CFAP 2, y con más tiempo para hacer el acercamiento a FSA y comenzar los trámites de solicitud. Esto fue un logro significativo ya que había varios de nuestros cultivos que eran inelegibles al comenzar el programa.

Nuevamente, todas las personas interesadas deben comunicarse con FSA para orientarse y solicitar antes del 11 de diciembre de 2020”, expresó la comisionada.

Para más información pueden comunicarse con las oficinas de FSA en San Juan al 787-294-1613, o a cualquiera de sus oficinas regionales en la isla. De igual forma pueden visitar la página de CFAP 2, www.farmers. gov/cfap.

20

Monday, September 21, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

How ‘Goodfellas’ and the gangster class of 1990 changed Hollywood

By JASON BAILEY

“A

s far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster,” Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) muses near the start of “Goodfellas,” and in the fall of 1990, when that film was released, it seemed that every filmmaker of note wanted to make a gangster movie. Martin Scorsese’s “Goodfellas” led the way that September, with Phil Joanou’s “State of Grace” and Abel Ferrara’s “King of New York” opening later that month.

The Coen brothers’ “Miller’s Crossing” followed in October. And in December came what was expected to be the biggest title of them all: “The Godfather Part III,” the longawaited follow-up to the Francis Ford Coppola films that most audiences considered the gold standard of gangster pictures.

Such a wave of similarly minded movies hadn’t been seen since the glut of rip-offs that followed the release of the original “Godfather.” The torturous time and effort required of any major production made their rollouts more coincidental than coordinated, although it seems safe to surmise that studios were hoping to ride the wave of interest in “Godfather III.” Yet that film, the most hotly anticipated and (initially) the most financially successful, was the least enthusiastically received — and left the smallest cultural footprint.

Instead, the other gangster movies of that fateful fall 30 years ago would prove far more influential: They combined to draw a map of the routes the crime movie, and movies in general, would take in the coming decade.

None made their mark more than “Goodfellas,” drawn from Nicholas Pileggi’s book “Wiseguy” and based on the real-life exploits of the New York mob underlingturned-informant Henry Hill. Scorsese was 47 when it was released, but he infused the picture with the furious energy and stylistic razzle-dazzle of a film school kid: elaborate camera movements, snazzy freeze frames, hard-boiled voice-over, non-chronological storytelling and tighter needle drops than a downtown DJ set.

The filmmaking is intoxicating because it makes Hill’s life of crime seem so seductive; it draws us into his world. So Scorsese crafts a subjective experience, often literally: in the shot introducing the various gangsters and hangers-on, all of whom speak directly into the camera (“I’m gonna go get the papers, get

From left, Ray Liotta, Joe Pesci and Robert De Niro in “Goodfellas.” the papers”), or the notorious “May 11, 1980” sequence, which uses jagged cutting, jittery camerawork and battling music cues to put us directly into the head of the film’s cokedout, paranoid protagonist. Compared with the respectful distance of earlier gangster stories (even “The Godfather” movies), the immediacy of “Goodfellas” feels like an earthquake.

It left unmistakable fingerprints on some of the most important films and television shows to follow. “‘Boogie Nights’ is very much ‘Goodfellas,’” said Glenn Kenny, author of the new book “Made Men: The Story of ‘Goodfellas,’” who has also written for The New York Times. He also sees a clear connection to Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction” and “Reservoir Dogs” — particularly the recurring motif of gangsters who hang out, talk trash and do their jobs like, well, jobs. Most gangster movies focus on the big bosses and godfathers; “Goodfellas” and its descendants are about the grinders, the middlemen, the working-class thugs.

Kenny also pinpoints the notion of “mobsters having other aspects of their lives,” everyday marital and familial woes, a key ingredient in David Chase’s subsequent groundbreaking series, “The Sopranos.”

Chase has called the film “his Quran, so to speak,” drawing not only from the film’s tone and perspective for “The Sopranos” but also from its cast, which features several future “Sopranos” co-stars.

The hoods in “State of Grace” are, if

anything, even smaller-time, expending their energies on nowhere hustles, petty theft and extortion. Foot soldiers for the Irish mob in Hell’s Kitchen, they’re scrappy street guys, and the relationship at the film’s center is a direct descendant of Scorsese’s 1974 film “Mean Streets”; both pair a sensible, centered earner (Sean Penn here, Harvey Keitel in “Mean Streets”) with a dangerous, trigger-happy yet charismatic hothead (Gary Oldman, standing in for Robert De Niro). That dynamic would reappear in many an indie ’90s crime movie (most notably Nick Gomez’s “Laws of Gravity”), while the ethnic and geographic sensibility of “State of Grace” is a clear influence on “Little Odessa” and “The Yards,” the early crime films of director James Gray.

“State of Grace” is also noteworthy for its acknowledgment of the separation (and tension) between the Irish and Italian mob, expanding the insular Italian perspective typical of gangster narratives. Abel Ferrara would go even further in “King of New York,” which is in many ways a direct throwback to the traditional gangster movies of the 1930s, featuring a charismatic lead (Christopher Walken), a colorful cast of supporting players and a heady serving of social issues.

But “King” broke radically from norms in its racial makeup (its cast included future ’90s breakout stars Wesley Snipes, Laurence Fishburne and Giancarlo Esposito). Walken’s underworld boss Frank White is, in fact, white, but his crew is mostly Black. Post-“Godfather”

“blaxploitation” movies like Larry Cohen’s “Black Caesar” were as strictly segregated as their mainstream counterparts, but here, Ferrara not only integrates the milieu but casts the film’s old world “Godfather”-style Italian gangsters as outright relics, barriers for his forward-glancing criminals to remove quickly and efficiently.

Like “The Godfather,” Joel and Ethan Coen’s “Miller’s Crossing” begins with a portly, mustachioed man asking a mob boss for a favor. But “Miller’s” is a beast of its own, filtering the conventions of the gangster picture through the Coens’ distinctive sensibility, and it’s full of their trademarks: ornate, flourishfilled dialogue delivered at a mile a minute; complex, often dizzying plotting; exhilarating camerawork; bellowing overweight men; John Turturro.

“The tentative title for ‘Miller’s Crossing’ was ‘The Big Head,’” Adam Nayman, author of “The Coen Brothers: This Book Really Ties the Films Together,” explained by email.

“Other crime films have higher body counts, but I’d wager there aren’t many with as much discussion about the intricacies of introducing a bullet into the brain.”

By the time “The Godfather Part III” finally arrived on Christmas Day, critics and audiences may well have simply burned out on gangster movies. “At the time, it was a massive, massive, massive disappointment,” Kenny recalled, and it’s easy to see why (without even revisiting Coppola’s decision to cast his daughter Sofia, an acting novice, in a key role).

It’s a decidedly old-fashioned movie, steeped in the classical style of its predecessors, laying out its story of gang wars, political wrangling, Vatican intrigue and personal redemption in studiously paced (sometimes pokey, even), exposition-heavy dialogue scenes.

To its credit, “Godfather III” is also quiet, introspective and emotional in a way that its flashy brethren aren’t. (Michael’s weeping confession of ordering Fredo’s death is one of the most wrenching scenes in the entire trilogy.) But by the time the picture landed at the end of that pivotal year, it seemed downright quaint. Coppola’s film was true to itself, and the artful approach to a disreputable genre that had made the series seem, 18 years earlier, so revolutionary. But by “Part III,” the “Godfather” series had served its purpose; the gangster movie had evolved yet again, into something even more grimy, eccentric and alive.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

21

Sarah Paulson remembers some good cries

By KATHRYN SHATTUCK

S

arah Paulson operates under the belief that blood once flowed through even the stoniest of hearts.

As the star of “Ratched,” Ryan Murphy’s origin story of the mental-ward tyrant Nurse Ratched in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” Paulson had no desire to lazily recreate Louise Fletcher’s performance. Instead, Paulson wanted to excavate the interior of a character she never saw as a villain in the first place.

In this version, Mildred Ratched arrives at a Northern California psychiatric hospital in 1947, where doctors are performing disturbing mind experiments on the patients. Tears roll down her cheek before she grips an ice pick and a hammer to perform a lobotomy.

“I thought, if we’re going to go back and invent it 20 years prior, who might she have been, and what might allow for the calcification of soul and spirit that we see in ‘Cuckoo’s Nest’?” said Paulson, who is a virtuoso of terror in her own right from her run in Murphy’s “American Horror Story.”

It’s the kind of gutsy deep dive she took in her Emmy-winning portrayal of Marcia Clark in “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.” (Linda Tripp is next.) And that she admires in the fearlessly unaffected performances of Gena Rowlands and Kim Stanley, two of her cultural influences.

“If you only give the audience what they’ve already seen,” she said in a call from Los Angeles, occasionally cooing to her dog Winnie, “we could all watch footage from Court TV.” These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

1. Lisa Eisner Over the years, I have come to collect her pieces. It was the moment I felt like a grown-up, that owning something like this was a sign that I had come into my own in terms of making my home be reflective of my personal style and taste. I have this dish — it might be an incense holder — that’s an abalone shell whose interior is this beautiful opalescent pink. And it’s got this rim around it, almost like the spine of an animal made of spores and bronze. It looks like it came from the sea, which of course the base of it did, but everything she has done to it is just so beautiful and still feels so raw. I like having those grounding elements in my house because I feel always like I’m about to float away.

2. DeLuscious Cookies & Milk It’s very important: the vegan chocolate chip cookie. I am not a vegan, but I want you to understand that it is the superior version of their very magical cookies. Something that tastes this good should have a lot of butter and eggs and dairy. But this is a cookie that don’t need no butter.

I think Renée Zellweger actually introduced it to me. We did a movie together called “Down With Love,” and she would never forget your birthday. Every year there would be a big cold glass bottle of milk and these cookies from DeLuscious. I swear to God, they seemed like they were still warm. Since I’m not a vegan, I can gulp that milk down right along with my vegan cookie. I like the incongruity of it.

3. John Cassavetes’ “Opening Night” It’s nothing original to be an actor and to love Cassavetes.

But that movie hit me before I had even arrived at the age where (I was) contending with the core theme. She’s this actress who is meeting this moment where she is aging. It makes my blood run

The actress Sarah Paulson in 2016. The frequent Ryan Murphy collaborator takes on a terrifying role in Netflix’s “Ratched” while soothing her soul with vegan cookies and John Cassavetes films. cold in terms of what I recognize about it for me at 45.

I find Gena Rowlands to be the world’s most spectacular performer, and this is the performance of a lifetime. It was so devoid of vanity that for me is of great value, because sometimes this industry dictates that you pay a lot of attention to what your exterior is looking like. It infiltrates the work in a way that can be really dangerous. I thought: “This is an actress who is not afraid to be loathed, who is not afraid to be humiliated, who is not afraid to be ugly. This is the kind of acting I want to do.”

4. Kim Stanley The movie “Frances” was one of the more defining moments for me. I remember being a 14-year-old and coming across it on television. It was this scene of Jessica Lange sitting in the car, staring at her house. And I thought, “What is this, and who is that?” But Kim Stanley was the most astonishing thing. This is probably something for my shrink to decipher, but I’m drawn to performances that are not about endearing oneself to an audience. I remember when I did “12 Years a Slave” being confronted with these feelings of, “Should I be bothered by the potential hatred that will be held by viewers for me?” But there was something that struck me as so true and so vulgar in terms of her living so vicariously through her child’s success, and her child’s beauty, and her child’s bravery. It was something I’ve never been able to shake.

5. Joan Armatrading’s “Heaven” I think it’s the most exquisite love song ever written. I grew up with all my friends worshipping Madonna. And I worshipped Joan Armatrading and Laura Nyro and Joni Mitchell and the Pretenders and all this music that my mother had these records of.

When she was out of the house, I would just put them on and cry like a good little artist who wanted to be a poet-performer. I had never heard anybody sing about love in a way that had all of the elements of the actual experience, which was exhilarating and mournful and celebratory. It’s my idea of heaven, for sure.

6. “A Little Life” by Hanya Yanagihara It’s the most exquisite book about pain I’ve ever read. But really what it’s about is friendship and the circuitous route that it sometimes takes. There was something so poignant to me about the love story between these friends, it just made me weep. And I mean sob uncontrollably in my bed at night before I turned off the light.

7. NPR’s “Throughline” It’s revisiting moments in our history in an effort to give greater clarity to where we stand now. And I think it’s important, given what we’re dealing with politically as well as from a social justice standpoint, to re-examine what you held to be true, and to perhaps give context to those stories. This podcast gives me a real opportunity to be told about it in a way that is inventive and clear and made by young people. I find it to be wonderful.

8. “I May Destroy You” I don’t know how Michaela Coel made a show that is about sexual assault, and yet it’s about everything else that happens in one’s life as well. And she challenges you to confront so many widely held beliefs. Arabella is a character who sometimes you don’t like very much. I think there’s such bravery in creating a character that an audience struggles with wanting to spend time with. And yet in the very next beat, you fall in love with her again.

And the very next beat you weep for her. And the very next beat you’re laughing uproariously. Also, it’s got the world’s greatest title.

9. “Ann” on PBS Great Performances Yes, I’m biased because it was written by the person I share my life with. But I feel like there is something very profound about loving someone the way I love Holland Taylor, having never known about “Ann” [Taylor’s Tony-nominated one-woman show about Ann Richards, a former governor of Texas]. And having not seen it until we were deep into our love story, and then to be sitting in an audience and watching the person you love more than anyone in the world do something astonishing. To basically realize that the person you love is a touched-in-the-head genius and a true artist with a sense of civic duty and responsibility. To be in such awe of a person that I already felt I knew so well. And to recognize how hard it is to fully know someone.

10. Sam Shaw’s Photographs The moment I knew I was going to own a home, the thing I wanted to acquire most were these photographs of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands. These probably are my most cherished possessions. I have one photograph from “Opening Night” that was wrinkled and damaged, and I insisted on having it anyway because it was a very beautiful moment of Gena Rowlands on the floor, in a pile. It somehow makes me feel connected to the performers themselves. And it’s a way to remind myself about the kind of work I want to do.

When Cate Blanchett and I were working on “Mrs. America,” as a wrap gift I gave her an original photograph of Sam’s, a very big close-up of Gena’s face. Just a meaningful thing between actors who love the same actors.

22

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

Gibraltar, Europe’s pandemic wedding hot spot

By CEYLAN YEGINSU

W

hen Je’nell Griffin’s husband proposed to her in November, she dreamed of having a big church ceremony in her hometown, Los Angeles, where she imagined gliding down the aisle in an ethereal gown flanked by scores of friends and family.

But eight months later, after her plans were upended by the coronavirus pandemic, the 36-year-old talent recruiter found herself exchanging vows in a small conference room on a yacht hotel in Gibraltar, a tiny British territory nestled under a towering rock on the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula.

Like many of the couples who married there this summer, Griffin had never heard of Gibraltar until it appeared at the top of a Google search for “the easiest place to get married in Europe.”

At a time when countries around the world are curtailing wedding ceremonies and imposing strict travel restrictions to stop the spread of the coronavirus, Gibraltar has welcomed couples of all nationalities, including Americans, who are determined to perform their nuptials despite the obstacles posed by the pandemic.

“It was vastly different from the dream,” said Griffin, who flew to Gibraltar from Los Angeles via London’s Heathrow Airport. “But in the end, the reality of being married to my person far outweighed any vision.”

Many of the marriages being celebrated in Gibraltar, like Griffin’s, involve a U.S. citizen marrying a partner from another country, because of the numerous hurdles the Trump administration has placed on immigration and travel.

“We were just tired of constantly being disappointed by all the immigration restrictions that worked against us,” Griffin said, referring to the sweeping travel ban that prevented her British fiancé from visiting her in the United States.

Now that they are married, he is exempt from the ban because he is a spouse.

“Living in different countries, this was the only way we could guarantee seeing each other.”

Jordan Lee, from Britain, and Roberta Pabline, from Brazil, posing for the photographer at the Marina in Gibraltar on Sept. 5, 2020. The tiny British territory at the tip of Spain, with its open border and lack of restrictions, has become the go-to place for couples looking to wed.

Other couples who have faced wedding restrictions in their own countries have also seized the opportunity to marry in Gibraltar this summer, ahead of a potential second wave of the virus.

Ireland currently has a 50-person limit on gatherings, so Craig Byrne, 25, and Orla Moore, 22, both Irish, got married in Gibraltar in front of the registrar and two local witnesses to avoid disappointing family members and friends who would not have made the cut to attend.

Even before the pandemic, Gibraltar was a popular wedding destination because of the minimal bureaucracy involved in tying the knot there. Couples are required to present their passports and birth certificates, and stay in the territory overnight either before or after their wedding. They receive their wedding certificate by mail within three weeks.

There is a history to Gibraltar weddings: John Lennon of the Beatles married Yoko Ono there, in 1969, after facing a series of setbacks in other countries.

“We chose Gibraltar because it is quiet, British and friendly,” Lennon is

quoted as saying in the book “The History of British Rock ‘n‘ Roll.”

“We tried everywhere else first.

I set out to get married on the car ferry and we would have arrived in France married, but they wouldn’t do it,” he said. “We were no more successful with cruise ships. We tried embassies, but three weeks’ residence in Germany or two weeks’ in France were required.”

Few of the couples getting married in Gibraltar on a recent weekend had concerns about the risks of traveling there during the pandemic. So far, the territory has managed to contain the spread of the virus, reporting fewer than 350 total cases and no deaths. However, cases have spiked in recent weeks and the territory’s open border with Spain, where the health ministry reported nearly 9,000 new cases last Friday, prompted Wales to remove Gibraltar from its list of countries exempt from quarantine requirements.

Still, wedding planners are reporting huge demand; the flights on British Airways and easyJet were full throughout August, and slots at the registry office — the British equivalent of an American

city hall marriage bureau — are booked up until November.

“We were just expecting people to cancel or postpone, but as soon as the travel restrictions were lifted in July, the phones wouldn’t stop ringing,” said Chamaine Cruz, the founder of wedding events company Sweet Gibraltar Weddings. “It makes sense as it’s easy to get married here. It’s cheap, there are many direct flights, and the marriage certificate provided is recognized worldwide.”

One item of clothing is mandatory for the ceremony: a face covering (even during the first kiss).

The bizarre circumstances bring couples from all over the world together, and on a recent weekend, after their ceremonies, many of them joined locals and tourists at the Ocean Village Marina, a popular drinking spot on the harbor, and celebrated in the bustling restaurants and bars with Champagne and live music. Those sitting outside at the bars and restaurants mostly did not wear masks.

Olivia Windham Stewart, who is British and her new husband, Michael, who is American, pose for the photographer in Gibraltar on Sept. 5, 2020.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

23

AstraZeneca, under fire for vaccine safety, releases trial blueprints

By DENISE GRADY, KATHERINE J. WU and SHARON LaFRANIERE

A

straZeneca revealed details of its large coronavirus vaccine trials Saturday, the third in a wave of rare disclosures by drug companies under pressure to be more transparent about how they are testing products that are the world’s best hope for ending the pandemic.

Polls are finding Americans increasingly wary of accepting a coronavirus vaccine. And scientists inside and outside the government are worried that regulators, pressured by the president for results before Election Day on Nov. 3, might release an unproven or unsafe vaccine.

“The release of these protocols seems to reflect some public pressure to do so,” said Natalie Dean, a biostatistician and expert in clinical trial design for vaccines at the University of Florida. “This is an unprecedented situation, and public confidence is such a huge part of the success of this endeavor.”

Experts have been particularly concerned about AstraZeneca’s vaccine trials, which began in April in Britain, because of the company’s refusal to provide details about serious neurological illnesses in two participants, both women, who received its experimental vaccine in Britain. Those cases spurred the company to halt its trials twice, the second time earlier this month.

The studies have resumed in Britain, Brazil, India and South Africa but are still on pause in the U.S. About 18,000 people worldwide have received AstraZeneca’s vaccine so far.

AstraZeneca’s 111-page trial blueprint, known as a protocol, states that its goal is a vaccine with 50% effectiveness — the same threshold that the Food and Drug Administration has set in its guidance for coronavirus vaccines. To determine with statistical confidence whether the company has met that target, there will have to be 150 people ill with confirmed coronavirus among participants who were vaccinated or received placebo shots.

However, the plan anticipates that a safety board will perform an early analysis after there have been just 75 cases. If the vaccine is 50% effective at that point, it

might be possible for the company to stop the trial early and apply for authorization from the government to release the vaccine for emergency use.

In allowing only one such interim analysis, AstraZeneca’s plan is more rigorous than the others that have been released, from Moderna and Pfizer, Dr. Eric Topol, a clinical trials expert at Scripps Research in San Diego, said in an interview.

Moderna allows two such analyses, and Pfizer four.

He said the problem with looking at the data too many times, after a relatively small number of cases, is that it increases the odds of finding an appearance of safety and efficacy that might not hold up. Stopping trials early can also increase the risk of missing rare side effects that could be significant once the vaccine is given to millions of people.

Topol said AstraZeneca’s plan, like those of Moderna and Pfizer, had a problematic feature: All count relatively mild cases of COVID-19 when measuring efficacy, which may hamper efforts to determine whether the vaccine prevents moderate or severe illness.

Such plans are not usually shared with the public “due to the importance of maintaining confidentiality and integrity of trials,” Michele Meixell, a spokesperson for AstraZeneca, said in a statement.

The company has released few details about the two cases of serious illness in its trial. The first participant received one dose of the vaccine before developing inflammation of the spinal cord, known as transverse myelitis, according to a participant information sheet for AstraZeneca’s vaccine from July. The condition can cause weakness in the arms and legs, paralysis, pain and bowel and bladder problems.

The case prompted a pause in AstraZeneca’s vaccine trials to allow for a safety review by independent experts. A company spokesperson told The New York Times last week that the volunteer was later determined to have a previously undiagnosed case of multiple sclerosis, unrelated to the vaccine, and that the trial resumed shortly thereafter.

Transverse myelitis can sometimes be the first sign of multiple sclerosis, which

A technician supervised vaccine filling and packaging tests at a facility in Italy, which will assist in the production of the Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine when it becomes available. involves more complex symptoms. But the myelitis alone can also occur after the body encounters an infectious agent like a virus.

The company said it had not confirmed a diagnosis in the second case, a participant who got sick after the second dose of the vaccine. A person familiar with the situation who spoke with the Times on the condition of anonymity said the participant’s illness had been pinpointed as transverse myelitis. The trial was paused again Sept. 6 after she fell ill.

The condition is rare but serious, and experts said that finding even one case among thousands of trial participants could be a red flag. Multiple confirmed cases, they said, could be enough to halt AstraZeneca’s vaccine bid entirely.

“If there are two cases, then this starts to look like a dangerous pattern,” said Mark Slifka, a vaccine expert at Oregon Health and Science University. “If a third case of neurological disease pops up in the vaccine group, then this vaccine may be done.”

A participant information sheet dated Sept. 11 on AstraZeneca’s trial in Britain lumped the two volunteers’ cases together, stating the illnesses were “unlikely to be

associated with the vaccine or there was insufficient evidence to say for certain that the illnesses were or were not related to the vaccine,” based on safety reviews. The next day, AstraZeneca announced that it had resumed the trial in Britain.

But the FDA has so far not allowed the company to start up again in the United States.

A spokesperson for the FDA declined to comment. The National Institutes of Health said in a statement that it “remains to be seen” whether the onset of illness in trial participants was coincidental or tied to the vaccine, adding that “pausing to allow for further evaluation is consistent with standard practice.”

Dr. Paul Offit, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the FDA’s advisory committee on vaccines, said that it’s unclear how the company — or the U.K. government — determined that the second case was not related to the vaccine.

He and other experts noted that transverse myelitis is rare, diagnosed in only about 1 in 236,000 Americans a year.

The trial in Britain involved only about 8,000 volunteers, a spokesperson for the Oxford researchers said last month.

24 LEGAL NOTICE Estado libre asociado de puerto rico CENTRO JUDICIAL DE HUMACAO Tribunal de primera instancia Sala superior.

MUNICIPIO DE HUMACAO representado por su Honorable Alcalde, Luis R. Sánchez Hernández Peticionario vs.

CARLOS M. CRUZ BENÍTEZ, MIRTA I. SANTIAGO GONZÁLEZ, DYNAMIC GROUP, LLC, JJ INVERSIONES, INC., UNIVERSAL PROPERTIES, CRIM, ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Partes con interés CIVIL NÚM.: HU2020CV00520.

SOBRE: expropiación forzosa.

EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS E.E.U.U. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE P.R.

A: CARLOS M. CRUZ BENÍTEZ, MIRTA I. SANTIAGO GONZÁLEZ, JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

RE: El MUNICIPIO DE HUMACAO se propone adquirir el título de pleno y absoluto dominio de la propiedad que se describe a continuación localizada en la Calle 7 #276, Punta Santiago Comm., Humacao, P.R. para llevar a cabo los fines y propósitos del Proyecto: ESTORBOS PUBLICOS. Parcela marcada con el #276 en el Plano de Mensura preparado por el Municipio de Humacao, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de 1513.1996 metros cuadrados, equivalentes a 0.384 cuerda. En lindes por el NORTE, con la Parcela 255, por el SUR, con la Calle 7, por el ESTE, con la Calle 18 y por el OESTE, con la Parcela 275.

Enclava una estructura utilizada para residencia y otras mejoras las cuales se encuentran en un alto grado de deterioro. Dado a su alto grado de deterioro se recomienda la demolición.

CODIFICACION: 282-051-06106-901. El MUNICIPIO DE HUMACAO, representado por su Honorable Alcalde, Luis R. Sánchez Hernández, a tenor con la autoridad conferida mediante la Ley General de Expropiación Forzosa del 12 de marzo de 1903, según enmendada, la Regla 58-Expropiación Forzosa de Propiedad, de las Reglas de Procedimiento Civil, según enmendada, 32 L.P.R.A. Ap. V, R-58, el Artículo 2.001(c) de la ley de Municipios Autónomos, Ley Núm. 81 del 30 de agosto de 1991, según enmendada;

@

Ley Núm. 84 del 29 de octubre de 1992, según enmendada; la Ley Núm. 31 del 18 de enero de 2012, según enmendada; y la Ordenanza Municipal Número 21, Serie Núm. 2015-2016, adoptada por la Legislatura Municipal del Municipio Autónomo de Humacao, interesa adquirir dicha propiedad en pleno dominio para el Proyecto Estorbos Públicos y por exceder la cantidad de la deuda por gastos necesarios y convenientes al valor de tasación no se requiere el depósito de suma alguna en el Tribunal como justa compensación por la propiedad. No habiéndose podido emplazar personalmente a usted por desconocerse su paradero, este Tribunal ha ordenado que conforme lo establecido en la Regla 58.4 C-2 de Procedimiento Civil se emplace por edicto que se publicará una vez por semana durante tres (3) semanas consecutivas en un periódico de circulación general en Puerto Rico. El Tribunal releva a la parte peticionaria del envío a los diez (10) días de la publicación del último edicto por correo con acuse de recibo de una copia del emplazamiento y de la demanda por desconocerse su dirección actual y/o paradero.

POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días si fuese emplazado por edictos, notificando copia de la misma al (a la) abogado(a) de la parte peticionaria o a ésta, de no tener representación legal.

Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

MARIA A. MERCADO PADILLA Número RUA 14,225 Ave. Ponce de León #1605 Oficina 701 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00909 Tel./Fax.: 787-945-7455/ Email: mercado.maria@gmail.com ABRAHAM FREYRE MEDINA RUA 19,280 COLEGIADO 19585 The Executive BLDG. Banco Cooperativo #623 Ave. Ponce de León, Suite 806-B San Juan, PR 00917 Ofic.: 787-631-2644/ Cel.: 787-392-6692 Email: freyrelex@gmail.com El Tribunal ha señalado el día 19 de octubre de 2020, a las 10:30 AM en Sala 206 para la vista del caso, en cuyo día se determinará el justo valor de la propiedad y las partes a ser compensadas, y a cuya vista podrá usted comparecer y ofrecer prueba de valoración aunque no haya contestado la Petición. Se le advierte que si dentro del mencionado término no contesta la petición ni com-

parece a la vista señalada, este Tribunal entenderá que no tiene interés en el caso y procederá a dictar sentencia conforme a las alegaciones de la Petición. Expedido por Orden del Tribunal en Humacao, Puerto Rico, hoy 25 de agosto de 2020. Dominga Gomez Fuster, Sec Regional.

Dalias Reyes de Leon, Sec Auxiliar. ****

derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberé presenter su alegación responsiva en la secretaria del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsive dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

LEGAL NOTICE Greenspoon Marder, LLP Lcda. Frances L. Asencio-Guido ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE R.U.A. 15,622 PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE TRADE CENTRE SOUTH, SUITE 700 PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA 100 ‘QEST CYPRESS CREEK ROAD SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN. FORT LAUDERDALE, FL 33309 Telephone: (954) 343 6273 REVERSE MORTGAGE Frances.Asencio@gmlaw.corn FUNDING LLC. Expedido bajo mi firma y sello Demandante vs. del Tribunal, en San Juan, PuerSUCESION ELISABETH to Rico, hoy 31 de agosto de ROMERO DE JESUS 2020. GRISELDA RODRIGUEZ COLLADO, Secretaria. LUZ E. T/C/C ELIZABETH FERNANDEZ Del Valle, SubSeROMERO DE JESUS cretaria.

pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberé presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaria del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

Greenspoon Marder, LLP Lcda. Frances L. Asencio-Guido R.U.A. 15,622 TRADE CENTRE SOUTH, SUITE 700 loo WEST CYPRESS CREEK ROAD FORT LAUDERDALE, FL 33309 Telephone: (954) 343 6273 Frances.Asencio@gmlaw.com Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, en Ponce, Puerto Rico, hoy 9 de septiembre de 2020. Luz Mayra Caraballo Garcia, Sec Regional. Maricell Ortiz Muñiz, Sec Aux del Tribunal I.

T/C/C ELIZABETH LEGAL NOTICE LEGAL NOTICE ROMERO COMPUESTA POR SARA DIAZ ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE ROMERO, WILFREDO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU- PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DIAZ ROMERO Y SALA SUPERIOR DE PONCE. SUPERIOR DE CAROLINA. RICHARD DIAZ REVERSE MORTGAGE BANCO POPULAR DE ROMERO; JOHN DOE FUNDING LLC. PUERTO RICO Y JANE DOE COMO Demandante vs.

PARTE DEMANDANTE VS. POSIBLES HEREDEROS GLORIA GONZALEZ T/C/C EL SECRETARIO DESCONOCIDOS; GLORIA M. GONZALEZ DE LA VIVIENDA Y ESTADOS UNIDOS DE T/C/C GLORIA MARIA DESARROLLO URBANO AMERICA; CENTRO GONZALEZ T/C/C GLORIA T/C/C SECRETARY DE RECAUDACION DE MARIA GONZALEZ OF HOUSING AND INGRESOS MUNICIPALES NIEVES T/C/C GLORIA M. URBAN DEVELOPMENT Demandados GONZALEZ NIEVES T/C/C OF WASHINGTON CIVIL NUM. SJ2020CV02312.

GLORIA GONZALEZ (HUD) POR SِÍ Y EN SOBRE: EJECUCION DE HIPOTECA. EMPLAZ4IENTO NIEVES; ESTADOS REPRESENTACIÓN POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIUNIDOS DE AMERICA DE ESTADOS UNIDOS DOS DE MÉRICA EL PRESIDemandados DE AMÉRICA; THE DENTE DE LOS ESTADOS CIVIL NUM. PO2020CV01245.

MORTGAGE LOAN UNIDOS EL ESTADO LIBRE SOBRE: EJECUCION DE HICO. INC.; MIGUEL ASOCIADO DE PUERTO POTECA. EMPLAZAMIENTO RICO. SS. ÁNGEL BURGOS POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIA: SARA DIAZ ROMERO, DOS DE AMERICA EL PRERIVERA, DENNISSE SIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS WILFREDO DIAZ RAMOS MARTÍNEZ Y ROMERO Y RICHARD UNIDOS EL ESTADO LIBRE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL ASOCIADO DE PUERTO DIAZ ROMERO; JOHN RICO. SS. DE GANANCIALES DOE Y JANE DOE COMO A: GLORIA GONZALEZ COMPUESTA POR MIEMBROS DE LA AMBOS, FULANO Y T/C/C GLORIA M. StJCESION ELISABETH GONZALEZ T/C/C GLORIA MENGANO DE TAL, ROMERO DE JESUS POSIBLES TENEDORES MARIA GONZALEZ T/C/C ELIZABETH DESCONOCIDOS DEL T/C/C GLORIA MARIA ROMERO DE JESUS PAGARÉ GONZALEZ NIEVES T/C/C PARTE DEMANDADA T/C/C ELIZABETH GLORIA M. GONZALEZ CIVIL NÚM. CA2020CV00177.

ROMERO NIEVES T/C/C GLORIA SOBRE: CANCELACIÓN DE POR LA PRESENTE se le emGONZALEZ NIEVES PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO POR pieza para que presente al Tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación de este edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: http://unired.rainajudíciel. pr, salvo que se represente por

staredictos@thesanjuandailystar.com

POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al Tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación de este edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: http: //unired.ramajudicial.

(787) 743-3346

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

LA VÍA JUDICIAL. EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS E.E.U.U. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

A: DENNISSE RAMOS MARTÍNEZ Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA CON

MIGUEL ÁNGEL BURGOS RIVERA a sus últimas direcciones conocidas: URB VILLAS DEL SOL, 509 CALLE GIJÓN (PARCELA E9), CAROLINA, PR 009855112, 6641 SENDERO LN, WACO, TX 76712-7575, MONTE CENTRO, APT 301H, CAROLINA, PR 00985, COND MONTE CENTRO, 404 CALLE DAGUAO APT 301, CAROLINA, PR 009877848, PO BOX 367649, SAN JUAN PR 009367649, URB. CASTELLANA GARDENS, LL14 CALLE 33, CAROLINA, PR 00983 y PO BOX 79577, CAROLINA PR 00984-9577. FULANO y MENGANO DE TAL, POSIBLES TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARÉ.

Queda usted notificado que en este Tribunal se ha radicado demanda sobre cancelación de pagaré extraviado por la vía judicial. El 29 de abril de 2005, Miguel Ángel Burgos Rivera y su esposa Dennisse Ramos Martínez, constituyeron una hipoteca en Bayamón, Puerto Rico, conforme a la Escritura núm. 50 autorizada por el notario Jaime Manuel Rosa Malavé en garantía de un pagaré por la suma de $11,095.40 a favor de Secretary of Housing and Urban Development of Washington (HUD), o a su orden, sin intereses y vencedero el 1ro de enero de 2031, sobre la siguiente propiedad: URBANA: Parcela E-9 de la Urbanización Villas del Sol, sita en el Barrio Martin González del Municipio de Carolina, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de 244.121 metros cuadrados. equivalentes a 0.0621 cuerdas, colindando por el NORTE, en 9.870 metros con la parcela D-9; por el SUR, en 9.119 metros, con la Calle Gijón; por el ESTE, en 25.00 metros con la parcela E-8; y por el OESTE, en 24.249 metros con la calle Mérida. Enclava una casa que mide 22’-9” de ancho por 38’8” de largo y tiene en el primer nivel, portal, vestíbulo, baño de visita, sala-comedor, cocina, lavandería con despensa y escalera que conduce al segundo piso, con un patio de servicio y área para estacionar dos automóviles, ambos, descubiertos, al frente de la casa. El segundo nivel consta de dos dormitorios, tres closets, baño, dormitorios master, baño master, closet vestidor y escalera que conduce al primer piso. Este solar está

afecto a una servidumbre que discurre a lo largo de sus colindancias Norte y Oeste con un ancho de 150 metros a favor de la Puerto Rico Telephone Company. La propiedad y la escritura de hipoteca constan inscritas al folio 115 del tomo 1377 de Carolina, Finca 52228. Registro de la Propiedad de Carolina, Sección II. Inscripción segunda. La parte demandada deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Administración y Manejo de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https:// unired.ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal. Se le advierte que, si no contesta la demanda, radicando el original de la contestación en este Tribunal y enviando copia de la contestación a la abogada de la Parte Demandante, Lcda.

Belma Alonso García, cuya dirección es: PO Box 3922, Guaynabo, PR 00970-3922, Teléfono y Fax: (787) 789-1826, correo electrónico: oficinabelmaalonso@gmail.com, dentro del término de treinta (30) días de la publicación de este edicto, excluyéndose el día de la publicación, se le anotará la rebeldía y se le dictará Sentencia en su contra, concediendo el remedio solicitado sin más citarle ni oírle. EXPEDIDO bajo mi firma y el sello del Tribunal, hoy 4 de SEPTIEMBRE de 2020, en Carolina, Puerto Rico. Lcda.

Marilyn Aponte Rodriguez, Sec Regional. Myriam I Figueroa Pastrana, Sec Auxiliar.

FULANO DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Quedan emplazados y notificados que en este Tribunal se ha radicado Demanda sobre cobro de dinero por la vía ordinaria y ejecución de gravamen mobiliario (reposesión de vehículo) en la que se alega que la parte demandada CARMEN H. NIEVES RIVERA, SU ESPOSO FULANO DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS, le adeudan solidariamente a Americas Leading Finance, LLC., la suma de principal de $20,014.00 más los intereses que continúen acumulando, las costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado según pactados.

Además, solicitamos de este Honorable Tribunal que autorice la reposesión y/o embargo del Vehículo. Se les advierte que este edicto se publicará en un periódico de circulación general una sola vez y que, si no comparecen a contestar dicha Demanda dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del Edicto, 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, se le anotará la rebeldía y se dictará Sentencia concediendo el remedio así solicitado sin más citarles ni oírles. El abogado de la parte LEGAL NOTICE demandante es la Lcdo. GerarESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE do Ortiz Torres, cuya dirección PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE física y postal es: Cond. El PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA Centro I, Suite 801, 500 Muñoz SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS. Rivera Ave., San Juan, Puerto AMERICAS LEADING Rico 00918; cuyo número de teléfono es (787) 946-5268 y su FINANCE, LLC correo electrónico es: gerardo@ Demandante, v. bellverlaw.com. Expedido bajo CARMEN H. NIEVES mi firma y sello de este TribuRIVERA, SU ESPOSO nal, en CAGUAS, Puerto Rico, FULANO DE TAL Y LA hoy día 10 de SEPTIEMBRE de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA SOCIEDAD LEGAL ORTIZ, Secretaria. MARITZA DE GANANCIALES ROSARIO PLACERES, Sec AuCOMPUESTA POR xiliar del Tribunal I.

AMBOS

Demandados CIVIL NÚM.: CG2020CV01218.

SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA Y EJECUCIÓN DE GRAVAMEN MOBILIARIO (REPOSESIÓN DE VEHÍCULO). EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. DE AMERICA EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

A: CARMEN H. NIEVES RIVERA, SU ESPOSO

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE CAROLINA.

LOURDES LOPEZ QUIÑONES DEMANDANTES VS.

SOUTHERN MORTGAGE, INC.; JOHN DOE, RICHARD ROE.

DEMANDADOS CIVIL NO. CA2020cv01911.

SOBRE: CANCELACION DE

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE. UU., EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

(787) 722-2243, cachorThmicrojuris.com dentro del término de treinta (30) días siguientes a Ia fecha de publicación de este Edicto; Si dejaren de asI hacerlo, Se les anotará Ia rebeldía y se dictará sentencia contra ustedes concediendo el remedio A: SOUTHERN solicitado sin más citarle ni oIrle.

MORTGAGE, INC. EXPEDIDO bajo mi firma y el JOHN DOE Y RICHARD sello del Tribunal de Carolina, ROE, como posibles Puerto Rico, hoy 10 de septenedores del pagare tiembre de 2020. Lcda. Marilyn Por Ia PRESENTE se le empla- Aponte Rodriguez, Secretaria za para que presente al tribunal Regional. Ida Fernandez Rodrisu alegación responsiva dentro guez, Sec Auxiliar del Tribunal. de los 30 días de haber sido diLEGAL NOTICE ligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el dIa del diligen- ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE ciamiento. Usted deberá pre- PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE sentar su alegación responsiva PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA a través del Sistema Unificado SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS. de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando Ia siguiente dirección: https://unired.ramajudicial.pr salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en Ia secretaria del Tribunal Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunaI podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder eI remedio solicitado en Ia demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. Por medio del presente edicto se les notifica de Ia radicación de una Demanda de cancelación de Pagare Extraviado en Ia que se solicita Ia cancelación del siguiente pagare hipotecario, que posiblemente se ha extraviado, luego de haber sido saldado por el deudor hipotecario: pagare a favor de Southern Mortgage, Inc., o a su orden, por Ia suma principal de cincuenta y un mil quinientoS dólares ($51,500.00), con intereses al 8 3/4 % anual, vencedero el primero de mayo del año 2008, segUn costa de Ia escritura número 96, otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 10 de abril de 1978, ante el notarlo Julio J. Cayere, e inscrita al folio 67 del tomo 388 de Carolina, finca nUmero 14,811, inscripción quinta.

La parte demandante solicita del Honorable Tribunal que declare con lugar Ia demanda y en su consecuencia ordene al Secretario del Tribunal que expida Mandamiento al Registrador de Ia Propiedad correspondiente, para que dicho funcionario proceda a cancelar en los libros a su cargo Ia referida hipoteca dejando Ia propiedad aquí descrita libre de dicho gravamen hipotecario. POR EL PRESENTE EDICTO se les emplaza y requiere para que conteste Ia Demanda radicando el original de su contestación ante el Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de San Juan, y notificándole con copia de dicha contestación al abogado del demandante, Lcdo.

Ricardo J. Cacho Rodriguez, 54 Calle Resolución, Suite 303, San Juan, Puerto Rico 009202729 Tel: (787) 722-2242; Fax:

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO

PARTE DEMANDANTE VS.

EL SECRETARIO DE LA VIVIENDA Y DESARROLLO URBANO T/C/C SECRETARY OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT OF WASHINGTON (HUD) POR SÍ Y EN REPRESENTACIÓN DE ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA; DORAL FINANCIAL CORPORATION H/N/C H.F. MORTGAGE BANKERS POR CONDUCTO DE SU AGENTE RESIDENTE; FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION (FDIC) COMO SÍNDICO DE DORAL BANK; DORAL MORTGAGE CORPORATION T/C/C DORAL MORTGAGE, LLC., POR CONDUCTO DE SU AGENTE RESIDENTE CT CORPORATION SYSTEM; ÁNGEL ALFREDO JUSINO MORALES T/C/C ÁNGEL A. JUSINO MORALES; FULANO Y MENGANO DE TAL, POSIBLES TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARÉ

PARTE DEMANDADA CIVIL NÚM. CG2020CV01282 (101). SOBRE: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO POR LA VÍA JUDICIAL. EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS E.E.U.U. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

A: FULANO Y MENGANO DE TAL, POSIBLES TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARÉ

Queda usted notificado que en este Tribunal se ha radicado

demanda sobre cancelación de pagaré extraviado por la vía judicial. El El 30 de noviembre de 2002, Ángel Alfredo Jusino Morales t/c/c Ángel A. Jusino Morales, se acogió a la alternativa de “Partial Claim”. Dicho beneficio, el cual se ofrece a los préstamos asegurados por la Administración de Vivienda Federal (FHA por sus siglas en inglés), consiste en la reinstalación del préstamo hipotecario, difiriendo los pagos en atraso a través de una hipoteca subordinada, sin intereses. Esta hipoteca subordinada fue constituida San Juan, Puerto Rico, mediante la Escritura núm. 902 autorizada por el notario Luis Fernando Castillo Cruz en garantía de un pagaré por la suma de $2,554.24, a favor de Secretario de la Vivienda y Desarrollo Urbano t/c/c Secretary Of Housing And Urban Development, sin intereses y vencimiento al 1ro de febrero de 2029 sobre la siguiente propiedad: URBANA: PROPIEDAD HORIZONTAL: Apartamento residencial identificado con el No. C-302, localizado en la tercera planta del “Cluster C” del Condominio Turabo Clusters, sito en la Avenida Principal del Barrio Cañabón de Caguas, Puerto Rico, el cual tiene una cabida superficial de 1,007.57 pies cuadrados, equivalentes a 92.96 metros cuadrados; en lindes por el NORTE, con el elemento exterior, en 31’9”; por el SUR, con el elemento exterior, la pared medianera del apartamento No. C-303 y la pared del pasillo, en 31’9”; por el ESTE, con el elemento exterior, en 32’7”; y por el OESTE, con la pared medianera del apartamento No. C-301, el pasillo que da acceso de entrada y salida al apartamento, al edificio, al condominio y a la vía pública, en 32’7”. La puerta principal de entrada a este apartamento se encuentra localizada en su colindancia Oeste. Consta este apartamento de sala-comedor, cocina, dos dormitorios, un servicio sanitario y terraza. A este apartamento le corresponde como elemento común limitado un espacio para estacionamiento que acomoda un vehículo de motor. Estos espacios para estacionamiento se identifican con la letra del “Cluster” donde se encuentra sito en el apartamento y el número de este. Este apartamento tiene una participación de 0.4163%. La propiedad consta inscrita al folio 115 del tomo 1624 de Caguas, Finca 53956.

Registro de la Propiedad de Caguas, Sección I. La escritura de hipoteca consta inscrita al folio móvil del tomo 1628 de Caguas, Finca 53956. Registro de la Propiedad de Caguas, Sección I. Inscripción segunda. La parte demandada deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Administración y Manejo de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https:// unired.ramajudicial.pr, salvo

que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal. Se le advierte que, si no contesta la demanda, radicando el original de la contestación en este Tribunal y enviando copia de la contestación a la abogada de la Parte Demandante, Lcda.

Belma Alonso García, cuya dirección es: PO Box 3922, Guaynabo, PR 00970-3922, Teléfono y Fax: (787) 789-1826, correo electrónico: oficinabelmaalonso@gmail.com, dentro del término de treinta (30) días de la publicación de este edicto, excluyéndose el día de la publicación, se le anotará la rebeldía y se le dictará Sentencia en su contra, concediendo el remedio solicitado sin más citarle ni oírle. EXPEDIDO bajo mi firma y el sello del Tribunal, hoy 10 de septiembre de 2020 en Caguas, Puerto Rico. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, SECRETARIA (O). ENEIDA ARROYO VÉLEZ, SUB-SECRETARIA(O).

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO EN EL TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE CAGUAS.

Lcda. Beatriz Cay Vázquez RUA 18,234; P.O. Box 1809, Caguas, Puerto Rico 00726-1809 Tel. (787) 731-0526, Email: beatrizcayvazquez@gmail.com Se le apercibe que si no compareciere usted a presentar alegación sobre dicha petición dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del edicto, podrá dictarse el auto, según lo previsto por la ley para el caso, haciendo declaración de las personas con derecho a la herencia de Dalila Torres Alejandro. Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, hoy 16 de SEPTIEMBRE de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, Secretario. Por: ENEIDA ARROYO VÉLEZ, Sub-Secretario.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA REGION JUDICIAL DE CAGUAS SALA MUNICIPAL DE CAYEY.

COOPERATIVA DE AHORRO Y CREDITO LOS HERMANOS Demandante V.

WILFREDO COTTO CORTES

Demandado(a) CIVIL NÚM: CY2019CV00590.

SALA: 203-B. SOBRE: COBRO Causante DE DINERO (REGLA 60). ESRaquel Hernández Torres TADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA, Peticionaria EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESEx-parte TADOS UNIDOS. EL ESTADO Civil Núm.: CG2020CV01735. LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERSala: Sobre: DECLARATORIA TO RICO. SS. DE HEREDEROS. EDICTO. A: WILFREDO ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICOTTO CORTES CA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS DIRECCIÓN: EE.UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE HC 45 Box 14430 ASOCIADO DE P.R. ss.

Sucesión de DALILA TORRES ALEJANDRO

Cayey, Puerto Rico 00736 A: A TODA PERSONA POR LA PRESENTE, se le emCON DERECHO A y se le notifica que una HEREDAR A: DALILA plaza Demanda sobre Cobro de DiTORRES ALEJANDRO, nero ha sido presentada en su fallecida el (21) de contra y se le requiere para que conteste la misma dentro de los diciembre de (2016); y a MERALDO SILVA treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación del edicto, radicanTORRES, fallecido el (27) do el original de su contestación de julio de (1996). en el Tribunal correspondiente y

Por la presente se le notifica que la peticionaria ha presentado ante este tribunal una Petición de Declaratoria de Herederos de la causante Dalila Torres Alejandro, en la que se solicita se declare únicos y universales herederos a sus hijos: Raquel Hernández Torres; Carlo Alberto Valdez Torres; Madeline Valdés Torres; Pedro Félix Valdez Torres; y Luz Nereida Silva Torres; y en representación del prefallecido Meraldo Silva Torres, a: Janice Silva; Emanuel Silva Meléndez; y Lizbeth Silva Meléndez. Se llama a toda persona que se crea con igual grado o mejor derecho a heredar a los aquí nombrados para que comparezcan a reclamar dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del edicto. Representa a la peticionaria la abogada cuyo nombre y dirección se consigna a continuación:

notificando con copia de la misma a la parte demandante a la siguiente dirección: BUFETE APONTE & CORTES LCDA. ERIKA MORALES MARENGO PO Box 195337 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00919 Tel. (787) 302-0014 / (787) 239-5661/ Email: emarengo16@yahoo.com.

Usted deberá presentar 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 presente por derecho propio. Se Le apercibe que de no hacerlo el tribunal podrá dictar Sentencia en rebeldía concediendo el remedio solicitado en la demanda sin citarle ni oírle.

Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, hoy día 3 de marzo de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, Secretaria. ZAIDA AGUAYO ALAMO, Sec Auxiliar.

25

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26

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

Pogacar wins Tour de France, capping dramatic comeback

By ELIAN PELTIER

T

adej Pogacar on Sunday became the youngest champion to win the Tour de France in the post-World War II era, a day after the 21-year-old cyclist took the yellow jersey off the shoulders of his friend and rival Primoz Roglic in an epic time trial that rewrote the ending of a one-of-a-kind, pandemic-delayed edition of the world’s most famous cycling race.

Pogacar, who will turn 22 today, also became the first rider from Slovenia to win the Tour, and the first to claim three of the event’s simultaneous competitions in the same year: the yellow jersey for the general classification, the polka dot one as the race’s top climber and the white jersey awarded to the Tour’s best young rider.

Sam Bennett of Ireland won Sunday’s 21st stage in a sprint on the Champs-Élysées, but, keeping with tradition on the race’s final day, the cyclists rode at a slower pace than the one they had maintained for three weeks, and the overall standings remained unchanged from Saturday’s penultimate stage.

All eyes were turned on Pogacar, though, who Saturday had accomplished what many thought impossible: He wiped out Roglic’s 57-second lead by beating his rival by almost two minutes in a time trial. In doing so, he opened an insurmountable lead of his own entering the final day.

Pogacar’s dramatic finish lit up a Tour that took place amid stringent coronavirusrelated regulations — imposed by both Tour organizers and French health officials — that affected everything from how the teams competed in the race to how the fans watched it from the roadside. This year’s Tour might not have been as spectacular as last year’s edition, when Colombia’s then 22-year-old Egan Bernal became, at the time, its youngest champion since World War II. But the rivalry between Pogacar and Roglic, two friends from Slovenia, kept the race captivating, as it became clear in the final week that one of them would win the Tour.

Throughout this year’s 2,165-mile-long journey, many focused not so much at who might win but at all the things that could go wrong. The race had already been pushed out of its traditional summer window by the pandemic, and in recent weeks France, one of the countries worst hit by the coronavirus pandemic in Europe, has seen a surge of new

Tadej Pogacar, 21, wore the leader’s yellow jersey during only one stage of the Tour, but he had it when it mattered most. infections. Even as the race wound its way across the country’s roads and up and down mountain passes, local authorities have reimposed restrictions to contain new outbreaks.

Taking hundreds of cyclists and staff around France in that context seemed a risky endeavor. But organizers went ahead anyway, even as the Tour’s race director and several team members tested positive and entered isolation.

Fans were scarcer during many stages, and their access to start and finish areas limited. Selfies and autographs were forbidden, and masks were everywhere. On Sunday in Paris, hundreds lined up on the Champs-Élysées and around the Arc de Triomphe plaza to congratulate the 146 remaining riders as they rode on Paris’ most famous avenue.

But the protocols put in place to keep the race safe appeared to work, and with the riders remaining in a so-called bubble, the Tour, the most prestigious cycling race in the world, proved that a sporting event of its scale could take place in the middle of a pandemic, even as other events, like the 2020 Tokyo Olympics or this summer’s European soccer championship, were postponed to 2021.

And while the coronavirus was largely kept out of the bubble, it remained omnipresent: The race director, Christian Prudhomme, tested positive and had to remove himself for a week, and in many instances fans cheered and ran alongside unmasked cyclists on narrow roads with their own masks down or without a mask at all.

The Tour breathed an enormous sigh of relief last Tuesday after all the remaining cyclists emerged negative during a final round of virus testing. Out of 176 riders, 30 abandoned the race this year, but none of the departures was linked to the coronavirus.

Meanwhile, the Tour remained the Tour, with its passionate fans and scenic climbs, its unexpected twists and age-old traditions: France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, paid a visit to the cyclists Wednesday; favorites (and last year’s champion) abandoned the race either through injury or when it became clear they could not win; and French cyclists, riding at home, turned in another year of disappointing performances.

Many expected the fate of the Tour to be sealed on Wednesday’s Stage 17 at the Col de la Loze, a harrowing mountain climb in the French Alps that had never appeared on

the race’s route. The 7,560-foot-high climb, experts said, would finally decide the duel between Pogacar and Roglic, who had led the Tour for nearly two weeks as his teammates from the Jumbo-Visma team backed him whenever Pogacar tried to make a challenge for his lead.

But after nearly five hours of racing and 25 miles of steep hills that day, the two Slovenes were only seconds apart, always in each other’s sight even as Roglic finished the stage second, 15 seconds ahead of Pogacar.

By Saturday, Roglic’s lead was a comfortable 57 seconds, with only an individual time trial and Sunday’s dutiful ride into Paris remaining. As he rolled down the starting ramp for the time trial, Pogacar’s chances were slim. Roglic went off right behind him.

Yet it was a modest climb at the end of that time trial, not the fearsome ascent up the Col de la Loze in the Alps or the hills of the Massif Central, that will be remembered as the defining stretch of this year’s Tour. It was there Saturday that Pogacar completed his push for the lead and where Roglic, having fallen almost two minutes behind his rival’s pace, crumbled on the final hill of La Planche des Belles Filles.

Pogacar won the stage and took over the leader’s yellow jersey; Roglic finished a disappointing fifth. He came off his bike and collapsed to the pavement, knowing that the lead he had held for two weeks and his title hopes were gone.

Minutes after the unforgettable stage had finished Saturday, Richie Porte, the 35-yearold Australian veteran rider who finished the Tour in the third position behind Roglic and Pogacar, said that the former may have deserved to win the race but that the latter’s ride had been incredible.

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The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

27

Denied the MVP, James takes out his frustration on the Nuggets in Game 1

By SCOTT CACCIOLA

O

n one of his ferocious drives to the basket, LeBron James appeared to roll his left ankle as he tumbled to the court. He grimaced, relaced his sneaker as several of his teammates from the Los Angeles Lakers crowded around him and then walked with a barely perceptible limp to the free throw line.

It was only the second quarter of the opening game of the NBA’s Western Conference finals, but it felt like a fragile moment. So much has gone wrong for the league during this topsy-turvy season — and for the Lakers. So many occasions when everything slowed to a stop, then rebooted to a crawl before pausing again.

James, though, has seemed fairly single-minded in his focus to stick to his familiar routines during a four-month hiatus brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, to grind through the league’s restart in isolation here at Walt Disney World, to pursue a fourth championship in empty arenas as fans watch from home.

On Friday night, James treated his tumble as if he had tripped over a speed bump. On the Lakers’ very next possession, he tried to dislodge the rim from the backboard on a soaring two-handed dunk, and the Denver Nuggets were in trouble.

It only got worse from there as the Lakers pulverized them, 126-114.

“This was not a great game for us,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said.

One game is a small sample size, of course, and Malone said he was confident that his team would rebound ahead of Game 2 on Sunday night. But for one night, at least, the Lakers looked too fast and too big, too strong and too experienced. Anthony Davis, who happens to possess all of those qualities, collected 37 points and 10 rebounds.

Denver has been living on the edge in the bubble, and it is a small miracle that it has not popped. In each of the first two rounds, the Nuggets came back from a three-games-to-one series deficit to advance. They have complained about a general lack of respect. The Lakers gave it to them by not giving them a sliver of space.

“That’s a historic type of resilient team,” Lakers coach Frank Vogel said of the Nuggets. “We’ve got to understand that, both with the series lead, 1-0, right

LeBron James led the N.B.A. in assists this season. He led the Lakers in Game 1, with 12. now, and wherever it goes.”

The NBA did not do the Nuggets any favors. About seven hours before Friday’s game, Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks accepted his second consecutive NBA Most Valuable Player Award poolside from a manse in Greece, the country where he grew up. (The Bucks, who finished with the league’s best record, are on vacation after they were upset by the Miami Heat in the Eastern conference semifinals.)

James, 35, has won four MVP awards, but none since 2012-13. He finished second to Antetokounmpo in this season’s vote after averaging 25.3 points, 10.2 assists and 7.8 rebounds and driving the Lakers to the best record in the West. He led the league in assists for the first time in his career.

James has seldom come off as the type of player who needs outside motivation to perform. But if additional fuel is available to him, he will consume it, and he went about his business against the Nuggets with a scowl — a stern, workmanlike experience for him. He finished with 15 points and 12 assists.

Afterward, James said he was not upset that he had not won the award — “Giannis had a hell of a season,” he said — but rather that he had received only 16 of 101 first-place votes from the panel of news media members who decide the award. (The New York Times does not participate in awards voting.) Yes, James knew the exact number: 16.

That, he said, is what irritated him more than anything. “I never came into this league to be MVP or to be a champion,” James said. “I’ve always just wanted to get better and better every single day, and those things will take care of themselves. But some things are just out of my hand and some things you can’t control.”

In expressing his support for his teammate, Davis suggested that it was a conspiracy.

“They kind of choose the MVP before the season even starts, you know,” he said.

In any case, going into Sunday’s Game 2 the Lakers were only three wins from the NBA finals and playing some of their best basketball at precisely the right time. It is more than a James and Davis production, although they seem to be emboldening

their teammates. The Lakers’ depth, so questionable for so much of the season, is shining through.

On Friday, Rajon Rondo packed nine assists into 22 minutes. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope scored 18 points while shooting 3 for 5 from 3-point range. The Lakers led by as many as 27 points.

Vogel even cracked open the dusty crate that had been housing the mercurial Dwight Howard, calling on him to supply 16 minutes at center after he had played sparingly against the Houston Rockets in the conference semifinals. Howard scored 13 points while mixing it up with the Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic, who was in foul trouble from the start.

“For me, as soon as I step on the court, I want to let him know that I’m there,” Howard said. “Since we’re staying at the same hotel, I might meet him right outside his room and let him know for the rest of the series that I’m going to be right there.”

Howard, James and the rest of the Lakers have been in the bubble for over two months. On Friday, they delivered a message: They do not plan on leaving anytime soon.

28

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

Dallas gets goals from unlikely sources in win over Lightning

By CAROL SCHARM

T

he Dallas Stars have drawn first blood as two of the NHL’s southernmost franchises compete for a championship inside the league’s socalled bubble in the league’s northernmost city.

The Stars defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning, 4-1, in a fast-paced and physical Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on Saturday night.

Dallas was the second-stingiest team in the NHL during the regular season.

But the offensive efforts of the club’s defensemen have drawn attention during the playoffs. Miro Heiskanen sat fourth overall in playoff scoring with 22 points coming into Game 1 and added another assist Saturday. But it was defensive blue liners Joel Hanley and Jamie Oleksiak who scored the Stars’ first two goals.

“It’s how you win in the playoffs,” Stars coach Rick Bowness said. “You rely on your top-end guys to get you some offense or to get you some chances, and you rely on some guys that have to step up every now and then to score some huge goals for us.

“Joel Hanley, I just couldn’t be happier for,” Bowness added. “This kid’s given us a lot of good quality minutes.

That’s what you need to win in the playoffs. You can’t just focus on your topend guys. You need contributions from everybody.”

Forward Joel Kiviranta added his fifth goal of the postseason, and Jason Dickinson scored his first into an empty net. Yanni Gourde had Tampa Bay’s only goal.

Stars netminder Anton Khudobin made 35 saves to record his 13th win of the playoffs, while Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 16 shots for the Lightning.

Although Dallas played two more games than Tampa Bay during the first three rounds of the playoffs, the Stars came into the finals as the more rested club. They had eliminated the Vegas Golden Knights in five games in the Western Conference finals. The Lightning needed six games to get past the New York Islanders, including a doubleovertime defeat in Game 5 and an over-

Joel Hanley, right, a journeyman defenseman, scored his first career goal in the first period. time win in Game 6.

“Dallas has been the benefactor of Game 1, with rest,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said.

“They came out and they were skating,” he continued. “It’s too bad. Turn the page and move on, short memory in the playoffs.”

Even without fans in the building, emotions were running high for both teams, the last squads standing after spending seven weeks isolated from family and friends in pursuit of a championship. The game also featured more than 100 hits: 56 for the Lightning and 50 for the Stars.

In the third period, Tampa Bay was awarded its three power plays but couldn’t beat the confident Khudobin.

“We finally found our game in the third period,” said Lightning defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk, who finished with

a team-high six shots on goal. “We allowed them to take the game to us. We generated chances and played our best hockey in the third. Not the result we wanted, but certainly something we can build on.”

At even strength with less than eight minutes left, Khudobin made a showstopping, around-the-world glove save on a shot by Zach Bogosian as he continued to capably carry the load for the Stars while starter Ben Bishop has been deemed unfit to play because of an injury.

“Anton, he’s just a great competitor,” Bowness said. “Don’t get wrapped up in styles. Get wrapped up in the job description: Stop the puck. He does everything he can to stop every shot.”

The Stars dominated puck possession early and opened the scoring just five minutes and 40 seconds into the

first period. Hanley tallied his first career NHL goal after receiving a pass into the slot from Roope Hintz. The play came after Kiviranta had agitated the Lightning by laying a big hit on star forward Brayden Point along the boards. Hintz later left the game and did not return after blocking a blast from Mikhail Sergachev with his foot.

The Lightning tied the game with 8:28 left in the first period. A point shot from Blake Coleman bounced off Khudobin’s right pad before pinballing into the net off the skate of Gourde and then ricocheting off Hintz. Gourde was given credit for the goal, his sixth of the playoffs.

In the second period, the Stars regained offensive momentum during two power-play opportunities after a pair of penalties to Coleman. But they didn’t beat Vasilevskiy until the 12:30 mark. With sustained pressure at even strength, Oleksiak swooped deep into the slot to collect a pass from Alexander Radulov. After his first shot, Oleksiak pulled the rebound around a sprawling Luke Schenn and beat Vasilevskiy high.

The goal was Oleksiak’s fifth of the playoffs, matching his career regularseason high, and stood up as the game winner.

“Getting the D involved a little bit more, I think the opportunities have come my way and I’ve been able to put a couple in,” said Oleksiak, who also said he lost a tooth during the second period when he “ate a little bit of elbow.”

“I think it’s just a product of good team play and our system. It’s definitely nice to contribute in that way.”

Tampa Bay’s best chance to score in the second came with just under four minutes left, when Anthony Cirelli stuck with a loose puck that came off Khudobin’s pads, but couldn’t put it home. Three minutes later, after a shot from Schenn rang off the post, the Stars surged down the ice and extended their lead to 3-1 on another rebound opportunity, this time when Kiviranta retrieved the puck after a block by Sergachev, then beat Vasilevskiy.

The best-of-seven series will continue tonight.

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 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)

You’re confused about a decision you need to make soon. This would not normally bother you but there are other people involved and you want to make the right choices. It would be easy to do this on the toss of a coin but this is something you really have to give more thought to.

Taurus

The San Juan Daily Star

Monday, September 21, 2020

(April 21-May 21)

Having too much of a good time could make you accident prone. You tend to be more forgetful than normal too. If you’re exhausted, get some rest. Take care when using machinery or driving. Better still, if you’re going out, leave the car keys at home and walk. The fresh air and exercise would do you good.

Libra

(Sep 24-Oct 23)

A friend or colleague expects you to agree to their latest suggestion because they think they have a great idea. You may not agree. You feel they haven’t got their facts straight and you also know they aren’t going to listen to advice unless you are able to find information to back your argument.

Scorpio

(Oct 24-Nov 22)

You’re in an obstinate and inflexible mood although you won’t admit this. Don’t pick a fight just because someone disagrees with you. Friends and colleagues will be more helpful if you try to meet them halfway. Instead of talking so much, try listening to what other people have to say.

Gemini

(May 22-June 21)

Sagittarius

(Nov 23-Dec 21)

Cancer

(June 22-July 23)

Capricorn

(Dec 22-Jan 20)

Daydreaming can be productive and ideas you come up with today could sow the seeds of promising plans for tomorrow. It would be easy to lose yourself in your imagination.

Allow your mind to wander wherever it might take you. Communications will be weird but you will feel you’re getting your views across quite well.

Someone will try to persuade you to cut corners. You don’t care how long it takes to get the job done, you want to do it properly.

What comes as the biggest surprise is the way a colleague who is in a position where they should know better makes a careless and foolish decision.

Leo

(July 24-Aug 23)

You aren’t afraid of a little flashy competition.

Someone who is new to your social scene is showy and flamboyant. It will seem at first as if their attempts to upstage you are working but don’t be discouraged. Friends who know you well will give you their support. Besides, there are some interesting things going on in the background.

Virgo

(Aug 24-Sep 23)

Someone is waiting for you to finish a job you started earlier in the month. You hadn’t meant to push it aside but other things got in the way.

You had intended to make a start on a new project but before doing so, you need to catch up with neglected work. You hate keeping people waiting.

You’re finding it easier to reach an agreement with your partner but don’t take too much for granted. It could be they will change their mind or when the time comes to carry out a promise, they will have completely forgotten about it, or so they will say. If there’s anything important to be done, tackle it yourself.

It would be easier to give in to pushy people for the sake of peace. By standing up to a bully, they will lose their power over you. Whether it means rejecting their suggestions, opposing their views or disregarding their demands, stand up for yourself. Do what in your heart you know is right for you.

Aquarius

(Jan 21-Feb 19)

A relative will accuse you of neglecting them because of your outside interests. You feel they are being selfish in expecting you to drop your commitment to a volunteer effort in order to spend more time at home. You can fit in family matters with obligations elsewhere as you intend to prove now.

Pisces

(Feb 20-Mar 20)

You’re surrounded by temptations and exciting offers. Someone will be urging you to try something risky and foolish. You know the risk and yet you are still tempted. It will take all your self-control to walk away from a persuasive friend. You will regret acting on impulse. Stick with the tried and tested.

Answers to the Sudoku and Crossword on page 29

Monday, September 21, 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, September 21, 2020

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