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      Freed From Prison by Trump and Now Facing the Prospect of Going Back

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      At a hearing this week, witnesses described behavior by Jonathan Braun that could result in his being locked up again. In the early hours of Feb. 15, Jonathan Braun, a violent felon granted clemency by President Trump, was agitated.After getting into a heated argument with his wife and parents and kicking them out of his cavernous Long Island home, Mr. Braun knocked on the door of his live-in nanny under the pretext of retrieving his phone, which was charging in her room.What followed, according to the former nanny’s testimony on Friday, was a terrifying, degrading encounter. Mr. Braun, shirtless, entered the room, pulled her onto her bed and put her into a headlock, she said. Then he pushed her hand over his bare genitals as he groped her breasts, telling her he had always wanted to have intercourse with her.The nanny said she had wrested herself away from his grasp, escaped to her bathroom and locked herself in.Coming on the second day of a hearing that will determine whether Mr. Braun returns to federal prison, her testimony offered one of the most vivid depictions of the depraved behavior he is accused of engaging in. There were no defense witnesses.Mr. Trump commuted Mr. Braun’s 10-year sentence for drug trafficking at the end of his first term in office. The commutation came after Mr. Braun’s family used its close ties to the father of Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and a senior White House adviser at the time, to secure Mr. Braun’s release.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Elon Musk and Social Security’s Effort to Curb Illegal Immigration

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      As Elon Musk continues to argue that Social Security drives illegal immigration, a new effort at the agency aims to curb it.One hallmark of Elon Musk’s 12 weeks in government has been his focus on Social Security.He has sent one of his closest advisers to work at the Social Security Administration. He has falsely insisted that the program is rife with fraud. And he has depicted the entitlement as a tool — a “giant magnet,” to be specific — that he says entices illegal immigrants to come to the United States.That last part has turned Social Security into a major focal point of Musk’s unfounded belief that Democrats have allowed immigrants into the United States as part of a scheme to tilt the electorate in their favor.A team of my colleagues has reported that Musk is now driving big changes at the Social Security Administration that have braided aspects of his rhetoric about the agency directly into policy. The agency is placing certain immigrants — people who are very much alive — on the agency’s list of dead people, cutting them off from crucial financial services in an effort to push them to leave the country.I called my colleague Alexandra Berzon to talk about this reporting, and she explained that, according to the White House’s own accounting, the targeted migrants did not receive much in the way of government benefits — and none of them received Social Security.The new effort, she explained, is less about cost-cutting than it is about getting the Social Security Administration into the business of immigration enforcement, a push that has deeply alarmed current and former employees of the agency.Explain to me what you and our colleagues discovered when reporting this story. How is the Trump administration using Social Security as a tool for immigration policy?We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      New Pact Would Require Ships to Cut Emissions or Pay a Fee

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      A draft global agreement sets a fee for cargo ships, which carry the vast majority of world trade, to pay for their greenhouse gas emissions.Amid the turmoil over global trade, countries around the world reached a remarkable, though modest, agreement Friday to reduce the climate pollution that comes from shipping those goods worldwide — with what is essentially a tax, no less.A draft accord reached in London under the auspices of the International Maritime Organization, a United Nations agency, would require every ship that ferries goods across the oceans to lower their greenhouse gas emissions or pay a fee.The targets fall short of what many had hoped. Still, it’s the first time a global industry would face a price on its climate pollution no matter where in the world it operates. The proceeds would be used mainly to help the industry move to cleaner fuels. It would come into effect in 2028, pending approval by country representatives, which is widely expected.The agreement marks a rare bit of international cooperation that’s all the more remarkable because it was reached even after the United States pulled out of the talks earlier in the week. No other countries followed suit.“The U.S. is just one country and that one country cannot derail this entire process,” said Faig Abbasov, shipping director for Transport and Environment, a European advocacy group that has pushed for measures to clean up the maritime industry. “This will be first binding decision that will force shipping companies to decarbonize and switch to alternative fuels.”The agreement applies to all ships, no matter whose flag they fly, including ships registered in the United States, although the vast majority of ships are flagged in other countries. It remained unclear whether or how Washington might respond to the fee agreement.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      She Worked in a Harvard Lab to Reverse Aging, Until ICE Jailed Her

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      A barracks-style detention center in Louisiana is jammed with around 90 immigrant women, mostly undocumented workers from central and South America, sharing five toilets and following orders shouted by guards.There is also, among them, a Russian scientist.She is 30 years old, shy and prone to nervous laughter. She cannot work, because her laptop was confiscated. She plays chess with other women when the guards allow it. Otherwise, she passes the time reading books about evolution and cell development.For nearly eight weeks, Kseniia Petrova has been captive to the hard-line immigration policies of the Trump administration. A graduate of a renowned Russian physics and technology institute, Ms. Petrova was recruited to work at a laboratory at Harvard Medical School. She was part of a team investigating how cells can rejuvenate themselves, with the goal of fending off the damage of aging.On Feb. 16, customs officials detained her at Logan International Airport in Boston for failing to declare samples of frog embryos she had carried from France at the request of her boss at Harvard. Such an infraction is normally considered minor, punishable with a fine of up to $500. Instead, the customs official canceled Ms. Petrova’s visa on the spot and began deportation proceedings. Then Ms. Petrova told her that she had fled Russia for political reasons and faced arrest if she returned there.This is how she wound up at the Richwood Correctional Center in Monroe, La., waiting for the U.S. government to decide what to do with her.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. ‘Continues to Delay, Obfuscate and Flout’ Courts in Return of Deported Man, Lawyers Say

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      Lawyers for a Maryland man who was unlawfully deported to a prison in El Salvador assailed the Trump administration on Friday for trying to delay its explanation for how it plans to bring him back, calling the move a “stunning display of arrogance and cruelty.”“The government continues to delay, obfuscate and flout court orders, while a man’s life and safety is at risk,” the lawyers wrote in court papers filed in the case.On Thursday evening, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Trump officials needed to “facilitate” the return to the United States of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a 29-year-old Salvadoran migrant who flown from Texas to El Salvador on March 15.The officials have already acknowledged that they made an “administrative error” when they put Mr. Abrego Garcia on the plane despite a previous court order that had expressly prohibited sending him back to his homeland.As part of its ruling, the Supreme Court told the administration that it should be prepared to “share what it can concerning the steps it has taken” to get Mr. Abrego Garcia back on U.S. soil as well as “the prospect of further steps” it intends to take.Echoing the justices’ demand, Judge Paula Xinis, who is handling the case in Federal District Court in Maryland, told the Justice Department to submit to her by 9:30 a.m. on Friday a written declaration of what the administration had already done and what it planned to do in its efforts to retrieve Mr. Abrego Garcia from El Salvador. Judge Xinis also set a hearing for 1 p.m. on Friday to discuss the next steps in the case.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Experts Doubt Kennedy’s Timetable for Finding the Cause of Autism

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      The nation’s health secretary announced that he planned to invite scientists to provide answers by September, but specialists consider that target date unrealistic.Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s health secretary, pledged on Thursday to seek out experts globally to discover the reasons for the increasing rates of autism in the United States.“We’ve launched a massive testing and research effort that’s going to involve hundreds of scientists from around the world,” Mr. Kennedy announced at a cabinet meeting held by President Trump. “By September, we will know what has caused the autism epidemic and we’ll be able to eliminate those exposures.”“There will be no bigger news conference than that,” Mr. Trump replied.But scientists who have worked for decades to find a cause greeted Mr. Kennedy’s predicted timeline with skepticism.They said that a single answer would be hard to identify in a field of possible contributors including pesticides, air pollution and maternal diabetes.Dr. Philip Landrigan, a pediatrician and expert on environmental toxins, pointed to the current mass layoffs and cutbacks for research at Mr. Kennedy’s Department of Health and Human Services as one reason for doubting such quick progress.“Given that a great deal of research on autism and other pediatric diseases in hospitals and medical schools is currently coming to a halt because of federal funding cuts from H.H.S.,” he said, “it is very difficult for me to imagine what profound scientific breakthrough could be achieved between now and September.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Book Review: ‘The Gate, the Girl and the Dragon,’ by Grace Lin

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      THE GATE, THE GIRL AND THE DRAGON, by Grace LinFall into a hole and thump into Wonderland. Open a wardrobe and step into Narnia. Board a train on Platform 9¾ and end up at Hogwarts. Crossing thresholds comes naturally to children, which is one of the reasons middle grade fantasy is so popular. The quests are timeless.Cue Grace Lin, whose latest novel, “The Gate, the Girl and the Dragon,” embraces this trope as well. Her setting is a bustling urban center, in the middle of which stands the Old City Gate. Passing through it is uneventful for humans (aside from entering a neighborhood filled with dangling red lanterns and traditional foods and crafts), but for a group of mythical creatures called Gongshi, it’s the only way back to their realm of grasslands, rivers and mountains.Gongshi are lively and fun-loving, but once they’re in the modern world they manifest as stone, standing silent and still. They hide in plain sight in the form of statues, highway pillars and necklace pendants. Lifeless to the human eye, they watch over the city’s populace and protect them from danger. All Gongshi take their job seriously — except for one.Lin’s main character, Jin, is a Gongshi lion cub who would rather play with his friends than play guardian. Early in the book, he becomes angry at his father and accidentally knocks over the Sacred Sphere, a golden ball that is never to be moved. As it bounces out of the house and through the Old City Gate, Jin chases after it, trying desperately to catch it. But he fails, and the gate clangs shut behind him. Jin is now stuck on the wrong side. Will the impetuous cub ever see his parents again?From “The Gate, the Girl and the Dragon.”Grace LinFor the remaining 300 pages, Jin is on a quest to reopen the gate and return home, an adventure that’s both physically and emotionally taxing. Along the way he meets a girl, a sculptor and a dragon who takes the shape of a worm — not all of whom he can trust. Meanwhile, the other Gongshi spend several chapters also trying to reopen the gate, in hopes of rescuing Jin and retrieving the Sacred Sphere.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Theater to Stream: David Tennant as ‘Macbeth,’ ‘Death of England’ and More

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      Take in Shakespeare, experimental theater and a three-play series on the fallout of Brexit, all available to watch at home.‘Macbeth’Stream it on Marquee TV.In the 2023 production of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” at the Donmar Warehouse in London, directed by Max Webster, an unusual request was made of audience members as they entered the theater: Wear headphones.The actors, too, wore headsets, their quips, shouts and whispers transmitted digitally into the audience’s ears, at times alternating between the left and right earphones. Writing for The New York Times, the critic Houman Barekat said that “the transmitted audio imbues the words with an added richness and immediacy.” The production conjures “just enough novelty,” he added, “to freshen things up, while still ensuring that the text remains center stage — in all its timeless glory.”Luckily for Shakespeare fans, the show, which was nominated for three Olivier awards, including best revival, best actor and best sound design, was recorded live.From Barekat’s critical notebook, which praised David Tennant’s turn as Macbeth, a “gaunt, energetic bundle of angst”:Tennant, with his slim-line physique and withdrawn, vaguely haunted-looking face, has a more expressive emotional energy that lends itself to treacherous intrigue and anguished remorse alike. He is frantic, almost from the get-go.The N.Y.C. Fringe FestivalAzhar Bande-Ali in “Bad Muslim.”Peter CooperStream it on frigid.nyc.Each year, the New York City Fringe Festival, presented by the nonprofit theater company Frigid, uses a lottery system to randomly select the plays it produces, giving less established theater makers a chance to stage their work.This year, the festival is running April 2-20, but you don’t have to be in Manhattan to take in the lineup. A large number of performances are available to livestream from home, including Jenn Howd and Roz Mihalko’s campy musical, “Texas Annie: The Legend of the Moan Ranger,” which follows the adventures of a renegade sex toy dealer in Texas; Azhar Bande-Ali’s comedy “Bad Muslim”; and Joanna M. Briley’s “Swipe This! My Life in Transit,” about the lonely life of a token booth clerk.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More