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      Climate Activists Interrupt New York City Ballet Performance

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      Protesters interrupted an all-Balanchine program on the company’s spring season opening night, which coincided this year with Earth Day.A small group of climate change activists interrupted a New York City Ballet performance at the David H. Koch Theater in Lincoln Center on Tuesday, the opening night of the company’s spring season.The protest occurred shortly before 9 p.m., as dancers and orchestra musicians performed Balanchine’s “Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux,” the third ballet on an all-Balanchine program for the opening night, which coincided this year with Earth Day.A woman began yelling from the balcony. Then, she shouted, “We’re in a climate emergency,” and unfurled a banner from a balcony.“Our country has become a fascist regime, and we are enjoying this beauty,” said the protester, according to videos of the incident.The dancers and musicians continued to perform through the demonstration for about five minutes. Some members of the audience booed the protesters and demanded their removal.The curtain came down, an announcer said the show would be paused because of the disruption and security officers removed several protesters from the auditorium. About five minutes later, “Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux” restarted from the beginning and the performance did not face further interruptions, City Ballet said in a statement.Activists had also gathered outside the theater before the performance, holding signs reading “Koch killing the planet” and “No billionaire ballet on Earth Day,” according to photos posted online.The theater is named after David H. Koch, a billionaire who donated vast sums to support the arts but was for some a polarizing figure because of his campaign to counter the science of climate change.The climate advocacy group Extinction Rebellion, which has organized similar protests, said in a social media post Tuesday night that the demonstration was meant to highlight the Koch family’s support for conservative causes and efforts to block policies to fight climate change.The protest follows similar episodes at other high-profile performances. Last year, three climate change protesters disrupted a Broadway performance of “An Enemy of the People,” starring Jeremy Strong. And in 2023, climate activists interrupted a performance of Wagner’s “Tannhäuser” at the Metropolitan Opera. A protester shouted “The spring is tainted,” and dropped a banner that read “No Opera on a Dead Planet.” More

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      ‘Andor’ Season 2 Premiere Recap: Rebel Rebel

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      The “Star Wars” series, back for its final season, shows how a revolution takes hold and how even in times of radical change, people have to keep living their lives.Episodes 1-3: ‘BBY 4’Want to escape from the real world by watching a “Star Wars” TV show? Can I interest you in Season 2 of “Andor,” which begins this week with stories about refugees being evicted from a safe haven, resistance fighters tearing each other apart, and the obscenely powerful plotting to destroy a whole planet?Maybe a touch too real? I get it. But let me add that the first three episodes of the season, the show’s last, are remarkably entertaining and thoughtful television. It’s provocative stuff, but satisfyingly stirring.This series is about how a revolution takes hold, in fits and starts, with a lot of disagreement about how to proceed. Season 2’s first set of episodes also shows how even in times of radical change, people have to keep living their lives.In Season 1, the show’s creator, Tony Gilroy, divided his saga into multiepisode arcs, each presented in a slightly different style. Gilroy and Disney+ are retaining that structure for Season 2 and leaning further into the “movie of the week” concept by releasing three episodes at a time.But the first thing fans may notice about the opening three episodes (of 12 total) is how they jump around between locations and genres, to tell essentially four different stories, all set over the course of a few days one year after Season 1 ended. The date is “BBY 4,” four years before the Battle of Yavin, the big space-fight in the original “Star Wars” that ends with the Death Star exploding. Reminder: That triumphant rebel attack was made possible by the events of the film “Rogue One,” for which “Andor” is a prequel. (Rampant franchise expansion can make for confusing timelines.)The series’s namesake, the mercenary-turned-rebel Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), bounces between two of these stories. The new season gets off to a strong start in its opening sequence, in which Cassian steals an imperial fighter ship, posing as a test pilot. After a lot of dramatic buildup to him getting into the pilot’s seat, Cassian pushes the wrong button and goes rocketing backward instead of forward. He then accidentally engages the ship’s blasters, shooting laser bolts indiscriminately around the hangar. It’s a funny bit of slapstick, but also exciting, filled with the fine design and special effects “Star Wars” is known for.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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      Wildfire Burns in 3,200 Acres of New Jersey Forest Area

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      The fire in the Pine Barrens led to the evacuation of 3,000 residents and the shutdown of a stretch of the Garden State Parkway.A fast-moving wildfire in the Pine Barrens section of southern New Jersey spread to 3,200 acres of the heavily forested area by the evening, prompting the shutdown of a 17-mile stretch of one of the state’s busiest highways, the authorities said.The smoky blaze, in Ocean County, threatened at least 1,320 structures, forced the evacuation of 3,000 residents of Ocean and Lacey Townships and caused the Garden State Parkway to be shut down between exits 63 and 80, the New Jersey Forest Fire Service said in a statement.Embers from the fire, which began Tuesday morning, jumped over the parkway at about 6 p.m., sparking several small blazes near a defunct nuclear power plant known as Oyster Creek, according to state officials. The plant, owned by Holtec International, shut down in 2018 and is being decommissioned.Patrick O’Brien, a Holtec spokesman, said the fires closest to the facility had been “completely and safely extinguished.”Even if a blaze were to reach an area where spent nuclear material is stored in secure casks, it poses no risk, according to Mr. O’Brien and Shawn M. LaTourette, commissioner of the State Department of Environmental Protection.All the buildings at the Oyster Creek site are “designed and constructed to withstand fires,” Mr. O’Brien said in a statement.

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      Critics Call Rubio’s Overhaul Plan a Blow to U.S. Values

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      Human rights, democracy, refugees, war crimes.Those are some of the key responsibilities of a State Department office that Secretary of State Marco Rubio intends to shutter as part of a larger reorganization plan for his agency that he unveiled on Tuesday.The official goal of the office — the under secretary for civilian security, democracy and human rights — is to help countries “build more democratic, secure, stable, and just societies.”In a post on Substack on Tuesday, Mr. Rubio called the change a blow against rogue liberal bureaucrats, saying the office had become “a fertile environment for activists to redefine ‘human rights’ and ‘democracy’ and to pursue their projects at the taxpayer expense” even when they conflict with the president’s goals.The office’s nine bureaus will be pared down and in most cases merged into other parts of the department under Mr. Rubio’s plan. Bureaus slated for elimination include those focused on conflict, global criminal justice and combating antisemitism.Two of the bureaus, including a smaller democracy and human rights bureau, will continue to exist under a new Office of the Coordinator for Foreign Assistance and Humanitarian Affairs. But that office will no longer be led by an under secretary.On Tuesday, a State Department spokeswoman, Tammy Bruce, cautioned that the changes did not mean the end of values-based initiatives in U.S. foreign policy, arguing that the goal was a “nimbler” department.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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      NYT Crossword Answers for April 23, 2025

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      Brandon Koppy makes space for us.Jump to: Today’s Theme | Tricky CluesWEDNESDAY PUZZLE — I’ve come to expect a trouncing from Wednesday puzzles — last week’s installment by Kathy Bloomer being an especially pronounced instance. So I was surprised to find myself breezing through today’s, constructed by Brandon Koppy. The puzzle has its fair share of midweek “crunch” (a term of art for challenging crossword fill), but is otherwise guileless.The theme is light and relatively easy to apprehend. In other words, there isn’t much gravity to it.Today’s ThemeThe exact origins of GALAXY BRAIN (61A), as in [Having ideas far too profound for anyone else to comprehend], are hard to pinpoint. The term often refers to a stock-image meme of a man’s brain expanding panel by panel, until it seems to radiate with cosmic energy. As it relates to this puzzle, GALAXY BRAIN gives you the power to see words about the galaxy in each of the themed entries.The [Honor for “Dune” and “American Gods”] at 18A is the NEBULA AWARD. At 25A, [Swifties vis-à-vis Taylor Swift] are STAR-STRUCK. The song described in 37A’s [Grammy-winning Soundgarden hit of 1994] was BLACK HOLE SUN. And the [Canadian province on the Gulf of Maine] at 52A is NOVA SCOTIA.Tricky Clues31A. In academic contexts, a score of 30 percent might be a failing grade. But when it comes to leaving a TIP, [30% is a very good one].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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      5 Democrats Visit Mahmoud Khalil and Rumeysa Ozturk in Louisiana

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      Five congressional Democrats on Tuesday traveled to Louisiana, where they met with two graduate students who have been detained by federal immigration officials and have become high-profile examples of the Trump administration’s efforts to suppress pro-Palestinian activism on college campuses.The lawmakers’ trip was an effort to bring further attention to the cases of Rumeysa Ozturk, a doctoral student at Tufts University in Massachusetts, and Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student at Columbia University in New York, who were detained under a rarely used legal provision that allows the secretary of state to deport noncitizens deemed a threat to American foreign policy. The students’ lawyers have argued that their detentions violate their rights to free speech.The visit to Louisiana was the latest attempt by Democrats to use the congressional recess to draw attention to what they see as violations of due process during President Trump’s second term. Over the last week, Democrats have made two visits to El Salvador to highlight the case of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man whom Trump administration officials have admitted to erroneously deporting.In Louisiana, Senator Edward Markey of Massachusetts and Representatives Jim McGovern and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Troy Carter of Louisiana and Bennie Thompson of Mississippi met with Mr. Khalil and Ms. Ozturk and toured the facilities where they were detained. Both had been transferred hundreds of miles away from their homes and from where they were originally detained.In a news conference outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Basile, La., where Ms. Ozturk is being held, the lawmakers argued that the government had violated the students’ constitutional rights and that both had been targeted for their political views.“Neither of them committed any crimes,” Mr. McGovern said. “They’ve been charged with nothing.”Mr. Markey criticized immigration officials for sending the two students to facilities in Louisiana, arguing the government did so to secure a more favorable hearing for their deportation proceedings. Louisiana has one of the most conservative appeals courts in the United States.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. Says Tren de Aragua Charges Will ‘Devastate’ Its Infrastructure

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      Federal prosecutors charged six members of the Venezuelan gang and 21 members of a violent splinter group.New York City’s mayor and police commissioner and a top White House immigration official announced on Tuesday two indictments charging 27 people they said were linked to Tren de Aragua, a gang that the Trump administration has said poses a unique threat to America.“Tren de Aragua is not just a street gang — it is a highly structured terrorist organization that has destroyed American families with brutal violence,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a news release touting the charges, adding that the arrests “will devastate TdA’s infrastructure” in three states.Six defendants were named as members or associates of Tren, which the Trump administration has designated as a foreign terrorist organization. The other 21 people, prosecutors said, had broken away to join a violent splinter group called anti-Tren.Still, officials argued, in displaying dozens of seized handguns and rifles, the existence of both groups showed Tren de Aragua’s singular harm. Members of the gangs had engaged in murders and assaults, sex trafficking and human smuggling, according to the indictments.At a news conference, Thomas D. Homan, whom President Trump appointed as “border czar,” said the indictments showed the necessity of his immigration policies.“New York City — you’re a sanctuary city, you’re sanctuary for criminals,” said Mr. Homan, the so-called border czar.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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      RFK Jr. Announces Ban on Food Dyes and Says ‘Sugar Is Poison’

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      Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. escalated his war against the food industry on Tuesday, declaring that “sugar is poison.”Mr. Kennedy’s comment came during a highly publicized news conference where he also asserted that he has “an understanding” with major food manufacturers to remove petroleum-based food colorings from their products by 2026.No one from the food industry attended the event, and none have publicly agreed to Mr. Kennedy’s demands, although the International Dairy Foods Association has pledged to eliminate artificial colors in milk cheese and yogurt sold to schools as part of the federal lunch and breakfast programs by the start of the 2026 school year.However, Mr. Kennedy and his advisers said that every major food manufacturer and some fast-food companies have contacted the agency looking for guidance.“Four years from now, we are going to have most of these products off the market, or you will know about them when you go to the grocery store,” Mr. Kennedy said.Mr. Kennedy’s push to get food manufacturers to remove dyes from their products is his first effort at sweeping reform of the food industry, which he has long blamed for creating and marketing ultra-processed foods that he says are making Americans obese and contributing to a host of diseases, including diabetes and heart disease.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