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    NYC and DocGo to Part Ways After Migrant Service Operator’s Contract Ends

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    DocGo, which has a $432 million contract with the city, faced allegations of providing migrants with false papers, wasting food and hiring unlicensed security guards.New York City will soon part ways with DocGo, which has provided services to migrants under a lucrative $432 million contract, city officials said Tuesday.Last spring, the company, a medical services provider that had multimillion-dollar contracts to provide Covid tests and vaccinations, landed a no-bid contract to house and care for migrants in the city and upstate despite having no broad experience dealing with asylum seekers.But the company quickly faced allegations that its employees or subcontractors had mistreated and lied to migrants, provided them with fake work papers, wasted staggering amounts of food and hired unlicensed security guards. In the wake of reporting by The New York Times and other news outlets, Attorney General Letitia James started an investigation into DocGo over possible violations of state or federal laws regarding the treatment of people in its care.In a written statement Tuesday, as first reported by Politico, Mayor Eric Adams’s chief of staff, Camille Joseph Varlack, said the city would not renew DocGo’s contract to house and care for migrants in New York City hotels when it expires in early May, one year after it took effect. A Texas-based company, Garner Environmental Services, will take over those services temporarily — at a cost of $10 less per person, per night than DocGo receives, officials said.“This will ultimately allow the city to save more money and will allow others, including nonprofits and internationally recognized resettlement providers, to apply to do this critical work, and ensures we are continuing to use city funds as efficiently and effectively as possible,” Ms. Varlack said.The city will begin a competitive bidding process to find a new provider to take over the work.But Ms. Varlack said the city was working on a temporary contract extension for DocGo’s services upstate in order to minimize disruptions to the 1,800 or so migrants, including school-age children, who are in DocGo’s care at cut-rate motels from Westchester County to Buffalo. City Hall says the extension will last until a new provider is selected in the competitive bidding process.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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      NASA Picks 3 Companies to Help Astronauts Drive Around the Moon

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      The agency’s future moon buggies will reach speeds of 9.3 miles per hour and will be capable of self-driving.NASA will be renting some cool wheels to drive around the moon.Space agency officials announced on Wednesday that they have hired three companies to come up with preliminary designs for vehicles to take NASA astronauts around the lunar south polar region in the coming years. After the astronauts return to Earth, these vehicles would be able to self-drive around as robotic explorers, similar to NASA’s rovers on Mars.The self-driving capability would also allow the vehicle to meet the next astronaut mission at a different location.“Where it will go, there are no roads,” Jacob Bleacher, the chief exploration scientist at NASA, said at a news conference on Wednesday. “Its mobility will fundamentally change our view of the moon.”The companies are Intuitive Machines of Houston, which in February successfully landed a robotic spacecraft on the moon; Lunar Outpost of Golden, Colo.; and Venturi Astrolab of Hawthorne, Calif. Only one of the three will actually build a vehicle for NASA and send it to the moon.NASA had asked for proposals of what it called the lunar terrain vehicle, or L.T.V., that could drive at speeds up to 9.3 miles per hour, travel a dozen miles on a single charge and allow astronauts to drive around for eight hours.The agency will work with the three companies for a year to further develop their designs. Then NASA will choose one of them for the demonstration phase.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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      Will Patrick Hendry Change the New York City Police Union?

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      Patrick Hendry, a reserved, behind-the-scenes power, is succeeding fiery Patrick Lynch, who ran the Police Benevolent Association at top volume.Patrick Hendry, the new head of New York City’s police officers’ union, has much in common with his predecessor: Their mothers are from Ireland. They grew up in Queens, the sons of union men. And they believe a police union must defend officers, even those accused of wrongdoing.Mr. Hendry and Patrick J. Lynch, the former president of the Police Benevolent Association, say officers must make split-second decisions that carry uniquely high stakes for union members, for the city and within the 50,500-employee Police Department — the nation’s largest.For nearly a quarter century, the booming voice of Mr. Lynch, who stepped down June 30, made the union a key player in New York politics. He was a take-it-or-leave-it megaphone for 21,000 active members. He battled Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani over wage freezes; accused Mayor Bill de Blasio after the assassination of two officers of stirring up anti-police sentiment; and led the union when it endorsed Donald J. Trump for president in 2020.Now Mr. Hendry, 51, who is untested as a public figure, must decide whether he will deviate from that path. He says that his plans are straightforward: Get more officers longer shifts in exchange for more days off, fend off watchdogs who he says seek to discipline officers over minor complaints and build on the diverse team he has assembled to serve a younger, majority-minority force.He also wants to retain officers being wooed by other law enforcement agencies offering more money and less big-city stress. Thanks to a union contract signed in April, officers starting next year will earn about $56,000 annually in their first year and just over $65,000 by their fifth year — far lower than elsewhere in the country.“Our members are still leaving. We are understaffed and overworked. We made progress on the contract, but we still believe we’re underpaid,” Mr. Hendry said during a recent interview at Police Benevolent Association headquarters in Lower Manhattan. “We are the biggest force in the country, and we should be paid the highest in the country.”Mr. Hendry himself is expected to earn about $218,000 annually, half from his police salary and half from the union; union leaders are excused from city work in order to perform union business full time.He was quick to take up his ceremonial duties. On Wednesday, he went to the northeast side of Central Park where, in 1986, a 15-year-old boy shot Detective Steven McDonald. In 2019, the detective, who had forgiven the boy who left him paralyzed, died from his injuries.Mr. Hendry gave a brief speech before a small group gathered there, 37 years to the day of the shooting. “Everyone here has a Steven McDonald story,” he said. “Those stories made us better police officers, made us better people.” After he finished, he embraced Detective McDonald’s widow and son.The timing of Mr. Hendry’s ascension coincides with a turning point for the Police Department. Edward Caban was named acting commissioner this month after the abrupt resignation of Keechant Sewell. Ms. Sewell, Mr. Lynch and the city negotiated a long-awaited contract that gives officers’ better pay and schedule flexibility, work that Mr. Hendry wants to continue with Mr. Caban, who is the son of a transit cop from the Bronx.The leadership of the Police Department is in flux, with Keechant Seewell stepping down as commissioner and Edward Caban, right, appointed on an acting basis.Dave Sanders for The New York TimesMr. Hendry, the son of a carpenter and waitress who immigrated from Ireland, grew up in Queens Village, the youngest of four children. He was an Eagle Scout and an altar boy at a Roman Catholic parish before he joined the department in 1993 at age 21. Nine years later, while working at the 103rd Precinct in Queens, he became a union delegate.Back then, Mr. Lynch was a new leader who quickly made the Police Benevolent Association a powerful voice in the city and on the national stage.Mr. Lynch gave voice to police officers’ anger following a two-year wage freeze during the Giuliani administration, with officers protesting from precincts to the State Capitol. The union made an unsuccessful appeal of a 2013 ruling that ended the department’s use of stop-and-frisk — a police tactic defended by mayor Michael R. Bloomberg that unfairly targeted Black and brown men.In 2014, after Ismaaiyl Brinsley, who was incensed over killings by the police, shot two officers dead, Mr. Lynch cast blame on Mr. de Blasio. At Woodhull Hospital in Queens that night, Mr. Lynch said, “There’s blood on many hands” and added: “That blood on the hands starts on the steps of City Hall, in the office of the mayor.” Days later, at the funeral of one of the slain officers, police officers turned their backs on the mayor as he spoke.Six years later, Mr. Lynch was again at war with Mr. de Blasio as racial-justice protests and calls to defund the police swept the country. The union endorsed Mr. Trump, putting Mr. Lynch in the national spotlight.Mr. Lynch appeared to have a better rapport with Mayor Eric Adams, a former officer who agreed to the more generous contract, and who has said he sees the police as an extension of himself.Patrick Lynch was a regular participant in New York’s public discourse, delivering his contributions at high volume.Sasha Maslov for The New York TimesMr. Lynch, 59, did not want to try for a new five-year term because he would have reached the mandatory retirement age for a police officer before the term ended. When he announced he would not seek re-election, Jumaane Williams, the city’s public advocate, said in a phone interview that his departure was long overdue, calling him the “most obstructive voice to having a real conversation around public safety.”“I don’t think he was ever interested in doing anything that was about addressing accountability and transparency in policing,” he said.“You have to speak up for your members, be it working conditions, pay, protection against undue discipline,” he added. “But he spoke for them as loud as possible, even when they were wrong.”Mr. Hendry has already made moves that reflect the modern makeup of the department, whose uniformed work force is now 58 percent nonwhite. He has selected two women of color to be among the union’s top six leaders. One, Betty Carradero, who is Latina, will be the union secretary; the other, Lethimyle Cleveland, who is Black and Vietnamese, will be the first openly gay board member. Although most of the organization’s 369 delegates are white, 40 percent are now people of color.“I’ve put a team together that truly reflects our members,” Mr. Hendry said.Still, changes in leadership might make little difference in the public perception of a Police Department with a history of high-profile killings of Black and brown New Yorkers, said Lee Adler, a labor studies professor at Cornell University and an expert in law enforcement unions.When federal prosecutors declined to charge an officer who fatally shot Ramarley Graham, an unarmed Black teenager, in the bathroom of his Bronx home in 2012, Mr. Lynch said there was a “scourge of guns and drugs in the community” and that the officer’s “good faith effort to combat those ills brought us to this tragedy.” After the firing of the officer whose chokehold led to Eric Garner’s death in 2014, Mr. Lynch said his members should “proceed with the utmost caution in this new reality, in which they may be deemed ‘reckless’ just for doing their job.”Union leaders have been driven “to defend, explain and rationalize” bad actors, Professor Adler said. “They may have private moments where their conscience rings as clear as a bell. But those thoughts don’t become part of their own operating systems from which they make decisions — even if it’s real, and even if it’s powerful, and even if it seems right.”To that, Mr. Lynch asks: If Mr. Hendry and the union do not stand behind police officers, whose every move is subject to intense scrutiny by the Police Department, politicians and the public, who will?“Sometimes the other side is just wrong, and someone has to tell them. It’s not always comfortable, but that’s the job,” Mr. Lynch said.“How you get there may vary with time. It may vary with the issue.” And, Mr. Lynch added: “It may vary with the person in charge.” More

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      Ecuador’s President Dissolves Congress Amid Impeachment Trial

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      President Guillermo Lasso disbanded the National Assembly as the opposition-led body was trying to oust him on embezzlement charges.President Guillermo Lasso of Ecuador disbanded the country’s opposition-led National Assembly on Wednesday, a drastic move as the right-leaning leader faced impeachment proceedings over accusations of embezzlement.The constitutional measure, never before used, allows the president to rule by decree until new elections can be held, marking a moment of extraordinary political turbulence for a country of 18 million already in turmoil.Ecuador has long been a relative haven in the region, but in recent years it has been convulsed by rising violence and a skyrocketing homicide rate as increasingly powerful narco-trafficking groups fight for territory.Opposition lawmakers accused Mr. Lasso of turning a blind eye to irregularities and embezzlement in a contract between a state-run shipping company and an oil tanker company that wasn’t delivering on its promises — allegations first made in news reports. The country’s constitutional court later approved a charge of embezzlement against the president but denied two charges of bribery.The charge was being investigated by congress and is political in nature. It is not a criminal charge.Last week, the National Assembly voted to begin impeachment hearings, but all proceedings were permanently halted once Mr. Lasso dissolved congress.The president has repeatedly denied the charges, pointing out that the contract was signed before he took office.“The prosecutors of this trial have acknowledged that they have nothing,” Mr. Lasso said on Tuesday during the impeachment proceeding. “This inquiry is political.”He added, “This is not about saving a presidency, but about preserving a functioning democracy.”This was the second time the opposition had tried to remove Mr. Lasso from the presidency since he took office in 2021.He has faced growing criticism and petitions for his removal from civil society groups in the face of soaring rates of crime, extortion, kidnappings and robberies. Gangs battle for control of drug routes and have gained greater control over the country’s prisons, leading to several prison riots and massacres over the last three years.For weeks, the president and congress were locked in a game of brinkmanship, with legislators threatening to impeach and remove Mr. Lasso as he threatened to dissolve congress and call new elections — a move known in Ecuador as muerte cruzada, or mutually assured death.The mechanism was written into the Constitution in 2008 as a tool to end deadlocks between the presidency and the legislature. But until now, no president had ever enacted it.With Mr. Lasso’s approval ratings plummeting, in some cases below 20 percent, he will govern by decree until new elections are held. The Constitution gives the national election body seven days to set a date for a presidential and legislative vote. The newly elected president and National Assembly would then govern until the end of the original term, 2025.The disbanding of congress provides temporary stability for the country, said Arianna Tanca, an Ecuadorean political scientist, allowing Mr. Lasso to pass laws without a deadlock and giving political parties the chance for a “reset.”But it also threatens to undercut the country’s democracy. A head of government calling for new elections is common in parliamentary democracies, but has no parallel in other presidential democracies in Latin America, said Mauricio Alarcón Salvador, the director of Transparency International’s chapter in Ecuador.“To see a president shut down the assembly and assume legislative power in a transitory manner is, undoubtedly, a blow to democracy,” he said, “and, above all, to the system of checks and balances that should be in force in any democracy in the world.”Mr. Lasso’s decision comes amid upheaval in the region. In December, Peru’s president attempted to dissolve congress — in this case an illegal move that led to his removal and arrest, and then to widespread protests that left dozens of people dead.In January, supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil stormed government buildings in the capital, arguing that November’s election, in which he was defeated, had been rigged.Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, said that Mr. Lasso’s decision to go around legislators could — possibly — be good for him.“Even though he is very unpopular now, I could see six months of rule by decree actually boosting his popularity if he can do something quickly about the twin crises of crime, and hunger and poverty,” he said. “Although, given his track record, that’s a big if.”Some human rights activists said they worry that Mr. Lasso’s power to govern by decree could open the door for serious rights violations, like using terrorism laws to target Indigenous organizations and other groups that might oppose him.“The executive branch governing by decree could continue to exacerbate and favor the interests of the banks, the oil mining companies and certain privileged sectors, to the detriment of the rights of the majorities,” said Lina María Espinosa, a human rights lawyer.Mr. Lasso’s first act on Wednesday under his new powers was a tax cut for businesses and middle-class Ecuadoreans, a move that was welcomed by María Paz Jervis, the president of the Chambers of Industries and Production, a business group.While the dissolution of the legislature could lead to unrest and hurt the economy, Ms. Jervis said new elections were a positive development for a country that needed economic growth, to fight poverty and to produce more jobs.“After this weariness, after this burden that we have felt with this political class, we believe that it is the moment to inaugurate a new politics in Ecuador,” she said.José María León Cabrera More

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      5 Takeaways From the Hochul-Zeldin Debate

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      In their only scheduled debate, Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York and her challenger, Representative Lee Zeldin, quarreled intensely on Tuesday over divisive issues such as rising crime and abortion access, while accusing each other of corruption and dangerous extremism.Mr. Zeldin, who has spent his campaign trying to appeal to voters’ dissatisfaction with the status quo, went on the attack from the get-go, frequently raising his voice as he channeled a sense of outrage, especially around crime. Ms. Hochul, a Buffalo-area Democrat vying for her first full term, took a more measured approach that fit her insistence that the state needs a steady hand to lead it.Scenes outside the debate.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesThere was no live audience, but some New Yorkers expressed their views.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesBeyond trading barbs, neither candidate appeared to have a major breakout moment or gaffe that could reshape the race, which, according to recent polls, may be tightening just two weeks before Election Day. But both staked out starkly different positions on substantive matters from crime to vaccine mandates and the migrant crisis ahead of the general election on Nov. 8.Here’s a recap of some of the most memorable moments.Zeldin repeatedly pivoted to crime.Mr. Zeldin, a Long Island congressman, has for months made crime the central focus of his campaign for governor, and Tuesday’s debate was no different. From the start, he attacked Ms. Hochul, charging that she was not doing enough to stem an increase in serious offenses in the state and especially New York City, and blamed her policies for fueling fears.New Yorkers, Mr. Zeldin said in his opening statement, were “less safe thanks to Kathy Hochul and extreme policies.”Mr. Zeldin largely stuck to tough-on-crime policy points that he honed during his primary campaign. He forcefully criticized Ms. Hochul for opposing further revisions to the state’s bail law and called for changes to laws that reformed the juvenile justice system and the parole system in the state.Mr. Zeldin also doubled down repeatedly on a vow that, if elected, he would immediately remove the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, from office, accusing Mr. Bragg of failing to enforce the state’s criminal code.Ms. Hochul sought to redirect attention to her efforts to stem the flow of illegal guns and noted that she had already tightened the bail reforms earlier this year. Those efforts, she said, had already proven fruitful.But Mr. Zeldin argued that the governor was overly focused on gun crime and had not focused enough on other offenses of concern to New Yorkers, including a rise in violent incidents in the subway system.Mr. Zeldin repeatedly turned the debate back to the topic of crime.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesIn New York City, the number of murders and shootings both dropped by about 14 percent through Sunday compared with the same time period last year, though other serious crimes, including robbery, rape and felony assault, have increased, according to police statistics. Though she largely kept her cool during the hourlong debate, Ms. Hochul appeared frustrated with Mr. Zeldin’s insistence on discussing crime when moderators were asking about other topics, something he did even during a discussion of abortion.Hochul says abortion is ‘on the ballot.’Throughout the debate, Ms. Hochul sought to criticize Mr. Zeldin’s anti-abortion stance, saying that he couldn’t run from his long record in Congress opposing access and funding for abortions.“You’re the only person standing on this stage whose name right now — not years past — that right now, is on a bill called ‘Life Begins at Conception,’” Ms. Hochul said.Ms. Hochul cast herself as a bulwark against a potential rollback of abortion protections in New York, warning that Mr. Zeldin, if elected, could appoint a health commissioner who is anti-choice — as he once pledged to do — and shut down health clinics that provide reproductive care.“That is a frightening spectacle,” said Ms. Hochul, the first female governor of New York. “Women need to know that that’s on the ballot this November as well.”Ms. Hochul said Mr. Zeldin could appoint a health commissioner who is opposed to abortion rights.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesReiterating a pledge from earlier this month, Mr. Zeldin vowed that he would not seek to unilaterally change the state’s already-strict abortion protections, which are enshrined in state law. Mr. Zeldin said that doing so would be politically unfeasible and that Ms. Hochul was being disingenuous by suggesting he would do so, given that Democrats control the State Legislature in Albany and are likely to retain control this election cycle.Mr. Zeldin, however, raised the prospects of potentially curbing funding for abortions for women traveling to New York from other states where abortions are banned.“I’ve actually heard from a number of people who consider themselves to be pro-choice, who are not happy here that their tax dollars are being used to fund abortions, many, many, many states away,” he said.Zeldin dances around his ties to Donald Trump.For months, Ms. Hochul has emphasized Mr. Zeldin’s close relationship with former President Donald J. Trump, focusing particularly on the congressman’s vote to overturn the results of the 2020 election hours after the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.Though Mr. Zeldin has scoffed at Ms. Hochul’s focus on that day, when asked by debate moderators if he would repeat his vote, he stood by it.“The vote was on two states: Pennsylvania and Arizona,” he said. “And the issue still remains today.”Sarah Silbiger/ReutersMr. Zeldin walked a delicate line as he was questioned about his relationship to the former president. When asked if he wanted to see Mr. Trump run in 2024, he waved away the question as irrelevant. When Ms. Hochul asked if he thought Mr. Trump — who lost New York by 23 percentage points in 2020 — was “a great president,” he refused to give her a simple “yes or no” answer.Yet Mr. Zeldin did not denounce Mr. Trump, who remains popular with many of the Republicans that he needs to draw to the polls if he hopes to defeat Ms. Hochul. He said he was proud to have worked closely with the former president on a laundry list of issues ranging from local crime to international politics.Ms. Hochul appeared satisfied with the reply. “I’ll take that as a resounding yes,” she said. “And the voters of New York do not agree with you.”Questioning Hochul’s ethics.Mr. Zeldin wasted little time impugning Ms. Hochul’s fund-raising efforts, accusing her of orchestrating “pay-to-play” schemes because of the large sums she has raised from people with business before the state.In particular, Mr. Zeldin referenced a $637 million contract that the state awarded in December to Digital Gadgets, a New Jersey-based company, for 52 million at-home coronavirus tests. The founder of the company, Charlie Tebele, and his family have given more than $290,000 to Ms. Hochul’s campaign and hosted fund-raisers for the governor.The Times Union of Albany has reported that the company charged the state about $12.25 per test, similar to the retail price for many tests, and that the company did not go through a competitive bidding process.“So what New Yorkers want to know is what specific measures are you pledging to deal with the pay-to-play corruption that is plaguing you and your administration?” Mr. Zeldin asked.Ms. Hochul vehemently denied any connection between the campaign donations and the contract, saying the company helped the state obtain an extraordinary number of tests at a time of huge demand when tests were relatively scarce nationwide. The company has also previously said that it never communicated with Ms. Hochul or her campaign about any company business.“There is no pay-to-play corruption,” the governor said. “There has never been a quid pro quo, a policy change or decision made because of a contribution.”Thalia Juarez for The New York TimesMs. Hochul, clearly expecting the attack line, used the opportunity to underscore the millions of dollars that Ronald Lauder, the heir to the cosmetics fortune of Estée Lauder, has steered into super PACs supporting Mr. Zeldin’s campaign, saying, “What worries me is the fact that you have one billionaire donor who’s given you over $10 million.”Only a glancing focus on the economy.Despite public polls showing that inflation is a top-of-mind concern for voters, the economy and rising costs of living received less attention than anticipated during the debate.Mr. Zeldin promised to slash taxes across the board if elected, saying that “New York is going to be back open for business on January 1.” He also vowed to block the congestion-pricing plan that would charge drivers a toll for entering part of Manhattan, which he believes would burden middle-class New Yorkers during a precarious economic moment.Mr. Zeldin questioned what Ms. Hochul has done as governor to try and stem New York’s recent population loss. The state has lost 319,000 people since mid-2020, a decline of 1.58 percent that is higher than any other state, primarily as a result of residents moving away, according to an analysis by the Pew Charitable Trusts.In response, Ms. Hochul turned to a turn of phrase she deployed several times during the debate, saying that Mr. Zeldin was more fixated on “sound bites” than “sound policy.” She challenged him to detail which social programs he would reduce spending on if he cut the state’s corporate and personal income tax rates, which are among the highest in the nation.And she highlighted her own record of economic investments. She mentioned the tax rebates she had enacted for the middle class, as well as a recent agreement to persuade Micron to build a semiconductor facility near Syracuse, a deal that the company said could generate more than 50,000 jobs. More

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      Macron Goes on Defensive Over Use of McKinsey and Other Consultants

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      President Emmanuel Macron’s opponents have criticized the French government for paying at least a billion dollars last year to private consulting firms.PARIS — In a sedate presidential race overshadowed by pandemic and war, it’s the one issue that has so far managed to ruffle an otherwise supremely confident President Emmanuel Macron: McKinsey.Yes, McKinsey, the American consulting firm.With about a week left before the French go to the polls, McKinsey and its proximity to Mr. Macron’s government has unexpectedly emerged as a campaign issue — putting Mr. Macron on the defensive and forcing his ministers to try to extinguish the controversy.The other presidential contenders, frustrated for months by Mr. Macron’s refusal to debate, have seized on McKinsey as a way to hit at what polls have long shown to be one of his great weaknesses: Mr. Macron’s image as an arrogant and aloof president of the rich, prone to a solitary and secretive decision-making style, out of touch with the concerns of ordinary French people.The issue had been percolating for a few weeks since the release of a damning report by the Senate showing that McKinsey and other firms — highly paid and politically unaccountable private consultants — earned at least $1 billion last year to do work on sensitive matters for the government.That amount followed already yearly increases in work for McKinsey and other consulting firms during Mr. Macron’s five-year presidency and a sharp acceleration during the coronavirus pandemic and France’s vaccine rollout.The 380-page Senate report, which stemmed from a four-month inquiry, described the firms’ influence on the government as “tentacular,” detailing how private consultants routinely sat in on ministry meetings and anonymously wrote government reports.McKinsey offices in New York. The company’s proximity to Mr. Macron’s government has unexpectedly emerged as a campaign issue in the French election.Emon Hassan for The New York TimesIt added that the government’s use of consultants had become “a reflex,” with consulting firms being “involved in most of the major reforms” in France, such as the overhaul of housing benefits or of unemployment insurance.The issue rose to the surface this week after Mr. Macron finally began holding full-fledged campaign events and was confronted several times with it. Mr. Macron reacted angrily, at times justifying the practice of hiring consultants and then trying to deflect responsibility.“I’m not the one who signs the contracts,” Mr. Macron said during a campaign stop in Dijon, eastern France this week, adding, “a lot of stupid things have been said in recent days.”Learn More About France’s Presidential ElectionThe run-up to the first round of the election has been dominated by issues such as security, immigration and national identity.On Stage: As the vote approaches, theaters and comedy venues are tackling the campaign with one message: Don’t trust politicians. Behind the Scene: In France, where political finance laws are strict, control over the media has provided an avenue for billionaires to influence the election.A Political Bellwether: Auxerre has backed the winner in the presidential race for 40 years. This time, many residents see little to vote for.Private Consultants: A report showing that firms like McKinsey earned large sums of money to do work for his government has put President Emmannuel Macron on the defensive.But as the issue stuck, the government went on the defensive, scheduling a news conference for Thursday and then moving it up to Wednesday evening at the last minute.Chloé Morin, a political scientist at the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, a Paris-based think tank, said that the issue struck several sensitive chords among the French public and played on a particular vulnerability for Mr. Macron, a former investment banker who as a politician has made it his mission to bring businesslike efficiency to the structures of the state.“One of the criticisms leveled at Emmanuel Macron since 2017 is that he is the president of the rich, a president of the private sector, a president who’s from the world of finance, and in France, there is a great distrust of the world of consultants and finance,” Ms. Morin said. “And so this revives the image of a president serving the interests of big donors and big banks.”Before entering politics, Mr. Macron worked at the investment bank Rothschild. As president, while the overall economy has grown, his policy mix of tax cuts and deregulation has tended to favor the wealthy.Mr. Macron’s presidency is also remembered for a series of disdainful comments he has leveled at ordinary people and their everyday concerns — an attitude that fueled the Yellow Vest movement of demonstrations against Mr. Macron’s economic policies.A Yellow Vest rally in Paris in 2019 to protest Mr. Macron’s economic policies.Kiran Ridley/Getty ImagesThe growing reliance on private, confidential consultants also reinforces the impression of Mr. Macron’s management style. As president, he has embraced, more than any of his immediate predecessors, the concentration of powers afforded the presidency in France’s Fifth Republic. During his presidency, as well as during his campaign for re-election, Mr. Macron has governed largely in secrecy, relying on his right-hand man, the general secretary of the Élysée Palace, Alexis Kohler.Caroline Michel-Aguirre, a French investigative reporter who co-wrote “The Infiltrators,” a book on the growing presence of consulting firms within the state apparatus, said that the government’s use of consulting firms “was set up in a secret way” and posed “a democratic issue.”“It took the involvement of the National Assembly, our book, a Senate inquiry commission and a controversy for the government to finally announce” that it would publish figures on government contracts with consulting firms, Ms. Michel-Aguirre said.Mr. Macron remains the favorite going into the first round of voting on April 10. But he has slipped a bit in the polls. His main rival, the far-right leader Marine Le Pen, has been visiting communities in rural France and focusing laserlike on a single issue: the rising cost of living, made worse by the war in Ukraine and increasing fuel prices.Ms. Le Pen and most of Mr. Macron’s other political opponents have seized on the consulting firms to accuse Mr. Macron of selling off the state.The Senate’s report said that the situation raised issues about the state’s “sovereignty in the face of private firms” and about “the proper use of public funds.”Who Is Running for President of France?Card 1 of 6The campaign begins. More

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      Hochul Amassed a Campaign Fortune. Here's Who it Came From.

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      Gov. Kathy Hochul’s record-setting $21.6 million in donations flowed from a who’s who of New York’s special interests.Last November, when many of Manhattan’s skyscrapers sat half-empty, Gov. Kathy Hochul made a high-stakes wager on New York City’s commercial real estate industry: She vowed to move ahead with a marquee plan to restore Pennsylvania Station and erect new office towers around it.For Manhattan’s mega-rich real estate developers, the announcement signaled Ms. Hochul’s support for the kind of grand projects that foretell a windfall, and some found a concrete way of showing their approval to the new governor.In the weeks that followed, Ms. Hochul’s campaign received checks for $69,700, the legal limit, from some of the city’s biggest real estate executives, including Steven Roth of Vornado Realty Trust, which is positioned to directly benefit from the project that he once called a “Promised Land.” Other checks trickled in from developers, builders, engineers and even some who opposed it.The campaign contributions flowed from a broader spigot of cash turned on last fall by New York’s varied special interests, from real estate and building trades to hospitals, labor unions and gaming companies, directed toward Ms. Hochul’s election campaign.The donations included $200,000 in checks from the family behind a major construction firm with millions in state contracts, $47,000 that was tied to a gaming giant leaning on the state to expand legal gambling, and $41,000 traced back to a single Albany lobbyist.The funds helped Ms. Hochul, a moderate Democrat who unexpectedly ascended to office last August, assemble a record-setting $21.6 million war chest, and claim a steep advantage heading into June’s Democratic primary and November’s general election.People and industries with financial interests before the state have long been reliable donors to top elected officials, showering them with money that, at times, can pose ethical and legal problems.There has been no evidence that the contributions from Mr. Roth and other developers were directly related to Ms. Hochul’s Penn Station plan, but those and others may still prompt scrutiny about her decision-making as she negotiates the state’s $216 billion budget.“It’s not like this isn’t a problem, but it is a well-trod path,” said Blair Horner, the executive director of the New York Public Interest Research Group, which pushes for tighter campaign finance laws. “She’s just running through it instead of walking.”More than 95 percent of the funds she collected came from donors who gave $1,000 or more, according to a review of publicly available campaign filings, despite the Hochul campaign’s claims of success in pulling in small donations. Dozens of people wrote the governor checks for the legal maximum.Jerrel Harvey, a spokesman for Ms. Hochul’s campaign, pointed to contributions from every county in the state and said that the campaign was proud that her agenda “has resonated with a diverse coalition of supporters.”“In keeping with the governor’s commitment to maintain high ethical standards, campaign contributions have no influence on government decisions,” he said.Many of her donors are fixtures in New York politics and were stalwart supporters of her predecessor, Andrew M. Cuomo, who collected tens of millions of dollars in campaign contributions by often using the same tactics Ms. Hochul is employing. But where Mr. Cuomo had years to build those relationships and fill his campaign coffers, Ms. Hochul has done so in a matter on months.Few industries gave more — and frequently in large amounts — than real estate, where large developers are keenly watching how Ms. Hochul will not only approach large, state-funded capital projects but the future of the state’s affordable housing law.Douglas Durst, who oversees a multibillion dollar real estate empire and chairs the influential Real Estate Board of New York, gave her $55,000. The family of Scott Rechler, a top donor to Mr. Cuomo whose RXR Realty controls millions of square feet of commercial real estate, gave $60,000. Members of the Rudin, Tishman and Speyer families — whose names dot buildings across the city — collectively contributed more than $400,000. Top executives at Related Companies, the group behind Hudson Yards, maxed out.The new governor, who has cast herself as pro-business and greenlighted a rash of expensive capital projects amid an influx of federal funds, also quickly began collecting funds from the state’s construction industry. Hundreds of thousands of dollars came from unions, trade groups and executives representing bricklayers, sheet metal workers, engineers, elevator constructors, machine operators, construction companies and even a law firm that specializes in construction accidents.Hospitals, nursing homes and other health groups, who scored significant victories in Ms. Hochul’s budget, including retention bonuses for frontline health workers, gave hundreds of thousands of dollars, as well. Over two days in October and December, for example, more than 60 LLCs associated with nursing or rehabilitation homes all gave $1,000 or more apiece.Three family members associated with the Haugland Group, a Long Island construction and energy firm with lucrative state contracts at Kennedy Airport and with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, gave more than $200,000 altogether.A Guide to the New York Governor’s RaceCard 1 of 5A crowded field. More

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      Trump Sues N.Y.C. for Ending Golf Course Contract After Capitol Riot

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      The Trump Organization, which had a 20-year contract to operate a public golf course in the Bronx, claims it was unfairly targeted.The Trump Organization sued New York City on Monday, saying the city had wrongly terminated a lucrative golf course contract for political reasons after the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol in Washington.The suit, filed in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan on the eve of the mayoral election, argued that the January decision by Mayor Bill de Blasio to end the company’s 20-year contract to run the public golf course in the Bronx had no legitimate legal basis and was meant only to punish former President Donald J. Trump.“Mayor de Blasio had a pre-existing, politically-based predisposition to terminate Trump-related contracts, and the city used the events of January 6, 2021 as a pretext to do so,” the suit said.In a statement, the company said that the course was “widely recognized as one of the most magnificent public golf experiences anywhere in the country.”A spokesman for the mayor, Bill Neidhardt, responded, saying: “Donald Trump directly incited a deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. You do that, and you lose the privilege of doing business with the City of New York.”Mr. Trump was impeached this year for inciting the riot, his second impeachment, but was acquitted by the Senate after leaving office.After the attacks on the Capitol, the city abruptly ended several contracts with the Trump Organization, including agreements that allowed the company to operate the Central Park Carousel and two ice-skating rinks in the park.The move came as a wave of other businesses also backed away from Mr. Trump after the attacks on the Capitol, including the P.G.A. of America, which announced it would no longer hold one of its major tournaments at a New Jersey golf club owned by the president.The contracts in Central Park had already been set to expire in April. The lawsuit centers on a city-owned course in the Ferry Point section of the Bronx, called Trump Golf Links at Ferry Point. The Trump Organization was in its sixth year of running the course, which opened in 2015.Overall, the contracts had garnered the Trump Organization about $17 million a year, Mr. de Blasio said in January.Although Mr. de Blasio said then that the decision to sever ties was made because Mr. Trump incited rioters at the Capitol, the city offered a more contractual basis for the decision: The Trump Organization had defaulted in its agreement on the golf course because it had not attracted a major tournament and was unlikely to do so in the future, given the P.G.A.’s decision.The mayor insisted at the time that the city was on “strong legal ground,” but the Trump Organization vowed to fight back, saying the move was a form of political discrimination.Mr. Trump had been hailed by city officials years ago for refurbishing Wollman Rink in Central Park. Travis Dove for The New York TimesNow, the organization has made its case in an 18-page petition saying that it was never obliged to attract an actual tournament but merely to maintain “a first class tournament quality daily fee golf course.” The petition included several statements from professional golfers, including Dustin Johnson and Bryson DeChambeau, attesting to the course’s being “first class” and “tournament quality.”A spokesman for the city’s law department said that it would “vigorously defend” its decision to terminate the contract and that it “looked forward to selecting a new vendor for Ferry Point.”There is little love lost between Mr. Trump and Mr. de Blasio. The former president has called the Democratic mayor and 2020 presidential contender “the worst mayor in the history of New York City.” Mr. de Blasio, in turn, embraced Mr. Trump as a foil during his own ill-fated presidential run, even attempting to give the president a nickname, “Con Don.”The city initially celebrated its collaboration with Mr. Trump when the rising real estate developer first won the contract to refurbish Wollman Rink in Central Park in the 1980s. Mr. Trump’s company finished the project under budget and ahead of its deadline, and city officials embraced him; one even joked about planting a “Trump tree” in the park.“I’m not used to having nice things said about me,” Mr. Trump said at the time.The contracts were renewed during the tenure of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. But Mr. de Blasio, a progressive Democrat, staked out a position against Mr. Trump, one that put him in line with his many liberal constituents.The lawsuit comes as Mr. Trump and his company are facing an unrelated criminal investigation from the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which is examining whether the former president and his employees committed financial fraud in recent years.Prosecutors appear to be in the final stages of investigating Allen H. Weisselberg, Mr. Trump’s long-serving chief financial officer, and could criminally charge him this summer, The New York Times previously reported.Mr. Weisselberg, who has worked for the Trump family since 1973, was listed as the contact for the company on the city’s contract for the Central Park carousel.Ben Protess More

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      Troubled Vaccine Maker and Its Founder Gave $2 Million in Political Donations

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      Emergent BioSolutions faces scrutiny in Congress for ruining Covid-19 vaccines and securing lucrative federal contracts. Executives will appear before some lawmakers who benefited from the company’s spending.WASHINGTON — When Fuad El-Hibri, founder and executive chairman of Emergent BioSolutions, appears Wednesday before a House subcommittee to explain how the company’s Baltimore plant ruined millions of doses of coronavirus vaccine, he will be questioned by lawmakers he and his employees spent tens of thousands of dollars helping to elect.Since 2018, federal campaign records show, Mr. El-Hibri and his wife, Nancy, have donated at least $150,000 to groups affiliated with the top Republican on the panel, Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, as well as Mr. Scalise’s campaigns. At least two other members of the subcommittee received donations during the 2020 election cycle from the company’s political action committee, which has given about $1.4 million over the past 10 years to members of both parties.Mr. El-Hibri and his wife have made additional donations totaling more than $800,000 over the same period, with the majority going to Republican candidates and organizations.Political giving is nothing new in Washington. But with the federal government as Emergent’s prime customer, Mr. El-Hibri and the company he founded have spent years cultivating ties on Capitol Hill, helping Emergent carve out a lucrative niche market as a government contractor under both Democratic and Republican administrations.Now Emergent and its top executives find themselves under scrutiny from some of the very elected officials they have sought to influence.Members of Congress are demanding answers from the company, which was awarded a $628 million contract last year to manufacture Covid-19 vaccines but has yet to produce a single dose deemed usable by federal regulators. Along with Mr. El-Hibri, Emergent’s chief executive, Robert G. Kramer, will testify beginning at 10:30 a.m. before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, which has opened a sprawling inquiry.Like nearly everything else about the coronavirus pandemic, the hearing is bound to be colored by politics.Democrats, led by Representative Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the panel’s chairman, are expected to use the session to put a spotlight on the company’s relationship with Trump administration officials, including Robert Kadlec, the former assistant secretary of health and human services for preparedness and response, who had previously consulted for Emergent. Dr. Kadlec has said that he was not involved in negotiating the company’s coronavirus contract but that he did sign off on it.Democrats have also signaled that they will zero in on the executives’ stock trades. Emergent’s stock performed so well in 2020 that Mr. El-Hibri cashed in shares and options worth over $42 million, The New York Times reported in March. Mr. Kramer sold slightly more than $10 million in stock this year, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission reported earlier by The Washington Post.“They all made millions in stock transactions while they seem to be hiding stuff from the public,” Mr. Clyburn said in a recent interview with CNN.Republicans, led by Mr. Scalise, who as the No. 2 Republican holds the title of whip, are likely to point out that the company’s contracts date at least to the Obama administration, which designated its Baltimore facility a center for innovation in advanced development and manufacturing — meaning it would be ready to make vaccines and other needed treatments in the event of a crisis.Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana received campaign donations from Mr. El-Hibri and his wife, Nancy.Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesA spokeswoman for Mr. Scalise said that Mr. El-Hibri would receive no special treatment at the hearing. “The Democrats invited him as a witness, and Whip Scalise will treat him as he would any other witness that has been invited before the committee,” the spokeswoman said.Until recently, Emergent was an obscure player in Washington, but a dominant force in the highly specialized market for drugs and vaccines aimed at countering a biological attack. The company burst into the limelight earlier this spring after The Times reported that workers at its Bayview plant in Baltimore had accidentally conflated the ingredients of two vaccines that rely on live viruses, forcing Emergent to discard up to 15 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.Food and Drug Administration inspectors subsequently raised concerns about possible further contamination, and the company has recently submitted a quality improvement plan to regulators. The equivalent of about 70 million more doses of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine, mostly for domestic use, are on hold and may never be cleared for use in the United States.“The collaboration with BARDA was designed to create a higher probability of success but was not without risk,” an Emergent spokesman, Matt Hartwig, said in a statement to The Times, using the acronym for the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, the federal agency that awarded the contract. “Our motivation in collaborating with BARDA was to help play a role in bringing the pandemic to an end and we are proud of the work of Emergent’s employees.”Mr. Kramer, the chief executive, is likely to use the hearing to outline the company’s corrective action plan and to cast Emergent as a company committed to helping the country in crisis. During a recent earnings call with investors, Mr. Kramer announced a management shake-up and took “full responsibility” for the problems in Baltimore.But he also cast some blame on the government, saying that federal officials had asked Emergent to manufacture the two live-virus vaccines — one developed by Johnson & Johnson and the other by AstraZeneca — despite the risk of contamination. He said that the company had taken precautions but that the contamination had most likely occurred when “one or more of these precautions did not function as anticipated.”Emergent’s chief executive, Robert G. Kramer, sold slightly more than $10 million in stock this year, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.Joe Andrucyk/Office of Governor Larry HoganThrough Mr. Hartwig, the Emergent spokesman, the El-Hibris declined to comment.The company is a longtime partner to the federal government. Then known as BioPort, it was founded by Mr. El-Hibri in 1998 after he and some investors paid the state of Michigan $25 million to buy the license for a government-developed anthrax vaccine and an aging manufacturing plant. In the two decades since, the company built its business largely around selling products to the Strategic National Stockpile, the nation’s emergency medical reserve.An investigation by The Times, published in March, found that the company’s anthrax vaccine had in some years accounted for roughly half of the stockpile’s budget and that the company’s aggressive tactics, broad political connections and penchant for undercutting competitors had given it remarkable sway over the government’s purchasing decisions related to the vaccines.The company’s board is stocked with former federal officials, and its lobbyists include former members of Congress and aides from both parties. The company’s government relations shop is similarly stocked with partisans; Chris Frech, its top in-house lobbyist, worked for former President George W. Bush, and Grant Barbosa, a senior director for government affairs, was a legislative assistant to Vice President Kamala Harris when she was a senator.Senate lobbying disclosures show that the company has spent an average of $3 million a year on lobbying over the past decade — much more than similarly sized biotech firms but about the same as two pharmaceutical giants, AstraZeneca and Bristol Myers Squibb, whose annual revenues are at least 17 times higher.During the first three months of this year, Emergent reported spending $1.47 million on lobbying, enlisting the services of more than two dozen lobbyists from 10 firms.Federal campaign disclosure records show that donations to the Emergent BioSolutions Inc. Employees PAC run the gamut. Board members and executives like Mr. El-Hibri give as much as $5,000, the maximum allowable amount per year under federal election rules. Some employees have contributed on a biweekly basis in amounts as small as $3.47. Three former employees said the company offered a payroll deduction program to make giving easier.The employee group tends to spend in small dollar amounts, typically $1,000 to $2,500 on incumbents, including lawmakers representing states where it operates, like Maryland and Michigan. Representative Steny Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the No. 2 Democrat in the House, was a top beneficiary in the 2020 election cycle; he and an affiliated organization received a total of $10,000.Two members of the House panel conducting Wednesday’s hearing — Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, and Representative Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland — each received $1,000 contributions over the same election cycle.In an interview, Mr. Raskin said that he had been unaware of the donation until he was contacted by a Times reporter and that he had returned the money. A spokesman for Mr. Jordan said that the congressman had raised more than $18 million during the 2020 election cycle and that contributions had no bearing on his work as a legislator.Mr. Hartwig, the Emergent spokesman, said in an email message that the PAC “supports incumbent Members of Congress of both chambers and from both parties who represent our employees and our facilities, and who are committed to preparedness and response for the next biological, chemical, or public health threat.”Sharon LaFraniere contributed reporting. More