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VOL. CLXVI . . . No. 57,458
$2.50
NEW YORK, MONDAY, DECEMBER 26, 2016
© 2016 The New York Times Company
Trump Name Amplifies A Mom-and-Pop Empire Challenges in Addressing Conflicts Where Loyalties to Boss and Company Blur This article is by Megan Twohey, Russ Buettner and Steve Eder.
MERIDITH KOHUT FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Yamilet Lugo in September visiting the grave of her son Kevin Lara Lugo, who died on his 16th birthday, in Maturín, Venezuela.
Poisoned by Hunger: Life and Death in Venezuela By NICHOLAS CASEY
MATURÍN, Venezuela — His name was Kevin Lara Lugo, and he died on his 16th birthday. He spent the day before foraging for food in an empty lot, because there was nothing to eat at home. Then in a hospital because what he found made him gravely ill. Hours later, he was dead on a gurney, which doctors rolled by his mother as she watched helplessly. She said the hospital had lacked the simplest supplies needed to save him on that day last July. “I have a tradition that in the morning of their birthdays, I wake up my children
and sing to them,” his mother, Yamilet Lugo, said. “How could I do that when my son was dead?” Venezuela has suffered from so many ailments this year. Inflation has driven office workers to abandon the cities and head to illegal pit mines in the jungle, willing to subject themselves to armed gangs and multiple bouts of malaria for the chance to earn a living. Doctors have prepared to operate on bloody tables because they did not have enough water to clean them. Psychiatric patients have had to be tied to chairs in mental hospitals because there was no medication left to treat their delusions. Hunger has driven some people to riot
— and others into rickety fishing boats, fleeing Venezuela on reckless journeys by sea. But it was the story of a boy with no food, who had gone searching for wild roots to eat but ended up poisoning himself instead, that seemed to embody everything that had gone wrong in Venezuela. The country’s economic crisis had spent months encircling his family, only to snatch away its second-born son. His neighborhood, on the edge of what was once a prosperous oil boomtown, had long been running out of basics like corn Continued on Page A6
When Tiah Joo Kim arrived at the Manhattan headquarters of the Trump Organization to pitch a hotel and condominium project in Vancouver, British Columbia, he expected the famous company with ventures across the globe to come with capacious offices and a staff of hundreds. Instead, he was led through a mere two floors with what appeared to be no more than a few dozen employees. “Lean,” Mr. Tiah, a young Malaysian developer, remembers thinking as he walked the halls. The first stop was a conference room, where Mr. Tiah was required to sell his vision to the boss’s three oldest children. Only after securing their support did he advance to the inner sanctum, with its sweeping views of Central Park. Mr. Tiah was not sure what to expect from the man whose face was beamed around the world through the reality television show “The Apprentice,” but the conversation that afternoon in 2012 was casual and warm. Donald J. Trump spent more time showing off a Shaquille O’Neal shoe and a Mike Tyson championship belt — prize artifacts from his display of sports memorabilia — than interrogating Mr. Tiah on the details of his business plan. “You’re a good-looking guy,” Mr. Tiah recalled Mr. Trump telling him as he gave the project his blessing. Then Mr. Trump’s lawyers and other top executives swooped in
ETHAN MILLER/GETTY IMAGES
Donald J. Trump and Phil Ruffin in 2008 at Trump International Hotel Las Vegas. to play hardball — working alongside Donald Trump Jr. to negotiate the confidential agreements that would allow the Vancouver development to be branded with Mr. Trump’s name and managed by his company. The talks consumed 16-hour days for nearly a week, Mr. Tiah said, explaining: “It was tiring. They’re tough.” That is the way business has been done at the Trump Organization, a relatively small company with a big reach and a bigger selfimage that has come under intense scrutiny as its chief prepares to become president of the United States. With extensive entanglements around the world, many packaged in a network of licensing agreeContinued on Page A14
U.S. Eye in the Sky Glares at ISIS As a Pivotal Battle Brews in Syria By ERIC SCHMITT
ABOARD A JOINT STARS SURVEILLANCE PLANE, over Northern Iraq — Flying at 30,000 feet, the powerful radar aboard this Air Force jet peered deep into Syrian territory, hunting for targets on the ground to strike in the looming offensive to seize Raqqa, the Islamic State’s capital. It was on a mission like this several weeks ago that analysts discovered a hiding place in the central Syrian desert where the Islamic State was stashing scores of oil tanker trucks that provide the terrorist group with a crucial financial lifeline. Acting on that tip and other intelligence, two dozen American warplanes destroyed 188 of the trucks in the biggest airstrike of the year, eliminating an estimated $2 million in oil revenue for the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. Even as the American-led air campaign conducts bombing missions to support Iraqi troops fighting the Islamic State in Mosul, American commanders said the
Donations Seen Influencing Aid By Kidney Fund By KATIE THOMAS and REED ABELSON
The American Kidney Fund is one of the largest charities in the country, with an annual budget of over $250 million. Its marquee program helps pay insurance premiums for thousands of people who need dialysis, a lifesaving and expensive treatment for kidney failure. The organization has earned accolades for its efficient use of the money. Under an agreement with the federal government, the Kidney Fund must distribute the aid based on a patient’s financial need. But the charity has resisted giving aid to patients at clinics that do not donate money to the fund, an investigation by The New York Times has found. The actions have limited crucial help for needy patients at these clinics. The agreement governing the relationship between the group and the companies forbids choosing patients based on their clinic. In multiple cases, the charity pushed back on workers at clinics that had not donated money, discouraging them from signing up their patients for assistance. Until recently, the Kidney Fund’s guidelines even said clinics should not apply for patient aid if the company had not donated to the charity. “I watched many patients who were not able to get that assistContinued on Page B5
air war would probably play an even greater role in Syria over the coming weeks in the battle to retake Raqqa. Newly recruited Syrian Arab militia fighters, allied with experienced Kurdish fighters, are encircling Raqqa. But they need allied bombing to weaken and dislodge enemy forces dug in there, and to cut off the ability for the Islamic State to rearm, refuel and reinforce its fighters. But with few spies in the city, American officials say assessing the enemy is difficult. “We’ve spent a lot of time trying to understand the situation on the ground in Raqqa,” Lt. Gen. Jeffrey L. Harrigian, the air war commander, said in an interview from his headquarters in Qatar. “It’s improving. It’s still not at the level we’d like it to be.” The air operation is a pivotal component of a military campaign that has cost $12.5 million a day in Continued on Page A10
CHRIS M c GRATH/GETTY IMAGES
Christmas in Iraq A Christmas Day Mass with Iraqi and American forces at Mar Hanna Church in Qaraqosh, Iraq, outside Mosul. The town, largely Christian, was recently liberated from the Islamic State.
Pro Wrestling’s Intricate New Move: Into China By NEIL GOUGH
SHANGHAI — Wang Bin looked down. A man wearing a blue skintight unitard writhed at his feet. Mr. Wang grinned. This was the moment he had been waiting for. So, too, had Cheng Shi. When Mr. Wang lifted the writhing man and slammed him to the floor for a
three-count, it completed Mr. Cheng’s dream of watching a professional wrestler — battling in that most American of fake spectacles — who hailed from China. “I feel very proud and excited to see him onstage tonight, and so do all the fans,” Mr. Cheng, a 21-yearold student who makes fan videos for a Chinese audience, said before the match. He pointed at the screen of his smartphone to indi-
cate the thousands of people watching him on his live broadcast. “We are very, very excited.” Looking for eyeballs and new money sources, World Wrestling Entertainment — the company that brought Hulk Hogan and Dwayne (The Rock) Johnson into American living rooms — has grand ambitions for a bigger but much more difficult market. It has Continued on Page A8
GILL ALLEN/ASSOCIATED PRESS
George Michael Dies at 53 Mr. Michael performing in 1993. In his solo career after his duo Wham!, he chose to set pop superficiality aside. Page A19.
INTERNATIONAL A3-10
NATIONAL A11-15
ARTS C1-8
NEW YORK A16-18
BUSINESS DAY B1-6
Livid Netanyahu’s Dilemma
A City’s Anxiety Over Muslims
Donald Judd, Philosopher
How to Catch a Guitar Thief
2016’s Lessons for the Media
Israel’s prime minister, caught between settlements and the international comPAGE A4 munity, may have to choose.
Donald J. Trump’s remarks linking immigration to terrorist threats resonate in Hendersonville, N.C., where PAGE A11 little is known about Islam.
Years of the sculptor’s notebooks and manuscripts have culminated in “DonPAGE C1 ald Judd Writings.”
When Any News Is ‘Fake News’
Employees at a Sam Ash Music store in Manhattan spotted a guitar whose owner, a professional, didn’t know it had been stolen. Then they helped find a suspect. Crime Scene. PAGE A16
The critic Wesley Morris on the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. PAGE C1
The news media is widely distrusted after a series of missteps in covering the presidential campaign. As journalists move into 2017, they must rededicate themselves to uncovering the PAGE B1 truth, Jim Rutenberg writes.
Choir Feared Lost in Jet Crash The Russian military plane went down with 92 people on board, including the famed Alexandrov Ensemble. PAGE A3
Some conservatives label any story that hurts their agenda as fabricated — and PAGE A11 the definition is expanding. SPORTSMONDAY D1-8
Nothing Left to Chance Coach Nick Saban’s football teams at Alabama recruit the best players at all PAGE D1 positions, even long snapper.
A Visit to ‘the Blacksonian’
Hurdles to Building Process An integrated contracting process for building projects, shown to save time and money by bundling together the design and construction phases, is slow PAGE A16 to catch on in New York. EDITORIAL, OP-ED A20-21
Paul Krugman
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Changes in the Press Room The president-elect’s advisers say some conventions of White House media coverage are outdated, and journalists PAGE B1 are bracing for adjustments.
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