Living Off a Glacier, While It Lasts...2017/11/26  · Harvesting flowers in Peru s Cordillera...

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CHAMBLEE, Ga. — Not manynotice when the SUVs arrive.

Around 5 a.m., when the immi-gration agents pull into the park-ing lot of the Chamblee Heightsapartments, 16 miles from down-town Atlanta, only one person ison the lookout.

Cristina Monteros catches sightof the cars with the telltale tintedwindows from her small apart-ment near the front, where sheruns a day care, and calls herdownstairs neighbor: ICE is here.

The neighbor dials another, whopasses it on. It takes less than 15minutes for everyone in the com-plex to hear about “la migra,”whereupon they shut their doorsand hold their breath. Some showup late to work, and others skip italtogether. The school bus mightleave some children behind.

“It’s just us helping each otherout,” said Ms. Monteros, 35.“There’s fear every day.”

Few places in the United Stateshave simultaneously beckonedundocumented immigrants andpenalized them for coming likemetropolitan Atlanta, a boom-town of construction and servicejobs where conservative politics

and new national policies haveturned every waking day into agamble.

President Trump has declaredanyone living in the country ille-gally a target for arrest and depor-tation, driving up the number ofimmigration arrests by more than40 percent this year. While theObama administration deportedrecord numbers of undocumentedimmigrants, it directed federalagents to focus on arresting seri-

ous criminals and recent arrivals.The current administration haserased those guidelines, allowingImmigration and Customs En-forcement agents to arrest and de-port anyone here illegally.

Freed of constraints, the re-gional ICE office in Atlanta madenearly 80 percent more arrests inthe first half of this year than it didin the same period last year, thelargest increase of any field office

As Arrests Surge, Immigrants Fear Even DrivingBy VIVIAN YEE

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested DavidMartinez-Samano as he drove to work in Norcross, Ga.

MELISSA GOLDEN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page 20

VIRU, Peru — The desert blooms now.Blueberries grow to the size of Ping-Pongballs in nothing but sand. Asparagus fieldscross dunes, disappearing over the hori-zon.

The desert produce is packed andshipped to places like Denmark and Dela-ware. Electricity and water have come tovillages that long had neither. Farmershave moved here from the mountains,seeking new futures on all the irrigatedland.

It might sound like a perfect develop-ment plan, except for one catch: The rea-son so much water flows through thisdesert is that an icecap high up in themountains is melting away.

And the bonanza may not last muchlonger.

“If the water disappears, we’d have to goback to how it was before,” said MiguelBeltrán, a 62-year-old farmer who worrieswhat will happen when water levels fall.

“The land was empty and people wenthungry.”

In this part of Peru, climate change hasbeen a blessing — but it may become acurse. In recent decades, acceleratingglacial melt in the Andes has enabled agold rush downstream, contributing to theirrigation and cultivation of more than100,000 acres of land since the 1980s.

Yet the boon is temporary. The flow ofwater is already declining as the glacier

vanishes, and scientists estimate that by2050 much of the icecap will be gone.

Throughout the 20th century, enormousgovernment development projects, fromAustralia to Africa, have diverted water toarid land. Much of Southern California wasdry scrubland until canals brought water,inciting a storm of land speculation andgrowth — a time known as the “WaterWars” depicted in the 1974 film “China-town.”

Yet climate change now threatens someof these ambitious undertakings, reducinglakes, diminishing aquifers and shrinkingglaciers that feed crops. Here in Peru, thegovernment irrigated the desert andturned it into farmland through an $825million project that, in a few decades, couldbe under serious threat.

“We’re talking about the disappearanceof frozen water towers that have sup-ported vast populations,” said JeffreyBury, a professor at the University of Cali-

Harvesting flowers in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca region, where glacial melt flows to farms through an irrigation project, below.PHOTOGRAPHS BY TOMAS MUNITA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Living Off a Glacier, While It LastsAn Icecap Is Vanishing in Peru, and Desert Farms May Soon Do the Same

By NICHOLAS CASEY

Continued on Page 12

A landmark privacy ruling in India isseen as a crucial advance in the fightagainst a law criminalizing sex betweenmen in the country. PAGE 6

INTERNATIONAL 4-15

Picturing a Gay Rights VictoryWhite House officials say the presidenthas the authority to name an actingConsumer Financial Protection Bureauchief. Others are crying foul. PAGE 25

NATIONAL 16-25

An Agency in LimboWall Street’s influence has helped liftrevenue and stock value at the onlinemarketplace for crafts. But a cherishedworkplace culture has eroded. PAGE 1

SUNDAY BUSINESS

Inside the Revolution at EtsyAt least six players are members of anexclusive group: They appeared in justone N.F.L. game. It’s a distinction thatsometimes haunts them. PAGE 1

SPORTSSUNDAY

A One-and-Done Career Roger Cohen PAGE 1

SUNDAY REVIEW

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By the time Senator Mitch Mc-Connell, the majority leader, madethe last of his repeated pleas toPresident Trump to keep his dis-tance from the Senate candidacyof Roy S. Moore, it was too late.

To Mr. McConnell, only thepresident could extinguish a firethat he sees as endangering Re-publicans’ Senate majority. ButMr. Trump, speaking by phonelast Tuesday with Mr. McConnell,responded with the same argu-ment he had been making for daysinside the White House.

The women who have called Mr.Moore a sexual predator, the pres-ident believes, may not be tellingthe truth.

“Forty years is a long time. He’srun eight races, and this has nevercome up,” Mr. Trump said to thetelevision cameras on the SouthLawn hours after his conversationwith Mr. McConnell, effectivelyendorsing Mr. Moore beforeboarding Marine One. “He says itdidn’t happen,” the president add-ed. “You have to listen to him,also.”

Mr. Trump’s decision to rejectevery long-shot plan to save theSenate seat reflects the impera-tive that an unpopular presidentfaces to retain his political base, adetermination that he should fol-low his own instincts after having

Trump DefenseOf Moore Adds

To G.O.P. Split

This article is by Jonathan Mar-tin, Maggie Haberman and Alexan-der Burns.

Continued on Page 21

WASHINGTON — On its face,the notice sent to 248 county elec-tion officials asked only that theydo what Congress has ordered:Prune their rolls of voters whohave died, moved or lost their eli-gibility — or face a federal lawsuit.

The notice, delivered in Sep-tember by a conservative advoca-cy group, is at the heart of an in-creasingly bitter argument overthe seemingly mundane task ofkeeping accurate lists of voters —an issue that will be a marquee ar-gument before the Supreme Courtin January.

At a time when gaming therules of elections has becomestandard political strategy, thetask raises a high-stakes ques-tion: Is scrubbing ineligible vot-ers from the rolls worth the effortif it means mistakenly bumping le-gitimate voters as well?

The political ramifications areas close as a history book. Flor-ida’s Legislature ordered the vot-er rolls scrubbed of dead regis-trants and ineligible felons beforethe 2000 presidential election. Theresulting purge, based on a broadname-matching process, misiden-tified thousands of legitimate vot-ers as criminals, and prevented atleast 1,100 of them — some saythousands more — from castingballots.

That was the election in whichGeorge W. Bush’s 537-vote marginin Florida secured his place in theWhite House. Controlling therules of elections — including whois on or off the rolls — has beenboth a crucial part of politicalstrategy and a legal battlegroundever since.

Conservative groups and Re-publican election officials in somestates say the poorly maintainedrolls invite fraud and meddling byhackers, sap public confidence in

BITTER STRUGGLE OVER THE PURGING

OF VOTING ROLLS

248 COUNTIES ON NOTICE

A Partisan Divide Over aProcess That Could

Swing Elections

By MICHAEL WINES

Continued on Page 18

CAIRO — After militants mas-sacred 305 people at a packedmosque on Friday in a stunningassault on a sacred place, Presi-dent Abdel Fattah el-Sisi re-sponded as he knows best.

Mr. Sisi went on television vow-ing to “take revenge” and strikeback with an “iron fist.” Momentslater, Egyptian warplanesswooped over the vast deserts ofthe Sinai Peninsula, droppingbombs that pulverized vehiclesused in the assault. Soldiersfanned out across the area.

But that furious retaliation,which follows years of battle in Si-nai against a vicious Islamic Stateaffiliate that downed a Russianpassenger jet in 2015 and has reg-ularly attacked Egyptian securityforces there, revived the mosttroubling question about Mr. Sisi’sstrategy in the desert peninsula:Why is it failing?

One of the most striking aspectsof the carnage that unfolded onFriday, the deadliest terrorist at-tack in Egypt’s modern history,was how easy it was for the mili-tants to carry it out. In a statementissued on Saturday, Egypt’s pros-ecutor general, Nabil Sadek, de-scribed the grisly scene in foren-sic detail.

Between 25 and 30 gunmen,traveling in five vehicles and car-rying an Islamic State flag, sur-rounded a Sufi mosque on all sidesin Bir al-Abed, a dusty town on aroad that arcs across the sandyplain of North Sinai.

After an explosion, they posi-tioned themselves outside themain entrance of the mosque and

Attack Exposes Egypt’s LapsesIn Fighting ISIS

Tactics Criticized AfterCarnage at Mosque

By DECLAN WALSHand DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK

Continued on Page 10

WASHINGTON — At a seniorstaff meeting early in PresidentTrump’s tenure, Reince Priebus,then the White House chief of staff,posed a simple question to JaredKushner: What would his newlycreated Office of American Inno-vation do?

Mr. Kushner brushed him off,according to people privy to theexchange. Given that he and histop lieutenants were paid little ornothing, Mr. Kushner asked,“What do you care?” He empha-sized his point with an expletive.

“O.K.,” Mr. Priebus replied. “Youdo whatever you want.”

Few in the opening days of theTrump administration dared tochallenge Mr. Kushner’s power todesign his job or steer the direc-tion of the White House as he sawfit. But 10 months after being givenfree rein to tackle everything fromthe federal government’s outdatedtechnology to peace in the MiddleEast, the do-whatever-you-wantstage of Mr. Kushner’s tenure isover.

Mr. Kushner, the president’sson-in-law and senior adviser, whohad been in seemingly everymeeting and every photograph,has lately disappeared from publicview and, according to some col-leagues, taken on a more limitedrole behind the scenes. He is stillforging ahead on a plan to end theconflict between Israel and thePalestinians, a goal that haseluded presidents and diplomatsfor generations, and he has beencredited with focusing attentionon the government’s technologicalneeds. But he is no longer seen asthe primary presidential con-sigliere with the limitless portfolio.

The new White House chief ofstaff, John F. Kelly, has proved lesspermissive than his predecessor.A retired four-star general whohas imposed more order on a cha-otic White House since taking overin July, Mr. Kelly has made clearthat Mr. Kushner must fit within achain of command. “Jared worksfor me,” he has told associates. Ac-cording to three advisers to thepresident, Mr. Kelly has even dis-cussed the possibility of Mr. Kush-

Kushner’s Role Seemed Limitless.Then Kelly Came on the Scene.

This article is by SharonLaFraniere, Maggie Haberman andPeter Baker.

Continued on Page 23

Late Edition

VOL. CLXVII . . . No. 57,793 © 2017 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2017

Today, sunshine with some clouds,cooler, breezy, high 48. Tonight,partly cloudy, cool, low 36. Tomor-row, sunshine and a few clouds, high50. Weather map is on Page 24.

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