8/17/2019 Corruption in Brazil NEW YORK TIMES

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 VOL. CLXV . . . No. 57,19 2 ©2016 The New York Times NEWYORK, MONDAY, APRIL 4, 2016

LateEdition

Today, cloudy, periods of rain, lesswindy, high 54. Tonight, mostlycloudy then clearing, low 27. To-morrow, partly sunny, colder, high41. Weather map is on Page A16.

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FLORIDA Democrats are workinghard to capture Marco Rubio’sSenate seat. PAGE A9

WISCONSIN Senator Ted Cruz andDonald J. Trump try to outmaneu-ver each other. PAGE A13

By SIMON ROMERO

BRASÍLIA — The silver-haired senatorfrom Brazil’s western frontier was still inhis pajamas when federal police agentsbanged on the door of his suite at the RoyalTulip, the futuristic luxury hotel thatserves as a bastion for much of Brazil’s po-litical elite. It was 6 a.m.

The agents were armed with a secret re-cording that sounded like the plot for a Hollywood thriller. The senator, Delcídiodo Amaral, had been caught detailing anelaborate plan for an oilman ensnared inBrazil’s spiraling graft scandal to flee thecountry on a private plane.

Mr. Amaral, 61, was until his arrest inBrasília that morning in late Novemberthe governing party’s most powerful lead-er in the Senate. He quickly sought a plea agreement, but prosecutors let him festerin prison for weeks, making a deal only af-ter the disgraced senator provided onestunning disclosure after another that be-trayed his former comrades and broughtthe government of President Dilma Rous-seff ever closer to collapse.

“I felt like I had just crashed into a wallafter a high-speed chase,” recalled Mr.Amaral, who was freed in February. “Imessed things up, so I figured I needed a chance to make them right again. You need

EMBATTLED PRESIDENT Dilma Rousseff faces calls for impeachment. Below, a protest in São Paulo.TOMAS MUNITA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Senator’s Tales of Bribery,

Back-Room Deals and

Desperate Cover-Ups

MIGUEL SCHINCARIOL/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES

LALO DE ALMEIDA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

FORMER PRESIDENT Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva likened himself to Nero.

A JUDGE Sergio Moro, right, hashelped jail powerful figures.

LALO DE ALMEIDA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

A SENATOR Delcídio do Amaralworked with authorities.

SEBASTIAO MOREIRA/

EUROPEAN PRESSPHOTO AGENCY 

How WebOf Corruption

Ensnared Brazil

Continued on Page A6

By PATRICK HEALYand YAMICHE ALCINDOR

The morning after he lost theNevada caucuses in February,Bernie Sanders held a painfulconference call with his top ad-visers.

Mr. Sanders expressed deepfrustration that he had not built a stronger political operation in thestate, and then turned to the wor-risome situation at hand.

His strategy for capturing theDemocratic presidential nomina-tion was based on sweeping allthree early-voting states, and hehad fallen short, winning onlyNew Hampshire — to the con-sternation of his wife, Jane, whoquestioned whether he shouldhave campaigned more in 2015.

Without that sweep, his aidesthought at the time, Mr. Sandershad little hope of overcoming hisvast problems with black votersin the Southern primaries. Andhe had no convincing evidence tochallenge Hillary Clinton’s elect-ability.

“If Clinton had lost Iowa, New

Hampshire and Nevada, it wouldhave been a devastating series of defeats that would have calledinto question her entire cam-paign,” said Tad Devine, one of several Sanders advisers who de-scribed the Feb. 21 conferencecall. “We had to shift our strat-egy. But no matter what, thenomination became tougher towin.”

Mr. Sanders is now campaign-ing more effectively than manyexpected, exposing Mrs. Clin-ton’s weaknesses as a candidate,and is positioning himself to wincontests like the Wisconsin pri-mary on Tuesday. But allies andadvisers of Mr. Sanders say theymissed opportunities to run anaggressive political operation in2015 that would have presented

more of a challenge to Mrs. Clin-ton. She has now firmly built a big lead in delegates needed toclinch the nomination — a mar-gin that would be smaller if Mr.

EARLY MISSTEPS

SEEN AS A DRAG

ON SANDERS BID

LATE-STAGE MOMENTUM

Senator Now Needs

Landslide Victories

to Catch Clinton

Continued on Page A12

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR

WASHINGTON — Merrick B.Garland, chief judge of the UnitedStates Court of Appeals here, hasbeen sequestered in a kind of al-ternate reality in a small confer-ence room in the Eisenhower Ex-ecutive Office Building next tothe White House, cramming forquestions from senators as if hearings on his nomination to theSupreme Court will happen thisyear.

The preparations — described

by top aides as businesslike —are part of a deliberate WhiteHouse strategy to ignore the factthat Republicans have refused toeven consider his nomination.Mr. Obama’s aides and JudgeGarland’s allies have concludedthat acting as if the SupremeCourt nomination is going aheadis the best way to maximize pres-sure on their adversaries.

That means maintaining a brisk schedule of one-on-onecourtesy meetings with senatorsfor the next month, a period thatWhite House officials consider“phase one.” This week, JudgeGarland will meet privately withtwo Republican senators, and onThursday, Mr. Obama will travelto the University of Chicago,where he taught constitutional

law, to press for more Repub-licans to meet with his nominee.Also this week, liberal groups

are flying in about 40 constitu-ents of Republican senators fromIowa, Nevada, New Hampshire,Pennsylvania, Ohio and Wiscon-sin to lobby their lawmakers andhold a news conference on Capi-tol Hill. The Republican constitu-ents include two former staff members of Senator Charles E.Grassley of Iowa, the Republicanchairman of the Judiciary Com-mittee, who would oversee con-firmation hearings if they evertook place.

White House officials say theyremain optimistic. Despite initialreports that Republican senatorswere united in their opposition toeven talking to Judge Garland, 16Republican senators have said

they are willing to at least meetwith him in person. Mr. Obama’sadvisers and his allies on CapitolHill view that as an early victory.

They also point to polling thatsuggests that the majority of thepopulation believes that Repub-licans should treat Mr. Obama’snominee as the way they haveprevious court picks — with a hearing and a vote.

“We are making steady but sig-nificant progress,” Senator ChuckSchumer, Democrat of New York,

Court Nominee Pushes Ahead  Despite Fracas

 A Strategy to Ignore

G.O.P. Intransigence

Continued on Page A10

By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and NICHOLAS FANDOS

WASHINGTON — Jack Evanswas a summer intern here in1976, the year Metro, the capitalregion’s subway system, openedto rave reviews. It was an archi-tectural triumph, with escalatorsthat plunged into clean, well-litstations — a mass transit marvel“like ‘The Jetsons,’” he says — a far cry from the graffiti-scarred,decrepit system of that era inNew York.

Now Mr. Evans, 62, is thechairman of the transit agencythat oversees Metro — perhapsthe city’s least enviable job. Lastweek, at a conference examiningMetro on its 40th birthday, hesaid out loud what Washingto-nians had known for years: Thecapital’s once-glorious subwaysystem, the nation’s second busi-

est, is short on cash and a terriblemess.

“It’s a system that’s maybesafe, somewhat unreliable, andthat is being complained about byeverybody,” declared Mr. Evans,who estimates that Metro couldface a $100 million budget short-fall next fiscal year.

Then he dropped a bombshell.He warned that whole lines mayhave to be closed for months forrepairs, adding, “If we do noth-ing, 10 years from now the sys-tem won’t be running.”

At a time of deepening concernover aging infrastructure and railsafety around the nation — on

Sunday, an Amtrak train struck a backhoe on the tracks outsidePhiladelphia, killing two people

Capital’s Metro, Creaking at 40,

 Is Staring Down a Midlife Crisis

MICHAEL BRYANT/THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS

AMTRAK TRAIN CRASHES Investigators at the site of a derailmentin Chester, Pa., on Sunday that killed two people. Page A9.

By MARGOT SANGER-KATZ

Mayor Jim Kenney was electedin Philadelphia last year afterpromising to bring the city uni-versal prekindergarten, but heneeded a way to pay for it.

Enter the soda tax. As part of his budget, introduced thismonth, Mr. Kenney has proposedtaxing sugar-sweetened bever-ages at 3 cents an ounce, thehighest soda tax proposed any-where in the country.

The idea of a soda tax was in-troduced about a decade ago bypublic health researchers whowere aiming to reduce consump-tion of sugary drinks, which theyargued were causing increases inobesity and diabetes. But themessage has been a tough politi-cal sell. Soda tax proposals,fought by the soda industry as

nanny-state excess, have failed inNew York State, San Francisco —and Philadelphia, twice. So far,the only American city topass a soda tax is Berkeley, Calif.

Mr. Kenney is taking a differ-ent political tack. Instead of theusual eat-your-vegetables pitchof public health reformers, he isoffering Philadelphians some-thing delicious: a giant pot of money to fund popular cityprojects. He says his soda taxcould raise more than $400 mil-lion over five years, enough tofund not just universal preschool,

but also renovations to local li-braries, parks and recreationcenters; “community schools”

Pointing to Cash, Not Health,

To Make a Soda Tax Palatable

Continued on Page A3

A canal project, shrouded in mystery,raises questions about the future of siteslike Lake Nicaragua, above. PAGE A4

INTERNATIONAL A4-8

Lake Scene, Canal Dream

A highway project in Kolkata, India,made residents’ lives miserable foryears before it collapsed. PAGE A4

Discontent Preceded a Tragedy

Continued on Page A11

Charles M. Blow PAGE A19

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A18-19

When should a great artist retire?James Levine conducted Plácido Do-mingo, above, on Friday. Both are in

their 70s. An opera review. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-7

 A Delicate Question at the Met

President Obama will leave the WhiteHouse with information technology inmuch better shape than he found it.White House Letter. PAGE A10

NATIONAL A9-13

 An Executive Tech Upgrade

Bans on renting to people with criminalrecords violate the Fair Housing Act,federal officials warned. PAGE A14

NEW YORK A14-17

More Room for Ex-Offenders

The Florida jury’s decisive rulingagainst the website Gawker for postinga celebrity’s sex tape may signal thatour appetite for gossip does have limits,Jim Rutenberg writes. PAGE B1

BUSINESS DAY B1-7

Gawker Tests Limits of Gossip

As people gravitate to small screens,personal computer makers are pumpingmoney into the design of desktop com-puters, hopingto regain the consumerexcitementthey once enjoyed. PAGE B1

PCs Aim to Be Cool Again

General Manager Brian Cashman andManager Joe Girardi have a long tenuretogether despite distinct styles. PAGE D1

SPORTSMONDAY D1-8

The Yankees’ Odd Couple

The Huskies, led by Breanna Stewart,below,beat Oregon Stateand will meetSyracuse in the N.C.A.A. final. PAGE D1

UConn Nears 4th Title in Row

Despite their convictions on corruptioncharges, Dean G. Skelos and his sonhave asked for no prison time. PAGE A17

Skelos and Son’s Risky Request