Author: News Room

Specter of Auto Tariffs Spurs Some Car Buyers to Rush Purchases

Ziggy Duchnowski spent Saturday morning car shopping along Northern Boulevard in Queens with two goals in mind.He wanted to find a new small car for his wife, and he hoped to strike a deal before the new tariffs that President Trump is imposing on imported cars and trucks affect prices.“The word on the street is prices are going to shoot up now,” said Mr. Duchnowski, 45, a union carpenter who voted for Mr. Trump, holding the hands of his two small children.The tariffs — 25 percent on vehicles and parts produced outside the United States — will have a broad…

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White House Correspondents Cancel Comedian Booked for Annual Dinner

Here’s another thing getting cut in Washington: comedy.The White House Correspondents’ Association said on Saturday that it canceled a planned performance by Amber Ruffin, the actress and talk-show host, at its annual black-tie dinner on April 26.A monologue by a featured comedian is usually the highlight of the journalists’ soiree. Memorable performances by Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers, among other stars, have turned into touchstones of political satire.But amid rocky relations between President Trump and the White House press corps — and numerous efforts by the administration to undermine the news media — the correspondents’ group decided to go in…

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How Climate-Resilient Chickens Could Help Fight Poverty

“How old do you think these chickens are?” Levy Phiri asked the crowd, after scooping four multicolored birds out of a crate and setting them down in the courtyard outside the primary school in Kambvumbe, a village in Zambia’s rural Eastern Province.The roughly 200 people who came out in the midafternoon heat for this presentation held by the country’s largest chicken hatchery and processor craned their necks for a better look.A year, someone called out. Fourteen months, another suggested.Mr. Phiri, a field representative for the company, Hybrid Poultry Farm, paused a moment for suspense. They are just six weeks, he…

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Gai Gherardi, Who Made Eyeglass Frames Fashion Statements, Dies at 78

Gai Gherardi, a Los Angeles optician who with a partner attracted a celebrity clientele by pioneering the notion that eyeglass frames did not have to be dull but rather could be fashion statements of individuality, died on March 16 at her home in Hollywood. She was 78.Her sister, Heather Gherardi, said the cause was bile duct cancer, which she learned she had last month.“Glasses afford spontaneity,” Ms. Gherardi told The New York Times Magazine in 1993. “They offer the possibility of a multitude of changes in your persona; they’re a great accessory, a great prop.”“Contacts are rigid. They’re no fun,”…

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The Financial Fallout of Being Deactivated from Delivery Work

Steve McDougall earned about $900 a week delivering for Uber Eats and DoorDash, whizzing through the heavy traffic of Gloucester, Mass., on an e-bike. The flexible hours allowed him to tend to his 15-year-old daughter and two parents with disabilities.“It’s not great money, but it’s freedom,” said Mr. McDougall, 40. “I get to come home a lot during the day. I get to go to my daughter’s softball games, practices, doctor’s appointments — anything I need to.”In November 2023, he received an email from Uber notifying him that his account had been deactivated. It cited “fraudulent activity,” but did not…

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Bloomberg Has a Rocky Start With A.I. Summaries

Bloomberg, the financial news powerhouse, has been experimenting with using artificial intelligence to help produce its journalism.It hasn’t always gone smoothly.The news outlet has had to correct at least three dozen A.I.-generated summaries of articles published this year. One happened on Wednesday, when Bloomberg broke news about President Trump’s auto tariffs.The article correctly reported that Mr. Trump would announce the tariffs as soon as that day. But the bullet-point summary of the article written by A.I. inaccurately said when a broader tariff action would take place.Bloomberg is not alone in trying A.I. — many news outlets are figuring out how…

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Pension Funds Push Forward on Climate Goals Despite Backlash

In the past few months, some of the largest banks and asset managers in the United States have quit net zero networks, the climate groups that encourage their members to set ambitious carbon reduction targets and collaborate internationally on sustainability efforts.But the week after Donald J. Trump won re-election in November, NYCERS, a pension fund for New York City employees, went in the opposite direction. It joined a United Nations-affiliated climate action group for long-term investors, the Net Zero Asset Owner Alliance.The timing wasn’t intentional, said Brad Lander, the comptroller who oversees the city’s finances, including the pension fund, and…

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U.S. Presses French Companies to Comply With Trump’s Anti-Diversity Policies

For months, French businesses have been bracing for the fallout of trade wars and tariff threats from the United States as the effects of President Trump’s “America First” policies ripple out. But this past week, the French corporate world was roiled by another type of Trump missive.In a terse three-paragraph letter sent by the American Embassy in France to French companies, executives were told that President Trump’s moves to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion policies would apply to any firm doing business with the U.S. government. It said it was giving them five days to sign a form indicating that…

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How U.S. Airports Like Pittsburgh’s Generate Electricity On Site to Avoid Heathrow-Like Outages

When Christina Cassotis, the chief executive of Pittsburgh International Airport, heard about the power outage that forced London’s Heathrow Airport to suspend operations last week, she thought of the workers who were frantically trying to manage the chaos.But when an outage hits closer to home, she has a more restrained response: Keep calm and carry on.For almost four years, her airport has been powered by a mix of on-site natural gas generators and solar panels. The airport estimates that the stand-alone system, known as a microgrid, has saved it about $1 million a year on its energy costs and allowed…

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Trump and Tariffs Enter the Scene Only Days Into Canada’s Election Campaign

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s election campaign had brought him to the bridge between Windsor, Ontario, and Detroit, over which $300 million worth of auto parts cross daily.He unveiled a series of promises of programs for workers and auto-related industries that would be rolled out if President Trump imposed tariffs on products from the Canadian auto industry. Among them was a proposed fund of 2 billion Canadian dollars to reshape the industry for a future without the U.S. market.The stakes are high. Cars and auto parts are the country’s second-biggest export by value and an employer, directly and indirectly,…

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