Impeachment, France, Best of 2019: Your Thursday Evening Briefing - The New York Times

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Good evening. Here’s the latest.

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Credit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times

1. “The president leaves us no choice.”

Speaker Nancy Pelosi asked the House Judiciary Committee to draft impeachment articles against President Trump, setting the stage for a full vote by Christmas. Two months of investigation, she said, made it clear that Mr. Trump had violated his oath of office by pressing a foreign power for help in the 2020 election.

“His wrongdoing strikes at the very heart of our Constitution,” Ms. Pelosi said in a somber formal address. Then, at a news conference, she took on a reporter for a conservative network who asked if she “hated” Mr. Trump, saying “don’t mess with me,” and adding that she prayed for the president every day.

The Judiciary Committee is expected to begin publicly debating and voting on the articles of impeachment by the end of next week.

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2. Strikes against changes to France’s pension system brought parts of the country to a grinding halt.

In one of the largest demonstrations France has seen in recent years, workers staged walkouts and joined protests opposing President Emmanuel Macron’s efforts to overhaul a byzantine system of 42 individual pension plans headed toward a $19 billion deficit.

Trains, subways and buses were canceled, many schools were closed, and thousands were forced to stay home from work across the country.

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3. Uber released its first report detailing unsafe incidents in the U.S. The numbers are stark.

In 2018, 58 people were killed in crashes during Uber trips; nine people were murdered, and 3,045 people were sexually assaulted. The numbers represented a fraction — just 0.0002 percent — of Uber’s 1.3 billion rides in the U.S. last year.

Separately, 19 people sued Lyft this week for failing to prevent drivers from sexually assaulting them, then ignoring their complaints.

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4. Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company, Saudi Aramco, set its initial share price at a level that is expected to make it the biggest I.P.O. ever. Above, Aramco’s chairman and chief executive last month.

The price is 32 riyals a share, or about $8.53. It plans to sell three billion shares — about 1.5 percent of Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, and also one of the most valuable.

That sets Aramco’s value at $1.7 trillion, short of the Saudi royal family’s hopes for a valuation close to $2 trillion.

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5. Joe Biden got the endorsement of John Kerry, the former secretary of state, in the 2020 Democratic primary.

But there might be more headlines about a heated confrontation between Mr. Biden and a voter who started by saying Mr. Biden was “too old for the job” of president. Mr. Biden suggested a push-up contest.

Then the voter falsely claimed that Mr. Biden had “sent” his son to work in Ukraine and accused him of “selling access to the president.” Mr. Biden shot back, calling him a “damn liar.”

The confrontation comes before what is likely to be an entirely white roster for the Dec. 19 Democratic debate. That’s prompting a reckoning over diversity, fairness and representation in the primary process.

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6. Twenty-two things happened for the first time in 2019.

Remember when scientists released the first-ever image of a black hole, above, forcing our brains to comprehend what a galaxy 55 million light-years away from Earth looks like?

Among the other landmarks: Rihanna was named the first woman of color to head a fashion house at LVMH, Saudi Arabia opened up for tourism, two new species of dinosaurs were discovered, researchers eliminated H.I.V. from infected mice, and Queen Elizabeth II joined Instagram.

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7. Deforestation in the Amazon has soared under President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil.

New data from Brazil’s space agency reported that in one year, more than 3,700 square miles of the rain forest, an important buffer against climate change, had been razed. It’s the highest loss in Brazilian rainforest in a decade — and stark evidence of just how badly the Amazon has fared under Mr. Bolsonaro.

And as humans increasingly fracture habitats, a new study shows that species in places with histories of disturbances are proving more resilient than those that have long had stable habits.

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8. Two noteworthy scientific studies.

Black women who regularly used permanent dyes to color their hair were 60 percent more likely to develop breast cancer than black women who did not report using dye, according to an analysis published this week in The International Journal of Cancer. Experts caution that much more study is needed.

And nearly one-third of high school students reported using a tobacco product recently, evidence that concerns over nicotine addiction among teenagers are not limited to e-cigarettes.

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9. “It’s a present from Norway, and it’s dead.”

The Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square is the talk of London this season — and not in a good way. The 79-foot fir, an annual gift from the people of Oslo as a sign of gratitude for Britain’s help during World War II, is looking a little … frail.

More cheerily, a new crop of albums has arrived that offers fresh (or retrofitted) takes on seasonal songs and sentiments. Our music critics rounded up their favorites.

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10. And finally, more books to add to your nightstand.

The Times’s staff critics picked their top choices for best fiction and nonfiction works of the year, and the editors of our weekly Book Review have their favorite titles, too. (The critics select from only those books they reviewed for The Times.)

Our critic-at-large Wesley Morris also offered his thoughts on the best performances of the year, including gymnast Katelyn Ohashi’s magnificent floor routine, Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Andrew Scott on “Fleabag” and an overcrowded train platform full of strangers all belting “Dancing on My Own.”

Have a best-of-the-best evening.

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