Michael Gold

In an 18-minute speech, Trump expressed his gratitude to American veterans but also used his remarks to pay tribute to the city, where he remains deeply unpopular.

“Since the earliest days of our nation, New York has exemplified the American spirit and has been at the heart of our nation’s story of daring and defiance,” Trump said.

Defiance, in particular, was on display throughout Trump’s speech, at Madison Square Park in Manhattan, just 2 miles down Fifth Avenue from Trump Tower, which had been Trump’s primary residence since 1983, until he filed to switch it to Florida in late September.

Even before the president arrived, protesters had gathered along the streets, a number of them from an anti-Trump group, Rise and Resist. They carried signs calling for Trump’s impeachment and repeatedly shouted, “Shame!”

In the windows of a nearby glass tower overlooking the dais where Trump spoke, large signs placed in the windows spelled out the word “impeach.” A few floors higher, letters spelling “convict” were placed in another set of windows.

As Trump, who is the first sitting president to take part in the parade, addressed the crowd, he was met with claps and cheers as he listed specific U.S. military victories and recounted stories of individual veterans.

“Today, we come together as one nation to salute the veterans of the United States Armed Forces, the greatest warriors to ever walk the face of the Earth,” Trump said.

Some of his supporters gathered nearby, many of them wearing hats bearing Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.”

But raucous boos and chants jeering Trump could also be heard throughout the president’s remarks. A chorus of people shouted “lock him up!” and “traitor” and blew whistles as he spoke, causing some veterans to complain that the din was drowning out the president’s speech.

“Vote him out if you don’t like him,” said Dennis Currier, 72, a Bronx resident who served in combat in the Vietnam War. “But don’t come here and be disrespectful on Veterans Day. They have a right to demonstrate, but there’s a time and a place for that.”

The only time the protesters fell silent was during a moment of silence and a wreath-laying ceremony honoring fallen soldiers.

Elliot Crown, 47, came to Trump’s speech wearing army fatigues, a clown nose and a farcical oversized mustache. He and a friend carried a sign reading “Operation Bone Spur,” a reference to a diagnosis that allowed Trump to avoid serving in the Vietnam War.

“He’s always pretending to be something he’s not,” Crown said. “And he certainly isn’t a supporter of veterans.”

Trump helped boost the parade in 1995 when it was struggling to attract donations, writing a check for over $300,000. In return, he asked to be made the grand marshal, an honor he was not bestowed because he never served in the military.

Still, being honored by the parade had remained a goal of Trump’s. So when the opportunity arrived this year to take part, he was pleased.

Trump has generally received more support from veterans than from the public at large. According to a recent survey from the Pew Research Center, 57% of veterans said they approved of the way Trump was leading the military, compared with 41% of adults overall.

Last year, an Associated Press poll found that 56% of veterans said they approved of the job Trump was doing as president, compared with 42% of the general public.

Still, Trump has been criticized by some veterans groups over incidents in which he was perceived as being disrespectful to those who had served.

During the campaign and his presidency, he frequently attacked Sen. John McCain, saying the former Navy pilot was “not a war hero” and criticizing the senator, who died in 2018, for his record on military and veterans’ issues.

Trump also drew condemnations after he disparaged the parents of a slain Muslim soldier who had strongly denounced Trump during the Democratic National Convention in 2016.

Trump’s rise to the ranks of the rich and famous has been inextricably linked to New York City, and he has spoken often of his affectionate for it. He was born in Queens and built his real estate empire in Manhattan, quickly becoming a fixture in the city’s tabloid papers and sprinkling his name on buildings across the region.

As Trump began his presidential campaign, he used the city as his backdrop, starting his eventual journey to the White House in the lobby of Trump Tower.

But three years into his presidency, Trump’s relationship with the city has become bitter and contentious. His name was removed from residential high-rises and a hotel in SoHo after numerous complaints, and the Central Park skating rinks that his company runs diminished the presence of his name on signs.

The president is also locked in a legal battle with Manhattan’s district attorney over a subpoena for his personal and business tax records. And last week, New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, announced a $2 million settlement in a lawsuit that accused the president of using money raised by his charitable foundation to promote his presidential campaign and pay business debts.

That investigation grew out of claims that a fundraiser for veterans in January 2016 was in fact, Trump later acknowledged in court papers, a campaign event.

The president’s visits to New York have often been met with protests. Earlier this month, Trump swung by an Ultimate Fighting Championship event at Madison Square Garden, where he was also met by both boos and cheers.

In late September, Trump filed court documents saying that he was becoming a resident of Florida and that the Mar-a-Lago Club was his primary dwelling. On Twitter, he said that while he cherished New York, the city with which he had become closely associated during his rise to fame, he had been “treated very badly” by officials there.

“Few have been treated worse,” he said. “I hated having to make this decision, but in the end it will be the best for all concerned.”

Demonstrators said they were specifically targeting Trump’s speech and had no plans to protest the annual parade, in which more than 20,000 people were expected to participate.

“We’re not protesting the vets; we’re protesting Trump,” said Jamie Bauer, 60, who was part of Rise and Resist. “We respect the vets, and there are several veterans in our group.”

This article originally appeared in

Veterans Day: Trump Returns to New York for Parade, to Cheers and Boos

NEW YORK — President Donald Trump returned to his hometown Monday to kick off the 100th annual New York City Veterans Day Parade, his second visit to the city since he announced he was making Florida his primary home.

Trump gave a speech that was met with some claps and cheers as he thanked veterans for their service. But raucous boos and chants jeering Trump could also be heard throughout.

Trump, the first sitting president to participate in the parade, addressed the crowd at Madison Square Park in Manhattan, just a couple of miles down Fifth Avenue from Trump Tower, the glass-and-steel skyscraper that has been his primary residence since 1983.

Hours before the president was set to appear, some supporters had already gathered near the park, many of them wearing hats bearing Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.”

But protesters had also gathered, a number of them from an anti-Trump group, Rise and Resist. They carried signs calling for Trump’s impeachment and shouted “shame” repeatedly.

In one act, people in buildings near the park had also posted signs in their windows bearing the words “impeach” and “convict.”

Elliot Crown, 47, came to the protest wearing army fatigues, a clown nose and a farcical oversized mustache. He and a friend carried a sign reading “Operation Bone Spur,” a reference to a diagnosis that allowed Trump to avoid serving in the Vietnam War.

Still, Trump has been criticized by some veterans groups over incidents where he was perceived as being disrespectful to those who had served. During the campaign and his presidency, he frequently attacked Sen. John McCain, saying the onetime Navy pilot was “not a war hero” and criticizing the now-deceased senator for his record on military and veterans’ issues.

Trump also drew condemnations after he disparaged the parents of a slain Muslim soldier who had strongly denounced Trump during the Democratic National Convention.

Trump’s rise to the ranks of the rich and famous was inextricably linked to the city he called home. He was born in Queens and built his real estate empire in Manhattan, quickly becoming a fixture in the city’s tabloid papers and sprinkling his name on buildings across the region.

Even as he began his presidential campaign, Trump used the city as his backdrop, starting his eventual journey to the White House in the lobby of Trump Tower.

But three years into his presidency, Trump is deeply unpopular in New York City. His name was removed from residential high-rises and a hotel in SoHo after numerous complaints, and even the Central Park skating rinks that his company runs diminished the presence of his name on signs.

The president’s returns to the city have often been met with protests. Earlier this month, Trump swung by an Ultimate Fighting Championship event at Madison Square Garden, where he was met by both boos and cheers.

In late September, Trump filed court documents saying that he was becoming a resident of Florida and that Mar-a-Lago Club was his primary dwelling. On Twitter, he said that while he cherished New York, the city with which he had become closely associated during his rise to fame, he had been “treated very badly” by elected officials there.

Trump has frequently sparred publicly with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, both Democrats who are critical of the president’s policies.

When asked about Trump’s return to New York last week, de Blasio told reporters that it was important to focus on veterans at the parade, not politics.

“This is not about him,” de Blasio said. He later added: “It should not be politicized. It should not be a spectacle. If he’s really coming here to truly honor veterans, God bless him.”

Veterans Day: Trump Returns to NY for Parade, to Cheers and Boos

But on Sunday, the more than 50,000 people who will pound the pavement for the New York City Marathon will be met on the streets by hundreds of thousands of others for whom the race is a spectator sport.

“On that day, you’ve got a million people cheering for you,” said Michael Capiraso, the president and chief executive of New York Road Runners, which organizes the marathon. “Someone’s going to pick you up along the way.”

Capiraso, who this year will be running his 28th straight New York City Marathon, said the crowds are crucial to keeping runners in good spirits.

“We seriously need you,” he said. “The inspiration and the impact from the people along the sides of the course is so invaluable.”

With 26.2 miles stretching across the five boroughs, the marathon route provides no shortage of spots to root on fatigued runners. Here’s a guide to the top places.

The places where runners need you most

The New York City course is set apart from other marathons in part because of the five bridges that carry runners between boroughs. The bridges are deceivingly tough hills, made trickier by their exposure to the wind and, because they are devoid of spectators, their relative silence.

So, when runners get back on land, it helps to have a boost from a raucous crowd.

“Between the solitude and the challenge that a bridge brings, getting to the other side and seeing people or hearing people cheer is really special,” Capiraso said.

That support is particularly crucial toward the start of the race, after runners descend from the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and head onto Fourth Avenue in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

At that point, runners will have completed a 2-mile stretch, including a steep hill. By cheering there, you’ll keep them buoyant in the face of the daunting miles ahead.

“The Verrazzano bridge is beautiful and iconic, but there aren’t people cheering on it,” Capiraso said. “So, when you get to Brooklyn, it’s a great cheering zone.”

If you want to be particularly inspiring, travel toward the 20-mile mark, where marathon runners often experience “the wall,” a challenging period when energy wanes.

To help racers push through, head toward East 138th Street in the Bronx, a relatively short stretch of the race, or to Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem, which runners divert around before heading down Fifth Avenue toward the finish line.

Both locations also tend to be less crowded than the miles that follow, making it more likely that you’ll see a particular runner you’re pulling for.

The places where the party is

The streets of New York are always lively, but the marathon brings a particularly energetic atmosphere. People crowd the sidewalks with signs, ring bells for hours and play music for both the runners and the crowd.

One of the most festive stretches of the course is in Fort Greene Brooklyn, along Lafayette Avenue between Fulton Street and Bedford Avenue.

Among the groups lining Lafayette Avenue are the Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School band, known for pumping up runners with the theme from the movie “Rocky,” and the choir from the Emmanuel Baptist Church, where congregants spill out of morning services to serenade marathon participants.

In the second half of the course, runners are met with another burst of sound on First Avenue in Manhattan, between 59th and 96th Streets.

Near 59th Street, marathoners who just finished scaling a challenging and quiet hill on the Queensboro Bridge are greeted with a cacophony of people screaming at runners, clanging noisemakers and banging drums.

The sidewalks here are generally clogged (though they thin out as the race heads uptown). But the energy is so high that it can carry runners as some of them start to hit the wall.

The places where you won’t have to log too many miles

For many city residents, the race winds through their neighborhoods. If you’re one of them, consider staying put.

“If the marathon runs through your neighborhood, your local place is always great,” Capiraso said. “Because you know the area, and you’ll know the people around.”

The course also has a number of subway stations along the route, a boon for those who need to travel to spots on the course. Notably, the R train runs under the course on Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn, which makes for easy spectating in an early stretch where runners are still plenty enthused.

The sidewalks nearest to subway stations, however, tend to be the most crowded. So, if you’re trying to see a specific runner at a specific spot, give yourself extra time to get settled.

You’ll also want to check with runners about their start time. The first athletes cross the start line at 8:30 a.m., but the last wave of runners won’t begin the race until 11 a.m.

The Best Places to Watch the New York City Marathon

NEW YORK — Training for a marathon can be a deeply solitary exercise, generally requiring runners to grind out miles multiple times a week to little fanfare.

It was all part of an elaborate plan — which also involved a razor, hacksaw blades and a priest — to escape from the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where he was awaiting trial in 2017.

But first he had to make sure he could fit through the hole he intended to create.

So Londonio, a portly man, embarked on an intense exercise routine of cardio and chin-ups and picked up a fiber-heavy diet to shed weight and ensure he could squeeze out of a jail cell window.

His plan, which was detailed in a recently unsealed FBI report, was ultimately foiled after a fellow inmate reported it to officials, and federal prosecutors eventually charged Londonio in September 2017 with attempted escape. He has pleaded not guilty.

The 10-page report, compiled from three interviews with the unnamed inmate, offered a more detailed picture of a dramatic, complex escape plan that prosecutors likened to a “script for a made-for-TV movie.”

A redacted version of the report was unsealed this month at the request of Jerry Capeci, a longtime Mafia reporter who first wrote about the document on his website, Gang Land News.

Londonio, now 45, was first detained at the Brooklyn federal jail in February 2017 on murder, racketeering and weapons charges, with prosecutors linking him to the killing of a gangster, Michael Meldish, in the Bronx in 2013.

Officials also accused Londonio of being part of a long-running conspiracy involving members of the Mafia and linked him to the Lucchese family, one of New York’s five infamous criminal family enterprises.

Londonio, who was awaiting trial, believed he could face a life sentence or the death penalty in his case, according to the report. He told the unnamed inmate that he had “nothing to lose” from an escape attempt and that he and an unnamed Bloods gang member had devised a complex plan.

Londonio’s father, the report said, had told him of a construction flaw in the windows of the Metropolitan Detention Center’s cells. Londonio planned to exploit it by cutting caulking from around the window with a razor, punching holes on the sides of the window, according to the report. He also planned to use dental floss, braided together, to saw through the glass.

The floss was smuggled in by Londonio’s mother, according to the report. He told his fellow inmate that at least twice, his mother hid the floss in condoms she then hid in food purchased from a jail vending machine. Londonio swallowed one condom and hid the other in his underwear.

After cutting through the glass, Londonio would still need to remove the steel guarding the windows. For that, the report said, he intended to use a diamond-tipped hacksaw blade smuggled into the jail by a “sympathetic priest.”

Afterward, Londonio and the Bloods member planned to climb down the side of the building using bedsheets he had been stockpiling in his cell, according to the report.

Londonio had initially considered escaping through an air duct in the prison’s gym but soon realized he wouldn’t fit, the FBI agents wrote in their report.

To guarantee he would be able to squeeze through his cell window, Londonio began eating “lots of bran” and was exercising feverishly, running on jail stairs and grinding through chin-ups, the report said.

Londonio’s father was then going to meet the would-be escapees near the jail and provide them with “a bag of guns” before taking them to a safe house nearby. To prevent them from being detected en route, Londonio was going to dye the inmates’ shirts with Kool-Aid.

Initially, they were going to wait for media attention around the escape to die down before relocating upstate to a family home in Monticello, New York, a small town in the Catskills, the report said.

But an incensed Londonio revised the plan, the report said, to include a stop in the Bronx to kill the wife of his co-defendant, Matthew Madonna. (After the couple ignored Londonio’s parents at a court hearing, Londonio apparently took umbrage at the perceived disrespect.)

According to the report, the unnamed inmate became “increasingly anxious” that Londonio and his co-conspirator might actually go through with their plan, especially after Londonio said he had sought permission for the priest to visit the jail.

Worried he might be implicated in the jailbreak, the inmate revealed the plan to prison psychologists.

In the FBI report, the anonymous inmate also told officials that Londonio spoke frequently about his role in Meldish’s death, admitted to being involved in drug businesses and said that his mother smuggled an opioid treatment drug, Suboxone, into the jail.

Londonio has pleaded not guilty to all charges. His lawyer, John Meringolo, said Friday that the details in the FBI report were “all false.”

“It’s a government-created crime to prejudice the jury on the other counts,” he said.

Since the 1990s, the power of the city’s five traditional Mafia organizations has seemed to be on the decline, particularly as officials boosted their use of racketeering laws to loosen the Mafia’s control over certain industries and unions.

Still, the criminal clans still exert influence in the city and the region, and cases against them have continued. Earlier this month, federal prosecutors charged 20 suspected associates of the Colombo family of racketeering, extortion and loan-sharking charges, including a scheme to fix a college basketball game.

Mobster's Jailbreak Plan: Floss, Hacksaw Blade, Crash Diet and a Priest

NEW YORK — To break out of a federal jail, a suspected Mafia soldier named Christopher Londonio planned to use dental floss as a glass-cutter, Kool-Aid as clothing dye and “lots of bran” to slim down.

But after a set of recent memos and court filings from the National Labor Relations Board, some are worried that Scabby (and the rest of his anthropomorphic balloon menagerie) could soon be exterminated. In documents filed in various cases around the country, the board has argued that the labor movement’s deployment of inflatable balloons like Scabby was unlawful.

The positions taken in the documents, which depict Scabby and others of that ilk as a disruptive form of illegal picketing, threaten the use of a powerful symbol that has helped union organizers draw attention to their campaigns against employers, labor leaders said.

“If you put up a balloon, if you put up something large and visible, then people will wonder what’s going on,” said Jerry Gozdyra, an organizer with Local 1 of the Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers in New York. “And they will ask questions, and I have an opportunity to educate the public.”

But the five-member labor board, which is controlled by Republicans, and particularly the office of the board’s general counsel, Peter B. Robb, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, appeared to view Scabby as something closer to the pest it depicts.

Just two weeks ago, Robb’s office filed a brief in a case in Philadelphia arguing that a union that placed two inflatable rats near the entrance to a hotel essentially “crossed the line from legitimate communication to unlawful coercion.”

Also, in a memo filed last December — but recently reported on by Gothamist — a lawyer from Robb’s office advised the board that Fat Cat, a 10-to-15-foot inflatable feline who sports a cigar in its mouth, a suit jacket around its torso and an inflatable construction worker choked in its paw, was a form of illegal picketing.

Last month, the labor board asked a judge to stop a local construction union from using Scabby the Rat and an inflatable cockroach in its protests against the owner of three supermarkets on Staten Island. The board’s request was denied by a federal judge in Brooklyn, but the case is continuing.

The NLRB declined to comment on any of the documents, saying that its representatives could not discuss pending cases or litigation.

But Tamir W. Rosenblum, general counsel for the union in the Staten Island case, said that the board’s arguments appeared to set up a larger fight over union actions and free speech. “Based on our case, it’s not about the inflatables,” he said. “It’s about any form of protest.”

While Scabby and similar inflatable rats have become prominent figures in New York, they have been used as a symbol by unions across the country for decades.

Like many famous New Yorkers, Scabby made his way here from elsewhere. The first iteration was created for a union based in the Chicago area around 1990, though two different unions have claimed a portion of the rat’s origin story and responsibility for its name. Organizers were searching for a powerful symbol that would rally protesters and send a message to business owners. They settled on a giant rat, meant to depict bosses who did not treat their employees well.

The early Scabby balloons were created by Big Sky Balloons and Searchlights, a company in Illinois. The company’s co-owners, Peggy and Mike O’Connor, were not available for comment Tuesday, but Peggy O’Connor told Vice in 2013, “They wanted a mean, ghastly looking kind of rat.”

The result: a larger-than-life gray rodent with a scab-riddled pink belly, prominent fangs and glowing red pupils that give it an imposing, menacing air.

These days, Big Sky makes Scabby in sizes ranging from 6 feet to 25 feet tall. (The average brown rat in New York City is 16 inches long.) The company also produced Fat Cat and Greedy Pig, a bubble-gum pink swine whose vest pockets are stuffed with cash.

The balloons can cost thousands of dollars.

Many unions own multiple rat balloons. Gozdyra said he knew his local had more than one, as well as a 10-foot inflatable Uncle Sam balloon. Richard Weiss, a spokesman for the union involved in the Staten Island case, said his local had eight rats, in addition to a cockroach and other symbols.

Over the years of Scabby’s prominence, several cases have come before the NLRB pertaining to the rat. Rosenblum joked that he been “defending the rat” since 2001, during George W. Bush’s administration.

But judges and courts have consistently found that the rat did not constitute picketing, a regulated and restricted action, and was instead a protected form of free speech.

Samuel Estreicher, a professor at New York University’s law school and director of its Center for Labor and Employment Law, said the labor board generally makes its rulings based on past case law.

In at least three cases during the Obama administration, which are cited in the board’s recent memos, judges said that as long as Scabby and its inflatable friends were stationary and did not obstruct people from entering a business, unions could deploy the balloons.

So for the status of these inflatable balloons to change, Estreicher said, the board would need to wait for a case to come before it, and only the general counsel’s office could carry out the necessary adjudication.

“He’s opening it up,” Estreicher said of the memo filed by Robb’s office in the Chicago case.

Both the memos argued that balloons like Scabby served a similar function as picketing in intimidating nonunion employees from reporting to work or potential customers from entering a location.

That was a notion that Gozdyra, the New York-based organizer, scoffed at.

“This is just a balloon! How intimidating could it be?” he said.

In his experience in New York, Scabby had become a beloved cult figure, and part of the city’s landscape.

“If they’re going to make the rat illegal, even the public is going to be disappointed,” Gozdyra said. “If I go handbilling without it, they pass us by, asking ‘What happened to the rat? Where’s the rat?’ ”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/30/nyregion/rat-balloon-union.html" id="9b86da26-1eac-382a-a782-339c21aa2b03">The New York Times</a>.

NEW YORK — In a city long teeming with rats, both literal and metaphorical, Scabby the Rat stood apart. The enormous balloon rodent loomed large on the streets of New York and across the country, with its buckteeth, menacing claws and crimson eyes drawing attention to the grievances of union protesters who had inflated it.

Are Rat Balloons 'Unlawful Coercion' or Free Speech?

Now, a decade into his time, at the age of 81, Madoff is seeking to have his sentence commuted by President Donald Trump. He has filed a petition for clemency with the Justice Department, according to its website.

It was not clear when Madoff filed his petition or what arguments he is making for the request. The Justice Department declined to comment. The department’s website said that information in its online clemency database was last updated July 1 and that Madoff’s request, which was first reported by CNBC, was still pending on that date.

Petitions for clemency, which include pardons and sentence commutations, are sent to the Office of the Pardon Attorney in the Justice Department. The office reviews petitions and makes recommendations on their merits to the president, who has constitutional authority to grant pardons and make final decisions on cases.

As president, Trump has increasingly wielded pardons as a way to push back against a justice system he frequently has called unfair. He has granted clemency to several prominent public figures whose politics resonate with him, like Joe Arpaio, a former sheriff in Arizona; and I. Lewis Libby Jr., former aide to Dick Cheney.

It was not clear whether Trump would consider Madoff’s application for clemency. The White House referred requests for comment to the Justice Department.

Years before he became president, Trump expressed contempt for Madoff in an interview with The New York Times Magazine in 2009.

Trump told The Times that he had met the notorious financier several times, both at Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private, members-only resort in Palm Beach, Florida, and at Trump’s nearby golf course.

At one point, Madoff, who once owned a waterfront mansion in Palm Beach, asked Trump to invest in his fund, Trump said.

“I said jokingly, ‘No thanks, I can lose my own money,’ ” Trump said.

In 2008, in an interview with CNN, Trump referred to Madoff as a “sleazebag” and “a total crook.”

Madoff’s former lawyer, Ira Lee Sorkin, who represented Madoff during his criminal case, said that he had no information about the clemency request. He did not know if another attorney had assisted Madoff with his petition.

Madoff has been incarcerated at a federal prison in Butner, North Carolina, since July 2009, after he pleaded guilty to 11 counts of financial crimes, including fraud, money laundering, perjury and theft. He received the maximum possible sentence.

He was accused of using his investment firm to steal billions from his clients, cheating many of them out of their life savings. Rather than investing their money, Madoff spent it on family and friends. He then took in money from additional investors to pay earlier ones and cover up his fraud.

In 2008, Madoff told his sons, both of whom have since died, that his investment advisory firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, had committed massive fraud. His family notified federal agents, who arrested him the next day.

Less than a year into his sentence, Madoff was moved to a low-security medical center at the prison complex, where he is currently located, according to online Bureau of Prisons records.

The Bureau of Prisons, cutting time off Madoff’s sentence for good behavior, gave him a projected release date of Nov. 14, 2139, when he would be 201 years old.

Madoff was not the only one seeking clemency related to the fraud scheme at his investment firm.

His former secretary, Annette Bongiorno, who was sentenced to six years in prison on fraud charges, also filed a petition for clemency, according to the Justice Department’s website.

Her lawyer, Roland G. Riopelle, said he did not have more information about Riopelle’s petition, but he noted that Bongiorno, 70, was moved to home confinement by the Bureau of Prisons in April.

She had previously asked a federal judge last year to move her into home confinement as permitted by the First Step Act, a criminal justice bill signed into law by Trump in December.

The law allows certain offenders over 60, who are not considered a threat to others, to be released into home confinement if they have completed two-thirds of their sentence.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/24/nyregion/bernie-madoff-trump-pardon.html" id="b51b9f00-b68b-3bee-a345-179b30ebe7e3">The New York Times</a>.

Madoff Asks Trump to Commute His 150-year Sentence

After Bernie Madoff admitted to masterminding the largest Ponzi scheme in history and bilking thousands of investors out of their cash, he was punished with a sentence that made it likely he would die in federal prison — 150 years.

It was not clear when Madoff filed his petition or what arguments he is making for the request. The department’s website said information in its online clemency database was last updated July 1 and that Madoff’s request was still pending on that date.

As president, Trump has increasingly wielded pardons as a way to push back against a justice system he frequently has called unfair.

It was not clear whether Trump would consider Madoff’s application for clemency. Years before he became president, Trump expressed contempt for Madoff in an interview with The New York Times Magazine in 2009.

Madoff’s former lawyer, Ira Lee Sorkin, who represented Madoff during his criminal case, said he had no information about the clemency request. He did not know if another attorney had assisted Madoff with his petition.

Then, Monday night, a thunderstorm brought weary New Yorkers fierce winds and heavy rains that wreaked havoc, causing flash floods across the city and suburbs.

The region moved quickly from sweat-soaked to waterlogged, with areas still flooded Tuesday morning, especially in New Jersey, where fire departments and emergency agencies cautioned drivers to avoid inundated areas.

In Hackensack, New Jersey, the city’s Fire Department said it had rescued multiple people early Tuesday whose cars were stuck in the water.

The winds, and in some cases, hail, left more than 300,000 customers without power in New Jersey, officials said. In a statement Monday night, Gov. Philip D. Murphy warned that it could be “up to several days” before electricity was fully restored.

As of 12:45 p.m. Tuesday, more than 180,000 customers still did not have electricity, according to utility companies in the state.

More than 2 inches of rain had fallen in Central Park by 8 a.m. Tuesday, the National Weather Service said. More than 3 inches of precipitation were measured in parts of Queens, Staten Island, Long Island and New Jersey.

The wind was intense, with some gusts whipping through parts of New Jersey at 70 mph, the Weather Service said.

Scattered showers and isolated thunderstorms continued to move across the New York City area on Tuesday morning, and the Weather Service issued a flash flood watch for most of the region that lasted until noon.

On Monday evening, floodwaters blocked parts of the Long Island Expressway and Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, officials said. The next morning, around rush hour, more flooding snagged traffic on the Belt Parkway in Queens.

The downpours also turned city streets into rushing streams in parts of the city, particularly in Brooklyn and Staten Island.

As they stood huddled under umbrellas, awnings and sidewalk scaffolding, New Yorkers were dismayed by the meteorological shift after three sun-soaked, 90-degree-plus days.

Undeterred, some wrapped plastic bags around their shoes to protect their feet before fording newly formed rivers. Others simply shrugged and waded into knee-deep water.

Then there was Daphnee Youree, 50, who, confronted with severe flooding on the Long Island Expressway, took matters into her own hands.

She was driving home to Brooklyn, along with her 11-year-old son and her cat, when traffic came to a halt. There was a giant pool of standing water caused by clogged sewer grates.

“It was crazy,” she said in an interview Tuesday. “I’d never seen anything like that on the LIE.”

Youree and a group of others pulled over, waiting to see if the water would clear. Someone half-jokingly suggested someone should try clearing the debris.

“Everybody was just standing around,” she said. “So, I decided to just do it.”

She grabbed a nearby orange traffic cone and trudged through the floodwaters in her Crocs.

As she worked to clear the mud and wood, ultimately clearing three grates, she said, people cheered her on. A video of her digging away the muck was posted on Twitter, where she was applauded by the City Council speaker, Corey Johnson, as a “Great New Yorker.”

Youree laughed off the praise: “I just wanted to get home,” she said.

In New York City, after Con Edison crews spent Monday working to restore power to the tens of thousands who lost it during the heat wave, more than 6,000 customers were without electricity after the storms, including in the parts of Brooklyn affected by Sunday night’s power failure. Roughly half of them had their power restored by noon, and Con Edison said it expected most of its customers to have power by Tuesday evening.

Subway stations, never impermeable to the elements, were inundated, with some seeming to sprout waterfalls more reminiscent of amusement parks than mass transit.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/23/nyregion/ny-nj-flooding.html" id="d75ab54f-7e92-3a7b-ad5b-699c567328cd">The New York Times</a>.

Storms Bring Floods and Power Failures to Weary New York and New Jersey Residents

In the last 10 days, New York City has seen a blackout in Manhattan, power failures in Brooklyn and Queens, and an oppressive three-day heat wave.

The utility initially said it expected service to be fully restored by Monday afternoon, but Con Edison’s online power-failure map estimated that some customers would not get power back until late evening, a full day after the company shut off power to 30,000 customers in southeast Brooklyn so it could make repairs related to the dangerously high temperatures.

It was mostly customers in Brooklyn who were still without power, officials said. Of the more than 3 million customers that Con Edison serves in the region, 900,000 are in the borough.

As of 3 p.m., just under 10,000 Brooklyn customers — most of them in and around the neighborhoods of Canarsie, Mill Basin, Flatlands and Bergen Beach — were without electricity. Just under 2,000 customers in Queens were also facing service disruptions.

The region had cooled by Monday, as residents across New York, New Jersey and Connecticut woke up in a kind of collective heat hangover. The thermometer fell to 80 degrees in New York City overnight, and the National Weather Service predicted temperatures would not rise much above the low 80s on Monday, though it warned of possible severe thunderstorms.

Still, even as the heat broke, Mayor Bill de Blasio lashed out against Con Edison during a news conference Monday, demanding answers and saying he no longer trusted the utility.

“This was obviously a predictable situation, and therefore, preventable,” de Blasio said, standing outside a command post in Brooklyn that had been set up to aid people affected by the power shutdowns. “What we’re getting continually is no clarity, no answers, no real timelines from Con Ed.”

City officials worked with the Red Cross to set up an emergency shelter at Junior High School 278 Marine Park in Brooklyn for people who needed medical attention or relief from the heat, de Blasio said. That shelter remained open Monday morning

Con Edison officials said they had faced a catch 22: If the utility had not shut off some power, there could have been a longer failure over a wider area.

“The actions we took were necessary to prevent longer outages to the impacted customers that would have occurred as a result of additional equipment damage,” the company said in a statement Monday morning.

On Sunday night, Con Edison officials said overhead lines supplying the area were in danger of overloading because of the heat.

NEW YORK — Nearly 12,000 customers were still without electricity in New York City and Westchester County on Monday afternoon, after 50,000 Consolidated Edison customers lost power Sunday night during an intense three-day heat wave, officials said.

Michael Gold

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