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    U.S. and Allies Impose Sanctions on Russia as Biden Condemns ‘Invasion’ of Ukraine

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    President Biden warned President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia that more sanctions would follow if he did not withdraw his forces and engage in diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis.WASHINGTON — The United States and its allies on Tuesday swiftly imposed economic sanctions on Russia for what President Biden denounced as the beginning of an “invasion of Ukraine,” unveiling a set of coordinated punishments as Western officials confirmed that Russian forces had begun crossing the Ukrainian border.Speaking from the White House, Mr. Biden condemned President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and said the immediate consequences for his aggression against Ukraine included the loss of a key natural gas pipeline and cutting off global financing to two Russian banks and a handful of the country’s elites.“Who in the Lord’s name does Putin think gives him the right to declare new so-called countries on territory that belonged to his neighbors?” Mr. Biden said on Tuesday afternoon, joining a cascade of criticism from global leaders earlier in the day. “This is a flagrant violation of international law and demands a firm response from the international community.”Mr. Biden warned Mr. Putin that more sanctions would follow if the Russian leader did not withdraw his forces and engage in diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis.But that prospect remained dim by the end of the day, as Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken canceled plans to meet with the Russian foreign minister on Thursday, saying that it does not “make sense” to hold talks while Russian forces are on the move.“To put it simply, Russia just announced that it is carving out a big chunk of Ukraine,” Mr. Biden said, adding, “He’s setting up a rationale to take more territory by force.”President Biden called Russia’s actions a “flagrant violation of international law” and unveiled tough sanctions aimed at punishing the country.Al Drago for The New York TimesThe global response began early on Tuesday, just hours after Mr. Putin recognized the self-declared separatist states in eastern Ukraine and Russian forces started rolling into their territory, according to NATO, European Union and White House officials. It was the first major deployment of Russian troops across the internationally recognized border since the current crisis began.At a news conference in Moscow, Mr. Putin said that he had not decided to send in troops “right at this moment.” But officials said the invasion started overnight, just hours before Mr. Putin’s Parliament formally granted him the authority to deploy the military abroad. Ukrainians near the territory controlled by Kremlin-backed separatists have already endured days of shelling, and as Ukrainian troops hunkered down in their trenches and civilians took shelter in basements, the country’s military said that one soldier had been killed so far and six wounded.Financial markets around the world wobbled on Tuesday in the wake of the Russian actions and the response from Western governments. In the United States, the news pushed stocks lower, leaving the S&P 500 in correction territory, more than 10 percent below its January peak. Oil prices, which had risen to nearly $100 a barrel in anticipation of a global disruption, settled at $96.84 a barrel, up 1.5 percent.Mr. Biden and his counterparts in Germany, England and other European nations described the package of global sanctions as severe. They include financial directives by the United States to deny Russia the ability to borrow money in Western markets and to block financial transactions by two banks and the families of three wealthy Russian elites.Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany put the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline on hold. The $11 billion conduit from Russia to Germany — completed but not yet operational — is crucial to Moscow’s plans to increase energy sales to Europe. European Union foreign ministers and the British government approved sanctions against legislators in Moscow who voted to authorize the use of force, as well as Russian elites, companies and organizations.“It will hurt a lot,” said the E.U. foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell Fontelles.The governments of Japan, Taiwan and Singapore also issued a joint statement saying they would limit technology exports to Russia in an effort to pressure Mr. Putin with damaging restrictions on his ambitions to compete in high-tech industries.But the moves in Washington and other capitals around the world were limited in scope and fell short of the more sweeping economic warfare that some — including members of Congress and other supporters of Ukraine — have repeatedly demanded in recent weeks.Mr. Biden and his counterparts have said they must balance the need to take swift and severe action with preserving the possibility of even greater sanctions on Russia if Mr. Putin escalates the conflict by trying to seize more territory claimed by the separatists, or even the entire country — a war that could kill tens of thousands of people.“This is the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine,” he said, adding that “we’ll continue to escalate sanctions if Russia escalates.”European leaders also vowed to get tougher if Mr. Putin’s forces continued to advance. Prime Minister Boris Johnson described British sanctions as just “the first tranche.”Mr. Biden’s use of the word “invasion” was significant. In the past, he had angered the Ukrainian leadership when he suggested that there might be lesser penalties for a “minor incursion.” Now that Mr. Putin has ordered forces into eastern Ukraine, Mr. Biden, in his choice of words, is making clear that there is nothing minor about the operation.Russian self-propelled howitzers being loaded onto a train car on Tuesday near Taganrog, Russia.The New York TimesBut that still leaves open the question of how to calibrate the sanctions — because so far there have been no mass casualties. Jonathan Finer, the president’s deputy national security adviser, said early Tuesday that the administration could hold back some of its promised punishments in the hopes of deterring further, far more violent aggression by Mr. Putin aimed at taking the rest of the country.“We’ve always envisioned waves of sanctions that would unfold over time in response to steps Russia actually takes, not just statements that they make,” Mr. Finer said on CNN. “We’ve always said we’re going to watch the situation on the ground and have a swift and severe response.”Crucially, it remains unclear how far Mr. Putin — who has argued that Ukraine itself is a phony country, wrongly carved away from Russia — is prepared to go. On Tuesday, he said ominously that he recognized the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk republics’ sovereignty over not only the land they control, but also the much larger portion of Ukraine that they lay claim to, home to 2.5 million people.Maps: Russia and Ukraine Edge Closer to WarRussia has built an enormous military force along Ukraine’s border that appears prepared to attack from the north, east and south.At a hastily called news conference on Tuesday, Mr. Putin demanded that Ukraine vow never to join NATO, give up the advanced weapons the West has delivered to it, recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea and negotiate directly with the Luhansk and Donetsk separatists, who are seen in Kyiv and Western capitals as illegitimate Kremlin proxies.“The most important point is a known degree of demilitarization of Ukraine today,” Mr. Putin said. “This is the only objectively controllable factor that can be observed and reacted to.”Understand How the Ukraine Crisis DevelopedCard 1 of 7How it all began. 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    Black Farmers Fear Foreclosure as Debt Relief Remains Frozen

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    Lawsuits from white farmers have blocked $4 billion of pandemic aid that was allocated to Black farmers in the American Rescue Plan.WASHINGTON — For Brandon Smith, a fourth-generation cattle rancher from Texas, the $1.9 trillion stimulus package that President Biden signed into law nearly a year ago was long-awaited relief.Little did he know how much longer he would have to wait.The legislation included $4 billion of debt forgiveness for Black and other “socially disadvantaged” farmers, a group that has endured decades of discrimination from banks and the federal government. Mr. Smith, a Black father of four who owes about $200,000 in outstanding loans on his ranch, quickly signed and returned documents to the Agriculture Department last year, formally accepting the debt relief. He then purchased more equipment for his ranch, believing that he had been given a financial lifeline.Instead, Mr. Smith has fallen deeper into debt. Months after signing the paperwork he received a notice informing him that the federal government intended to “accelerate” foreclosure on his 46-acre property and cattle if he did not start making payments on the loans he believed had been forgiven.“I trusted the government that we had a deal, and down here at the end of the day, the rug gets pulled out from under me,” Mr. Smith, 43, said in an interview.Black farmers across the nation have yet to see any of Mr. Biden’s promised relief. While the president has pledged to pursue policies to promote racial equity and correct decades of discrimination, legal issues have complicated that goal.In May 2021, the Agriculture Department started sending letters to borrowers who were eligible to have their debt cleared, asking them to sign and return forms confirming their balances. The payments, which also are supposed to cover tax liabilities and fees associated with clearing the debt, were expected to come in phases beginning in June.But the entire initiative has been stymied amid lawsuits from white farmers and groups representing them that questioned whether the government could offer debt relief based on race.Courts in Wisconsin and Florida have issued preliminary injunctions against the initiative, siding with plaintiffs who argued that the debt relief amounted to discrimination and could therefore be illegal. A class-action lawsuit against the U.S.D.A. is proceeding in Texas this year.The Biden administration has not appealed the injunctions but a spokeswoman for the Agriculture Department said it was continuing to defend the program in the courts as the cases move forward.The legal limbo has created new and unexpected financial strains for Black farmers, many of whom have been unable to make investments in their businesses given ongoing uncertainty about their debt loads. It also poses a political problem for Mr. Biden, who was propelled to power by Black voters and now must make good on promises to improve their fortunes.The law was intended to help remedy years of discrimination that nonwhite farmers have endured, including land theft and the rejection of loan applications by banks and the federal government. The program designated aid to about 15,000 borrowers who receive loans directly from the federal government or have their bank loans guaranteed by the U.S.D.A. Those eligible included farmers and ranchers who have been subject to racial or ethnic prejudice, including those who are Black, Native American, Alaskan Native, Asian American, Pacific Islander or Hispanic.After the initiative was rolled out last year, it met swift opposition.Banks were unhappy that the loans would be repaid early, depriving them of interest payments. Groups of white farmers in Wisconsin, North Dakota, Oregon and Illinois sued the Agriculture Department, arguing that offering debt relief on the basis of skin color is discriminatory, suggesting that a successful Black farmer could have his debts cleared while a struggling white farm could go out of business. America First Legal, a group led by the former Trump administration official Stephen Miller, filed a lawsuit making a similar argument in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas.Last June, before the money started flowing, a federal judge in Florida blocked the program on the basis that it applied “strictly on racial grounds” irrespective of any other factor.The delays have angered the Black farmers that the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress were trying to help. They argue that the law was poorly written and that the White House is not defending it forcefully enough in court out of fear that a legal defeat could undermine other policies that are predicated on race.Those concerns became even more pronounced late last year when the government sent thousands of letters to minority farmers who were behind on their loan payments warning that they faced foreclosure. The letters were sent automatically to any borrowers who were past due on their loans, including about a third of the 15,000 socially disadvantaged farmers who applied for the debt relief, according to the Agriculture Department.Leonard Jackson, a cattle farmer in Muskogee, Okla., received such a letter despite being told by the U.S.D.A. that he did not need to make loan payments because his $235,000 in debt would be paid off by the government. The letter was jarring for Mr. Jackson, whose father, a wheat and soybean farmer, had his farm equipment foreclosed on by the government years earlier. The prospect of losing his 33 cows, house and trailer was unfathomable.“They said that they were paying off everybody’s loans and not to make payments and then they sent this,” Mr. Jackson, 55, said.The legal fight over the funds has stirred widespread confusion, with Black and other farmers stuck in the middle. This year, the Federation of Southern Cooperatives has been fielding calls from minority farmers who said their financial problems have been compounded. It has become even harder for them to get access to credit now, they say, that the fate of the debt relief is unclear.“It has definitely caused a very significant panic and a lot of distress among our members,” said Dãnia Davy, director of land retention and advocacy at the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund.Mr. Smith bought more equipment for his ranch when he thought aid was finally on the way. But now he’s deeper in debt.Montinique Monroe for The New York TimesThe Agriculture Department said that it was required by law to send the warnings but that the government had no intention of foreclosing on farms, citing a moratorium on such action that was put in place early last year because of the pandemic. After The New York Times inquired about the foreclosure letters, the U.S.D.A. sent borrowers who had received notices another letter late last month telling them to disregard the foreclosure threat.“We want borrowers to know the bottom line is, actions such as acceleration and foreclosure remain suspended for direct loan borrowers due to the pandemic,” Kate Waters, a department spokeswoman, said. “We remain under the moratorium, and we will continue to communicate with our borrowers so they understand their rights and understand their debt servicing options.”The more than 2,000 minority farmers who receive private loans that are guaranteed by the U.S.D.A. are not protected by the federal moratorium and could still face foreclosure. Once the moratorium ends, farmers will need to resume making their payments if the debt relief program or an alternative is not in place.Some Black farmers argue that the Agriculture Department, led by Secretary Tom Vilsack, was too slow to disburse the debt relief and allowed critics time to mount a legal assault on the law.The Biden administration has been left with few options but to let the legal process play out, which could take months or years. The White House had been hopeful that a new measure in Mr. Biden’s sweeping social policy and climate bill would ultimately provide the farmers the debt relief they have been expecting. But that bill has stalled in the Senate and is unlikely to pass in its current form.“While we continue to defend in court the relief in the American Rescue Plan, getting the broader relief provision that the House passed signed into law remains the surest and quickest way to help farmers in economic distress across the nation, including thousands and thousands of farmers of color,” Gene Sperling, the White House’s pandemic relief czar, said in a statement.For Black farmers, who have seen their ranks fall from more than a million to fewer than 40,000 in the last century amid industry consolidation and onerous loan terms, the disappointment is not surprising. John Boyd, president of the National Black Farmers Association, said that rather than hearing about more government reports on racial equity, Black farmers want to see results.“We need implementation, action and resources to farm,” Mr. Boyd said. More

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    Why Companies Struggled to Navigate Olympics Sponsorships

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    The debacle over Olympic sponsorship shows how the U.S.-China relationship has turned into a minefield for companies trying to do business in both countries.WASHINGTON — Companies usually shell out for Olympic sponsorship because it helps their business and reflects well on their brands. But this year, with the Olympics in Beijing, Procter & Gamble paid even more to try to prevent any negative fallout from being associated with China’s repressive and authoritarian government.The company, one of 13 “worldwide Olympic partners” that make the global sports competition possible, hired Washington lobbyists last year to successfully defeat legislation that would have barred sponsors of the Beijing Games from selling their products to the U.S. government. The provision would have blocked Pampers, Tide, Pringles and other Procter & Gamble products from military commissaries, to protest companies’ involvement in an event seen as legitimizing the Chinese government.“This amendment would punish P.&G. and the Olympic movement, including U.S. athletes,” Sean Mulvaney, the senior director for global government relations at Procter & Gamble, wrote in an email to congressional offices in August.Some of the world’s biggest companies are caught in an uncomfortable situation as they attempt to straddle a widening political gulf between the United States and China: What is good for business in one country is increasingly a liability in the other.China is the world’s biggest consumer market, and for decades, Chinese and American business interests have described their economic cooperation as a “win-win relationship.” But gradually, as China’s economic and military might have grown, Washington has taken the view that a win for China is a loss for the United States.The decision to locate the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing has turned sponsorship, typically one of the marketing industry’s most prestigious opportunities, into a minefield.Companies that have sponsored the Olympics have attracted censure from politicians and human rights groups, who say such contracts imply tacit support of atrocities by the Chinese Communist Party, including human rights violations in Xinjiang, censorship of the media and mass surveillance of dissidents.“One thing our businesses, universities and sports leagues don’t seem to fully understand is that, to eat at the C.C.P.’s trough, you will have to turn into a pig,” Yaxue Cao, editor of ChinaChange.org, a website that covers civil society and human rights, told Congress this month.The tension is playing out in other areas as well, including with regards to Xinjiang, where millions of ethnic minorities have been detained, persecuted or forced into working in fields and factories. In June, the United States will enact a sweeping law that will expand restrictions on Xinjiang, giving the United States power to block imports made with any materials sourced from that region.Multinational firms that are trying to comply with these new import restrictions have found themselves facing costly backlashes in China, which denies any accusations of genocide. H&M, Nike and Intel have all blundered into public relations disasters for trying to remove Xinjiang from their supply chains.Explore the Games Propaganda Machine: China has used a variety of tools such as bots and fake social media accounts to promote a vision of the Games that is free of controversy.Aussie Pride: Australia has won more medals than ever before at the 2022 Winter Games. Could the country turn into a winter sports wonderland?At High Speed: The ‘Snow Dream’ train line, built to serve the Winter Olympics, has been a source of excitement — and a considerable expense.Reporter’s View: A typical day in Beijing for our reporters may include a 5 a.m. alarm, six buses, a pizza lunch and lots of live-blogging. For some, it’s the first time back in China in a while.Harsher penalties could be in store. Companies that try to sever ties with Xinjiang may run afoul of China’s anti-sanctions law, which allows the authorities to crack down on firms that comply with foreign regulations they see as discriminating against China.Beijing has also threatened to put companies that cut off supplies to China on an “unreliable entity list” that could result in penalties, though to date the list doesn’t appear to have any members.“Companies are between a rock and a hard place when it comes to complying with U.S. and Chinese law,” said Jake Colvin, the president of the National Foreign Trade Council, which represents companies that do business internationally.President Biden, while less antagonistic than his predecessor, has maintained many of the tough policies put in place by President Donald J. Trump, including hefty tariffs on Chinese goods and restrictions on exports of sensitive technology to Chinese firms.The Biden administration has shown little interest in forging trade deals to help companies do more business abroad. Instead, it is recruiting allies to ramp up pressure on China, including by boycotting the Olympics, and promoting huge investments in manufacturing and scientific research to compete with Beijing. The pressures are not only coming from the United States. Companies are increasingly facing a complicated global patchwork of export restrictions and data storage laws, including in the European Union. Chinese leaders have begun pursuing “wolf warrior” diplomacy, in which they are trying to teach other countries to think twice before crossing China, said Jim McGregor, chairman of APCO Worldwide’s greater China region.He said his company was telling clients to “try to comply with everybody, but don’t make a lot of noise about it — because if you’re noisy about complying in one country, the other country will come after you.”Some companies are responding by moving sensitive activities — like research that could trigger China’s anti-sanctions law, or audits of Xinjiang operations — out of China, said Isaac Stone Fish, the chief executive of Strategy Risks, a consultancy.An NBC production crew in Beijing. An effort to prevent Olympic sponsors, like NBC, from doing business with the U.S. government was cut from a defense bill last year.Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesOthers, like Cisco, have scaled back their operations. Some have left China entirely, though usually not on terms they would choose. For example, Micron Technology, a chip-maker that has been a victim of intellectual property theft in China, is closing down a chip design team in Shanghai after competitors poached its employees.“Some companies are taking a step back and realizing that this is perhaps more trouble than it’s worth,” Mr. Stone Fish said.But many companies insist that they can’t be forced to choose between two of the world’s largest markets. Tesla, which counts China as one of its largest markets, opened a showroom in Xinjiang last month.“We can’t leave China, because China represents in some industries up to 50 percent of global demand and we have intense, deep supply and sales relationships,” said Craig Allen, the president of the U.S.-China Business Council.Companies see China as a foothold to serve Asia, Mr. Allen said, and China’s $17 trillion economy still presents “some of the best growth prospects anywhere.”“Very few companies are leaving China, but all are feeling that it’s risk up and that they need to be very careful so as to meet their legal obligations in both markets,” he said.American politicians of both parties are increasingly bent on forcing companies to pick a side.“To me, it’s completely appropriate to make these companies choose,” said Representative Michael Waltz, a Florida Republican who proposed the bill that would have prevented Olympic sponsors from doing business with the U.S. government.Mr. Waltz said participation in the Beijing Olympics sent a signal that the West was willing to turn a blind eye to Chinese atrocities for short-term profits.The amendment was ultimately cut out of a defense-spending bill last year after active and aggressive lobbying by Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Intel, NBC, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and others, Mr. Waltz said.Procter & Gamble’s lobbying disclosures show that, between April and December, it spent more than $2.4 million on in-house and outside lobbyists to try to sway Congress on a range of tax and trade issues, including the Beijing Winter Olympics Sponsor Accountability Act.Lobbying disclosures for Coca-Cola, Airbnb and Comcast, the parent company of NBC, also indicate the companies lobbied on issues related to the Olympics or “sports programming” last year.Procter & Gamble and Intel declined to comment. Coca-Cola said it had explained to lawmakers that the legislation would hurt American military families and businesses. NBC and the Chamber of Commerce did not respond to requests for comment.Many companies have argued they are sponsoring this year’s Games to show support for the athletes, not China’s system of government.In a July congressional hearing, where executives from Coca-Cola, Intel, Visa and Airbnb were also grilled about their sponsorship, Mr. Mulvaney said Procter & Gamble was using its partnership to encourage the International Olympic Committee to incorporate human rights principles into its oversight of the Games.“Corporate sponsors are being a bit unfairly maligned here,” Anna Ashton, a senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute, said in an event hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.Companies had signed contracts to support multiple iterations of the Games, and had no say over the host location, she said. And the funding they provide goes to support the Olympics and the athletes, not the Chinese government.“Sponsorship has hardly been an opportunity for companies this time around,” she said. More

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    Patrick Gelsinger is Intel's True Believer

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    Patrick Gelsinger was 18 years old and four months into an entry-level job at Intel when he heard a pivotal sermon at a Silicon Valley church in February 1980. There, a minister quoted Jesus from the Book of Revelation.“I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!” the minister said. “So, because you are lukewarm — neither hot nor cold — I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”The words jolted Mr. Gelsinger, reshaping his philosophy. He realized he had been a lukewarm believer, one who practiced his faith just once a week. He vowed never to be neither hot nor cold again.Now, at age 60, Mr. Gelsinger is hot about one thing in particular: Revitalizing Intel, a Silicon Valley icon that lost its leading position in chip manufacturing.The 120,000-person company was a household name in the 1990s, celebrated as a fount of innovation as its microprocessors became the electronic brains in the vast majority of computers. But Intel failed to place its chips into smartphones, which became the device of choice for most people. Apple and Google instead grew into the trillion-dollar emblems of Silicon Valley.Rejuvenating Intel is partly about Mr. Gelsinger’s own ambitions. As a young engineer, he once wrote down a goal of leading Intel one day. But in 2009, after spending his entire career at the company, he was forced out. A year ago, he was wooed back for a surprise second chance.His mission is also about America’s place in the world. Mr. Gelsinger wants to return the United States to a leading role in semiconductor production, reducing the country’s dependence on manufacturers in Asia and easing a global chip shortage. Intel, he believes, can spearhead the charge. If he succeeds, the impact could extend far beyond computers to just about every device with an on-off switch.The quest faces many obstacles. Steering a $200 billion company while chasing a goal of raising U.S. chip production to 30 percent globally from about 12 percent today requires tens of billions of dollars, political maneuvering with governments and years of patience.“You’re going to have to spend a lot of money and you’re going to have to spend it for a long period of time,” said Simon Segars, who recently stepped down as chief executive of Arm, a British company whose chip designs power most smartphones. “Whether governments have the stomach for that over the long term remains to be seen.”In four interviews, Mr. Gelsinger acknowledged the difficulties. But the father of four and grandfather of eight has pursued the goals with intensity.In March, he unveiled a $20 billion project to add two chip factories to Intel’s complex near Phoenix. Last month, he joined President Biden to showcase a $20 billion investment in a new chip manufacturing site near Columbus, Ohio. On Tuesday, he announced a $5.4 billion deal to buy Tower Semiconductor, which operates chip production services from factories in four countries.To drum up government support for his investments, Mr. Gelsinger has attended three virtual White House gatherings, spoken with two dozen members of Congress and four governors. He became a key ally to President Biden over a $52 billion package that would provide grants to companies willing to set up new U.S. chip factories. And in Europe, Mr. Gelsinger met with President Emmanuel Macron of France, President Mario Draghi of Italy, their counterparts in other countries, and the pope.Mr. Gelsinger with President Emmanuel Macron of France last June.Pool photo by Stephane De SakutinIt has been a tough slog. Intel’s stock has dropped as Mr. Gelsinger committed huge sums to chip manufacturing. The $52 billion funding package stalled for months in the House of Representatives, finally passing this month as part of broader legislation that must now be reconciled with a Senate version. Criticism of the chief executive from Wall Street analysts has ramped up.“Every day the job is way bigger than me,” Mr. Gelsinger said. But “it’s OK,” he added, because he believes he has help. “God, I need you showing up with me today because this job is way more than I could possibly do myself.”Faith and WorkIf his father had managed to buy a farm, Mr. Gelsinger would almost certainly have inherited it and become a farmer. That was expected in Robesonia, a borough in Pennsylvania Dutch country where he was raised and worked on his uncles’ farms.But there was no farm to inherit. So at age 16, Mr. Gelsinger passed a scholarship exam that took him to the Lincoln Technical Institute, a for-profit vocational school, where he earned an associate degree.Mr. Gelsinger tells this and other stories self-deprecatingly in a 2003 book of advice that he wrote for Christians titled “Balancing Your Family, Faith & Work,” which was expanded in 2008 and titled, “The Juggling Act: Bringing Balance to Your Faith, Family, and Work.”In 1979, he was interviewed at the technical institute by a manager from Intel. Unlike most of the other students there, Mr. Gelsinger had heard of the company. He breezed through questions related to his studies and predicted he could earn bachelor’s, master’s and Ph.D. degrees while holding down a full-time job, said Ronald Smith, the former Intel executive who conducted the interview.“He is very smart, very ambitious and arrogant,” Mr. Smith said he wrote in a summary of the conversation. “He’ll fit right in.”Mr. Gelsinger took his first plane ride to interview at Intel in California, where he started in October 1979 as a technician. He worked on improving the reliability of microprocessors while studying for a bachelor’s degree at Santa Clara University.He soon started hanging out with the engineers who designed the chips, coming up with ideas to test the chips more efficiently. In 1982, he became the fourth engineer on the team that introduced the groundbreaking 80386 microprocessor.During a 1985 presentation near the completion of the chip, Mr. Gelsinger chided Intel’s leaders Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore and Andy Grove about balky company computers that were slowing the process.A few days later, he got a surprise call from Mr. Grove. The Hungarian-born executive, then Intel’s president who later wrote the management book “Only the Paranoid Survive,” had built a culture where lower-level employees were encouraged to challenge superiors if they could back up their positions. Mr. Grove began mentoring Mr. Gelsinger, a relationship that lasted three decades.By 1986, Mr. Grove had convinced Mr. Gelsinger not to pursue a doctorate at Stanford University and instead made him, at age 24, the leader of a 100-person team designing Intel’s 80486 microprocessor. Mr. Gelsinger eventually earned eight patents, became Intel’s youngest vice president in 1992 and the first person with the title of chief technology officer in 2001.His climb up Intel’s ladder was shaped by another priority: his faith.Though raised in the mainstream United Church of Christ, Mr. Gelsinger said he didn’t really become a Christian until he attended the nondenominational church in Silicon Valley where he met Linda Fortune, who later became his wife. It was at that church in 1980 that he heard the minister quote Revelations.After Mr. Gelsinger became a born-again Christian, he wrestled privately with whether to join the clergy. In a 2019 oral history conducted by the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif., he said he eventually decided to become a “workplace minister,” where “you really view yourself as working for God as your C.E.O., even though you’re working for Intel.”Intel SlipsIn the mid-2000s, Mr. Gelsinger’s footing within Intel shifted. Mr. Grove retired as board chairman in 2004. Another executive, Paul Otellini, was appointed chief executive in 2005. Mr. Gelsinger said he was a “dissonant voice” on Intel’s senior executive team.Mr. Otellini pushed him to leave, Mr. Gelsinger said. (Mr. Otellini died in 2017.) In 2009, Mr. Gelsinger accepted an offer to become president and chief operating officer of EMC, a maker of data storage gear.Departing Intel after 30 years as a company man hurt badly. “I was just so angry and emotional about the departure,” Mr. Gelsinger said.In 2012, he became chief executive of VMware, a software company that EMC controlled. He weathered challenges there, including an aborted effort to compete in cloud computing services with Amazon, but broadened the company’s business and nearly tripled revenues.During those years, Intel slipped. For decades, the company had led the industry in delivering regular factory advances that pack more processing power into chips. But delays in perfecting new production processes allowed rivals such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Samsung Electronics to grab the lead in manufacturing technology between 2015 and 2019.Mr. Gelsinger in 2006, when he was senior vice president of Intel’s digital enterprise group, with the company’s dual core next generation chip.Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesToday, T.S.M.C. makes chips designed by hundreds of other companies. It supplies the world with more than 90 percent of the chips made with the most advanced production technology. Because it is headquartered in Taiwan, which China has laid territorial claim to, its location has made it a political and supply chain chokepoint should conflict erupt over the island nation.Intel was also suffering from its missteps in the mobile market, which consumes billions of processors compared with the hundreds of millions sold for computers.After convincing Apple to use its chips in Macintosh computers in 2005, Intel had a chance to win a place in the iPhone, which debuted in 2007. But Mr. Otellini said in a 2013 interview in The Atlantic that he turned down the opportunity because the price that Apple was willing to pay for chips was too low to make a profit.The decision, which Mr. Otellini said he regretted, led Apple to use rival Arm technology for smartphones and, later, tablets. So did Samsung and other companies that make devices using Google’s Android software. More recently, Apple started using Arm chips in many new Macs.Mr. Otellini and his successors prioritized Intel’s profit margins while failing to take risks to move into new markets and outflank rivals, former company insiders now acknowledge. If boiled down to a book, “it could be called ‘the insufficiently paranoid don’t survive,’” said Reed Hundt, a former Federal Communications Commission chairman who served on Intel’s board from 2001 to 2020, in a nod to Mr. Grove’s “Only the Paranoid Survive.”As questions swirled about Intel’s future, Mr. Gelsinger was viewed as a possible savior. But he insisted he was committed to VMware, a point he seemed to underscore by adding a temporary tattoo with the company’s name on his arm during a 2018 conference in Las Vegas.Then, just before Thanksgiving 2020, an Intel director asked Mr. Gelsinger to join the company’s board. Mr. Gelsinger asked for permission from Michael Dell, the founder of Dell Technologies, which then controlled VMware.“I knew Intel needed some help and Pat was somebody who could help a lot, so I said ‘sure,’” Mr. Dell said.Understand the Global Chip ShortageCard 1 of 7In short supply. More

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    Biden Administration Says China Failed Trade Commitments

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    In a new report, the administration detailed China’s violations of promises made both to the World Trade Organization and under a 2020 trade deal with the U.S.WASHINGTON — The Biden administration criticized China in a new report released Wednesday morning for failing to uphold a wide range of trade commitments, including promises it had made when it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001 and others in a trade deal signed with the Trump administration in 2020.In its annual assessment of China’s compliance with its obligations to the W.T.O., the Office of the United States Trade Representative excoriated the Chinese government for flouting the global trade body’s rules and its transparent, market-oriented approach. Instead, China expanded its state-led approach to its economy and trade, causing serious harm to workers and businesses around the world, particularly in industries targeted by its industrial plans, Katherine Tai, the U.S. trade representative, said in a statement.“China has not moved to embrace the market-oriented principles on which the W.T.O. and its rules are based, despite the representations that it made when it joined 20 years ago,” Ms. Tai said.Katherine Tai, the United States trade representative, accused China of failing to embrace the market-oriented principles of the World Trade Organization, which it joined in 2001.Fabrice Coffrini/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe report also criticized the trade deal signed by the Trump administration, in one of the first written assessments the Biden administration has provided of China’s progress toward the terms set out in that deal.The Biden administration has said it intends to hold China to the terms of that agreement, while also calling for a different approach to trade. But it has not clarified just how assertively it would enforce a deal it has described as fundamentally flawed.The report said that the deal had failed to address the most fundamental concerns the United States has with China’s approach to trade, and that the United States had serious concerns with China’s implementation of several of its commitments. Those included pledges to purchase U.S. goods and services, as well as promised reforms related to agriculture, particularly biotechnology, and an assessment China promised to conduct on the use in swine and cattle of ractopamine, a feed additive widely used in the United States that Beijing has banned.The United States has raised concerns about China’s progress during regular meetings between officials at various levels of government, the report said.Data released this month showed that China fell far short of satisfying commitments it had made in the trade deal signed with the Trump administration to purchase an additional $200 billion of goods and services by the end of last year. The Biden administration said its patience with China was wearing thin, but it has not yet clarified what action, if any, it would take in response.The report echoed many of the criticisms of China issued under the prior administration, including spelling out the World Trade Organization’s shortcomings in disciplining China’s trade violations and calling for measures to take on China outside the organization.But the report also appeared to take issue with the Trump administration’s attempt to decouple from China, arguing that the United States needed to invest in American workers and infrastructure to compete with China in an integrated global economy.“We cannot build a wall between the United States and China and assume that it will address the problems posed by China,” the report said.Beyond efforts at the World Trade Organization, the United States was pursuing several strategies to hold China to account, the report said. They included bilateral dialogues with China, including over its progress toward the commitments of the 2020 trade deal; cooperation with allies like Japan and Europe; and efforts to repurpose and expand domestic trade tools, like using tariffs to encourage companies to reduce their carbon emissions.“It is also apparent that existing trade tools need to be strengthened, and new trade tools need to be forged,” the report said. “China pursues unfair policies and practices that were not contemplated when many of the U.S. trade statutes were drafted decades ago, and we are therefore exploring ways in which to update our trade tools to counter them.” More

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    Senate Republicans Stall Crucial Vote on Fed Nominees

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    President Biden’s plans to reshape the Federal Reserve suffered a setback on Tuesday as Republicans delayed a key vote on his five nominees for its Board of Governors.Republicans did not show up for a committee decision that would have advanced the nominees to the full Senate for a confirmation vote. Because a majority of the Senate Banking Committee’s members need to be physically present for such votes to count, their blockade effectively halted the process.The unusual maneuver, spearheaded by Senator Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania, was driven by Republican opposition to Mr. Biden’s pick for the nation’s top bank cop, Sarah Bloom Raskin.The president has renominated Jerome H. Powell as Fed chair and has tapped Lael Brainard, a current Fed governor, as vice chair. He has also nominated the economists Lisa D. Cook and Philip N. Jefferson as Fed governors. But Ms. Raskin — a longtime Washington policymaker and lawyer whom Mr. Biden has picked as vice chair for bank supervision — has garnered the most pushback.To prevent her nomination from advancing to the full Senate, Republicans held up the vote on all five nominees.Democrats and the White House criticized Republicans for engineering a boycott and scrambled for a solution that could get the nominees to a confirmation vote. Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio and chair of the Banking Committee, on Tuesday shot down the idea that he would separate Ms. Raskin from the other nominees to allow the rest to advance. Ms. Raskin could face tough odds of passing, especially on her own.By nominating five of the Fed’s seven governors and all of its highest-ranking leaders, Mr. Biden had a chance to shake up the institution. While some of his picks — like Mr. Powell — represented continuity, together they would have made up the most racially and gender-diverse Fed leadership team ever.Sarah Binder, a professor of political science at George Washington University who co-wrote a book on the politics of the Fed, said Democrats would need to come up with a strategy to overcome the Republican block or the nominees could get stuck in limbo.“It is really a delay — it might yet scupper Raskin,” she said. She noted that Democrats could break the nominations up or try to garner enough support among the full Senate to override the rules and get the nominees past the committee, though that might be a challenge.“It’s pretty uncharted, and they’re going to have to find a way,” Dr. Binder said.Molly Reynolds, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, said that outside of trying to change Senate rules — which she called the “nuclear option” — Democrats’ clearest avenue was probably to negotiate with Republicans.“They just need a Republican to show up,” she noted, explaining that the senator would not even need to vote yes for the committee to secure a majority and move the candidates along.Tuesday’s maneuver was the latest step in Mr. Toomey’s opposition campaign against Ms. Raskin, who would serve as arguably the nation’s most important bank regulator if confirmed.Mr. Toomey has criticized Ms. Raskin for past comments on climate-related regulation, worrying that she would be too activist in bank oversight. More recently, he has pressed for more information about her interactions with the Fed while she was on the board of a financial technology company that was pushing for a potentially lucrative central bank account.“Until basic questions have been adequately addressed, I do not think the committee should proceed with a vote on Ms. Raskin,” Mr. Toomey said in the statement.White House officials criticized his move as inappropriate when the Fed is wrestling with rapidly rising prices and preparing to raise interest rates next month.“It’s totally irresponsible, in our view — it’s never been more important to have confirmed leadership at the Fed,” said Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary. She added that the administration’s focus now was moving the nominees through the committee and called Mr. Toomey’s probing of Ms. Raskin’s background “false allegations.”The dispute centers on the revolving door between government regulators and the arcane world of financial technology.Mr. Toomey and his colleagues have said Ms. Raskin, a former Fed and Treasury official, had contacted the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City on behalf of Reserve Trust, a financial technology company. Reserve Trust secured a strategically important account at the Fed while she was on its board: To this day, it advertises that it is the only company of its kind with what’s known as a “master” account.Master accounts give companies access to the U.S. payment system infrastructure, allowing firms to move money without working with a bank, among other advantages.Republicans are blocking the process over concerns about one of the nominees, Sarah Bloom Raskin.Pool photo by Ken CedenoMs. Raskin said in written responses to Mr. Toomey’s questions early this month that she did “not recall any communications I made to help Reserve Trust obtain a master account.” But Mr. Toomey said in a subsequent letter that the president of the Kansas City Fed, Esther George, had told his staff that Ms. Raskin called her about the account in 2017.The Kansas City Fed has insisted that it followed its normal protocol in granting Reserve Trust’s master account and noted that talking with a firm’s board members was “routine.” But Mr. Toomey has continued to push for more information.“Important questions about Ms. Raskin’s use of the ‘revolving door’ remain unanswered largely because of her repeated disingenuousness with the committee,” Mr. Toomey said in his statement Tuesday.Democrats have emphasized that Ms. Raskin recently committed to a new set of ethics standards, agreeing not to work for financial services companies for four years after she leaves government — a pledge Ms. Cook and Mr. Jefferson also made, at the urging of Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts.Ms. Brainard agreed to a weaker version of that commitment that would bar her from working at bank holding companies and depository institutions outside of mission-driven exceptions like banks that target underserved communities, a spokesperson for Ms. Warren’s office said Tuesday.Mr. Powell declined to make a similar commitment, the spokesperson said. The Fed chair did signal that he would adhere to the administration’s ethics rules, which ban paid work related to government service for two years upon leaving office.On Tuesday, a dozen Republican chairs in the room where the committee met remained empty while Democrats occupied their seats across the room. Democrats took a vote to show support, though it was not binding, and Mr. Brown pledged to reschedule.“Few things we do as senators will do more to help address our country’s economic concerns more than to confirm this slate of nominees, the most diverse and most qualified slate of Fed nominees ever put forward,” Mr. Brown said, chiding Republicans for skipping the session.“They’re taking away probably the most important tool we have — and that’s the Federal Reserve — to combat inflation,” he later added.The Fed has four current governors, in addition to its 12 regional presidents, five of whom vote on monetary policy at any given time. Mr. Powell has already been serving as chair on an interim basis, since his leadership term officially expired this month. Even if the nominees advance, Ms. Raskin may struggle to pass the full Senate. Winning confirmation would require her to maintain full support from all 50 lawmakers who caucus with Democrats and for all those lawmakers to be present unless she can win Republican votes. Senator Ben Ray Luján, Democrat of New Mexico, has been absent as he recovers from a stroke.“The Republicans are playing hardball because they can,” said Ian Katz, the managing director at Capital Alpha Partners. “At the least, it delays her confirmation. It could have the ultimate effect of killing it.” More

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    Fed nominees commit to not taking part in finance’s revolving door.

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    Three of President Biden’s nominees to the Federal Reserve committed to lawmakers that, if confirmed to their posts, they would not work in financial services for four years after leaving the Fed.The pledge comes amid growing concern about the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street.The three potential Fed governors in question — the economists Lisa D. Cook and Philip N. Jefferson and a longtime government official and lawyer, Sarah Bloom Raskin — said they would “commit not to seek employment or compensation” from any financial services company after leaving the board, which oversees the largest banks.Their promises came at the urging of Senator Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat who has criticized the so-called revolving door between government and finance. Fed officials regularly go to work for Wall Street after leaving the institution, making the commitment notable.“These are the strongest ethics standards ever agreed to by Federal Reserve Board nominees,” Ms. Warren said in a statement on Wednesday. “U.S. Senators and the American people can be confident that these public servants will make sound economic policy decisions in the public’s best interest.”Republicans have been questioning Ms. Raskin’s nomination by highlighting her stint on the board of directors for a financial technology company, Reserve Trust.The company got a critical account with the Fed — known as a master account — while Ms. Raskin was on the company’s board. The account provided the firm with advertisable benefits, like access to the Fed’s payments system.During her confirmation hearing before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs last week, senators questioned whether she had used her previous positions at the Fed and Treasury to help secure the account. Ms. Raskin did not confirm or deny whether she had been in touch with the company’s local Fed bank while she sat on its board.The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, which approved the master account, has said that it “did not deviate from its review process in evaluating this request.”Senator Patrick J. Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania, asked Ms. Raskin to respond in writing by Wednesday about the Reserve Trust situation.Ms. Raskin, in her response, said she did “not recall any communications I made to help Reserve Trust obtain a master account. Had I done so, I would have abided by all applicable ethics rules in such communications.”Amanda Thompson, the communications director for Republicans on the Banking Committee, called those responses a “case of selective amnesia.”The White House has continued to stand behind its nominees. Christopher Meagher, a spokesman for the White House, called the Republican questioning “smears” and said that they “continue to fall flat in the face of scrutiny and facts.”Dr. Cook, Dr. Jefferson and Ms. Raskin are up for confirmation alongside Jerome H. Powell — who Mr. Biden renominated to be Fed chair — and Lael Brainard, a Fed governor who is the Biden administration’s pick for vice chair.Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio and the chairman of the Banking Committee, said last week that all five candidates would face a key committee vote on Feb. 15. More

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    The U.S. and Japan strike a deal to roll back Trump-era steel tariffs.

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    WASHINGTON — The Biden administration reached a deal to partly lift tariffs that the Trump administration had imposed on Japanese steel, agreeing to scale back levies that had rankled both the Japanese government and American manufacturers that use imported metal.The agreement, which U.S. trade officials announced on Monday, will maintain some protections for American metal makers by transforming the current 25 percent tariff on Japanese steel into a so-called tariff-rate quota, an arrangement in which higher levels of imports are met with higher duties. Up to 1.25 million metric tons of Japanese steel will be allowed to come into the country duty-free each year, with volumes above that level subject to a 25 percent tariff.That level is the average of Japanese steel exports to the United States in 2018 and 2019, a Biden administration official said. The arrangement is set to take effect April 1.The deal will place restrictions on products that are finished in Japan using steel from other countries. To qualify for duty-free treatment, steel products must be entirely made in Japan, to ensure the agreement is not providing a back door to the United States for cheap metal from China and other countries.The official said the countries would continue to negotiate over Japan’s steps to reduce excess capacity in its steel sector, as well as to lower the carbon emissions generated by the steel industry, which was a focus of a United States steel agreement with the European Union in October. European steel has been able to enter the United States duty free since Jan. 1.Aluminum imports — which have also been subject to a 10 percent tariff since the metal levies went into effect — were not affected by the agreement.In a statement, Gina Raimondo, the commerce secretary, said the agreement would “strengthen America’s steel industry and ensure its work force stays competitive, while also providing more access to cheaper steel and addressing a major irritant between the United States and Japan, one of our most important allies.”Ms. Raimondo pointed to the agreements with Japan and Europe as a sign that the administration was trying to restore alliances that were strained during the Trump administration.“Today’s announcement builds on the deal we struck with the E.U. and will further help us rebuild relationships with our allies around the world as we work to fight against China’s unfair trade practices and create a more competitive global economy for America’s families, businesses and workers,” she said.The Trump administration imposed metal tariffs on dozens of countries in 2018, saying a glut of foreign steel and aluminum threatened to put U.S. manufacturers out of business and posed a national security threat. President Donald J. Trump did lift or scale back the tariffs on certain countries, including Mexico and Canada, in return for trade concessions, but many governments remained subject to the levies.Wendy Cutler, the vice president of the Asia Society Policy Institute, said imposing national security-related tariffs on a close U.S. ally like Japan “never made sense, and was an unfortunate chapter in U.S. trade history.”“By putting the steel matter finally behind us, it opens the door for stepped-up cooperation on a range of pressing regional and global economic and trade issues,” she said.The trade barriers pleased many domestic metal makers and unions, which said they were necessary to preserve American industry and compete with a glut of cheap foreign metal from countries like China. But the tariffs have upset both foreign allies and many American companies that use imported steel and aluminum to make cars, washing machines, beer cans and other products, and that were forced to pay higher prices for their inputs.Kevin Dempsey, the chief executive of the American Iron and Steel Institute, an industry group, said the agreement with Japan would prevent another import surge that would undermine American industry and employment in the steel sector.“We appreciate the Biden administration’s continued recognition that the American steel industry is critical to our national and economic security and to efforts to build a more sustainable U.S. economy,” he said, adding that “proper implementation and enforcement” of the deal would be essential. More