Where Is My Family?This document, obtained by The New York Times, advised Chinese officials in the Xinjiang region what to tell students whose parents had been detained in camps built to indoctrinate Muslim minorities. To protect the source’s anonymity, The Times recreated this page to eliminate any identifying markings.

Detainees are called “concen-trated education and training school students,” one of several euphemisms the Chinese government uses.

Family members sent away “have come under different degrees of harmful influence in religious extremism and violent terrorist thoughts,” the document says.

“You have nothing to worry about” — the food is high-quality, and tuition is free, the document says. Former detainees say facilities are sometimes overcrowded and unsanitary, and food can be withheld as punishment.

Question No. 1: Where is my family?

Question No. 2: Why are my relatives required to be in these schools?

HONG KONG — The students booked theirtickets home at the end of the semester, hopingfor a relaxing break after exams and a summer ofhappy reunions with family in China’s far west.

Instead, they would soon be told that theirparents were gone, relatives had vanished andneighbors were missing — all of them locked upin an expanding network of detention campsbuilt to hold Muslim ethnic minorities.

The authorities in the Xinjiang region wor-ried the situation was a powder keg. And so theyprepared.

The leadership distributed a classified direc-tive advising local officials to corner returningstudents as soon as they arrived and keep themquiet. It included a chillingly bureaucratic guide

for how to handle their anguished questions, be-ginning with the most obvious: Where is myfamily?

“They’re in a training school set up by thegovernment,” the prescribed answer began. Ifpressed, officials were to tell students that theirrelatives were not criminals — yet could notleave these “schools.”

The question-and-answer script also includ-ed a barely concealed threat: Students were tobe told that their behavior could either shortenor extend the detention of their relatives.

“I’m sure that you will support them, be-cause this is for their own good,” officials wereadvised to say, “and also for your own good.”

The directive was among 403 pages of inter-nal documents that have been shared with The

‘Show Absolutely No Mercy’:Inside China’s Mass Detentions

Leaked documentsreveal how Xi

and other leadershave secretly waged

a ‘people’s war’to round up

Muslim minoritiesin Xinjiang.

By AUSTIN RAMZYand CHRIS BUCKLEY

Continued on Page 12

C M Y K Nxxx,2019-11-17,A,001,Bs-4C,E3_+

NEWTON, Mass. — When shewas brought before a court thisspring, charged with the federalcrime of obstruction of justice,Judge Shelley Joseph did not looklike a rebel.

Her face was tear-streaked, andbore an expression of helpless dis-may, as if she were struggling totake in the upside-down world inwhich she was the defendant.

In April, she and a court officer,Wesley MacGregor, were accusedof allowing an immigrant to evadedetention by arranging for him tosneak out the back door of a court-house.

The federal prosecutor in Bos-ton took the highly unusual step ofcharging the judge with obstruc-tion of justice, setting off a debateover whether and how states canrefrain from carrying out Presi-dent Trump’s immigration policy.

Massachusetts has been at theforefront of the sanctuary city

movement, passing a series of le-gal rulings that constrain Immi-gration and Customs Enforce-ment from detaining immigrantsin courthouses.

The judge’ssupporters sayshe is no cru-sader, but an in-experiencedjudge whostumbled into abitterly con-tested area ofthe law. Theywarn that if thecase goes forward, it will open thedoor for prosecution of otherjudges, undercutting their inde-pendence, as the country grappleswith its deep divisions over immi-gration.

Judge Joseph has refused a pleadeal that would have allowed herto avoid prosecution if she admit-

Man Flees ICE, and His JudgeFaces a Trial and Time in Jail

By ELLEN BARRY

Continued on Page 20

Judge Joseph

MARSHALL, Texas — Oneevening last spring, a retired doc-tor named James Harris carried apickle jar filled with bright redJell-O to Marshall’s school boardmeeting.

He shook it up so the Jell-Osloshed against the glass, a repre-sentation, he told the school boardmembers, of what happens to thebrain during a hard hit in footballand what can happen to those whoare allowed to play the sport at ayoung age.

“The brain is like this Jell-O inthe bottle,” he told them. “Whenthe head hits the ground, it hitsfront and back, and swishes,twists, sloshes and stretches in-side the skull.”

It was a dramatic presentation.It was also futile.

The board listened and thenvoted unanimously on the matterat hand, to bring back tackle foot-ball for seventh graders, which it

had banned only five years ago.Football is a powerful cultural

force in Marshall, a city of about24,000 people in East Texas,where high school games can

draw half of the city’s residentsand church ends early on Sundayswhen the Dallas Cowboys areplaying.

Still, even Marshall has notbeen immune to the nationwidedebate over whether and howyoung children should play tacklefootball — and the shifting demo-graphics of who is left playing it.

The most urgent battle lines areforming along the first years oftackle football, including middleschool in many parts of the coun-

Continued on Page 18

After 5 Years, Youth Football Roars Back in East Texas Town

By KEN BELSON

ON DEFENSE

Debating When to Play

U(D5E71D)x+[!.!/!#!}

A cargo vessel started capsizing off theGeorgia coast in September, promptingconcerns about the pollution creepinginto the waterways. PAGE 17

NATIONAL 4, 17-27

Worries Rise as a Ship SinksAn 18-word viral hit seen 3.9 billiontimes on YouTube won over toddlersand World Series fans, but profits havebeen harder to capture. PAGE 1

SUNDAY BUSINESS

‘Baby Shark’ Hunts Wallets

WASHINGTON — In the 2017fiscal year, FedEx owed more than$1.5 billion in taxes. The next year,it owed nothing. What changedwas the Trump administration’stax cut — for which the companyhad lobbied hard.

The public face of its lobbyingeffort, which included a tax pro-posal of its own, was FedEx’sfounder and chief executive,Frederick Smith, who repeatedlytook to the airwaves to championthe power of tax cuts. “If you makethe United States a better place toinvest, there is no question in mymind that we would see a renais-sance of capital investment,” hesaid on an August 2017 radio showhosted by Larry Kudlow, who isnow chairman of the NationalEconomic Council.

Four months later, PresidentTrump signed into law the $1.5 tril-lion tax cut that became his signa-ture legislative achievement.FedEx reaped big savings, bring-ing its effective tax rate to lessthan zero in fiscal year 2018 from34 percent in fiscal year 2017,meaning that, over all, the govern-ment technically owed it money.But it did not increase investmentin new equipment and other as-sets in the fiscal year that fol-lowed, as Mr. Smith said busi-nesses like his would.

Nearly two years after the taxlaw passed, the windfall to corpo-rations like FedEx is becomingclear. A New York Times analysisof data compiled by Capital IQshows no statistically meaningfulrelationship between the size ofthe tax cut that companies and in-dustries received and the invest-ments they made. If anything, thecompanies that received the big-gest tax cuts increased their capi-tal investment by less, on average,than companies that got smallercuts.

FedEx’s financial filings showthat the law has so far saved it at

INTENSE LOBBYINGBY FEDEX SLASHEDITS TAX BILL TO $0

A $1.6 BILLION WINDFALL

Pledges to Invest SavingsFrom the Trump Cut

Were Not Fulfilled

This article is by Jim Tankersley,Peter Eavis and Ben Casselman.

Continued on Page 22

Anna Louie Sussman PAGE 6

SUNDAY REVIEW

At the last minute, Colin Kaepernickmoved his workout for N.F.L. teams to ahigh school as bad blood continuedbetween him and the league. PAGE 1

SPORTSSUNDAY

No Kneeling, but More Drama

WASHINGTON — John R.Bolton, President Trump’s na-tional security adviser, met pri-vately with the president in Au-gust as part of a bid to persuadeMr. Trump to release $391 millionin security assistance to Ukraine,a senior National Security Councilaide told House impeachment in-vestigators last month.

The meeting, which has notbeen previously reported, cameas Mr. Bolton sought to marshalMr. Trump’s cabinet secretariesand top national security advisersto convince the president that itwas in the United States’ best in-terest to unfreeze the funds to helpUkraine defend itself against Rus-sia. But Mr. Bolton emerged withMr. Trump unmoved, and in-structed the aide to look for newopportunities to get those officialsin front of Mr. Trump.

“The extent of my recollectionis that Ambassador Bolton simplysaid he wasn’t ready to do it,” saidthe aide, Timothy Morrison, refer-ring to Mr. Trump, according to atranscript of his testimony re-leased by House Democrats onSaturday.

Mr. Bolton, who left the WhiteHouse in September, has emergedover weeks of interviews as per-haps the single most importantwitness who has evaded HouseDemocrats as they build a casethat Mr. Trump abused the powersof the presidency by withholdingvital military assistance and acoveted White House meetingfrom Ukraine until it delivered in-vestigations he wanted. The newdisclosure only makes clearer thesignificance of his potential testi-mony.

It also underlines the dilemmathat House Democrats face overtheir decision to press ahead withproceedings without his testi-mony. Last week, Mr. Bolton’s law-yer told House investigators thathis client could discuss “many rel-evant meetings and conversa-tions” of interest to their inquiry,

Aide Disclosed Bolton MeetingAbout Ukraine

Trump Was UnmovedAfter Private Talk

By NICHOLAS FANDOSand SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

Continued on Page 24

TWO VERSIONS MSNBC and FoxNews had different takes on theimpeachment hearings. PAGE 25

For a second day, angry crowds calledfor the ouster of government officialsover a steep increase in gasoline prices.Six people were killed. PAGE 10

INTERNATIONAL 6-16

Iranian Protests Turn Deadly

Late Edition

VOL. CLXIX . . No. 58,514 + © 2019 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2019

BATON ROUGE, La. — Gov.John Bel Edwards of Louisiana,the only Democratic governor inthe Deep South, narrowly won re-election Saturday, overcoming theintervention of President Trump,who visited the state multipletimes in an effort to help Mr. Ed-ward’s Republican challenger anddemonstrate his own clout.

It was the second blow at theballot box for Mr. Trump thismonth in a Republican-leaningstate, following the Democraticvictory in the Kentucky gover-nor’s race, where the presidentalso campaigned for the G.O.P.candidate.

In Louisiana, Mr. Trump hadwagered significant political capi-tal to try to lift Eddie Rispone, abusinessman who ran against Mr.Edwards in large part by embrac-ing the president and his agenda.Mr. Trump campaigned for Mr.Rispone twice in the final two

weeks of the race, warning Louisi-ana voters that a loss would re-flect poorly on his presidency —the same appeal he made in Ken-tucky earlier this month to try tohelp Gov. MattBevin, who ulti-mately lost.

Of the threegovernor’sraces this year,all in deep redstates, Republi-cans won onlyone, in Missis-sippi. Republi-cans also lost control of bothchambers of the state legislaturein Virginia, where many Demo-cratic candidates were sharplycritical of Mr. Trump.

The victory was a deeply per-sonal one for Mr. Edwards, a con-servative Democrat in a state andregion where his party can often

In Louisiana, Governor’s VictoryShows Limits of Trump’s Support

By RICK ROJAS and JEREMY ALFORD

Continued on Page 27

Gov. Edwards

Today, mostly cloudy, brisk, high 43.Tonight, mostly cloudy, a bit of rainlate, breezy, low 38. Tomorrow,cloudy, periodic rain, cold, high 46.Details, SportsSunday, Page 8.

$6.00