Without evidence

President Trump doesn’t like wind farms. Never has. He thinks they’re ugly. He calls them inefficient and expensive. Years ago, he failed to stop the construction of one that’s visible from one of his golf courses in Scotland. He was apoplectic about it. He told a Scottish politician on Twitter in 2014 that “the windmill hovering over hole 14 is disgusting & inappropriate.”

On his first day in office this year, Trump stopped new wind projects on public lands and waters. A judge called that order “arbitrary” and said it violated federal law. Still, Trump persevered. Yesterday his administration said it would halt leases for five wind farms under construction off the East Coast, virtually gutting the offshore wind industry in the United States. The projects were “expected to power more than 2.5 million homes and businesses,” my colleagues Maxine Joselow and Lisa Friedman report.

Perhaps in order not to appear arbitrary, Doug Burgum, the secretary of the interior, said that the decision “addresses emerging national security risks, including the rapid evolution of the relevant adversary technologies, and the vulnerabilities created by large-scale offshore wind projects with proximity near our East Coast population centers.”

Based on what evidence? The Pentagon has produced classified reports, Burgum said, and the Energy Department has found that wind farms could interfere with radar systems.

Is this true? Military studies have indeed shown that offshore wind turbines could disrupt radar, Lisa told me. But they concluded that the risk could be offset with planning. A spokesman for one of the wind farms said it had worked “in close coordination with the military.” He pointed out that his project’s two pilot turbines had been operating for five years with no impact on national security.

It is not the first time the administration has justified a new policy — one it wanted to impose quickly without fretting over legal and regulatory procedures — with a broad claim. It just asserts there’s a problem.

A fixation

Trump has given many reasons to dislike wind farms, but so far none are backed by agreed-upon facts. Here’s a look at his views:

• “If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations, your house just went down 75 percent in value,” he said in 2019. “And they say the noise causes cancer.”

• “If you love birds, you’d never want to walk under a windmill because it’s a very sad, sad sight. It’s like a cemetery,” he continued. “In California, if you shoot a bald eagle, they put you in jail for five years. And yet the windmills, they wipe them all out.”

• “The windmills are driving the whales crazy, obviously,” he said in January.

(Maybe, but the administration has also weakened habitat protections, ended automatic protections for threatened species and said economic factors should take priority in decisions about endangered species.)

The rationales

In explaining a range of new policies, the president has pointed to grounds that don’t draw from evidence, or at least not evidence the public can see.

Wind farms: These need to be stopped because of radar “clutter.” See above.

Illegal immigrants: Some have been selected for deportation because the government has said they belong to a gang — without proving it.

Boat strikes: The administration says the nearly 100 boats destroyed off South America were running drugs to the United States. It hasn’t released any evidence for that claim.

National Guard deployments: Trump says protesters in a number of Democratic-led cities have threatened the safety of immigration agents and government facilities. Judges have chastised officials for not providing evidence for these assertions.

Alien Enemies Act: The administration says the presence of Venezuelan gang members in the United States constitutes an “invasion” by a “hybrid criminal state” that allows him to invoke this wartime law, reminds my colleague Mattathias Schwartz, who covers legal affairs. But U.S. intelligence agencies have said Venezuela is not directing gang activity.

Refugees: Trump has shut down most refugee admissions but is letting in white Afrikaners based on a claim of genocide against them that is not backed by evidence, says my colleague Zolan Kanno-Youngs, who covers the White House.

Liberal nonprofits: Vice President JD Vance and others say these groups support political violence — again without providing evidence.

It all adds up to what you might call a governance of assertion. That is: Trust, but don’t verify.

Now, let’s see what else is going on in the world.

THE LATEST NEWS

China

• The Pentagon and American A.I. companies share a weakness: They both desperately need China’s batteries.

• The Trump administration banned sales of foreign-made drones, including a popular brand from China.

• A federal judge in Brooklyn declared a mistrial in the case of Linda Sun, a former aide to Democratic governors who was accused of working for China.

Trump Administration

• The Trump administration is considering giving nearly 800 acres of land in a wildlife refuge in Texas to SpaceX to expand its rocket launch and production site, documents show.

• President Trump announced a new class of Navy warships that would be named for himself.

• The Education Department will investigate safety standards at Brown University following a shooting there.

Diplomacy

• Trump appointed a special envoy to Greenland, part of his efforts to take over the Danish territory. Officials in Denmark and Greenland were furious.

• The Trump administration has ordered nearly 30 ambassadors to leave their posts by mid-January. The union representing career diplomats said such a mass recall had never happened before.

Health

• The F.D.A. approved a pill version of the injectable weight-loss drug Wegovy.

• Around 50 Planned Parenthood locations shut down this year, largely as a result of Republican efforts. Click the video below to watch Caroline Kitchener explain how Christian anti-abortion centers are filling the void.

Immigration

• A judge ruled that the Trump administration must either help bring back a group of Venezuelans deported to El Salvador or let them challenge their deportations in U.S. courts.

• Many Sikh immigrants are truckers in the United States. Their jobs are under threat.

Assad Regime

• Syrian officials who brutalized hundreds of thousands of people during Bashar al-Assad’s regime have fled the country. Today, many are reveling at places like the Four Seasons in Moscow, a Times investigation found.

• Assad himself has been living and dining in luxury — in secluded villas and gleaming skyscrapers, guarded by Russian security services.

Other Big Stories

• Jim Beam, the country’s largest bourbon maker, announced a one-year pause in production at its flagship distillery in Kentucky as demand for alcohol continues to decline.

• CBS is in turmoil after its top editor, Bari Weiss, pulled a “60 Minutes” segment.

• Larry Ellison, the billionaire father of Paramount’s chief executive, made a personal guarantee to provide the roughly $40 billion in equity that Paramount is offering in its bid for Warner Bros. Discovery.

• The U.S. Army for years put inexperienced pilots in aging helicopters and flew them over the nation’s capital, a Times investigation found.

IN ONE MAP

During the Biden administration, most deportations happened at the border: Migrants who had crossed into the U.S. were quickly sent away. In the Trump era, though, the border has gotten much quieter. So the administration has set out to arrest and deport far more people from the interior of the country.

The map above shows what that new deportation system looks like, as people are transferred between immigrant detention facilities across the U.S. and then sent out of the country from a handful of hubs in the South. Read the story.

OPINIONS

Christians are frustrated with the media’s simplistic depictions of them, Molly Worthen writes.

Here is a column by Thomas Edsall on how Trump’s policies could kill his own supporters.

MORNING READS

A new face at the manger: In Naples, Nativity scenes sometimes include miniature statues of celebrities and politicians. This year, Trump is a popular addition.

Ghosting ChatGPT: The woman behind the MyBoyfriendIsAI online community isn’t dating (or sexting) her A.I. boyfriend anymore. She found something more fulfilling.

Street art: Two new murals attributed to Banksy have appeared in central London.

Your pick: The Morning’s most-clicked link yesterday was about the U.S. military’s pursuit of a tanker linked to Venezuela.

A singer-songwriter: Chris Rea, a British rocker whose hits included the ballad “Driving Home for Christmas,” died at 74.

TODAY’S NUMBER

5-millionths

— That’s how much of a second the atomic clocks at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colo. — some of the most accurate in the world — fell out of sync last week because of a power outage.

SPORTS

N.F.L.: The Buffalo Bills, the Los Angeles Chargers and the Jacksonville Jaguars are headed to the playoffs after the Indianapolis Colts lost to the San Francisco 49ers.

Hockey: Players in one of the top minor hockey leagues in North America could go on strike Friday. They have been playing without a collective bargaining agreement since the start of the season.

RECIPE OF THE DAY

This was my father’s recipe until it became mine, and I hope it’ll become yours and then someone else’s: prime rib, one of the holiday season’s most handsome and delicious proteins. It is also one of the most expensive, so don’t even think of proceeding without an instant-read probe thermometer at your side. Protect the investment! Pull the roast from the oven at 120 to 122 degrees Fahrenheit and allow it to rest, continuing to cook as it does, until the internal temperature has reached 125 or so for medium rare. Definitely make Yorkshire pudding with the fat rendered in the roasting pan.

WHO IS SYDNEY SWEENEY?

Sydney Sweeney is one of the most perplexing figures in the movies today, writes Esther Zuckerman: a bombshell actress who has been hailed and vilified for what might be her real-life political views, and whose work onscreen often challenges the patriarchy.

“The right-wing crowd has deemed her a hero, the left-wing one a pariah,” Esther writes, “and lost in all of this is what she’s doing in her true profession: acting.”

Sweeney is a blank slate, in other words. Which makes her both a promising star and someone who can be whoever the fans want her to be. Cue Michael Jordan: “Republicans buy sneakers, too.”

More on culture

• It was a year of big headlines, but consider these small shifts, mini trends and under-the-radar developments that reveal a new cultural atmosphere. Cigarettes are back (at least onscreen). Woke is gone. Plastic surgery’s no secret. Maybe college is a waste of money. There’s a lot here to debate and discuss.

• Is “Jingle All the Way,” the unhinged 1996 action comedy starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sinbad, Phil Hartman and Rita Wilson, the perfect good-bad holiday movie? My colleague Maya Salam makes the case.

THE MORNING RECOMMENDS

Watch our critic Jon Caramanica break down the emotional manipulation of the A.I.-generated Black Christian soul singer Solomon Ray. Ray’s — or “Ray’s” — “Find Your Rest” is our song of the week.

Improve your running, and avoid injury, with these simple exercises.

Discover the most popular products the testifying experts at Wirecutter uncovered this year.

GAMES

Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangrams were clunked and knuckled.

And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections, Sports Connections and Strands.

Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times and me. See you tomorrow. — Sam

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