Your Weekend Briefing

Trump, Saudi Arabia, Turkey View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Sunday, October 14, 2018 [NYTimes.com »]( [Your Weekend Briefing]( By JOUMANA KHATIB AND LANCE BOOTH Here are the week’s top stories, and a look ahead. Johnny Milano for The New York Times 1. The aftermath of Hurricane Michael: The Category 4 storm unleashed powerful winds and rains across six states, killing at least 16 people, causing flash flooding and leaving at least one million without power. As people from the Florida Panhandle to Virginia tried to make sense of the damage — flattened blocks, collapsed buildings, crippled infrastructure — a resigned gloom was setting in throughout the disaster zone. In Florida, rural communities far from the coastline [face an unexpectedly daunting recovery](. Have you been keeping up with the headlines? Our news quiz writer is off this week, but [here’s the front page of our Sunday paper]( [the Sunday Review]( from Opinion and our [crossword puzzles](. ____ Murad Sezer/Reuters 2. What happened? That’s the central question about the [disappearance of the Saudi journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi]( this month. Mr. Khashoggi, a columnist for The Washington Post, entered the Saudi Arabian Consulate in Istanbul, but appears to have never left. Mr. Khashoggi’s fiancée and friends fear he has been either kidnapped or killed. Turkish [investigators have concluded that he is dead](. The Saudi government maintains that he left the consulate on Oct. 2 and is not in its custody. The U.S. has been drawn into the controversy, with Turkish officials saying only President Trump can apply pressure to top Saudis. The disappearance has cast a pall over Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s upcoming conference that attracted top investors, nicknamed “Davos in the Desert.” ____ Tom Brenner for The New York Times 3. Jared Kushner appears to have [paid almost no federal income tax in recent years]( confidential documents show — even as his net worth quintupled to $324 million. Mr. Kushner’s low tax bills are the result of a common tax-minimizing maneuver that, year after year, generated millions of dollars in losses for him, according to the documents. But the losses were only on paper — Mr. Kushner and his company did not appear to actually lose any money. Nothing suggests that he broke the law, one that often ends up being a lucrative giveaway to real estate developers like Mr. Kushner and his father-in-law, President Trump. The White House championed a sweeping revision of federal tax laws that expanded many of the benefits enjoyed by real estate investors, allowing them to reap even larger deductions. ____ Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times 4. With the midterms looming, President Trump has publicly seized control of his messaging, frequently speaking to reporters, hosting a series of rallies and entertaining Kanye West in the Oval Office before TV cameras. Ahead of the election, Mr. Trump’s support among white women has been under scrutiny as many of them shift their support to Democrats, but [white men continue to support the president and his party](. The base could be a bulwark for Republicans, especially in suburban battleground districts that are likely to help decide the next House majority. Find all the [top politics stories of the week here](. ____ Noah Berger/Associated Press 5. Worsening food shortages. More wildfires. Flooded coastlines. These are among the [dire predictions for the next 25 years]( in a report by the U.N.’s scientific panel on climate change. Above, fighting fires in California. Avoiding the most serious damage requires transforming the world economy within just a few years, said the authors, who acknowledged the rescue was politically unlikely. ____ Justin Lane/EPA, via Shutterstock 6. [U.S. stocks suffered their steepest drop in eight months]( last week, as rising interest rates gnaw at investors and technology shares tumble in the face of growing trade tensions with Beijing. The Trump administration took those tensions up another notch by announcing [new investment restrictions]( aimed primarily at preventing China from gaining access to sensitive American technology. [President Trump responded to falling stock prices]( by continuing to throw rocks at the Federal Reserve, which he has described as “crazy,” “loco,” “going wild” and “out of control” for slowly raising interest rates against the backdrop of a booming economy. ____ Hadley Green for The New York Times 7. In Boston on Monday, a court will hear an affirmative action case that could resonate for decades. The [case accuses Harvard of setting a quota on Asian-American students]( accepted to the university and holding them to a higher standard than applicants of other races. It’s not yet clear whether the case will make new law — perhaps banning the consideration of race in college admissions — or will narrowly affect only Harvard. At most, it could end up at the Supreme Court, with lasting changes to admission policies that could reshape universities across the country. ____ Kyle Adams for The New York Times 8. The limousine crash in upstate New York this month left in its wake mourning families, young orphans and officials trying to piece together what went wrong. [Twenty people were killed]( a group of 17 friends on its way to a brewery, the driver of the limousine, and a professor and his father-in-law standing near another car. The limousine had repeatedly failed inspections, including of its brakes, and had been deemed not road worthy by state officials. It was the deadliest accident in the U.S. in nearly a decade. Above, mourners in Amsterdam, N.Y. ____ Will Heath/NBC 9. “Saturday Night Live” recreated last week’s strange meeting between President Trump and Kanye West, with Alec {NAME}, above right, [returning to his role as Mr. Trump](. Chris Redd, above center, played Mr. West, declaring, “I flew here using the power of this hat.” Seth Meyers was this week’s host, his first time since he left the show in 2014. ____ Compass International Pictures 10. Forty years later, the film “Halloween” is still going. The horror classic has inspired a passionate following and a number of sequels and remakes. (The latest reboot comes out this week.) Jamie Lee Curtis, William Shatner, John Carpenter and others sat down to [recall their memories of the film](. “It’s the greatest experience I’ve ever had professionally,” Ms. Curtis said. “It gave me everything in my creative life.” ____ Todd Heisler/The New York Times 11. Finally, what does life look like for girls turning 18 in 2018? Our Gender team asked young women and photographers around the world to explore the question. And Haruki Murakami says he doesn’t dream — he writes. Don’t miss Dan Barry and Jeffrey E. Singer’s moving investigation into the suicide of Song Yang, above, a Chinese immigrant and sex worker in Queens. We have these stories and more in our [Best Weekend Reads](. For more suggestions on what to read, watch and listen to, may we suggest these [10 new books our editors liked]( a glance at the latest small-screen recommendations from [Watching]( and our [music critics’ latest playlist](. _____ Have a great week. Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6 a.m. Eastern. You can [sign up here]( to get our Morning Briefings by email in the Australian, Asian, European or American morning, or [here]( to receive an Evening Briefing on U.S. weeknights. Browse our full range of Times newsletters [here](. What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at [briefing@nytimes.com](mailto:briefing@nytimes.com?subject=Weekend%20Briefing%20Feedback). LIKE THIS EMAIL? Forward it to your friends, and let them know they can sign up [here](. ADVERTISEMENT Sponsor a Subscription Inspire a future generation of readers by contributing to The New York Times [sponsor-a-subscription program](. 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