Mueller Report, North Korea, Pope Francis: Your Friday Briefing

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Good morning,

We start today with the release of the Mueller report, a new analysis of North Korea and a look at dueling visions within the Vatican.

The special counsel’s report is here

The Mueller report has landed with a thud.

The document revealed a frantic, monthslong effort by President Trump to thwart the investigation into Russia’s 2016 election interference.

Mr. Mueller’s team ultimately decided not to charge the president, citing numerous legal and factual constraints. But they pointedly declined to exonerate him — and they cataloged the attempts by Mr. Trump to escape an inquiry that imperiled his presidency from the start.

The special counsel also left the door open to the possibility that Mr. Trump could be charged after he leaves office.

Quote of note: “If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the president clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state,” Mr. Mueller’s investigators wrote.

Barr’s news conference: The attorney general defended the president in a half-hour news conference ahead of the report’s release. He portrayed Mr. Trump as having been under unprecedented stress from the first days of his presidency from investigations and media scrutiny. Despite his frustration, Mr. Barr said, the White House fully cooperated. Watch the news conference.

Mr. Trump claimed vindication at a White House event and on Twitter. Democrats wasted no time in assailing the attorney general’s framing of the report.

See for yourself: Read the full 448-page report handed out by the Justice Department. We’ve also analyzed excerpts.

A warning from North Korea

American-led sanctions against North Korea are hurting Kim Jong-un in a new way: by targeting the party and military elite who support his totalitarian rule.

Previous international sanctions were aimed at preventing North Korea from acquiring weapons, but newer penalties have hit its lucrative exports — the regime’s main source of income.

North Korea’s test of a “guided tactical weapon” on Thursday might be both a sign of Mr. Kim’s frustration and a warning to Washington that there will be no progress on nuclear disarmament unless the sanctions are eased.

Reminder: Mr. Kim and Mr. Trump have met twice, but they failed to reach an agreement in February, when Mr. Trump rejected Mr. Kim’s proposal to lift sanctions in return for suspending operations at its largest nuclear facility.

What’s next: Mr. Kim said recently that he would give the U.S. until the end of the year to come up with proposals around the deadlock, an implicit warning that North Korea might resume nuclear and intercontinental missile testing. Thursday’s test suggested that he might raise the stakes sooner.

Dueling popes in a divided Vatican?

An outwardly cordial meeting this week between Pope Francis and his predecessor, Pope emeritus Benedict XVI, masked a growing concern within the Vatican and far beyond: that having two popes can be confusing to the faithful — and can risk creating schisms within the Roman Catholic Church.

Francis and Benedict are vastly different in their style, substance and visions of the church. Benedict has remained an icon to traditionalists who feel threatened by Francis, a pope they consider a dictator, a liberal radical and an existential threat to church doctrine.

The background: Since 2013, when Benedict became the first pontiff in centuries to resign, he hasn’t disappeared from view. Last week, he released a 6,000-word letter explaining his views on the church’s clerical sex abuse crisis, effectively undercutting Francis on the issue.

Go deeper: Many theologians consider Benedict’s letter to be an embarrassing analysis of the crisis of pedophilia within the church, which he blamed on the sexual freedoms of the swinging 1960s. Francis, on the other hand, has frequently attributed the crisis to clericalism, a systemic abuse of power and the unhealthy pursuit of authority within the church’s hierarchy.

If you’re following the Indian elections ...

The Election Commission’s ultimate test

The Indian elections are an unruly behemoth, not only to administer but also to monitor. Thousands of candidates deliver campaign speeches and post on social media at the same time.

The Sisyphean task of keeping an eye on it all falls to the Election Commission.

Already, it has temporarily banned two candidates from campaigning for making incendiary remarks, postponed the release of a Bollywood biopic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and canceled voting in one district after uncovering a cash-for-votes scheme.

The commission faces perhaps its greatest test of legitimacy in trying to rein in disinformation — in a country with over 600 million internet users.

In the past year, rumors on social media have led to fatal lynch mobs across the country. And, two phases into a seven-stage election, there has already been an explosion of fake poll results, doctored news clippings and other election-related falsehoods, according to a fact-checking website.

The commission can count some successes. WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook and other platforms have taken down posts that violate the commission’s rules, and developed tools to curb the spread of falsehoods. But there are still concerns. — Alisha Haridasani Gupta

Send us your feedback or questions on this series here.

Here’s what else is happening

Notre-Dame: Donations from wealthy French families and companies to rebuild the fire-ravaged cathedral are nearing $1 billion, intensifying the resentment about economic inequality that has been on display during the Yellow Vest protests.

Salk Institute: Women at the research institution say they faced a culture of marginalization and hostility. In our in-depth report, we found evidence that they’re not alone.

China: An American scholar who advised President Trump said the country blocked his visa application to attend a conference in Beijing, a move that he said was retaliation for American restrictions on Chinese scholars.

Taiwan: A strong earthquake struck the island’s east coast on Thursday, rekindling memories of a deadly tremor last year. The authorities said 17 people were injured and there were no immediate reports of any deaths.

China Mobile: The F.C.C.’s chairman said he would oppose China Mobile’s application to provide cell service to Americans because of security concerns, escalating the battle against Beijing’s influence in the global technology industry.

Saudi Arabia: Six months after agents from the kingdom murdered the writer Jamal Khashoggi, companies are no longer shying away from doing business there.

Snapshot: The Red Cross is struggling to deliver humanitarian aid in Venezuela, above, where even basic transportation infrastructure is crumbling.

Cave diver: Josh Bratchley, a British diver who helped rescue 12 Thai boys from a cave in July, was himself rescued from a cave in Tennessee.

What we’re reading: This essay in Glamour. “After a divorce, the writer Lyz Lenz finds herself dating for the first time,” says Dan Saltzstein, our editorial director for special projects. “What does re-entering the dating world look like in the heat of the #MeToo era? In Lenz’s phrase: ‘a very bad time to be in love with men.’”

Now, a break from the news

Cook: This ultra-tangy tart is somewhere between a lemon tart and a lemon pie.

Watch: Roxann Dawson’s faith-based film, “Breakthrough,” tells the story of a miraculous ordeal with an unassuming simplicity, our critic writes.

Read: The Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Robert Caro shares insights into his craft in “Working,” which is new this week on our hardcover nonfiction and combined print and e-book nonfiction best-seller lists. You can find all our lists here.

Go: History is being made at the Bridge Theater in London, where Maggie Smith is starring in a 100-minute long one-person show.

Smarter Living: Checking to see if something can be repaired before you replace it is a simple way to save money and the earth. YouTube has plenty of instructional videos, and iFixit offers how-to guides and repair discussion forums. In Europe, repair parties and cafes are starting to spring up as well. There’s also a movement to support “right to repair” laws that would require companies to make their products easier to fix.

And we have guidance on the right way to use a public bathroom.

And now for the Back Story on …

The hyphen in Notre-Dame

As we’ve been covering the fire that tore through the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris, we’ve often wondered why it’s not just Notre Dame. Why would Our Lady Cathedral need extra punctuation?

We got the answer from the national commission that preserves and guides France’s conventions of official names. (The French have earned their reputation for being literate, logical and bureaucratic.)

Elisabeth Calvarin, who helps leads that agency, Commission Nationale de Toponymie, explained that the hyphen differentiates place names from proper nouns.

The mother of God worshiped at the cathedral is Notre Dame. The cathedral named for her must have a hyphen. Part of the landmark’s address is named after a pope: Place Jean-Paul II. Saint Denis is the martyr; Saint-Denis is the name of the Paris suburb.

But it’s Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris. Why do the hyphens stop halfway through?

Because France has many churches and cathedrals listed as Notre-Dame, adding the name of the location is helpful — but not registered officially.

That’s it for this briefing. See you on Monday. (We know what our weekend reading is.)

— Stephen and Inyoung

Thank you
Katie Van Syckle helped compile today’s briefing. Mark Josephson, Eleanor Stanford and Kenneth R. Rosen provided the break from the news. Daphné Anglès, in our Paris Bureau, reported today’s Back Story, and we also received guidance from the French Studies Program at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com.

P.S.
• We’re listening to “The Daily.” Today’s episode is the second of a two-part series on abortion.
• Here’s today’s mini crossword puzzle, and a clue: Toss in the trash (5 letters). You can find all our puzzles here.
• The New York Times takes great care with its use of hyphens. For instance, we use the hyphen in compounds denoting national origin, like Japanese-American, but not when the phrase denotes current group membership rather than origin, as in French Canadian.