Here\u2019s what you need to know about the week\u2019s top stories.<\/b>
\nHere are the week\u2019s top stories, and a look ahead.
1. A damning turn for President Trump and his associates:
Federal prosecutors say he directed illegal payments during the presidential campaign to help prevent a possible sex scandal.
The president\u2019s lawyer, Michael Cohen, has said Mr. Trump, above, directed payments to women who claimed they had affairs with Mr. Trump. But in a memo arguing for a prison term for Mr. Cohen, prosecutors in Manhattan said Mr. Cohen \u201cacted in coordination and at the direction of an unnamed individual\u201d \u2014 a clear reference to Mr. Trump.
Separately, the special counsel\u2019s office said that Paul Manafort, Mr. Trump\u2019s former campaign chairman, had \u201ctold multiple discernible lies\u201d about his contacts with Trump administration officials and his interactions with a Russian linked to Moscow\u2019s intelligence services.
Together, the filings laid bare the most direct evidence to date linking Mr. Trump to potentially criminal conduct, and added to an already substantial case that Russia was seeking to sway the 2016 election in his favor.
Have you been keeping up with the headlines? Test your knowledge with our news quiz. And here\u2019s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
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2. John F. Kelly is out. The president said Saturday that Mr. Kelly, above, his second chief of staff, would leave his job by the end of the year. Mr. Kelly\u2019s departure had long been rumored amid signs that he and Mr. Trump had grown irritated with each other.
The president said he would announce Mr. Kelly\u2019s replacement in the coming days. The leading candidate is the vice president\u2019s own chief of staff, Nick Ayers, a political operative who possesses the campaign savvy that Mr. Trump has craved.
Mr. Trump also announced his pick for attorney general: William P. Barr, who served as head of the Justice Department in the first Bush administration. Mr. Barr is a skeptic of the Russia investigation and is known for his expansive vision of executive power.
Speaking of personnel: One former cabinet member had some harsh words for Mr. Trump, who fired right back. Mr. Trump said his former secretary of state of state, Rex W. Tillerson, was \u201cdumb as a rock\u201d and \u201clazy as hell\u201d after Mr. Tillerson said the president was undisciplined, did not like to read and regularly pushed him to take actions that were illegal.
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3. The war of words ended a somber week Washington, which bade farewell to former President George H. W. Bush.
Beginning Monday night, Mr. Bush lay in state in the Capitol Rotunda. His coffin was draped in an American flag and placed on the catafalque built for President Abraham Lincoln. Thousands lined up to pay their respects.
On Wednesday, at a funeral of pomp, pageantry and military precision, former President George W. Bush remembered his father as \u201ca commander in chief of formidable accomplishment and a gentleman who executed the duties of his office with dignity and honor.\u201d (Our chief White House correspondent looks at the extraordinary relationship between the 41st and 43rd presidents.)
President Trump and all four living former presidents, as well as more than 3,000 foreign leaders, lawmakers, Supreme Court justices and other mourners, were in attendance. Here are some major moments from the service.
The comedian Dana Carvey wrote about his friendship with the elder Mr. Bush, whom he impersonated on \u201cSaturday Night Live,\u201d and activists reflected on Mr. Bush\u2019s \u201cmixed legacy\u201d on addressing the AIDS epidemic.
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4. Inside Jared Kushner\u2019s relationship with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia:
The crown prince cultivated Mr. Kushner\u2019s friendship even before his succession, and the two men have had informal, private discussions. Several U. S. advisers worried that Mr. Kushner\u2019s political inexperience could make him a target for manipulation. Their close communication continued even after the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in October set off a firestorm across the world. Above, the crown prince, left, with Mr. Kushner and his wife, Ivanka Trump, last year.
The benefits of their relationship to the U. S. are uncertain, but it has paid off well for the Saudis.
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5. France was roiled by protests for the fourth weekend in a row, as thousands of the so-called Yellow Vests took to the streets across the country. In Paris, the protests turned violent, above, with the police firing water cannons and tear gas to control crowds.
In a time of populist uprisings across the world, the Yellow Vests are different. Though the movement is filled with the working poor from rural areas, these demonstrators have deeper demands, including lower taxes, higher salaries and freedom from financial fear.
President Emmanuel Macron\u2019s government has backed off on a planned fuel tax increase, but that has done little to assuage the protesters, whose outrage has morphed into a broader outcry at his economic policies.
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6. The arrest of a top executive at Huawei, one of China\u2019s flagship technology firms, has thrown President Trump\u2019s trade negotiations with China into disarray.
Unlike another round of tariffs or tough rhetoric from American officials, the detention of the executive, Meng Wanzhou, above, appears to have driven home the rivalry between the United States and China in a visceral way for the Chinese establishment.
China\u2019s president, Xi Jinping, now faces competing pressures: to show strength, perhaps by retaliating against the United States, but also to limit the cost of rising tensions on China\u2019s ruling class.
The Justice Department is investigating Huawei on charges of violating sanctions on Iran. China sees the firm as an important driver of its global ambitions, but much of the world increasingly sees the company as a potential conduit for espionage and sabotage.
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7. The friction between the United States and China on a range of issues threatens to slow global action on climate change at a critical time.
The emissions produced by both countries account for more than 40 percent of the global total \u2014 and those emissions went up this year. That fact is hovering over Katowice, Poland, where the United Nations is leading two weeks of talks on how to implement the Paris Agreement.
In the U. S., the Trump administration is hurriedly clearing the way for oil exploration in the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, seen above, as part of the administration\u2019s campaign to exploit fossil fuels and erase restrictive policies protecting the environment and addressing global warming.
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8. Some lawmakers are not taking their midterm losses quietly. After Gov. Scott Walker\u2019s stunning loss last month, Wisconsin Republicans pushed through a sweeping set of bills Wednesday designed to limit the power of the incoming Democratic leaders.
Michigan Republicans followed suit, but may not have the support of their departing governor, Rick Snyder, who portrays himself as a pragmatic businessman. Above, protesters at the Wisconsin State Capitol.
One congressional race in North Carolina is still not settled. Here\u2019s what we know \u2014 and don\u2019t know \u2014 about the election turmoil in the Ninth District, where the campaign of the Republican candidate, Mark Harris, hired a \u201cguru of elections\u201d who may have gone too far.
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9. \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d brought back Robert De Niro in his role as Robert Mueller, the special counsel, who visited Eric Trump, played by Alex Moffat, in his Trump Tower bedroom. \u201cMr. Mueller, people say you\u2019re the worst thing to ever happen to my dad,\u201d Moffat said.
\u201cNo, Eric,\u201d answered De Niro. \u201cGetting elected president was the worst thing that ever happened to your dad.\u201d
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10. The nominees are here for the Grammys and the Golden Globes.
For both awards, there were surprises, snubs and refreshing developments: All four of the Grammys\u2019 major categories \u2014 record of the year, song of the year, album of the year and best new artist \u2014 are dominated by women, including Cardi B, above.
Our writers had some opinions on the picks. And our critics put out their guides to their favorite albums, movies and performances of the year.
In case you missed it, the actor Kevin Hart stepped down as the host of the Oscars after an outcry over homophobic tweets and comments .
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11. Therapeutic cookie baking; the journalist Isabel Wilkerson on Michelle Obama\u2019s new memoir, \u201cBecoming,\u201d above; and President Trump\u2019s undocumented housekeeper speaks out: We have these stories and more in our Best Weekend Reads.
For more suggestions on what to watch and listen to, may we suggest the latest small-screen recommendations from Watching, 11 new books our editors liked this week and our music critics\u2019 latest playlist .
Have a great week.
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