Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Doctor RJ, Magnifico, annetteboardman and Man Oh Man. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse, ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Interceptor7, BentLiberal, Oke and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
Guardian: Cameron: Brexiters stoking intolerance with immigration obsession by Anushka Asthana and Heather Stewart
David Cameron has accused leave campaigners of stoking intolerance and division with extreme warnings on immigration, and said Britain will be seen as a more “narrow, insular and inward-looking” country if it votes to leave the EU.
In an interview with the Guardian two days before the referendum, the prime minister said all sides of the leave campaign had “become very narrowly focused” on immigration and that the decision could carry consequences.
“I’ve always believed that we have to be able to discuss and to debate immigration. But I’ve always believed that this is an issue that needs careful handling,” he said, speaking in his Downing Street office on Tuesday before embarking on a final 24 hours of campaigning.
“We are talking to a country that has a lot of people who have fled persecution and contribute a massive amount to our country. It does need great care.”
Describing the UK as “arguably the most successful multi-ethnic, multi-faith, opportunity democracy anywhere on earth”, Cameron said a remain vote would represent a step forwards, sending “a very clear message that we’ve rejected this idea that Britain is narrow and insular and inward-looking”.
Chicago Sun-Times: Rauner quietly confirms re-election bid by Tina Sfondeles
Gov. Bruce Rauner — who has spent the last year and half in a war of words with Democrats over the state’s budget crisis — on Monday quietly confirmed he is seeking re-election in 2018.
The news is not a surprise to political insiders. The venture capitalist has long said the business community urged him to run to try to turn around the state’s economy. And he hasn’t yet succeeded in securing his “Turnaround Agenda,” more than a year into his first term.
Just a day after legislators left Springfield without a budget, Rauner as the head of the state’s Republican Party donned his campaign cap, beginning a statewide tour of contested legislative districts in his push to try to oust Democrats in the November election.
The tour prompted state Senate President John Cullerton to urge the governor to “stop campaigning” and “start governing,” and the governor to simply say everyone’s in “election mode.”
I suppose that it’s always possible that the Republicans could run a primary opponent against Rauner. But Republicans with a more “social conservative” bent simply do not do well in Illinois statewide elections (as Jim Oberweis well knows). And, of course, there is the question of whether Illinois Democrats can get anything together to beat a very beatable Rauner...we shall see.
The Hill: Evangelical leader says Trump is ‘un-Christian,' endorses Clinton by Tom Devaney
A top Evangelical leader on Tuesday called Donald Trump “un-Christian” and endorsed Hillary Clinton for president.
“Mr. Trump’s proposals are not just un-Christian — they’re un-American and at odds with the values our country holds dearest,” said Deborah Fikes, executive advisor to the World Evangelical Alliance, a global ministry organization that works with churches in 129 countries around the world.
Fikes went on to say she is “praying” for “Sister Hillary” to be elected.
“Hillary Clinton is the leader who people of faith are looking for and we are praying that Sister Hillary and not Mr. Trump will be elected in November,” Fikes said.
Fikes chimed in with her personal view on the presidential race following Trump’s meeting with Evangelical leaders on Tuesday, though she did not attend the gathering in New York.
Fikes expressed concerns about Trump’s “religious and ethnic intolerance” toward Muslims.
“It troubles me deeply to see abuse of the vulnerable and intolerance toward religious minorities on the rise,” Fikes said.
While I do detest the degree to which religious leaders on both sides of the aisle are involved in politics and policy-making, Deborah Fikes doesn’t seem to be that bad as far as white evangelicals go. I’m willing to bet she is in the minority among evangelical leaders, who may not particularly like Donald Trump but have always held a passionate hatred for Hillary Clinton.
New York Times: Orlando Massacre Inspires Some to Come Out as Gay by Julie Turkewitz
ORLANDO, Fla. — Just hours after the music at the Pulse nightclub was interrupted by the roar of gunfire, a teenager with a nose stud and tight jeans peered across his dinner table here. “Dad,” Carvin Casillas said, “I’m kind of gay.”
The worst mass shooting in United States history by a single perpetrator, which left 49 people dead and 53 injured, has sent the nation reeling and ignited heated conversations about firearm access, terrorism and homophobia. It has also had the incidental effect of pushing some gay people in this increasingly Latino community out of the closet.
Some had their sexuality revealed by accident: Gertrude Merced learned that her 25-year-old son, Enrique, was gay only after she heard the news of his death. Others, though, have chosen to expose their inner lives, stirred by the outpouring of support for Orlando’s gay community or wrought with sorrow and unable to keep their secrets in anymore.
“I just had to let them know,” said Mr. Casillas, 19, a soon-to-be college freshman who had been dancing at Pulse for more than year, unbeknown to his Puerto Rican father and Cuban mother. His mother had raised him in a church where parishioners learned that gay people went to hell.
Guardian: Trader Joe's reaches settlement over Clean Air Act violation claims by Ciara McCarthy
Trader Joe’s agreed on Tuesday to reduce its stores’ greenhouse gas emissions and pay a $500,000 penalty to settle claims from the federal government that the grocery chain had violated the Clean Air Act.
US officials alleged that the company did not promptly repair leaks of a hydrochlorofluorocarbon that the chain used as a coolant in its stores’ refrigerators. Hydrochlorofluorocarbons are an ozone-depleting substance and a potent greenhouse gas which contributes to global warming. The federal complaint also said the company had not kept adequate records of refrigerator repairs.
“Some of the refrigerants now in use by Trader Joe’s are up to 4,700 times more potent than carbon dioxide,” said Alexis Strauss, an EPA official, in a statement. “Today’s settlement will affect all of Trader Joe’s current and new stores to prevent the release of approximately 31,000 metric tons of carbon-equivalent greenhouse gases.”
The settlement, which was filed on Tuesday, stipulates that the company commit to reducing coolant leaks in its refrigerators in the majority of its stores. Trader Joe’s stores will maintain a leak rate of 12.1% through 2019, according to the consent decree. Across the grocery store industry, refrigerators leak potentially harmful coolants at an average rate of 25%, officials said in a statement. In addition, all new Trader Joe’s stores will use a different refrigerator coolant that is less harmful to the ozone layer. These changes, which include a new leak management system, will cost the California-based chain about $2m over the next three years.
Reuters: Two L.A.-area wildfires threaten to merge after forcing evacuations by Alex Dobuzinskis
Two rapidly growing wildfires burning a few miles apart through drought-parched foothills northeast of Los Angeles prompted the evacuation of nearly 800 homes on Tuesday, as a heat wave continued to bake much of the U.S. Southwest for a third straight day.
Abnormally high temperatures climbing into the high 90s and triple digits across much of the region helped stoke wildfires from the coastal hills outside Santa Barbara to desert brush near the Mexican border, and several other Western states.
Fires also were menacing populated areas in New Mexico, Arizona and along the Colorado-Wyoming border.
The greatest immediate threat was posed by a pair of fires that erupted near each other on Monday near the Angeles National Forest and doubled in size overnight as they roared unchecked through foothills and canyons above the communities of Azusa and Duarte northeast of Los Angeles.
Those fires, jointly referred to by authorities as the San Gabriel Complex, had devoured some 5,400 acres combined, according to latest estimates on Tuesday evening.
Dallas Morning News: Mavs owner Mark Cuban on Donald Trump: 'It's rare that you see someone get stupider before your eyes'
The NBA season is over, and Mavericks owner Mark Cuban would like you to know what he thinks of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
In an interview with Extra, Cuban said, "It's rare that you see someone get stupider before your eyes, but he's really working at it...You have to give him credit. It's a difficult thing to do, but he's accomplished it."
Cuban challenged Extra interviewer Renee Bargh to come up with one good deal Trump had made. She couldn't.
"When he talks about his great renegotiations, they're renegotiations, so tell me if you think this is a good deal: I lose four casinos, they go out of business, but I'm really good at renegotiating the debt of his companies that have already gone out of business," Cuban told Extra.
"He'd get kicked out of Shark Tank so fast, it would make your head spin," Cuban said, referring to his ABC show.
Trump and Cuban haven't spoken in a month, since soon after Cuban started "picking on him," to his own admission.
Say what you will about Cuban (and Cuban is likeable but I can take him or leave him), he is spilling much tea on The Donald and I am all ears...and chuckles.
Bloomberg.com: Ryan Carves Conservative Path as Trump Agenda Remains Elusive by Billy House
House Speaker Paul Ryan is pushing out a detailed Republican platform that hews to conservative orthodoxy in an election year when Donald Trump has found found success in being unorthodox and vague.
It’s a highly unusual move -- a top lawmaker trying to set the party’s agenda ahead of the presidential nominee. And it raises the question of whether Trump, who has shown little interest in Ryan’s proposals, might adopt them, or just ignore them altogether.
Ryan is issuing a six-volume policy agenda for House colleagues to campaign on ahead of November elections. The fifth part, to be announced Wednesday, focuses on replacing President Barack Obama’s health-care law. That will be followed by a final chapter of proposed tax changes.
Trump and his aides have been quietly sounding out a number of Republicans on their policy plans, but the billionaire has shown little sign of adopting any in his public remarks.
"I worry whether Trump will actually embrace the conservative ideals that both the House and Senate conservatives would like to see happen," Representative Reid Ribble, a Wisconsin Republican, said. "Clearly, there’s differences of opinion" on such things as trade.
Minneapolis Star-Tribune: Facing backlogs, Minnesota hospitals develop housing for psychiatric patients by Chris Serres
Frustrated by chronic bottlenecks in the state mental health system, three of Minnesota’s largest hospitals are taking matters into their own hands.
Mayo Clinic and Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC) have cemented plans to develop short-term housing for adults with psychiatric illnesses who may be ready for discharge from the hospital, but need more therapy before returning to their own homes. And in St. Paul, Regions Hospital is exploring plans to develop a 16-bed residential treatment center that will help psychiatric patients after they are discharged from area hospitals.
The new “recovery homes” will serve more than 400 adults with mental illnesses a year, relieving pressure on hospital emergency departments that have become overwhelmed by a surge of patients suffering mental health crises.
These projects reflect a broader change in direction for Minnesota hospitals, which historically have offered limited help for patients making the difficult transition back to their own communities after being discharged from an acute psychiatric ward.
Guardian: San Diego sex trafficking industry worth $800m annually, federal report finds by Joanna Walters and Laurence Mathieu-Leger
A federal report on sex trafficking in San Diego has revealed a vast underground industry worth more than $800m annually, eight times higher than previously estimated.
The report, considered the best measure of the problem’s scope to date, has shocked researchers and law enforcement officers in the region.
“I didn’t realize the amount of money involved,” said Bill Gore, the San Diego County sheriff.
Sex trafficking, defined as the trade in which someone has been forced, coerced or tricked into prostitution, involves some 110 gangs just in San Diego County, dubbed one of 13 hot spots for child sex trafficking in the US by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
“This is a beautiful town with an ugly truth,” said Summer Stephan, the county’s chief deputy district attorney.
AlJazeera: India's embarrassing North Korean connection by Nilanjana Bhowmick
New Delhi, India - Hong Yong-il is the North Korean embassy’s new first secretary to India and has been in the country for just a month.
He lives on the first floor of a two-storey house in a tree-lined lane in Delhi’s busy Lajpat Nagar.
The apartment is huge but nondescript, sparsely furnished; a modest affair as compared with many other diplomatic residences in the Indian capital.
Hong wears on his shirt a miniature badge, with the face of Kim Il-sung, the country's founding father and grandfather of current leader Kim Jong-un.
This is not Hong's first stint in India. In 1996, he stayed in the country for nine months, studying a course in remote sensing technology at the Centre for Space Science and Technology Education in Asia and the Pacific (CSSTEAP).
The research centre is located in Dehradun, a small town in the foothills of the Himalayas, about 235km from the Indian capital New Delhi.
"Dehradun is a very quiet town," Hong said in an interview with Al Jazeera. "The course was very informative, the teachers were very good."
Reuters: In Jerusalem's cramped Old City, Christians feel the squeeze by Sleiman Jad
When hundreds of Jewish nationalists marched through the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem's Old City this month, waving banners and chanting songs in what has become an annual ritual, it wasn't only Muslims watching warily. Christians were, too.
Religious tension is nothing new in a city that has been the home of three faiths for centuries. But the outlook for the Christian minority, squeezed inside the ancient walls of the Old City and caught in the midst of a months-long wave of violence involving Muslims targeting Jews, has seldom looked tougher.
While the Muslim population rises steadily, now making up 75 percent of the 38,000 residents in the city's alleys, and the Jews increasingly make their presence felt via the annual march and their settlements beyond the Jewish Quarter, the number of Christians has not risen in 50 years, hovering around 7,000.
"If a thousand Muslims leave Jerusalem, that's one thing," said Jamal Khader, head of the Latin Patriarchate Seminary near Bethlehem. "But if a thousand Christians leave, you threaten the identity of Jerusalem as a city of multiple faiths."
AFP: Rivals clash in heated Brexit showdown
Rival sides in Britain's referendum on European Union membership clashed in a passionate debate to the roars of an audience of six thousand in a London concert arena.
It was a final opportunity for the two camps to win over voters, with polls showing a razor-tight race less than 36 hours before a vote that will shape the future of Europe.
Panellists locked horns over immigration, as the pro-EU London Mayor Sadiq Khan tore into his predecessor Boris Johnson, a key campaigner on the "Leave" side.
"You're telling lies and you're scaring people," Khan declared as he brandished a "Leave" leaflet warning that majority-Muslim Turkey could join the EU.
"That's scaremongering, Boris, and you should be ashamed... you are using the ruse of Turkey to scare people to vote Leave," Khan said to cheers from the audience.
Johnson threw the criticism back at Khan, saying the pro-EU side had run a "Project Fear" by warning that leaving the 28-member bloc would damage Britain's economy.
"They say we have no choice but to bow down to Brussels. We say they are woefully underestimating this country and what it can do," Johnson said.
Reuters: Kidnappers snatch son of top provincial judge in Pakistan by Syed Raza Hassan
Masked men kidnapped the son of a senior Pakistani judge in the southern port city of Karachi, police said on Tuesday, suspecting the victim could be used as a bargaining chip in negotiations to free imprisoned Islamist militants.
Awais Ali Shah, the son of Sindh High Court Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah, was abducted outside a supermarket in the city on Monday, according to police. Eyewitnesses told officers that Shah, a lawyer, had put up a fight before being quickly overpowered and thrown into a white getaway car.
"So far it is kidnapping, and my professional assessment is that it is not for ransom," Allah Dino Khawaja, the police chief in Sindh province told Reuters.
Security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said they suspected the kidnappers would offer to free Shah in return for the release of captured militants.
Kidnapping by criminal gangs and militants is common in Pakistan. Police did not say why they suspected Shah had been abducted by militants.
Mashable: Sick crew member at the South Pole prompts rare, dangerous rescue mission by Andrew Freedman
A rare, daring mission is underway in Antarctica to rescue an ill contractor for the National Science Foundation from the frigid, isolated and dark Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station.
Right now, two propellor-driven DeHavilland Twin Otter aircraft are on the ground at the British Antarctic Survey's Rothera base, located on the Antarctic Peninsula.
Once a window of favorable weather conditions appears, one of the planes will fly south in complete darkness and extreme cold, to the South Pole Station. The other plane will remain at Rothera, ready to launch a rescue mission should the first plane go down.
According to a statement from the National Science Foundation (NSF), which operates the South Pole Station, at least one member out of the 48 overwintering crew will be evacuated to receive medical treatment.
That crew member is a contractor for Lockheed Martin Antarctic Support, which is the main support contractor to NSF for the U.S. Antarctic Program.
"It is possible that the evacuation flight will bring a second patient out of Antarctica. That decision still is pending," the NSF stated in a press release Monday. The agency did not release any details about the patients or the nature of their illnesses.
Deutsche Welle: German 'Stonehenge' opens to the public by Courtney Tenz
The "Ringheiligtum Pömmelte" as it is known thanks to its location near the eastern German town of Pömemlte, celebrated its opening as a cultural site on Tuesday (20.6.2016).
The formation, known as the Stonehenge of Germany, is estimated to be around 4,300 years old and was discovered in 1999 in the forest near the banks of the Elbe River. Made of wood, the archaeological wonder has not withstood the test of time well and has since been entirely reconstructed at a cost of 2 million euros ($2.27 million).
Comprising an arrangement of rings seven layers deep, the configuration is thought to have been of great significance from the 21st to 23rd centuries BC - the time in which the world was transitioning from the Neolithic period to the Bronze Age.
The pre-historic site is presumed to have served as a power center to the elite. Carvings found in the wood that are thought to symbolize the cosmos suggest the area was of importance in religious ceremonies and perhaps played a significant role in offerings.
And don’t forget that Hunter is hosting an open thread for night owls tonight.
Everyone have a great evening!