Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, eeff, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame, jck, and JeremyBloom. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Interceptor 7, Man Oh Man, wader, Neon Vincent, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck (RIP), rfall, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) 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.
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Chicago Sun-Times: For third time, Illinois lawmakers fail to pass Karina’s Bill aimed at protecting domestic violence victims by Mawa Iqbal
A few months ago, Monica Alvarez traveled from Chicago to Springfield.
She was joined by dozens of advocates with various gun violence prevention groups. Alvarez was there to push for Karina’s Bill. At a rally outside of the Capitol building, she said it was both painful and heartbreaking for her to be there.
“But I stand here today because my cousin Karina and Daniela were murdered on July 3, 2023,” Alvarez said.
Karina Gonzalez and her 15-year-old daughter Daniela were shot and killed in their Little Village home — allegedly by Karina’s husband. The court had ordered her husband to stay away from Karina and her family, citing drug use and threatening behavior. And while his firearm owners ID card was confiscated, his firearms were not. [...]
The lawmakers, however, wrapped up their legislative session last month once again without passing Karina’s bill, or even calling it for a full vote on the Senate floor. The measure would have required judges to order the confiscation of guns from people who have emergency restraining orders against them.
The New York Times: Wisconsin Charges 3 Trump Allies in Fake Electors Scheme by Neil Vigdor and Danny Hakim
Wisconsin brought felony charges on Tuesday against three onetime advisers of former President Donald J. Trump in connection with a fake electors plot there in 2020, becoming the fifth battleground state to prosecute his allies for their attempts to overturn his defeat that year.
Kenneth Chesebro, an architect of the Trump campaign’s plans to impanel slates of bogus electors in several states that Mr. Trump lost, was named as a defendant in the action by Wisconsin’s attorney general, Josh Kaul, a Democrat.
The other men charged were James R. Troupis, a former judge who was working for the campaign in Wisconsin, and Michael Roman, who was Mr. Trump’s director of Election Day operations.
All three face a single count of forgery-uttering, a felony in Wisconsin that carries a penalty of up to six years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
NBC News: Triple-digit temperatures to hit parts of California and Arizona in early-season heat wave by Evan Bush and Dana Griffin
Following a bout of extreme pre-summer heat in Texas and Florida, California and Arizona are next in line for temperature spikes.
The National Weather Service is forecasting a heat wave throughout much of the Southwest and parts of California from Tuesday through Thursday as a ridge of high pressure centers over the region.
The forecast suggests temperatures may climb to 113 degrees Fahrenheit in Phoenix and could reach 108 in California’s Central Valley.
“It’s coming early,” said Eric Kurth, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sacramento, California. “Heat is here, and we need to prepare.”
By Wednesday, most Southwest communities will have moderate, major or extreme heat risks, according to a new map of heat risk from the National Weather Service.
CNN: Biden’s sweeping asylum restrictions take effect at midnight as he tackles a key political problem by Priscilla Alvarez and Donald Judd
The Biden administration is quickly invoking an authority to shut off access to asylum for migrants who cross the US-Mexico border illegally, a significant attempt by President Joe Biden to address head on one of his biggest political vulnerabilities.
Biden unveiled the sweeping executive action Tuesday afternoon at the White House, attempting to use executive action to affect the situation on the border after a bipartisan measure failed earlier this year. The action marks the administration’s most dramatic move on the US southern border as Biden tries to gain the upper hand on immigration just weeks from the first presidential debate – by using the same authority former President Donald Trump tried to use in office.
The White House announced the action would take effect at midnight.
In a speech at the White House, Biden said Republicans in Congress who blocked a bipartisan border deal left him no choice but to take executive action.
“I’m moving past Republican obstruction and using the executive authorities available to me as president to do what I can on my own to address the border,” Biden said.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lost its national majority after suffering major losses in key states, marking a dramatic shift in a political landscape it has dominated for the past decade.
The BJP emerged, comfortably, as the country’s single-largest party in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of India’s parliament. But with most votes counted after India’s six-week-long election on Tuesday, the BJP was well short of its performances from 2014 and 2019.
Unlike both those elections, when the BJP won clear majorities on its own in a house of 543 seats, it was poised to end up with 240 seats this time around. The halfway mark is 272 seats.
By contrast, the opposition INDIA alliance, led by the Congress party, was projected to win more than 200 seats, significantly higher than exit polls had predicted. Released on June 1 after the final phase of India’s election cycle, the exit polls had suggested that the BJP would outdo its 2019 tally of 303 seats.
Modi and his party are still likely to be able to form India’s next government — but will be dependent on a clutch of allies whose support they will need to cross the 272-seat mark. The BJP with its allies, in a coalition known as the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), was projected to win around 282 seats.
Modi was expected to win in an electoral rout, according to the polls. It’s why I haven’t hit the panic button for this coming November.
Now Rishi Sunak and the Conservative Party in Britain, OTOH...
BBC News: Mexican mayor killed hours after first woman elected president by Vanessa Buschschlüter
Gunmen have killed the female mayor of a town in Mexico just hours after the country celebrated the election of Claudia Sheinbaum as the nation's first woman president.
Yolanda Sánchez was shot in the town of Cotija, which she had governed since September 2021.
She was the first woman to be elected to the post.
Widespread violence against politicians has overshadowed Mexico's general election, which saw two women run for the presidency.
Yolanda Sánchez was ambushed by gunmen in the centre of Cotija, Michoacán, on Monday.
Local media say she was shot 19 times and died in hospital shortly after the attack. Her bodyguard was also killed in the gun battle.
No arrests have been made so far in connection with the attack but it is widely thought that the gunmen belonged to an organised crime group.
DW: Are North Korea's trash balloons a sign of bigger tensions? By Julian Ryall
The South Korean government has warned it is planning countermeasures against North Korea, which has dramatically ramped up provocations following a failed attempt to place a spy satellite into orbit on May 27.
South Korea's ruling People Power Party (PPP) convened a meeting of its emergency committee on Monday to consider responses to the North's actions since the rocket carrying the satellite exploded in mid-air shortly after launch.
Since late May, North Korea has jammed GPS signals over a wide area off the west coast of the Korean Peninsula, potentially endangering civilian air and maritime traffic. The North also fired 10 short-range ballistic missiles and rounds from 18 multiple rocket launchers into the Sea of Japan.
Pyongyang has also issued threats against shipping operating near the disputed sea border off the west coast, and claims to have released 2,000 balloons carrying trash and human waste over the border into the South.
Authorities in the South have confirmed around 700 have landed, causing minor damage and spreading human feces and rubbish at landing sites.
The Washington Post: Dr Pepper is now as popular as Pepsi. It’s still shrouded in mystery. By Emily Heil
“Prune juice.” “Barbecued water.” “Elixir of the gods.”
Those are just some of the phrases used to describe Dr Pepper, the un-pin-downable soda brand whose secret recipe is said to include 23 flavors. This week, we learned that the purplish-red canned beverage (see, even its label contains an enigma!) had joined Pepsi to become the nation’s second-best-selling soda, behind category-dominating Coke, according to trade publication Beverage Digest. (Dr Pepper is technically a smidgen ahead, but it’s essentially a tie.)
That news might have surprised even some of Dr Pepper’s most ardent fans, many of whom revel in the kind of weird aura that surrounds their beloved, inscrutable drink. But Pepsi’s fortunes have declined, and the good doctor’s have risen, and now each brand represents 8.3 percent of the soda market. (Coke is ahead comfortably with 19.2 percent.)
The drink’s story started in 1885 at Morrison’s Old Corner Drug Store in Waco, Tex. There, pharmacist Charles Alderton was supposedly inspired by the intermingled scent of the various fruit syrups used to flavor sodas, and so he created the blend to achieve the concoction’s now-iconic flavor.
More than a century later, among the shelves of bland corporate products, Dr Pepper has always felt like a freaky anomaly, a brand shrouded in mystery...
Have the best possible evening everyone!