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: Lightfoot is out — with Vallas in strong lead, expected to face Johnson in runoff by Fran Spielman
Lori Lightfoot, the first Black woman and the first openly-gay person ever to serve as mayor of Chicago, on Tuesday became a one-term mayor.
With 88.8 % of precincts reporting, the mayor who guided Chicago through the pandemic was headed toward a third-place finish in Tuesday’s election with 16.4% of the vote behind former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas at 35.02% and Cook County Commissioner and Chicago Teachers Union organizer Brandon Johnson with 20.25%.
Vallas, 69, and Johnson, 46, will likely face off in the April 4 runoff to decide who will become the 57th mayor of Chicago.
“Obviously, we didn’t win the election. But, I stand here with my head held high and my heart full of thanks,” Lighfoot told supporters shortly before 9 p.m.
“You will not be defined by how you fall. You will be defined by how hard you work and how much you do for other people.”
Chicago Sun-Times: Analysis: How Lightfoot went from political rock star to rock bottom by Fran Spielman
Four years ago, she was a darling among national Democrats. The first openly gay Black woman to serve as mayor of Chicago and only the second woman to do so in the city’s history.
On Tuesday, she joined Jane Byrne and Michael Bilandic as the the only elected mayors of Chicago to be denied a second term since Prohibition.
How did Lori Lightfoot fall so far, so fast, to the point where she couldn’t even make it into a runoff between the two top finishers? [...]
Bad timing is too simple an explanation for Lightfoot’s stunning political downfall.
It does not explain why violent crime is up 40% since Lightfoot promised during her inaugural address to stop the “epidemic of gun violence that devastates families, shatters communities, holds children hostage to fear in their own homes” and leaves parents wondering “if Chicago is a place where they can continue to live and raise their children.”
It does not explain why Lightfoot has been such a disappointment to the lakefront voters who formed the base of her support in 2019. Lightfoot opposed the elected school board after saying she’d support it, failed to deliver the transparency she had promised and broke her pledge to raise the real estate transfer tax on high-end home sales to create a dedicated funding source to reduce homelessness.
The New York Times: Supreme Court Appears Skeptical of Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness Plan by Adam Liptak
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority seemed deeply skeptical on Tuesday of the legality of the Biden administration’s plan to wipe out more than $400 billion in student debt, heightening the prospect that the justices would thwart efforts to forgive the loans of tens of millions of borrowers.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. indicated that the administration had acted without sufficiently explicit congressional authorization to undertake one of the most ambitious and expensive executive actions in the nation’s history, violating separation-of-powers principles.
“I think most casual observers would say,” the chief justice said, that “if you’re going to give up that much amount of money, if you’re going to affect the obligations of that many Americans on a subject that’s of great controversy, they would think that’s something for Congress to act on.”
The court’s three liberal members said Congress had already acted, by passing a law in 2003 that authorized the secretary of education to address emergencies.
The Washington Post: A poll asked if it’s ‘OK to be white.’ Here’s why the phrase is loaded. By Marisa Iati and Scott Clement
The polling group presented survey takers with an oddly phrased question: Did they agree or disagree with the statement, ‘It’s OK to be white’?
When a slim majority of Black respondents said yes, comic strip creator Scott Adams cited the results to argue that Black Americans are “a hate group,” urging White people to “get the hell away from” Black people. His racist rant prompted hundreds of newspapers to drop his “Dilbert” comic in disapproval, rendering the decades-old cartoon homeless.
The survey question was asked by the conservative-leaning Rasmussen Reports, whose head pollster described it as a “simple” and “uncontroversial” query. But, in fact, the phrase in question has a freighted history that implies more than its face-value meaning.
The phrase “it’s okay to be White” was popularized in 2017 as a trolling campaign meant to provoke liberals into condemning the statement and thus, the theory went, proving their own unreasonableness. White supremacists picked up on the trend, adding neo-Nazi language, websites or images to fliers with the phrase.
NBC News: Amid a crime spike and complaints of uncollected trash, New Orleans mayor faces a possible recall election by Daniella Silva
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell faces a possible recall election as violent crime spikes, uncollected trash overflows into the streets and she contends with allegations she had an affair with a member of her security detail.
The first Black woman to be elected mayor in 2018, Cantrell easily won re-election in 2021. But her popularity has waned as the number of murders has climbed, allowing New Orleans to capture a title last year that no municipality wants — the murder capital of the nation.
Her second term has also been plagued by questions about her personal use of a city-owned apartment in the French Quarter and her relationship with a member of her security detail.
Organizers of an effort to recall Cantrell delivered nearly a dozen boxes of signed petitions to the registrar of voters’ office last week, just ahead of a deadline to seek a recall election. Organizers said they gathered enough signatures to force a recall vote.
BBC News: Finland starts construction of Russia border fence by George Wright
Finland has begun constructing a 200km (124 mile) fence on its border with Russia to boost security.
The Border Guard said it will be 3m (10ft) tall with barbed wire on top.
Finland shares the longest European Union border with Russia, at 1,340km (832 miles). At present, Finland's borders are secured primarily by light wooden fences.
Finland decided to build the fence due to a rise in Russians seeking to escape conscription to fight in Ukraine.
The Nordic country also moved closer to joining the Nato alliance on Tuesday. Its parliament started debating a bill to speed up the country's bid, with a vote expected on Wednesday.
Work on the fence at the Imatra border crossing started on Tuesday with forest clearance, while road construction and fence installation are planned to start in March.
AlJazeera: Bola Tinubu leads in Nigeria election, opposition seeks new vote by Eromo Egbejule
Abuja, Nigeria – Three of Nigeria’s opposition parties have called for the cancellation of the February 25 presidential and parliamentary elections, as the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has firmly taken the lead in the ongoing collation process.
Provisional results announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from 19 of Nigeria’s 36 states put the APC’s presidential candidate Bola Tinubu in the lead, ahead of Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Obi the Labour Party (LP) and Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP).
On Wednesday, the LP, PDP and the African Democratic Congress called for new polls during a joint news conference held in the capital, Abuja, saying the wait for the announcement of the final result would be “like waiting to treat a dead body”.
“We monitored with dismay the travesty to democracy exhibited at the collation centre of INEC. It is, to say the least, a rape on democracy,” said Julius Abure, the LP chairman, alleging widespread manipulation.
DW: With G20 in India, Global South addresses West by Alexandra von Nahmen
Russia will have a seat at the table when the foreign ministers of the G20 come together in New Delhi this week. After all, the country has one of the world's major economies — one that is also highly relevant to the global economic system — the measure by which the G20 group defines itself.
Moreover, according to a recent survey, emerging powers such as India and Turkey still view Russia as a partner, despite the war of aggression that the Kremlin is waging on Ukraine.
For India, which holds the current G20 presidency, it will be a challenge to make the meeting a success. Ashok Malik, a former adviser to the Indian foreign ministry and now country head of The Asia Group — a business advisory firm — told DW that India will nevertheless strive to produce a joint statement signed by all the participants. Malik said New Delhi intends to put emphasis "on the inequalities and developmental challenges" that many countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America face today.
The West's focus on the "all-consuming war" in Ukraine, however, has taken a lot of international attention away the from those challenges. Malik emphasized the fact that such challenges are "exacerbated by the ongoing fertilizer, food and energy crises caused by both the pandemic and the war."
Have the best possible evening, everyone!