Since 2007, the Overnight News Digest has been a nightly, community series chronicling the day’s news and the American dystopia. This is an open thread where everyone is welcome, especially night owls and early birds, to share and discuss the happenings of the day.
Ed. note: Formatting ability on Daily Kos has changed and not wanting to go against the grain I did not fight it this week. Hence, a new format for my digests.
NPR
A judge in New York found former President Donald Trump in contempt of court for failing to produce documents pursuant to a subpoena from state Attorney General Letitia James. James is conducting a civil probe of the Trump Organization's business practices.
Judge Arthur Engoron imposed a penalty of $10,000 a day until Trump fully complies.
James opened her civil probe of Trump business practices in 2019, after former Trump personal attorney Michael Cohen testified before Congress that Donald Trump was a "con man" who would routinely inflate or deflate the reported value of his assets to further his business interests.
Over the past few months, the probe moved into a new phase when James subpoenaed Trump and his two eldest children, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump. James was seeking testimony directly from the Trumps and documents directly in Donald Trump's custody, as opposed to papers held by the Trump businesses.
NPR
Elon Musk will soon hold the keys to Twitter.
The company announced on Monday that it has accepted the Tesla CEO's $44 billion offer to take the company private. That means the world's richest person who has a penchant for theatrics and erratic behavior is about to have the power to reshape discourse on a social network used by more than 200 million people every day.
How might Musk wield that power?
Here are some proposals for Twitter that he's floated.
Deutsche Welle
Russia's Foreign Ministry says it has made 40 German diplomatic staff "persona non grata." US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin made a visit to Kyiv.
Mariupol authorities say new mass grave found
Vadym Boychenko, the mayor of the besieged city of Mariupol, said a new mass grave had been identified 10 kilometers (6 miles) north of the city.
Several victims were located there, though authorities are trying to identify how many victims are in the unmarked graves.
Over the past several days, satellite photos have shown what appear to be images of mass graves on the outskirts of the city.
Mariupol has been under siege for two months, with 100,000 civilians remaining trapped in the city. The remaining Ukrainian forces in the city are holding out in a sprawling steel factory. Ukrainian officials have been trying for weeks to secure the safe evacuation of civilians.
Should Russian forces succeed in completely capturing Mariupol, they will have a land corridor to Crimea, which Russia seized in 2014.
Deutsche Welle
Residents of the Chinese city of Beijing have been buying up food and supplies ahead of a feared coronavirus lockdown.
The city's largest district of Chaoyang on Monday began mass-testing residents for COVID-19, triggering fears of a repeat of the Shanghai lockdown. Residents will have to go through three rounds of testing at two-day intervals.
From Tuesday to Saturday, the mass-testing regime will be expanded to 10 other districts, local officials said.
Beijing authorities warned that the virus had "stealthily" spread in the city for about a week before it was detected.
For weeks, the 25 million residents of Shanghai have been locked down, with food supply bottlenecks causing widespread discontent.
Bangkok Post
Palm oil slumped on prospects that top producer Indonesia’s surprise ban of cooking oil exports will not be strict as feared.
Indonesia will only halt exports of bulk and packaged RBD palm olein, a higher value product that has been processed. Exports of crude palm oil and RBD palm oil will still be allowed, according to people familiar with the matter.
RBD olein accounts for 30% to 40% of Indonesia’s total palm oil exports.
Al Jazeera
Medan, Indonesia – Indonesia is “in consultation” with other members of the G20 amid growing calls for Russia to be barred from the economic forum’s November summit in Bali.
Some members of the intergovernmental group of 19 countries and the European Union have been threatening to boycott the event if Russian President Vladimir Putin and delegates from Moscow are allowed to attend, leaving Indonesian President Joko Widodo, who is better known as Jokowi and holds the annual presidency this year, in a potentially fraught position.
Al Jazeera
Cuba’s foreign minister has accused the United States of seeking to exclude the country from an upcoming regional summit, just days after the two nations held their first high-level talks in four years.
In a series of tweets on Monday, Bruno Rodriguez said the US was pressuring regional governments to block Cuba from participating in the Ninth Summit of the Americas in June in Los Angeles, California.
“We have learned from various sources that the United States government has been carrying out intense efforts and exerting pressure on countries in the region to try to exclude Cuba from the IX Summit of the Americas,” Rodriguez wrote.
“There is no justification for excluding Cuba or any other country from this event that we have attended the last two editions,” he said.
The Guardian, US Edition
While gas prices soar for consumers, one group of people isn’t faring so badly.
Chief executives from the largest oil and gas companies received nearly $45m more in combined total compensation in 2021 as compared to 2020 amid the steep rise in gasoline prices across the US over the last year, a new report states.
Twenty-eight major oil and gas companies, such as Shell, Exxon, BP and Marathon Petroleum, gave out $394m in total to their chief executives in 2021, according to an exclusive analysis provided to the Guardian.
Among the highest earners were Michael Hennigan of Marathon Petroleum, who received over $21m – $5m more than 2020 – and Darren Woods of Exxon, who received over $23m – $7m more than 2020.
The Guardian, US Edition
The Texas court of criminal appeals has issued a stay of execution for Melissa Lucio, the Mexican-American woman who was set to be judicially killed within 48 hours, ordering a lower court to consider new evidence of her innocence in the death of her two-year-old daughter Mariah.
The court issued its order on Monday as the final clock was ticking on Lucio’s transfer to the death chamber. She would have been the first Hispanic woman executed by Texas.
As Wednesday’s scheduled execution date grew closer, calls for a stay to give time for new scientific evidence of her innocence to be reviewed grew to fever pitch. The intensity of the outcry against her pending death rivaled that of the case of Troy Davis, the African American man executed by Georgia in 2011 despite serious doubts around his guilt.
The Guardian, International Edition
Sweden and Finland have agreed to submit simultaneous membership applications to the US-led Nato alliance as early as the middle of next month, Nordic media have reported.
The Swedish newspaper Expressen cited government sources as confirming the report. The two countries’ prime ministers said this month they were deliberating the question, arguing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had changed Europe’s “whole security landscape” and “dramatically shaped mindsets” in the Nordic region.
The Guardian, Australian Edition
Laurena Henschke had been dead about 12 months when a letter from the Australian government turned up at her Adelaide home.
“Dear Mrs Henschke,” it read.
“You have moved up in the queue and I expect that you will be assigned a home care package in about three months. This package may be lower than the level you are approved for, but it lets you start to receive some home care services.”
The letter was a cruel frustration for her husband and carer, Dr Philip Henschke, who had sought, and been approved for, the highest level of home care for Laurena 18 months earlier.
The Guardian, Australian Edition
Labor will vow to increase foreign aid to Pacific island countries and ramp up patrols to fight illegal fishing, as it makes an election pledge to “restore Australia’s place as first partner of choice for our Pacific family”.
A boost to regional broadcasting is also part of the package, with Labor seeking to intensify political pressure on the prime minister, Scott Morrison, in the wake of China signing a security agreement with Solomon Islands.
The shadow minister for foreign affairs,
Penny Wong, who will outline the Labor plan alongside senior frontbench colleagues on Tuesday, accused Morrison of dropping the ball in the Pacific.
The Guardian, UK Edition
The UK national security adviser, Sir Stephen Lovegrove, has said he did not consult Downing Street before telling the Foreign Office it should allow staff from an animal charity to be listed for evacuation from Afghanistan, but said he has “a far from perfect memory” of precisely what happened.
The foreign affairs select committee is investigating leaked emails from Foreign Office staff that say Lovegrove directed that the Nowzad staff be evacuated after consulting No 10 last August.
Downing Street had previously insisted Boris Johnson and his wife, Carrie, did not intervene on behalf of their friend Pen Farthing, the charity’s founder, to airlift dogs out of Kabul while people died. The decision caused huge media controversy at the time, but Johnson said it was nonsense to suggest he intervened.
The Guardian, UK Edition
The UK’s top civil servant has privately warned Boris Johnson against forcing government workers back to the office amid growing anger in Whitehall over “scare tactics”, the Guardian has learned.
Alongside Simon Case, at least four permanent secretaries – the most senior civil servants in their department – are also understood to have raised alarm over government rhetoric designed to reverse the shift to working-from-home arrangements during the Covid pandemic.
Spot checks on office working by Jacob Rees-Mogg, including “sorry you were out when I visited” notes left on empty Whitehall desks, have seen the Cabinet Office minister branded “the milk monitor” by disgruntled officials.
Case told the prime minister over the weekend that Rees-Mogg’s strategy was unwise and that the language against civil servants was going too far. A No 10 source said Case was fully on board with a return to more face-to-face working.
The Guardian, International Edition
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The Russian defence ministry said it would open a humanitarian corridor earlier on Monday for all civilians to leave the Azovstal steel plant in the besieged port city of Mariupol. Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, said Kyiv had not reached an agreement with Moscow on creating a humanitarian corridor and said the UN should act as the “initiator and guarantor” of any agreement with Russia on evacuating civilians from the plant.
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Five railway stations in central and western Ukraine were hit by Russian airstrikes in the space of one hour on Monday. Oleksander Kamyshin, the head of Ukrainian Railways, said five train stations came under fire causing an unspecified number of casualties, as most of Ukraine was placed under an unusually long air raid warning for two hours on Monday morning.
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Large fires broke out early on Monday at two oil depots in the Russian city of Bryansk, less than 100 miles from the border with Ukraine, in a potential act of sabotage by Kyiv. Russian state media said the first fire occurred at a civilian facility in Bryansk holding 10,000 tons of fuel, followed by a second fire at a military fuel depot holding 5,000 tons.
The Guardian, International Edition
In the long, narrow basement underneath Litsey 20, a school in Ivano-Frankivsk, western Ukraine, Serhiy Korneliyevych Hamchuk stands before a row of women and lays a Kalashnikov assault rifle down on the desk in front of him.
The 10 women, aged between 18 and 51, watch attentively as Hamchuk demonstrates how to load ammunition into the gun’s magazine, sliding the bullets into place one after another with his thumb. “Dobre,” he says. “Good. Who wants to try?”
The concrete walls of Litsey 20, one of the largest schools in Ivano-Frankivsk, are normally filled with the chatter of more than 1,200 students aged between six and 18. But with in-person teaching banned across Ukraine because of the war, the school is providing a different sort of education.
At the end of March, the mayor of Ivano-Frankivsk, one of the largest cities in western Ukraine, announced that shooting ranges at five schools in the city – normally used by pupils in the Ukrainian equivalent of the Combined Cadet Force – would be reopened in order to teach civilians how to use firearms. Although open to all, the courses are primarily aimed at women.
Reuters
BERLIN, April 25 (Reuters) - The co-leader of Germany's Social Democrats called on former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder to quit the party after he defended his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, exposing a rift at the heart of government in Berlin over the Ukraine crisis.
Schroeder has refused, despite Russia's invasion of Ukraine, to step down from the posts with Russian energy companies from which he has earned millions of euros since leaving office in 2004.
Reuters
April 25 (Reuters) - A New York judge on Monday held former President Donald Trump in contempt of court for not producing documents subpoenaed in the state attorney general's civil probe of his business practices, and ordered Trump to be fined $10,000 per day until he complies.
Trump lost a bid to quash a subpoena from state Attorney General Letitia James, then failed to produce all the documents by a court-ordered March 3 deadline, later extended to March 31 at his lawyers' request.
BBC
Antigua and Barbuda should "one day become a republic", its prime minister has told the Earl and Countess of Wessex during their Caribbean tour.
Gaston Browne said during a meeting with the royal couple, who are touring the region to mark the Platinum Jubilee, it was the country's wish to remove the Queen as head of state.
However Mr Browne acknowledged such a move is "not on the cards" currently.
He also called for "reparatory justice" to compensate for slavery.
The earl and countess met Mr Browne and his cabinet at a meeting on Monday during the third leg of their Caribbean tour.
Mr Browne told the couple: "We continue to have the Queen as our head of state, even though I should say we aspire at some point to become a republic
BBC
A Turkish court has sentenced an activist and philanthropist to life in prison in a case Turkey's international allies said was politically motivated.
Osman Kavala has already spent more than four years in prison without being convicted.
He was found guilty of charges related to the nationwide protests in 2013 and the failed coup attempt in 2016.
Kavala denied the charges and has accused the government of "judicial assassination".
Western diplomats were among those attending a packed court.
Kavala was first accused of orchestrating and financing nationwide anti-government protests that erupted in 2013.
He was acquitted, but soon after he was accused of being part of the attempted coup in 2016, which saw tens of thousands of people jailed or lose their jobs.
C/NET
Facebook's parent company, Meta, doesn't just want to sell its virtual reality headsets, video chat devices and smart glasses online. It wants people to try out the products in a store.
Meta said Monday that it's opening its first retail store on May 9. The 1,550-square-foot space will be located on the social network's campus in Burlingame, California, where employees are focusing on the metaverse -- virtual worlds where people will be able to work, play and socialize. The opening underscores how serious the tech giant is getting about creating consumer hardware, taking on companies such as Google and Apple that also have physical stores. Still, products such as VR headsets and smart glasses that allow you to enter these virtual spaces haven't become mainstream yet.
C/NET
People are putting solar panels on their roofs at an impressive clip. Over half a million houses got solar panels in 2020 alone and 5% of homes in the United States that are suitable for solar have solar panels installed. And 13% of homes in America could have solar panels by 2030.
Maybe you've looked into putting solar panels on your roof, but it didn't make sense. You've looked at the cost and potential savings and the math didn't work out for you. Maybe your roof is too shaded or oriented poorly for solar. Maybe this year is just a year too soon. Maybe you rent or live in a condo complex. But access to solar energy, and the associated savings, doesn't always require a ton of money or even owning your home.
Depending on where you live, you may have the option to join a community solar program that lets you subscribe to solar power generated off your property. In states where community solar is allowed, you can start saving money on electricity almost immediately with very little effort.
The crew of the Overnight News Digest consists of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, eeff, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Rise above the swamp, Besame and jck. 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.