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 (RIP), 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 since 2007, 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.
Subbing for maggiejean tonight.
BBC
Musk-led group makes $97.4bn bid for ChatGPT maker OpenAI
A consortium of investors led by Elon Musk offered $97.4bn to take over OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT.
The billionaire's attorney, Marc Toberoff, confirmed he submitted the bid for "all assets" of the tech company to its board on Monday.
The offer is the latest twist in a longstanding battle between Musk, the world's richest man and right hand to US President Donald Trump, and Open AI chief executive Sam Altman over the future of the start-up at the centre of the AI boom.
In response to the bid, Altman posted on Musk's social media platform X: "no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want."
OpenAI is widely credited with helping bring artificial intelligence tools into the mainstream and sparking huge investment in the sector.
Musk and Altman co-founded the start-up in 2015 as a non-profit company, but the relationship has soured since the Tesla and X boss departed the firm in 2018.
BBC
Hamas says it will postpone hostage release, blaming Israel
A spokesman for the armed wing of Hamas says the group is postponing the next scheduled release of Israeli hostages, blaming what he says are Israeli violations of the ceasefire deal.
Three hostages held in Gaza are due to be freed on Saturday in exchange for more Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.
Israel's Defence Minister Israel Katz called the Hamas announcement a "complete violation of the ceasefire agreement".
Key Israeli ally US President Donald Trump has suggested the ceasefire should be cancelled if "all" the hostages held in Gaza are not returned by Saturday.
"I'd say they ought to be returned by 12 o'clock on Saturday... all of them, not in dribs and drabs, not two and one and three and four and two," he said.
If hostages were not released, Trump added, "All hell is going to break out."
Asked whether he meant retaliation from Israel, he said: "You'll find out, and they'll find out too. Hamas will find out what I mean."
NPR
Why many Republicans think shrinking Medicaid will make it better
Congressional leaders are looking to make big reductions to federal spending to pay for President Trump's priorities, and they've singled out Medicaid as a program where they could find significant savings.
Trump said last month that he would not make cuts to the country's public health insurance program for low-income and disabled Americans. But the White House and Republicans in Congress are considering a menu of options that could add up to $2.3 trillion in potential cuts to Medicaid over the next decade.
"Medicaid is not working for Americans," said Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last week at his confirmation hearings to become Trump's secretary of health and human services.
"We're spending $900 billion and our people are getting sicker every single year," he added later. (In other parts of the hearings, Kennedy showed minimal understanding of the basics of Medicaid.)
Health economists generally agree that some people on Medicaid could get coverage through their employer or via the Obamacare exchanges, but how many is less clear. Some studies suggest that it could be as many as several million people.
The Guardian
At least 55 dead in Guatemala after bus plunges from highway bridge
At least 55 people have died after a bus veered off a highway bridge into a polluted ravine in Guatemala City, leaving survivors trapped in the wreckage.
The densely packed bus was carrying more than 70 people at the time of the accident early on Monday morning. It was traveling into the capital from the town of San Agustín Acasaguastlán when it plunged approximately 20 metres (66ft) from Puente Belice, a highway bridge that crosses over a road and creek.
Fifty-three people were found dead at the scene, while two others died after they were admitted to the hospital, officials said.
Images shared by the fire department on social media showed the bus partially submerged in wastewater surrounded by victims’ bodies.
The Guardian
Leeds student jailed in Saudi Arabia for 34 years over tweets is released
Campaigners have welcomed the release of a Saudi PhD student at Leeds University who was sentenced to 34 years in prison for posting tweets in support of women’s rights.
Salma al-Shehab, 36, is understood to have left the prison in Saudi Arabiawhere she was being held and has been reunited with her two young children.
“It is fantastic news,” said Lina al-Hathloul, head of monitoring and advocacy at the Europe-based Saudi rights group ALQST. “She has not seen her children during her whole four years of imprisonment.”
Al-Shehab was arrested while on holiday in Saudi Arabia in January 2021. Campaigners say she was kept in solitary confinement for more than nine months before she was brought before Saudi Arabia’s specialised criminal court.
USA Today
Meta carrying out performance-based layoffs starting Monday, cutting 5% of staff
Meta is expected to carry out "performance terminations" this week, which will roughly cut 5% of its staff and replace them with machine learning engineers, according to the tech company and multiple reports.
Notices regarding the layoffs, which were announced in mid-January, were set to go out to underperforming employees in the U.S. and other countries on Monday morning, Meta spokesperson Tracy Clayton told USA TODAY.
Employees in Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands will not be included in the staffing cuts "due to local regulations," while those in more than a dozen other countries across Europe, Asia and Africa will receive the termination notifications between Feb. 11-18, according to the memo, Reuters reported, citing an internal memo authored by Meta's Head of People Janelle Gale.
“We typically manage out people who aren’t meeting expectations over the course of a year,” Zuckerberg said, per the outlet. “But now we’re going to do more extensive performance-based cuts during this cycle.”
USA Today
Double trouble: 2 storms threaten millions with snow, ice
ARLINGTON, Va. − Much of the Midwest and East were bracing Monday for ablast of snow and ice as a series of weather fronts promised to bring weather havoc to more than 100 million Americans this week.
Two winter storms threatened to roll across the nation in the next few days before a possible "atmospheric river" sweeps into California with what could be multiple inches of rain in Southern California and multiple feet of snow in the Sierra.
The first winter storm was expected to bring light snow to cities such as Kansas City, Missouri, on Monday night. But as it moves east, it will become more dangerous. In Washington, D.C., and suburbs including Arlington, the weather service is calling for 4-6 inches Tuesday and early Wednesday.
Washington Post
Find out if you’ll be affected by 3 big storms hitting this week
A series of winter storms will bring snow, ice and heavy rain to millions of people across the United States this week.
Few states will be spared — parts of more than 40 states are expecting some snow. As of early Monday, winter storm watches and warningswere in effect for many states. Cities including Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, Des Moines, Omaha and Denver, as well as Kansas City, Missouri, and Topeka, Kansas, will probably all receive snow and/or ice this week.
A late-week storm might bring significant rain and snow to the West, with the potential for life-threatening debris flows in areas recently devastated by wildfires.
New York Times
Two Planes Collide at Arizona Airport, Killing 1 and Injuring 3, Officials Say
A small plane veered off the runway at Scottsdale Airport in Arizona on Monday afternoon after part of its landing gear failed, causing it to crash into a parked business jet on a tarmac, killing one person and injuring three others, the authorities said.
The plane that veered off the runway, a Learjet 35A, belonged to the Mötley Crüe singer Vince Neil, who was not on board, his lawyer Worrick Robinson IV said in a news release.
The crash happened at about 2:45 p.m., when the Learjet that had taken off from Austin, Tex., landed and then collided with a larger Gulfstream 200 business jet that had been parked on private property near the runway, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The Learjet’s left main gear failed as it landed, said Kelli Kuester, the aviation planning and outreach coordinator for the Scottsdale Airport.
