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: Illinois joins suit after feds threaten billions in funding over Trump order targeting trans people — again by Violet Miller
Illinois has joined 11 other states in suing the Trump administration over its attempt to condition billions of dollars of federal funding on discrimination against trans people in accordance with Trump’s previous executive orders.
The federal government is trying to condition billions in federal funding on Trump’s executive orders targeting transgender people, saying institutions are out of compliance with Title IX for not falling in line with Trump’s executive orders attempting to coerce states into excluding transgender people from sports, removing their ability to correct their documents and other rights awarded to cisgender people.
The funds being halted would impact any institution that receives funding under Title IX, such as schools, colleges, universities, 4-H programs, non-governmental organization programs, sports programs and other education-related awards to detention facilities.
The suit, filed in Rhode Island District Court on Tuesday, said the administration was once again overreaching in trying to condition funds that have already been signed off on by Congress.
The New York Times: ‘Like a Military Occupation’: Clashes Rise With Federal Agents in Minneapolis by Thomas Fuller and Jamine Ulloa
The video shows a young employee in a reflective vest being hauled away by federal agents from the entrance of a Target store in a Minneapolis suburb.
“I’m a U.S. citizen!” the worker shouted as the armed agents shoved him into an S.U.V. on Monday, after he had directed expletives at one. “U.S. citizen! U.S. citizen!”
In and around Minneapolis in recent days — in quiet residential neighborhoods and busy shopping districts, at gas station and big box store parking lots — similar chaotic scenes are unfolding, an escalation of tensions between residents and federal agents as the Trump administration intensifies its immigration crackdown in Minnesota after the killing of Renee Good by an immigration officer last week.
“It feels like our community is under siege by our own federal government,” said State Representative Michael Howard, a Democrat whose district includes Richfield, where the Target employee and another colleague were seized on Monday.
USA Today: When will the $2,000 tariff checks go out? Trump's latest answer by Kinsey Crowley
President Donald Trump spoke again about $2,000 tariff rebate checks, though their funding and legality remain questionable.
Pressed by reporters at The New York Times on when Americans would get the checks he has floated over the last several months, Trump mentioned the $1,776 "warrior dividends" sent to the military for the holidays.
"The tariff money is so substantial. That’s coming in, that I’ll be able to do $2,000 sometime. I would say toward the end of the year," he told the Times in an exclusive sit-down on Jan. 7. The transcript of that conversation was published Jan. 11.
But if the tariff rebate checks are distributed on the same criteria as COVID stimulus checks, a single round is estimated to cost as much as $600 billion, though tariff revenue is only projected to generate about $300 billion a year. That's if the U.S. Supreme Court does not rule against Trump's sweeping global tariffs.
CNN: Pentagon bought device through undercover operation some investigators suspect is linked to Havana Syndrome by Katie Bo Lillis, Natasha Bertrand, Priscilla Alvarez, Jim Sciutto, and Zachary Cohen
The Defense Department has spent more than a year testing a device purchased in an undercover operation that some investigators think could be the cause of a series of mysterious ailments impacting US spies, diplomats and troops that are colloquially known as Havana Syndrome, according to four sources briefed on the matter.
A division of the Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations, purchased the device for millions of dollars in the waning days of the Biden administration, using funding provided by the Defense Department, according to two of the sources. Officials paid “eight figures” for the device, these people said, declining to offer a more specific number.
The device is still being studied and there is ongoing debate — and in some quarters of government, skepticism — over its link to the roughly dozens of anomalous health incidents that remain officially unexplained.
CNN has asked the Pentagon, HSI and the DHS for comment. The CIA declined to comment.
DW: Japan, South Korea vow stronger ties amid China challenge by Martin Fritz
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi met in Nara, Takaichi's hometown, on Tuesday and agreed to strengthen bilateral ties and cooperation at a time of rising geopolitical uncertainty around the world.
"I believe cooperation between Korea and Japan is now more important than ever and anything else, as we have to continue moving forward to a new, better future amid this complex, unstable international order," Lee said at the outset of the summit.
Takaichi said she wanted to further improve Japan's relations with South Korea "as I believe the two countries should cooperate and contribute for the stability in the region."
Both sides agreed on "shuttle diplomacy" three years ago, with regular meetings at the highest level.
Lee's national security adviser, Wi Sung Lac, said the summit's goal was to build trust between the South Korean and Japanese leaders.
The Guardian: Human activity helped make 2025 third-hottest year on record, experts say by Ajit Niranjan
Last year was the third-hottest on record, scientists have said, with mounting fossil fuel pollution behind “exceptional” temperatures.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said 2025 had continued a three-year streak of “extraordinary global temperatures” during which surface air temperatures averaged 1.48C above preindustrial levels.
Current rates of heating could breach the Paris agreement limit of 1.5C (2.7F) – which is measured over 30 years to iron out natural fluctuations – before the end of the decade, according to the EU’s Copernicus climate agency. That is more than 10 years sooner than scientists expected when world leaders signed the pledge in 2015.
“We are bound to pass it,” said Carlo Buontempo, the director of the Copernicus climate change service. “The choice we now have is how to best manage the inevitable overshoot and its consequences.”
Everyone have the best possible evening that you can!
