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Good morning, Portland! Summer is goin’ out with a bang! Today we’re in for toasty weather, with a high of 87 degrees and a low of 58. Things are likely to cool down a little by tomorrow.
There’s more to talk about than just the weather, so let’s dive in.
In Local News:
• ICYMI: Environmental groups have been at odds with the city of Portland for years over Zenith Energy’s oil transloading facility in Northwest Portland. Critics argue the city is allowing a dangerous operation with environmental and health risks to continue its business, with little mechanism for the city to enforce its own regulations imposed on the energy company. That last part came into clearer focus recently. A lawsuit filed against the city by multiple environmental groups revealed issues with a Land Use Compatibility Statement (LUCS) granted to Zenith. The lawsuit alleges the city didn’t allow the public adequate opportunities to weigh in on the land use review. During a court hearing last month, an attorney for the city acknowledged it’s the DEQ, not the city, that has authority to enforce stipulations in the LUCS. That’s concerning to a number of Portlanders who note that Zenith has already run afoul of land use laws by making unapproved changes to its facility. Attorneys insist the city has recourse to enforce the rules it imposed on the company using other avenues.
• The Oregonian reports Oregon’s recent mass layoffs have reached recession levels- mirroring job cuts in 2008. Though 2020 proved the worst for widespread layoffs, the latest numbers reflect a shrinking workforce at some of the state’s most prominent employers. Luckily, many recently laid off workers appear to be finding new employment a lot quicker than they did during the 2008 recession.
• Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon recently teamed up with Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen for a trip to the West Bank, seeking a first-hand account of the conditions in Gaza. Upon his return, Merkley issued a biting critique of Israel’s war on Gaza, saying the United States is complicit in Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. The US senator is urging other lawmakers to endorse legislation to stop providing aid to Israel. Read more about Merkley’s interview with the Mercury here, in the latest reporting from Abe Asher.
Following a recent trip to Israel and the West Bank, Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley says the US and its allies have a moral obligation to stop providing military aid for the war in Gaza.
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) September 16, 2025 at 8:33 AM
• It’s another edition of Do This; Do That! Our weekly round-up of notable happenings around Portland. This week, check out cinema at the Clinton Street Theater, a comedy set from Portland’s top-notch funny man, Kyle Kinane, and an art exhibit inspired by the ocean featuring objects of utility (think rubber tubes and metal) melded with hagfish slime, algae, and cicada shells.
It’s the last week before the fall equinox—let’s make it count, shall we? Options include astral jazz, Ricky Bearghost’s giant beaded weavings, and vampire baseball set to a live orchestra.
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) September 15, 2025 at 1:32 PM
In National/World News:
• Trump has threatened to again take over DC’s police force after recently federalizing officers there so they could engage in immigration enforcement. While immigration arrests surged last month, local and federal officers also appear to have spent time just hanging around. Check out this photo from the Associated Press of FBI agents, Homeland Security, and Metropolitan Police Department officers standing around watching a high school football game. Maybe they were casing the place for potential arrests.
• Speaking of Trump, the sitting president is suing the New York Times and four of its journalists for what he claims is a years-long pattern of “intentional and malicious defamation” of him, particularly leading up to the 2024 election. The lawsuit, which reads like it was written by Trump himself with little to no legal counsel around, seeks $15 billion.
• We need to talk about Nepal for a minute. Recent protests in Kathmandu against government corruption and extreme wealth inequality turned violent when protesters clashed with police, resulting in the deaths of 72 people. At least 1,300 were injured, Reuters reports. The protests–largely carried out by millennials and Gen-Z residents–were organized via the Discord app, after the government shut down social media sites. The social unrest led Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli to resign, in what the international news agency called “the deadliest political crisis to hit the Himalayan nation in decades.” Interim leadership has now been installed, thanks to the same youth protesters who toppled the government.
Nepal appoints its first female PM after historic week of deadly protests
— The Guardian (@theguardian.com) September 12, 2025 at 9:54 AM
• Coral in the Great Barrier Reef is declining at historic levels. With more frequent coral bleaching events (“bleaching” is when coral reef sheds itself of algae living on it) including one in 2024, marine biologists who track the coral say it’s declined by up to a third in some areas.
• At least two journalists have been fired for remarks they made in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s murder last week on a Utah college campus. Last week, MSNBC fired Matthew Dowd, a senior political analyst who noted Kirk was a divisive figure and suggested Kirk’s propensity for hateful rhetoric may have played a part in his death. Karen Attiah, a global opinions editor at the Washington Post, also lost her job over posts she made on social media. “Part of what keeps America so violent is the insistence that people perform care, empty goodness and absolution for white men who espouse hatred and violence,” Attiah wrote, along with a series of other posts about America’s response to Kirk’s death. The firings are a chilling reminder of the erosion of truth in a profession that is supposed to uphold it. They also reflect the ways in which several media outlets have engaged in whitewashing Kirk’s belief system–one that denigrated Black women and women in general, while dismissing gun violence deaths as an unavoidable byproduct of the 2nd Amendment. Hot take incoming: While Kirk certainly didn’t deserve to die, he also doesn’t deserve to be lionized or regarded as a vehicle for civil discourse.
For the record. My posts were not even about Kirk directly, but about America’s apathy towards political violence, and the coddling of white male shooters and hate peddlers. I was fired because I mentioned race: white men and violence— that was my “gross misconduct.”
— Karen Attiah (@karenattiah.bsky.social) September 15, 2025 at 9:48 AM
• Despite a resounding denouncement of political violence after the fatal shooting of Kirk, and calls for peace from Republicans and Democrats alike, Stephen Miller advocated for political vengeance against liberal and anti-fascist groups, which he blames for Kirk’s death. “With God as my witness, we are going to use every resource we have at the Department of Justice, Homeland Security and throughout this government to identify, disrupt, dismantle and destroy these networks and make America safe again,” Miller told Vice President JD Vance on a recent episode of Kirk’s podcast, which Vance guest hosted after Kirk’s death. “For the American people, it will happen, and we will do it in Charlie’s name.”
Now that you’ve made it this far, it might be time to disengage from the news for a little while and just find joy in stupid things.
@zachwhite00 solid glowup
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Courtney Vaughn
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