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Good morning, Portland! I'm Elinor Jones, and you know a lot of people are sick or on vacation when they've got me writing Good Morning, News. Usually they keep me locked over on the gossip beat. But any news can be gossip if you're kinda bitchy when you're writing it, and in the words of the Incredible Hulk: that's my secret; I'm always kinda bitchy. So let's do this!
In Local News:
• I can't believe it's already June! Happy birthday to all the gays and gadjacents (gay-adjacents) out there. Wouldn't it be helpful if some cute local journalists rounded up all of the Pride events happening around town? Oh wait—THEY DID.
Portland Pride things to do this week: drag history, elf parties, eating the rich in the park.
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) June 3, 2025 at 1:10 PM
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• Speaking of excellence in local journalism, don't miss our own Courtney Vaughn's reporting on how City of Portland Police had to cut ties with a private contractor who was also a former City of Portland employee! And if it sounds messy, that's because it was. I think my favorite factoid from the story is that the contractor flew first class on the 52 minute flight from Redmond to Portland. This is a guy who was trying to spend money.
• In some of the more highly fucked news in a deeply troubled timeline, a transgender Mexican woman seeking asylum who was arrested at a Portland Immigration Court on Monday has been transported to Tacoma to face her imminent deportation. Isn't it interesting that a lot of the people who clapped at that "Immigrants: we get the job done" line in Hamilton are awfully quiet today? I just think that is interesting.
• Up in Vancouver, a DoorDash driver returned to a place he'd delivered groceries to with a gun to demand a larger tip. Amazingly, the resident was able to disarm the deliverer and he was arrested without injury. It could have been such a worse story! De-escalation works!!
• Local gals-focused sports bar The Sports Bra has been so wildly successful in broadcasting women's sports to interested parties with disposable income (what a concept!) that it is expanding into FOUR other cities! I'm about to share a link, but first I want you to imagine what the four other cities are. Think for a second. Got 'em? Okay you're most certainly wrong. Get the answers here.
• Portland's Rose Festival is thriving and Fleet Week is back! I can't ethically tell you to go downtown and ogle all the sailors, because it's wrong to harass people at work, but I can tell you to ogle the ships. Ships don't have feelings!
• I hope you enjoy this cool drizzly day as you brace for a weekend that's just as hot as you are.
In National/International News:
• World's Worst Dad Elon Musk finally publicly spoke out against Trump's Big Beautiful Bill, sharing on Twitter that it was "a disgusting abomination." That is famously the worst kind of abomination—ouch! You know, I have been waiting for these messy bitches to fall out for a long-ass time, and seeing them act like besties for the past year was almost worth it because we knew this was coming and it's going to be mean and ruthless and petty AF. Give me the popcorn.
• Speaking of the bill, new predictions from the Congressional Budget Office predict that it will add $2.4 trillion to the national deficit over the next ten years. Also, GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene didn't read it, and said so while lambasting some AI provisions. She was all "in the interest of transparency," like she was trying to be above-board, but while fully admitting that she didn't read the bill before she voted for it. And look, I am a person who willy-nilly agrees to whatever user agreement a website shoves in my face, but I know this, and that's why I am not a congressperson.
• Yo, it's a pretty dark time when former George W. Bush hawk Condoleezza Rice is the voice of reason in the current administration's attack on institutions of higher learning.
Condoleezza Rice was on Fox & Friends this morning making the case against Trump's attacks on universities and scientific research
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) June 4, 2025 at 7:14 AM
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• Other countries seem to be doing a better job electing their leaders: South Korea's presidential election was called yesterday for progressive candidate Lee Jae-myung. This follows months of uncertainty after the former president tried declaring martial law and the people immediately rose up together with a clear and firm "NOPE" and it was abandoned. Psst, hey South Korea—if you could send us a redacted version of your plan to build a successful opposition movement over to some American Democrats, that would really help us out. (Please tell us it doesn't involve a Katy Perry single.)
• Actor Jonathan Joss was murdered in an alleged hate crime in Texas on Sunday. He was shot in front of his husband by a man spewing homophobic slurs. Joss was best-known by many as Chief Hotate on Parks and Recreation. This is just awful. I don't really know what else to say.
• Go ahead and carry that sadness around, but also rejoice in community: Jaya Saxena at Eater just shared this piece about queer food and restaurants and it is so important to remember that we have each other, and we can have beautiful things.
• That's all for now, my friends. Go out there knowing that watermelon is in season, so if you buy one today, it will be juicy. That's got to count for something.
Earth Ranked Number One Party Planet
— The Onion (@theonion.com) June 3, 2025 at 2:00 PM
theonion.com/earth-r...
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