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GOOD MORNING, PORTLAND! Happy Thursday, and thank you for starting it with me, Elinor Jones. Usually I stick to the gossip beat, but like I always say: Any news can be gossip if you're bitchy when you write it. So let's go!  

IN LOCAL NEWS:

• TriMet released a list of service cuts coming later in the year because our elected leaders won't do their jobs and pass legislation that will help people. Governor Tina Kotek is calling for a special session next month to try to figure something else out, and based on what I know from having several teachers in my life, good luck with the morale of bringing in a bunch of public servants who were supposed to have time off. If they couldn't do it in a normal session, what makes the governor think they can pull it off when they're pissed about missing their vacations?
• This story is so scary: a man with a hatchet attacked a security guard at the Mall 205 Target on Monday and they had to evacuate the store and then coax the man out. He was hiding in some storage shelves. I'm sure they didn't, but they should have gotten some moms in there to help find him. Ever gone into a Target with a busy parent? They can find anything in that store. He was arraigned on Tuesday and charged with attempted assault and unlawful use of a weapon. It always seems like the rent-a-cops at retail establishments are just looking at their phones, so kudos to this guy for paying attention! 
• While Portland feels relatively cool for this time of year, other parts of the PNW are hot, as in literally on fire. Klickitat County issued a Level 3 go now order for some residents as the Brewer Fire grows in size. 
• Kaiser Permanente showed their cowardice in the face of a cruel federal administration by announcing that they were "pausing" gender-affirming surgeries for people aged 19 and younger. Their press release said that they "will remain a voice and advocate for safe, high-quality, and evidence-based care for transgender patients," which is not true, because the evidence shows that young people who receive gender-affirming healthcare have better overall health outcomes than younger trans patients who do not. But I guess they didn't say what kind of voice they would be. Maybe it's a screechy, pointless voice, like an angry chihuahua. Or Gilbert Gottfried.

• If you're going to be driving around Southwest Portland this weekend, watch for construction as a pedestrian bridge is torn down. This OregonLive story on the removal does not have a ton of information on the project, so if one were to assume that the pedestrian bridge is being replaced with a human catapult, well, who's to say we're wrong? 

I'm sucker for stories like we had a writing residency behind the front desk and a darkroom in the toilet. But it might also be cool to have NICE residencies on the third floor of Mother Foucault's building.

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— Suzette Smith (@suzettesmith.bsky.social) July 23, 2025 at 6:07 PM

• Local alt-rock band Everclear is touring for their 30th anniversary and will be playing some Oregon shows in September, including one right here in Portland. I mentioned this in my column a few weeks ago, but there are not a ton of cultural differences between me and my partner, with me having grown up here and him in Washington. But he recently wondered out loud where Everclear came from, and it was like in The Little Mermaid when Ariel didn't know how to use a fork. Like, where are YOU from?!? Not here, obviously! 
• Do you deserve a treat? OF COURSE YOU DO. The Mercury's Summer of Slushies is in full swing and you should check out this handy map of places to get one (or more)! Do it for the child you used to be who always imagined that the best part of being a grown-up would be getting slushies whenever you wanted. Because it's true. On that note, don't sleep on ice cream. Rachel Cavanaugh has a round-up of some new places slingin' scoops. 

IN NATIONAL/WORLD NEWS:

• Surprising absolutely no one, sources have shared that AG Pam Bondi told President Donald Trump that his name appeared more than once in the Epstein files. I know that Trump is super pissed about all of this, but the man is a thin-skinned narcissist whose greatest fear is being ignored—don't you think he also would have been a little bit sad if his name didn't appear in the Epstein files? Imagine how you'd feel if your best friend of two decades never bothered to make a note of all the fun you were having. Last night a committee voted 8–2 to subpoena the files from the DOJ. Today they're going to interview Ghislaine Maxwell. (Isn't it crazy that I can spell that name from memory now? I used to remember people's phone numbers, now I use my brain for this.)
• But it seems like the fun must have been PRETTY bad, because Trump trotted out National Security Director Tulsi Gabbard to make baseless claims against former president Barack Obama. She said that his administration committed "treasonous conspiracy" as they investigated Trump's ties to Russia. This is clearly an attempt to get the news cycle off of everything going on with Epstein, which is hilarious because in the past Trump kept talking about Epstein to get the news cycle off of his multiple felony convictions. Will this backfire into Congress having to release all of the Russia investigation materials? One can hope! 
• Elsewhere in the administration from hell, Columbia University has agreed to pay the federal government over $200 million to settle discrimination charges in exchange for getting billions of dollars back in future grants. Being kind of dumb and not a lawyer, doesn't that feel, like, illegal? Or at the very least, pretty fucked up? 
• Internationally, the humanitarian situation in Gaza is going from worse to way worse than one thought could happen, with images of emaciated children flooding the news. Or at least, I hope it is flooding your news feeds. People are starving to death just miles from food and they're taking their sweet time with ceasefire talks and just letting it happen. It's so sad, and so deeply fucked. 
  

  Trump's new executive order about AI states that companies' models must not incorporate the idea that trans people exist as a concept. Seems bad.
  
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  — Parker Molloy (@parkermolloy.com) July 23, 2025 at 5:15 PM

• Let's keep an eye on the brewing border war between Thailand and Cambodia? We don't need a whole other section of the globe to be destabilized right now! There is too much happening already! 
• Sorry to have buried the lede but THE MOST important thing happening nationally is of course that they have started filming The Devil Wears Prada 2. Anne Hathaway was photographed wearing a maxi dress that I did not know about yesterday but now I might die if I don't obtain?
• Elsewhere in entertainment, South Park season 27 (wow!) premiered last night with a story about President Trump fucking Satan. This will anger Trump, I'm sure, but if he rallies around getting the show canceled, it will call a great deal of attention to the episode in which he is pictured in bed with Satan and that will be fun.
• There is so much more happening but I have got to go about my day. The weather today will be a perfect 84 degrees—go excel at something!