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Good Morning, Portland! The forecast for today is looking sunny, with temperatures hitting high 70s. We’re basically twinning with yesterday. The Portland area could see some rain on Friday and Saturday and a drop in temperatures next week.
IN LOCAL NEWS:
• Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) crews are in the midst of reopening Interstate-5 through Portland’s Rose Quarter and expect the stretch, which has been closed since September 11, to completely reopen to drivers by midday Thursday. At a press conference, ODOT noted that though the project’s plan allowed for five weeks, mild weather and minimal disruptions helped them finish the updates early. Crews worked 24-hours a day to make the southbound stretch more earthquake-ready and update bridge joints and rebar. ODOT said it’s currently planning a similar closure of I-5 northbound for summer 2027.
• Portland City Councilor Dan Ryan is under a court order not to delete messages from his personal phone and other devices, which may contain public records. But in court documents, Ryan said he no longer has the phone he’s been using, because his spouse traded it in the same day the judge issued a temporary restraining order barring him from deleting phone records. He says nothing was lost. The order stems from a lawsuit filed by the Mercury in September, seeking records it believes the city did not provide because they were not in the city’s archive system. A hearing for a preliminary injunction to bar Ryan from deleting records while litigation is ongoing is expected Friday. The city says it won’t oppose the injunction. Reporter Jeremiah Hayden takes us through the Sisyphean pursuit of trying to read this city councilor’s texts.
• After years of rolling out the tax-break carpet for data centers, Hillsboro’s city council will soon vote on an ordinance to limit the size and location of new builds to just 30 more acres of land, with new placement restrictions requiring 1,000 feet of distance from schools. The Oregonian‘s Mike Rogoway continues to keep after Hillsboro’s data center discourse:
• This week’s Mercury Music Picks are a blend of soft, sultry, and sinister! What fits the vibe best: the dreamy Love Spells at Polaris or darkwave Boy Harsher at Rev Hall? Perhaps the screamo revival of In Loving Memory at High Limit is what your weekend requires. Dip into the picks for more!
• Whether or not you scored tickets for Ear at the Den tonight, this profile of the UK-based electronic duo has plenty of lo-fi glitch for your to peruse.
IN NATIONAL NEWS:
• In a fairly obvious bid for midterm votes, President Donald Trump has been promising Americans sums of money: $90 to Medicare enrollees to help with their premiums, $500 rebates for Affordable Care Act premiums, and $5000 for every adult American if Republicans retain control of the House and Senate after midterms. These pledges—rattled off via social media or during the GOP’s midterm convention in Dallas—are all in various states of a) not happening or b) happening, but probably not to you. The one-time $90 Medicare payments are expected to go out this week, but less than one-third of all Medicare recipients are eligible for them. The $500 Affordable Care Act rebates started going out in early October, just after the Trump administration announced it planned to remove 760,000 Affordable Care Act enrollees. That $5,000 one is easily the most ludicrous; it would require congressional approval, likely worsen inflation, and undoubtably crank the deficit. Furthermore, it should remind everyone of Trump’s promise to distribute $2,000 payments, funded by the savings Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) would create—lol. Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, characterized the $90 payouts as “another desperate attempt by a failed president to escape Americans’ revulsion with his failed agenda, amounting to one tank of Trump-inflated gas.”
• President Trump’s plan to build a 250-foot-tall arch in a traffic circle in Washington, DC—one of his many DC renovation projects—was supposed to begin in early September. (Though the Interior Department has thus far been tight lipped on the project’s actual status.) The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved the structure in mid-September (with a caveat that it must have an eternal flame on top “and floodlight projectors pointed towards the Arch to make it noticeable for pilots.”) However, the Association of Flight Attendants announced this week that the arch presents safety concerns for planes flying over DC. The union also criticized Trump’s plan to turn the arch into “a top grade military complex” that contains drones and snipers.
• US diesel prices continue to hit record highs in response to Trump’s war on Iran. The President signed an executive order on Monday to cut taxes on the fuel and which kinds of diesel can be used, but farmers, truckers and economists say it’s not going to do much, especially since diesel is also regulated by differing state rules.
• The FBI says that it prevented a a teenager from carrying out a terror attack in the Mall of America—the FBI also sold him the AK-47 rifle before immediately arresting him.
• Showing kittens something they have not seen before is actually one of my favorite things to do at a party. You don’t have to take them to the aquarium; just lift them to the top of your room’s doorframe. I promise they will sniff. Minnesotan kitten rescue Bitty Kitty Brigade has taken this concept to new aquatic depths with an annual “field trip” to the Sea Life aquarium at the Mall of America. I love that we’re showing sharks to kittens, and that’s just news now.
• Sending you into Thursday to mosh.
