Minnesota Republicans say they paid the price for standing by Trump

MINNEAPOLIS – Minnesota Republicans headed into the 2026 election with their strongest slate of candidates in years and a persuasive anti-fraud message after scandal rocked the DFL under Gov. Tim Walz.

Yet the GOP was wiped out anyway, crushed by a historic Democratic wave in which voters handed the DFL control of every statewide office and full control of the Minnesota Legislature.

The results are already sparking a reckoning within the GOP over what the party could have done — if anything — and whether Republicans need a top-to-bottom revamp in a state that appears to be marching to the left.

Some Republicans laid the blame solely at the feet of President Donald Trump, saying Minnesota voters weren’t repudiating the platform of local Republicans so much as voicing a broader frustration.

—The Minnesota Star Tribune

Why California’s billionaire tax was a harder sell than expected

LOS ANGELES — Despite a nationwide blue wave in the midterm election, California’s much-debated billionaire tax didn’t get the support many expected in one of the country’s most liberal states.

Since the Golden State’s powerful healthcare union proposed the new tax, supporters of Proposition 40 have faced a fierce, expensive battle against the world’s richest people.

In what has been described as a David-versus-Goliath fight, the underdog appears to have lost. The proposition, which would have imposed a one-time 5% tax on the assets of California billionaires to mostly fund healthcare, seemed headed toward defeat as votes continued to be tallied Thursday.

“In a deep blue state like California, most voters are going to support additional funding for healthcare, especially to replace Trump funding cuts,” said Dan Schnur, a politics and communications professor at the University of Southern California, University of California, Berkeley and Pepperdine University. “But in retrospect, the sponsors may wish they’ve been a little bit less ambitious.”

—Los Angeles Times

Lunar rocket launch tore ‘hole’ in Earth’s atmosphere, disrupted GPS, study finds

A NASA rocket launch for a lunar mission may have punched a hole in Earth’s atmosphere, potentially disrupting GPS signals, a new study found.

The Artemis II mission launched April 1 from Florida, carrying astronauts around the moon on humanity’s first lunar mission since the Apollo program ended in 1972, NASA said.

Atmospheric disturbances recorded during the launch suggested the rocket may have punched a hole in Earth’s ionosphere, according to a study by researchers at Taiwan’s National Cheng Kung University. The study was published in July in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, Newsweek reported.

Earth’s ionosphere is a region of the upper atmosphere, extending from roughly 30 to 600 miles above sea level, where solar radiation ionizes atoms and molecules, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

—The Sacramento Bee

Russell Brand guilty of rape and sexual assaults in UK trial

LONDON — Russell Brand is facing years in prison and will spend the rest of his life on the sex offender's register after being found guilty of raping one of his fans and sexually assaulting three women during his showbiz heyday.

Brand, now 51, preyed on women he encountered while becoming one of Britain's best-known stand-up comedians, a lauded TV and radio host, and a Hollywood movie star.

His victims came to court to reveal how Brand had forced them into sexual activity, sometimes within seconds of them first meeting, using his immense fame to determinedly pursue a goal of sex with 5,000 women.

And Southwark Crown Court heard how Brand, who once boasted he would not relent in his pursuit of sex before getting his "birthright orgasm," ignored pleas from women for him to stop. Six women gave evidence against Brand, while the former comedian, who was once married to Katy Perry, could not persuade any of his celebrity friends or former showbiz colleagues to give evidence in his defense.

—dpa