In another key primary test, a favored progressive is upset in Wisconsin governor's race

WASHINGTON — In another major test of how far left Democratic voters in swing states are willing to go, moderate David Crowley narrowly defeated democratic socialist Francesca Hong to become the Democratic nominee for governor of Wisconsin.

The surprise result in Tuesday's primary — in a closely watched swing state seen as a possible bellwether of Democratic sentiment — came after polls had shown Hong leading the field by double digits. With 95% of the vote counted, Crowley clinched the nomination early Wednesday by just 3,000 votes.

It was the second purple-state race between Democrats in two weeks to have an extremely narrow result, following the slim win by progressive Abdul El-Sayed in the Michigan Senate primary last week. Polling also overestimated progressive performance in that race.

In the November general election, Crowley, the Milwaukee County executive, will face Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany, who was endorsed by President Trump. If Crowley were to defeat Tiffany, he would become the first Black governor in the state's history.

—Los Angeles Times

Transgender girl sues coaches, Sacramento State over discrimination on youth rowing team

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — For over two years, a 16-year-old transgender girl says she was bullied, excluded and discriminated against by her teammates and coaches at the Capital Crew youth rowing program housed at the Sacramento State Aquatic Center.

The alleged discrimination — which she says included segregating her from the rest of the team, allowing false rumors to spread, excluding her from opportunities she was qualified for, misgendering her and perpetuating a culture of hostility against her — eventually led to her quitting the team. She suffered enormous mental health consequences, she said, including self-harm and suicidal ideation.

Now, through her mother, she has filed a lawsuit against her coaches, the Capital Crew youth rowing program and the Sacramento State Aquatic Center over sex discrimination, sexual harassment, and aiding and abetting of the bullying she faced from her teammates.

In the complaint filed in the Sacramento County Superior Court under a pseudonym, she also names Sacramento State, its student government Associated Students, Inc., and the California State University trustees.

—The Sacramento Bee

Illinois law is the first in the Great Lakes region to designate industrial plastic pellets as pollution

CHICAGO — Illinois is requiring polluters to begin reporting spills of industrial plastic pellets known as nurdles, a growing source of contamination in the Great Lakes and Mississippi River watersheds.

Companies that manufacture, use or transport nurdles also must develop plans to limit them in storm runoff, making the state the first in either watershed to officially designate bits of wasted plastic as pollution.

The new law, signed late last week by Gov. JB Pritzker, comes as an ongoing Tribune series, “Great Waste in the Great Lakes,” delves into threats posed by nurdles and other man-made particles known collectively as microplastics. Nurdles, synthesized by petrochemical plants as building blocks of new plastics, have been found in every Great Lake and in rivers throughout Illinois.

Light enough to travel long distances through the air, nurdles routinely spill from chemical plants that make them, trains and trucks that transport them and factories that turn them into consumer products, the Tribune has found. Fish mistake them for food.

—Chicago Tribune

Palestinians want Israeli vote to change policy, not just leader

Israel’s election in two months may see out Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s religious-rightist government, but a major shift in West Bank policy would be needed for there to be peace in the territory, the top Palestinian diplomat said.

“You can change the faces as much as you want. If the policy remains the same, then the issues remain the same,” Varsen Shahin, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates for the Palestinian Authority, told Bloomberg TV in an interview. “The new government might be doing the same, but in a different manner.”

While much of the world watches Israel’s wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran, the West Bank has seen a surge of violence by extremist settlers against Palestinian civilians. Netanyahu, whose coalition includes ultra-nationalists campaigning for the area to be annexed, has sought to downplay incidents, attributing them to a handful of radicals.

Rising insecurity and Israel’s expanding grip on the West Bank, along with the destruction in Gaza, have eroded Palestinians’ hopes of founding a state in the territories — even as recognition of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel builds among world powers looking to isolate Netanyahu’s government.

—Bloomberg News