News from around the nation.

The death penalty is still on the table for the accused mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, a new bill aims to overhaul immigration enforcement and limit government surveillance, and critics of a Washington ballot initiative say it could limit sports access for low-income girls with invasive tests.

Transcript

The Public News Service Daily Newscast PM Update for October 19, 2026.

I'm Mary Sherman.

The Supreme Court denied a bid by the accused mastermind behind the 9-11 terror attacks to revive a plea deal.

The agreement would have spared Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two co-defendants the death penalty.

They're currently being held at Cuba's Guantanamo Bay awaiting trial in June 2028.

The raid on Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar's home is underscoring an Illinois lawmakers push to replace the Department of Homeland Security with a new agency she says would better protect the American people.

Judith Ruiz-Branch has the story.

Congresswoman Delia Ramirez has formally introduced the Reimagining Safety Act.

It would create a Department of Community Safety that she says would preserve critical security functions while overhauling immigration enforcement.

Ramirez calls the recent raid on fellow Congresswoman Omar's home bone-chilling and argues DHS has increasingly put public safety at risk through surveillance and abuses of power with little accountability.

Targeting a sitting member of Congress who the president considers his political enemy, this should concern everyone because if they can do this to Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, they can do it to any of us.

The 71-page bill outlines how the new agency would redirect DHS funds and responsibilities to other departments.

In the legislation, ICE and Customs and Border Protection would be abolished in their current forms and replaced by establishing a separate civil immigration system.

Hundreds of violence prevention groups and medical professionals in Washington state are opposing Initiative 638, which would require girls playing in sports to provide documentation verifying their sex.

The ballot initiative is aimed at keeping transgender girls out of girls' sports and calls for female athletes to get a DNA test, hormone test, or genital exam.

Pediatric nurse Kelsey Gelner says DNA and hormone tests are expensive and impractical options.

She adds that the possibility of needing a genital exam would be a huge deterrent for girls who want to play sports.

Girls are far more likely to leave sports because of body image issues.

Requiring a genital exam opens the door for more scrutiny, more judgment.

Supporters say doctors already check a box to assert the sex of a child, and the change is necessary to protect fairness in girls' sports.

I'm Isobel Charle.

South Carolina's rapid growth is putting pressure on farm families to sell land held for generations.

The South Carolina Farm Bureau Land Trust offers an alternative, purchasing development rights while allowing farmers to retain ownership.

Executive Director Gary Spires says the permanent conservation easements help families protect their land for future generations.

It's a state planning tool farm.

It makes it very clear to folks coming along after they're gone what that land is intended to be used for.

So it's going to be a farm forever.

I think that provides some peace of mind to folks.

This is Public News Service.

Kentucky's data center tax break, previously estimated to cost $15 million a year, could quickly cost the state more than $1 billion in lost revenue, according to the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy.

Nadia Ramlagan reports.

Some Kentucky lawmakers are considering expanding incentives for data centers.

In Owen County, local resident Mike Haynes says concerned citizens want the county to implement a moratorium on building data centers. given the county's lack of zoning regulations and permits.

They're going to start construction or they're going to get these tax breaks, and in the six to seven years that it takes to get one of these things up and running, at any point, they could just say, nah, we don't need it and walk away.

No data center has yet been awarded a tax break by the Cabinet for Economic Development.

In 2024, the Kentucky General Assembly created a sales tax exemption for data centers located in Jefferson County.

The next year, the bill was expanded to cover the entire state.

Electric vehicles are growing in popularity, but concerns remain among consumers over costs and accessible charging stations.

A poll by the Zero Emission Transportation Association finds more than half of Americans have a very positive or somewhat positive view of electric vehicles.

Across many demographics, positive attitudes towards electric vehicles are growing.

Corey Cantor with the Zero Emission Transportation Association says the positive views on electric vehicles bode well for the future of the market.

That's five times as many people as buy EVs today who are already positive on electric vehicles before the market addresses many of the challenges.

So I think that's really good news as we kind of reset and look at where the market is following this kind of year-long retrenchment on the federal policy side.

The city of Boston will roll out a new fleet of battery-operated trains in 2030, but it remains to be seen if the technology can handle the daily commute.

The MBTA will run seven trains on the Fairmount line, each with four cars, to help boost the frequency of stops along the route and save more than 17,000 tons of climate-altering emissions each year.

Albert Charella, a professor of history at Kennesaw State University, says cities worldwide have long viewed electrification as a way to improve efficiency and provide cleaner air for riders underground.

People get infatuated with technological advancements, and they tend to believe that these are cure-alls, that these are things that have extraordinary, almost unlimited potential.

The new trains will run for 50 miles on a single charge and will test whether the MBTA can electrify the route without installing miles of overhead wires.

This story is based on original reporting by Benton Graham with Grist.

I'm Katherine Carley.

I'm Mary Sherman for Public News Service.

Find our trust indicators at publicnewsservice.org.