Good morning! And welcome to the last full day of winter. Tomorrow is the Spring Equinox, which means we get 12 hours of daylight, and the promise of 9 p.m. sunsets in our future. But for today it’s still winter, and we get the same weather as yesterday: highs in the low 50s, a little rainy. The usual Winter Special.

Welcome Party: Yesterday, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams came back to Earth. After a botched test flight left them stuck in the International Space Station for more than nine months, their capsule splashed down in the Gulf of America Mexico, off the coast of Tallahassee. According to the AP, Wilmore and Williams spent 286 days in space—278 days longer than anticipated. They circled Earth 4,576 times and traveled 121 million miles. When they landed, the astronauts were greeted by a pod of dolphins—which almost makes up for the fact that they had to come back to…all the rest of this.

Seen Any Burning Teslas Lately? After protesters lit the EVs on fire at dealerships around the country, Attorney General Pam Bondi released a statement saying her office will treat these incidents as “domestic terrorism.” There’s no one law that defines and punishes domestic terrorism, so this is more of a Big Feeling than anything else. But domestic terror aside, burning EVs creates super toxic smoke. Can we find another way to vandalize Elon’s stuff?

Protect the Chickens: RFK’s newest idea to combat bird flu is to let the virus run through infected flocks, and then identify the surviving birds as “immune” to H5N1. Sound idiotic to you? That’s because it shows a basic lack of understanding of what we’re up against here. The biggest concern with the virus right now is mutation—every new infection represents a chance for the virus to mutate into something that’s more easily transmissible to and between humans. Encouraging more infections within a flock will do exactly that. RFK doesn’t have any authority over our country’s farms, but the agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, has said she’s willing to try this. “It’s a recipe for disaster,” one veterinarian told the New York Times. 

Trans Military Ban Halted: U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes blocked the Trump administration from enacting an order that would ban trans people from serving openly in the military. The administration claims that allowing trans people to serve impacts their combat readiness, which Reyes called “totally, grossly misleading.” “The law does not demand that the Court rubber-stamp illogical judgments based on conjecture,” she wrote.

Close but Not Quite: A different U.S. District judge ruled yesterday that the Trump administration wasn’t acting in contempt of court when it cancelled an NIH grant to Seattle Children’s Hospital to develop an online tool for health education for trans kids. “Research programs based on gender identity are often unscientific, have little identifiable return on investment, and do nothing to enhance the health of many Americans,” wrote an NIH. “Many such studies ignore, rather than seriously examine, biological realities. It is the policy of NIH not to prioritize these research programs.” On top of being wildly factually inaccurate, AG Nick Brown argued that it violated the injunction on the ban on funding for gender-affirming care. While the judge found the National Institutes of Health’s interpretation of her orders “unreasonable and self-serving,” she said there isn’t enough evidence to hold the Trump administration in contempt.

Who Said Impeachment? All of these injunctions are starting to piss Trump off. Yesterday, after a judge paused his efforts to deport 200 people to El Salvador, Trump went on an all-caps rant on Truth Social, calling the judge a “radical left lunatic” and calling for him to be impeached. The unhinged claims inspired Chief Justice Roberts to make a rare exception, and make a public statement. “For more than two centuries,” the chief justice said, “it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.” I know the chief justice on the Supreme Court can’t just call the president an idiot, but wouldn’t it be fun?

FYI: It’s day 59 of the Trump administration. We have 1,403 days to go. But who’s counting?

Trouble in Oly: It’s been a rough start to Governor Ferguson’s term. First, after an inauguration speech that felt like a love letter to state Republicans and Danny Westneat, House Democrats rewrote a long-standing rule allowing the Governor’s aides easy access to their chambers. (Dems said it wasn’t connected to that stinker of a speech, but they kinda have to say that.) Then, last week, two of Ferguson’s aides resigned—his legislative director, Joyce Bruce, and her deputy. And yesterday, Sen. Yasmin Trudeau (D-Tacoma) told the Seattle Times that his chief strategy officer, Mike Webb, may have been the reason. Trudeau said she heard from “current executive staff and former campaign staff about a hostile and toxic workplace culture,” and she went to a senior staff member in the governor’s office to report her concerns. Ferguson denies receiving any complaints, but this morning, Webb resigned. 

Revenue Woes Just Got Worse: Outside of his staffing chaos, Ferguson’s biggest issue right now is the state’s budget. Going into his term, the state was already looking at a massive budget shortfall (some $15 billion), and in a report released yesterday, the Office of Financial Management found that the state should expect to bring in $845 million less in the next four years than it estimated in November. Ferguson appears to be willing to propose anything but taxing the wealthiest in our state, including proposing a massive $4 billion in cuts over the next four years, which would require two years of monthly furloughs for state employees.

Who Wants to Live in SoDo? Soon, you might be able to. Last night, City Council voted to allow almost 1,000 new apartments on the edges of our main industrial district. Like the gig worker wage bill last year, this bill was one of Sara Nelson’s pet projects—maybe to expand our housing stock, maybe to help out billionaire hedge fund manager Chris Hansen. Stranger contributor Tobias Coughlin-Bogue gets into it here. 

ICYMI: After a brief flirtation with running for the open City Council seat for District 2, Tanya Woo appears to have taken her hat out of the ring. We were this close to making a punch card for her. Lose three elections and the fourth one’s free!

Block Party Is Growing Up: At least, the crowd is. Capitol Hill Block Party announced its two-day lineup for the 27th annual music festival yesterday (shaving a day off its usual three-day run.) And for the first time, the festival is going to be 21+. The festival’s producers say it’s to “optimize the festival layout, providing a better customer, fan, and neighborhood experience.” The whole event is a bit scaled back, which Stranger Arts Editor Emily Nokes says “seems fine given the pink-and-rhinestone beating the Pike/Pine corridor took from the glorious Chappell Roan show that dominated last year's CHBP; a beating I personally loved, but I was um, having a psychedelic experience and didn’t have to work there, or clean anything up afterwards!”

Looking for Something to Do Tonight? Torrey Peters, author of Detransition, Baby, will be at Town Hall tonight to talk about her new book Stag Dance. Read about the book here before you go!

Some Parker Posey for Your Wednesday: Her voice has been stuck in my head for days, and I hope it stays there.