Lawrence

• Douglas County Clerk Jamie Shew warned voters that a new Kansas law eliminates the three-day grace period for mail-in ballots. →
• The Douglas County Tenant Eviction Defense pilot program launched a new data dashboard to track the eviction defense process. →
• The Douglas County Commission appointed six new members to the Douglas County Crisis Response Community Advisory Board. →
• The Lawrence City Commission voted to allocate up to $39,000 to keep the downtown Community Building free to the public through 2026. →
• WellSpring School of Allied Health abruptly closed its Lawrence location, leaving massage therapy students stranded days before graduation. →
• Ten Douglas County Special Olympics athletes will compete in swimming, bocce, flag football, and cornhole at the USA Games in Minnesota. →
• It's going to be a gorgeous, mostly sunny Friday in Lawrence with just a light breeze and a high of 85°F, making it a perfect day to head outdoors.

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🌾 Kansas

• Kansas's 2026 wheat harvest reached roughly 50% completion, with the cooperative CoMark Equity Alliance expecting only 40% to 45% of a normal crop due to high abandonment, variable stands and weed pressure, with yields ranging from 5 to 40 bushels per acre. →

• U.S. Reps. Sharice Davids and Derek Schmidt introduced the bipartisan USDA Field Office Stability Act on June 18 to prevent closure or relocation of NRCS, FSA and Rural Development offices, responding to roughly 24,000 USDA job cuts nationwide since January 2025. →

• Kansas health and wildlife officials issued blue-green algae advisories June 18 for 12 lakes statewide, placing six under warning status and six under watch status, and urged people and pets to avoid suspicious water. →

• Gov. Laura Kelly denied serial killer John Robinson's request to commute his death sentence June 18, citing no credible claim of innocence or evidence of manifest injustice for the 82-year-old convicted of killing eight victims dating to 1984. →

• A Prairie Village empanada shop has sold roughly 10,000 empanadas per week during the World Cup, with owner Ivan Acuña attributing the surge to strong demand around Argentina-related matches and overflow crowds at Fan Fest. →

🇺🇸 US

• U.S.-Iran talks in Switzerland were postponed Friday as Israel carried out new strikes in Lebanon, straining a preliminary deal signed by President Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian that critics say offers Tehran economic relief while deferring harder questions about its nuclear program. →

• The Senate voted 84-8 to advance the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, a bipartisan bill aimed at increasing housing supply by modernizing federal programs, supporting construction and preservation, and streamlining regulatory reviews. →

• The CDC reported 2,104 confirmed U.S. measles cases in 2026 as of June 18, approaching the full-year 2025 total of 2,288, with 93% of cases linked to outbreaks and most occurring among unvaccinated individuals. →

• The White House and Anthropic are developing a framework to assess the severity of security flaws in AI models and guide potential government intervention, following export controls imposed after a jailbreak vulnerability was discovered in Anthropic's latest models. →

• The Obama Presidential Center opened to the public June 19 in Chicago's Jackson Park, offering a museum, Chicago Public Library branch, gardens, and athletic facilities, with most of the campus free and museum access requiring timed-entry tickets. →

Weather

JUNE 19, 1865: SLAVERY’S END ANNOUNCED IN TEXAS ON “JUNETEENTH”

On June 19, 1865, Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, to announce that the Civil War had ended and that all enslaved people in the state were free. The news—more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation—set off celebrations among the 250,000 newly freed people in Texas and became known as Juneteenth. In 2021, President Joe Biden signed legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday.