USG candidates guilty in headshot dispute
Tomo Chien
February 20, 2026
Good morning. It’s Friday, and these are the five USC, Los Angeles, and California stories you need to know for today.
1.
Scandal! The student government found presidential candidates Diane Kim and Syrabi Nur Rahman guilty of the heinous crime of having a UC Irvine student take their campaign headshots, among other charges. Read the hilarious, 11-page judicial decision, which reads more seriously than most federal criminal indictments.
2.
Activists this week celebrated an apparent end to one of the Department of Education’s efforts to dismantle DEI initiatives across the country. Don’t expect much to change, though: Several executive orders targeting the practice are still in place, and President Beong-Soo Kim said USC has no plans to revert its DEI-scrubbing efforts.
3.
Alysa Liu, a UCLA student and one of the darlings of the U.S. Olympic team, won gold after pulling off a stunning free skate routine. USC, which typically dominates the Summer Olympics, unfortunately appears to have few shots at gold in Milan — save for one former swimmer who’s now competing on the bobsled team.
4.
In case it wasn’t obvious: LA is experiencing far wetter weather than it typically does this time of year. The storm system, which is expected to abate today, has made for several unbelievable videos, including a flooded Trader Joe’s, inundated highways, and a very confused Waymo and Coco delivery bot.
5.
The Daily Trojan apparently got paid to promote voting in this year’s Undergraduate Student Government elections. Sellouts! Let it be known that Morning, Trojan is a pro-bono sponsor of democracy and civic virtue. Click here to vote in the elections, which close Sunday.
