Good morning, this is Eleanor Ainge Roy bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Tuesday 9 January.

Top stories

Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner is facing renewed scrutiny over his company’s business deals with China and Israel. The US’s top financial watchdog is looking into an investment-for-visa program run by the Kushner family’s real estate company in China, and questions have also been raised about his business dealings in Israel. The Kushner real estate company has reportedly entered into business relationships with Israeli financial institutions since Jared Kushner sought to establish himself as the Trump administration’s Middle East peace broker. According to the New York Times Kushner’s company received an investment nearing $30m from Menora Mivtachim, one of Israel’s largest insurers, in the spring of 2017, shortly before the president and his son-in-law visited the country.

Kushner has also taken out at least four loans from Bank Hapoalim, Israel’s largest bank and currently under a US Department of Justice criminal investigation. A White House spokesperson denied that government ethics laws had been broken in the Menora Mivtachim deal. “We have tremendous confidence in the job Jared is doing leading our peace efforts and he takes the ethics rules very seriously and would never compromise himself or the administration.” Both developments contribute to concern that Kushner’s White House role is compromised by the family’s foreign business dealings.

Rising temperatures are turning almost all green sea turtles in a Great Barrier Reef population female, new research has found. The scientific paper, published in Current Biology, warned the skewed ratio could threaten the population’s future. It examined two genetically distinct populations of turtles on the reef, and found the northern group of about 200,000 animals was overwhelmingly female – 99.1% of juveniles, 99.8% of subadults and 86.8% of adults. Sea turtles are among species with temperature-dependent sex determination and the proportion of female hatchlings increases when nests are in warmer sands.

India may be on track for a major victory for gay rights after the supreme court agreed to re-examine a colonial-era law outlawing sex between men. Section 377, modelled on a 16th-century British law, bans “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal”, and is punishable by life imprisonment. The supreme court observed in 2013 that fewer than 200 people had been convicted of homosexual acts under the legislation, but activists claim it is regularly used to blackmail and intimidate LBGTI Indians, and stymie HIV/Aids prevention efforts. Harish Iyer, an activist, said he was “cautiously optimistic” that the court would scrap the 150-year-old law.

New South Wales Labor narrowly led the Berejiklian government 51% to 49% in Guardian Essential polls covering the last three months of 2017. The results for October to December also show incumbent Labor governments hold narrow leads in Victoria and South Australia, while those in Western Australia and Queensland have big leads after the 2017 state elections. The poll found Labor had a primary vote of 39% in NSW (up 4.9% since the 2015 election), the Coalition had 40% support (down 5.6%) and the Greens 9% (down 1.3%). It is the first time Labor has led on the two-party preferred measure since the 2015 state election, reversing a 51% to 49% deficit in the previous three-month average.

If practice makes perfect, the wedding of Ron van Houwelingen and Antony McManus should go off without a hitch. The couple have committed to each other at 16 unofficial wedding ceremonies, but this will be their first legal marriage, and one of the first in Australia since marriage equality was legalised in December. Although a few gay weddings have occurred with special dispensation, the 30-day waiting period to marry after lodging official notice means most same-sex couples have had to wait until today to tie the knot.

Sport

After mixed performances in the Brisbane International (Ashleigh Barty losing in the first round and Nick Kyrgios taking the men’s title), the pair remain Australia’s best hope for major grand slam damage on home soil. With Daria Gavrilova hot on Barty’s heels and Thanasi Kokkinakis and Alex de Minaur emerging, Australia boasts the strongest grand slam contingent for some time, and will benefit from an increasingly open draw, writes Val Febbo.

Guardian sports writers Ali Martin and Adam Collins rank the the Ashes players of 2017-18, with Dawid Malan and Jimmy Anderson the only tourists to impress, while Steve Smith completed a Bradman-esque series and Australia’s pace attack shone.

Thinking time

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Oprah Winfrey accepts a lifetime achievement award at the 75th Golden Globes. Photograph: Network/Sipa USA/REX/Shutterstock

Black was the dress du jour at the Golden Globes, as Hollywood’s elite united in their stand against the sexual abuse and harassment of women in their industry, and workforces around the world. The Guardian’s Abi Wilkinson writes that Hollywood doing politics can be cringe-worthy – but last night they nailed it. Host Seth Myers peppered his speech with acerbic jabs at the disgraced Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey, while Oprah’s impassioned message to girls around the globe that “a new dawn is upon us” was met with a standing ovation and whispers of a tilt for the White House.

To see the political narrative at play in Victoria’s alleged African gang crisis, look no further than the surf coast town of Torquay, says criminologist Mark Wood. On Thursday, while politicians were debating whether Victorians were afraid to dine out at restaurants because of “African gang violence”, more than 100 young people rioted and threw bottles at police cars in the tourist town. But it caused barely a blip on the national media or political radar. The reason is that the Coalition believes a law and order campaign around so-called African gangs is one of the few ways it can hurt Labor at November’s state election, political analysts tell Calla Wahlquist.

Kate Hennessy’s quarterly music column is back, and she has once again picked the best releases from deep in the Australian underground. This edition features the “fine, filthy and very funny” hip hop artist Miss Blanks; the latest experimental album from Machine Translations, who is on “a constant quest to unlearn”; and the blinding debut of HTMLflowers, who at 27 has outlived his life expectancy by 26 years and finds “power in expecting to die young”.

What’s he done now?

More than a year after the US election, Donald Trump is still chastising citizens who voted for his rival, Hilary Clinton. “African American unemployment is the lowest ever recorded in our country. The Hispanic unemployment rate dropped a full point in the last year and is close to the lowest in recorded history. Dems did nothing for you but get your vote! #NeverForget.”

Media roundup

Photograph: The Daily Telegraph

The Daily Telegraph leads with Nicole Kidman’s win at the Golden Globes. She picked up the award for best actress in a TV series for playing a beaten wife in 2017’s Big Little Lies. The paper features a rousing quote from Kidman: “I do believe we can elicit change through the stories we tell” and under the banner “Historic stand against creeps”. The Australian reports that the number of people accessing their superannuation to cover the cost of medical bills – especially weight-loss surgery – has soared, with recent data showing around 15,000 people drew down a total of more than $200m to fund medical bills in 2017. The ABC delves into new research that has found baby boomers can significantly reduce or even reverse their risk of heart failure if they embark on a regular exercise regime. “We’ve also found that the ‘sweet spot’ in life to get off the couch and start regular exercise is in late-middle age when the heart still has plasticity, and this applies to people right around the world, including Australia,” said Dr Erin Howden of the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute.



Coming up

A rush of same-sex weddings will take place today as the 30-day waiting period since the passage of the marriage equality legislation expires. A few couples have received special dispensation to marry in the intervening period.

The Indigenous affairs minister, Nigel Scullion, will visit Gunbalanya in Arnhem Land to discuss remote school attendance, youth crime and the work for the dole program.

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