News Roundup: BPS Moves to Close Charlestown High, Supreme Court Rejects DOJ Bid on California Ballots, and Europe Supermarket Freezers Are Hacked

Here is your Monday evening roundup, with one story from Boston, one from across the country and one from overseas. Tomorrow is Election Day in Massachusetts. If you still need hours, ID rules or the nine ballot questions in plain words, use our Election Day guide.

Boston: BPS proposes closing Charlestown High School

Boston Public Schools has proposed closing Charlestown High School, citing a sharp drop in enrollment, GBH News reported on Monday. Parents, teachers and alumni say they were blindsided. If the School Committee approves the plan, students could move to another high school as early as the 2028-2029 school year, and the district says it would put a new high school in the same building.

Enrollment has fallen about 32% in three years, from 820 students to 559, according to BPS. Superintendent Mary Skipper has previously pointed to lower international immigration as one reason. History teacher and Boston Teachers Union representative Cecil Carey said Charlestown High has one of the highest shares of immigrant students in the district, plus one of the largest programs for students with intellectual disabilities and a large life-skills program. "At no point were we involved in this process," Carey said.

Parent Destin Montecalvo, whose son is in ninth grade, called the school the most stable education setting her family has had. Parent Lillian Scrow, whose son is in 10th grade, started a petition that she said gathered nearly 1,500 signatures in two days. Skipper and Mayor Michelle Wu said closing a school is one of the hardest decisions a district makes, and that the city would work with neighbors on the transition. The School Committee is expected to take up the proposal on Dec. 2.

National: Supreme Court rejects DOJ bid to hold about 20,000 California mail ballots

On the eve of the midterm elections, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the Trump administration's last-minute request to temporarily block California from counting mail ballots from about 20,000 voters the Justice Department says may not be U.S. citizens, CNBC and AP reported Monday evening.

Solicitor General D. John Sauer had told the Court the government identified more than 20,000 people who appear registered in California but who, in the United States' view, are "likely not U.S. citizens." The application came after a federal judge in Los Angeles denied a temporary restraining order last week, and after a divided Ninth Circuit panel rejected an emergency appeal on Friday. The majority had warned of a "material risk" of disenfranchisement. Judge David Carter, denying the TRO, wrote that never before had the federal government, on the eve of an election, sought to coerce a state to abandon its own election procedures.

The one-sentence denial in United States v. California, application 26A624, carried no noted dissents and no explanation. Justice Elena Kagan had referred the request to the full Court, which did not seek a response from California before ruling. Noncitizens are barred from voting in federal elections; California officials have cast doubt on the reliability of the federal list.

International: Supermarket freezers hacked across seven European countries

Dozens of supermarkets in Belgium, Luxembourg, Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands, Estonia and Finland reported overnight that refrigerators and freezers warmed up, in what companies and officials describe as a cyberattack, the BBC and The Guardian reported.

Around 40 Delhaize stores in Belgium and Luxembourg were hit. Smaller numbers of shops were affected in the other countries, including ICA and Coop stores in Sweden, about 13 SuperValu stores in Ireland, and some Carrefour, Spar, Ikea and neighborhood shops. Stephan Moelans, CEO of Sabcobel, which runs Delhaize's refrigeration systems, said evaporators were switched into defrost mode, the same method used in last month's attack on hundreds of French stores that forced millions of euros of food to be thrown out. Temperatures in some units reportedly rose as high as 50°C (122°F).

Moelans said technicians worked through the night to disconnect affected units from the network, and that many systems need physical changes, not only software patches, after the French incident. Belgium's and Sweden's cyber agencies said they were monitoring the case. The UK's National Cyber Security Centre said it was working with partners; no UK incidents were reported. No one has claimed responsibility.

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That's the evening roundup. For community gatherings, talks and family events around Massachusetts this week, see the Mass Halal events calendar.