Trouble displaying posts after update

Hello world.

I have a spot on my website where my theme is supposed to display latest news, but I wanted to keep the format and stuff and instead replace it with upcoming events. It was working before with the following code, but after the update with the timezones (and I did clear the extra fields, oops maybe), it’s not finding any data to include. So this section is displaying, but it’s blank. It probably has to do with the dates, I just can’t find in the documentation what it should look like now.

<div id="carousel-homepage-latestnews" class="carousel slide" data-ride="carousel">
					<!-- Indicators -->
				
					<!-- Wrapper for slides -->
					<div class="carousel-inner" role="listbox">

					<?php $today = getdate (); ?>
					<?php

						$args = array( 
							'event-categories' => 'special-events' , 
							'post_type' => 'event' , 
							'order' => 'ASC' , 
							'posts_per_page' => '20' , 
							'meta_query' => array( 'key' => '_start_ts', 'value' => current_time('timestamp'), 'compare' => '>=', 'type'=>'numeric' ),
							'orderby' => 'meta_value_num',
							'meta_key' => '_start_ts',
							'meta_value' => current_time('timestamp'),
							'meta_value_num' => current_time('timestamp'),
							'meta_compare' => '>=',
							);

						$loop = new WP_Query( $args );

						$newSlideActive = '<div class="item active">';
						$newSlide 		= '<div class="item">';
						$newSlideClose 	= '<div class="clear"></div></div>';
						$i_latest_posts= 0;
						while ( $loop->have_posts() ) : $loop->the_post();

						$i_latest_posts++;

						if ( !wp_is_mobile() ){

								if($i_latest_posts == 1){
									echo $newSlideActive;
								}
								else if($i_latest_posts % 4 == 1){
									echo $newSlide;
								}
							?>
								<div class="col-sm-3 latestnews-box">

									<div class="latestnews-img">
										<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>">

											<?php if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) : ?>
												<?php the_post_thumbnail(); ?>
											<?php else: ?>
												<img src="<?php echo get_template_directory_uri(); ?>/images/blank-latestposts.png">
											<?php endif; ?>

										</a>
									</div>

									<div class="latesnews-content">

										<h5 class="latestnews-title"><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h5>
										<p style="clear:both">
										<?php the_excerpt(); ?>
										</p>
									</div>

								</div><!-- .latestnews-box"> -->

							<?php
								/* after every four posts it must closing the '.item' */
								if($i_latest_posts % 4 == 0){
									echo $newSlideClose;
								}

						} else {

							if( $i_latest_posts == 1 ) $active = 'active'; else $active = ''; 

						?>
	
							<div class="item <?php echo $active; ?>">
								<div class="col-md-3 latestnews-box">
									<div class="latestnews-img">
										<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>">
											<?php the_post_thumbnail(); ?>
										</a>
									</div>
									<div class="latesnews-content">
										<h5 class="latestnews-title"><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h5>
										<?php the_excerpt(); ?>
									</div>
								</div>
							</div>

						<?php
						}
						
					endwhile;
					
					

					if ( !wp_is_mobile() ) {

						// if there are less than 10 posts
						if($i_latest_posts % 4!=0){
							echo $newSlideClose;
						}

					}

					 wp_reset_postdata(); 
					?>	

				    </div>

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