TheChek News Flow

Weekend Papers Summary

NEW YORK TIMES

• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a call to reopen schools in a statement that aligned with Trump’s pressure on cities and states to end lockdowns, listing numerous benefits of being in school and downplaying the potential health risks.

• In Latin America, where authorities have been unable to control the coronavirus pandemic and where few people can afford quality medical care, interest is growing in dubious medicines such as chlorine dioxide, touted as cures for the virus.

• Several progressive challengers upset entrenched incumbents in the New York Legislature in the recent Democratic primary, cementing their movement’s influence in Albany and making it likely that the state government will become one of the most liberal in the nation.

• Trump signed several executive orders Friday targeting the high price of prescription drugs, including a tentative plan to link the price that Medicare pays for some drugs to the low prices that foreign countries pay, but major changes aren’t likely to occur anytime soon.

• The Trump administration is bypassing an arms control deal to sell large, armed drones to countries such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, but arms control officials and lawmakers trying to limit the proliferation of such drones oppose the move.

• The Trump administration is pressing forward with policies limiting transgender rights, even though many rules that have been in development for years have now either been finalized or have gone into effect.

• American intelligence officials warned that China, Russia, and Iran are expanding their influence in the US ahead of the presidential election, but Democrats briefed on the matter said the threat was far more urgent than what the administration described.

• The Dodd-Frank financial law succeeded at making banks safer, but empowered shadowy corners of finance—such a class of hedge funds that had been caught on the wrong side of a trade with ample risks—that nearly wrecked the system in March.

• As the back-to-school season approaches this year, 16 states are temporarily exempting clothing, shoes, notebooks, and other school supplies, sometimes including computers, from state, and often local, sales taxes.

• The US and China are dismantling decades of political, economic, and social engagement, setting the stage for a new era of confrontation shaped by the most hawkish voices on both sides—cementing what the Trump administration hopes to be one of its key legacies; related story says the US-China trade deal is providing a rare point of stability as relations between the countries fray over Hong Kong, the coronavirus, and accusations of espionage.

• Across the pharmaceutical and medical industries, senior executives and board members of companies developing coronavirus vaccines are making millions of dollars selling shares that go up after the companies announce positive developments.

• North Korea said it had locked down a city near its border with South Korea and declared a “maximum” national emergency after finding what its leader, Kim Jong-un, said could be the country’s first case of COVID-19 there.

• The Global Antitrust Institute—part of the law school at George Mason University and bankrolled in large part by tech companies such as AMZN, GOOGL, and QCOM—promotes the belief that the best way to foster competition is to maintain a hands-off approach to antitrust law.

• Despite the stock market’s distaste for the prospect of a Democratic presidential victory, stocks could prosper if Joe Biden wins in November according to a new analysis by Bank of America Global Research, with the coronavirus and trade likely to be two major factors in the outcome.