Monday, July 20 top news briefs
Hello, welcome to The Daily Moth! It is Monday, July 20. I’m back from my one-week break. Thank you Renca Dunn for doing a fantastic job of covering news in my place.
Now, here are top news briefs.
John Lewis passes away at 80
On Friday night, John Robert Lewis passed away from pancreatic cancer at the age of 80. He was a civil rights leader who fought for racial equality for his entire adult life and was a long-time U.S. representative.
When Lewis was a young adult, he was physically assaulted multiple times while protesting against racism, was arrested over 40 times, and was at one point jailed for more than a month.
Lewis was one of the speakers at the 1963 March on Washington in which Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.
In 1965, Lewis was beaten by Alabama law enforcement after he went across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma during a march to encourage people to register and vote. The day was called “Bloody Sunday.”
In 1986, he won a U.S. Congressional seat for Georgia’s 5th District and has been a lawmaker for the rest of his life.
In 2015, Lewis walked across the Pettus bridge in a ceremony with then-president Barack Obama and former president George W. Bush. Now many people have called for the bridge to be renamed in honor of John Lewis.
Lewis’ family recognized that he was known as an activist and as a Congressman, but they said they knew him as a loving father and brother and that he will be deeply missed.
One of Lewis’ best-known quotes is “Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.”
It is not yet announced when or where Lewis’ funeral will be. News reports say memorials are expected in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, and his birthplace of Troy, Alabama.
Covid-19 vaccine trials
A Covid-19 vaccine trial at Oxford University reported positive results today after two months. Over 1,000 healthy adults received a dose, and 10 patients received a second dose. Half of the adults got a vaccine for the coronavirus and another half got a meningitis vaccine. The studies said adults were able to develop “strong immune responses.” There were minimal side effects for the coronavirus vaccine that can be relieved by Tylenol or other acetaminophens. The trials at its early stage can only measure safety and dosing, and future tests will focus on whether it protects an individual from the coronavirus. There are about 17 different vaccine tests around the world.
There was a second vaccine study in China that is similar to the Oxford vaccine, and that one also had positive results with about 500 individuals involved in the studies.
We’re still a long way from a vaccine being widely available. A USAToday analysis put where we are in a clock illustration — with midnight being the start of the pandemic and the “next day” being a vaccine widely available. We’re only four hours in, it’s only 4:00 a.m. So there’s a lot left to do.
Federal judge’s son fatally shot at home
An unknown person shot and killed the son of a federal judge at their home in New Jersey. The judge’s name is Esther Salas and she was not injured. A gunman was dressed into a FedEx uniform, was wearing a mask, and knocked on the family home at 5:00 pm on Sunday night. The son opened the door with the husband behind him and they were shot. The son was killed. The husband was seriously injured but is in stable condition. The son was a student at Catholic University. Judge Salas was home at the time, but in the basement. There was a manhunt for the gunman that included FBI agents, but news reports this afternoon said the suspect died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Portland protests
In Portland, Oregon, there have been protests against racism that have continued for almost two months. The tensions have now ramped up with federal law enforcement officers wearing green military fatigues sent into the city. President Donald Trump said he sent them there to restore order. The agents are from the Department of Homeland Security. News reports say the federal officers have been driving up in unmarked vehicles and detaining protesters without explaining why the protesters were arrested. They have launched tear gas and used batons to beat back protesters. News reports said the protesters sprayed graffiti and tried to set fire to a police building. The mayor of Portland and the Oregon governor are opposed to the federal officers’ presence and have sued the Trump administration seeking to remove the “federal police.” The unrest is still going on in Portland.
That is all the top stories for today. See you tomorrow and stay with the light!
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/17/politics/john-lewis-dead-at-80/index.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lewis_(civil_rights_leader)
https://abcnews.go.com/US/federal-judges-son-shot-killed-husband-injured-attack/story?id=71871708