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Some Americans were infected with COVID in December 2019

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

The National Institutes of Health said Tuesday morning that testing of samples from an ongoing study of Americans show a very limited number of cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection in five U.S. states as early as Jan. 7, 2020.

Why it matters: Calling it another "piece of the puzzle" of when and how the coronavirus pandemic began, the NIH researchers say this offers more evidence that the virus was in the U.S. at the end of December.

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Senate confirms antitrust expert Lina Khan as FTC commissioner

Lina Khan speaks at a Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee confirmation hearing. Photographer: Saul Loeb/AFP/Bloomberg via Getty Images.

The Senate voted 69-28 on Tuesday to confirm antitrust expert Lina Khan as a commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission.

Why it matters: Known for her work on how to apply antitrust laws to the tech industry, Khan's confirmation marks a changing tide in federal government efforts to rein in Big Tech companies, Axios' Ashley Gold and Margaret Harding McGill report.

MacKenzie Scott donates another $2.7 billion to 286 organizations

MacKenzie Scott with her former husband, Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon. Photo by Greg Doherty/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)

MacKenzie Scott announced Tuesday that she and her husband, Dan Jewett, had donated $2.74 billion to 286 different organizations, including community-based nonprofits and organizations focused on racial justice.

Why it matters: It's the next phase of what the New York Times describes as a "highly unconventional approach" to philanthropy from one of the richest women in the world.

Heat wave enveloping West will shatter records, spark wildfires

The sun sets behind power lines in Rosemead, California on June 14, 2021, amid an early season heatwave across much of California this week. Photo by Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images

A dangerous and widespread mid-June heat wave is bringing blowtorch-like heat, skyrocketing power demand, and “critical” wildfire danger to much of the West Tuesday through this weekend.

Why it matters: The heat is building in a region that is experiencing a record drought, leading to dangerous fire weather conditions, straining electrical grids, and causing water supplies to dwindle further. The heat itself may prove deadly.

Politico's top editor leaving for NBC

Screenshot: Youtube

Politico’s top editor Carrie Budoff Brown is joining NBC in a high-level executive position at the network that includes overseeing the "Meet the Press" franchise, sources familiar with the discussions tell Axios.

Why it matters: Budoff Brown has been with Politico since its earliest days in 2007 and is admired among newsroom staff. Her departure will be a major loss to the organization.

Bored of binging: Weekly streaming releases on the rise

Expand chart
Data: Parrot Analytics; Chart: Will Chase/Axios

Consumers and streamers are gravitating towards shows that are released weekly, as opposed to binge-watching shows that are released all-at-once, according to data provided exclusively to Axios from Parrot Analytics.

Why it matters: Streamers are no longer competing against traditional TV for consumers attention — they're competing against each other. Weekly releases help reduce subscriber churn.

Emails reveal Trump pressured top DOJ officials to overturn election results

Photo: Anna Moneymaker-Pool/Getty Images

Between December 2020 and early January, former President Trump and his allies repeatedly pressed senior Justice Department officials to investigate baseless conspiracy theories and challenge the results of the 2020 election, according to documents released by the House Oversight Committee.

Why it matters: The documents reveal new details about the extent to which Trump and his aides — including White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows — were willing to go to maintain power and advance the lie that the election was stolen.

4 hours ago - World

U.S. and EU suspend 16-year Airbus-Boeing feud

President Biden at the EU summit in Brussels. Photo: Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

The United States and the European Union reached a deal to end a 16-year-old dispute over subsidies to Airbus and Boeing, the White House announced on Tuesday.

The state of play: Both sides agreed to suspend tariffs for five years while they work together to counter China's investment in the aircraft sector in ways "that reflect our standards for fair competition," U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai told reporters.

White House releases first national strategy for countering domestic terrorism

Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Photo: Samuel Corum/Getty Images

The Biden administration on Tuesday released the first-ever "National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism," following a 100-day comprehensive review ordered by President Biden on his first day in office.

Why it matters: It's the first national plan for countering what the White House is calling "the most urgent terrorism threat the United States faces today," echoing previous assessments by Attorney General Merrick Garland, FBI Director Christopher Wray and the intelligence community.

Bitcoin’s code upgrade is about privacy

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

Bitcoin’s most significant code improvement in years won a key stamp of approval this weekend, reports CoinDesk’s Christie Harkin.

Why it matters: Over three years in the making, Taproot represents the ability for bitcoin to one day do more than be a store of value: think more nimble smart contracts (similar to those on Ethereum) and better usability.

Mike Allen, author of AM
6 hours ago - Politics & Policy

Melinda French Gates meets with Biden administration, Hill officials

Melinda French Gates speaks during SXSW Online in March. Photo: SXSW via Getty Images

Melinda French Gates is staying visible with a Washington swing this week to visit White House and Hill officials to discuss issues important to her, especially paid leave, advisers tell me.

Driving the news: French Gates met at the White House yesterday with Chief of Staff Ron Klain and Domestic Policy Adviser Susan Rice, among other senior administration officials.

Republicans push to sanction Chinese officials over Wuhan lab probe

Rep. Elise Stefanik. Photo: Samuel Corum/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Two House Republicans — including Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) — are introducing a bill Tuesday to sanction top Chinese health officials until they allow an investigation into whether the coronavirus originated in a Wuhan lab, according to a copy of the bill text obtained by Axios.

Why it matters: The lab-leak theory has regained prominence in both the scientific and political worlds, after the Wall Street Journal reported that three scientists who worked at the Wuhan Institute of Virology experienced COVID-19 symptoms in November 2019.

7 hours ago - Technology

Your hands-free car drives way more politely than you

2021 Cadillac Escalade with Super Cruise technology allows hands-free highway driving. Photo: GM

Assisted-driving features are supposed to make cars safer and relieve some of the monotony of driving, but if your robot sidekick's driving style doesn't match your own, it could lead to unexpected dangers.

The big picture: Reliable, fully driverless cars are still a long way off. Until then, motorists will share driving duties with partially automated, assisted-driving systems, and they need to know what to expect from them.

3 dirty jobs that will build the future

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

The clean, green, connected world that's right around the corner will require dirty, dangerous work to build.

Think: Hauling solar panels up to high roofs. Digging trenches for fiber-optic cables along busy highways. Climbing towering masts to rig cellular antennas.

House antitrust bills take tight aim at tech giants

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

The sweeping antitrust bills House lawmakers introduced Friday don't just propose broad new principles of digital-age competition — they put giant bullseyes on the backs of Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple.

Why it matters: Laws crafted now to tie the hands of today's dominant companies will still be on the books for years and decades to come, and critics are already flagging possible unintended consequences.

PwC outlines new plan on racial equity, building trust in business

Illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios

A slew of corporations over the last year made promises to help build a more equitable future, pushed to action by sustained protests demanding racial equity. Consumers and investors alike are looking for action to back up rhetoric.

What’s new: PwC, a professional services firm, provided Axios an early look at a new global strategy announced this morning that aims to reimagine business' role in society. A cornerstone of the plan is putting $300 million toward education and racial equity programs.

Grid operator asks Texans to conserve power amid outages in searing heat

Power lines stretch along along a highway near Alpine, Texas. Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Texas' power grid operator has asked people to "reduce electric use as much as possible" until Friday following days of searing heat and a "significant number of forced generation outages."

Why it matters: The request by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) comes months after a deadly winter storm blew out the state's power infrastructure and left millions of Texans without power for days.

11 hours ago - World

ICC prosecutor seeks full probe into Duterte's drug war killings in Philippines

President Rodrigo Duterte during a speech at a Philippine Air Force base in Manila, the Philippines, in February. Photo: Xinhua/Rouelle Umali via Getty Images

The International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor has called for a full investigation into a deadly crackdown on drugs since President Rodrigo Duterte took office.

Why it matters: Official government data shows more than 6,100 people have died in police drug operations in the Philippines since 2016, but rights groups say the figure is likely to be much higher.

3,000 unruly passenger reports made to FAA this year

Photo: Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Airlines have reported some 3,000 cases of unruly behavior by passengers to the Federal Aviation Administration this year — including 2,300 for refusing to comply with face mask mandates, the FAA announced Monday.

Why it matters: Passenger numbers remain below pre-pandemic levels. But the FAA is investigating the highest number of suspected federal law violations since it began recording unruly passenger incidents in 1995, per ABC News.

Cashier killed after face mask policy dispute in Georgia grocery store

An Atlanta area grocery store cashier was killed and three other people were injured in a shooting following a dispute over a face mask policy in the supermarket Monday, police said.

Driving the news: DeKalb County Sheriff Melody Maddox said during a news conference that the female cashier was working at the Big Bear Supermarket in Decatur when she was shot following a "confrontation" over the wearing of masks.

House panel to investigate Trump-era DOJ data seizures

Photo: James Devaney via Getty Images

The House Judiciary Committee will launch a formal probe into the Trump-era Justice Department's seizure of data from devices belonging to members of Congress, their aides, journalists and then-White House counsel, panel chair Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) announced Monday.

Why it matters: Though it's so far unclear if the cases are related, they raise "serious constitutional and separation of power concerns," Nadler said in a statement.

16 hours ago - Politics & Policy

Scoop: Inside Biden's Putin prep

Photo illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Leon Neal (WPA Pool)/Getty Images

President Biden assembled a group of outside Russia experts — including former Trump officials — to brief him for his summit with President Vladimir Putin, people familiar with the matter tell Axios.

Why it matters: The previously unreported session demonstrates the extent to which Biden wants to be well prepared, drawing on the experience of officials with first-hand knowledge of the onetime KGB colonel’s tactics and tricks.

Rubio's play for anti-China vote

Sen. Marco Rubio. Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call Inc. via Getty Images

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is making a play for China hawks in Florida as he braces for a competitive re-election fight next year, records show.

Why it matters: Hostility toward communism drove a significant number of Latino voters in Florida into the Republican column in 2020. The Rubio campaign’s focus on China can capitalize on that trend and a wider — and widening — American mistrust of Beijing.

By the numbers: The building migrant backlog

Reproduced from TRAC, Syracuse University; Chart: Axios Visuals

There are now more than 1.3 million cases awaiting a decision from an immigration judge — double the caseload from 2017 — to determine whether migrants can legally stay in the U.S., according to newly released data reviewed by Axios.

Why it matters: The rapidly growing backlog is another sign of a broken immigration system. Migrants have been waiting an average of nearly 950 days for a court decision — two-and-a-half years of living in limbo.

Updated 16 hours ago - Health

Vermont becomes first state to reach 80% vaccine threshold

A COVID-19 vaccination record card and an "I got my COVID-19 vaccine!" sticker. (Photo by: Don and Melinda Crawford/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Vermont Gov. Phil Scott (R) announced Monday that 80% of its eligible population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.

Why it matters: Vermont is the first state in the country to reach that threshold. As a result, Scott said he is removing all COVID-19 restrictions.

Obama: Women "found themselves in an impossible situation" during pandemic

Photo: Scott Olson via Getty Images

Former President Obama, speaking to The 19th, called on the government, spouses and partners to play their role in addressing the decline in women's labor force.

Why it matters: Women's labor force participation in the U.S. was at a 33-year low in January. The pandemic has driven mothers out of the workforce, and there's reason to be concerned about "permanent scarring," Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in March.