Axios

Thousands of Puerto Ricans on Friday marched to protest against ongoing power outages across the island, AP reports.

Driving the news: Many of the approximately 4,000 protesters called for the ouster of Luma, a private company that took over the island’s transmission and distribution of power on June 1, per AP.

Virginia Democrat Terry McAuliffe has sworn off money from the Richmond company Dominion Energy. But the utility has found more subtle ways to back McAuliffe's gubernatorial bid, records show.

Driving the news: Dominion's political action committee has donated $200,000 to a murky political group called Accountability Virginia PAC, a group with ties to prominent Democrats that's been running ads attacking Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin from the right.

President Biden speaking at the U.S. Capitol on Saturday honored members of law enforcement who died in the line of duty in 2019 and 2020 and saluted those who are currently serving.

Driving the news: "We expect everything of you, and it's beyond the capacity of anyone to meet the total expectations. Being a cop today is one hell of a lot harder than it's ever been," Biden said.

A law banning obscenities from license plates in Maine goes into effect Monday — but it may take a few months for the ban to officially come to fruition, AP reports.

Driving the news: Maine, which has about 121,000 vanity license plates on the road, offers some with colorful language, including one that says "F---YoU," with all of the letters spelled out.

Former President Barack Obama will travel to Glasgow next month for the UN climate summit, CNN reports.

Driving the news: Obama will meet with young climate change advocates and "urge more robust action going forward by all of us — governments, the private sector, philanthropy and civil society," according to an Obama spokesperson, per CNN.

A judge on Friday issued a temporary restraining order against the Chicago police union president, barring him from making statements discouraging members from reporting their COVID-19 vaccine status to the city, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The big picture: The order came just hours before the deadline for Chicago city employees to report their vaccination status, but city officials said it would take days for them to determine who got shots and who did not, according to ABC 7 Chicago.

The Pentagon has offered unspecified payments as a condolence to the families of 10 Afghan civilians, including seven children, who were killed in an Aug. 29 U.S. drone strike in Kabul.

Why it matters: Though U.S. military officials initially said the drone strike targeted an Islamic State member, they later admitted that Zemari Ahmadi, an aid worker who was driving the car struck by the drone, was an innocent victim.

President Biden said Friday that the Justice Department should prosecute those who defy subpoenas from the Jan. 6 select committee.

Why it matters: The president's remarks come one day after Donald Trump ally Steve Bannon failed to show up for a deposition before the committee.

Former President Bill Clinton was admitted to the University of California, Irvine Medical Center on Tuesday for a non-COVID-related infection, his spokesperson Angel Ureña said Thursday.

The latest: In an update on Friday, Ureña said Clinton's health indicators are "trending in the right direction, including his white blood count which has decreased significantly."

Companies and CEOs are reluctant to speak out against Texas’ abortion ban because they fear there’s more to lose than gain.

Why it matters: As the de facto fourth branch of government, CEOs face more pressure to drive social and political change.

A federal appeals court on Friday denied an emergency request to block a COVID-19 vaccine mandate from going into effect in Maine, the Associated Press reports.

Driving the news: The mandate, which Gov. Janet Mills (D) announced in August, requires health care workers in Maine to get vaccinated by Oct. 29 or face losing their jobs.

A Texas superintendent apologized to his district on Thursday after a top official told teachers to "make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has an opposing, that has other perspectives."

Why it matters: The comment, which was first reported by NBC News, led to widespread outrage. State lawmakers on both sides of the aisle condemned the implication of an "opposing" side, as did the Anti-Defamation League.

Gov. Tim Walz (D) announced Friday that he'll put the Minnesota National Guard on alert to help ease staffing shortages at hospitals and care facilities due to the rise in COVID-19 cases among unvaccinated residents in the state.

Driving the news: Over 400 Minnesota patients are currently waiting for beds to open up at other care centers as hospitals across the state have reported that they're at or close to reaching capacity, AP reports.

The Texas House voted 76-54 Thursday to pass legislation that would require public school students to play on sports teams based on their assigned sex at birth, NBC News reports.

Why it matters: The bill, which Gov. Greg Abbott (R) is poised to sign into law, would make Texas one of nine states that passed laws targeting tans youth this year.

The Department of Justice gave former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe back pay and restored his retirement benefits as part of a settlement for a federal lawsuit alleging he was illegally fired for political reasons in March 2018.

Why it matters: McCabe had been dismissed hours before he was set to retire by former Attorney General Jeff Sessions after an inspector general's report alleged that he had improperly disclosed information to reporters, meaning he was denied retirement and other benefits.

A U.S. Capitol Police officer has been indicted on obstruction of justice charges for allegedly helping hide evidence of a participant's involvement in the Jan. 6 riot.

Driving the news: Officer Michael A. Riley, 50, is accused of telling the unidentified participant, referred to as "Person 1," in the Jan. 6 riot to delete posts from Facebook, which showed them in the Capitol during the attack.

Developing new military technologies, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, will be necessary to prevent a war with China or other adversaries, Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) said at an Axios event Friday.

Why it matters: With the war on terror ramping down and competition with China increasing, Kelly said it's time for the U.S. to adapt its military technology to address threats in the western Pacific, specifically China.

Italy began enforcing one of the world's strictest workplace vaccination policies on Friday, risking protests and worker strikes, the Washington Post reports.

Driving the news: The policy requires all employees — in both public and private sectors — to have a "Green Pass," which shows workers have proof of vaccination, a negative test or have recently recovered from COVID-19, per AP.

The Department of Homeland Security said late Thursday that it is prepared to reinstate former President Trump's "Remain-in-Mexico" policy in mid-November.

Driving the news: The Supreme Court in August upheld a lower court's decision ordering the administration to reimplement the policy formally called the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) program, which requires asylum seekers at the southern border to wait in Mexico while their claims are processed in U.S. courts.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has announced a new bill that would establish an interagency task force to craft a response to China's use of economic measures to further its geopolitical goals.

Why it matters: The draft bill represents growing awareness in the U.S. that economic coercion is a cornerstone of the Chinese Communist Party's ability to project authoritarianism beyond its borders.

The White House will announce Friday plans to lift travel restrictions for fully vaccinated international travelers beginning Nov. 8, a White House official said.

Why it matters: The move will allow vaccinated travelers from most countries to visit the U.S. for the first time in more than 18 months.

The president and CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee resigned Thursday night amid a scandal over the denomination's handling of sexual abuse cases.

Driving the news: Ronnie Floyd's resignation comes after weeks of internal division have rocked the SBC, the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S.

Ken Auletta, longtime author of The New Yorker's "Annals of Communications" profiles, will be out in July with "Hollywood Ending: Harvey Weinstein and the Culture of Complicity," Penguin Press tells me.

• The publisher calls Auletta's 12th book "a deep dive into the life and career of Harvey Weinstein — how he rose to become one of the most iconic figures in the world of movies, how he used that position to feed his monstrous sexual appetites, and why he was allowed to operate with such impunity for so many years."

A three-judge panel for the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday denied the Department of Justice's emergency request to suspend Texas' abortion ban, which bars the procedure after a fetal heartbeat is detected, or roughly six weeks — before many people know they are pregnant.

Why it matters: The ruling allows the ban to continue to be enforced as the courts consider the law's constitutionality. It's one of the most restrictive bans to be enforced since the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortion nationwide in 1973.

A White House official tells me talks with Democratic lawmakers on the final shape of President Biden's Build Back Better agenda "are accelerating ... [T]his progress means we can conclude negotiations soon."

Driving the news: "There’s urgency and purpose in our conversations behind bringing these game-changing economic growth plans home for families, and we feel good about the momentum," the official said.

The outcry over Congress' latest proposal to regulate tech companies' algorithms shows how difficult it is for lawmakers and platforms alike to deal with online content moderation.

Why it matters: The new bill is backed by the leadership of a powerful committee with jurisdiction over the issue, giving it more momentum than some previous legislative attempts to revamp online platforms' legal protections.

Some swing voters say the most important elements to preserve in Democrats' massive social spending package are the ones that would lower prescription drug costs, reduce pollution and make childcare or pre-K free or more affordable.

Yes, but: Considerably less popular among Trump-to-Biden voters: Extending the expanded child tax credit to 2025.

Missouri Gov. Mike Parson (R) on Thursday suggested he was prepared to prosecute the staff of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch after the newspaper published a story exposing a data risk on the state education department's website.

Driving the news: The Post-Dispatch notified the state Tuesday after discovering the vulnerability, which left the Social Security numbers of 100,000 staffers vulnerable to public disclosure. Parson's remarks Thursday echoed the rhetoric of a statement by the department, describing the reporter as a "hacker."

Maine health care workers who face firing for defying COVID vaccine requirements will not be eligible to receive unemployment benefits, AP reports.

Why it matters: The notice comes as Maine's hospitals suffer labor shortages partly related to the state's vaccine mandate. One of the state's biggest hospitals has had to turn away trauma and pediatric patients and shutter an entire department, according to a local CBS affiliate.

Test scores in both reading and math declined for 13-year-old students between 2012 and 2020, according to new data released Thursday from the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP).

Why it matters: It's the first major decline in the two subjects since the NAEP began tracking long-term academic achievement trends in the 1970s.