May 3, 2018

Trump tweets defense of Stormy Daniels payment, denies affair

In a string of early Thursday morning tweets, President Trump denied using campaign funds for the $130,000 that his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, paid adult film actress Stormy Daniels for her silence regarding an alleged affair. Trump has previously stated that he had no knowledge of the agreement.

Go deeper: The AP has a great explainer on why Trump's claim that the payment can't be tied to the campaign could be legally dubious.

The backdrop: Rudy Giuliani, who recently joined Trump's legal team told Fox News' Sean Hannity on Wednesday night that Trump knew of Cohen's arrangement to pay Daniels. But the president and Giuliani both claim that the funds for the payment came from Trump personally.

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Axios

Updated 28 mins ago - Politics & Policy

Coronavirus dashboard

Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

Global: Total confirmed cases as of 6 p.m. ET: 13,203,571 — Total deaths: 575,201 — Total recoveries — 7,331,068 — Map.
U.S.: Total confirmed cases as of 6 p.m. ET: 3,407,798 — Total deaths: 136,252 — Total recoveries: 1,031,939 — Total tested: 41,004,275 — Map.
Politics: Biden welcomes Trump wearing mask in public but warns "it’s not enough"
Public health: Four former CDC heads say Trump's undermining of agency puts lives at risk — CDC director: U.S. could get coronavirus "under control" in 4–8 weeks if all wear masks.

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Courtenay Brown

33 mins ago - Economy & Business

Bank CEOs brace for worsening economic scenario

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon. Photo: J. Lawler Duggan/For The Washington Post via Getty Images

Wells Fargo swung to its first loss since the financial crisis — while JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup reported significantly lower profits from a year earlier — as the banks set aside billions of dollars more in the second quarter for loans that may go bad.

Why it matters: The cumulative $28 billion in loan loss provisions that banks have so far announced they’re reserving serves as a signal they’re preparing for a colossal wave of loan defaults as the economy slogs through a coronavirus-driven downturn.

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Bob Herman

57 mins ago - Health

Moderna's vaccine spurred immune system response to coronavirus

Moderna's stock rose 16% after hours on this news. Photo: Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Healthy volunteers who took Moderna's coronavirus vaccine candidate appeared to generate an immune system response to the virus, and there were "no trial-limiting safety concerns," according to a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Why it matters: The phase one trial is still small and does not definitively determine how effective the vaccine is. But Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health, which is running the trial, told the Wall Street Journal that these data make it "pretty clear that this vaccine is capable of inducing quite good [levels] of neutralizing antibodies."