Here are the headlines you Need2Know for Wednesday, October 21, 2020:

CHEDDAR POLL

Joe Biden is maintaining a 10-point national lead against President Trump with less than two weeks until Election Day, according to a new Cheddar/SurveyUSA poll out this morning. The poll finds Biden growing his lead among key groups like women while the president is underwater with seniors. LIkely voters rank the pandemic and the economy as their two most important issues. CHEDDAR

STIMULUS SHOWDOWN

Just as the House Speaker and Treasury Secretary appeared to be nearing a breakthrough on a new $2 trillion-ish stimulus bill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly told the White House not to accept a new bill before the election, as it would disrupt the Senate’s plans to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court next week. McConnell would need to bless any deal for it to have a shot of becoming law before Election Day, and that’s looking extremely unlikely, even though President Trump has urged Congress to “go big.” WASH POST

COVID-19: SILVER LINING

Even as new cases continue to surge in the northern hemisphere, two new peer-reviewed studies show that there’s been a sharp drop in mortality for hospitalized COVID patients across age groups. One study out of NYU and another out of the UK suggest that doctors and hospitals are getting much better at standardizing treatment for the virus. The NYU study found that hospitalized patients had about a 26 percent chance of dying at the start of the pandemic, and about an 8 percent chance of dying now. That still makes COVID more deadly than the flu, but it’s a significant improvement. NPR

UNITED STATES V. GOOGLE

The U.S. government has filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing it of antitrust violations related to its dominance in search. This is the most significant action taken against a tech giant by the federal government since President Clinton’s DOJ sued Microsoft. The government is arguing that Google is protecting its advantage in search by striking deals with Apple and others to make Google the default search engine on iPhones and other devices. Google is likely to argue that there’s plenty of choices for consumers on the internet. THE VERGE

SOCIAL MEDIA & ELECTION

Twitter has implemented a change to how users “retweet” that the company says will stay in place until at least the week after Election Day. Now, when you want to retweet something, you are prompted with an encouragement to write about whatever it is you’re retweeting. The hope is that by adding some friction to the retweet process, it will cut down on the spread of misinformation. Meanwhile, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says that platform may ease up its content restrictions after the election. Both Twitter and Facebook continue to face criticism from Republicans that they are censoring or “throttling” conservative content. FOX BIZ

ELECTRIC HUMMER

Tesla has some new competition in the market for high-end electric cars. General Motors debuted the new all-electric Hummer in a commercial during the World Series, officially entering a market that has been dominated by Elon Musk and Tesla. GM is marketing the GMC Hummer EV as an electric “supertruck” that will be available in a year, just before Musk’s Cybertruck. Starting price: $80K. CAR & DRIVER

WORLD SERIES

The Dodgers easily took Game 1 of the World Series, beating the Rays, 8-3, on the back of a dominant outing from pitcher Clayton Kershaw. The MLB is allowing 11,500 fans to attend the games at the brand new Globe Life Field in Texas. ESPN

FASTER & FURIOUS..ER

The Fast & Furious “core” franchise will come to a close after the 11th film. Universal is reportedly in talks with director Justin Lin, who is in post-production on the ninth installment of the series, to wrap up the story over two final movies. Fast & Furious is now Universal’s most successful franchise ever, eclipsing Jurassic Park. DEADLINE

FINAL ACT

Chadwick Boseman’s final performance will be memorialized on Netflix. The streaming giant will premiere Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom on Dec. 18. The drama has the late Boseman starring opposite Viola Davis, who plays the legendary blues singer Ma Rainey. Boseman’s turn as her ambitious trumpet player already getting buzz as a contender for a posthumous Oscar. WATCH THE TRAILER

LEFTOVERS: CALL FOR CIVILITY

The two opposing gubernatorial candidates in Utah appear together in a new commercial calling for civility ahead of Election Day. The Republican, Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox, and the Democrat, Chris Peterson, ask Utah residents to “show the country that there’s a better way.” (Cox is way up in the polls, for what it’s worth.) SEE THE AD

Listen to the N2K Podcast! Looking for more context and analysis on the big stories of the day? Check out our podcast! Hosts Jill and Carlo break down the headlines, every weekday morning Listen on Apple or Spotify, or watch on YouTube, and send us your feedback!

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