President Donald Trump speaks during an NBC News Town Hall, at Perez Art Museum Miami, Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020, in Miami. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Here are the headlines you Need2Know for Friday, October 16, 2020:
SPLIT-SCREEN ELECTION
President Trump and Joe Biden mostly stayed on the opposing political tracks they’ve been running on for the last few months at two dueling town hall appearances on NBC and ABC. The president again refused to denounce QAnon, questioned the effectiveness of masks and the legitimacy of the election, but did appear to commit to a peaceful transfer of power for the first time, part of a contentious rapid-fire back-and-forth with NBC’s Savannah Guthrie. Biden was pressed by ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on what he would have done differently in the pandemic and his position on packing the Supreme Court. (Biden said he’d give an answer on that question before the election.) AP
SOCIAL MEDIA POLITICAL CONTENT
Twitter has reversed course on a controversial policy that banned users from posting links to hacked materials, admitting it was overly broad and could do harm to journalists and whistleblowers. Joe Biden’s national press secretary told Cheddar that Twitter’s decision to block the sharing of a disputed New York Post article about the candidate and his son was evidence that the allegations in and of themselves are false: WATCH
COVID-19: LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
COVID cases in the U.S. are fast approaching a third peak, led by states like Alaska, Minnesota and Wisconsin that have officials worried about a lack of ICU beds in rural areas. Deaths are, for now, staying relatively flat, at around 800 a day. Dr. Fauci is warning that the country must get its baseline caseload down significantly before the winter. Canada will keep its border with the U.S. closed until America gets cases under control. USA TODAY
MEXICAN GENERAL ARRESTED
Mexico’s former defense minister was arrested at LAX last night by federal agents working on behalf of the DEA. Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda is the highest-ranking Mexican official to be detained on U.S. soil on drug and corruption charges. Mexico’s military generals have generally been considered untouchable -- at least in Mexico -- as the army is one of the few institutions in the country that has broad public support. NPR
YOUTUBE QANON CRACKDOWN
Google is the latest tech giant to crack down QAnon, banning any content related to the conspiracy movement that threatens real-world violence from YouTube. Journalists who cover QAnon say that YouTube has played the biggest role of any platform in moving the group from the fringes into the mainstream, as YouTube videos are often cross-posted to Facebook, where they spread like wildfire. CBS NEWS
IPHONE PREORDERS
Preorders for the iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro open today, with the devices shipping next week. The cheapest phone in this release is $800, but the big carriers are offering different trade-in promotions: SEE THEM
PLAYOFF BASEBALL
The Braves answered the Dodgers historic win in Game 3 of the NLCS with their own offensive clinic in Game 4, winning 10-2 and putting L.A. on the brink again. Game 5 is tonight, preceded by Game 6 of the ALCS, where the Rays will look to close out the Astros. CBS SPORTS
SPOTTED...
...Timothée Chalamet, on the cover of the new issue of GQ. The heartthrob debunks the conspiracy theories about those infamous paparazzi photos of he and ex-girlfriend Lily-Rose Depp in deep make-out mode being staged: READ THE COVER STORY
TONY NOMS
The Tony nominations have been announced, even though we still don’t know when -- or how -- the award show will take place. Jagged Little Pill, based on the Alanis Morissette album, notched 15 nominations to lead the Best Musical race. Slave Play scored 12 nominations, the most ever for a play. The nominations come amid the biggest crisis in the history of theater, with nearly all productions shut down indefinitely. BROADWAY WORLD
LEFTOVERS: CLOSE CALL
An old Soviet satellite and a piece of a decommissioned Chinese rocket came within feet of each other overnight, averting a major collision that astronomers had worried could have set off a wave of space debris into low-Earth orbit. The issue of space junk is real: NASA has been ringing alarm bells for years, saying the amount of stuff in orbit -- from human waste to rocket stages -- is already creating hazards for spacecraft launches, operational satellites and the ISS. BBC
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Markets closed the day mixed, and well off their lows of the day following a market meltdown earlier in the session. The Nasdaq staged a comeback late in the day, even amid ongoing worries about the Federal Reserve raising interest rates. Doug Flynn, certified financial planner and co-founder of Flynn Zito Capito, joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss the markets' close and what's driving the major indexes.
Two companies recently announced a new partnership aimed at addressing the growing demand to borrow against crypto - digital assets capital markets firm CrossTower is partnering with commercial bank, BankProv. The companies are launching a crypto lending platform that will allow Bitcoin miners to receive loans to invest in crypto mining equipment. The companies say the program also addresses the difficulty of breaking into crypto mining due to the high cost. CrossTower research analyst Martin Gaspar joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Next-gen social sports platform Break the Love recently raised $2.5 million in seed funding. Break the Love's platform and iOS app allows users to discover and book group-based tennis activities, to either learn, train, or compete. The new company has already gotten support from a few big names in the world of tennis, including the coach of Naomi Osaka, as well as the United States Tennis Association and the brand Wilson. Break the Love founder and CEO Trisha Goyal joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
As the Omicron variant continues to sweep across the country. The US Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments at the end of this week on whether or not the Biden administration can force private companies to vaccinate or test millions of their employees. In addition, the National Nurses United has spearheaded legal action to protect nurses and health care workers, patients, and the public while on the job. President of the National Nurses Union, Zenei Cortez, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
China's ongoing crackdown of its own entertainment industry has been raising eyebrows for once now. With the ruling Communist Party instructing media companies to boycott immoral and overly entertaining stars. But the country has gone even further. Now experts warn that this could lead to further issues such as gender-based violence. Professor at the Institute of Sociology at National Tsinghua University, Hsiu-Hua Shen, and Associate Professor of Politics at Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame Joshua Eisenman, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
Today marks one year since the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol. The Country watched as supporters of then-President Trump stormed what was assumed to be the most secure building in the country in an attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 Election. Several lawmakers, including the Vice President, could be seen ducking down as they feared for their lives. Democratic Michigan Representative Dan Kildee, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
Bed Bath & Beyond delivered disappointing fiscal third-quarter results for 2022. Shares initially dove more than 9% in premarket trading on the news but finished the day up nearly 8%. Bed Bath & Beyond has been a meme-stock target for online investors in the past -- so was meme-stock mania a factor in the recent stock movement for the company? Jaime Rogozinski, the founder of the subreddit WallStreetBets, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell for more, as his forum helped spark the meme stock phenomena. He also discussed some decentralized finance services and trends for the retail investor to watch for in 2022.
Digital medical care provider Pear Therapeutics rang the closing bell on the Nasdaq Friday and President and CEO Dr. Corey McCann, joined Cheddar to talk about how the company plans to grow the business of software-based therapeutics and how the first FDA authorized prescription digital therapeutics company will go about treating illnesses like insomnia and addiction. "These really are pieces of software. In many cases, they're apps and in the cases of our addiction products, these are based on something called cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT," he said. "These products change the patient's brain circuitry to help them be abstinent, to help them stay in treatment, and that's exactly what we see in randomized clinical trials and that's what we see in the real world." He also addressed the ongoing mental health crises brought on by the pandemic. **copy updated to remove IPO information as Pear Therapeutics went public in December**
James Tattersall, director of sales and marketing for Lake Nona Wave Hotel, talks about the hotel's initiatives to foster diversity and how these amenities champion inclusivity in the Orlando area.
