Youngkin wins Virginia governor’s race
Glenn Youngkin won the Virginia governor’s race early this morning, tapping into culture war fights over schools and race to unite former President Donald Trump’s most fervent supporters with enough suburban voters to become the first Republican to win statewide office here in 12 years. The 54-year-old Youngkin’s defeat of Democrat Terry McAuliffe marked a sharp turnabout in a state that has shifted to the left over the past decade and was captured by President Joe Biden last year by a 10-point margin. It is certain to add to the Democrats’ anxiety about their grip on political power heading into next year’s midterms, when the party’s thin majority in Congress could be erased.
Facebook to shut down
face-recognition system, delete data
Facebook said it will shut down its face-recognition system and delete the faceprints of more than 1 billion people amid growing concerns about the technology and its misuse by governments, police and others. Jerome Pesenti, vice president of artificial intelligence for Facebook’s new parent company, Meta, wrote in a blog post on Tuesday that the company was trying to weigh the positive use cases for the technology “against growing societal concerns, especially as regulators have yet to provide clear rules.” The company in the coming weeks will delete “more than a billion people’s individual facial recognition templates,” he said.
Military grants few vaccine exemptions as deadlines loom
Two months after the Pentagon began requiring all troops to get the coronavirus vaccine or face dismissal, the vast majority has now had shots, military officials said. Requests based on religious beliefs are coming under close scrutiny in the military and at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the first federal agency to impose a mandate. They will likely be followed by the rest of the federal government, where most workers are required to be vaccinated by the end of this month. The Biden administration will release a federal vaccine requirement for private companies with 100 or more employees “in coming days,” a Department of Labor representative said this week.
Democrats reach deal to add drug price controls to social policy bill
Democrats reached a deal Tuesday to add a measure to control prescription drug costs to President Joe Biden’s social safety net plan, agreeing to allow the government to negotiate prices for medications covered by Medicare, as the House moved closer to a vote on the sprawling bill. The prescription drug deal is limited. Starting in 2023, negotiations could begin on what Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., called the most expensive drugs — treatments for cancer and rheumatoid arthritis, as well as anticoagulants. Most drugs would still be granted patent exclusivity for nine years before negotiations could start, and more advanced drugs, called biologics, would be protected for 12 years.
Opioid makers win major victory in California trial
Four manufacturers of prescription opioids won the pharmaceutical industry’s first major legal victory in the opioid crisis, turning aside claims by local California governments that they contributed substantially to the epidemic. In a bench trial decision late Monday, a state judge rejected a legal argument being employed in thousands of cases against the industry over its role in an epidemic of abuse that, according to federal data, has contributed to the deaths of some 500,000 people in the United States since the late 1990s. The manufacturers include Johnson &Johnson; Teva; Allergan; and Endo Pharmaceuticals.
By wire sources
