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World-record sprinter and eight-time Olympic gold medalist Usain Bolt is self-quarantining at home in Jamaica, after testing positive for the coronavirus following a party celebrating his 34th birthday attended by several sports stars. Jamaica’s health ministry confirmed late Monday that Bolt tested positive, after he posted a video on social media earlier Monday saying he was waiting for the results.  Bolt, who took the test Saturday after his party said, he did not have any symptoms of the coronavirus, but he urged anyone who came in contact with him to quarantine just to be safe. Bolt has received well wishes and some have accused him of being careless in the midst of a pandemic. Bolt is part of the uptick in infections in Jamaica that officials blame on the reopening of international borders as well as recent celebrations marking Independence Day and Emancipation Day. Officials also say people are ignoring measures to keep themselves and others safe, including wearing masks and social distancing.  Jamaica has confirmed more than 1,600 infections and at least 16 deaths. “I’m having no symptoms so I am going to quarantine myself and wait on the confirmation, to see what is the protocol and how I should go about quarantining myself,” Bolt added. “Until then, I am saying anyone who has had contact with me should quarantine by themselves just to be safe, and just to take it easy.” 
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Millions of public-school students in Mexico are taking classes by way of a television broadcast after being idled for months because of the coronavirus outbreak. Both parents and teachers said, Monday’s return to class got off to a bumpy start.  Still, Reuters said nearly two million students from private schools are expected to join the public-school enrollment because of the crisis. In an effort to keep its students, private schools are offering discounts and other benefits, but it’s unclear if the incentives are changing the minds of parents concerned about paying tuition without in person classes.  The pandemic has eased some in Mexico, but the government said that infections are still too high to resume in person classes.  Mexico has confirmed more than 560,000 COVID-19 infections and more than 60,800 deaths. 
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A parade of Republicans is set Monday night to acclaim President Donald Trump at the Republican National Convention and call for his reelection. But the main event is the finale for the evening, Trump himself unleashing attacks on his Democratic opponent, former vice president Joe Biden. Party stalwarts renominated Trump earlier Monday for a second four-year term, with the U.S. leader appearing shortly after at the convention site in Charlotte, North Carolina. He called the November 3 vote “the most important election in the history of our country.” He contended that the only way Democrats could defeat him is through a rigged election using mail-in ballots sent to voters.  “They’re trying to steal the election,” Trump declared without evidence. “Suppose they don’t mail them to Republican neighborhoods.”  Trump’s speech Monday night is the first of four straight evenings he plans to speak to the mostly virtual convention, in Charlotte and Washington, culminating Thursday with his renomination acceptance speech at the White House. FILE – Donald Trump Jr. speaks before President Donald Trump arrives, at Dream City Church in Phoenix, June 23, 2020.His oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., one of the U.S. leader’s staunchest defenders, is addressing the convention Monday night, as are Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the lone Black Republican in the U.S. Senate, and Nikki Haley, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Trump, as president, has been a vocal supporter of gun ownership rights as sanctioned by the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But as many Democrats call for limitations on gun ownership, Republicans are bringing the issue to the fore with a pair of controversial speakers, Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a St. Louis, Missouri, couple who brandished guns at Black Lives Matter protesters as they walked past their mansion in a June demonstration against racial injustice.The McCloskeys said they felt threatened by the protesters, but a St. Louis prosecutor charged both with a felony, unlawful use of a weapon. Other speakers include three Republican congressmen, Steve Scalise of Louisiana, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Jim Jordan of Ohio, all of them among Trump’s most fervent conservative advocates on Capitol Hill. Democrats last week conducted their convention entirely virtually, with a collection of taped and live presentations, to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. Delegates gather for the first day of the Republican National Convention, August 24, 2020, in Charlotte, N.C.Republican delegates in Charlotte are subject to regular temperature checks and daily testing for COVID-19. All were required to be tested before they left their states, and throughout the convention they are wearing devices to enable contact tracing. A total of 336 delegates gathered at the convention to renominate Trump.The size of the Republican gathering is downscaled from past conventions, just not as much as the Democrats’ conclave. Gone at both party conventions are the thousands of delegates who have crammed into arenas and stadiums at quadrennial gatherings in years past.”I live 15 minutes from the arena, and yet I’m not going to be part of it,” Sarah Reidy-Jones, the vice chairman of the Mecklenburg County GOP, told VOA. Reidy-Jones was one of North Carolina’s delegates to the convention, but because of the downscaling, the closest she would get to the convention center was dropping off a fellow delegate there Sunday morning. “It’s really emblematic of everything shutting down right now across the country,” she said.Biden, as he accepted his party’s presidential nomination last week, contended that Trump had created a “season of darkness in America” in which he had failed to control the unrelenting pandemic while millions of workers have lost their jobs. “We will choose hope over fear, facts over fiction, fairness over privilege,” Biden said. Trump claimed that “the Democrats held the darkest and angriest and gloomiest convention in American history.” He accused them of “attacking America as racist and a horrible country that must be redeemed.” But he wasted no time in attacking Biden after the delegates cast their votes to renominate him. As he has often done in recent times, Trump attacked his Democratic opponent as a puppet of the radical left, warning that if the former vice president is elected in November, “Your American dream will be dead.” Republicans are billing their convention “Honoring the Great American Story.” The Trump campaign said that each night will include remarks from political leaders as well as “everyday Americans whose stories are filled with hope and patriotism.” People wait to hear President Donald Trump speak at Asheville Regional Airport, August 24, 2020, in Fletcher, N.C.All three living former Democratic presidents – Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama – along with 2004 nominee John Kerry and 2016 nominee Hillary Clinton, spoke on behalf of Biden at the Democratic convention. But neither former Republican President George W. Bush nor 2012 nominee Mitt Romney, who now is a Utah senator and a Trump critic, is on the Republican convention schedule.  More than two dozen former Republican lawmakers announced their support for Biden as the Republican convention started. Democrats released an ad mocking the Republican convention just as Republicans staged counter events last week while the Democrats met. “Welcome to the RNC, Republican National Chaos,” the narrator says in the 30-second spot, which opened with a scene of downtown Charlotte. “Because Trump is meeting the COVID moment with job-destroying incompetence and deadly mismanagement, students and teachers are left to themselves, the jobless left without a lifeline, grandparents left to die alone, an economy left to perish. “Because Trump has no plan for COVID, nothing will change, because Trump won’t change,” the narrator continues. “Enjoy the convention.”  
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Kenyan authorities and aid agencies say rape and sexual abuse cases against girls have increased since the start of pandemic restrictions, and they say in most cases relatives are the offenders. Some safe shelters in Nairobi are overwhelmed by girls who need an escape from people meant to care for them.  Kenyan children have extra time off these days since schools closed in March because of the coronavirus pandemic. That is making them more vulnerable to sexual predators.  Thirty-three-year-old Judith Andiso said a 20-year-old man targeted her teenage daughter at home and got her pregnant.  “I started interrogating my daughter,” Andiso said. “She started to explain how the man will come in the house while I am away, give her 10-20 shillings, and take her to another dark building near our place.”  Some of the abused children end up in safe houses in central Nairobi. Florence Keya runs one of them. Her center hosts 26 girls, 17 of them came here between March and July.  Keya said  there are many more girls who need a safe home.  “We can only take the number we can manage,” Keya said. “We are so sad because sometimes we deny cases at the gate. So, we say we can’t take them in because we are full.”  Kenya’s Ministry of Health says it has received reports of at least 5,000 sexual violence cases across the country, 65% of them involve girls younger than 18, many of whom live in poverty.  Officials say in many cases the perpetrators are close to the victims and do not believe the abuse is a crime.     Fanis Lisiagali is the head of Healthcare Assistance Kenya, an organization that works closely with the ministry of gender on issues of women and girls. “Girls are being lured very easily by these perpetrators just because they know this family cannot afford to provide,” Lisiagali said. “So, they give them handouts and they end up having sex with these girls. They don’t know this is a punishable thing or punishable crime, but now they accept just because their parents cannot afford to provide certain items.”  Andiso, the mother of five, rarely leaves her house these days worried her children will be victim to more abuse.  
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Chants of “Long Live Belarus” echoed through a busy intersection in the Chicago suburb of Buffalo Grove, as people dressed in red and white — the colors of the Belarusian flag — proudly waved their home country’s banner and sang patriotic songs. Local Belarusians, part of Chicago’s large Eastern European community, have been rallying in solidarity with the people of Belarus since that nation’s August 9 election in which President Alexander Lukashenko won a sixth term over opposition leader Svetlana Tsikhanouskaya with what officials declared was 80% of the vote. Since then, tens of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets of the Belarussian capital, Minsk, charging that the election outcome was rigged and demanding the resignation of Lukashenko, whom critics have characterized as “Europe’s last dictator.” “All the power is in the hands of just one person. And what’s on his mind? No one knows,” said Stas Pivavarau, who held red and white balloons. “Against his people, he is prepared to go as far as he can, simply to remain in the seat.” Pivavarau, who moved to Chicago a year ago to be with his parents and brother, had been studying in New Zealand and supported Tsikhanouskaya in the recent election. The Belarusian community in the Chicago area supports protestors in Belarus who have faced violence in the past few weeks at the hands of police, August 22, 2020. (Kulsoom Khan/VOA)“This woman has become a symbol of changes — positive changes,” he said. In Belarus, protests over the election results have been met with violence at the hands of police, including beatings, torture, arrests and detentions. “It’s painful to even watch the pictures of the people, so that’s basically why I’m here,” said Marat Dzekevich, who wore a Belarusian flag on his back. “Even though I’ve lived in the U.S. for 16 years, my heart is still with Belarus.”  Zhanna Charniauskaya, an organizer with a nonprofit cultural organization called Belarusians in Chicago, said the Belarusian people lack basic rights such as freedom of speech, assembly and to protest. The high school chemistry teacher immigrated to the U.S. in 1997 after the breakup of the Soviet Union. She lived in Wisconsin with her husband and children for two years before settling in the Chicago suburbs. “People are politically intimidated,” she said. “If we have a political opinion, and if it’s more or less a public person, they lose their jobs and are put in jail.” BelarusSafety for families back home is a major concern for the Belarusian community in the U.S. Many of Charniauskaya’s relatives, including her brother, sisters-in-law and nephews, have taken part in the protests. Pivavarau said his sister in Belarus is frightened to leave her home. Dzekevich’s nephew in Belarus was walking home with his friends when he was detained by police, jailed and beaten, even though he did not take part in the demonstrations. Dzekevich said the authorities confiscated his nephew’s phone, which left him unable to contact his parents. “Until the morning when he was let out, no one knew where he was, so it was very stressful for my family,” he said. “The police brutality is all over the place. They just lost the sense of humanity in them.” Belarusians in Chicago recently submitted a petition to U.S. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois. Charniauskaya also plans to send another petition to Senator Tammy Duckworth on behalf of the group. “We will try to reach every representative to create pressure that Congress takes serious steps against the authoritative regime of Lukashenko,” she said. “I hope we have enough strength for the protest not to die down. So, I’m sending the message to our people in Belarus that we’ll be doing whatever is possible here to keep your spirits up. And I want you to know that the world is watching, and the world is giving you a helping hand.” 
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Tropical Storm Laura is likely to become a hurricane Tuesday as it heads into the warm waters of the Caribbean, forecasters warn, while its twin storm Marco is losing strength but will still produce heavy and high winds as it approaches the Gulf Coast of the southern United States. The Yoleine Toussaint, 22, removes mud from plates in front of her flooded house, one day after the passing of Tropical Storm Laura, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Aug. 24, 2020.The forecasters say Marco will degenerate into a tropical depression by late Monday or early Tuesday, but is still forecast to produce a potentially deadly storm surge for areas of coastal Louisiana and Mississippi and produce as much as 25 centimeters of rain for some areas. As of midday Monday, Tropical Storm Laura was just off the southern coast of Cuba, after leaving a path of destruction in its wake across Puerto Rico, Haiti and the Dominican Republic, where it killed at least 11 people.  Forecasters expect the storm to move into the very warm waters of the northwestern Caribbean early Tuesday, where they expect it to become a hurricane. It could strengthen into a large and dangerous storm as it crosses the equally warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico.  The storm is forecast to make landfall late Wednesday or early Thursday in a zone between roughly New Orleans and Houston. The National Hurricane Center warned residents and businesses in these areas to monitor the progress of Laura and ensure they have their hurricane plan in place, as storm surge and hurricane watches will likely be issued later Monday. 
 
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President Donald Trump is promising to outline an optimistic vision for America at this week’s Republican convention. But he’ll be speaking to a public deeply pessimistic about the direction of the country and overwhelmingly dissatisfied with his and the federal government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
Most Americans think there isn’t enough being done to help individual Americans, small businesses or public schools as the pandemic stretches on, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Overall, just 31% of Americans approve of Trump’s leadership on the pandemic, a significant drop from 44% approval in March, when the virus began sweeping through the United States.
The public’s negative assessment of how Trump is handling the crisis puts him on the defensive as his November face-off against Democrat Joe Biden nears. One of Trump’s challenges as his convention opens on Monday night is to convince Americans that anything about his response to the pandemic will change or improve if voters give him four more years in office.
Yet Trump has shown little willingness to acknowledge that a course correction of any kind is needed. He’s repeatedly cast the virus as all but defeated, even when cases were sharply increasing, including in states he needs to win in November. He’s also insisted the U.S. has vastly outperformed other countries in tackling the pandemic, despite the fact the U.S. has the most confirmed cases (more than 5.7 million) and most confirmed deaths (more than 176,000) of any country in the world.
“To be persuasive, there needs to be a strategy and not just rhetoric,” Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster, said of Trump’s challenge this week.
The president heads into his four-night nominating convention with an overall approval rating of 35%. That’s down from 43% in March but still within range of where Trump has been for much of his presidency. Where he falls within that range as Election Day nears could make a difference to his reelection prospects.
His support continues to be driven overwhelmingly by Republicans, with 79% approving of his job performance compared with just 5% of Democrats.
Trump must also contend with Americans’ persistently negative view of the country’s direction as he asks voters to stay the course instead of handing the reins over to Biden. The AP-NORC poll finds that just 23% think the country is heading in the right direction, while 75% think it’s on the wrong path.
Republican strategist Gail Gitcho said the national mood makes it imperative for the president to strike an optimistic tone during his convention.
“The most important time for optimism is when pessimism is rampant,” said Gitcho, who advised Sen. Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. “That’s when it is most needed and works best.”
The president’s highest marks continue to come on the economy: 47% of Americans approve of his stewardship of the economy, though that, too, is down from 56% approval in March. Trump is expected to lean hard into his economic credentials during the convention, arguing that when the pandemic subsides, he can again lead the country into a period of sustained growth and job creation.
Trump’s advisers are also seizing on remarks Biden made last week in which he said he would shut the country down to stop further spread of the virus if that’s what public health experts recommend. They believe Americans are weary of pandemic restrictions and focused instead on ways to safely keep the economy up and running.
Biden, in an interview with ABC News, said he would “be prepared to do whatever it takes to save lives because we cannot get the country moving until we control the virus.”
As the country grapples with how to keep businesses afloat and open schools for in-person learning, Americans see little help flowing to those who need it most. Two-thirds of Americans say the government is doing too little to help the individuals and small businesses. A similar share thinks the government needs to do more to help public schools with their finances.
The poll was conducted after Congress left for its August recess without passing a new round of pandemic assistance. House Democrats approved a $3 trillion relief package that included money for schools, state and local governments and other entities, but Republicans balked at the price tag and some of the provisions. It’s unclear whether lawmakers can break the logjam when they return to the Capitol in September.
The lack of action on Capitol Hill appears to have contributed to Congress’ sinking approval rating. Just 13% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing during the pandemic, down from 31% in March. The federal government as a whole has also taken a hit with the public, with approval down from 38% in March to 23% now.
Americans remain more positive in their views of how state governments are handling the pandemic, with 44% approving of their state’s performance. Democrats are somewhat more likely than Republicans to approve of state government, 51% to 41%.
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U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy returns the Capitol Hill Monday, this time to face the Democratic-controlled House Oversight Committee, to defend postal service policies under his watch that Democrats claim are designed to slow mail deliver and hamper voting by mail. DeJoy appeared before the Republican-led Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Friday where he explained his policies were designed simply to make postal service more efficient and cost-effective. He also promised to ensure all mailed-in ballots for the November election would be handled safely and on time, though he offered no details as how he would do that.  DeJoy, a donor to U.S. President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, prompted an outcry from Democrats when, shortly after his assumed his post early this summer, began cutting overtime pay, limiting extra trips by mail carriers, and removing sorting machines from post offices. Those policies have led to delays in mail delivery, including medicine, pension checks and bills. Over the weekend, led by Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the House passed a bill that would block DeJoy from continuing with his changes to Postal Service operations, along with adding $25 billion in postal service funding. The measure was viewed as largely symbolic as the Republican-led Senate is unlikely to consider it. The chairman of the Postal Service’s board of governors, Robert M. Duncan, another Trump appointee, will also be testifying before Monday’s hearing — the first public remarks he has given on the state of the embattled agency.   
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Kellyanne Conway, a long-serving advisor to President Donald Trump known for sparring with reporters, announced Sunday she will step down to focus on her family.
 
Conway, 53, has been at Trump’s side since day one, managing his 2016 campaign that catapulted the reality TV star into the world’s most powerful office.
 
But the past four years of singular loyalty to Trump, including defending him on TV and with informal “gaggles” with the press, have taken a toll on the combative spin doctor who coined the phrase “alternative facts.”
 
While she made a name for herself as one of Trump’s sharpest defenders, her husband, prominent Washington lawyer George Conway, is a strident critic of the president, repeatedly and loudly questioning his mental fitness for office.
 
“I will be transitioning from the White House at the end of this month,” she said in a statement.
 
“George is also making changes. We disagree about plenty but we are united on what matters most: the kids.”
 
She said their four children would be starting the new academic year remotely.
 
“As millions of parents nationwide know, kids ‘doing school from home’ requires a level of attention and vigilance that is as unusual as these times,” she said.
 
“For now, and for my beloved children, it will be less drama, more mama.”
 
Her announcement came a day after her 15-year-old daughter Claudia tweeted that she was “devastated” that her mother would speak at the Republican convention, and pledged to seek legal emancipation “due to years of childhood trauma and abuse.”
 ‘Alternative facts’
 
Separately, George Conway said he would be stepping back from the Lincoln Project, a group of anti-Trump Republicans he co-founded, and taking a break from Twitter, which he frequently used to assail the president.
 
The dislike was mutual, with Trump calling him the “husband from hell.”
 
Kellyanne Conway came to prominence just days after Trump took office for coining the term “alternative facts” while defending the debunked White House claim that the 45th president’s inauguration crowd was larger than Obama’s.
 
In 2017 she referred to a non-existent terrorist attack, “the Bowling Green massacre,” to defend Trump’s immigration ban.
 
During Trump’s term she was both famous and notorious for sparring with the media, often by finding a way to change the topic, turn the question back on the reporter, or merely complain.
 
She did all of it with a flamboyant fashion sense — snake-skin pattern dress one day, a bright red one the next — standing out in an often-gray city.
 
Her work led her at one point to be depicted on the long-running U.S. comedy show Saturday Night Live as “Kellywise”, a spoof of the murderous, sewer-dwelling clown from horror novel and film “It”.
 
A lawyer and pollster by training, she also stuck out her White House role while a parade of other aides was forced out, quit or left in humiliation.
 
In her statement, Conway described her time at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as “heady” and “humbling” and said her departure was her call.
 
“This is completely my choice and my voice. In time, I will announce future plans.”
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The U.S. Republican National Convention starts Monday, with party stalwarts set to renominate President Donald Trump for a second term in the White House and the chief executive himself unleashing attacks on Democratic opponent Joe Biden for four straight nights. Last week, Democrats, wary of gathering in large numbers in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, nominated the former vice president as their presidential candidate at a virtual convention.   RNC delegates arrive at the Charlotte Convention Center ahead of the start of the 2020 Republican National Convention in uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, Aug. 23, 2020.The Republicans are planning a different scenario, meeting Monday in the mid-South city of Charlotte, North Carolina. President Trump is expected to arrive in Charlotte Monday afternoon as delegates formally nominate him to be the Republican presidential candidate.  From Tuesday to Thursday, most of the action will take place in Washington. Trump plans to make his renomination acceptance speech on the South Lawn of the White House on the last night of the convention, concluding with a crescendo of fireworks. Ross Richardson, a Trump supporter and resident of Charlotte, uses the hand sanitizer station set up outside of the Charlotte Convention Center in uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, Aug. 23, 2020,Delegates in Charlotte are subject to regular temperature checks and daily testing for COVID-19. All were required to be tested before they left their states, and throughout the convention they are wearing devices to enable contact tracing.  On Sunday, barricades were being put up for blocks around the Charlotte Convention Center as 336 delegates conducted meetings in the nearby Westin hotel. The size of the Republican gathering will be downscaled, just not as much as the Democrats’ conclave. Gone at both party conventions are the thousands of delegates who have crammed into arenas and stadiums at quadrennial conventions in years past. “I live 15 minutes from the arena, and yet I’m not going to be part of it,” Sarah Reidy-Jones, the vice chairman of the Mecklenburg County GOP, told VOA. Reidy-Jones was one of North Carolina’s delegates to the convention, but because of the downscaling, the closest she would get to the convention center was dropping off a fellow delegate there Sunday morning. “It’s really emblematic of everything shutting down right now across the country,” she said. Delegates at work Delegates in attendance are expected Monday to formally renominate the 74-year-old Trump for another four-year term after he won the 2016 election. Some of the speeches by Republican leaders later in the week extolling Trump’s presidency are being delivered at an auditorium not far from the White House. “It is disappointing, especially to the businesses downtown, that were really looking forward to the economic impact that the convention would have brought with it,” John Steward, chairman of North Carolina’s 9th Congressional district Republican Party, told VOA. “But it’s still exciting to be in North Carolina and to have the president here and everybody from across the country, at least those that can, to be able to experience the city and see it,” Steward said. Signs for the 2020 Republican National Convention outside of the Charlotte Convention Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, Aug. 22, 2020.While Trump narrowly won the state of North Carolina in the 2016 presidential election, Mecklenburg County, where Charlotte is located, has historically voted blue in both local and national elections. Charlotte, which hosted the Democratic National Convention in 2012, is governed by a Democratic mayor, and the state’s governor is also a Democrat. Demonstrators protest near the Charlotte Convention Center, the site of the Republican National Convention, in Charlotte, North Carolina, Aug. 23, 2020.Protests against the RNC have been held in downtown Charlotte over the weekend. On Monday, at least one protest has been planned by the group “Resist RNC.” A “Never Trump” convention, organized by moderate Republicans, is also expected to be held Monday a few blocks from the convention site. Protesters from FILE – Joe Biden accepts the Democratic presidential nomination in Wilmington, Delaware.Trump claimed that “the Democrats held the darkest and angriest and gloomiest convention in American history.” He accused them of “attacking America as racist and a horrible country that must be redeemed.” Republicans are billing their convention as “Honoring the Great American Story.” The Trump campaign said that each night will include remarks from political leaders as well as “everyday Americans whose stories are filled with hope and patriotism.” All three living former Democratic presidents — Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama — along with 2004 nominee John Kerry and 2016 nominee Hillary Clinton, spoke on behalf of Biden at the Democratic convention. But neither former Republican President George W. Bush nor 2012 nominee Mitt Romney, who now is a Utah senator and a Trump critic, is on the Republican convention schedule.  Convention schedule FILE – Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) is flanked by Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) and John Cornyn (R-TX) as he speaks about his new police reform bill unveiled by Senate Republicans during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, June 17.Monday’s speakers for Trump include South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, the lone Black Republican in the U.S. Senate, Louisiana Congressman Steve Scalise, Nikki Haley, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and Donald Trump Jr., the president’s oldest son. Also on the Monday schedule are Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a St. Louis, Missouri, couple who drew national attention in June for brandishing guns at Black Lives Matter protesters outside their home as they marched by. The McCloskeys face criminal charges, the unlawful use of a weapon, in the incident. FILE – First lady Melania Trump speaks during an Indian Health Service (IHS) Task Force briefing on “Protecting Native American Children in the Indian Health System” at the White House in Washington, July 23, 2020.First lady Melania Trump is speaking on behalf of her husband on Tuesday, likely from the White House, while Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul and two more of Trump’s adult children, Eric Trump and Tiffany Trump, are also making a pitch on behalf of their father. The Wednesday convention schedule includes Vice President Mike Pence, speaking from Fort McHenry in Baltimore, where U.S. soldiers defended the young country from a British attack in 1814, inspiring the writing of the U.S. national anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Other Wednesday speakers include Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn, Iowa Senator Joni Ernst and South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem. The Thursday list, before Trump’s acceptance speech, includes Housing Secretary Ben Carson, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy of California, Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton and the fourth of Trump’s adult children, Ivanka Trump, who is a White House adviser to her father.  
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Brazil’s president threatened Sunday to punch a reporter in the face for asking about his wife’s bank deposits, allegedly linked to a corruption scheme involving an aide to their senator son. “I want to punch you in the face, OK?” the right-wing Bolsonaro was heard replying to the reporter from O Globo newspaper in an audio recording released by the daily. The president did not take any follow-up questions from other journalists after the exchange and left without making further comments. The O Globo reporter was referring to an article published earlier this month in the magazine Crusoe that linked First Lady Michelle Bolsonaro to retired police officer Fabrício Queiroz, a friend of the president, and former adviser to their now senator son Flavio Bolsonaro. According to the magazine, Queiroz deposited about $13,000 in checks from government employees in the first lady’s account between 2011 and 2016. Queiroz was an aide to younger Bolsonaro when he was a Rio de Janeiro state legislator, before his father became president in January 2019. During and after the campaign Jair Bolsonaro has promised not to tolerate corruption. While both Queiroz and Flavio Bolsonaro are being investigated, Queiroz is under arrest in connection with bank deposits of $213,500 made at the time. 
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Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden says he isn’t blaming President Donald Trump for the coronavirus outbreak, but he does blame him for “walking away” from the crisis.  “The idea of saying that this is going to go away, that some miracle is going to happen is unrealistic,” Biden said, adding that Trump has repeatedly promoted “crazy” treatments and “hasn’t listened to the scientists.”  Biden and his vice presidential running mate, California Senator Kamala Harris, spoke to ABC News television in an interview broadcast Sunday night. It was their first joint interview since teaming up for the Democratic ticket.  The interview was conducted last Friday, the day after the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention.  On Sunday evening, Trump announced he had helped to end a regulatory logjam and prompted the federal Food and Drug Administration to grant emergency authorization of so-called convalescent plasma to treat COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. Trump called it a “powerful therapy” with “an incredible rate of success, although government scientists said the treatment needs further study.Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar speaks during a media briefing in the James Brady Briefing Room of the White House, Aug. 23, 2020, in Washington.On Monday, Republicans begin their national convention to nominate Trump and Vice President Mike Pence for a second term. Trump and his supporters are certain to cite the FDA emergency authorization of the treatment, which uses antibodies from the blood of patients who have recovered from COVID-19 to treat the disease in others, as a prime example of Trump’s leadership in fighting the pandemic.  Biden said that if elected president, he would follow the advice of public health experts, including shutting down the nation’s economy again if that is what it takes to stem the coronavirus pandemic. “I would be prepared to do whatever it takes to save lives. We cannot get the country moving until we control the virus,” Biden said. He also called on governors to require the wearing of face masks. To those who refuse to wear masks, Biden said, “give me a break.” He called the wearing of masks a patriotic responsibility for Americans to protect their neighbors by not passing along the virus. Biden said the president hasn’t listened to public health experts and scientists, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and instead has suggested people do “crazy things” like consuming disinfectant to kill the coronavirus. Biden said he has been pleading with the president to devise a national plan, saying Trump has no notion how to reach Americans.Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden watch fireworks during the fourth day of the Democratic National Convention, Aug. 20, 2020, at the Chase Center in Wilmington, Del.Harris dismissed as a “distraction” any talk about the sharp words she had with Biden during one of the Democratic presidential debates over the matter of school busing. She said Biden understands that Black families own only one-tenth of the wealth that whites do, and that Blacks and Hispanics are twice as likely to die from COVID-19 as whites.  Harris and Biden also downplayed differences they had on issues such as health care. Harris supported a Medicare-for-all type insurance system while Biden, who as his vice president helped President Barack Obama enact the Affordable Care Act, wants to add a public option to the existing private insurance markets. “We both believe that health care is a right, not a privilege,” Biden said. Harris said she would be honored to serve as Biden’s vice president and says the call to be his running mate was a “surreal” moment. Biden said he did not feel pressure to choose a Black woman to run with him but added that women make up 51% of the country’s population and that “the government should look like the people, look like the country.” When questioned about whether a 78-year-old man is mentally prepared to become president of the United States – and possibly serve until he is 86 years old — Biden said, “watch me.” 
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