Texas attorney general asked Trump administration to revoke COVID relief funds for Harris County

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton asked the Trump administration in the spring to revoke millions of dollars in COVID-19 relief for Harris County, which includes Houston, because the funds were earmarked to expand mail-in voting in the 2020 election. Paxton wrote a letter to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on May 21, the Houston Chronicle reported, claiming that using federal money to increase mail-in voting during the coronavirus pandemic violated state law. “We respectfully ask the department to scrutinize its award of CARES Act funding to Harris County in light of the county's stated intent to use federal funding in violation of state law, and to the extent possible, seek return of any amounts improperly spent on efforts to promote illegal mail-in voting,” Paxton wrote in the letter.

US companies no longer have to pay sick leave to people with Covid after Mitch McConnell reportedly blocks extension

US businesses will no longer have to provide sick leave to employees who contract coronavirus, after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly blocked an extension of the policy. At the start of the pandemic in the US in March, Congress passed legislation that allowed employees to claim two weeks of paid sick leave if they contracted Covid-19. The legislation also mandated two weeks of paid leave to care for a relative who was quarantining after contracting Covid-19, and 10 weeks of paid family leave to look after a child whose school or daycare was closed because of the pandemic.

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  Employers Will No Longer Be Required To Give Paid Leave To Workers With COVID-19

  HuffPost
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  McConnell blocked extending a paid-leave mandate for employees sick with COVID-19 in the $900 billion stimulus package

  Business Insider

The disappointing downfall of Dr. Deborah Birx

In the aftermath of President Trump's astounding suggestion in April that people may want to inject disinfectants to flush the coronavirus from their bodies, much of the public reaction focused on Dr. Deborah Birx. The respected AIDS doctor, who had joined the White House coronavirus task force earlier in the spring, was sitting to the president's right in the Brady Briefing Room as he mused on alternative cures; cameras captured — and social media memes promulgated — her astonished reaction, which reflected perfectly the growing exasperation of Americans with a president who consistently subverted and maligned science, sowing confusion every time he took to the podium. “Dr. Birx is all of us right now,” read one tweet from a prominent Trump critic that was shared thousands of times.