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Busy Bee Biden to announce a plan that will boost education and could significantly reduce poverty.
Busy Bee Biden to announce a plan that will boost education and could significantly reduce poverty. Alex Wong / Getty News

GOOD MORNING, PORTLAND! I'm in the room, it's a typical Tuesday night. I'm listening to the kind of music she doesn't like. And she'll never know your story like I do. LET'S GO TO PRESS.

IN LOCAL NEWS:

• While a quarter of Oregonians have been vaccinated against COVID-19, a scary surge in cases has reemerged thanks to a more contagious variant of the virus and safety mandate carelessness, therefore forcing Gov. Kate Brown to move 15 counties back to the "extreme risk" category. What does this mean for you and others in Portland? Our Blair Stenvick has the details.

• The Portland Business Alliance (PBA)—possibly the most politically influential group Portland (and NOT in a good way)—violated the city's lobbying rules an astonishing 25 times in 2020, and yet is only getting a laughably small slap on the wrist from the city auditor (a $450 fine, instead of the maximum penalty which is $75,000). But it gets worse: Over the course of 2020, the PBA reported having 76 meetings and 85 phone calls with City Hall. (Let me know if you, or any average Portlander, has ever had that much access to our city's leaders.)

• A new study revealed that of 2,000 local protesters who were exposed to tear gas last summer during Black Lives Matter/police brutality demonstrations, nearly all of them experienced detrimental physical and mental health effects causing many to seek medical treatment. Who would've thought that cops shooting nightly clouds of chemicals into the air could be dangerous?

IN NATIONAL NEWS:

• Busy Bee Biden is set to announce a $1.8 trillion plan that would fund universal preschool, free community college, and in what could go a long way to reducing poverty in America, making sure low- and middle-income families don't spend more than 7 percent of their incomes on child care. It's expected to be paid for with a tax on the wealthy over a 15 year period.

• New video has been released in the brutal police shooting of a North Carolina Black man, Andrew Brown Jr., that according to a civil rights attorney representing the family says, " [shows a] militarized police force rushing to kill Andrew Brown" before shooting him five times—once in the back of the head. And if you were thinking that the result of the Derek Chauvin trial would be a wake up call to cops, check out this unsettling fact: "Brown was one of at least seven people shot by law enforcement officers across the country in varying circumstances in the 24 hours after jurors reached a verdict in Chauvin's trial April 20."

• Sadly related: Police in Alameda, California have released video of the arrest of Mario Gonzalez, who died after cops pinned him to the ground for more than five minutes. (Sound familiar?)

• The COVID crisis in India has hit an all-time high with 200,000 people dying from the virus, easily overwhelming their already strained health system.

• Noting that Black Americans in particular are aversely affected, Busy Bee Biden is expected to announce a ban on menthol cigarettes.

• The New York Post reporter who wrote the bullshit (and quickly debunked) story claiming that Veep Kamala Harris gave copies of her book to migrant children in a California shelter has resigned, saying that editors forced her to write the article.

• HUMP! HUMP! HUMP! If you enjoy sexy stuff (and I know you do), get your tickets NOW for HUMP's Greatest Hits, Volume 3—featuring some of the best short sex flicks from 15 years of HUMP! HUMP! HUMP!

• And now... THE WEATHER REPORT: A partly cloudy, dry day today with a balmy high of 74!

• And finally, the anti-vaxxer's lament: