November 11, 2020 News Summary

US Politics and Economics

Former Vice President Joe Biden has been declared President-Elect with 77.1 million votes, roughly 5 million more votes than the President’s 72.2 million votes. In addition, the NYT has called 218 districts in the House for the Democrats, meaning that, despite losing six seats, the Democrats still hold the majority. Finally, in the senate race, both North Carolina and Alaska have been called today, bringing the GOP to 50 seats. However, with the two races in Georgia both advancing to runoffs in January, the Democrats need to flip both seats in order to take control of the Senate.

Texas Politics

According to the Houston Chronicle, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick is offering $1 million in rewards to people who can help uncover voter fraud in the presidential election. On Tuesday in a press conference, he said whoever found evidence that led to a final conviction of voter fraud would receive a minimum of 25,000 dollars, and that the money would be coming out of his campaign funds. Patrick states, “I support President Trump’s efforts to identify voter fraud in the presidential election and his commitment to making sure that every legal vote is counted and every illegal vote is disqualified.”

After the lockdown in April, there was a steep high in COVID-19 cases throughout June and July. Now, Texas has become the first state to pass one-million COVID-19 cases. The Wall Street Journal reports, “Disagreements over how to handle the virus persist. El Paso County Judge Ricardo Samaniego, the elected executive of the county, implemented an emergency shutdown order last month as cases and deaths rose sharply. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton challenged that, saying it conflicted with Mr. Abbott's reopening orders, and requested an emergency injunction. A court initially sided with the county, and an appeal is pending.”

Health

According to, CDC’s COVID Data Tracker, as of November 11, 2020, 12:32 PM, there are 10.17 million cases nationwide and almost 240k deaths. Currently, Texas leads with 1.04 million cases, while California follows with 977k. .

(Chron) Harris County Public Health will be conducting surveys to test residences in areas for COVID-19 antibodies. The survey is meant to assist health experts to learn more about the spread of the virus in light of recent data.

Science and Technology

Autonomous functions for robots, such as spontaneity, are highly sought for. Doctoral student Katsuma Inoue details on his studies, “There is an aspect of high-dimensional chaos called chaotic itinerancy (CI) which can explain brain activity during memory recall and association...CI has been a key tool for implementing spontaneous behavioral patterns...we propose a recipe for implementing CI in a simple and systematic fashion only using complicated time-series patterns generated by high-dimensional chaos.”

Southeast US Weather

(Atlantic) Currently, there are three disturbances in the area. The first is Tropical Storm Eta, which is currently delivering heavy rainfall to the west coast of Florida.

The other storm, located east of the central Caribbean sea, currently has an 80% chance of forming. Like Tropical Storm Eta, it will bring heavy rainfall to the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and portions of Hispaniola. Finally, located a few hundred miles west of central Africa’s coast, Tropical storm Theta formed a few days ago and is experiencing high winds. Although, it will likely be turned away before reaching Africa

(Pacific) Located south of Mexico, a disturbance has a 30% chance of forming.

_________________________________________________________________________

Writers:

US Politics and Economics: Dylan, Miranda, Caleb, and Annabelle

Texas Politics: Stephanie, Vicki, and Megan

Health: Matthew, David, and Owen

Science and Technology: Bryan

Southeast US Weather: Simon

Editor: VIA

(All writers and editors are in middle to high school)