10 things you need to know today: August 19, 2016

(Image credit: Getty Images)

Jump to category:

1. Trump apologizes for rhetoric that has caused 'personal pain'
2. Justice Department says it will stop using contractors to run prisons
3. Administration used $400 million Iran payment as leverage to free prisoners
4. Clinton told the F.B.I. that Colin Powell advised her to use private email
5. 2 Zika cases reported in Miami Beach
6. Univision to shut down Gawker
7. Superintendent recommends firing seven officers for false Laquan McDonald reports
8. Usain Bolt wins third straight 200m gold
9. Twitter cracks down on abuse
10. U.S. swimmers allowed to leave Brazil after debunking robbery story

published 19 August 2016

1. Trump apologizes for rhetoric that has caused 'personal pain'

Donald Trump said Thursday night that he regretted remarks he has made during the presidential campaign that "may have caused personal pain." "Sometimes, in the heat of debate and speaking on a multitude of issues, you don't choose the right words or you say the wrong thing," Trump said at a Charlotte, North Carolina, rally. The shift in the combative Republican nominee's campaign message came after he shook up his campaign staff this week as he faced falling poll numbers. Rival Hillary Clinton's campaign dismissed Trump's change of tone as insincere.

The Justice Department announced Thursday that it planned to phase out the use of private contractors to run federal prisons. Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates announced the decision in a memo calling for declining to renew expiring contracts, or substantially reducing the roles of contractors in prisons. Yates wrote that private contractors "simply do not provide the same level of correctional services, programs, and resources; they do not save substantially on costs; and as noted in a recent report by the Department's Office of Inspector General, they do not maintain the same level of safety and security."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

The State Department confirmed Thursday that a $400 million payment to Iran was contingent upon the release of three American prisoners. Republicans have accused the Obama administration of paying a ransom to get Tehran to free the prisoners. President Obama said the U.S. does not pay ransom for hostages. The State Department said the $400 million was part of a $1.7 billion settlement of a dispute over a 1970s-era arms deal, and was used as leverage to make sure that Tehran went through with the prisoner release, which was negotiated separately from the payment.

Hillary Clinton told the Federal Bureau of Investigation that Colin Powell, one of her predecessors, had advised her to use a personal email account while serving as secretary of state, The New York Times reported Thursday. According to notes of the F.B.I.'s interview with Clinton regarding her use of a private e-mail server, Clinton said she had decided to use a private account and asked Powell about his email practices as George W. Bush's top diplomat. Powell reportedly told her he used a private account except for classified communications, which he conducted over the State Department system.

Two cases of Zika virus have been reported in Miami Beach, suggesting that Miami's outbreak might no longer be confined to the Wynwood neighborhood on the mainland, a health official said Thursday. The virus appears to have been transmitted by mosquitoes. Federal and state officials now are debating whether to broaden a travel advisory urging pregnant women to avoid traveling not just to Wynwood, but to the entire city and possibly all of Miami-Dade County. Until three weeks ago, all U.S. cases of the Zika virus, which is linked to devastating birth defects, were believed to have been contracted abroad.

Spanish-language TV network Univision is shutting down Gawker.com, one of seven websites it acquired after winning an auction for Gawker Media. A bankruptcy judge still has to approve Univision's $135 million bid before the sale is finalized. Gawker's demise, expected next week after a 14-year run, comes after the news site outed billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel as gay, and Thiel secretly bankrolled wrestler Hulk Hogan's invasion of privacy lawsuit over a sex tape. The lawsuit resulted in a $140 million judgment that bankrupted the company.

Chicago's police superintendent is recommending that the department fire seven officers for allegedly filing false reports regarding the 2014 fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald, a black teenager. Superintendent Eddie Johnson said his decision was based on the findings of Chicago's inspector general, who recommended firing 10 officers — but two have retired and Johnson found "insufficient evidence" against the 10th officer. Johnson said the officers "will have their right to due process."

Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt won the men's 200m on Thursday, his second gold medal in Rio and the eighth of his Olympic career. Bolt has now won the 100m and 200m in three straight Olympics, the first athlete to score a triple-double in the events. He has a shot for an unprecedented triple-triple on Friday, when he will run in the 4x100m relay. Also on Thursday, U.S. athlete Ashton Eaton won his second straight gold medal in the decathlon.

Twitter on Thursday announced new measures to prevent people from abusing its micro-blogging site. The company said it had suspended 235,000 accounts in the last six months for promoting terrorism, saying it is "committed to eliminating the promotion of violence or terrorism on our platform." Twitter also said it was beefing up its review teams to speed up the process of looking into reported violations, and making it harder for banned users to get back onto Twitter. It also is introducing new quality filters to help users avoid abuse.

Two American swimmers, Gunnar Bentz and Jack Conger, reportedly told Brazilian authorities on Thursday that gold-medal-winning teammate Ryan Lochte made up a story about being robbed at gunpoint. Bentz and Conger, who were pulled off a plane for questioning a day earlier, were allowed to board a flight home late Thursday after giving revised statements to police. Security footage from a Rio gas station undermined Lochte's claim the swimmers had been robbed, showing them being held by armed security guards until they paid for damaging a bathroom door. A fourth swimmer, Jimmy Feigen, agreed to pay $10,800 to a Brazilian charity to avoid prosecution. Police reportedly have considered charges of vandalism and giving a false statement.

Explore More

Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.