10 things you need to know today: September 4, 2015

(Image credit: (Carter County Detention Center via AP))

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1. Kentucky clerk jailed for denying same-sex marriage licenses
2. Judge lifts Tom Brady's "Deflategate" suspension
3. Biden says he doesn't know if he has the energy for a presidential bid
4. Prosecutors seek death penalty for Charleston church massacre suspect
5. Bodies of drowned Syrian boys and mother returned home for burial
6. Trump promises GOP he won't make a third-party presidential bid
7. Investors cautious ahead of federal jobs report
8. Guatemala's former president arrested on corruption charges after resigning
9. Migrants refuse to leave train and enter camp in Hungary
10. Turkey releases two Vice News journalists but not their fixer

last updated 4 September 2015

1. Kentucky clerk jailed for denying same-sex marriage licenses

A federal judge ordered Rowan County, Kentucky, clerk Kim Davis to be jailed for contempt of court on Thursday for refusing to comply with a court order to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Davis stopped granting licenses to all couples, straight and gay, after the Supreme Court ruled in June that same-sex couples had the right to wed. All but one of Davis' deputies told the judge they would comply with the order to issue licenses when the clerk's office reopens on Friday.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Berman on Thursday overturned the NFL's four-game suspension of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady over his role in the "Deflategate" scandal. Patriots staff were accused of breaking the rules by deflating footballs (presumably to make them easier to handle in bad weather) in a playoff game the team won against the Indianapolis Colts last season. The Patriots went on to win the Super Bowl. Brady is now expected to play in his team's season opening game on Sept. 10.

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Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday that he was not sure he would have the "emotional energy" to run for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. An old friend, longtime diplomat Stuart Eizenstat, asked Biden directly about his intentions after Biden delivered a speech on Iran at an Atlanta synagogue, and Biden's answer was his most extensive response to speculation he would jump in the race. Biden said his decision hinged on whether his family was ready for the rigors of a campaign. "I just don't know," he said.

South Carolina prosecutors said Thursday they would seek the death penalty for Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old white man accused of fatally shooting nine black ministers and churchgoers at Charleston's historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Survivors said Roof shouted racial epithets as he opened fire during a Bible study session led by the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, the church's pastor and a Democratic state senator. Pinckney was among the dead.

The Syrian man whose wife and two sons, ages 3 and 5, drowned this week as the family tried to sail from Turkey to Greece has taken his loved ones' bodies back to the Syrian Kurdish region for burial. Turkish lawmakers accompanied the man, Abdullah Kurdi, to his hometown, Kobani. The tragedy helped increase pressure on European leaders to address a migration crisis fueled by conflict after publications worldwide published haunting photos of Kurdi's 3-year-old, Aylan, washed up on a Turkish beach.

Donald Trump announced Thursday that he would sign a pledge not to launch a third-party presidential campaign if he does not win the Republican presidential nomination. Trump refused to rule out a third-party bid in Fox News' big GOP debate in August, but said Thursday that he had been treated "with great respect" since surging to a lead in GOP presidential polls. Trump said he saw "no circumstances under which I would tear up that pledge."

Global stocks headed down on Friday as investors rattled by trouble in Chinese markets showed caution ahead of the release of U.S. jobs data. Economists polled by Reuters forecast that employers added 220,000 jobs last month. Such a solid figure would be the latest in a series of signs that employment growth is gaining steam, which would bolster arguments for the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates soon for the first time in nearly a decade.

Guatemala's ex-president, Otto Perez Molina, was arrested to face corruption charges 12 hours after he resigned, and his second vice president, Alejandro Maldonado, was sworn in to replace him. As Perez Molina awaited a Friday court hearing, Maldonado ordered all remaining top government officials to resign. He reached out to anti-corruption protesters by promising to leave "a legacy of honesty" and urging them to keep pressing for reform. "You can't consider your work done," Maldonado said.

Hundreds of migrants barricaded themselves in a train at the Bicske station in Hungary early Friday to prevent authorities from sending them to a nearby camp. The stand-off came as Hungary struggles to cope with a wave of migrants trying to reach Europe from Africa, the Middle East, and elsewhere. The people on the train in Bicske had rushed on board the day before after Hungarian authorities reopened Budapest's Keleti station after a two-day shutdown, but they thought they were bound for Austria, not a camp.

Turkish authorities on Thursday released two British journalists — correspondent Jake Hanrahan and cameraman Philip Pendlebury — who were arrested last week on terror-related charges. Their Turkey-based assistant and translator, Iraqi journalist Mohammed Ismael Rasool, remained in custody. The men were detained in Diyarbakir in Turkey's mostly Kurdish southeast after filming in a neighborhood where young Kurds have clashed with Turkish security forces.

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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.