In a surprising reversal, the Environmental Protection Agency announced on Thursday it is walking back a recent decision to reauthorize use of M-44s, also known as "cyanide bombs," to kill coyotes, foxes, and other wild animals.

M-44s are spring-loaded traps filled with sodium cyanide, which Wildlife Services officials use when they kill animals for ranchers and farmers. Last year, the federal agency killed more than 1.5 million animals, with about 6,500 dying because of M-44s. These traps have also killed pets and injured people who stumbled upon them.

Last week, the EPA said on an interim basis, Wildlife Services would be able to use the traps again, but after public outcry, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler announced Thursday the "withdrawal of EPA's interim registration decision on sodium cyanide," adding that the issue "warrants further analysis and additional discussions by EPA with the registrants of this predacide."

The news relieved environmental groups. Predator Defense Executive Director Brooks Fahy said in a statement that it's obvious "somebody at EPA is paying attention to the public's concerns about cyanide bombs. ... Our phone has been ringing off the hook from concerned citizens regarding their greenlight to continue using these horrific devices. We'll have to see how this plays out." Catherine Garcia

Tropical Storm Isaias is wasting no time moving up the East Coast, after making landfall in North Carolina as a Category 1 hurricane late Monday night.

Two people in Windsor, North Carolina, died early Tuesday morning after a tornado generated by the storm tore through a marshy neighborhood. Before arriving in the U.S., Isaias killed two people in the Caribbean, Time reports.

As of 3 p.m. ET, the storm was near New York's Hudson Valley with maximum sustained winds of 65 miles per hour, moving north-northeast at 40 miles per hour, per the National Hurricane Center. Strong winds, heavy rainfall, and the threat for tornadoes will continue in the northeast through the afternoon. Isaias is expected to make the journey from the Carolinas to Canada in 24 hours, The Washington Post reports.

At least 2 million people are left without power in the wake of the storm between South Carolina and Connecticut, per PowerOutage.us.

Mark Kruea, spokesman for Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, told the Post that extra precautions were taken during hurricane preparation, due to the coronavirus pandemic. The control center was equipped with plexiglass sneeze guards, and staffing was reduced.

"We were ready for it," Kruea told the Post. "We're ready for 2020 to be over." Taylor Watson

At least 50 people were killed and more than 2,700 injured in a blast that rocked Beirut near its port earlier Tuesday, officials said, per The Associated Press. Beirut's governor, Marwan Abboud, said the city is "devastated."

The cause of the blast remains unclear, but Abbas Ibrahim, the chief of Lebanese General Security, said it may have been highly explosive material confiscated from a ship years ago and stored in the port. Indeed, there are reports that Lebanese officials seized 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate in 2013 and stored it in the port's warehouses.

Experts also have sought to dispel theories that the blast was the result of a nuclear explosion and regard ammonium nitrate as a much more likely source. Tim O'Donnell

Neil Young is officially taking the president's 2020 campaign to court.

Young has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit in New York federal court against President Trump's campaign for using his songs at its rallies, with the complaint saying he "in good conscience cannot allow his music to be used as a 'theme song' for a divisive, un-American campaign of ignorance and hate," according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The rock star has repeatedly expressed his disapproval of the Trump campaign's use of his songs, including "Rockin' in the Free World," which USA Today notes the president has played at events going back to his June 2015 campaign announcement. Young last month said in an open letter to Trump that he wouldn't sue since this would potentially distract "from your important work at hand protecting and saving American lives" during the COVID-19 pandemic. Young later said, however, that he was reconsidering this.

"There is a long history to consider and I originally considered it, deciding not to pursue," Young said on his website in July. "But then President Trump ordered thugs in uniform onto our streets. ... Imagine what it feels like to hear 'Rockin’ in the Free World' after this president speaks, like it is his theme song. I did not write it for that." Brendan Morrow

Four former Census Bureau directors say it's a big mistake to cut counting efforts short.

The Census Bureau said last week it would stop its in-person count on Sept. 30, a month earlier than its scheduled end date of Oct. 31. The move left census workers concerned a "massive undercount" is imminent. The former directors, who worked under nine past presidents, reflected that fear in a Tuesday statement, and called for the count's data delivery date to be extended to April 30, 2021, to avoid "seriously incomplete enumerations in many areas across our country."

In-person census interviews are used to count people who didn't respond to a paper or online census, and are essential for counting underrepresented and hard-to-reach populations. The four former directors acknowledged the in-person count was supposed to happen from May 15 through July 31, but was delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic. This rescheduling led the Census Bureau to determine it needed four more months beyond the end of 2020 to tabulate congressional redistricting and apportionment stemming from the count, and the former directors agreed.

"Our expert opinion is that failing to extend the deadlines to April 30, 2021, will result in seriously incomplete enumerations in many areas across our country," the former leaders said, calling on Congress to make those necessary legal extension. In addition, they asked Congress "to require the Census Bureau to continue data collection operations through Oct. 30, 2020." Kathryn Krawczyk

The antiviral drug remdesivir's effectiveness at combating the coronavirus has been one of the biggest breakthroughs since the pandemic began. The catch is that the Gilead treatment is expensive and in short supply. So, a bipartisan group of state attorneys general are looking to the federal government to step in and change that.

In a letter to the heads of the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration, 31 attorneys general asked the agencies to exercise march-in rights granted to them by the 1980 Bayh-Dole Act to increase the supply of the drug and lower the price so it becomes more accessible to Americans.

The bill allows federal agencies to retain patent rights for drugs developed from federal funds, which Gilead received to boost remdesivir during the pandemic, if the manufacturer fails to achieve a reasonable price or "alleviate health or safety needs" of consumers. In this case, the letter argues, "it is clear that Gilead" has not done either of those things. Read the full letter here and more on the issue at USA Today. Tim O'Donnell

Ryan Reynolds has some major regrets about his and Blake Lively's controversial wedding venue.

The actor spoke to Fast Company this week and opened up about criticism he and his wife, Lively, have received for having their 2012 wedding at a former plantation in South Carolina, offering an apology for doing so.

"It's something we'll always be deeply and unreservedly sorry for," Reynolds said. "It's impossible to reconcile. What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. What we saw after was a place built upon devastating tragedy."

Reynolds went on to describe this as a "giant f---ing mistake," which "can either cause you to shut down or it can reframe things and move you into action," also saying that "years ago we got married again at home."

The two actors faced renewed criticism over their wedding earlier this year in light of the nationwide protests over the police killing of George Floyd. In May, they announced they had donated $200,000 to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, at the time saying, "We're ashamed that in the past we've allowed ourselves to be uninformed about how deeply rooted systemic racism is." Brendan Morrow