A former staff assistant to Joe Biden, Tara Reade, has accused the former vice president of sexually assaulting her when she worked in his Senate office from December 1992 to August 1993. Biden's campaign says the allegation is false and a New York Times investigation found no corroboration outside of two friends Reade told in 1993 and 2008.

The Times spoke with both of Reade's friends, seven other women who accused Biden of inappropriate (but not sexual) touching last year, and several people who worked in Biden's office at the time, including two interns Reade supervised. The newspaper tried and failed to locate a complaint Reade said she had filed with the Senate. "No other allegation about sexual assault surfaced in the course of reporting, nor did any former Biden staff members corroborate any details of Ms. Reade's allegation," reporters Lisa Lerer and Sydney Ember wrote. "The Times found no pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr. Biden."

Reade says when she took Biden a gym bag one afternoon in 1993, he pushed her against the wall, kissed her neck, and reached under her skirt, penetrating her with his finger, stopping only when she reacted negatively. She says she told her brother and mother about the incident at the time; her mother is dead and her brother, who has publicly confirmed part of her account, did not speak with the Times. Biden "firmly believes that women have a right to be heard — and heard respectfully," deputy Biden campaign manager Kate Bedingfield said in a statement. "Such claims should also be diligently reviewed by an independent press. What is clear about this claim: It is untrue. This absolutely did not happen."

Biden's former Senate chief of staff, deputy chief of staff, and longtime executive assistant said they would have remembered if Reade had complained to them about Biden harassing her, as she said she did, and it would have been out of character. Melissa Lefko, a staff assistant for Biden in 1992 and 1993, said she had no memory of Reade but Biden's office was a "very supportive environment for women" and she had experienced no harassment herself. "When you work on the Hill, everyone knows who the good guys are and who the bad guys are, and Biden was a good guy," she told the Times. Peter Weber

The Food and Drug Administration on Saturday authorized Johnson & Johnson's single-dose COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use, which means there will soon be three effective shots available for Americans.

The Johnson & Johnson candidate registered a 72 percent efficacy rate in the U.S. clinical trial. That falls short of the roughly 95 percent rates seen in the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna trials, but, The New York Times notes, experts are still very pleased with Johnson & Johnson's results, especially since it also showed 85 percent efficacy against severe COVID-19 infections, and 100 percent efficacy against hospitalizations and deaths, suggesting it will be a crucial tool in the fight to end the pandemic.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government's top infectious disease expert, told the Times people shouldn't get wrapped up in the numbers and instead "accept the fact that now you have three highly effective vaccines. Period." And Dr. Danny Avula, the vaccine coordinator for Virginia, said he's "super-pumped about this," adding that the lack of hospitalizations and deaths among vaccinated trial volunteers is "all I need to hear."

Plus, Johnson & Johnson's vaccine requires just one dose for full inoculation and can be stored at standard refrigeration temperatures for three months, which will help states speed up their vaccination drives and make distribution easier. All told, Johnson & Johnson has pledged to provide the U.S. with 100 million doses by June, but four million doses should be ready to go as soon as possible now that the FDA has signed off, with another 16 million available by the end of the March. Read more at The New York Times. Tim O'Donnell

The Associated Press has obtained internal Louisiana State Police records that represent the first public acknowledgment that Ronald Greene, a 49-year-old black man who died in custody in May 2019, was mistreated.

The cause of Greene's death remains unexplained and is the subject of a federal civil rights investigation. Per AP, the records reveal that body camera footage — which has not been released — shows Master Trooper Kory York dragging Ronald Greene "on his stomach by the leg shackles" after a violent arrest and high-speed pursuit, and an attorney representing Greene's family who has reportedly seen the video told AP that other troopers can be seen choking, beating, and jolting Greene with stun guns. Police initially claimed Greene died as a result of a car crash.

York, who turned his own body camera off on the way to the scene (he said it was beeping loudly and he forgot to turn it back on), was suspended without pay for 50 hours after an internal investigation. Col. Lamar Davis, the State Police's new superintendent, reportedly told York he "would have imposed" more severe discipline, but the suspension was handed out by his predecessor who stepped down last year amid a series of scandals, AP reports. Read more at The Associated Press. Tim O'Donnell

On Friday, Myanmar's ambassador to the United Nations, Kyaw Moe Tun, received an ovation from the U.N. General Assembly after he made an emotional request for help restoring democracy on behalf of the country's elected government that was overthrown in a military coup earlier this month.

But a day later, the military junta that now runs Myanmar announced it had fired him in response, BBC reports. A state television announcement said Kyaw Moe Tun had "abused the power and responsibilities" of his post and "betrayed the country and spoken for an unofficial organization which doesn't represent" Myanmar.

The news comes after another full day of anti-coup demonstrations across the nation. Police continued to crack down on the protesters, and there are reports that a woman was shot and taken to a hospital. A monitoring group reports more than 770 people have been arrested and sentenced since the rallies began three weeks ago. Read more at BBC. Tim O'Donnell

When former President Donald Trump makes his first major return to the public stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland, on Sunday, expect his rhetoric to be more reminiscent of his 2016 presidential campaign than his 2020 one, The New York Times' Maggie Haberman reports.

Rather than boast about his own accomplishments during his lone term in the White House, an adviser told the Times, Trump will instead deliver a fierce critique of President Biden's first few weeks in office. Reporting by CBS News' Ed O'Keefe appears to confirm the strategy, suggesting Trump will focus on Biden's immigration policy, school reopening plan, and "identity politics."

That said, Trump will reportedly find time to highlight and defend Operation Warp Speed and the COVID-19 vaccine development that took place under his administration, and he's also expected to bring up the future of the GOP. "There's a 99.99 percent chance" Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), who has steadfastly expressed her opposition to Trump in the wake of the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, will get a not-so-friendly mention from Trump, a source told O'Keefe.

Of course, Trump is known for going off script, so all bets are off. Read more about Trump's return at The New York Times. Tim O'Donnell

President Biden on Saturday praised House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and her fellow Democrats who backed his administration's $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill in the wee hours of the morning. Now, "there's no time to waste" as the package heads to the Senate, Biden added. "If we act now decisively, quickly, and boldly, we can finally get ahead of this virus, we can finally get our economy moving again," he said. "And the people of this country have suffered far too much for too long. We need to relieve that suffering."

The president didn't address the minimum wage issue in his comments, but his call for speed seems to be in line with his previous rhetoric on the matter. Biden has made it clear he'd prefer an item gradually increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour to remain in the bill, but he's also reportedly not interested in rewriting Senate rules or ignoring the parliamentarian who ruled against its inclusion in the package under budget reconciliation, the tool Democrats are using to push the bill through without Republican support. Biden has also previously said he didn't expect the measure to make it through with the rest of the bill. Tim O'Donnell

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) didn't exactly pull punches in an interview with Politico, going after congressional Republicans, Democrats, former President Donald Trump, and the Biden administration all in one go.

Sasse, who is facing imminent censure from the Nebraska GOP for voting to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial, stands by that vote and says he's not bothered by the action his home state's Republican Party is taking against him, though he did say he thinks it's not "healthy." His comments to Politico seemed to back up that confidence. At one point, when asked about Trump loyalist Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Sasse simply said "that guy is not an adult," and described Congress, generally, as "a bunch of yokels screaming."

Sasse's candor is gutsy, but it's worth noting he's generally well-respected by his Senate colleagues and won re-election handily last year, so he's ensconced in the upper chamber until 2026, and likely doesn't need to look over his shoulder as of now.

While he's been in the spotlight for his intra-party criticism of late, Sasse did have words for Democrats, as well, per Politico. He said the Biden administration is "cowering" to the opinions of progressive lawmakers like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and called the education spending plan in President Biden's COVID-19 relief package "disastrous." Read more at Politico. Tim O'Donnell