Evening Briefing

Top U.S. officials warned Friday that China’s push to introduce new security laws in Hong Kong could jeopardize the city’s special trade status and spark investor flight. The admonition came as China signaled it was undeterred by international condemnation of its plan to implement authoritarian restrictions residents fear will be used to crush a free press, free speech and freedom of assembly. Here’s the latest. —Josh Petri

Here are today’s top stories

If a leader has a weakness, the coronavirus is finding it. In China, it revealed a damaging addiction to secrecy on the part of President Xi Jinping and local officials. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s blustering approach to policy endangered British lives and nearly cost him his own. And President Donald Trump’s months of false statements and failed efforts to produce a working test left America defenseless to the pathogen. The slowness of the U.S. response may have cost more than 50,000 American lives. Worldwide, the price of putting power and politics ahead of health has been catastrophic: The global death toll is more than 335,000.

Anti-malaria drugs Trump keeps touting as a treatment for Covid-19 not only don’t work, but can kill those who use it, a new study showed.

Americans who have been stuck at home for two months seem resigned to participating in a dangerous experiment starting this weekend, with all 50 states open at least in part. As the outbreak drags on, social-distancing rules are evolving based on changing knowledge. With a vaccine months or years away, a second wave of infection and death is likely.

The University of Oxford and AstraZeneca are recruiting more than 10,000 subjects for advanced human studies of one of the world’s fastest-moving vaccine programs.

African Americans overwhelmingly disapprove of Trump, who has a long history of racially offensive remarks and policy positions. Still, he is trying to win black votes. Former Vice President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, apologized for his own ill-advised remark during a radio interview, when he seemed to take black support for granted.

Amazon’s Prime Air fleet will grow to about 200 planes—up from 42 now—in the next seven or eight years, creating an air cargo service that could rival UPS.

What you’ll need to know tomorrow

Sponsored Content by Otis

Build a collection. And a portfolio. Otis is a fractional ownership platform that allows almost anyone to invest in cultural assets--from contemporary art to rare collectibles and more. To learn more, view current offerings, and read about investment risks, download the app now.

What you’ll want to read in Bloomberg Hyperdrive

Elon Musk Is the Hero America Deserves

Next week, two American astronauts are set to ride in a Tesla electric car to a Florida launchpad and climb into the nose of a SpaceX rocket built by South African billionaire Elon Musk. If the launch goes well, it will be the first privately built rocket and capsule ever to put humans into space, and the first trip from U.S. soil since 2011. You would think this was a made-for-TV-movie: Immigrant rocket man ferries brave men into the heavens. But these are not normal times. Musk, has become an icon with his own impressive set of baggage.

Like Bloomberg’s Evening Briefing? Subscribe to Bloomberg All Access and get much, much more. You’ll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, The Bloomberg Open and The Bloomberg Close.

Join our Bloomberg Media feedback community. Tell us what you love and want to improve about our products.

Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. Learn more.