Murphy to allow indoor dining to start on Friday

Governor Phil Murphy will announce this afternoon that indoor dining at New Jersey restaurants is permitted effective Friday, September 4, according to Matt Friedman’s POLITICO New Jersey Playbook.

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Rt Spikes After Murphy Dines in Middletown

By Art Gallagher

The COVID-19 rate of transmission, Rt, has spiked in New Jersey since Wednesday, August 26 when Governor Phil Murphy dined in Middletown.

There is absolutely no evidence that Murphy dining outdoors while his friend hosted a 40-50 people indoors in his EO-163 non-compliant Barrel Room Bar has anything to do with the increase in New Jersey’s Rt from .77 on Thursday to .87 on Sunday.

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Murphy says he didn’t see the indoor diners at Nicholas Barrel and Roost

Governor Phil Murphy said on Friday that he did not see people dining indoors at Nicholas Barrel and Roost when he dined there outdoors on Wednesday evening.

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Gopal bill that would require senior living facilities to prevent social isolation passes Senate unanimously

Legislation sponsored by State Senator Vin Gopal that will require nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and other long term care facilities to implement policies to prevent social isolation among their residents passed in the New Jersey Senate today, 39-0.

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Murphy to allow gyms to open on Sept 1

BREAKING: Gyms may reopen at 25% capacity as of Tuesday, September 1st. Masks will be required.https://t.co/PZt2ex6fKP

— Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) August 26, 2020

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Arnone to Murphy: Let restaurants and gyms open or at least give them your plan

Monmouth County Freeholder Director Tom Arnone issued the following statement regarding Governor Phil Murphy’s job and business crushing policies that are keeping New Jersey’s gyms and restaurants closed:

On behalf of the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders, I am asking Governor Murphy to either permit restaurants to host indoor dining or, at least, put together a staged plan with dates on when this next phase will begin. I also ask the same for gyms and any other industry that has yet to reopen due to the State’s shutdown orders.

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Stonewalling

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Trump announces FDA authorization of COVID-19 treatment

President Donald J. Trump announced this evening that the FDA has authorized the use of Convalescent plasma to treat patients suffering from COVID-19.

LIVE: President @realDonaldTrump holds a news conference https://t.co/BvYoN0T57c

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) August 23, 2020

From the FDA:

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O’Scanlon: Murphy’s Draconian Restrictions Are Proven Unnecessary, Economically Devastating

Senator Declan O’Scanlon (R-Monmouth) today criticized the Murphy administration’s continued blockade of New Jersey’s reopening and cited numerous metrics from surrounding states’ successful reopening.

“That the Governor, with a straight face, can cite a debunked study of an incident that happened over 8,000 miles away involving a restaurant in China with a wheezy, inadequate ventilation system that doesn’t conform to standards used in this country…to justify continuing to kill businesses here in New Jersey is outrageous and demoralizing for anyone trying to hold out hope that there’s any real, scientific focus on our safety and the health of our economy,” said O’Scanlon. “That the Governor, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, continues to suggest that we have to continue to destroy thousands of businesses and jobs and livelihoods is simply unconscionable.”

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NJ’s Powerful Teachers Union Says Remote Learning This Fall

Joint statement adds pressure on Murphy to make remote-only the only option for reopening schools

By JOHN MOONEY , NJSpotlight

New Jersey’s largest teachers union along with its administrator associations added their powerful voices to the growing calls for a remote-only reopening of schools in the fall while the pandemic remains ongoing.

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