August 20, 2021: Biden, Afghanistan, Capitol bomb threat, Storm Grace, COVID booster shot, Australia

1. President Joe Biden is brushing off criticism of his administration’s chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal because he and his aides believe the political fallout at home will be limited, according to White House allies and administration officials.

2. A man who claimed to have a bomb in a pickup truck near the U.S. Capitol surrendered to police after a standoff that paralyzed a swath of Washington for more than five hours.

3. Tropical storm Grace dumped heavy rain on Mexico’s Caribbean coast but appeared to have spared tourist resorts serious damage as it moved across the Yucatan Peninsula into the Gulf of Mexico, where it was forecast to strengthen again.

4. The Biden administration’s plan to provide COVID-19 vaccine boosters is based on concerns that a decrease in the vaccines’ ability to protect against milder infections could also mean people will have less protection against severe illness, a premise that has yet to be proven, scientists said.

5. Two million residents of Sydney will be under nightly curfew from next week to slow the highly infectious Delta variant of coronavirus that is spreading across New South Wales state.