Towns cleared to keep counting ballots in Fourth, as Auchincloss leads Mermell

Elections officials could have a complete preliminary tally in the primary as early as Thursday.

A Kennedy loses in Massachusetts, dimming the sheen of a storied political dynasty

The loss raises questions about whether the Kennedys — who captivated the nation for the better part of a century with their promise and tragedy, and who adopted created the enduring myth of Camelot — have seen their dynasty’s end.

Ed Markey beats Joe Kennedy in Senate primary

Senator Ed Markey, who rebranded himself from dutiful career politician to fierce progressive warrior over the course of a volatile 11-month campaign, fended off a challenge from Representative Joe Kennedy, whose increasingly bare-knuckled offensive failed to capture the imagination of Massachusetts voters.

Candidates barrel toward a primary election where nearly 1 million voters have already cast a ballot

While polls open Tuesday to decide a swath of races, about 927,000 voters have already cast ballots in the Massachusetts primary, setting up possibly the busiest — and certainly, the most unusual — state party contest in three decades.

Latest Metro headlines

3 current and 6 retired Boston police officers charged with overtime fraud, US attorney says

They were arrested Wednesday for allegedly collecting more than $200,000 in fraudulent overtime payments while working in the department’s evidence warehouse, US Attorney Andrew Lelling’s office said.

Markey win highlights goals of progressive wing in Democratic Party

For the rising generation of progressive activists who helped return him to the Senate, Markey’s win sent a message: The restive left-wing is looking for champions, not just blood.

Dozens of students were not admitted to Boston exam schools because of mistake

Boston Public Schools mistakenly denied 62 students, largely from private, charter, or parochial schools, entry to the district’s coveted exam schools since last year.

‘I want the people of God to enjoy liberty’: Pastor at Maine super-spreader wedding gives a defiant indoor sermon

The officiant of a now-infamous Aug. 7 wedding in Millinocket gave a defiant sermon during an indoor church service on Sunday, just a day after Maine’s CDC announced it was investigating a coronavirus outbreak among those affiliated with the Sanford church.

Kennedy, Markey campaign hard — and joyfully — in final push

With more than 700,000 ballots already cast, the vast majority of them by mail, Kennedy and Markey focused their efforts on turning out supporters who haven’t yet sent in their ballots or who plan to vote in person.

Yvonne Abraham

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Abraham is a Metro columnist. Her work appears on Thursdays and Sundays.

Thomas Farragher

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Farragher is a Globe columnist and associate editor. He spent eight years as editor of the Spotlight Team.

Adrian Walker

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Walker has been a columnist for the Metro section since 1998. His column runs Mondays and Wednesdays.

Special reports

The house at 212 Forest St.

He bought the fencing coach’s house. Then his son got into Harvard

The Needham house was assessed at $549,300, but sold for nearly a million dollars. The buyer, who never lived a day there, would sell it 17 months later at a substantial loss in what may become the next chapter in the national debate over fairness in college admissions.

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Virus thrusts college presidents into hot seat

Traditionally, university presidents are behind-the-scene managers and fund-raising gurus, most often seen welcoming students in the fall and sending them off with their degrees during graduation in the spring. But the pandemic has made them the public face of their institution’s decision on how to reopen for the fall.

Hard times afflict the state’s iconic cranberry bogs, as economic, environmental changes reshape the industry

A combination of competition, environmental regulations, and other forces are driving more of the state’s cranberry farmers out of the business.

Sales tax holiday seen as crucial in bringing customers back into stores

For local retailers, the state sales tax holiday that began Saturday makes this the most important weekend since the “twin crises” of the coronavirus pandemic and economic downturn began, a local business advocate said.

Welcome to college! Please stay in your room. Alone

Most colleges are requiring arriving students to stay alone in their dorm rooms for some period of time until they test negative for COVID-19.

‘It’s like talking a surgeon through surgery’

For parents of kids who need specialized therapies, remote learning means intensive responsibilities.

YVONNE ABRAHAM

Feed kids, for goodness’ sake

Making sure children have enough to eat is a no-brainer at the best of times. So why is the federal government about to make it harder in the midst of pandemic?

Down in the polls, Joe Kennedy makes a final push for votes

As the final days of the contentious primary tick down, both Joe Kennedy and Ed Markey are battling for working-class voters, particularly those of color, a crucial slice of the Massachusetts electorate.

Jeneé Osterheldt

From the King’s Dream to a call for America to get its knee of our necks: We March on Washington

We’ve been fighting this fight for generations. America has eaten our young while feeding off our labor. We can no longer be your buffet. We were there not just to fight for our lives, but to benefit from the balm that is radical togetherness. We need healing.

‘Enough!’: Boston activist groups demand action on policing, racial justice

Representatives of several Boston-based racial justice organizations gathered at the State House Friday to deliver one message in unison: “Enough is enough.”

State to allow remote learning pods, kids’ programs outside schools

State education officials announced Friday that families can form small remote-learning co-ops, after-school programs can operate during typical school hours, and churches and community centers can host students who might otherwise be unsupervised when out of school this fall.

Stephen Lynch on death of Brockton soldier from Fort Hood: ’We need to bring in a separate investigation’

Elder Fernandes, who was found dead earlier this week, was the 10th person to go missing from the Army base in a year.

New study confirms staggering racial disparities in COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts

The pandemic produced a "perfect storm" of factors for communities of color, the research found.

Mass. stays course on testing, despite shift in federal guidelines

Boston-area public health experts are slamming new COVID-19 testing guidelines from the CDC suggesting people don’t need tests if they’ve had contact with an infected person but don’t have symptoms themselves.

‘It’s starting to feel like a jilted lover is stalking me’ : Campaign texts have become relentless

Politicians might send a billion texts this election cycle.

Neal and Morse refocus on issues, not allegations, as race for 1st District heads to finish

A political earthquake rattled what already had been a nationally watched campaign by Morse, a progressive, to unseat Neal after 32 years in Congress.

Before he was a congressman, Joe Kennedy was a prosecutor

Joe Kennedy’s time as a prosecutor has become a point of contention in a race that increasingly appears to hinge on which candidate has stronger progressive bona fides.

Shirley Leung

Remote learning for kids means more work for parents

The fall is going to be better than spring, but that's a low bar to clear.

‘We got nothing from the Army’: Grieving family of Brockton soldier demands answers

The family of Brockton soldier Sergeant Elder Fernandes learned Tuesday that the 23-year-old's body had been found about 25 miles from Texas's Fort Hood. He had been missing for more than a week.

Videos shed new light on police shooting of fleeing suspect, Juston Root

Police body camera video depicts the final, chaotic moments before five Boston officers and one state trooper opened fire, killing the suspect near a Brookline shopping center in February.

Why hasn’t the Mass. Legislature sent a police accountability bill to the governor?

Now, with deadly unrest resurfacing after Jacob Blake, a Black man, was shot in the back by police in Kenosha, Wis., the Democratic-led Legislature is facing renewed pressure, quite literally, at its front door.

Markey leads Kennedy by notable margin in trio of new Senate polls

A Suffolk University poll released Wednesday found Markey with a 10 point lead, beating Kennedy 51 percent to 41 percent.

Yvonne Abraham

Dystopian fiction, and facts

This is a country where a Black man who appears to have been trying to break up a domestic dispute gets seven police bullets in the back, and where a white kid brandishing an AR-15 gets police gratitude before he goes on to murder two people and heads home to sleep in his own bed.

Work is weird these days — wherever you are

From grocery store clerks who’ve been working in protective gear since spring, to software engineers stuck in stifling attics, to employees rotating between their office and home, work has never been weirder.

Brockton soldier missing from Fort Hood found dead, family says

The family of Sergeant Elder Fernandes learned late Tuesday night that the young soldier’s body had been found -- hanging from a tree about 25 miles from the base he disappeared from over a week ago, the family’s lawyer told the Boston Globe.

Always a traffic jam, candidates in the race for Fourth now colliding as primary day looms

A negative turn in campaign rhetoric is, of course, common. But it has helped feed into the eight-Democrat primary's already chaotic nature, with arrows seemingly whizzing from all corners of a race.

Biogen conference likely led to 20,000 COVID-19 cases in Boston area, researchers say

A new study shows the Biogen conference held at Boston’s Marriott Long Wharf hotel in February played a far greater role in spreading the coronavirus than previously thought.

Electrician Gabe Fonseca worked on removing a wall between two classrooms at Boston Preparatory Charter School.

Even in union-free charter schools, leaders are embracing a virtual start to the school year

All 15 of Boston’s independently run charter schools have decided with little public fanfare to start classes in cyberspace — a broad consensus that suggests the reluctance to reopen classrooms this fall goes well beyond teachers union agendas.

In the bluest of states, a pair of Republican candidates face off in Senate primary

Shiva Ayyadurai of Belmont and Kevin O’Connor of Dover are competing for the attention of voters attuned to a different primary contest.

In caustic Senate race’s final days: news of death threats against Kennedy, complaints of whining

The contentious Senate Democratic primary race took an even nastier turn Monday, with the campaign of Representative Joe Kennedy contending that Senator Ed Markey and his supporters had created a “dangerous” atmosphere that has contributed to numerous death threats against their candidate.

Lynn emerges as a new center of coronavirus in the state

As COVID-19 ravaged Massachusetts in the spring and summer, a blue-collar city north of Boston emerged as the state’s worst outbreak.

Lottery

Lottery results from Monday drawings

Mass. reports 571 new coronavirus cases, 27 new deaths as state releases weekend cases following systems upgrade

The state's confirmed death toll due to the coronavirus rose to 8,717 and the total number of confirmed cases climbed to 116,421, as officials resumed the flow of its coronavirus dashboard Monday following an upgrade to the state’s laboratory reporting system over the weekend.

FDA’s plasma decision may hamper ‘gold standard’ research, experts say

The FDA’s decision this week to allow convalescent plasma as a treatment for COVID-19 will make it harder to conduct rigorous studies of its effectiveness, because patients will demand the therapy rather than agreeing to studies in which they might get a placebo, experts said Monday.

Anthony Martignetti, star of iconic 1969 Prince Spaghetti commercial, dies at 63

Anthony Martignetti starred at age 12 in an iconic Prince Spaghetti commercial shot in Boston’s North End in 1969.

Ex-City Hall health chief Felix Arroyo sues Marty Walsh

Former City Hall health and human services chief Felix G. Arroyo is suing Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh, saying he was wrongfully fired three years ago in the wake of sexual harassment accusations that Arroyo denies. He is alleging that the city’s probe of that matter was “a sham from the beginning.”

FBI searches Quincy storage facility

The FBI executed a search warrant Monday morning at a storage facility in Quincy, and hazardous evidence specialists were on scene, police said.

SJC asked to make last-minute change to state primary election calendar

The state’s top court Monday was asked for a last-minute rewrite of the primary election schedule to make sure postal snafus and a state law requiring all mail-in ballots to be postmarked the same day of the election, Sept. 1, do not prevent them from being properly counted.

‘Everything is on the table’ as MBTA eyes looming budget crunch

The transit agency will not rule out service cuts, fare hikes, or layoffs.

Trees crash through homes; water rescue made during severe storms on Sunday

A severe thunderstorm that ripped through Massachusetts Sunday damaged homes, flooded streets, overturned a sailboat in Boston Harbor, and at one point knocked out power for more than 31,000 customers in the state.

ANNEAR TO THE GROUND

State botanist rediscovers endangered orchid not seen in nearly two decades

The crested fringed orchid was found in Bristol County this month; officials won't say where.

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