Medical examiner who ruled George Floyd's death a homicide testifies today

Friday is here, as are the top headlines for your weekend, after the weather:

Searching for a sunny weekend. Showers and clouds that have dominated Minnesota skies this week will finally clear out tomorrow. Before that, expect additional rainfall, up to an inch, today, with highs in the upper 40s to the mid-50s. Temps will gradually rise over the weekend, and Sunday will be the sunniest day. Check out the latest forecast from Updraft.

The Hennepin County medical examiner who concluded Floyd's death as a homicide in his autopsy is testifying today.

With the trial's outcome expected to hinge on who or what killed George Floyd as he was subdued while in police custody, Medical Examiner Dr. Andrew Baker questioning will be crucial to the jury’s decision-making. In his autopsy last year, Baker listed ruled Floyd’s death a homicide but also identified “hypertensive heart disease,” “fentanyl intoxication” and “recent methamphetamine use” as other “significant conditions.”

The murder trial of Derek Chauvin is set to resume at 9:15 a.m. today. Watch it live on MPRNews.org or our Facebook/YouTube.

A pulmonologist told the court yesterday that Floyd died from low level of oxygen and “a healthy person subjected to what Mr. Floyd was subjected to would have died.” Watch a recap of yesterday's testimony here.

Vaccinations, as well as new cases and hospitalizations, are on the rise in Minnesota.

The question still to be decided: Can the vaccination push outrun the growth of new COVID-19 strains spreading now through the state? The latest data shows the number of COVID-19 cases each day continues trend upward, even as vaccination efforts accelerate. Minnesota on Thursday reported over 2,500 new cases and 565 people, including 131, are currently hospitalized with the disease. On the brighter side, the vaccination effort stays apace, and Minnesota appears to be on track to have 50 percent of adults vaccinated within two weeks.

For many tribes working to revitalize language and culture, the loss of elders to COVID-19 leaves a painful void.

Native Americans have the highest COVID-19 mortality rate of any population in the U.S. And some of the elders lost to COVID-19 carried generations of knowledge about language and culture. “We're resilient, we're staying strong ... But the effect is that we're all very, very sad,” said Baabiitaw Boyd, who has worked to preserve language and culture within the Mille Lacs Band. “And at the same time, we feel a tremendous amount of pressure to collect information so that we have the intergenerational transmission of knowledge.”

Homers, happy⚾️ Twins welcomed fans back at Target Field with a big win last night.

The Minnesota Twins welcomed their fans back to the ballpark by hitting like they wanted to give them all souvenirs. Mitch Garver, Byron Buxton and Luis Arraez hit home runs to back another strong start by José Berríos, and the Twins beat the Seattle Mariners 10-2 on Thursday.

Minnesota’s Asian American chefs and bartenders have a message for their non-Asian clientele: “Love our people like you love our food.”

That’s the tagline of a new collaboration between eight chefs and bartenders in the Twin Cities. They’re raising awareness and money to combat racism against Asian Americans through a virtual cooking masterclass called “Minnesota Rice.”

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— Jiwon Choi, MPR News | Find me on Twitter @ChoiGEE1