Daily Briefing: Cows in neck-high water

Hurricane Ernesto boasted maximum sustained winds of 80 mph last night. New polling suggests Kamala Harris leads Donald Trump in five of seven battleground states. USA TODAY investigates how PFAs made their way into your drinking water.

🙋🏼‍♀️ I'm Nicole Fallert , Daily Briefing author. Meet dinosaur skeleton "Gnatalie."

Hurricane Ernesto lurks off the US coast

Swaths of Puerto Rico remain submerged Thursday after Hurricane Ernesto unleashed torrential rain and damaging winds that triggered flash flood warnings and cut power for thousands of residents.

Though Ernesto is expected to remain offshore from the U.S. East Coast, officials said swells are forecast to reach the region into the weekend — increasing the risk of life-threatening surf and rip currents.

• The storm pummeled Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands through much of Wednesday, quickly dumping several inches of rain and cutting utilities for nearly half of Puerto Rico.
• Cows wading through neck-high water: Rising waters in Puerto Rico's Gurabo River − in the east-central part of the island − forced cows to "fight for their lives," painting a picture of how intense flood levels are.
• Ernesto could become a Category 3 hurricane by Friday before approaching Bermuda on Saturday.

Harris leads Trump in five battleground states

Kamala Harris is ahead of Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina and Arizona, while the candidates are tied in Georgia, according to a new survey released Wednesday. The findings suggest multiple paths to the 270 electoral votes needed to win the election have opened for Harris. Read more

The news to know on Thursday

• Here's who is headlining the Democratic National Convention next week .
• NASA still hasn't decided the best way to get the Starliner crew home .
• What's behind Russia's sluggish response to Ukraine's raid ?
• Walz agreed to a Oct. 1 VP debate against Vance .
• Columbia University's president resigned months after protests over the Israel-Hamas war .
• Time to play today's USA TODAY Crossword ! Click here for Sally's expert analysis .

What's the weather today? Check your local forecast here .

Hamas will skip Gaza truce talks

Hamas said would not take part in a new round of Gaza ceasefire talks slated for Thursday in Qatar, but an official briefed on the talks said mediators expected to consult with the militant group afterwards. The U.S. has said it expects indirect talks to go ahead as planned on Thursday, and that a cease-fire agreement was still possible − while warning that progress was needed urgently to avert a wider war. Read more

Now Parvovirus B19 is a thing

More people in the U.S. have become infected with Parvovirus B19, a highly transmissible seasonal respiratory virus that can pose serious risks to pregnant people and those with blood disorders, health officials say. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a broad warning on Tuesday to health care providers, health agencies and the public. For most, the highly-contagious infection is mild.

More stories we're reading

• An Oklahoma city approved a $7 million settlement for a wrongfully imprisoned man.
• Olympians are turning to OnlyFans .
• Get a smarter bird feeder .
• Jim Harbaugh wants to hire Colin Kaepernick .
• Ellie the Elephant is taking the mascot world by storm .

Wondering who (or what) put forever chemicals in your drinking water? USA TODAY investigated .

How a gymnastics saga, not the gymnastics, became the story

Jordan Chiles and two Romanian gymnasts would all get bronze medals if an arbitration panel could award them, and said “a great deal of heartache” could have been avoided had there simply been a way to verify in the moment whether a scoring appeal was submitted on time. The International Gymnastics Federation needs to put a mechanism in place so a similar situation “never happens again,” the ad-hoc panel of the Court of Arbitration for Sport wrote this week. Read more

Photo of the Day: Nice to meet you, baby Toni

Baby pygmy hippopotamus Toni made a first public appearance Thursday at the Berlin Zoo in Germany. Toni's mother, Debbie, has raised a few hippos already. The first of the highly endangered species came to Europe from Sierra Leone in 1873.

Nicole Fallert is a newsletter writer at USA TODAY, sign up for the email here . Want to send Nicole a note? Shoot her an email at NFallert@usatoday.com .

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Daily Briefing: Cows in neck-high water