@#25 ... "ICE is not planning operations targeting polling locations." ...

So, ICE said it is not planning operations targeting polling locations.

What they did not say is that they won't have operations targeting polling locations.

ICE could start planning for such operations any day now, depending upon what Pres Trump instructs them to do. ...

@#16

More from the article ...

... A database of federal law enforcement officer misconduct records. A survey measuring physical, sexual and emotional violence against children and youth. Real-time pollution readings collected by air quality monitors from US embassies around the world.

These are among the hundreds of federal datasets that the Trump administration has taken down or altered as part of its aggressive campaign to wipe all mentions of data findings that do not align with the administration's priorities.

Over the past year and a half, at least 28 federal datasets have been deleted and another 338 data collections have been modified, according to an online tracker released last week from dataindex.us, a group of data policy experts, researchers and developers that formed last year to monitor changes to government data.

"We're at a very vulnerable point as a nation," said Denice Ross, former US chief data scientist under the Biden administration and a co-founder of dataindex.us. "We're facing a future where we are not going to have the information that we need to make decisions that will save lives and benefit American communities."

The tracker includes detailed information about deleted or altered datasets from more than 60 federal agencies that span the environment, labor, law enforcement and other topics. But datasets on health appear to be the most affected by the Trump administration's crackdown, comprising about 40% of the total number of terminated or altered data collections tracked by dataindex.us. ...

... Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, an Army National Guard veteran, has repeatedly elevated military recruiting successes into the marquee achievement of his tenure and folded recruiting, long treated as an apolitical function of the military, into a broader culture-war proxy.

In remarks to roughly two dozen of the military's top recruiters at the Pentagon in December, Hegseth framed improved enlistment numbers as a reflection of confidence in the administration.

"You can talk about polls, you can talk about money, but men and women willing to serve and put on the uniform is a reflection of the belief they have in civilian leadership and military leadership," he told them.

Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell, in a statement to ABC News, shared that same sentiment, adding that, "Americans everywhere are prouder than ever to serve in our unmatched military that prioritizes lethality, merit, and protecting our nation from those who seek to harm it."

Yet the military has been selling effectively the same proposition since the U.S. abandoned the draft and fully transitioned to an all-volunteer force in 1973: job stability and benefits, with a sense of adventure to sweeten the deal. What has changed, however, is the politics surrounding that bargain.

The military's recruiting rebound is real, but the reasons behind it are far less political than Hegseth's framing suggests.

ABC News interviewed nearly 40 recruits and prospective recruits at different stages of enlistment, along with two dozen recruiters across the military and current and former defense officials, and found young Americans are still largely making the same calculation that has driven enlistment for decades: steady pay, education benefits, job training and a direct path to the middle class. ...

@#5 ... That's a bad ratio even for Israel. ...

yeah.

Then there are the Israeli settlers on the West Bank besieging Palestinians in their homes for days.

More from the article ...

... "It's really a sea change in American politics," said Evan Roth Smith, a Democratic pollster.

Some of it appears to be the result of the widening gulf between the generations on a host of policy issues, from economics to the US's relationship with Israel.

But Democrats have also spoken of a collective trauma in the party following Joe Biden's repeated gaffes and the collapse of his campaign in 2024, aged 81. That, and the Republican victories in the 2024 election, have left a mark.

The transformation in the party has taken place over a matter of months, beginning in Texas on May 26, when Julie Johnson, 60, lost to Colin Allred, 43, and Al Green, 78, lost to Christian Menefee, 40 years his junior.

Mr Green is one of the oldest members of Congress " although more than a decade younger than the very oldest.

In March 2025, he was ejected from the House chamber during 80-year-old Donald Trump's joint address for heckling and waving his cane in the air: possibly not the image of youthful vitality that his voters back home had been looking for.
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Then in June, Adriano Espaillat, aged 71, lost his New York primary to 32-year-old Darializa Avila Chevalier, who had been backed by another young, dynamic socialist " Zohran Mamdani, the New York City mayor.

Ms Avila Chevalier backed abolishing ICE and cutting off US military aid for Israel " many of the hallmarks of the younger candidates who surged to prominence this year.

"Israel is probably the biggest dividing line within the Democratic Party right now, and it is one that divides very neatly along age lines," said Seth Masket, a political science professor at the University of Denver.

"Older Democrats tend to be much more sympathetic to Israel, and younger Democrats, particularly those who came of age while [Benjamin] Netanyahu has been a prominent national figure, have a very negative view toward Israel." ...

@#1

That all begs the question ...

Why should States feel the need to protect their elections from the President of the United States?