DOJ's Civil Rights Unit Shifts Focus to Voter Fraud, Five Killed in Miami Cargo Plane Crash

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division has spent decades sending workers called 'election monitors' to polling places. Their job was to make sure no one was kept from voting because of their race, disability, or language. Now, the Trump administration wants these monitors to focus on finding voter fraud instead. Harmeet Dhillon, a Republican who helped lead a legal group for Donald Trump during the 2020 election, now runs the division. She wants 1,000 monitors in place for the upcoming midterm elections.

Some people who used to work at the Justice Department are worried about this change. They say the monitors could be used to cast doubt on election results if the president is unhappy with them. Many staff members have also been replaced with new hires who support the president's claim that he won the 2020 election — a claim that courts and election officials have found to be false. It is unusual for this division to focus on voter fraud, since its main mission has always been to protect voters from unfair treatment.

In Ohio, a frightening moment occurred at a public fair. An armed man named Patrick Havas, 38, pushed his way through a crowd toward Amy Acton, the Democratic candidate for governor. Security stepped in quickly, and two people were knocked down during the struggle. Police arrested Havas and found he was carrying two handguns and a set of brass knuckles. Acton, who is a doctor, was not hurt and even stayed to help care for one of the injured people.

A deadly crash near Miami International Airport killed five people and hurt five others. An Amazon-branded cargo plane ran off the runway while landing and crashed into several vehicles before stopping in a field. The plane had taken off from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Three people were reported to be in critical condition, and a hotline was set up for families seeking information about loved ones who may have been on board or near the crash.

In Germany, a far-right political party called Alternative for Germany, or AfD, won a regional election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. The party's strong showing alarmed leaders across Europe. French Finance Minister Roland Lescure called it 'a very, very worrying signal,' and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also called it a troubling sign. If the AfD gains enough support to take power, it would be the first far-right group to govern a German state since World War II.