Suspect in custody following spate of stabbing attacks in Seattle: Police

(NEW YORK) — Election workers across the country are being bombarded with threats, and law enforcement agencies nationwide are dedicating “substantial resources” to ensure public safety during the election, according to a new threat assessment obtained by ABC News.

The document, transmitted Monday by the NYPD Intelligence Bureau, encapsulates the full picture of Election Day threats, including the risk of physical violence and disinformation generated by foreign governments. Potential targets include “election personnel and government officials, campaign offices, as well as voting-related sites, infrastructure, and technology,” the assessment said.

“Individuals may employ a variety of tactics that could include physical attacks, threats of violence, delivery of suspicious packages, swatting, arson, and property destruction, harassment, as well as cyberattacks and mis/dis/mal-information campaigns,” the assessment also said.

The FBI has received more than 2,000 threats to election workers and “opened at least 100 investigations into these unlawful actions” as of April, the assessment said, citing a September report by the U.S. Department of Justice, with more than 20 people charged.

In the last week alone, multiple individuals in separate states have faced charges related to threats against election officials, according to the assessment:

• Teak Brockbank, 45, of Colorado, pleaded guilty to transmitting interstate threats after he made a series of online threats against election officials in Colorado and Arizona, a judge in Colorado, and federal law enforcement agents.
• Richard Glenn Kantwill, 61, of Tampa, allegedly made threats against an election official.
• John Pollard, 62, of Philadelphia, allegedly threatened to kill a state party representative who was recruiting poll watchers online.

Threats and hostile rhetoric against election officials have proliferated online, according to the assessment:

• Last month, the NYPD Intelligence Bureau found users on several platforms that accused Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger of attempting to influence the outcome of the 2024 presidential election, and called for his execution.
• A user in an online extremist messaging channel called for a “national militia for the defense of the Republic” to ensure “election integrity.”
• In September, suspicious packages containing powder were sent to secretaries of state and state election offices in at least 15 states.

“Each state runs elections a little bit differently but the commonalities across all the states are that election officials are professional, they follow the laws of their state, and the process is transparent,” Benjamin Hovland, chairman of the bipartisan U.S. Election Assistance Commission, told ABC News.

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(NEW YORK) — When the weather turns cold, meteorologists and climate scientists almost always get a variation of the same question, “If we had global warming, I don’t think I’d have a jacket on.”

That’s because climate and weather are two terms that go hand in hand but are not the same thing.

ABC News Chief Meteorologist and Chief Climate Correspondent Managing Editor of the ABC News Climate Unit Ginger Zee has heard questions like this for years.

“How can we have sweatshirt weather, or even the first snow, when the whole globe is getting warmer and warmer?”

It’s the same for Marshall Shepherd, director of the Atmospheric Sciences Program at the University of Georgia and former president of the American Meteorological Society, who will get questions like, “What are you all talking about — that the climate is changing? It’s snowing right now!”

Weather is the temperature and conditions on one particular day, Zee said — the short-term state of the atmosphere and what it brings.

“If you walk outside and almost every day it’s hot, or almost every day it’s dry, that’s called climate,” Zee said.

People also often refer to climate as “average weather,” which is another misnomer, Shepherd said.

“That’s actually not correct,” he said. “Climate is really more the full statistics of weather, not just average. It’s the highs and lows. It’s frequency. It’s max and min. It’s a lot of things.”

The seasons are governed by the Earth’s tilted axis and its path of orbit around the sun, Shepherd said. The tilted axis means there are times when some parts of the planet are getting less energy from the sun — the main distinction between summer and winter.

Just because the climate is warming overall doesn’t mean there won’t be big swings in either direction, including cold fronts and snow storms in typically warm places or drought conditions in typically wet places and torrential downpours in normally dry climates, the experts said.

“As the globe warms, we are going to have cold and, of course, snow,” Zee said. “Because if that all abruptly stopped, it would be really scary.”

Scientists love their metaphors, especially when it comes to comparing the two terms.

Weather is your mood, and climate is your personality, according to Shepherd and Zee.

Weather and climate can be looked at as the dog and the dog walker, Yarrow Axford, a professor in geological sciences at Northwestern University, told ABC News. The dog can sniff around and tug at its leash, but the dog walker is the one setting the pace and direction.

But that old adage often no longer applies because the climate is changing so quickly, Axford said.

On a long-term scale, the number of overall cold events is declining. The likelihood of extremely cold days has decreased due to human-caused global warming, a 2016 paper published in The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine authored by Shepherd found. The same paper also found an increase in the number of extremely hot days.

The lack of cold events could cause people to pay more attention when they happen, the experts said.

Geography also makes a difference, Zee said. When scientists say the climate is warming, they mean for the entire planet — not in a particular city, state or county, Zee said.

“The point is that climate — all weather days all over the world — on average, is getting warmer,” Zee said.

Shepherd continued, “We’ve got to really expand the average person’s understanding of what climate actually is.”

ABC News’ Dan Manzo contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Hurricane Milton is forecast to bring a slew of devastation to Florida’s west coast as the Category 3 storm makes landfall in the Tampa area Wednesday evening.

In addition to physical damage to the region, power blackouts and cell service outages could last for days after the storm hits, as was seen in the wake of Hurricane Helene late last month.

As residents prepare for impact, there are several satellite connection options available for the latest iPhone and Android models to facilitate contact with loved ones and emergency personnel in the face of outages.

iPhone

With iPhone 14 or more recent models, users can connect devices to a satellite to text emergency services, request roadside assistance, message friends and family and share locations, even without cellular and Wi-Fi coverage, according to Apple.

However, because satellites are located hundreds of miles away from Earth and move rapidly the user experience may be impacted by the low bandwidth, according to the company.

“In ideal conditions with a direct view of the sky and the horizon, a message might take 30 seconds to send. It might take over a minute to send under trees with light or medium foliage,” the company notes on its website.

Apple recommends being outside with a clear view of the horizon, moving away from obstructions such as trees, sending shorter messages and updating to the latest IOS for best results.

To connect to a satellite, swipe down from the top right corner of your iPhone to open Control Center, then tap the Cellular button on the right. Tap Satellite, then choose a satellite feature.

Ahead of the storm and for emergencies at large, Apple recommends having emergency contacts and important medical information added to your Medical ID within the Health app.

Android

For Android users hoping to connect to Google’s satellite services, the models with the capability include the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, Pixel 9 Pro XL, and the Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

Called Satellite SOS, “This feature will be activated once all the necessary software and APIs are updated and the service is registered with the satellite network,” according to Google.

The company says users will be notified once the feature is active but the status can be checked in the settings app.

On the Pixel models listed above, if you need to contact emergency services without a mobile or Wi-Fi network, dial 911 and you’ll find an option to use Satellite SOS in the dialer.

Tap Satellite SOS and then press start, from there you’ll fill out the emergency questionnaire.

To set up emergency contacts to receive updates on your location and status when using Satellite SOS, Android users should go to the phone’s Personal Safety app.

Starlink

In a collaboration with T-Mobile, Elon Musk’s Starlink is offering direct-to-cell service for areas expected to be impacted by Hurricane Milton.

“We have accelerated the rollout of Starlink direct to cell phone connectivity for areas affected by the hurricanes,” Musk wrote on X early Wednesday morning. “This is being provided free of charge by SpaceX and TMobile to help those in need,” he added.

New users can activate Starlink for free and the service will work for carriers outside of T-Mobile, according to Musk.

If a phone connects to a Starlink satellite, it will have one to two bars of signal and show “T-Mobile SpaceX” in the network name, according to SpaceX.

“Users may have to manually retry text messages if they don’t go through at first, as this is being delivered on a best-effort basis,” the company wrote on X.

“The service works best outdoors, and occasionally works indoors near a window,” SpaceX added.

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