Judge blocks additional citizenship provisions in latest setback to Trump’s election executive order – The Seattle Times

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Judge blocks additional citizenship provisions in latest setback to Trump’s election executive order

Jan. 30, 2026 at 4:59 pm

By TOM VERDIN, The Associated Press

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A federal judge on Friday blocked certain federal agencies from requesting citizenship status when distributing voter registration forms, the latest blow to a wide-ranging executive order on elections President Donald Trump signed last year.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington ruled that the Constitution’s separation of powers, giving states and to an extent Congress authority over setting election rules, are at the heart of the case.

“Put simply, our Constitution does not allow the President to impose unilateral changes to federal election procedures,” wrote the judge, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton.

Specifically, Kollar-Kotelly permanently blocked two provisions of the executive order that sought to impose proof-of-citizenship rules.

Her decision said agencies will not be allowed to “assess citizenship” before providing a federal voter registration form to people enrolling in public assistance programs. It also said the Secretary of Defense cannot require documentary proof of citizenship when military personnel register to vote or request ballots.

“Our democracy works best when all Americans can participate, including members of our military and their families living overseas. Today’s ruling removes a very real threat to the freedom to vote for overseas military families and upholds the separation of powers,” said Danielle Lang, a voting rights expert with the Campaign Legal Center, which is representing plaintiffs in the case.

The White House said Trump’s executive order was intended to ensure “election security” and said Friday’s ruling would not be the last word.

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Judge blocks additional citizenship provisions in latest setback to Trump’s election executive order | The Seattle Times

Hours after ABC News ran a story about a Minnesota toy store, ICE agents arrived at their door – The Seattle Times

Hours after ABC News ran a story about a Minnesota toy store, ICE agents arrived at their door

Jan. 19, 2026 at 5:41 pm

Snow covers the sign at Mischief Toy Store on Grand Avenue as heavy, wet snow creates its own mischief in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Oct 20, 2020. (John Autey/Pioneer Press/TNS)

By Ross Raihala, Pioneer Press

ST. PAUL, Minn. — At 1 p.m. Friday, ABC News aired an interview with Abigail Adelsheim-Marshall, who owns St. Paul’s Mischief Toy Store with her parents Dan Marshall and Millie Adelsheim. She discussed the store’s decision to distribute free whistles that citizens have been using to alert neighbors of the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

“She delivered a very strident anti-ICE message, which we’re incredibly proud of,” said Dan Marshall. “Three hours later, two plainclothes ICE agents came into our store and served us with a Notice of Inspection.”

Related Federal immigration crackdown in Minnesota

• Minnesota and the Twin Cities sue the federal government to stop the immigration crackdown
• Minnesota protesters, agents repeatedly square off while prosecutors quit after Renee Good’s death
• Allegations of racial profiling of US citizens on the rise as ICE surge expands in Minnesota

The agents were asking for I-9 documents — which prove people are legal to work in this country — from the store’s employees. Marshall said the store has been audited for various things in the past, but this was different. For starters, the notice listed the store by its name, rather than its legal name Mischief LLC, which has been used in every other government document the store has received. Also, Marshall said, he was alerted to previous audits by mail, not by in-person agents.

“In 27 years of being retailers in St. Paul, we’ve never been audited for this,” he said. “We have five part-time employees and three owners. So tell me why they want to waste time on five part-time employees. But here we are.”

Representatives for DHS and ICE did not respond to a request for comment.

“It’s traumatizing to see my neighbors being terrorized. It’s one of the worst things I’ve seen in my life. But I’m also feeling defiant. This is an attempt to silence us and it’s going to do the opposite.” — Dan Marshall, co-owner of Mischief Toy Store

The owners of Mischief Toy Store have been outspoken in opposition to both ICE and President Trump. In April, the store joined a lawsuit with a handful of other retailers and manufacturers against the U.S. government in an effort to roll back international tariffs imposed by the Trump administration.

Marshall’s daughter Ada Adelsheim was working when the ICE agents arrived. They flashed IDs, but Adelsheim didn’t take a photo of them. The agents left behind paperwork for the store to complete. The store’s lawyer, who specializes in small business legal issues, told Marshall numerous immigrant-owned businesses have also been hit with this audit.

Editor’s Note: The featured image at the top is from WP AI. –DrWeb

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Hours after ABC News ran a story about a Minnesota toy store, ICE agents arrived at their door | The Seattle Times

What Seattle read in 2025: Seattle Public Library’s most popular books – The Seattle Times

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What Seattle read in 2025: Seattle Public Library’s most popular books

Dec. 18, 2025 at 6:00 am, Updated Dec. 18, 2025 at 6:00 am

“Three Days in June” by Anne Tyler. (Knopf)

“Three Days in June” by Anne Tyler. (Knopf)

By Elisa Murray

Special to The Seattle Times

The Seattle Public Library loves to promote books and reading. This column was submitted by the library to highlight local checkout trends. Find out more at spl.org.
 
It’s always fascinating to compile The Seattle Public Library’s top checkouts for the year to get a sense of what’s been on the minds of Seattle’s readers. In 2025, they turned closer to home and explored local voices — perhaps not surprising given the state of national dialogue.

Several of our most checked-out print books were written by local authors, including Seattle Times journalist Moira Macdonald’s debut novel “Storybook Ending”; travel writer Rick Steves’ memoir “On the Hippie Trail”; and David B. Williams’ “Wild in Seattle.”

A little further afield, Spokane author Jess Walter’s new novel “So Far Gone” also ranked as a top print checkout, and Oregon writer Omar El Akkad’s “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This” was in the top 10 for nonfiction print books. Bainbridge Island author Kristin Hannah’s “The Women” ranked high for e-book and audiobook checkouts.

Of course, Seattle library patrons also followed national reading trends, checking out bestsellers such as Anne Tyler’s “Three Days in June,” Percival Everett’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “James” and Rebecca Yarros’ wildly popular romantasy “Onyx Storm” thousands of times.

Another takeaway: Seattle readers want compelling stories, which can mean looking to older titles with a lasting impact. The audiobook version of “Braiding Sweetgrass” by Robin Wall Kimmerer, originally published in 2013, has been the top checked-out book of any format for the past three years.

Below are the top 10 checkouts from The Seattle Public Library in five categories for 2025, from Jan. 1 through Nov. 30 (data does not include renewals). As always, SPL values and protects patron privacy, and all checkout data is anonymous.

Most popular adult fiction physical books

 See more at below link: ebooks, audiobooks, and more…

Continue/Read Original Article Here: What Seattle read in 2025: Seattle Public Library’s most popular books | The Seattle Times

>>“The prospect of the First Peoples being physically or forcibly stopped or detained is harrowing and reminiscent of this country’s original treatment of the First Peoples,” Galanda said. “It’s also deeply troubling that in 2025, the first people of this country have to essentially look over their shoulders.”<<

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/indigenous-actress-elaine-miles-says-ice-called-her-tribal-id-fake/

#Indigenous #ElaineMiles #ICE #TheSeattleTimes #WashingtonState #Redmond

How Seattle, King County libraries get books into your hands

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How Seattle, King County libraries get books into your hands

Nov. 2, 2025 at 6:00 am, Updated Nov. 2, 2025 at 6:01 am

Tony Lauricella, automated materials handling system lead, dumps a tote of books into a singulator to be sorted at Seattle Public Library’s Maintenance and Operations Center in Georgetown on Sept. 11. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)

1 of 11 | Tony Lauricella, automated materials handling system lead, dumps a tote of books into a singulator to be sorted at Seattle Public Library’s Maintenance and Operations Center in Georgetown on Sept. 11. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)

By Sara Jean Green, Seattle Times staff reporter

Under a pitch-black sky, Jason Hayes and Chris Little loaded stacks of blue storage totes into box trucks parked outside a Georgetown warehouse that, up until a few years ago, housed luxury sports cars.

On this particular Tuesday, Hayes would drive to Rainier Beach, Columbia City, Beacon Hill and Leschi while Little made stops downtown and at seven sites in the northeast part of the city.

Hayes manages the Seattle Public Library’s materials distribution and fleet services, coordinating drivers who fan out every day to deliver totes filled with books to 26 library branches. Little, a library driver for 28 years, said the “bread-and-butter” of his job is the mobile library, the unofficial 27th branch that holds pop-ups at Seattle Housing Authority buildings and housing complexes for seniors and people with disabilities.

“It’s getting the library to people who can’t get out,” he said. “‘It’s like Christmas once a month’ — that’s what people literally say.”

Hayes and Little are two of the 18 library employees who work out of the Maintenance and Operations Center, a nearly 20,000-square-foot industrial warehouse on Corson Avenue South. Known as the MOC, it serves as the Seattle Public Library’s hidden hub, where an average of 10,000 books a day begin their journeys across the city, with 60% of them destined to fill online holds and the remainder returning to their home branches.

In an industrial park 25 miles to the east, off Interstate 90 in the tiny, unincorporated community of Preston, the King County Library System’s distribution center handles three times the daily volume of books processed through Seattle’s central sorter and serves 50 branches across a vast geography, from Skykomish to Algona.

A borrowing agreement between the Seattle and King County library systems — first signed in 1943 — meansresidents can borrow from both.

For library patrons, it can seem as if books magically appear on hold shelves in their neighborhood branches. But the infrastructure, technology and logistics involved in moving books — along with CDs, DVDs and mobile Wi-Fi hot spots — reflects the value placed on public libraries and is indicative of the Seattle area’s literary culture. The two libraries’ digital collections of audiobooks and e-books are attracting even more readers who prefer listening and scrolling to turning pages.

An abundance of books — and e-books

The Seattle Public Library and the King County Library System are beloved institutions with a combined collection of 6.8 million copies of physical and digital books. E-books and audiobooks are gaining in popularity but have yet to surpass demand for bound and printed copies. Source: https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/GWj9m/

Seattle Public Library, King County Library System (Fiona Martin / The Seattle Times)

The two library systems are part of a larger ecosystem, said Stesha Brandon, Seattle Public Library’s literature and humanities program manager. Our region boasts numerous local authors and “a committed community of readers” who shop at local bookstores, attend readings, take part in programming, use libraries and support library levies, she said.

“It really is the kind of place where we kind of breathe literature,” Brandon said. “Stories are part of our DNA. Maybe some cities feel it more through music or sports or other things, but I think here in Seattle, we definitely feel it through books.”

Continue/Read Original Article: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/how-seattle-king-county-libraries-get-books-into-your-hands/

#2025 #America #Books #Education #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Reading #Science #SeattlePublicLibrary #Technology #TheSeattleTimes #UnitedStates

Most books pulled from Naval Academy library are back on the shelves in latest DEI turn – Seattle Times & Associated Press

Most books pulled from Naval Academy library are back on the shelves in latest DEI turn
May 21, 2025 at 4:36 pm

By LOLITA C. BALDOR
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — All but a few of the nearly 400 books that the U.S. Naval Academy removed from its library because they dealt with anti-racism and gender issues are back on the shelves after the newest Pentagon-ordered review — the latest turn in a dizzying effort to rid the military of materials related to diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

Based on the new review, about 20 books from the academy’s library are being pulled aside to be checked, but that number includes some that weren’t identified or removed in last month’s initial purge of 381 books, defense officials told The Associated Press.

A few dozen books at the Air Force libraries — including at the Air Force Academy — also have been pulled out for review, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the process is still ongoing.

The back-and-forth on book removals reflects a persistent problem in the early months of the Trump administration, as initial orders and demands for an array of policy changes have been forced to be reworked, fine-tuned and reissued because they were vague, badly defined or problematic.

The reviews and changes at military libraries and to websites, social media accounts and more are part of the Trump administration’s far-reaching efforts to purge so-called DEI content from federal agencies.

The Pentagon earlier this month issued a detailed directive to all military leaders and commands to pull and review all library books addressing diversity, anti-racism or gender issues by Wednesday. The order contained more specific search words than earlier guidance and verbal orders from Defense Department leaders, and officials said it resulted in dramatically fewer banned books than initially thought.

Read more: Most books pulled from Naval Academy library are back on the shelves in latest DEI turn – Seattle Times & Associated PressSource Links: Most books pulled from Naval Academy library are back on the shelves in latest DEI turn | The Seattle Times

#Annapolis #AssociatedPress #Books #Censorship #DEI #GOP #Maryland #TheSeattleTimes #Trump #USNavalAcademy

Pro-#Palestinian activists clash with police at Seattle Microsoft event

from #TheSeattleTimes
May 19, 2025 at 12:42 pm
Updated May 19, 2025 at 4:32 pm

"Seattle police arrested one demonstrator after a crowd of dozens tried to push into the #Seattle Convention Center, where hundreds had gathered for #Microsoft Build. Several demonstrators were doused with pepper spray.

Demonstrators ultimately left the convention center at 1:30 p.m., returning to downtown Seattle’s Westlake Park where they had rallied earlier in the day."

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/microsoft/pro-palestinian-activists-clash-with-security-at-seattle-microsoft-event/

#NoTechForApartheid
#FoodAsWeapon
#PermanentCeasfireNow #EndBlockadeOfGaza #RestoreFundsToUNRWA
#IsraelWarCrimes #ArrestNetanyahuAndGallant #USHandsOffICC
#StopGazaGenocide
#GazaBelongsToPalestine
#NeverStopTalkingAboutPalestine
#StopArmingIsrael
#BDS #DivestFromIsrael
#SolidarityWithPalestine is #NotAntisemitism
#Gaza #Israel #Palestine #MiddleEast #WestAsia
#USA #US #USPolitics #Trump
#news #press #politics @palestine

https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation/officials-to-release-video-of-officer-shooting-black-woman-in-her-home-after-responding-to-911-call/

#TheSeattleTimes

Officials to release video of officer shooting woman racialised as 'Black', in her home, after she phoned 911

#ACAB #BLM #BlackLivesMatter