Maryland local election officials are keeping a close eye on ballot boxes this election cycle following incidents of people setting them ablaze in Oregon and Washington. Jared DeMarinis, Maryland’s state administrator of elections, said ballot drop-box security is top of mind. “This is a crime against democracy,” DeMarinis said in an email to Capital News Service. “We have taken steps to mitigate any potential problems if it occurs in Maryland.”

Former President Barack Obama paid a surprise visit ― and even brought Halloween cookies — to volunteers at a get-out-the-vote phone bank for Senate candidate Angela Alsobrooks on Thursday. “Had fun surprising some of the volunteers working hard to elect @AlsobrooksforMD as Maryland’s next U.S. Senator,” Obama said on X, formerly Twitter.

New juvenile justice laws will be implemented Friday in Maryland that Gov. Wes Moore said will usher in more accountability and lower crime rates. Sun co-owner Armstrong Williams interviewed the governor to explore what the juvenile justice changes will mean for Maryland residents.

Americans on Friday will get their last major look at the state of the U.S. economy — the October jobs report — just four days before Election Day. The view, though, is likely to be obscured by the effects of strikes and hurricanes that left many workers temporarily off payrolls. The Labor Department is expected to report that employers added just under 118,000 jobs last month, according to forecasters surveyed by the data firm FactSet.

Hundreds of thousands of Marylanders have already made their voices heard with early voting ending Thursday night. The next time voters can cast their ballots in person is from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 5. “We have this right” Voters lined the sidewalks Thursday evening at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Highlandtown on the last day of early voting in Maryland. Many voters said they wanted to cast their ballots early to get it done.

When two hurricanes hit the South this fall, the U.S. Small Business Administration warned Congress it would likely run out of money for loans. Ten days later, the department was tapped out. That has left some of the small businesses seeking loans after the March collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in a lurch. Even though the SBA funds are depleted, requests for financial help from those affected by the bridge disaster continue to roll in, including 500 new applications in the last month.

Local school board elections have taken a nasty turn this year in some parts of Maryland as they have elsewhere across the country. No longer are the candidates chosen from the usual pool of school volunteers, retired educators and community activists — often running without opposition. Campaigns aren’t the amicable PTA-like chitchat about budgets or where to draw district lines or how to support teachers.

Americans are being peddled misinformation about what happens to the plastic they buy and use in their daily lives, and Maryland taxpayers have an opportunity to fight back. California Attorney General Rob Bonta has sued ExxonMobil for the fossil fuel company’s pollution and track record of misinformation — particularly around the recyclability of Americans’ plastics.

Is a letter received by Baltimore-area voters promoting election participation or intimidating voters? The mailer shows whether the recipient voted in the past four elections, as well as information about their neighbors’ voting history. Some recipients feel like the information shouldn’t be publicly accessible, calling the letter a “voter intimidation tactic.”

By not picking, voters like Jeremy Gosnell just might help pick the next president of the United States. The Oakland, Maryland, property manager calls himself a loyal Democrat. He’s never voted Republican, but he can’t get behind his party’s presidential candidate. “Kamala Harris is a tough sell for me,” Gosnell wrote during our email conversation about his dilemma.