Some people find their calling in college. Take for example, Dakota Hall, who began organizing young people while a student at the University of Wisconsin. Hall used his experience mobilizing students to get engaged in the university’s budget process to launch a career helping the youth of Milwaukee, particularly helping people of color as executive director of Leaders Igniting Transformation. On Nov. 30, he took on a new position as executive director of the Alliance for Youth Action, which supports civic engagement through a network of local organizations. His answers have been edited for clarity and length.
What's the tweet-length description of your organization?
Building and sustaining youth power across the nation with an emphasis on BIPOC leadership.
Describe your very first civic engagement.
I ran for multiple club executive boards in high school and became president of our Green Club and Native American Student Association. Very proud of organizing to get recycling bins in my high school!
What was your biggest professional triumph?
Being a part of the amazing team with Leaders Igniting Transformation in Wisconsin that helped end the school resource officer contracts for Milwaukee Public Schools and got those dollars invested back into the classroom and futures of Black and Brown young people.
And your most disappointing setback?
I grew up politically in Gov. Scott Walker’s Wisconsin, and consistently saw cuts to my higher education institution including critical divestment from student services and support services for the most marginalized young people on campus. It took a while, but the same young people who saw cuts in their education were finally able to defeat Walker in the 2018 election. While we suffered setbacks under his leadership, we were able to do some deep organizing to remove him.
How does your identity influence the way you go about your work?
Being a Black and Indigenous male, I center the voices, stories and lives of BIPOC individuals the most. This country was born upon the sins, genocide, and slavery of Black and Indigenous peoples. Our resistance and resilience is the only thing that can set this country up for any sort of foundation that creates an environment for everyone to have the freedom to thrive.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever been given?
Set time to think about what you want, prioritize your visioning space, build your dreams, follow your heart and remember to center joy.
Create a new flavor for Ben & Jerry’s.
Banana ice cream with Reese's chunks and brownie bites.
What’s your favorite political movie or TV show?
“The West Wing.”
What's the last thing you do on your phone at night?
Check out the new Gen Z TikTok trends.
What is your deepest, darkest secret?
I am a triple Cancer zodiac sign and sometimes it shows, and I don’t like that.
Americans across the political spectrum have continued to ask about the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s connections among the political elite. (Angela Weiss/AFP)
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner speaks to voters at a town hall at the Elks Lodge 188 on June 7, 2026, in Portland, Maine.
McConnell and Platner both feel entitled
The two men could not be more different. One, a Republican, octogenarian, seven-term Southern senator, the other a progressive, millennial Maine oysterman who’s never spent a day in elected office.
But Mitch McConnell, the senior senator from Kentucky who’s been MIA for the past few weeks and Graham Platner, the Maine Senate candidate who’s facing calls to drop out of his race against Sen. Susan Collins, apparently do have something in common: an outsized sense of entitlement.
McConnell, who is 84 and not running for reelection, has been hospitalized for three weeks, and yet we still don’t fully know what he was admitted for or what his condition is. Per CNN, “his office has not disclosed a medical reason for the hospitalization or provided specifics on his health status beyond saying last week that he ‘continues to improve’ and ‘is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters.’ ”
While several legislators have said they’ve talked to him and insist he sounds strong, others have said they are completely in the dark. One MAGA influencer, Laura Loomer, posted ”High level source close to the White House tells me ‘Mitch McConnell is officially brain dead. He’s not coming back.’ ”
Meanwhile, up in Maine, Platner has been artfully dodging calls from his own party to drop out of his race after several allegations of misconduct from women, including a sexual assault allegation from a former girlfriend, came to light. While Platner, who has managed to survive a Nazi-tattoo scandal, a sexting scandal, and several old tweets scandals, denies the allegations, he has not quit.
High-profile Democrats including Sens. Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer, the latter of whom had unsuccessfully hand-selected Maine Gov. Janet Mills to face Collins instead of Platner, have urged Platner to drop out, while other Dems have accused him of trying to influence the picking of his replacement.
Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson released a statement Tuesday, which said in part:
“Unfortunately, Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like. We have repeatedly reiterated to Graham Platner’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate nor in determining what this process looks like.”
Both incidents show a deep lack of accountability to voters, who in one case deserve to know whether their senator is capable of performing his duties, and in another deserve a candidate who isn’t being accused of crimes, bigotry and deception.
The offensive and odious entitlement of both McConnell and Platner stands out not because it is particularly unique among today’s political class. Tom Kean, the New Jersey GOP congressman, missed more than 100 votes, only sharing after a three-month mystery absence that he was dealing with depression.
Former President Joe Biden’s Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin failed to disclose a hospitalization for prostate cancer surgery, flouting the established rules for Cabinet members and senior U.S. officials.
From Biden’s insistence on running for reelection despite his obvious cognitive and political weaknesses to Trump’s brazen flouting of laws and norms, few politicians seem to appreciate that their public service job comes with responsibilities to constituents, including transparency and honesty.
But both parties increasingly justify the chicanery, because the stakes of winning elections and keeping power are simply too high. But that’s no excuse. If we’ve learned anything over the past decade, it’s that character and accountability do, in fact, matter. And when we, the voters, stop caring about it, well, so do they.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.