Newsy's Vote Smarter 2020 series aims to answer your questions about the most unusual election in modern history. From early voting to counting ballots to staying safe at the polls, get all the information you need to successfully cast your ballot this year.
This video is being made available on The Fulcrum through our partnership with Newsy — "delivering news with the why."
Original farmworker cabins, transported from Eastern Washington.
On a quiet stretch of Des Moines Memorial Drive in South Seattle, the Sea Mar Museum of Chicano/a/Latino/a Culture rises like a long‑overdue acknowledgment. Its brick exterior doesn’t shout; it invites. Inside, the rooms hum with the stories of families who crossed borders, harvested fields, organized classrooms, and built communities across Washington state—often without seeing their histories reflected anywhere on a museum wall.
For Rogelio Riojas, founder and CEO of Sea Mar Community Health Centers, the museum is a promise kept. “We wanted to make sure the contributions of Latinos in Washington state are recognized and preserved for future generations,” he told The Seattle Times when the museum opened in 2019. It was a simple statement, but one that captured decades of work—both visible and invisible—by the region’s Latino communities.
Walking through the galleries feels like stepping into a living archive. One of the most arresting sights is a pair of original farmworker cabins, transported from Eastern Washington. Their narrow wooden frames and sparse interiors speak volumes about the migrant families who once slept inside after long days in the fields. The cabins are not replicas or artistic interpretations; they are the real thing, weathered by sun, dust, and time. They anchor the museum’s narrative in the physical realities of labor that shaped the state’s agricultural economy.
Sea Mar describes the museum as “dedicated to sharing the history, struggles, and successes of the Latino community in Washington state,” a mission that plays out in photographs, letters, student newspapers, and oral histories contributed by community members themselves. These aren’t artifacts chosen from afar—they’re family treasures, personal archives, and memories entrusted to the museum so they can live beyond the kitchen tables and shoeboxes where they were once kept.
The story extends beyond the museum walls. Just steps away is the Sea Mar Community Center, a sweeping, light‑filled gathering space designed for celebrations, performances, workshops, and community events. With room for nearly 500 people, a full stage, a movie‑theater‑sized screen, and a catering kitchen, the center was built with one purpose: to give the community a place to see itself, gather, and grow. Sea Mar describes it as “a welcoming space for families, organizations, and community groups to gather, celebrate, and learn,” and on any given weekend, it lives up to that promise.
Together, the museum and community center form a cultural campus—part historical archive, part living room for the region’s Latino communities. Students come to learn about the Chicano activists who reshaped the University of Washington in the late 1960s. Families come to see their own histories reflected in the exhibits. Visitors come to understand a story that has long been present in Washington, even if it wasn’t always visible.
The Sea Mar Museum is open Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Saturdays from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., offering free admission to anyone who walks through its doors. For many, it’s more than a museum—it’s a recognition, a gathering place, and a testament to the people who helped shape the Pacific Northwest.
Preserving Latino History and Community Life in Washington was first published on Washington Latino News (WALN) and republished with permission.
As America approaches the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, we find ourselves in an uncertain time.
No matter our politics, many of us feel it: a sense of anxiety about where the country is headed and whether we are too divided to come back together. That unease has surfaced especially around one of the most basic acts of self-government: voting in free and fair elections. Too many Americans now approach elections with doubt, frustration, or mistrust. At this milestone, we have a choice. We can give in to cynicism, or we can help renew one of our most important shared American traditions and make sure every eligible voter can participate with confidence.
For us, as patriotic Americans who have each taken an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, the answer is clear: show up. That conviction is what brought us together to launch Project HALO.
Project HALO brings veterans, legal professionals, faith leaders, and everyday citizens together near polling locations for patriotic activities and community celebrations — making elections feel welcoming, visible, and grounded in civic pride. On Election Day and in the months before, cohorts of trusted community members will be present in neighborhoods across the country, not as protesters, but as neighbors. They will publicly reflect on what American citizenship means to them and offer opportunities for everyone to celebrate our democracy. And they will be trained to direct voters to the most trusted sources of election information and to help create a calm, welcoming environment so every eligible voter can participate with confidence.
The strength of these cohorts comes not only from showing up, but from who is showing up together. Each trusted community member carries a different kind of public credibility. A lawyer or retired judge signals respect for the rule of law. A faith leader signals moral responsibility and care for neighbors. A veteran signals service, duty, and commitment to the country. When they stand together, the message is broader and more durable: supporting the right of every eligible American to vote is not the work of one party, one profession, or one organization. It is a shared civic responsibility. That cross-sector presence helps reassure voters, support election officials, and remind the public that elections belong to the whole community.
That kind of cross-community effort is our answer to cynicism. It reflects what American civic life is supposed to be at its best: people from different backgrounds, beliefs, and traditions standing together around a shared responsibility.
We come to this work from different paths of service. But we share a common belief: voting is one of the most important things Americans do together, and it deserves to be treated that way. Not as a bureaucratic obligation. Not as a battleground. But as a shared civic tradition worthy of celebration.
We are doing this now because the moment calls for it. Confidence in elections is not built only in courtrooms, legislatures, or television studios. It is built locally, through trusted relationships and visible acts of civic care. As our country marks 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, Project HALO will be in communities across America helping renew what self-government depends on most: people showing up for one another, and for the shared traditions that hold us together.
Learn more or get involved at halovote.org
Daniel Miller is a lawyer and Co-Founder of Democracy Rising Collaborative.
Christopher Purdy is a U.S. Army Veteran and CEO & Founder, The Chamberlain Network.
Rev. George Scott is a Lutheran Minister and a U.S. Army Veteran.
Chris Stapleton performs onstage during the 59th Annual CMA Awards at Bridgestone Arena on November 19, 2025 in Nashville, Tennessee..
On May 6th, I watched Chris Stapleton perform “Living in the Promiseland” on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. The song, a Willie Nelson classic from 1985, hit me hard. Originally, Nelson released it at a time when debates about immigration and the American dream were in the headlines, and the song became an anthem of hope and inclusivity. These days, almost everything gets viewed through a political lens, but the song’s opening lines felt powerful without being political:
Give us your tired and weak, and we will make them strong
Bring us your foreign songs, and we will sing along
Leave us your broken dreams, we'll give them time to mend
There's still a lot of love living in the promised land
Our dreams are made of steel
The prayer of every man is to know how freedom feels
There is a winding road across the shifting sand
And room for everyone living in the promiseland
So they came from a distant isle
Nameless woman, faithless child, like a bad dream
Until there was no room at all
No place to run and no place to fall
Was Stapleton just singing a song he loves, or was he making a political statement, or maybe something in between? In an interview, Stapleton explained that he chose to cover "Living in the Promiseland" because he feels the song "speaks to the heart of what America strives to be—welcoming, inclusive, and compassionate." He added, "Music has a way of reaching people regardless of the noise around them, and this song is about hope." I think his approach lands somewhere in the middle: personal, values-driven, but not overtly political.
In a 2024 interview with The Guardian, Stapleton expressed his discomfort with celebrities wading directly into politics: “I’m not saying celebrities shouldn’t endorse people — that’s American. I also think the right to keep that private, and the right to let politicians be politicians, to let people make their own choices based on what politicians say and do … that’s American, too.”
That feeling sums up Stapleton’s unique style. While artists like Bruce Springsteen, Jason Aldean, and Taylor Swift sometimes make politics part of their public image, Stapleton focuses on values instead of politicians. He sings about fairness, empathy, and the real lives of working-class Americans. His “Promiseland” performance shows this well: it’s moving, caring, socially aware, but not political.
Stapleton doesn’t endorse candidates, rarely talks about elections, and often says he wants his music to speak for itself. Even when he addresses social issues, like supporting Black Lives Matter in 2020 or talking about gun violence in “Watch You Burn,” he does it without linking his message to any politician or party. In contrast, Springsteen is open about his politics, Aldean connects with a conservative audience, and Swift is clear about her advocacy and efforts to get people to vote.
Stapleton is different. His songs have a strong moral message, but he avoids the political spotlight that often comes with them. Basically, he’s saying: I’ll talk about people, pain, and America, but not about politicians.
When Stapleton sang the final verse on Colbert’s stage, the strength of his approach was clear:
Give us our daily bread, we have no shoes to wear
No place to call our home, only this cross to bear
We are the multitudes, lend us a helping hand
Is there no love anymore living in the promised land?
Living in the promiseland
Our dreams are made of steel
The prayer of every man is to know how freedom feels
There is a winding road across the shifting sand
And room for everyone living in the promiseland
This was a reminder that artists can share powerful social messages without getting involved in politics.
It also showed that artists don’t need to pick sides to say something important. Sometimes a message matters not because it’s debated, but because it’s felt.
You can watch the full performance and decide for yourself:
- YouTube www.youtube.com
David Nevins is the publisher of The Fulcrum and co-founder and board chairman of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Headquarters Building in Washington, DC.
WASHINGTON — Nearly a year after President Donald Trump threatened to abolish the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a review council he appointed released a final report on Thursday to overhaul the agency by reducing administrative costs and shifting responsibility for disaster response to states.
The review council was created in January 2025 through Executive Order 14180. According to the order, the council, led by Homeland Secretary Markwayne Mullin and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, was tasked with evaluating and improving the agency's efficacy and disaster response.
Last year, Trump described FEMA as “not a very successful experiment” and “extremely expensive.” He originally called to abolish FEMA outright, but later hedged.
“We want to wean off of FEMA, and we want to bring it back to the state level,” the president said in the Oval Office in June.
However, the council approved a report on May 7 that would preserve the agency but ask Congress to downsize personnel and raise the threshold for disaster aid. The report heads to Trump for review. Many recommendations would need congressional approval.
“We need to refocus FEMA and get it back on its mission that it originally was,” Mullin said. Mullin assumed the role of co-chair after former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem was fired.
FEMA, part of the Department of Homeland Security, coordinates federal response efforts before, during, and after natural disasters. It aims to reduce risks and support communities before, during, and after these disasters, including providing financial assistance for response efforts such as debris removal and infrastructure repairs.
The report advised reducing administrative costs and transferring responsibility for disaster response to states and local territories, with FEMA taking on a supporting role.
It recommends, for example, that FEMA abandon efforts to help survivors secure long-term housing, saying the agency should instead help temporarily house people whose homes are uninhabitable.
FEMA’s support should “only be reserved for truly significant events,” said Kevin Guthrie, the director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management and a member of the review council.
Florida, along with Louisiana and Texas, has received the largest share of FEMA assistance since 2015, according to Axios. In the meantime, states like Illinois and California say FEMA isn’t delivering aid efficiently.
Thousands of survivors of the 2024 Los Angeles Fires, for example, still await more than $30 billion in federal aid for rebuilding homes and infrastructure.
In the 1990s, it took less than two weeks, on average, for a governor’s request for a major disaster declaration to be approved by the president. It now takes more than a month under the Trump administration, according to analysis from the Associated Press.
This new recommendation to overhaul FEMA under the Trump administration raised concerns for activist groups, which say FEMA is critical for disaster assistance. An advocacy organization called Sabotaging Our Safety, composed of disaster experts and former FEMA employees, criticized the president for deep cuts to the workforce.
“The agency Americans rely on when disaster strikes is measurably less prepared than at any point in recent memory,” the organization said in a report.
The group opposed the council's recommendations.
“Slashing the workforce in half and putting the burden of disaster recovery on the states would not save money. It would cost lives,” according to the report.
The Trump administration implemented, early on, a policy requiring top-level approval for FEMA contracts over $100,000. This policy, aimed at rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse,” delayed $17 million in federal disaster funds in January, according to The New York Times.
When Mullin took over as DHS secretary, he lifted the policy to speed up FEMA grants and reimbursements. Following this decision, more than $1 billion in backlogged funding was released.
FEMA under the partial government shutdown
During the 76-day partial government shutdown, FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund was reduced from nearly $10 billion to roughly $3 billion, forcing the agency to prioritize lifesaving and immediate relief, according to a press release from FEMA.
Non-essential activities, like rebuilding projects and funding for mitigation, were halted. Roughly 4,000 FEMA employees were furloughed, and another 1,600 worked without pay, according to the same press release.
Funding for the Disaster Relief Fund was reinstated on April 30, when the shutdown ended, but the agency faces a backlog of delayed projects.
Samantha Freeman is a graduate of politics, policy, and foreign affairs journalism student at Northwestern University Medill School of Journalism.
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