Election offices in at least six states have received letters containing white powder, raising fears of further threats or violence as officials enter the final week before the midterm elections.

The FBI and the US Postal Inspection Service told the Daily Mail that investigations remain ongoing into as many as 100 suspicious mailings sent to election administrators this month.

The reports have heightened anxiety among state and local officials as Election Day approaches, with millions of Americans preparing to visit polling places and cast their ballots.

Authorities have not determined who is behind the suspicious mailings.

Some election officials have pointed to what they describe as incendiary rhetoric from President Donald Trump, warning that his repeated allegations of voter fraud could place them at greater risk of harassment and violence.

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes accused Trump of “ginning up” division ahead of the midterms. In a CNN interview, Fontes called the president’s conduct “wholly and completely irresponsible.”

“Unfortunately, the president has a very broad reach and his audience takes him very seriously,” Fontes said. He added that some of his colleagues had personally had their dogs poisoned. “My own family has been threatened. I have been threatened.”

The White House has defended the president’s election-related actions, saying they are intended to prevent voter fraud and ensure federal election laws are enforced.

“No one has done more than President Trump to ensure America has free and fair elections,” White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis told the Daily Mail.

The threats have continued despite the investigation. Law enforcement officials said more than 100 letters were sent to state and local election facilities in October, with officials in Louisiana, Ohio and Oklahoma reporting that they had been targeted.

In Louisiana, a state employee was taken to the hospital as a precaution after opening one of the letters, while the building was evacuated.

More than three dozen congressional offices have also received letters containing a white, powdery substance in recent weeks.

At least 10 people were exposed to white powder mailed to the New York offices of Democrats Hakeem Jeffries, Ritchie Torres and Tom Suozzi, local outlets reported earlier this month.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, California Democratic Senator Alex Padilla, Republican Senator Mike Rounds of South Dakota and Texas Senator Ted Cruz also appear to have been targeted, according to ABC News and Axios.

The incidents have forced state and local election officials to move quickly, training employees on how to prepare for and respond to an expanding range of threats.

Many officials are working with organizations such as the nonpartisan Committee for Safe and Secure Elections (CSSE). The group, made up of current and former election officials and law enforcement personnel, provides security training for election staff at the state and local levels.

Tina Barton, the group’s co-chair, told the Daily Mail that she has conducted more than 140 security training sessions for state and local election staff ahead of the November 3 elections. That is a sharp increase from 2024, when she led about 67 sessions.

Demand, she said in an interview, has ‘substantially increased’ in the past two years – due to the rise of new, sophisticated technologies, as well as an awareness from the law enforcement community that these threats ‘aren’t going away.’ 

The group briefs sheriffs offices, election workers, and police departments on emerging threats, deescalation techniques, and other safety measures. 

ALSO READ: Massachusetts Mother Lindsay Clancy’s Lawyer Denies She’ll Testify About Homicidal Thoughts in Ex-Husband’s Lawsuit Against Doctors

They also run ‘tabletop exercises’ to prepare for responding to bomb threats, suspicious packages, swatting and disruption from possible drone use. 

Despite their local roles, these individuals receive an outsize amount of harassment and threats – a Brennan Center study conducted this year found that 32 percent of election officials said they have been ‘threatened, harassed, or abused’ for doing their job.

Barton, a former Republican city clerk in Michigan, has experienced this harassment first-hand. ‘I had my life threatened in 2020,’ she told the Daily Mail, referring to a man who called her and vowed to kill her and her family in deeply explicit terms. 

The individual, Andrew Nickels, of Carmel, Indiana, was charged with making interstate threats to an election worker, and was sentenced to more than a year in prison in 2023.

Now, she’s hoping to protect other election officials from experiencing the same. 

Barton said politicians with a following must choose their words carefully.

‘Every action they take evolves into a reaction by people who believe them and trust them,’ she said. ‘We all have a responsibility when we know we have authority.’ 

Faith in the system is incredibly fragile: Just six in ten Americans say they would trust the election results, according to a new ABC News/Ipsos poll. 

A PBS News/Marist survey earlier this month found that 30 percent of voters believe violence might be necessary to get the country back on track.

Some states have moved to beef up security at polling locations in response, and embrace a bevy of unique solutions to protect election workers this November.

Some counties in Georgia and Nevada have issued ‘panic buttons’ at polling locations, which that transmit GPS coordinates and photographs directly to the local sheriff’s offices and emergency dispatchers in the event they are pressed.

In Los Angeles County, election workers have teamed up with bomb-sniffing canine teams to screen incoming mail.

And in Durham County, North Carolina, polling sites are now equipped with bulletproof glass, security cameras, and state-of-the-art mail ventilation rooms – including a separate exhaust system to contain potentially hazardous substances.

The flurry of threats comes as the president has pushed for greater federal control over elections during his second term.

He signed two executive orders seeking to regulate states’ use of mail-in ballots, an effort blocked last month by the Supreme Court – and has repeatedly claimed that noncitizens are voting illegally, despite studies that show such cases are extremely rare.

Last week the Justice Department sued California after the state refused to purge 20,000 suspected noncitizens from its voter rolls. 

In a separate case, a federal judge blocked the Department of Homeland Security from examining voter rolls in nine states under its ‘Unlawful Voting Initiative’. The department is likely to appeal.

Marc Elias, a Democratic lawyer and founder of Democracy Docket, argued that the fear-mongering is a far greater threat to elections than any instances of voter fraud itself.

‘In a nation of 340 million Americans, where you have hundreds of millions of voters voting in each election, a couple of voters or a dozen voters who vote illegally is not changing the outcome of anything,’ he said.

Barton, the CSSE co-chair, said the unfortunate reality is that much of the hostility fomented by politicians often impacts state and local election officials.

‘Unfortunately, some of that rhetoric has been targeted at the election community and the election processes,’ Barton said. ‘And the average election worker is the one that ends up bearing the brunt of this.’

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration moved Wednesday to make several unproven peptide drugs more accessible, advancing a policy favored by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Six people familiar with the matter said FDA scientists had limited involvement in developing the proposal and strongly objected to the changes.

The draft policy, released online by Kennedy’s Department of Health and Human Services, applies to a small group of injectable peptides marketed by the wellness industry as tools for building muscle, speeding recovery from injuries and increasing energy. The public will have two weeks to submit comments before the policy is finalized.

HHS officials were primarily responsible for writing the proposal, which encountered intense resistance from FDA drug experts. Those staff members warned that the plan could weaken the agency’s traditional role of keeping potentially dangerous health products off the US market, according to the people familiar with the discussions.

The individuals spoke with The Associated Press anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss internal government deliberations.

Under the proposal, the FDA would generally not pursue enforcement against specialty pharmacies distributing about six wellness peptides, including BPC-157, TB-500 and KPV. Under existing FDA standards, the substances would typically be treated as illegal drugs because they have not undergone the agency’s required testing for safety and effectiveness.

Kennedy wrote that the policy “advances patient choice and freedom.” The document also says the change would offer protection from peptides sold online that may be produced with ingredients whose source and quality are uncertain.

Kennedy has publicly described himself as a “big fan” of peptides and has said he used BPC-157 while treating a muscle injury.

Lee Rosebush, of the American Academy of Peptide Medicine, called the announcement “a huge step for patient and provider medical freedom” in an online statement. The organization is not a medical professional society and represents individuals who prescribe or market peptides.

The growing peptide market has also drawn major telehealth companies. Hims & Hers recently said it planned to offer wellness peptides if the government revised its policy, while Wall Street analysts have estimated that the industry could eventually exceed $2 billion.

Wellness peptides are not FDA approved

Some peptides are naturally produced by the body and help activate hormones involved in growth, metabolism and tissue repair. Pharmaceutical companies have developed approved medicines based on several peptides, including widely used treatments for diabetes and weight loss.

The compounds addressed by the new policy, however, have not been cleared by the FDA as safe and effective. They are nevertheless heavily promoted online by influencers and celebrities for conditions ranging from insomnia, anxiety and inflammation to migraines.

Peter Lurie, a former FDA official, said the agency already has approved medications that have been thoroughly tested for each of those conditions.

If patients “are diverted from those drugs toward this stuff, there will be more unnecessary pain and suffering,” said Lurie, who now heads the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest.

Lurie also raised questions about the timing of the announcement, which came only days before the midterm election.

“This is a wink and nod to the MAHA faithful in the hope that they’ll show up at the polls,” Lurie said, invoking Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement.

RFK Jr. and his MAHA followers support peptides

An HHS spokesperson said the department was addressing the dangers of “black-market peptides” by providing Americans “a more controlled alternative through licensed US compounders.”

YOU MAY ALSO READ: Fort Lauderdale Witnesses Unruly Celebrations on St. Patrick's Day as Spring Breakers End Up on Stretchers Following Miami's Strict Measures – NewsFinale

The move represents the latest effort by Kennedy to steer US health policy toward the priorities of the MAHA movement, whose prominent supporters include people who sell peptide injections and supplements.

It also marks a significant departure from previous FDA campaigns targeting unproven wellness products, including peptides, stem cell treatments and dietary supplements making unsupported medical claims. That enforcement posture repeatedly placed the agency at odds with Kennedy, who has publicly promoted the potential benefits of each category.

Two people familiar with the policy’s development said the version released Wednesday was less sweeping than HHS’ initial proposal.

The department initially sought to have the FDA write a formal regulation placing BPC-157 and other peptides on a list of drug substances considered safe for use by compounding pharmacies — specialty businesses that prepare customized medications.

FDA officials warned that the agency’s scientific staffers had major safety concerns and would not support a regulation deeming the peptides safe. HHS officials moved to a different approach that directs the FDA not to enforce its rules against pharmacies that compound the substances.

FDA staffers ultimately provided technical assistance in drafting the HHS plan, including guardrails intended to improve safety, such as requiring pharmacies to use peptide ingredients from FDA-registered factories. Additionally, compounders are directed to collect information on side effects for safety analysis and verify the purity of peptides they use.

Lurie pointed out that the FDA, under federal law, does not have the authority to enforce those pharmacy requirements.

The Alliance for Pharmacy Compounding, which represents specialty pharmacies, said several details need to be clarified — including when the policy takes effect and how it will intersect with state pharmacy boards, who traditionally regulate pharmacists.

Decisions over compounding have long rested with the FDA, not HHS

Decisions about regulating peptides and compounding pharmacies have almost always come from the FDA, which has an office dedicated to protecting US consumers from unsafe or poor-quality compounded drugs.

The issue of compounding safety became a greater focus for the FDA after a deadly outbreak of fungal meningitis in 2012 was linked to contaminated injections from a Massachusetts compounding pharmacy. Once a niche business, compounding has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry, providing customized medications to doctors, clinics and hospitals.

It’s extremely rare for HHS to take the lead in drafting policies over the compounding industry, former FDA officials said. But federal law technically gives HHS authority over drug regulations, which are then delegated to the FDA.

FDA has warned Americans about safety risks of unproven peptides

Many in the US who are using peptides today do not deal with a doctor or a pharmacy to get the injections, but often order vials online sold by chemical manufacturers based in China.

Peptide sellers often try to skirt US regulations by labeling their products as “for research use only” because the FDA does not regulate research chemicals.

In 2023, the FDA added more than a dozen peptides, including BPC-157 and TB-500, to its list of substances that should not be compounded due to risks of allergic reactions, kidney damage and tumor growth.

At a meeting in July, FDA staffers reiterated that more than half a dozen peptides brought forward for reconsideration remained unproven in terms of safety and effectiveness.

But a panel of outside experts voted to drop restrictions on the six peptides named in Wednesday’s document. The panel — selected by Kennedy’s HHS — included several doctors, pharmacists and consultants who work in the peptide field.