Curious, that article mentions that “The incident was first reported by Ostsee-Zeitung, a major German daily newspaper.” and links to this article.

That original article contains the following passage:

Teil der Reisepapiere waren die von ihnen unterschriebenen Verhörprotokolle. „Da standen Sätze drin, die wir so gar nicht gesagt haben“, sagt Charlotte Pohl. „Die haben es so hingedreht, dass wir zugegeben hätten, dass wir illegal in den USA arbeiten wollen.“

Part of the travel documents were the interrogation protocols signed by them. “There were sentences in there that we didn’t say at all,” says Charlotte Pohl. “They twisted it so that we had admitted that we wanted to work illegally in the USA.”

Yet usatoday only reports the allegations, not the denial.

Could you perhaps share one?

While I have no expectations of progressive policies from Merz, it has to be pointed out that the statement in this article came from the old government.

1. there are other elections besides the federal ones
   https://www.wahlrecht.de/termine.htm

2. Politicians should always care about the political opinions of the population and not only 6 months before elections

If the thing that user asked to happen doesn’t happen then the thing won’t happen?

My understanding was that they asked that politicians with bribery convictions are blocked from running in elections (aka the topic of this thread).

Which can not happen if the prerequisite bribery convictions - which is something different from being blocked from the elections - have not been met.

Won’t do much if nobody ever gets convicted for bribery/ corruption

As for the US, the headline does mention Greenland and the article includes

Denmark’s military changes also come in the wake of growing political tensions with the U.S. over control of Greenland, a Danish territory.

And “why Russia tensions?” Probably because Russia is currently waging a war of territorial expansion and several NATO members in the Nordics and Baltics could be next.

Regarding potential conflict with Russia, Denmark’s Minister of Defense Troels Lund Poulsen said in February, "Within two years, Russia could pose a credible threat to one or several NATO-countries if NATO does not build up its own military power in the same rate as Russia.

Then we should start ascension talks with Korea immediately.

Malta is in Africa

By what definition, plate tectonics?