1. Halloween is a holiday about scares, but one real-life statistic may frighten more people this year than the ghouls and ghosts. A report by the journal JAMA just released the highest cause of death Halloween night — what was it?

a. Assault while out trick-or-treating

b. Eating candy with razor blades or drugs in it

c. Getting hit by a car

2. On Oct. 29, President Donald Trump threatened to end what longstanding practice by executive order, defending his remark on Oct. 31 through a tweet citing the U.S. Constitution?

a. Ending U.S. citizenship for children born on U.S. soil

b. Ending Social Security

c. Ending the U.S. mail service

3. A mass shooting in Pittsburgh on Oct. 27 was the deadliest attack perpetrated against in targets in U.S. history? What group was targeted in the attack?

a. Evangelical Christian worshipers

b. Jewish worshipers

c. Methodist worshipers

4. Which Western European leader announced he or she will be stepping down after his or her current term in a surprise address on Oct. 29?

a. France’s President Emmanuel Macron

b. Italy’s President Sergio Mattarella

c. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel

5. Trump’s approval rating took a sharp blow in late June this year when the administration was facing controversy over family separations at the U.S.-Mexico border. It took another blow recently following the apprehension of the man sending bomb threats to Trump critics and the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting. How many percentage points did he lose as of Oct. 28?

a. Two points

b. Four points

c. Eight points

Answers:

1. c. The biggest killer on Halloween is markedly mundane, and also more likely to happen than any other time in October, and most times during the year, according to the JAMA study. The Los Angeles Times reported that during the height of the fun on Halloween, pedestrians are 43 percent more likely to be fatally struck by a car than at the same times during the night a week previous or after the day. Young children are particularly at risk; in some cases, their chance to be hit increased by a factor of 10.

2. a. Trump threatened to end automatic U.S. citizenship for children born on U.S. soil, according to Roll Call. Sen. Lindsay Graham of South Carolina has called birthright citizenship a magnet for undocumented immigrants to come to the U.S. and make a claim to legal citizenship through an infant child. Trump and Republican allies have argued that ending birthright citizenship will correspondingly lower illegal immigration.

3. b. The shooting of 11 worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh was the deadliest attack against Jewish people in the U.S., reported the Los Angeles Times. The attack, committed by a man who repeatedly took to social media to call for the eradication of Jews, has been called a capstone in a recent flaring of anti-Semitic sentiment in the U.S. The Anti-Defamation League has tracked reports of anti-Semitic events since 1979, and in recent years, the numbers have climbed from 2013’s reported 751 events to 2017’s 1,986 events.

4. c. Merkel announced that she will not seek reelection in 2021 after her 13 years as Germany’s chancellor, according to Independent UK. Merkel was the first female chancellor since Germany became a modern nation-state in 1871. Merkel’s party suffered political losses in recent elections, which she took credit for, and announced that her two focuses for the remainder of her term would be Brexit and U.S.-Russia relations.

5. b. Trump’s approval took another four-point drop in a Gallup poll, according to Bloomberg News. That put him at 40 percent approval, down from 44 percent the previous week, and matched the 45 to 41 percent drop he experienced in late June.