Demand for tech-infused toys is growing — and raising alarm about kids' privacy and safety, Erica Pandey writes for Axios What's Next.

• Why it matters: Action figures that talk back, robots that follow kids around and dollhouses that resemble smart homes will be common holiday presents.

What's happening: "You can go to Target and find a whole aisle that is almost entirely smart toys," says James Zahn, senior editor of the trade publication The Toy Insider.

• Some tiny toys, aimed at preschoolers, have the advanced tech of a smartphone.

What's already out there:

• KidKraft and Amazon have partnered on a toy kitchen and supermarket set that's Alexa-enabled.
• Huge! Play has an animatronic figurine called GameBud Talking Tom that talks in real life, and also interacts with kids in mobile games on their devices.

Between the lines: Kids are spending more time on screens than they ever have, and parents want to engage them with exciting, tech-infused toys that often have educational value instead of leaving them to browse the internet on iPads, according to the Toy Insider editor.

• "The demand is really driven by parents, especially younger parents," Zahn says.

Threat level: Smart toys come with the same data privacy concerns as the rest of the "Internet of Things" ecosystem.

• "These toys can come with cameras or microphones, they can connect kids to the internet or other users, and they can create personalized online accounts for kids," says Hannah Rhodes, a consumer watchdog associate with the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

Adults know how voice assistant technologies work, but kids "may not understand that they should be careful about what information they share with the toy," says Melanie Subin of the Future Today Institute.

• They "could give out details such as their address or date of birth that pose a risk if the toy company's systems were ever compromised."

Flashback: In 2015, a data breach at smart toymaker VTech exposed millions of kids' data.

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Schools nationwide issued warnings — and some went remote — because of what a leading anti-gun-violence group called a "national TikTok challenge" threatening school shootings today.

• Why it matters: The threat is rattling students on what for many is the last school day of the year, with exams and Christmas fun on the docket. Instead, schools are cutting back and locking down, with last month's attack in Michigan renewing fears of shootings.

Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit organization founded by families who lost loved ones in the Sandy Hook school shooting of 2012, tweeted:

• "A national TikTok challenge promotes school shootings on December 17. Gun violence is not a subject for jokes or pranks."

Reality check: The threats don't name specific schools and local authorities say many of them lack credibility, Bloomberg reports.

• The University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh (UWO) said: "We do not believe the threat is credible."
• Oshkosh K-12 schools said in a letter to students, families and staff: "[T]here is no information that these warnings are directed toward any Oshkosh schools ... However, in an abundance of caution, there will be increased police presence."

Schools in Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Montana, New York and Pennsylvania are among those stepping up security today, per AP.

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President Biden acknowledged yesterday what Axios has been telling you for weeks: It looks like his (<) $2 trillion Build Back Better package, expanding America's safety net, will be punted into next year.

• "We will advance this work together over the days and weeks ahead," Biden said in a written statement. "Leader Schumer and I are determined to see the bill successfully on the floor as early as possible."

Why it matters: The White House badly wants this as a Year 1 accomplishment — it's easier to pass something big in odd-numbered years: Election years are always more complicated.

What's happening: Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), the singular roadblock, has said since September he might prefer the bill in '22. Now he's deadlocked in talks with Biden. Rising inflation bolstered his resistance.

State of play: Asked Wednesday whether Dems should move on to voting-rights legislation and put off BBB to next year, Biden replied:

• "There's nothing domestically more important than voting rights. It's the single biggest issue."

The new COVID wave is crashing into a health care system with workers at a breaking point, Axios health care editor Tina Reed writes.

• Why it matters: Hospital workers have had little relief from COVID over the past two years. That burned-out, dispirited workforce is facing yet another wave from Omicron.

"We're facing a national emergency," Rick Pollack, CEO of the American Hospital Association, told Axios.

• "Just think about it: When America shut down, our folks stepped up," Pollack said. "And for two years now, they've been going absolutely full throttle."

🚨 President Biden warned yesterday: "For unvaccinated, we are looking at a winter of severe illness and death — if you're unvaccinated — for themselves, their families, and the hospitals they’ll soon overwhelm."

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Visa applications show 62,000 Afghan interpreters and others who worked alongside American forces still remain in Afghanistan, a State Department official told The Wall Street Journal (subscription).

• Why it matters: "This is the first time that the State Department has provided a number on those left behind since the Afghanistan government collapsed this summer," The Journal reports.

About 33,000 Afghans have cleared vetting requirements and are eligible for evacuation. The 29,000 other visa applicants are in earlier stages.

• U.S. evacuation flights have increased recently.

States and the U.S. government carried out 11 executions this year — the fewest since 1988, as support for the death penalty continues to decline, AP reports.

• 18 people were sentenced to death in 2021, matching last year's number — a record low since the death penalty's modern era began in 1972, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Go deeper: Year-end report on the death penalty (45-page PDF).

Emma Broyles, Miss Alaska, is surrounded by contestants after being crowned last night as winner of the 100th Miss America Competition — no longer a "pageant" — at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn.

The first Miss America contestants, wearing sashes over swimsuits, on the boardwalk in Atlantic City, N.J., in September 1921, when the pageant was launched to try to extend the beach season.

• The winner was Margaret Gorman (second from left), Miss District of Columbia.

Go deeper: "100 years ago, the first Miss America pageant was as messy as today's," by The Washington Post's Amy Argetsinger, adapted from her new book this year, "There She Was: The Secret History of Miss America."

This Berlin public transport "hemp ticket," being sold only this week, is edible and infused with hemp oil.

• The city's transport authority is marketing the ticket to bring patrons down from holiday-shopping-induced stress once they eat it.

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