‘I Look After People But No One Will Look After Me’ - Why The UK's Migrant Key Workers Are Facing Extreme Poverty And Abuse In The Pandemic


The Home Office has been accused of ignoring migrants with No Recourse to Public Funds in the Covid-19 pandemic, forcing many into destitution | PA Images
 


Georgina Bailey
24 October


Approximately 1.4 million migrants in the UK have no access to state funds – including hundreds of thousands of key workers in the healthcare and hospitality sectors. As Covid-19 pushes more people into destitution, Georgina Bailey reports on how they've been impacted by the government's policies.

“It's really hard. I'm really scared to go to work, especially because I'm a carer. I'm so scared. But I don't have a choice. I need to go to work. Because nobody will help me.”

Maya*, 36, is a senior night carer at a residential care home in North London. Originally from the Philippines, she lives in a two bedroom flat with her British 8-year-old son and another family member. Maya has colitis and suspected Crohn's disease – a condition placing patients at high-risk for Covid-19, and in the ‘shielding’ category.

However, Maya never shielded, despite being asked to by her doctor. She continued to go to work, earning £9 per hour, less than the London Living Wage, currently £10.75. “I just kept on working… while I'm on treatment as well. I just carry on working. Of course, I'm worried about, financially… how can I manage everything during the pandemic?”

When she tested positive for Covid-19 in August, Maya took two weeks of annual leave to self-isolate with her son rather than rely on statutory sick pay – it would not cover her rent (£900 a month), and she is already in debt. She normally works 55 hours a week including overtime, totaling £1980 before tax and deductions. In the pandemic, she has cut back to 40 hours a week to try and protect her health as much as possible.

Maya is ineligible for most types of state support, despite her low income – and her situation is not unique. She, like approximately 1.4 million others, is living and working legally in the UK with No Recourse To Public Funds (NPRF) conditions applied to her visa, meaning that she cannot access Universal Credit, Job Seekers Allowance, child tax credit, or housing benefit, among other state funds.

Many of those living under these conditions, like Maya, are key workers – around 850,000 migrants work in health – including the NHS – and social care, accounting for approximately one-fifth of the total workforce.

I do look after people but no one will look after me. When I need it, nobody is there

NRPF is a standard condition applied to the visas of legal migrants who have Limited Leave To Remain. Although a similar policy has existed for decades, it was expanded in 2012 and now most legal migrants to the UK have NRPF conditions – illegal migrants, by default, cannot access most public funds.

Explaining the policy, the Home Office says: “Those seeking to establish their family life in the UK must do so on a basis that prevents burdens on the State and the UK taxpayer. It is right that those who benefit from the State contribute towards it.” However, charities have long argued that it pushes migrants into destitution, particularly as they are more likely to be in low-paid, insecure work.

According to those who work with those with NRPF, the pandemic has made the situation “immeasurably worse”, with the number of people applying to have the condition lifted because of destitution increasing six-fold. The Children's Society estimated early in the pandemic that there were at least 100,000 children in families in the UK on the brink of destitution due to NRPF conditions.

According to The Unity Project, a charity which supports people who are destitute get their NRPF conditions lifted, a third of those they have helped in the pandemic have been key workers like Maya.

“I don't get enough salary. I do look after people but no one will look after me. When I need it, nobody is there,” says Maya. After previously being rejected, she has now applied for her NRPF conditions to be lifted again.

The Local Government Association, the Labour party, the House of Commons Work and Pensions and Home Affairs Committees, and a number of charities have all called for NRPF conditions to be suspended for the course of the pandemic, citing pressures on homelessness and local authority services, the increased risk of destitution, and the public health risks of people being forced to work when they should be isolating or shielding.

“It has been absolutely devastating,” says The Children’s Society, who are reporting “a huge rise in new referrals from families that they've never worked with before” since the pandemic started.

Safety4Sisters, a charity working with migrant women experiencing gender-based violence, reported this week that their number of referrals and cases had doubled over lockdown. All of the women they saw who wanted a refuge space were initially refused one due to their NRPF conditions. In one case, a domestic abuse service support worker Safety4Sisters worked with informed them that they were unable to take on outreach support for a woman with NRPF as their funders ‘do not allow it’.

In the first six months of the pandemic, 15% of those helped by The Unity Project had been subject to domestic abuse, with both the amount and severity of harm increasing during lockdown.

One advocacy worker with Safety4Sisters stated in their report, Locked in abuse, locked out of safety, that:

“As Covid–19 restrictions were quickly embedded into households, perpetrators – who already used their wives or partners immigration dependency as a form of coercive control – were further empowered…

“In some cases they were persuaded by social services and the police that they should negotiate around the abuse and “humour” the abuser in the house or leave their children behind with the abuser, rather than risk homelessness under Covid or/and that as “NRPF cases” they neither had the resources nor statutory responsibility to ensure their safety.”

The Government has repeatedly rejected calls to suspend NRPF, stating that the Job Retention Scheme, Self-Employed Income Support Scheme, Statutory Sick Pay, and the statutory duty on local authorities to provide a “a basic safety net” to the most vulnerable, can all be accessed by those with NRPF.

Additionally, if people have paid national insurance for two years prior, those with NRPF may be entitled to limited contribution-based benefits such as Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) to cover lost income. The ban on evictions which was in place from March to September also covered those with NRPF, and free school meals were also extended to cover the children of parents with NRPF.

However, with ongoing issues with eligibility and strains on local authority finances, and as further restrictions and more job losses loom, some are worried that the situation could worsen further, with MPs alleging that that more families will be forced into hunger and destitution in Tier 3 areas due to the lack of support.


These are families who have literally no food at all in the cupboard, parents are regularly cutting down on the number of meals they eat each day to be able to feed their children

The topic of NRPF in the pandemic first came to public attention in May this year when Stephen Timms, chair of the Work and Pensions Committee and long-term Labour MP for East Ham, one of the most deprived constituencies in the country, appeared to trip up the Prime Minister about NRPF in front of the powerful House of Commons Liaison Committee.

Timms had asked about the case of two constituents, originally from Pakistan, with two children. Living and working here legally, on the 10 year path to settlement route, the husband’s employer had not put him on the job retention scheme during the pandemic, leaving him with zero income. The wife’s income was less than their household rent. They had NPRF.

“Isn’t it wrong that a hard-working, law-abiding family like that is being forced into destitution by the current arrangements?” Timms had asked.

After initially querying what no recourse to public funds meant, Johnson told Timms: “Clearly people who have worked hard for this country and who live and work here should have support of one kind or another… You’ve raised a very important point – if the condition of their leave to remain is that they should have no recourse to public funds I will find out how many there are in that position and we will see what we can do to help.”

But since then, the Prime Minister and Home Secretary have repeatedly said that they will not lift the condition, citing existing pandemic-specific support.



Timms however, believes that the Home Office “has absolutely failed to recognise the situation that people find themselves in”. He recently visited a warehouse of the charity FareShare, which gathers surplus food from farms and supermarkets and distributes it to food banks and other charities.

“They told me that before the pandemic, they were sending one tonne of food per week to my borough, Newham. They’re now sending 20 tonnes of food per week to Newham. And the council estimates… probably around a third of that increase from one tonne to 20 tonnes is accounted for by people with leave to remain working legally, fully entitled to and complying with the law. But their work has stopped because of the pandemic and they've got no recourse to public funds. They've got zero income coming in,” Timms explains.

Lucy Leon of The Children’s Society explains: “Some families we work with are sleeping on people's floors. We're talking about a whole family of three or four having to share a bed, or sleeping on a sofa with no privacy or space for themselves. People are at risk of potentially exploitative situations. These are families who have literally no food at all in the cupboard, parents are regularly cutting down on the number of meals they eat each day to be able to feed their children.”

The Unity Project reports that even before the pandemic, 52% of the people with NRPF they supported did not have a bed to sleep in, one-third shared a bedroom with their children and with other people who were not their family, and that 6% of single women they supported had been street homeless with their children.

Other cases reported by The Unity Project in the pandemic include several who work in the NHS. One couple who are both care assistants in the NHS could only afford to live with their 11-year-old British daughter in an unconverted office room in a business centre, with no bathroom and only a shared toilet and kitchenette.

Another key worker, Ada*, is an NHS healthcare assistant, earning just over £1,000 a month. She has to share a single room with her 6-year-old daughter in a house they share with five adult male strangers, who sometimes take drugs in the shared kitchen.


It's survival really, when you look at the kind of conditions that many of the families are living in and the huge pressure they're under

While the government has repeatedly said that those with NRPF are eligible for many of the UK wide support schemes, The Unity Project reported that less than 13% of the people they supported had been able to access the furlough scheme and less than 3% had received a self-employed grant, and many couldn’t access ESA either, due largely to being in precarious or potentially exploitative employment.

There was also some confusion as to whether those with NRPF were covered by the government’s Everyone In scheme, which provided emergency accommodation to nearly 15,000 people who were rough sleeping or otherwise unable to comply with “lockdown” due to their living arrangements at the start of the pandemic. Councils were told to “use their judgement” to assess support they could legally give, leading to difficult decisions around legality and finances, and reports of some people with NRPF being turned away.

“Because of NRPF a lot of the provision out there hasn't been applicable for them so they've got very limited routes of what they can turn to in terms of - I was going to say support, but actually, it's survival really, when you look at the kind of conditions that many of the families are living in and the huge pressure they're under,” Leon adds.

For migrants and families who become destitute, there are two main avenues for support.

Firstly, families may be able to access support from their local authorities under Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 if the welfare of a child is at risk, with 8,117 families with at least 16,331 dependents being supported this way between 2015 and 2019. Charities report that the money provided by local authorities was often very limited – under £3 per child per day.

Councils may also provide basic safety net support if there is “a genuine care need that does not arise solely from destitution”, for example, such as community care needs or migrants with serious health problems.

Secondly, migrants can apply to the Home Office to have the condition lifted if they are destitute, at risk of destitution, have exceptional financial circumstances, or the welfare of a child is at risk. Home Office data shows that the number of people with NRPF who applied to have it lifted increased by 567% in the first three months of the pandemic, with 5,665 applications and a 89% success rate.



The process is labyrinthine. “We have seen cases with people having to send 15 separate emails each with huge attachments,” says Leon. “It’s a huge burden especially as we're talking about families who sometimes don't have smartphones. If they do, they have very limited data and the pandemic has made it worse, they can no longer go to a drop in centre and see someone face to face to provide evidence, instead they're having to go into a supermarkets or shopping centre, to access Wi-Fi to be able to send over these documents. There’s also a lot of back and forth - so it's a really challenging process.”

The average time taken for the Home Office to process an application between April and June 2020 was 30 days – with some cases taking up to four months. However, charities working with those with NRPF say that the government’s processing speed has improved over the course of the pandemic. People without internet access or who are not confident using a computer can access phone support to complete their application, although this is not widely referenced among charities supporting those with NRPF.

As well as lack of access to government schemes, there are also sector-specific demographic challenges to contend with. Migrants subject to NRPF are disproportionately represented in the food, drink, accommodation and hospitality sectors, with Migration Exchange analysis revealing that around 16% (74,000) of migrants arriving in the UK from non-EU countries work in a business that was largely or entirely shut down in the first lockdown.

However, as Tier 2 and 3 restrictions are introduced across the country, again hitting the food, drink, hospitality and accommodation sectors the hardest, questions have been raised again about whether the government have considered the needs of the 1.4 million people living with NRPF in their calculations.


It’s another sneaky way of excluding certain people from support without explicitly saying people with NRPF can’t apply, which is obviously a public health risk

One such example is the Chancellor’s recent announcement that workers in impacted sectors in Tier 3 will still receive 67% of their pay if their places of work have to shut down, compared to 80% when the furlough scheme was running.

In the House of Commons on Wednesday, health minister Ed Argar said that those losing a third of their income should apply for Universal Credit – something which is not accessible to most with NRPF, leading charities to accuse the government of “stacking disadvantage upon disadvantage”.

Timms told The House that: “Yet again, the government is overlooking hard-working families with No Recourse to Public Funds. They cannot access this Universal Credit top up. So, in Tier 3 areas, many will receive just 67% of the national minimum wage. More families will be forced into hunger and destitution.”

“It’s typical of everything they’ve done with NRPF,” says Caz Hattam, from The Unity project. “It’s another sneaky way of excluding certain people from support without explicitly saying people with NRPF can’t apply, which is obviously a public health risk.”

For some the concern is that the issue will soon be forgotten. “The pandemic has exacerbated existing problems,” adds Hattam. “We're worried that after the initial shock of the pandemic, people might think that the problems have gone away, and they most definitely won't have done - if anything, the inequality and discrimination faced by people with NRPF will be worse.”

A government spokesperson said:

“The government has acted decisively to ensure that everyone is supported through this crisis, including those who have no recourse to public funds.

“Many of the wide-ranging coronavirus measures we have put in place are not considered public funds, and individuals who have a right to be in the UK on account of their family life or other human rights reasons can apply to have the NRPF condition lifted if their financial circumstances change.”

*Names changed for anonymity

A TikTok Ban On LGBT Conversion Therapy Content Has Reignited Calls To Ban The Practice In The UK

A petition calling for the practice to be banned attracted over 200,000 signatures earlier this year (PA)
 


Eleanor Langford

TikTok has become the latest social media platform to ban content promoting so-called “gay conversion therapy”, reigniting calls for the government to ban the practice.

In a statement, TikTok UK announced it was updating its guidelines with the aim of “removing content that is hurtful to the LGBTQ+ community by removing hateful ideas, including content that promotes conversion therapy and the idea that no one is born LGBTQ+.”

Other content now banned on the social media platform, which has over 100 million active monthly users in Europe, includes those promoting white nationalist ideologies and conspiracy theories targeting Jewish and Muslim communities.

Conversion therapy refers to treatment or psychotherapy aimed at changing a person’s sexual orientation or suppressing their gender identity.

Harry Hitchens, co-founder of the Ban Conversion Therapy campaign, said he was “cautiously optimistic” about the move, but warned that “we’ve heard this promise before from other platforms without much result”.
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He added: “Time and time again, pledges have been made in the public and private sector to limit the reach of so-called ‘conversion therapy’ organisations. We’d now like to see those pledges turn into action.”

Boris Johnson described the practice in June as “absolutely abhorrent” and pledged that he would “bring forward” plans to make it illegal in the UK once a study on its prevalence had been conducted.

TikTok’s latest move to remove such content from its platform has reignited cross-party calls for the government to speed up action on conversion therapy in the UK.

Dan Carden was among Labour MPs welcoming the move, he told PoliticsHome: “It’s welcome to see online platforms taking action to protect their users from dangerous and detrimental content involving gay conversion therapies and theories.

“Action from the government is well overdue. Indeed, it had been promised in recent years but sadly under Boris Johnson’s premiership we are seeing Ministers backtracking on these commitments.”

Meanwhile, Abena Oppong-Asare said: “TikTok have done the right thing by banning content promoting gay conversion therapy. This is an abhorrent practice.

“The Government must now act urgently to do the right thing to make sure this is banned in the UK.”

And the SNP's Alyn Smith said: "Gay conversion therapy across the globe causes extreme suffering for individuals. It is a fraudulent practice that severely damages people.

"By some estimates, around 70% of people who have gone through gay conversion therapy have had suicidal thoughts. Over 30% have attempted suicide, while over 40% have self-harmed. It is a vile assault on a person’s happiness, and it should be outlawed entirely."

The Scottish MP added that he hoped the move by TikTok "will come with a greater sense of urgency" to remove harmful content when it appears.

LGBT rights group Stonewall also said it was good that TikTok was "stepping up" on this issue.

"All forms of so-called ‘therapy’ that attempt to change a person’s sexual orientation and/or gender identity are unethical and have been condemned by major UK health organisations like the NHS, psychotherapy and counselling bodies," said Josh Bradlow, Policy Manager at Stonewall.

"Being lesbian, gay, bi or trans is not something that can or should be ‘cured’."

"The Government’s National LGBT survey found that 2% of LGBT people have undergone conversion therapy, and a further 5% have been offered it.

"If we want all LGBT people to be safe, then the Government must bring forward an effective ban on these harmful practices now."

Responding to a written question from Mr Carden on the issue last week, equalities minister Kemi Badenoch said the government was “considering both legislative and non-legislative options to end conversion therapy practices for good.”

“Officials have been reviewing the current legislative framework to see how harmful and unacceptable practices referred to as conversion therapy may already be captured by existing laws and offences.”

She added that the government was working “at pace” to end the practice and “will outline in due course how it intends to proceed with an effective and proportionate response”.

TikTok confirmed in a blog post on its website that content that speaks positively about gay conversion therapy or claims about it being effective will now be removed, as well as content that promotes misinformation about the LGBT community.

Other content to be banned includes those which plays into antisemitic tropes, promotes conspiracy theories about high-profile Jewish individuals or families, and promotes misinformation about the Muslim community.

Seychelles opposition wins presidency for first time in 43 years




By Reuters Staff




VICTORIA, Seychelles (Reuters) - The Seychelles elected an opposition candidate as president for the first time since 1977, authorities announced on Sunday, and winner Wavel Ramkalawan reaffirmed a pledge to hike the minimum wage after COVID-19 stifled the tourism-dependent economy.

Seychelles State House said in a statement on its website that Ramkalawan and his vice-president Ahmed Afif would be inaugurated on Monday.

Ramkalawan, a former Anglican priest, defeated President Danny Faure after three decades of unsuccessful runs for the presidency of the East African nation, an Indian Ocean archipelago famed for its natural beauty and rare wildlife.

Ramkalawan captured 54.9% of the vote while Faure got 43.5% in the vote held from Thursday through Saturday, the electoral commission announced.


Ramkalawan promised to continue working with Faure - an unusually good-natured transfer of power for the nearby African continent where many rulers are eliminating term limits and cracking down on political opposition.

“Mr Faure and I are good friends. And an election does not mean the end of one’s contribution to one’s motherland,” Ramkalawan said in his victory speech. “In this election, there were no losers, there were no winners. Our country was given the opportunity as the ultimate winner.”

As he spoke, Faure sat close by, nodding his head.

In 1977, power changed hands via a coup that led to 27 years of rule by Albert Rene, punctuated by several coup attempts including one in 1981 by South African-backed mercenaries masquerading as vacationing rugby players.

Faure’s United Seychelles party had been in power over the past 43 years but this was the first time he had faced voters himself. He was vice president when his predecessor resigned in 2016 after a constitutional amendment was passed limiting presidents to two terms.

Faure’s chances may have been damaged by a severe economic downturn. Travel restrictions imposed due to the global COVID-19 pandemic mean the Seychelles economy is expected contract by 13.8% this year, according to the International Monetary Fund.


It is a stunning reversal of fragile progress since the government defaulted on its debt in 2008 and sought an IMF bailout.

Both Ramkalawan, of the Linyon Demokratik Seselwa party, and another opposition candidate, Alain St Ange of the One Seychelles party, had promised voters they would raise the minimum wage.

This week’s election was for both the presidency and parliament. Ramakalawan’s party will have 20 directly elected parliament seats and five nominated ones, while Faure’s party will have six directly elected members and four nominated.


Writing by George Obulutsa; Editing by Mark Heinrich

Backers of QAnon conspiracy theory on path to U.S. Congress



By Susan Cornwell


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives recently voted to condemn the pro-President Donald Trump online conspiracy theory known as “QAnon.” But multiple QAnon-friendly lawmakers may soon be taking seats in the House chamber.


FILE PHOTO: A supporter holds a campaign sign for Republican U.S. House candidate Marjorie Taylor Greene at a news conference in Dallas, Georgia, U.S. October 15, 2020. REUTERS/Elijah Nouvelage//File Photo

More than two dozen candidates for Congress in the Nov. 3 elections have endorsed or given credence to QAnon or promoted QAnon content online, the non-profit watchdog group Media Matters says. Two are independents; the rest are Republicans.

At least one of them is expected to be elected to the House of Representatives next week, and a second has a good chance.

The FBI has listed QAnon as a domestic terrorism threat.

The unfounded conspiracy theory, which began in 2017 with anonymous web postings from “Q,” posits that Trump is secretly fighting a global cabal of child-sex predators that includes prominent Democrats, Hollywood elites and “deep state” allies.

Messages pushed online by its adherents aim to vilify and criminalize political rivals with unfounded allegations. The ADL civil right group called it “an amalgam of both novel and well-established theories, with marked undertones of antisemitism and xenophobia.”


Right-wing small business owner Marjorie Taylor Greene, who declared in a 2017 video that “Q is a patriot,” is expected to win a House seat in rural northwest Georgia after her opponent dropped out.

Gun-rights activist Lauren Boebert, who told a conservative podcast last spring that she hopes Q “is real,” has a good chance of winning her Republican-leaning district of western Colorado.

Both women are political neophytes who declare they want to go to Congress to “stop socialism.” After they won Republican primary elections in the summer, both sought to distance themselves from their previous statements about QAnon.

Trump invited both to attend his Republican National Convention speech at the White House in August.

After amplifying conspiracy theorists, social media platforms lately have been trying to crack down on QAnon’s sprawl. But a recent poll by Morning Consult said 38% of Republicans believe that at least parts of the QAnon conspiracy are true.



A supporter of an early form of the conspiracy, predating Trump’s election, in 2016 opened fire at a Washington pizzeria that early proponents of the conspiracy claimed was the site of a child sex trafficking ring. No one was hurt.

Trump has refused to renounce QAnon and even praised it as patriotic. He has frequently retweeted QAnon-linked content. Some Republicans, however, have publicly denounced the conspiracy theory.

“We simply cannot continue to be a party that accepts conspiracy theories and lives in crazy echo chambers,” said Brendan Buck, who worked for two former House Republican speakers, Paul Ryan and John Boehner.
A PLACE FOR GREENE?

“There is no place for QAnon in the Republican party,” House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy told Fox News in August, becoming the highest-ranking Republican to publicly condemn QAnon.


But there will be a place for Greene among House Republicans. McCarthy said Greene should be given the chance to prove herself, once she is elected, because she had distanced herself from QAnon.

“She’s a small business owner, and she’ll be given an opportunity,” McCarthy told C-Span in August.

In the 2017 video about QAnon uncovered this year by Politico, Greene, 46, said: “There’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take this global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles out.”

After winning her primary runoff in August Greene backtracked, telling Fox News that QAnon does not “represent” her and “wasn’t part of my campaign.”

That did not stop her from recently attacking a House Republican, Representative Denver Riggleman, who co-sponsored the House-passed resolution condemning QAnon. On Twitter, Greene called the resolution “useless” and asked why the lawmakers had not done a resolution condemning the anti-fascist movement antifa.


Boebert, 33, the House candidate from Colorado who has also spoken warmly about QAnon, wears a pistol on her hip in campaign photos. She defeated a five-term House Republican in a June primary after defying coronavirus lockdown orders by opening her restaurant.

Boebert’s restaurant is known as “Shooters Grill,” boasts of armed waitresses and is located in the small town of Rifle.

In a May conservative podcast, Boebert said of QAnon that “if this is real, then it could be really great for our country.” After her June primary victory, she backpedaled, telling a local television station that “I’m not a follower” of QAnon: “I’m not into conspiracies.”

She faces Democrat Diane Mitsch Bush in a district that non-partisan analysts say leans Republican.

Fake news spread on WhatsApp to Indian Americans plays stealth role in U.S. election



By Paresh Dave

OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters) - New Jersey tech entrepreneur Arun Bantval is U.S. presidential candidate Joe Biden’s top fake-news watchdog on messaging service WhatsApp about the Democrat and his Indian American running mate Kamala Harris.




FILE PHOTO: U.S. Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris speaks during a campaign event in Detroit, Michigan, U.S., October 25, 2020. REUTERS/Rebecca Cook/File Photo

Messages on WhatsApp, owned by Facebook Inc, are confidential and cannot be seen by moderators who police misleading memes, claims and other content on the social media giant’s flagship platform. Two billion users rely on WhatsApp’s free app to chat with individuals and groups of up to 256 people.

Bantval, 56, chairs South Asians for Biden’s five-member rapid response team, which has tracked dozens of concerning messages of unknown origin and crafted about 50 rebuttal graphics and texts over the last three months.

The volunteer group, which is recognized by Biden’s campaign, is trying to fill WhatsApp’s moderation void by joining big WhatsApp groups and asking community leaders to report items.

Fighting fake news on social media such as Facebook and Twitter has become standard practice for campaigns. But apps for secret messaging such as WhatsApp have flown under the radar despite serving as a crucial political forum among middle-aged Indians, Latinx and other immigrant groups.

South Asian voters, mostly Indian Americans, will be pivotal in the Nov. 3 contest in swing states such as Florida, North Carolina and Pennsylvania where results will be close and predict the national outcome, researchers and nonpartisan voting advocacy groups say.


About 72% of Indian-American registered voters plan to back Biden, according to a September survey by Carnegie Endowment. But South Asian Biden supporters and nonpartisan activists worry that misinformation on WhatsApp will affect turnout and support.

“There’s just a lot of inaccurate information for an already confusing process,” said Chavi Khanna Koneru, executive director of nonpartisan group North Carolina Asian Americans Together. “And this year is different for everybody because we’re relying on virtual connections more than ever.”

Each day, users can receive hundreds of memes, videos, voicemails and texts spanning greetings, social invitations and political propaganda. Users regularly forward shocking and humorous messages, with the original sender’s name automatically stripped, making it hard to trace them.

“It’s almost like going viral on Facebook,” Bantval said.

WhatsApp said its role in U.S. politics is small. But political misinformation on WhatsApp in Brazil, India and elsewhere prompted the service beginning in 2018 to limit recipients when forwarding messages.

It also introduced a chatbot that users can message to access fact checks by internationally recognized organizations. But when Reuters queried the system for topics in messages sent to South Asian voters, it generated zero results.

WhatsApp also said users can search the web from heavily forwarded messages to find relevant fact checks, though Reuters again found no related results.

A campaign spokeswoman for Republican incumbent Donald Trump said WhatsApp was not a focus for its social media staff. But some misleading messages on the app target him over racial justice policies and alleged extramarital affairs, according to Indian voters from both parties.

“There’s more on the Democratic candidates, but there is fake news about the Republican side, too,” said Kannan Srinivasan, an Orlando businessman.

TAPPING INTO FEARS

It is unclear where WhatsApp misinformation originates or whether the examples observed by Bantval and others are part of organized efforts. They said spelling and wording suggest some authors are Indian residents who view Trump as better for bilateral relations.

Messages seen by Reuters and sent to swing-state voters portray Biden’s views on Pakistan, Islam, China, taxation and policing in ways debunked by fact-checking groups.

Bantval said the misrepresentations preyed on older Indian immigrants concerns about crime, wealth and religion.

Other messages sent to South Asian voters in Texas and North Carolina, seen by Reuters, contain false claims that ballots will not count when voters select a Democrat in every contest or when election officials sign dropped off ballots.

Koneru estimated her North Carolina group spends about 15% of its time correcting inaccuracies about voting procedures on WhatsApp and other popular services compared with 2% during the 2016 presidential election.

“We do our best to jump in and clarify but there’s so many WhatsApp groups,” she said.


Reporting by Paresh Dave; Additional reporting by Elizabeth Culliford; Editing by Greg Mitchell and Richard Chang

Europe to send modules, astronauts to NASA moon station

BERLIN (AP) — The European Space Agency says it has agreed to provide several modules for NASA’s planned outpost around the moon, in return for a chance to send European astronauts to the lunar orbiter.

ESA said Tuesday that its director-general, Jan Woerner, signed a deal with NASA chief Jim Bridenstine to provide “essential elements” for the mini space station, known as Artemis Gateway.

ESA said this includes the main habitat for astronauts visiting the lunar outpost, and a module that provides communications and refueling capability along with a window for the crew to observe the moon.

The agency said it will receive “three flight opportunities for European astronauts to travel to and work on the Gateway” as part of the agreement.

NASA aims to use the Gateway as a staging post for missions to the moon and eventually to Mars.

ESA previously agreed to build two service modules providing power, propulsion, water and oxygen for NASA’s Orion spaceship taking astronauts to the Gateway.

NASA said it plans to sign further agreements with other international partners for the Gateway.

Eager for change, Chile faces long road to new constitution

By EVA VERGARA and CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA

1 of 4
An anti-government protester runs from police water cannons, on the day Chileans vote in a referendum to decide whether the country should replace its 40-year-old constitution, written during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, in Santiago, Chile, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2020. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)


SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — The fireworks and street celebrations are over in Chile, and now many months of hard work and uncertainty loom for a population impatient for change.

One of Latin America’s most affluent nations, and also one haunted by social and economic inequality, plans to draft a new constitution to replace the charter introduced during military rule decades ago. The project’s launch comes during a global pandemic that sapped Chile’s economy and follows protests and deadly clashes with security forces since last year.

Even though the protests ebbed during lockdown measures aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus, the potential for unrest remains. Whether a new constitution can deliver the sweeping, egalitarian change that many in the country of 19 million people want won’t be clear for years.

“How will a new Chilean constitution define new economic and social rights, which are only attainable if the funding resources are there?” said Cynthia Arnson, director of the Latin America program at the Wilson Center in Washington.

“The channeling of last year’s social explosion into a process for political change is a major accomplishment. Meeting demands to overcome inequality through constitutional procedures will be a huge, but not insurmountable challenge,” Arnson said.

Sunday’s overwhelming vote to have a constitutional convention with gender parity draft a new charter sets up a long schedule — the election of 155 citizens for that body on April 11 next year, the installation of the convention in the following month, and then a plebiscite on the proposed constitution in mid-2022.

The fact that Chileans voted to elect constituents who are not in Congress highlights an awkward dynamic: The constitutional project will unfold under the aegis of a government and Congress widely viewed as having failed their people.

“It has to be interpreted as a general and comprehensive rejection of the political class as a whole,” said Marcelo Mella, a political analyst at the Universidad de Santiago de Chile, a university in Chile’s capital. “All parties with parliamentary representation should feel on notice.”

Lucía Dammert, an academic at the same university, said the vote was “a very strong blow to conventional politics.”

There is concern that independent candidates will struggle to be elected to the constitutional convention because large political coalitions may try to dominate with their own candidates.

The vote on a new constitution was the result of an agreement between the government of President Sebastian Piñera and the opposition. The goal was to find a way to address the concerns of protesters frustrated over inequality in pensions, education, health care and other issues.

For many Chileans, Piñera, a businessman, represents free-market principles that were embodied in the old constitution that took effect in 1981 under military ruler Gen. Augusto Pinochet, after a plebiscite in 1980. Those principles led to a booming economy that left many people behind, and conservative critics speculate a new constitution endorsing more social programs and state intervention could hurt economic development.

The old constitution was amended over the years, notably with the 2005 repeal of an article that had allowed appointed senators and senators for life in Congress.

Piñera had described the vote Sunday as a way of strengthening democracy, and the robust voter turnout — despite worry about the pandemic — and nearly 80% support for a new constitution show a high level of unity and enthusiasm among Chileans seeking change.

The 155 people who will b e elected to draft a new constitution are likely to revise or throw out a host of articles in the old one. They include language that allows the state to take a backseat to the private sector in the provision of some social services, lets the private health care industry dominate while state options deteriorate, limits the right of state workers to protest, and describes the military as having a role in domestic security.

Also, Chile’s Indigenous groups are not specifically mentioned in the old constitution, and there is a push for Indigenous candidates to be allowed to run in April for election to the constitutional convention. Members of the Mapuche, Chile’s most populous ethnic group, have a contentious relationship with the state and their longtime push for land and other rights has been marked by violence.

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Associated Press writer Eva Vergara reported this story in Santiago and AP writer Christopher Torchia reported from Mexico City.

Susan B. Anthony’s headstone gets shield from voter stickers

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ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — People putting their “I Voted” stickers on women’s suffrage leader Susan B. Anthony’s headstone will see something new this year: a plastic cover.

Her headstone, in a cemetery in Rochester, New York, now has a shield to prevent further degradation to the marble from the stickers’ glue and the cleaners used to remove the stickers, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reported. Her sister Mary Anthony’s headstone, just next to hers, was also covered.

The sticker trend became popular on Election Day 2016, said Patricia Corcoran, president of the nonprofit Friends of Mount Hope Cemetery, in an email. That day, as many as 12,000 people visited Mount Hope Cemetery, the sisters’ final resting place, to honor the work done by Anthony to win women’s suffrage and to memorialize the first time Americans could vote for a female major-party presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton.

A restoration effort in spring revealed the damage done to the marble marker by the stickers, Corcoran said.

The nonprofit’s main mission is the cemetery’s preservation, “so above all we wanted to protect this iconic gravesite,” she said.





The headstones were already covered in plastic on Saturday, when in-person early voting began in New York.

The city of Rochester, which owns the cemetery, doesn’t know how many voters will visit this Election Day, said Justin Roj, spokesperson for the city.

The headstone could be a popular destination this year, too, because it’s the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. Other explanations: it’s the 200th anniversary of Anthony’s birth, and Kamala Harris, Democratic candidate Joe Biden’s running mate, is the first woman of color to be nominated for national office by a major party.

Teen who recorded Floyd death on phone to receive PEN award

By HILLEL ITALIE

NEW YORK (AP) — The teenager who recorded the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police in May will be honored in December by PEN America, the literary and human rights organization.

Darnella Frazier will be presented the PEN/Benenson Courage Award.

“With nothing more than a cell phone and sheer guts, Darnella changed the course of history in this country, sparking a bold movement demanding an end to systemic anti-Black racism and violence at the hands of police,” PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel said in a statement Tuesday.

The 17-year-old Frazier will share the Courage Award with Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine who was pushed out by the Trump administration.

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, PEN had postponed its annual gala from May 19, six days before Floyd’s death, to Dec. 8, and will host the event online.

“Darnella Frazier took an enormous amount of flak in the wake of releasing the video,” Nossel told The Associated Press. “People were accusing her of being in it for the money, or for being famous, or were asking why she didn’t intervene. And it was just left this way. We wanted to go back and recognize and elevate this singular act.”

Others being honored by PEN in December include the author and musician Patti Smith and Chinese dissident Xu Zhiyong.

Poland’s leader wants churches defended, condemns protests

By MONIKA SCISLOWSKA

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Women's rights activists with posters of the Women's Strike action protest against recent tightening of Poland's restrictive abortion law in front of the parliament building as inside, guards had to be used to shield right-wing ruling party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski from angry opposition lawmakers, in Warsaw, Poland, on Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2020. Massive nationwide protests have been held ever since a top court ruled Thursday that abortions due to fetal congenital defects are unconstitutional. Slogan reads 'Women’s Strike'. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland’s powerful ruling party leader urged his supporters Tuesday to defend the predominantly Catholic nation’s churches, potentially setting the stage for clashes with demonstrators angry at a court ruling that severely restricts abortions.

The call Tuesday by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, a conservative, drew strong condemnation from the main opposition head who accused him of deepening the nation’s divide, inciting hatred and civil war. Poland’s archbishop appealed for calm and respect for churches.

The country’s top court on Thursday ruled that abortions due to fetal congenital defects are unconstitutional, further tightening one of Europe’s most restrictive abortion laws and triggering protests.

The ensuing massive demonstrations — in violation of pandemic restrictions — entered their sixth day Tuesday and have included angry gatherings and obscene chants before churches and even disruptions of Masses.

In a Facebook video message Kaczynski insisted that the ruling was in line with the constitution and said the protests were marked by anti-church “nihilism.”

“We must defend Polish churches, we must defend them at every price,” Kaczynski said, in an appeal to members and supporters of his ruling Law and Justice party.

Opposition Civic Coalition leader Borys Budka reacted by saying that words calling for “hatred, inciting civil war and using party forces to attack citizens are a crime.”

He warned that the opposition could seek to bring Kaczynski before a special court for politicians.

In his message, Kaczynski also said the protesters were “committing a serious crime” by breaching the anti-COVID-19 nationwide ban on gatherings larger than five people.

“In the current situation these demonstrations will surely cost the lives of many people,” said Kaczynski whose right-wing party won power in 2015 on a platform that included a promise to tighten the abortion law.

Kaczynski spoke as people across Poland took strolls in a form of protest that blocked traffic. A general strike that would see all women stay off work is planned Wednesday and a major protest march will be held in the capital city of Warsaw on Friday.

Earlier in the day, the head of Poland’s Catholic Church, Archbishop Wojciech Polak, called for calm and respect for churches.

“It is a moral obligation of every Christian to take steps to de-escalate a conflict, not to intensify it,” Polak wrote in a letter to his diocese of Gniezno.

Tensions involving Kaczynski also erupted in parliament.

Parliament’s speaker called guards to protect Kaczynski, a deputy prime minister, from angry opposition lawmakers. Speaker Ryszard Telecki, a close ally of Kaczynski, caused more anger by likening the red lightning symbol of the protests to the runes of Nazi Germany’s SS forces.

On Monday, thousands of protesters led by women’s rights activists blocked traffic for hours in most cities and also gathered outside churches, chanting obscenities against Poland’s influential Catholic Church leaders, who condemn abortions. They called for the women to have the right of choice.

Early Tuesday, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, whose government backs the tight restrictions, defended the court verdict said that “In order to have the freedom of choice you first must be alive.”

He urged everyone to observe restrictions in an effort to fight a sudden spike in coronavirus cases, which hit a new high of some 16,300 daily confirmed cases Tuesday.

The Constitutional Tribunal’s ruling on Thursday tightened what was already one of Europe’s most restrictive abortion laws. When it takes effect, which is expected with its official publication in the coming days or weeks, abortion will be permitted only when a pregnancy threatens the woman’s health or is the result of crime like rape or incest.