North Gaza Crisis, Election Conspiracies, Presidential Abortion Powers
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Israeli forces intensified their assault on Hamas in the northern Gaza Strip, besieging towns and killing or wounding hundreds of people. What's the fate of an area home to hundreds of thousands of people living among ruins? I'm Steve Inskeep with A. Martinez, and this is Up First from NPR News.

Law enforcement agencies are preparing for possible election violence and challenges to the results amid widespread conspiracy theories about voter fraud. So-called evidence is mobilized to sort of create misleading rumors and misleading narratives of voter fraud.

Okay, what's driving those claims? An abortion is a major campaign issue this election, but how much power does a president really have? We'll ask what any president can do on the issue with or more likely without action by Congress. Stay with us. We've got all the news you need to start your day.

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Well, we finally made it. Election week. That is what this whole never-ending election cycle has been building up to. And what happens now will determine the future of our country. You can keep up with election news when it matters most with the NPR Politics Podcast. All this week, we're taking the latest stories from the campaign trail, swing states, and polling places to help you make sense of them and what they mean for you. Listen now to the NPR Politics Podcast.

The humanitarian crisis in northern Gaza is dire. Yeah, Israeli forces have intensified their assault on Hamas in that area, besieging entire towns. Hundreds of Palestinians are being killed and wounded as hospitals shut down and rescue workers are banned from operating, according to health officials there.

There are some questions over what Israel's endgame might be with calls for parts of Gaza to be seized as payback for Hamas' attack on Israel last year. NPR's Adil Alshalchi joins us now from Tel Aviv. So what exactly is happening in northern Gaza right now?

Well, just like Steve was mentioning, there's a serious ground operation there. The military had said that they had cleared Hamas fighters in the north, but now they've regrouped and they're still battling them. For example, troops raided a hospital last week, one of the last three functioning in the north. They rounded up the staff, arrested some of them, and hospital workers are now saying they're running out of things like oxygen.

oxygen tanks, fuel, and other basic life supplies. Airstrikes are also getting worse. A few days ago, the military struck a five-story building in the town of Beit Lahya. It was full of families of displaced Palestinians. And the Ministry of Health said at least 93 Palestinians were killed or missing, and that at least 25 of the killed were children. Islam Ahmed is a freelance journalist in Beit Lahya. NPR spoke to him this week. The streets were destroyed.

Ahmed said he saw bodies strewn on the street. He said there were body parts stuck to the rubble. Ahmed said the situation was very, very bad. The Israeli military said that incident was, quote, being looked into. And the thing is, last week, the Israeli military demanded that Gaza first responders leave Beit Lahya. So civilians ended up pulling people out of the rubble themselves and burying the killed in the street.

The United Nations and aid agencies have said that Israel has drastically reduced the amount of aid and food getting into northern Gaza. What has Israel said to those charges?

Right. So we need to know that Gaza right now is split into two these days. It's divided by this large fenced in barrier that Israel's military built just south of Gaza City. It's called the Netzerim Corridor. Aid groups began warning earlier this month that almost no aid trucks were going into the area north of that barrier. And the idea was that maybe the Israeli military was trying to starve out Gaza.

Hamas fighters. But then there's also hundreds of thousands of civilians still living there. And the U.S. actually went as far as threatening to cut off some weapons deliveries to Israel if more supplies aren't allowed in. The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, warned Israel against being tempted to use that strategy in besieged towns like Jebel and the north. The United States rejects

any Israeli efforts to starve Palestinians in Jabalia or anywhere else. And Hadil, there have been some increasing calls from some in Israel for a lasting military occupation of northern Gaza. Are these likely to come to pass?

Right. So there have been these calls by the settler community for a return to Gaza for a while now. Israel had Jewish settlements in Gaza until 2005. Now, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that these settlements in Gaza is not realistic, but some of his own ministers were at a rally this week on the Gaza border where settlers from the West Bank called for the government to allow them to return. The idea is maybe the Israeli military could declare North Gaza a closed military zone and the remaining Palestinian civilians would live in these places.

bubble surrounded by soldiers. But really, those discussions and decisions really need to come after the war actually ends. That's NPR's Adil Al-Shalchi in Tel Aviv. Thank you very much. You're welcome. Millions of Americans have already voted in this year's election. Others are preparing to vote, and some people are spreading concerns about their experiences. Some anxiety comes amid Democratic concerns about being turned away from the polls. A lot of it centers on Republican preparations to challenge the results if

they lose. Now, before we get into the conspiracy theories, let's note the basic facts. U.S. elections are run by thousands of separate jurisdictions, a bipartisan system that no one person controls.

The 2020 election was upheld through all challenges. Many states have updated their election rules since then, and election officials have spent four years preparing for this very moment. NPR's Ho Jing-nan covers how false narratives are spreading as we vote. Good morning. Good morning. She's in our studios here, Studio 31 in Washington, D.C. What are you seeing?

So I'm seeing this massive effort from people on social media to collect and report suspicious incidents and framing them as a coordinated effort to steal the election again. I spoke with Kate Starbird about this. She tracks election rumors at the University of Washington, and she says there is a whole audience that have been told by their leaders and by former President Trump that the 2020 election was stolen. And that audience interprets every incident they see and hear about that way.

They go looking for evidence to support this feeling that they already have that they can't trust results.

So this time, these Trump supporters feel that they need to safeguard the vote. And one of the ways they're trying to do this is by collecting evidence of supposed voter fraud. OK, so what does that evidence gathering look like? A lot of it looks like first-person accounts of people running into mistakes or things they didn't expect, things when people are voting early, knocking on doors, or working as poll watchers. By all accounts, the mistakes when they happened were promptly corrected.

If the ballot printout doesn't match how people wanted to put it, they were able to fill it out again. The unexpected things like finding many people registered at the same address, there are explanations to that. And as far as we have seen, the system is working as it should. But people already suspicious still saw all of these as proof that the voting system is unreliable. And these incidents are being collected online in long lists by Trump allies. For example, Elon Musk's Super PAC set up a group

on his platform X, formerly known as Twitter, and people are busy posting stories there. And Steve, I wanted to point out that, you know, just two days ago, that community, that group had 10,000 people, and now, as of this morning, it now has 50,000. 10,000 up to 50,000 in a very short period of time. So what kind of themes emerge when you look at these communities? So we see a remix of old villains from the 2020 election, voting machines, drop boxes. The theories about, like, all of these things have been disproven in courts.

But this year, a big narrative is that non-citizens are voting in large numbers, that outsiders are wreaking havoc on the democratic process.

To be clear, there have been incidents of non-citizens voting illegally, but it happens in very small numbers. And there is no sign that it has affected elections results. Also, the penalties for doing so are very severe. Okay, so what is the cumulative effect of gathering all of these claims and concerns and evidence, things that may have happened, but they're taken out of context?

It is building an impression that voter fraud is everywhere when in fact it is very rare and usually caught quickly by authorities. I gotta say that this laundry list of claims on X is very...

very overwhelming to look at. It is very dense and lots of it appears to be technical. It's very challenging because the real voting process is also very nerdy, technical, and as you said, localized. So for people who doesn't know the process, well, it's hard to tell what is credible and what is not, right? So when you see a stream of content like that, it just gives you an impression that something must be up, that there's so much supposed evidence, like how can it be all made up, you know?

But the impression is just one aspect of it. Like all of these materials, they lay the groundwork for Trump supporters to contest the results in lawsuits if they don't like it, just like what we saw four years ago. But the difference is that this time the challengers are geared up and they're ready to go. NPR's Ho Jingnan, thanks so much. Thank you.

Nearly 40% of women voters under the age of 30 now say abortion is the most important issue this election. Abortion access is directly on the ballot in 10 states. It is also at stake in a less direct way when it comes to who the next president might be and what they might do. Vice President Harris says that if she's elected, she would restore reproductive freedom and sign a bill enshrining the right to an abortion.

When Congress passes a bill to restore reproductive freedom nationwide as President of the United States, I will proudly

You'll note that she says when Congress passes a bill, that would have to come first. So how much power does a president actually have here? Joining us now to discuss is NPR correspondent Alyssa Nadworny. So how likely would it be that a President Harris, if she becomes president, could actually get that bill on her desk?

Well, just like Steve said, she's not going to be able to pass legislation expanding abortion access without Congress. And, you know, that depends on what party controls it. Now, Harris could try and repeal a law first enacted in the 1970s called the Hyde Amendment, which generally prohibits federal money from being used for abortions. But she can't do that alone either. And

Look, even if she did get something passed, there would no doubt be legal challenges. And there is a conservative Supreme Court now. Now, so does that mean passing a federal law banning abortion could also then be a challenge?

Well, former President Trump and his allies have talked about passing national abortion limits, sometimes called a minimum national standard, but it's not a very popular idea. And just weeks ago on the campaign trail, Trump rolled that idea back saying he would actually veto a federal abortion ban. All right. So a new nationwide law on abortion might not be in the cards, but could the next president then use existing federal law to change abortion access?

Yeah. So one of the ways a Trump presidency could limit abortion is by deciding to enforce something called the Comstock Act. It's an anti-obscenity law from the 1800s that could be used to criminalize abortion. So you could ban abortion pills or medical instruments needed for an abortion. What about just bypassing Congress and just simply going with executive power?

Yeah, a president could use executive authority to do a lot of things, like strengthen privacy laws that would protect women from prosecution, or they could, for example, create abortion tracking requirements in the other direction. The president also nominates who's in charge of the Food and Drug Administration, which regulates abortion pills.

Nearly two-thirds of all abortions in the U.S. are medication abortions, so getting pills through the mail has been a key way for people who live in states with bans. A new leader at the FDA could roll back that access and make it harder for providers to send pills. Got a feeling, though, no matter what happens, it's all going to wind up at the courts.

Exactly. And another critical presidential power is the authority to appoint judges, not just to the Supreme Court, but to federal and appellate courts. Sonia Souter, a law professor at George Washington University, says courts are where abortion policy is being decided. Questions about the right to travel, for example. Can providers tell people in banned states about access to abortion, where they can get abortion in non-banned states?

Can laws restrict that? These are questions that are being addressed at the federal court level. And you'll remember during Trump's presidency, he appointed a number of justices and judges who have had a big impact on the whole abortion debate. All right, that's NPR's Alyssa Natwerny. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, finally...

It's hard for me to say this as someone who follows the New York Yankees, but A. Martinez, congratulations to you and Dodgers fans everywhere. Swing and a miss! And the Dodgers are World Series champions! So Steve, I had to be asleep, but I was recording the game, but I woke up around 8.30 Pacific to the sounds of what I hope were only fireworks. Oh my goodness, that must have been really something to wake to. Hope you got a little bit of sleep afterward.

I'm just not that bitter. But we do have this clip from Dodger fan Lester Singer, who came all the way from Pasadena near Los Angeles to watch his team win it all at Yankee Stadium. I feel amazing! Let's go Dodgers! Seems kind of happy. Yeah, he'll probably be at that victory parade through downtown LA that's scheduled for Friday morning. I will be there, so if anyone sees me, say hello. All right! A. Martinez will be reporting live. I guess we should mention the actual score.

The Dodgers won four games to one. In the final game last evening, the Yankees were up five to nothing and then gave up five runs in a single inning, ended up losing the game seven to six. Congrats to the Dodgers once again.

And that's a first for Thursday, October 31st. I'm E. Martinez. And I'm Steve Inskeep. For your next listen, consider, consider this from NPR. Vice President Harris's final pitch to voters argues that former President Trump poses an existential threat to democracy. Will that win the White House? Listen to consider this from NPR News. Today's episode of Up First was edited by Lauren Migaki, Brett Neely, Catherine Laidlaw, Olivia Hampton and Alice Wolfley. It was produced by Ana Perez, Nia Dumas and Christopher Kuhn.

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