AFP

At a gas station in Houston, David Blanco fills up the tank of his car, a Glock 19 pistol clearly visible on his left hip. 

The Hispanic Texan says that in the crucial mid-term US elections coming up in less than two weeks, “the criteria that would mainly make me want to go out (and vote) is strictly firearms at the moment.”

Blanco, a serious-looking 33-year-old, had never been interested much in politics before, and didn’t normally vote.

But things changed, he said, when politicians “started threatening the Second Amendment, saying that, ‘Oh, we’re gonna ban AR-15s and high-capacity magazines.'”

“I was like, ‘You know what, maybe I should get involved now, maybe I should look more into it, and see who’s for protecting my rights that are guaranteed to me” under the US Constitution.

Blanco now scrutinizes the past of candidates for Congress, governor and county judge, among the positions contested in the November 8 elections, watching for any questioning of the right to bear arms which is so important to him.

The choice is not as clear-cut as it might seem. “There are some politicians on the Republican or conservative side that are anti-gun also,” he said, even if Republicans traditionally tend to favor gun rights.

In Texas, which has some of the most lax gun laws in the nation, the weapon is king — something no politician wishing to make a career here can afford to ignore.

But in Houston, a Democratic stronghold in a fiercely Republican state, seeing residents walking around armed is rare.

If Blanco wants to show off his firearm, he says it is to deter any would-be attacker. 

He has eight pistols and rifles, because “if anything bad happens, you can arm your neighbors and they can help you with, you know, any situation that happens to come along.”

He also uses them to practice shooting, his favorite hobby. 

– Suicide –

A city dweller of Hispanic origin, Blanco does not fit the typical profile of the American gun owner, who is generally white and rural. 

In 2021, 47 percent of white adults said they lived in a household with firearms, compared to just 26 percent of those of Hispanic origin, according to the Pew Research Center.

Blanco lives with a roommate in a neighborhood where shootings are not uncommon. 

It is also the area where he grew up, raised by a Mexican mother who always lived in fear of being robbed. 

He is constantly on guard. As a cyclist passes, he watches, wary he could be a thief on the prowl. 

Three events in his youth convinced him to carry a gun: a burglary at a friend’s place, a shooting in a neighboring house and, finally, Hurricane Ike, which plunged his neighborhood into darkness for several days in 2008.

During nights punctuated by regular gunshots, the family protected their house from looters with a rifle belonging to Blanco’s older brother, Humberto. The experience marked David deeply. 

He is, however, well placed to understand the tragedies that firearms cause.

Two years after Hurricane Ike, he heard his older brother handling his shotgun one day. 

Frightened, Blanco called the police, who on arrival discovered Humberto had committed suicide.

Gun violence is a national crisis in the United States, where mass shootings have become commonplace. In 2020, the most recent year with complete data available, more than 45,200 people died from gun-related injuries.

More than half of gun deaths in America are suicides, a fact regularly advanced by those who defend stricter gun control laws.

Blanco doesn’t see it that way. “He could have hanged himself,” he said of his brother.

– AR-15 –

In May, Texas was rocked by one of the worst school shootings in US history.

A young gunman killed 19 children and two teachers in an elementary school in Uvalde, using an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle, a type of weapon regularly used in this type of slaughter. 

“It’s very sad what happened,” said Blanco. But condemning the crime is not, in his opinion, the same thing as condemning the weapon. 

To those who say the average citizen doesn’t need such guns to defend themselves, he replies “there’s all kinds of situations that you could use an AR-15 for.”

He has two of them, and thinks this could allow him to respond more quickly to a possible threat. 

These are words that Greg Abbott, the current Texas governor and a candidate for re-election, would agree with. 

Last year, the Republican allowed almost all Texans to carry a gun openly, without training and without a license.

He is the big favorite against Democrat Beto O’Rourke, who is calling for tougher restrictions.

After the mass killing in Uvalde, O’Rourke stood out when he interrupted Abbott during a press conference, reproaching him for his inaction.

But even O’Rourke says on his web site he is “proud of Texas’ long tradition of responsible gun ownership.”

After a treacherous trip from his native Venezuela, Gustavo Mendez has survived two months in New York, finding work and a host family to live with on his path to a new future.

But he’s among the lucky ones to have a roof and a job in a city struggling to accomodate a recent influx of asylum seekers — 17,000 people since April — many of whom are being sent to makeshift tent camps.

Tens of thousands of Venezuelan migrants have been intercepted at the southern border over the past year, and in recent months several Republican-led border states started transferring asylum seekers north to Democratic stronghold cities — an explosive ploy ahead of the upcoming midterm vote.

Just weeks before that November 8 poll, which will see Democrats and Republicans fight for control of Congress, President Joe Biden limited the number of Venezuelan asylum seekers allowed to enter to 24,000.

The federal program offers a limited number of Venezuelans legal entry at US airports. But the Biden administration will expel those who attempt to cross via the land border, invoking a Donald Trump-era emergency health rule that denies them the right to apply for asylum, citing the need to quell Covid-19.

– Limited access to work –

Mendez can’t work legally but the cook and television technician did find a source of income a week after his arrival, at a restaurant in Queens that also sells refreshments out of a food truck at sporting events.

“I wanted to work as a cook or in television, and that’s what I came here for,” the 40-year-old told AFP.

He is making between $800 and $1,200 per week, a far cry from the $600 he took in monthly in his home country, where his two teenage children remain.

But Mendez is among the relatively fortunate.

Finding work is of singular importance for these migrants fleeing danger or persecution in their home countries.

But as things stand now, asylum seekers must wait 150 days after filing their initial application before they can request employment authorization.

“Since the middle of August, we have seen a large increase of asylum seekers,” Jay Alfaro, the manager of social services and partnerships at the Church of the Holy Apostles in Manhattan.

“The number one of questions here is, ‘Hey, do you know where to get a job?'”

The church provides food, legal services, housing counseling and medical assistance, operating one of the largest programs of its kind in the country.

Venezuelan Naisary Angulo, her husband and her three-year-old daughter came to the church seeking a rare warm meal.

After journeying for 50 days the 29-year-old and her family have been sleeping in one of the hotels set up by the mayor’s office.

– Work delays –

New York is the only city in the country obliged by law to offer shelter to anyone who asks for it.

For registered newcomers, the city is also to offer access to medical care, English language classes and skills training, as well as schooling for children.

But many asylum seekers say the process to gain legal work access is rife with delays; Mendez does not have an appointment with migration services until 2024.

Mayor Eric Adams, who has been open about his presidential ambitions, urged the federal government to pass legislation allowing asylum seekers to seek work “now, not in six months.”

Alongside the city’s shelters — originally meant to house its staggering homeless population — authorities have set up hotel rooms for asylum seekers.

Last week New York also began filling a gigantic tent set up on Randall’s Island in the East River, which can house 500 single men. 

There are also talks to set up a cruise ship to accommodate new arrivals.

– ‘Not sustainable’ –

At the moment those in these temporary shelter systems do not have limits to their stays.

Alfaro cited the overwhelming cost of rent in the city, which also has a housing shortage, in explaining the challenges faced by new arrivals.

According to a recent study published by the news outlet CNBC, a worker earning the city’s minimum wage of $15 dollars per hour would need to work 111 hours a week to pay for a one-bedroom apartment.

New York’s Mayor Adams has deemed the current situation “not sustainable,” with the city’s comptroller, Brad Lander, estimating the metropolis will spend between $500 million and $1 billion to temporarily house the influx of people.

Adams argues that all US cities should share the burden, saying that New York never made “any agreement to take on the job of supporting thousands of asylum seekers.”

Russia’s strategic forces carried out drills Wednesday, including a test launch of a ballistic missile from a submarine, further stoking concerns that a nuclear weapon could be deployed in the Ukraine war.

Russian President Vladimir Putin surveyed the drills carried out by his nuclear-capable forces as Moscow persisted in claiming, without offering evidence, that Kyiv was developing a “dirty bomb.”

On Monday the Russian foreign ministry posted photographs of ostensible nuclear materials on social media it said depicted “Ukraine’s capacities to create the ‘dirty bomb.'”

But on Wednesday Slovenia said the photo came from its own nuclear waste management agency and dated to 2010.

According to Dragan Barbutovski, an advisor of Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob, it depicted smoke detectors.

– Heavy fighting on main fronts – 

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said fighting remained intense in the eastern Donbas region near Bakhmut, a town Russia’s elite Wagner troops have made a concerted push to seize.

“The situation on the front line hasn’t changed significantly,” Zelensky said in his daily address to the nation. “The fiercest battles are in the Donetsk region, towards Bakhmut and Avdiyivka.”

In the main southern front, Russians were apparently fortifying their positions in Kherson city as civilians were evacuating the region. 

At least 70,000 people have left their homes in Kherson province in the space of a week, a Moscow-installed official, Vladimir Saldo, told a regional TV channel.

Pro-Kremlin authorities have sought to move residents to the Russian-controlled areas on the left bank of the Dnipro river, as Ukraine troops are expected to make a bid for the main urban area on the right bank.

Saldo banned entry to the right bank area of the region for a period of seven days “due to the tense situation on the contact line.”  

“The Russians do appear to be digging in to defend that region,” said Pentagon spokesman Pat Ryder on Tuesday.

– Submarine missile launch –

Western officials downplayed the Kremlin’s war games, a regular event for which Moscow gave foreign counterparts advance warning.

“Under the leadership of… Vladimir Putin, a training session was held with ground, sea and air strategic deterrence forces, during which practical launches of ballistic and cruise missiles took place,” the Kremlin said in a statement.

Russian state-run media ran footage of a submarine crew preparing the launch of a Sineva ballistic missile from the Barents Sea in the Arctic.

The drills also included launching test missiles from the Kamchatka peninsula in the Russian Far East. 

In calls to Chinese and Indian correspondents, Russia’s Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu continued to press his allegations that Ukraine planned to detonate “dirty bomb” — a crude, small weapon filled with radioactive, biological or chemical materials — which it would blame on Russia.

Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said that in his call with Shoigu, he “pointed out that the nuclear option should not be resorted to by any side as the prospect of the usage of nuclear or radiological weapons goes against the basic tenets of humanity.”

– Cultural damage studied  – 

Meanwhile the UN culture agency UNESCO said it is using before-and-after satellite imagery to monitor the cultural destruction inflicted by Russia’s war in Ukraine, and would make its tracking platform public soon.

UNESCO said it had verified damage to 207 cultural sites in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began on February 24, including religious sites, museums, buildings of historical and or artistic interest, monuments and libraries.

“Our conclusion is it’s bad, and it may continue to get even worse,” UNESCO’s cultural and emergencies director Krista Pikkat told reporters at a briefing in Geneva.

“Cultural heritage is very often collateral damage during wars but sometimes it’s specifically targeted as it’s the essence of the identity of countries,” said Pikkat.

Earlier this month, Zelensky requested that UNESCO add the historic port city of Odessa to its World Heritage List in a bid to protect it from Russian air strikes.

UNESCO is working with the Odessa authorities to make sure that its main monuments and cultural sites are marked with a blue shield — the emblem used during armed conflicts to denote cultural property that should be protected.

Facebook-parent Meta reported Wednesday that its profit more than halved to $4.4 billion in the third quarter from $9.2 billion a year earlier, and said it plans “significant changes” to bolster efficiency in a tough economic environment.

The social networking giant, which faces stagnating user numbers and cuts in advertising budgets, also said revenue slipped to $27.7 billion from $29 billion a year earlier.

“We’re approaching 2023 with a focus on prioritization and efficiency that will help us navigate the current environment and emerge an even stronger company,” said Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg.

Meta shares plunged 19.1 percent to $105 in after-market trades, the price less than a third of what it was at the start of this year.

“While we continue to navigate some challenging dynamics – a volatile macro economy, increasing competition, ad signal loss and growing costs from our long term investments — I have to say that our product trends look better from what I see then some of the commentary I’ve seen suggests,” Zuckerberg told analysts on an earnings call.

The number of monthly active users at Facebook was up just two percent to 2.96 billion at the end of September, Meta reported.

Meanwhile, the number of employees at the tech titan tallied 87,314, a 28 percent increase from a year earlier, the earnings report stated.

“We are making significant changes across the board to operate more efficiently,” Meta said in the release.

The Silicon Valley-based tech firm said that it expects to hold headcount levels in check over the next year.

Zuckerberg said that while tightening its belt, Meta will focus on its artificial intelligence that powers recommendations at offerings such as short-form video feature Reels, as well as ad messaging platforms and its vision for the metaverse.

– Apple squeeze –

Big tech platforms have been suffering from the economic climate, which is forcing advertisers to cut back on marketing budgets, and Apple’s data privacy changes, which have reduced leeway for ad personalization.

“Meta is on shaky legs when it comes to the current state of its business,” said Insider Intelligence principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson.

“Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to focus his company on the future promise of the metaverse took his attention away from the unfortunate realities of today.”

Those realities include Meta being under pressure due to global economic conditions, competition including TikTok, and Apple letting iPhone users curb collection of data “signals” for targeting money-making ads, according to the analyst.

Apple last year began letting iPhone users decide whether to allow their online activity to be tracked for the purpose of targeting ads — a change which it said shows its focus is on privacy, but which critics note does not prevent the company itself from tracking.

Meta expected that policy, which impacts the precision of the ads it sells and thus their price, to cost the social media giant $10 billion in lost revenue this year.

This week, Apple updated its App Store rules to require that apps offered there use its payment system for sales of “boosted” posts, which are essentially ad messages promoted to the top of social media feeds for a price.

The App Store is the lone gateway for digital content to get onto iPhones or iPads.

The change means that Apple will be able to collect its 30 percent commission on that type of advertising at Facebook and Instagram, where all the money made previously had gone to Meta because they used their own payment system.

“Apple continues to evolve its policies to grow their own business while undercutting others in the digital economy,” Meta said in reply to an AFP inquiry.

“Apple previously said it didn’t take a share of developer advertising revenue, and now apparently changed its mind.”

Meta had long delivered seemingly endless upward growth, but reported early this year its first decline in global daily users.

In July, Meta reported its first quarterly revenue drop and a plunging profit.

US President Joe Biden and Israel’s President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday discussed the growing threat to Ukraine from Russia’s Iranian-supplied war drones, as Israel comes under pressure to help Kyiv.

Herzog told reporters at the White House after his talks that they “mainly” discussed Iran’s nuclear program, the crushing of protesters demonstrating against strict Iranian religious laws, and the issue of Tehran’s drone sales to Russia.

The weapons are “killing innocent Ukrainian citizens,” Herzog said.

Israel has been reluctant to get involved in a US-led alliance helping pro-Western Ukraine to repel a bloody Russian invasion. 

But Herzog’s trip to Washington underlined Israeli concern at the growing role of Iran in the conflict, with Tehran accused of supplying fleets of deadly drones used by Russia against Ukrainian civilian targets.

On Tuesday, Herzog met with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and announced he was sharing intelligence to prove that Iran has been supplying military drones to the Russians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed this Wednesday, saying “this is a positive trend in relations with Israel…. After a long pause, I see us moving forward.”

Biden and Herzog also discussed Iran’s ongoing tussle with the international community over its nuclear program, which it insists has only civilian goals. Israel opposes a push by the Biden administration to salvage a deal that would reinstate international inspections in Iran in exchange for sanctions relief.

“They consulted on a wide range of global and regional issues of mutual concern, including the threats posed by Iran and its proxies. The president emphasized his administration’s pledge to ensure Iran will never acquire a nuclear weapon,” the White House said in a statement after the talks.

– Maritime border ‘breakthrough’ –

Sitting alongside Herzog in the White House Oval Office, Biden praised Israel for reaching a long-delayed accord with Lebanon on their sea border. The deal was brokered by the United States.

Biden hailed the “historic breakthrough.”

“It took a lot of courage for you to step up and step into it,” he told Herzog. “It took some real guts. It took principled and persistent diplomacy to get it done.”

Biden said the newly agreed border would allow both countries to develop energy fields, and it would “create new hope and economic opportunities.”

However he pressed the Israeli president on the need to “deescalate” the violent standoff in the Palestinian West Bank and “underscored that a negotiated two-state solution remains the best avenue to achieve a lasting peace” with the Palestinians, the White House readout said.

Biden “underlined the need to take continued steps to improve the lives of Palestinians, which are critical to peace, security and prosperity.”

Herzog indicated that Biden would be attending the COP27 climate summit in Egypt next month — something not yet confirmed by the White House — and said the climate crisis “can serve as a common denominator for so many nations.”

Herzog’s visit comes days ahead of Israel’s fifth election in less than four years. Hawkish ex-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has had tense relations with Democratic US administrations, is seeking a comeback.

It also comes less than two weeks before Americans vote in the midterm elections that are predicted to strip Biden’s Democrats of their control of Congress.

“We have elections in Israel and you’re having midterm elections in the United States but one thing is clear — I think this visit epitomizes that our friendship, our strong bond transcends all political differences,” Herzog told Biden.