NPR News: Posts

NPR News

Ilhan Omar says Trump attacks on Somali immigrants 'deflect attention' from scrutiny

Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., appears onstage during the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation Phoenix Awards Dinner, in Washington, Saturday, Sept. 27.

NPR's Michel Martin speaks with Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., who came to the U.S. from Somalia, about President Trump's racist tirade against Somali immigrants.

(Image credit: Cliff Owen)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

This High Arctic rhino may change what we know about ancient animal migrations

Canadian Museum of Nature researchers Natalia Rybczynski (left), Danielle Fraser and Marisa Gilbert examine the bones of <!-- raw HTML omitted -->Epiaceratherium itjilik.<!-- raw HTML omitted -->

A 23-million-year-old rhinoceros fossil is reshaping scientists' understanding of mammal evolution.

(Image credit: Pierre Poirier)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

'New York Times' sues Pentagon over media restrictions

Members of the Pentagon press corps walk out of the Pentagon as a group after turning in their press credentials on Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2025. On Thursday, <!-- raw HTML omitted -->The New York Times<!-- raw HTML omitted --> sued the Defense Department and Secretary Pete Hegseth over its new media policy.

The Times accuses Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth of violating its constitutional rights with a press policy that, the paper says, deprives the public of access to critical national security information.

(Image credit: Kevin Wolf/AP)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

'There's no 911 for us': inside America's elite urban search and rescue teams

Grant Light demonstrates how to use a torch to cut through steel at a search and rescue training in Dayton, Ohio in November 2025.

America's urban search and rescue teams are facing financial and political pressure. But their work has never been more in-demand, as weather disasters get more common.

(Image credit: Ryan Kellman)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

U.S. health care is broken. Here are 3 ways it's getting worse

MINNETONKA, MINN.: Flags fly at half mast outside the United Healthcare corporate headquarters on Dec. 4, 2024, after CEO Brian Thompson was shot dead on a street in New York City. The shocking act of violence sparked a widespread consumer outcry over U.S. health care costs and denied claims.

One year after UnitedHealthcare's CEO was shot and killed, the crisis in U.S. health care is intensifying — even for the companies and investors who make money from it.

(Image credit: Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

In an era of rising prices, computers have gotten cheaper. (And why that may end)

Computing has been one of the few areas where prices have decreased over time while many other things have seen large increases. Technological advances have underpinned a consistent drop in the cost of computing, but experts say that this may be reaching the end of the road.

One thing has bucked the trend of rising prices: computing. Technological advances have underpinned a consistent drop in the cost of computers. But experts say that this may be reaching a limit.

(Image credit: Getty Images)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Announcing the NPR Student Podcast Challenge for 2026 — and a very special prize!

undefined

The annual contest for students in grades four through 12 is back for its eighth year — this time with a special prize for a podcast that marks the 250th anniversary of the United States.

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Hepatitis B: What parents should know about the virus and the vaccine

The hepatitis B virus attacks the liver. Hepatitis B has no cure, and chronic infection can lead to serious outcomes such as liver cancer, cirrhosis and death.

For decades, newborns in the U.S. have been given the hepatitis B vaccine. This could change. A CDC vaccine advisory panel may vote to end that routine vaccination. Here's what parents should know.

(Image credit: angelp)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Congo and Rwanda to sign symbolic peace deal in Washington as fighting rages

Rwandan backed M23 rebel soldiers in Goma, Eastern DRC, May 2025.

A long-awaited U.S.-brokered peace deal between DR Congo and Rwanda will be signed in Washington on Thursday — but the reality on the ground tells a different story.

(Image credit: JOSPIN MWISHA)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Trump is fighting the Institute of Peace in court. Now, his name is on the building

President Donald Trump

The Trump administration has renamed the U.S. Institute of Peace after President Donald Trump, despite an ongoing fight over the institute's control.

(Image credit: Matthew Lee)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Family of Colombian man killed in U.S. strike files human rights challenge

The Pentagon is seen on Sunday, Aug. 27, 2023, in Washington.

In a petition to the premier human rights watchdog in the Americas, the first challenge to U.S. military strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats argues that the death was an extrajudicial killing.

(Image credit: Carolyn Kaster)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Steve Cropper, guitarist and member of Stax Records' Booker T and the M.G.'s, dies

Guitarist, songwriter and record producer Steve Cropper poses Wednesday, Dec. 2, 2020, in Nashville, Tenn.

Steve Cropper, who co-wrote classics including "(Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay" and "In the Midnight Hour" during his years playing guitar at the legendary Stax Records in Memphis, has died. He was 84.

(Image credit: Mark Humphrey)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

How Minnesota became a hub for Somali immigrants in the U.S.

Women walk down a street in the predominantly Somali neighborhood of Cedar-Riverside in Minneapolis in 2022. The Twin Cities is a hub for Somalis in the U.S.

Minnesota boasts the largest population of Somalis in the U.S. — a community that's recently faced attacks from President Trump. Here's a brief history of how they came to settle there.

(Image credit: Jessie Wardarski)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Filmmaker Jafar Panahi is sentenced again in Iran as Hollywood's awards season starts

Alongside interpreter Sheida Dayani, filmmaker Jafar Panahi accepts the award for the best original screenplay at the Gotham Awards in New York on Monday for his film <!-- raw HTML omitted -->It Was Just an Accident<!-- raw HTML omitted -->.

Panahi's latest film, It Was Just an Accident, won three Gotham Awards on Monday. The filmmaker has been imprisoned in Iran before — but continues to make movies.

(Image credit: Mike Coppola)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Trump administration rolls back fuel economy standards

Motorists drive on Interstate 210 during the morning commute on December 03, 2025 in Pasadena, Calif. President Trump announced new fuel economy standards today which will roll back fuel efficiency standards put in place by former President Joe Biden.

At a White House this afternoon, President Trump said he was terminating "ridiculously burdensome" fuel economy rules. It's part of a series of changes relaxing or eliminating rules promoting cleaner cars.

(Image credit: Mario Tama)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

CDC's vaccine advisers meet to question long-used vaccines

A child gets immunized at a Florida pediatrician

Advisers to the Centers for Disease Control Prevention will scrutinize the childhood vaccine schedule and may start to upend it.

(Image credit: Joe Raedle)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Pentagon watchdog finds Hegseth risked the safety of U.S. forces with use of Signal

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth listens as President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet Meeting at the White House on Dec. 2.

A forthcoming inspector general report finds that had intel shared by Hegseth been intercepted by an adversary, it would have endangered servicemembers, according to a source who viewed the findings.

(Image credit: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Trump uses 'Third World' in a social media post. What's up with that term?

"I will permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries to allow the U.S. system to fully recover," he wrote on Truth Social. That label raises the issue of how to classify certain nations.

TK

(Image credit: Jing Wei for NPR)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Check your cheese: Shredded and grated varieties are recalled nationwide

Several varieties of shredded mozzarella and other cheese blends, sold at retailers including Aldi, Target and Walmart, are being recalled over concerns they were contaminated with bits of metal.

The FDA is urging customers to toss certain brands of grated Pecorino Romano; at the same time, it escalated an existing recall of numerous shredded cheeses.

(Image credit: Roberto Machado Noa)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Did the Trump administration commit a war crime in its attack on a Venezuelan boat?

Washington Post reporter Alex Horton talks about the Sept. 2 U.S. military strike on a boat with alleged "narco terrorists," in which a second strike was ordered to kill two survivors in the water.

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Greetings from Ukraine, where churchgoers seek respite ahead of another winter at war

undefined

Far-Flung Postcards is a weekly series in which NPR's international team shares moments from their lives and work around the world.

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Your glitchy video calls may make people mistrust you

Brief glitches in video calls may seem like no big deal, but a new study suggests they can have a negative effect on how trustworthy a person is perceived to be. <!-- raw HTML omitted -->

Brief glitches in video calls may seem like no big deal, but new research shows they can have a negative effect on how a person is perceived by the viewer.

(Image credit: gpointstudio/iStockphoto)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

One year on from martial law crisis, South Korea celebrates its democracy's resilience

South Korean President Lee Jae Myung gestures during a news conference to mark the first  anniversary of the Dec. 3 martial law crisis at the Blue House in Seoul, South Korea on Wednesday.

One year on from failed presidential power grab, South Korea celebrates its resilient democracy, and tries to heal deep political divisions.

(Image credit: Ahn Young-joon)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Dems seek to limit who can be immigration judges. And, the GOP wins House election

A masked federal agent walks in a hallway at New York Federal Plaza Immigration Court at the Jacob K. Javitz Federal Building in New York City on Oct.15, 2025.

Democrats seek to limit who can serve as immigration judges amid layoffs from the administration. And, Republican Matt Van Epps narrowly wins a special House election in Tennessee.

(Image credit: Charly Triballeau)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

A Palestinian convicted in bombing plot is now an award-winning novelist, and free

Bassem Khandaqji, 41, poses for a photo at a hotel in Cairo on Oct. 17, 2025, days after Israel freed him and other Palestinian prisoners in the Gaza ceasefire deal. He was imprisoned for helping plan a deadly 2004 bombing in Tel Aviv, and went on to become an award-winning novelist in prison.

Bassem Khandaqji entered prison 21 years ago for plotting a deadly bombing in Israel. He left prison as an award-winning novelist.

(Image credit: Ahmed Abuhamda)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Belgium rejects EU plan to use frozen Russian assets for Ukraine

Belgium

Belgium on Wednesday rejected a plan to use frozen Russian assets to help prop up Ukraine's economy and war effort over the next two years, saying that the scheme poses financial and legal risks.

(Image credit: Virginia Mayo)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Democrats seek limits on who can serve as immigration judges amid mass layoffs

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents look over lists of names and their hearing times and locations inside the Federal Plaza courthouse in June 2025 in New York.

The legislation comes after the White House authorized up to 600 military lawyers to be temporary immigration judges and scrapped requirements for them to have immigration law experience.

(Image credit: Bryan R. Smith)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

The use and misuse of the word 'ideology'

The word "ideology" traces its origins to the French Enlightenment. During the 2024 presidential campaign, Donald Trump vowed to "defeat the toxic poison of gender ideology."

The word "ideology" has become a fixture in American political rhetoric, invoked by leaders to cast opponents' beliefs as dangerous, stupid or unfounded. But it wasn't always this way.

(Image credit: Brendan Smialowski)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

Missouri's redistricting drama renews focus on direct democracy … and 'Air Bud'

Buddy and Josh in the spotlight in the 1997 Walt Disney movie, <!-- raw HTML omitted -->Air Bud<!-- raw HTML omitted -->.

The road to redistricting in Missouri has been wild and winding, but its tie to a 1997 kids' movie starring a basketball-playing golden retriever might be the most unexpected development of all.

(Image credit: Walt Disney Pictures)

Continue Reading…

NPR News

50 years after the birth of special education, some fear for its future under Trump

<!-- raw HTML omitted -->Left:<!-- raw HTML omitted --> Ed Martin was one of the authors of the law now known as IDEA. Before the law, children with disabilities were often turned away from public schools. "They were invisible," says Martin. <!-- raw HTML omitted -->Right:<!-- raw HTML omitted --> Maggie Heilman and her daughter, Brooklynn, 14, at their home in a Kansas City suburb. Brooklynn has Down syndrome and her own special education plan thanks to IDEA.

The Trump administration has fired, or tried to fire, many of the federal staff who manage and enforce federal disability law in schools.

(Image credit: Thomas Simonetti and Katie Currid for NPR)

Continue Reading…