NPR News Now - NPR News: 01-12-2025 12AM EST

Episode Date: January 12, 2025

NPR News: 01-12-2025 12AM ESTLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Matt Wilson spent years doing rounds at children's hospitals in New York City. I had a clip-on tie. I wore Heelys, size 11. Matt was a medical clown. The whole of a medical clown is to reintroduce the sense of play and joy and hope and light into a space that doesn't normally inhabit. Ideas about navigating uncertainty. That's on the TED Radio Hour podcast from NPR. Live from NPR News, I'm Dale Willman. The death toll from the wildfires burning in and around Los Angeles has risen to 16.

The L.A. Coroner's Office says 11 of those deaths have occurred in the Eaton fire. Firefighters meanwhile are working to save the J. Paul Getty Museum and its priceless art collection from the flames. And California Attorney General Rob Bonta says the state will also be protecting those affected by the fires as they try to return their lives to normal. Whether it's groceries or rent, we are very serious about this and the governor's office as well is very focused on this. We are working at the highest levels in the governor's office on ensuring that there is no price gouging. While firefighters continue to battle those fires, officials say they could become the costliest in U.S. history. The fires have burned more than 12,000 structures since

Tuesday and one of the fires is destroying thousands of properties in the Pacific Palisades and Malibu areas, which are home to many Hollywood stars and executives who are living in multi-million-dollar properties. One way people living near wildfires are getting information to stay safe is by using a mobile app from Member Station KQED in San Francisco. Alexander Gonzalez has more on that story. The app is called WatchDuty. It gives real-time alerts and brings together other key information like evacuation warnings

and power outages. Monitoring all this is a nonprofit made up of former emergency personnel. John Mills is the CEO of WatchDuty. We are actually listening in real time to first responder radio traffic and that's how we get such granular intelligence that is not normally found anywhere else on the internet. Mills says in the first 48 hours since the LA fires began the app got more than 1 million downloads. For NPR News, I'm Alexander Gonzalez in San Francisco. The Super Bowl in New Orleans is less than a month away and public safety concerns have grown

since the Bourbon Street attack occurred on New Year's Day. But as Joseph King of the Gulf States Newsroom reports, officials say that state and local law enforcement are now prepared. At a press conference, New Orleans city officials reassured residents and visitors. New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell said local agencies working alongside the Department of Homeland Security and other federal agencies have created a program for people and businesses involved with the Super Bowl to help identify any suspicious activity. Our greatest asset, which we keep hearing over and over, which we know, are our people. and so if we can engage them in training and it is specifically on security and terrorism training, awareness training that we will be conducting. Cantrell said there will be hundreds of local, state, and federal officers spread out

across New Orleans to ensure public safety. For NPR News, I'm Joseph King. And you're listening to NPR News. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine's military has captured two North Korean soldiers. He said they were fighting with Russian troops in Russia's Kursk region. North Korea has sent thousands of troops to help Russia shore up Moscow's war effort. Ukraine has been pressing an offensive in the Kursk region in recent days. For the first time in more than 100 years, the Department of Justice has published a report on the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. Max Bryan with Member

Station KWGS reports. In the massacre, a white mob killed as many as 300 people, leveled more than 1,000 homes, and destroyed prominent businesses in the area known as Black Wall Street following an unsubstantiated report that a black teenager assaulted a white woman. Now the DOJ says there are credible reports that some members of law enforcement murdered black residents in the massacre. And unlike the first report produced in the weeks after the massacre, the document issued

Friday asserts that the white mob's quote, opportunistic violence became systematic and stemmed from racial bias. Federal authorities say prosecution opportunities are prohibited by expired statutes of limitations and the fact that perpetrators are dead. However, DOJ officials say the report is still important for history. For NPR News, I'm Max Bryan in Tulsa. JJ Spahn finished with a birdie to finish Saturday's round with a 65 at the PGA Tournament underway in Hawaii. Stephen Yeager meanwhile shot the lowest round of that tournament so far with a 62 that moved

him from a tie for 42nd place to one stroke off the lead. I'm Dale Willman, NPR News. The Indicator is a podcast where daily economic news is about what matters to you. I'm Dale Willman, NPR News.