NPR News Now - NPR News: 01-29-2026 3PM EST

Episode Date: January 29, 2026

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Live from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh. The federal government's moving closer to a partial shutdown after a majority of senators voted down a funding package today. In the wake of anger over the federal immigration enforcement campaign in Minnesota, NPR's Barbara Sprint has more. Senate Democrats are refusing to back the package in its current form. They want to see major changes to the Department of Homeland Security's ongoing immigration enforcement actions. The measure needs 60 votes to advance. which means Democrats are critical for any future passage. Republicans have urged Democrats to negotiate directly with the White House, but neither side has committed to a path forward. Democrats are calling

for broad changes to the way DHS agents are carrying out their work. This includes barring them from wearing masks, requiring body cameras, and creating a uniform code of conduct and use of force rules. Agencies will run out of funding after Friday. Barbara Sprint and Pier News, Washington. Officials in Fulton County, Georgia are promising to take their fight to court after the FBI seized 2020 election records yesterday from the county's election hub. Here's Fulton County Chairman Rob Pitts. Fulton County has been targeted for years because I stood up to Donald Trump's big lie and refused to bend the pressure. The ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner, Virginia is questioning why the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was on site, involving. in what appears to be a local matter, but a senior Trump administration official says

Gabbard has a pivotal role in election security and protecting elections against interference. Despite President Trump's insistence, the 2020 election was rigged. Courts and election officials said there was no evidence of that. For months, the administration has offered little information on how much the president's National Guard deployments in American cities have cost. But as NPR's Julianna Kim tells us, Congressional Budget analysts now say these operations are on pace to surpass $1 billion this year. Last year, it cost more than half a billion dollars to pay for President Trump's domestic troop deployments. It could be double

that this year if current operations remain in place. The use of troops in Washington, D.C. alone, could cost $660 million. That's according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. It's a tiny fraction in the country's trillion dollar defense budget, but state leaders and government watchdog groups argue that these deployments aren't a good use of taxpayer dollars. The White House did not respond to a request for comment, but Trump has repeatedly defended the use of troops and suggested sending them to more cities. Juliana Kim, NPR News. U.S. stocks are trading lower this hour with the Dow Jones Industrial average now down 85 points at 48,933. The SMPs off 40 points, and the NASDAQ is down 323 points or 1.3%. It's NPR news.

The Trump administration says it wants to make caring for the elderly at home more affordable. To achieve that goal, the Labor Department is proposing cut wage protections for home care workers. And Pierre's Andrea, she reports. Home care workers are one of the largest groups of workers in the U.S. and the lowest paid. The workforce is 85 percent women and two-thirds people of color. The Trump administration argues an Obama-era rule granting these workers the right to earn overtime pay and the federal minimum wage has hurt both workers and the families they serve. The Home Care Association of America says, rather than pay overtime, many home care agencies

capped workers at 40 hours a week to keep costs down. Workers had to take on second jobs to make up for lost wages. Now the Trump administration has proposed rescinding the decade-old rule. Labor advocates say doing so would deprive the home care workforce of basic employment rights most other workers have long enjoyed. Andrea Shoe and PR News. More sub-freezing temperatures are forecast in the southern U.S. by tomorrow and places not used to the winter intensity typically felt in the north. Emergency response crews in Mississippi and Tennessee have been conducting welfare checks and fielding calls from medically vulnerable people stuck in frigid homes after the storm cut their electricity. Poweroutage.us shows Mississippi and Tennessee each has more than 100,000 people without electricity.

And it could be days before that power. is fully restored across the southern U.S. I'm Lakshmi Singh, NPR News, in Washington.