NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-13-2025 3PM EST

Episode Date: February 13, 2025

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Donald Trump is back in the White House and making a lot of moves very quickly. Keep track of everything going on in Washington with the NPR Politics Podcast. Every day we break down the latest news and explain why it matters to you. The NPR Politics Podcast. Listen every day. Live from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh. President Trump's moving ahead with plans for what he calls reciprocal tariffs that he says match the tax rates other countries charge on imports. They can build a factory here, a plant or whatever it may be here, and that includes the medical, that includes cars, that includes chips and semiconductors, that includes everything. If you build here, you have no tariffs whatsoever.

And I think that's what's going to happen. I think our country is going to be flooded with jobs. Trump had a proclamation signing on tariffs that many analysts say could send U.S. inflation higher. More people at the U.S. Department of Education say they're now out of a job. NPR's Janaki Mehta reports dozens of employees who were still in the probationary periods of their jobs were terminated. One worker at the Department of Education's research arm, the Institute of Education Sciences, tells NPR they were fired Wednesday night, effective immediately, with no reason given. That employee says they plan to appeal.

They ask not to be identified because they hope to work for the federal government again. According to the American Federation of Government Employees Union, at least 60 employees who were in their one-year probation periods have been terminated from the Department of Education. Now many employees at the department say they fear reduction in force in the coming days. Janaki Mehta, NPR News. The Education Department's new boss could be a former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment. Linda McMahon pledged to make American education the best in the world at her confirmation hearing today. If confirmed as secretary, I will work with Congress to reorient the department toward helping educators,

not controlling them. My experience as a business owner and leader of the Small Business Administration, as a public servant in the state of Connecticut, and more than a decade of service as a college trustee has taught me to put parents, teachers, and students, not bureaucracy, first. The family members of three Venezuelan immigrants sent to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba are suing the Trump administration. NPR's Sergio Martinez-Botran is following their story. The lawsuit was filed at the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. The plaintiffs say the Trump administration is thwarting access to counsel for immigrants in detention in

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. They also say the government is holding the immigrants in comunicado without access to attorneys, family, or the outside world. The American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the families and four immigrant rights groups, says it wants to ensure immigrants can meet with lawyers. The Trump administration has said it's sending to Guantanamo the worst criminals. They are in maximum security there. However, some of those being sent to the barracks facility reportedly include migrants who do not have criminal records. Sergio Martinez Beltran, NPR News, Austin. The Dow is up 349 points. This is NPR News. A car plowed into a crowd in Munich a day

before the German city hosts a global security conference. Local authorities say at least 28 people were injured today. Police say the car was driven by a 24-year-old Afghan national when the vehicle struck pedestrians mid-morning local time. The motive remains under investigation. NBC News reported that the U.S. Secret Service said there was, quote, no protective impact to Vice President J.D. Vance, who is in Germany to attend the conference. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is also scheduled to attend. One of the advances in cancer is that new treatments

do less damage to healthy parts of the body. NPR's Yukinoguchi reports that's allowing some people to preserve their fertility. Studies show an alarming increase in women getting cancer at younger ages. For many of those young adults, preserving the ability to have children after treatment is a huge concern. That includes Maggie Lauch, who was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 28 and always wanted her own children. After the initial shock of the diagnosis, that was the most present thing on my mind. And that was really almost even harder than the treatment for breast cancer.

She is now age 40, cancer-free, and has had three children. Yuki Noguchi, NPR News. At last check on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 344 points or roughly three-quarters of a percent at 44,712. The Nasdaq was up 1.2 percent or 250 points. This is NPR. There's been a lot of attention on loneliness lately. 16 percent of Americans report feeling lonely all or most of the time.

The former Surgeon General even declared a loneliness epidemic. On It's Been a Minute, we're launching a new series called All the Lonely People, diving deep into how loneliness shows up in our lives and how our culture shapes it. That's on the It's Been a Minute podcast on NPR.