NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-18-2025 7PM EST

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

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There's been a lot of attention on loneliness lately. 16% 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. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack Spear. New York Governor Kathy Hockel held meetings with top political and civic leaders in Manhattan today to weigh the future of Mayor

Eric Adams. Hockel says she may force Adams from office as soon as tomorrow over a corruption scandal involving the Trump administration. Here's NPR's Brian Mann. Mayor Adams was charged last year with federal bribery and corruption charges. Last week, the Trump administration's DOJ agreed to suspend that criminal case. It was a move so controversial, seven DOJ attorneys resigned rather than go along with it. Critics say Adams leveraged the favor from Trump's team after agreeing to collaborate with the White House's crackdown on illegal immigration. After four of Adams' own top aides resigned this week, Governor Hockel began talks with

officials about whether to use her authority to remove Adams from office. It's unclear when she'll decide. Brian Mann, NPR News, New York. A coalition of unions is going to court seeking to block Elon Musk and his Doge team from getting access to sensitive taxpayer information at the Internal Revenue Service. What Musk or his Doge team are looking for is not entirely clear, though the administration has said the task force's job is to root out waste and fraud. NPR's Scott Horstley says when it comes to the IRS, though, such occurrences are rare.

Fraud does happen, but the agency's own inspector general combed through seven years of records and found less than 1% of payments were made in error. But as with tax records, Social Security has a lot of people's sensitive personal information on file and privacy advocates recoil at the idea of Elon Musk's deputies digging through that data without a lot of guardrails. Those opposed to granting Doge access have also pointed to the special privacy protections tax data enjoys and the potential unlawful use of taxpayer records to maliciously target people. Pope Francis has pneumonia in both lungs. That's according to the Vatican. NPR

Sarah Venturi reports there's concern about the ability of the 88-year-old pontiff to fight off the infection. The Vatican says laboratory tests, chest X-ray, and the Holy Father's clinical condition continue to present a complex picture. A CT scan showing pneumonia has caused them to adjust his treatment, which now includes antibiotic and drug therapy. Francis had part of one lung removed after a pulmonary infection as a young man and is prone to bouts of bronchitis in the winter.

Now, he's reported to be in fair condition and is said to be eating breakfast every day, reading the newspapers and even doing some work from the hospital. Given his condition, some Vatican events have been canceled. There will be no weekly general audience on Wednesday and it's not clear if Francis will miss his Sunday noon blessing for a second week in a row. Sarah Ventry, NPR News. Stocks after wobbling around a bit today ended up closing higher, the broader market again moving past its previous record high.

The Dow was up 10 points to 44,556. The S&P 500 rose 14 points. This is NPR. The number of measles cases in rural west Texas has now risen to at least 58, with 8 cases also now being reported in neighboring eastern New Mexico. New Mexico officials say the agency has not identified any direct contact with the Texas cases. Texas Department of Health Service says 13 people are hospitalized, Many of those infected are not vaccinated. The late country music legend Loretta Lynn is coming to Broadway

in a stage adaptation of Coal Miner's Daughter, the 1980 film which told the singer's life in one sissy space at an Oscar. It will be played on Broadway by Tony Award winner Sutton Foster. Jeff London reports. Coal Miner's Daughter was very much a musical film. It featured many songs made famous by Loretta Lynn. The Broadway show will follow the singer's rise from hardscrabble beginnings in rural Kentucky to becoming a country music star. It will be overseen by a couple of Broadway stalwarts, director Sam Gold and music supervisor

Janine Tesori, who collaborated on the Tony Award-winning musical Fun Home. Georgia-born Sutton Foster, who last appeared on Broadway in Once Upon a Mattress and Sweeney Todd, will get to show off her range singing a variety of country music hits. For NPR News, I'm Jeff London in New York. Mexico says it's awaiting a new response from search engine company Google to changes in its Google Map service that has followed Trump administration guidelines renaming the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America. President Claudia Scheinbaum is starting to take the

matter to court. I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington.