NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-19-2025 12AM 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 Shae Stevens. President Trump says Ukraine should not be allowed to join NATO. Speaking at his Palm Beach Florida resort Tuesday, Trump also blamed Ukraine for the

war that began there after Russia invaded it in 2022. And I think I have the power to end this war. And I think it's going very well. But today I heard, oh, well, we weren't invited. Well, you've been there for three years. You should have ended it three years. You should have never started it. You could have made a deal. I could have made a deal for Ukraine.

Trump made the remarks as U.S. and Russian officials met in Saudi Arabia Tuesday to discuss the war in Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine will not agree to any peace agreement that is negotiated without its participation. Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron, as European allies, will hold a second round of talks on being excluded from Russian-American negotiations on Ukraine. And as NPR's Eleanor Beardsley reports, Wednesday's gathering will also include Romania, Sweden, Finland, the Baltic nations, and Canada.

The meeting will take place by video conference. Participants are looking for a way to weigh in on the negotiations to end the war. The talks come a day after U.S. and Russian officials met in Saudi Arabia. Europeans are stunned by the sudden rapprochement and incredulous that President Trump seems more inclined to blame Ukraine for not capitulating than to blame Russian President Vladimir Putin for the invasion. Macron cited cyberattacks, election interference, and disinformation campaigns as a few of the ways Russia has already attacked Europe and don't think even worse things cannot happen," he said. Eleanor Beardsley in Pure News, Paris.

Hamas says it will release six more Israeli hostages this weekend under a ceasefire deal reached weeks ago. The Palestinian group says it will also return the remains of four Israelis Thursday and perhaps another four next week. The measles outbreak in West Texas continues, with confirmed cases more than doubling over the past week. From member station KTTZ in Lubbock, Samantha Larned reports that at least five counties in the region have now confirmed 58 cases. The measles outbreak was originally identified in rural Gaines County along Texas

border with New Mexico. Dr. Ron Cook is the public health authority with the city of Lubbock. With cases on the rise, including at least four among vaccinated individuals, he says the focus is on containing the outbreak. Right now, it's based on exposure and they're not knowing that you had measles or ever been vaccinated. If this thing were to really get carried away, then we would offer booster doses for many different people. Samon Leeson Cook says that the state of Texas has vaccine reserves on hand if the measles

outbreak continues spreading. For now, cases are expected to rise as more people get tested. For NPR News, I'm Samantha Larned in Lubbock. NPR. This is NPR. A federal judge is refusing a request by 14 Democratic attorneys general for an emergency injunction to keep billionaire Elon Musk and Doge from accessing federal data systems. The plaintiffs argued that the Musk's role in government violates the constitutional clause that requires presidential appointees to be approved by the Senate. U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkin says they failed to show grave legal harm to justify

a temporary restraining order. Chutkin also expressed discomfort with the administration's statements about Musk and his authority in Doge, formerly called the Department of Government Efficiency. Native American activist Leonard Peltier was released from a federal prison in Florida Tuesday. Peltier served nearly 50 years in connection with the murder of two FBI agents on a South Dakota reservation, a crime he maintains he did not commit. From Member Station WUSF, Steve Newborn reports. Peltier's life sentence was commuted to indefinite house arrest in the last days of Joe Biden's presidency. One of his attorneys, activist Chase Ironize, said Peltier will be honored during a ceremony

in his native North Dakota before being confined to his home. He's going to be welcomed as a hero in his homeland. We are going to celebrate Leonard Peltier in the same way that we celebrate Nelson Mandela. At his trial, Peltier said he fired his gun at the federal agents in self-defense but didn't kill them. For NPR News, I'm Steve Newborn in St. Petersburg, Florida. This is NPR News. Technologist Paul Garcia is using AI to create photos of people's most precious memories. How her mother was dressed, the haircut that she remembered.

We generated tens of images, and then she saw two images that was like, that was it. Ideas about the future of memory. That's on the TED Radio Hour podcast from NPR.