NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-19-2025 2AM EST

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

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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. of memory. That's on the TED Radio Hour podcast from NPR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Shea Stevens. Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky says he wants to be an equal partner in any talks on ending Russia's war in his country. As NPR's Joanna Kokissis reports, Zelensky is rescheduling a trip to Saudi Arabia, following U.S.-Russia talks there on ending the conflict. Speaking to reporters in Istanbul during an official visit,

Zalensky said Ukraine wants the war to end more than anyone, but with a fair deal. You can discuss whatever you want, Zalensky said, but you cannot make a decision about ending the war in Ukraine without Ukraine. He says Russia is pushing for Ukraine to decrease the size of its military and accept the loss of occupied territories. We did not agree to this during our most difficult moments, Ukraine's leader said. Why would we do so now?

The Trump administration's special envoy for Ukraine and Russia is expected in Kiev on Thursday. Joanna Kekesis, NPR News, Kiev. President Trump and Elon Musk both are promising that Musk will be removed from any government work that could benefit the tech billionaires' companies. As NPR's Bobby Allen reports, it comes as ethics experts continue to raise concerns about Musk's role in the White House. Musk's Department of Government Efficiency is moving to decimate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and initiated mass layoffs at the Food and Drug Administration. The CFPB was set to oversee digital wallets, like a service Musk is working on at X.

And the FDA had investigated Musk's brain implant company, Neuralink. Yet on Tuesday night, Fox News host Sean Hannity asked Trump and Musk about conflicts of interest. He won't be involved. Yeah, I'll recuse myself if it is. If there's a conflict, he won't be involved. I mean, I wouldn't want that and he won't want it. Right, and also I'm getting sort of a daily proctology exam here. You know, something like I'll be getting away from slipping the dead of night.

White House lawyers said in a recent court filing that Musk is involved in Doge but is not leading it, leaving the exact administrator of Doge unknown. Bobbi Allen in PR News. A haze of smoke still hovers over the Philadelphia suburbs of Edge Hill and Jenkins Town following where a 500,000 square foot manufacturing facility burst into flames late Monday and again Tuesday.

Local officials say air quality concerns prompted a voluntary evacuation notice for residents within a five-block radius of the facility. Fire chief Tom McEnany of Edge Hill says an ATF national response team is working with local investigators. Tom McEnany, Fire Chief, Edge Hill, ATF National Response Team, ATF National Response Team is working with local investigators. So they're working out their game plan on how to conduct that investigation, but obviously any major portion of the investigation can't take place until we have the fire completely out. The blaze occurred in SBS Technologies, describing itself as the developer, manufacturer and

supplier of aerospace fasteners and precision parts. This is NPR. 80-year-old Native American activist Leonard Peltier is heading home to North Dakota after being released from a federal prison in Florida. Peltier spent nearly 50 years in prison with the murder of two FBI agents, a crime he maintains he did not commit. A Los Angeles jury has acquitted Grammy-winning hip-hop star Aset Rocky of felony assault charges. Rocky, whose legal name is Raquem Mayors, could have faced up to 24 years in prison

if convicted. He was accused of firing a semi-automatic weapon at former friend and fellow artist Aset Relly in November 2021. A stage adaptation of the 1980 film Coal Miner's Daughter is coming to Broadway. The movie featured the story of late country music legend Loretta Lynn. Tony win an actor Sutton Foster will play Lynn on stage as 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. This is NPR News.