NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-20-2025 8PM EST

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

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This message comes from Wondery. At 24 years old, Monika Lewinsky was in a scandal that defined who she was for the entire world. And now she's ready to draw from her own experience on what it means to redefine yourself on her new podcast, Reclaiming with Monika Lewinsky. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack Spear. As tensions mount between Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky in Washington, a scheduled news conference was canceled today. The event was due to follow talks between President Trump's Ukraine envoy and Zelensky, but wound up simply being a photo-wop.

NPR's Joanna Kokitsa says more on the mounting tensions between Kiev and Washington. Zelensky has remained calm and he's tried to be diplomatic and he seemed concerned, not angry when he said yesterday that President Trump seems to live in a Russian-created space of disinformation. Trump is repeating Kremlin talking points, he's blaming Ukraine for the war, even as Russia continues to attack the country every night, and he's claiming Zalensky is an illegitimate president. And now Ukrainians are, you know, they very much want this war to end but they've been watching the Trump administration's actions with disbelief.

Trump blames Ukraine for the now three-year-old war with Russia despite the fact it was Russia that attacked Ukraine. Senate Republicans are forging ahead with their budget resolution with a likely all-nighter as NPR's Barbara Spahn explains it comes despite President Trump saying he favors the House's approach to implementing his agenda. The Senate and the House are pursuing different strategies in helping the White House get more funding for the southern border and extend the 2017 tax cuts. The House wants to tackle the components in one big bill.

The Senate thinks it's more expeditious to split it into two bills, one for now and one later this year. The Senate is undertaking what's known as a votorama, where lawmakers bring amendments often aimed at making members of the other party take challenging votes. It will likely last through the evening and early morning hours of Friday, and represents an early phase of a long road ahead.

Barbara Sprunt and Peer News, The Capitol. Not a ringing endorsement, but by a narrow margin, the Senate has confirmed Cash Patel as the country's new FBI director. The 51 to 49 vote puts a loyalist to President Trump at the helm of the premier federal U.S. law enforcement agency. Patel's confirmation comes as many Democrats are expressing skepticism about his qualifications for the job. Trump's Justice Department has already forced out a group of senior FBI officials and asked for the names

of thousands of other agents who participated in investigations relating to the 2021 insurrection. More than 126 million people in the U.S. who live in areas where there is drought, that's more than a third of the U.S. population. MPR's Michael Copley reports that in a lot of areas, unusually dry conditions are expected to continue. The latest data from NOAA shows drought or abnormally dry conditions across most of the

country's lower 48 states. Droughts especially severe in the southwest, from southern Nevada and California through Arizona and New Mexico and into west Texas. There are also pockets of extreme drought in parts of the Great Plains, including Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nebraska. NOAA says the southwest is likely to see below normal precipitation through May. Dryer conditions this spring could extend up into Colorado, Nebraska, and Wyoming. Michael Copley, NPR News.

On Wall Street, the Dow was down 450 points. This is NPR. One of the things that Chief Doge Government cost-cutter and downsizer, Elon Musk, has repeatedly said is ongoing efforts by the entity to root out supposed waste and fraud are going to result in some mistakes that has already happened with the Nuclear Safety Group and now it appears the Agriculture Department has found itself scrambling to rehire key employers responding to the ongoing bird flu outbreak. That outbreak has substantially driven up the cost of eggs for consumers. According to a USDA spokesman, cuts by the

administration failed to protect veterinarians and others involved in bird flu response efforts. Sugar is a quick form of energy, but many people crave it even when they are full. MPR's Emily Kuang reports on a new study looking at why. When you're out to eat and the server comes by and says, hey, you got any room for dessert? Where does that voice inside that says, yes, I will take a slice of cake, come from? A study in the journal Science offers a new clue. Heading Fenzelow of the Max Planck Institute fed mice to the point of fullness and then gave them sugar.

His team noticed that the same neurons which signaled that the mice were full also released naturally occurring opiates, which triggered a feeling of reward. His team then found the same neural pathway in humans. Because sugar is so easy to metabolize, its consumption beyond energy needs is favorable for animals. The team ultimately hopes this research can help create better weight loss drugs. For NPR News, I'm Emily Kwong. Critical futures prices defied the downdraft on Wall Street today, oil closing higher,

gaining 32 cents a barrel to end the session at $72.57 a barrel in New York. I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington. This message comes from Home Instead. Home Instead knows that if you leave home to seek aging care, you say goodbye to where you built your life. So why not stay with help from Home Instead? Learn more at HomeInstead.ca. Home Instead. For a better what's next.