NPR News Now - NPR News: 03-07-2025 11AM EST

Episode Date: March 7, 2025

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This message comes from Wondery. Scam Factory, the explosive new podcast series, exposes a multi-billion dollar criminal empire where thousands are being forced to scam others under the threat of death. Follow Scam Factory wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Korva Coleman. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky prepares to go to Saudi Arabia next week. He'll meet with the Trump administration. President Trump has suspended U.S. military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine. And P.O.'s Joanna Kakissis reports Trump is pressuring Ukraine to take a peace deal with

Russian officials who invaded their country. Writing on social media, Zelensky said he will meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh on Monday. Then his team will stay in Saudi Arabia to talk with Trump administration delegates later in the week about a framework for ending Russia's war on Ukraine. It's the first meeting between the U.S. and Ukraine since President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance publicly berated Zelensky in the Oval Office on February 28th.

Since the incident, Zelensky's popularity at home has increased by more than 11 percentage points. A new public opinion poll shows that 68% of Ukrainians trust him as a leader. Joanna Kekissis, NPR News, KU. Meanwhile writing online, President Trump says he is considering putting tariffs on Russia because Russia is pounding Ukraine on the battlefield right now. The Labor Department has released its latest monthly report on jobs. It says U.S. employers created 151,000 new jobs last month.

Kevin Hassett leads the White House National Economic Council. He told CNN that the unemployment rate remained steady. I think it's a fantastic report. It's showing exactly what President Trump intends to do. He intends to reduce government spending, to get rid of wasteful government jobs, and to create manufacturing jobs. And that's what you see.

Economists say data that includes the mass firings of tens of thousands of federal workers is not reflected in today's report. They expect to see it in coming employment reports. Today is the 60th anniversary of the bloody Sunday March in Selma, Alabama, that sparked the passage of the Federal Voting Rights Act of 1965. Voting rights advocates are calling on Congress to bring back key parts of the landmark federal law. And Piers Hansi Lo Wang says it's been dismantled by

the U.S. Supreme Court. Police bludgeoned civil rights icon John Lewis and other peaceful protesters on the Edmund Pettus Bridge 60 years ago today. It galvanized the push to pass legal protections against racial discrimination facing black eligible voters across the South and other parts of the country, says Danielle Lange of the Campaign Legal Center. We quite frankly just did not have a real democracy before the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. This week, House Democrats reintroduced a bill to restore a key part of that law that

the Supreme Court rule was out of date in 2013. Representative Terri Sewell of Alabama says that led to more restrictive state voting laws. And John Lewis didn't get beaten on that bridge just so that we could sit here and watch extremists erect new barriers to the ballot box. The bill is unlikely to become law in this Republican-controlled Congress. Anzela Wong, NPR News. This is NPR.

President Trump has again paused the tariffs he just imposed this week on imported goods from Canada and Mexico. He's now delayed these for another month, but they could be revived on April 2nd. That's when Trump has vowed to impose reciprocal tariffs on goods from even more countries. One of the reasons President Trump says he's imposing tariffs on Canada is to stop the illegal street drug fentanyl from flowing into the U.S. Canadian officials say almost no fentanyl gets into the U.S. from their country. Meanwhile, a former Olympic snowboarder for Canada has been added to the FBI's list of the 10 most wanted fugitives.

And bears Ryan Lucas reports he's wanted for allegedly leading a violent drug trafficking organization. Ryan Wedding represented Canada at the 2002 Winter Olympics. He was indicted last year in the United States on federal charges, including conspiracy to export cocaine and murder. Court papers say the drug trafficking network allegedly run by Wedding has shipped massive amounts of cocaine to the U.S. and Canada and has orchestrated multiple murders to further its drug business. The FBI says Wedding is believed to reside in Mexico, but that he could be in the U.S.,

Canada, or Central America. The State Department, meanwhile, is offering a $10 million reward for information leading to Wedding's arrest. Ryan Lucas, NPR News, Washington. Daylight, saving time begins this weekend for most of the U.S. The clocks will spring forward by one hour early Sunday morning. The time change also means one less hour of sleep. Meanwhile, fire officials also recommend replace the batteries in your smoke detectors at this time.

I'm Korva Coleman, NPR News. This message comes from Wondery. At 24 years old, Monica 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 Monica Lewinsky. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.