NPR News Now - NPR News: 03-08-2025 12AM EST

Episode Date: March 8, 2025

NPR News: 03-08-2025 12AM ESTLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Public media counts on your support to ensure that the reporting and programs you depend on thrive. Make a recurring donation today to get special access to more than 20 NPR podcasts, perks like sponsor-free listening, bonus episodes, early access, and more. So start supporting what you love today at plus.npr.org. Live from NPR News, I'm Dale Willman. Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell says it's still not clear whether the Trump administration's tariff plans will prove to be inflationary. The new administration is in the process of implementing significant policy changes in four distinct areas, trade, immigration, fiscal policy, and regulation.

It is the net effect of these policy changes that will matter for the economy and for the path of monetary policy. While there have been recent developments in some of these areas, especially trade policy, uncertainty around the changes and their likely effects remains high. Paul was speaking during an economic forum

in New York City on Friday. He also pointed out that actions during the first Trump administration actually caused global growth to slow rather than be inflationary. Brazil is bracing for a boost in its agricultural exports to China, the world's largest exporter of soy and other grains, is hoping to take advantage of the latest US trade war between the US and China following President Trump's tariffs on Chinese goods. MPR's Carrie Khan has more in that story. China's quick retaliation of Trump's tariffs has made Brazil's ag products 10 to 15 percent cheaper. Brazilian exporters are prepped to up their shipments of soy, cotton, beef and chicken meat to China. That's exactly what Brazil did during Trump's first term, when he also sparked a trade war with China.

Importers ditched higher-priced U.S. goods. U.S. soybean farmers never recouped market share. Analysts, though, warn increased demand abroad could lead to higher food prices in Brazil. President Luís Anácio Lula da Silva has seen his approval ratings plunge, in part, to rising food prices and stubborn inflation. His government just announced it would remove taxes on many food items.

Kari Kahn, NPR News, Rio de Janeiro. President Trump signed an executive order Friday that attempts to make changes to WHO qualifications for a long-standing federal loan forgiveness program. NPR's Johnnaki Mehta has more. The federal government's public service loan forgiveness program, known as PSLF, has been in place since 2007. It forgives a portion of loans for employees who work in the public sector or for nonprofits

after they've completed 10 years of service and 120 qualifying payments. What's left of their debt after that is forgiven by the government. Now, President Trump's executive order is attempting to limit who qualifies for the program. The order says PSLF would exclude, quote, individuals employed by organizations whose activities have a substantial illegal purpose. Legal expert Pursus Yu of the Student Borrow Protection Center, a nonprofit that advocates for student loan borrowers.

It says any steps a Trump administration takes to modify the law would require a lengthy federal rulemaking process. Janaki Mehta, NPR News. Stocks finished on a high note after a brutal trading week on Wall Street. The Dow gained 222 points, the Nasdaq up 126 points. This is NPR News. A union that represents workers with the Transportation Security Administration says a decision by Homeland Security to end the collective bargaining agreement with them is an unprovoked attack.

The department criticized the union and said poor performers were allowed to stay on the job hindering efforts to keep Americans safe. The union says the order strips collective bargaining rights from 47,000 workers. The population of monarch butterflies in central Mexico almost doubled this winter compared to a year ago, but Mexican officials and environmental groups say the number still remains far below average. Nina Kruinsky of Member Station KJZZ reports.

Nearly twice as much land in Mexico is covered by hibernating monarch butterflies compared to last winter. But the species is still under pressure from a change in climate and habitat loss. Experts say the past year's population increases thanks to more favorable weather conditions, specifically less intense drought on the butterflies route from Canada and the U.S. to Mexico. The butterflies' numbers are still just a sliver of what was seen there in the 1990s when scientists in Mexico started estimating the size of the winter population. The US Fish and Wildlife Service late last year

proposed giving monarch butterflies endangered species status. For NPR News I'm Nina Kravinsky in Hermosillo Mexico. Pope Francis spent 20 minutes on Friday in a hospital chapel praying. Officials say he also did some work in between therapy sessions. The Pope has now spent three weeks in a Rome hospital where he's being treated for double pneumonia. He's using high flows of supplemental oxygen to help him breathe during the day and uses a mechanical ventilation mask at night. I'm Dale Willman, NPR News. There's a lot of news happening. You want to understand it better, but let's be honest. I'm Dale Willman, NPR News.