NPR News Now - NPR News: 03-20-2025 12AM EDT

Episode Date: March 20, 2025

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There's a lot of news happening. You want to understand it better, but let's be honest, you don't want it to be your entire life either. Well, that's sort of like our show, Here and Now Anytime. Every weekday on our podcast, we talk to people all over the country about everything from political analysis to climate resilience, video games. We even talk about dumpster diving on this show. Check out Here and Now Anytime, a daily podcast from NPR and WBUR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Shea Stevens. A federal judge is refusing to temporarily block Joe's takeover of a congressionally

funded think tank in Washington. As NPR's Ryan Lucas reports, the request was made in a lawsuit by former members of the nonprofit U.S. Institute of Peace, or USIP. The lawsuit seeks to reinstate the board members who were removed and to block DOJ from further accessing the Institute or its systems. At a hearing in federal court in Washington, D.C., U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell said she was very offended by how DOJ has moved to take over USIP.

That includes threatening criminal prosecution and showing up with armed law enforcement to remove senior employees from the building. But Judge Howell says there is confusion in the lawsuit and that she has concerns about its likelihood of success on the merits. She therefore denied the former USIP board member's request for a temporary restraining order

blocking Doge's actions while the lawsuit proceeds. Ryan Lucas, NPR News, Washington. President Trump is expected to sign an executive order on Thursday calling for the shutdown of the U.S. Department of Education. A draft of the order directs Education Secretary Linda McMahon to take steps to return education authority to the states. It also calls for the elimination of any department funding to programs or activities involving diversity, equity and inclusion or gender ideology. The Federal Reserve has left its key benchmark rate unchanged. Chairman Jerome Powell says the overall economy is strong and wages

are growing faster than inflation which is still higher than the Fed's 2% target. Goods inflation moved up pretty significantly in the first two months of the year. Trying to track that back to actual tariff increases, given what was tariffed and what was not, very, very challenging. So some of it, the answer is clearly some of it, a good part of it, is coming from tariffs. Powell says the Fed's latest quarterly projection is the same as the one issued in December. Russia and Ukraine have each released 175 prisoners of war. NPR's Eleanor Beardsley reports that it's one positive, tangible aspect of ongoing ceasefire

talks. The Ukrainian army posted emotional videos on social media of the newly liberated soldiers. All were thin with shaved heads, each was wrapped in a Ukrainian flag. One POW cried as he called his mother to tell her he was finally home. Thousands of prisoners of war are being held by both sides, though the exact numbers are not known. It is the 62nd prisoner exchange since the full-scale invasion three years ago. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky posted on social media that those returned

from captivity have health problems, severe injuries and traumas. 22 seriously wounded Ukrainian soldiers were also returned outside of the POW exchange. Eleanor Beersley reporting. This is NPR. A North Dakota jury has ordered the environmental group Greenpeace to pay more than $660 million for damages to an oil pipeline. The case stems from protests in 2016 and 2017 when demonstrators tried to block construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline and its Missouri River crossing.

The project had been opposed by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which feared the pipeline would contaminate its downstream water supply. The pipeline has been delivering oil since May 2017. A federal appeals court in Washington has rejected a computer scientist's bid to copyright a piece of art that he created using artificial intelligence. But as NPR's Bobby Allen reports, the plaintiff plans to take his fight to the U.S. Supreme Court. The D.C. Circuit of Appeals wrote, This case presents a question made salient by recent advances in artificial intelligence.

Can a non-human machine be an author under the Copyright Act of 1976? Its answer, no. And that's because the 49-year-old law says only a work made by a human can be copyrighted. The Missouri computer scientist Stephen Thayer says he guided his AI to create an image called a recent entrance to paradise, and the AI deserves to own it. The Copyright Office has granted copyright to work assisted by AI, but Thayer says the AI itself should be an author. The Federal Appeals Court rejected this.

Thayer says he is appealing. Bobby Allen, NPR News. US futures are higher in after hours trading on Wall Street. On Asia Pacific, market shares are mostly lower, down 1% in Hong Kong. This is NPR. Following the news out of Washington, D.C. can be overwhelming. I'm Scott Detrow and NPR has a podcast that can help. It's called Trump's Terms.

Stories about big changes the 47th president is pursuing on his own terms. Each episode is short, usually around five minutes or so. We keep it calm and factual. We help you follow what matters and we leave out what doesn't. Listen to Trump's Terms from NPR.