NPR News Now - NPR News: 03-20-2025 3PM EDT

Episode Date: March 20, 2025

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When you take a shower or get ready in the morning, how many products are you using? Everything from your shampoo to your lotion. In our study, we found that the average woman used about 19 products every day and the average man used about seven. These products might come at a cost. The ingredients they contain can be harmful to our health. Listen to the Life Kit podcast from NPR to learn more about the risks of personal care products. Live from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh.

President Trump will soon begin the process of dismantling the U.S. Department of Education. This afternoon, Trump is scheduled to sign an executive action that aims to deliver on his campaign promise to shutter the federal agency. Doing so will require an act of Congress. The White House says the action will not cut key federal funding streams that help schools serve low-income students, kids with disabilities and rural communities. The administration says it wants to return education authority to the states. Earlier today, White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt said the closure is also a national security issue. When you look at how students around the world, particularly in China, are being educated,

American students are falling behind. We're not keeping up with our allies or our adversaries, and that's a major problem for our country. And the president is fixing it today. A week after sweeping layoffs, the department will soon be down to roughly half the size it was when President Trump took office. Immigration officials have detained a second person in connection with pro-Palestinian protests.

Badar Khan Suri was arrested in his Virginia home earlier this week under the same authority used to arrest Palestinian activist Mahmood Khalil. NPRC Manobustiyo has more. Khan Suri, a national of India, is in the US on a student visa, which allows him to teach and study as a Georgetown University researcher. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested him and moved him to a detention center in Louisiana according to a detention database. Kansuri's lawyers have petitioned for his release.

The government says that he was detained under an immigration law that allows the Secretary of State to deport non-citizens the government sees as a threat to U.S. foreign policy. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for Homeland Security, said on social media that Kansuri was, quote, actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting anti-Semitism on social media. Hibana Bustillo, NPR News. The administration has cut funding for a worldwide network of more than 700 labs that test for measles. NPR's Gabriella Emanuel has the details. The Global Measles and Rubella Laboratory Network is funded by the U.S., but run by

the World Health Organization. In January, President Trump decided to withdraw from the WHO and pulled funding, including for these labs. And so this lab network is now under severe threat of collapse. Kate O'Brien is with the WHO. It would mean many, many more outbreaks, many, many more deaths, and many, many more cases. A spokesperson for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said funding for domestic measles labs continues. The WHO says it's looking for other sources of support for the global

network. The price tag? $8 million annually. Gabriella Emanuel, NPR News. U.S. stocks are trading lower this hour. The Dow is down 38 points, the S&P is off 20, and the Nasdaq is down nearly 100 points. This is NPR News. New details today about the plane crash at Toronto's Pearson International Airport last month. Aviation authorities in Canada say the Delta Airlines regional jet descended too quickly at a rate of more than 1,100 feet per minute when it crash landed. The country's Transportation Safety Board says in its preliminary report today that the rate of descent was nearly twice as fast as it should have been. All 80 people on board survived,

but two people were seriously injured. Ramadan. It can be a lonely experience for Muslim youth in non-Muslim homes. The Muslim Foster Care Association in Michigan has held an iftar to bring some of those youth together to break their fast. Nargis Rahman of member station WDET has more. Organizers and volunteers of the Muslim Foster Care Association put the final touches to the buffet style iftar, a roll of savory Thai food and sweet pastries. Director of Operations for the Association, Shireen Abunada, says resettlement agencies recently brought in more refugee Muslim minors in anticipation of changing immigration policies. They expedited a lot of travel of refugee Muslim foster youth from West African countries,

so we've had an influx of about 50 to 70 youth that have just recently arrived in the past couple months. The Association says there are 250 Muslim children in foster care in Michigan but less than a dozen Muslim foster homes. For NPR News, I'm Nargis Rahman in Detroit. The Dow is down 29 points, SMP is off 17 and the Nasdaq is down 86 points or nearly half a percent. This is NPR News.