NPR News Now - NPR News: 04-18-2025 4AM EDT

Episode Date: April 18, 2025

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Fall in love with new music every Friday at All Songs Considered. That's NPR's music recommendation podcast. Fridays are where we spend our whole show sharing all the greatest new releases of the week. Make the hunt for new music a part of your life again. Tap into New Music Friday from All Songs Considered, available wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News in Washington I'm Shae Stevens Alaska US Senator Lisa Murkowski continues to break ranks with fellow Republicans by speaking out against President Trump's downsizing of federal agencies speaking in Anchorage this week Alaska Public Media's Liz Ruskin reports that Murkowski admitted fearing political retribution Murkowski told a forum of nonprofit leaders that they should continue to object to funding

cuts that erode the social safety net. An organizer asked her what she'd say to those too afraid to raise their voice. We are all afraid. Murkowski has said most of her Republican colleagues aren't talking because they fear Trump or his supporters will take them down in the next election or make them targets of mockery. Because retaliation is real. A few hours later she welcomed anti-Trump protesters into her office and told them to keep at it.

For NPR News, I'm Liz Ruskin in Anchorage. U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen has met with the Maryland man who's being held in an El Salvador prison after being deported by mistake. Van Hollen's visit came as U.S. and Salvadoran officials say they have no plans to return Kilmore Abrego-Garcia to the U.S. President Trump is again pressuring the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates. Trump is also suggesting that he plans to replace Fed Chair Jerome Powell. More from NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben. In a social media post, Trump criticized Powell for not having lowered interest rates recently,

a move central banks use to boost the economy. He then wrote, quote, Powell's termination cannot come fast enough. Trump appointed Powell to the chairmanship in 2018, and President Joe Biden reappointed him in 2022. Powell's current term is up in May 2026. In a Wednesday speech, Powell said that there might be both higher inflation and slower growth amid Trump's tariffs. Those two goals are in tension. Fixing one could mean making the other worse. Powell said it's unclear which the Fed would focus on.

While Fed policymaking is independent of the president, Trump has many times criticized the Fed's choices under Powell. Danielle Kurtzlaven, NPR News. Danielle Kurtzlaven, NPR News. Danielle Kurtzlaven, NPR News. A gunman opened fire at Florida State University yesterday, killing two people and injuring five others. Police say a suspect, identified as 20-year-old Phoenix Eichner, was injured by officers and taken into custody. Leon County Sheriff Walter McNeil says Eichner is the son of a local county law enforcement official.

Our deputy, Deputy Eichner, has been with the Leon County Sheriff's Office for over 18 years. She has a tremendous job that she's done. Her service to this community has been exceptional. Unfortunately, her son had access to one of her weapons and that was one of the weapons that was found at the scene. FSU has canceled all events at its Tallahassee campus through Sunday. This is NPR. The Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments on May 5th regarding President Trump's claim

that the Constitution does not guarantee citizenship for everyone born in the U.S. Lower courts have blocked Trump's executive order to end birthright citizenship for people whose parents were born in another country. A federal judge says that Google holds an illegal monopoly in online advertising. For Member Station KQED, Rachel Miro has more on the ruling in a lawsuit by the Justice Department and 17 states. A federal judge largely agreed with the government's claim that Google's monopoly in ad tech allowed it to charge higher prices and take a bigger cut of each sale. Now the ad giant could be forced to sell off some of its ad businesses at a time when other

antitrust cases might force the same for other parts of the company. Allison Rice is with the nonprofit Accountable Tech. We're just really glad to see that this ruling came down and wanting to see solutions that permanently end Google's monopoly on the exploitation of consumer data. Google lawyers are spinning the ruling as a partial win. We won half of this case and we will appeal the other half, a VP wrote on X. For NPR News, I'm Rachel Miro. Officials in Puerto Rico are investigating the cause of this week's island-wide power

outage. More than 1.4 million residents and tourists were left in the dark, and around 400,000 people were without clean water. Hospitals, the main airport, and hotels on the island had to rely on generators. Crews had restored power to more than half of Puerto Rico by Thursday afternoon. The island has had multiple blackouts since the 2017 earthquake. This is NPR News. Cell phones, cars, coffee. How do these goods make their way to us from overseas? And what will President Trump's tariffs mean for their price tags? Join the one day podcast as we NPR News.