NPR News Now - NPR News: 04-18-2025 8AM EDT

Episode Date: April 18, 2025

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Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Cora Vaquilman. U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen held a face-to-face meeting with Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's

Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's Kyrgyzstan's K Yesterday, on all things considered, Van Hollen said soldiers had initially prevented him from reaching the prison. They simply said they had been given orders not to allow me to visit him. Later in the day, the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, posted on X that Van Hollen had met with Abrego Garcia and said that he, quote, gets the honor of staying in El Salvador's custody.

The senator then posted a picture of himself and Abrego Garcia sitting at a table. Also yesterday, a federal appeals court declined the Trump administration's request to lift a judge's order that they help bring Abrego Garcia back to the US. Rylan Barton, NPR News. President Trump has been bashing Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell.

Trump wants Powell and the Fed to lower interest rates. Powell says the policymakers want to see more data from the president's on-again, off-again global tariffs. NPR's Scott Horsley says Trump disagrees. Trump complains that over in Europe, the central bank has been cutting interest rates, but here in this country, the Fed has been sitting on its hands, keeping rates relatively high. The president is also unhappy about a speech that Powell gave this week in which the Fed chairman warned that Trump's tariffs are likely to push inflation higher, at least temporarily. Trump stopped short of telling Powell, you're fired, but

he made it clear he wouldn't be sorry to see the Fed chairman go. NPR's Scott Horsley reporting. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky says there is evidence China is supplying Russia with artillery and gun powder. NPR's Joanna Kokissis reports from Kyiv, Zelensky did not elaborate on this evidence, while China says the charge is baseless. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Chen said Beijing has not sent weapons or ammunition to either Russia or Ukraine during the war that China calls a crisis. Speaking to reporters in Kyiv on Thursday, Zelensky said Ukraine's intelligence has

documented such shipments from China to Russia and said he wasn't surprised. Zelensky said Chinese leader Xi Jinping promised earlier in the war that he would not sell or send weapons to Russia. Unfortunately, now we see information to the contrary. Zelensky said he would provide more information about these shipments sometime next week. Ukraine has also captured two Chinese nationals fighting for Russia. Joanna Kekesis, NPR News, Kiev. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the U.S. could, quote, move on if a peace deal is not reached soon between Ukraine and Russia.

Rubio is in Paris for talks with European and Ukrainian officials about the war. It's not clear if he means dropping US efforts to get a truce or if the US would walk away from commitments to Ukraine. It's NPR. Officials have not disclosed a motive for yesterday's mass shooting at Florida State University in Tallahassee. They've arrested a student in connection with the attack. It left two people dead and six wounded. More staffers could leave the U.S. Census Bureau as part of the Trump administration's cuts to the federal workforce.

NPR's Hansi Lo Wang reports, current and former Bureau staffers are worried this could hurt the 2030 census results and other key statistics. The Census Bureau has been accepting applications for early retirement and voluntary separation offers as part of the Trump administration push to keep shrinking the federal workforce. Amy O'Hara, a former bureau official, warns that losing experienced civil servants is disrupting work on producing monthly jobs numbers, plus preparations for the 2030 census that will be used to redistribute federal funding and political representation across the country. I think the public needs to question whether the agency is going to be able to produce

the information that it needs to on time with the same quality that we've grown accustomed to. It's not clear how many federal workers have volunteered to leave the Bureau. A mass firing of some of the remaining employees may be next. Hansi Luong, NPR News, Washington. A federal judge has ruled that big tech company Google has an illegal monopoly over online advertising. The decision means Google could be forced to sell off some of its ad business.

This case is separate from another lawsuit against Google. Last year, a different federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly in the search engine market. In this trial, the Justice Department is expected to seek a breakup of some of Google's features that could include its Chrome Web browser business. I'm Corva Coleman, NPR News.