NPR News Now - NPR News: 04-22-2025 2PM EDT

Episode Date: April 22, 2025

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On this week's Wild Card podcast, Brett Goldstein says even though his shows Ted Lasso and Shrinking get emotional, he doesn't. I'm a crybaby. I guess I thought you might be like a closet crier. No. I mean, I write all this stuff because then I don't have to live it. Whoa. She's like, I got him.

I'm Rachel Martin. Brett Goldstein is on Wild Card, the show where cards control the conversation. Laxmi Singh, NPR News. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says he is streamlining what he's calling a bloated bureaucracy. He's cutting about 700 positions at headquarters. NPR's Michelle Kellerman with details. In an op-ed explaining some of his changes, Rubio takes aim at the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. He says it became a platform for left-wing activists in places like Poland, Hungary and Brazil and he says he's putting that Bureau under the control of a new coordinator

for foreign assistance. He's also getting rid of over 130 offices to prevent what he calls meaningless turf wars. His aides say no one will be fired today, though hundreds of positions will be cut. The Trump administration has already dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development. What remains of that will be folded into the department with more oversight from regional bureaus. Michelle Kelliman, NPR News, the State Department. Four Democratic lawmakers from the U.S. have left El Salvador where they sought answers about Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

He is the Maryland man now in Salvadoran detention after he was deported illegally. Oregon Congresswoman Maxine Dexter was part of the U.S. delegation. The most important thing that this trip accomplished is keeping this story in the constitutional crisis. It really illustrates front and center. This is one man and family's nightmare, but it could be anyone's. Danielle Pletka The White House initially admitted that Abrego Garcia was deported due to an administrative error, but it continues to defend its actions. The Justice Department says that despite a U.S. Supreme Court order to facilitate the

man's return, its hands are tied since Abrego Garcia is in foreign custody. Around the globe, Catholic communities are reflecting on the legacy of Pope Francis, who died Easter Monday at the age of 88. He was the only pontiff to take the name of Saint Francis of Assisi, the Roman Catholic patron saint of animals and ecology. And as countries observe this Earth Day in Paris, Jeff Brady notes Francis also pushed for action on climate change during his 12-year papacy. Matthew 1 Pope Francis' 2015 climate encyclical did not mince words. Quote, the Earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth.

The letter called on rich countries to help poorer ones and inspired new religious organizations focused on climate to form. Kristiana Zenner is a theology professor at Fordham University. The Catholic Church now has to be seen as an entity that is concerned about care for creation and people's faith lives together. I don't think that can be erased. More than 8,000 families, schools, groups, dioceses, and other organizations have pledged to take actions in response to Francis's climate encyclical.

Jeff Brady, NPR News. From Washington, this is NPR. From Washington, this is NPR. The International Monetary Fund's outlook for global economies is worse. As governments worldwide contend with the fallout of the Trump administration's tariffs, the IMF is now projecting 2.8% growth this year, down from its earlier forecast of 3.3%. As for the world's two biggest economies, the IMF is now projecting sharply lower expansion of 1.8% in the US and 4% in China. About 40% of women have dense breast tissue. This puts them at higher risk both for

developing cancer and for cancer to be missed on mammograms. And Piers, you can agree, reports follow-up imaging can be expensive and hard to get. Mammogram results now include information about whether a patient has dense breasts. But many don't know what to do with that information or when to get a follow-up MRI. Wendy Berg, a radiologist, says MRIs can catch many more early stage cancers, but many doctors themselves don't know what to advise patients. And so it remains incumbent on the woman herself to look at her risk factors, to talk to her doctor and say, hey, I'd like to get an MRI.

Don't wait for them to recommend it to you. Berg says self-advocacy could help more women at earlier ages catch cancers so they can be treated. Yuki Noguchi, NPR News. US stocks are trading higher this hour. The Dow is up 740 points or nearly 2 percent. At 38,911, the S&P is up nearly 2 percent. NASDAQ is up roughly 2 percent as well.

This is NPR News. Donald Trump has an extraordinary approach to the presidency. 2% as well. This is NPR News.