NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-01-2025 6AM EDT

Episode Date: May 1, 2025

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Does the idea of listening to political news freak you out? Well, don't sweat it. The NPR Politics Podcast makes politics a breeze. Every episode will break down the day's headlines into totally normal language and make sure that you walk away understanding what the day's news might mean for you. Take a deep breath and give politics another chance with the NPR Politics Podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Korva Coleman. The U.S. and Ukraine have signed an agreement that gives the U.S.

access to Ukraine's vast mineral deposits. It creates a joint investment fund. This will allow the U.S. to share revenue from that fund with Ukraine. President Trump has been demanding an agreement like this for some time. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant says the deal... Signals clearly to Russian leadership that the Trump administration is committed to a peace process centered on a free, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine over the long term.

But full details of the arrangement were not released. Ukraine has been insisting that the United States provide it with strong security guarantees. It doesn't include explicit guarantees, but the fund can be used for new military aid. Senate Democrats have failed to pass a resolution to effectively block President Trump's global terrorists. And Piers-Elena Moore reports three Republican senators joined Democrats in supporting the measure. The failed Senate resolution marked a rare moment of some bipartisan opposition towards Trump, but not enough. Republican Susan Collins was one of the senators who supported it.

Before the vote, she told reporters she wanted to send a message. We really need to be far more discriminatory in imposing these tariffs and not treat allies like Canada the way we treat adversaries like China. Earlier this month, Collins joined a small group of four Republicans in pushing back against Trump's tariffs on Canadian imports. Despite passing in the Senate, that resolution stalled in the House. Alaina Moore, NPR News, The Capitol. Harvard University says it has provided information on international students to the Department

of Homeland Security. For Member Station GBH in Boston, Kirk Carapesza reports administrators are not saying what information was turned over. Here's what we do know. The Trump administration had demanded that Harvard turn over detailed records for all foreign students' illegal and violent activities, or lose the right to enroll any international students. In a message sent to the campus community, Harvard Executive VP Meredith Wienich says the school responded to the request from DHS without saying what exactly was shared.

Wienicke reiterates Harvard's quote, steadfast commitment to international scholars, urging them to stay focused on their academics. Last week, Harvard announced it was suing the administration over this and other demands. But now some faculty and students question the school's commitment to push back. For NPR News, I'm Kirk Carripeza in Boston. Meanwhile, the U.S. Postal Service has been helping immigration officials in recent months to find people in the U.S. illegally. The story was first reported by the Washington Post.

Officials are seeking access to the Post Office's surveillance systems. This is NPR. The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday on whether overtly religious charter schools can be fully funded by taxpayers. By law, public schools must be non-sectarian. But the conservative majority on the Supreme Court appeared to be friendly to arguments supporting the position. Some justices suggested that preventing religious schools from doing

so could be seen as discriminatory. Facebook's parent company, Metta, says it drew better than expected revenue in the first quarter of this year. As MPR's John Rewich reports, the results helped ease some investor concerns about the trade war's effect on the economy. Metta says it hauled in $42.3 billion in revenue during the first three months of the year, with profit per share of $6.43. Those numbers beat expectations and came on the back of strong income from ads. The company is accelerating the construction

of data centers for developing artificial intelligence, and it says it'll increase its planned capital expenditures this year. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said AI is transforming everything Meta does, and it's focusing more resources on it. Separately, Microsoft also reported strong earnings in the first quarter. Its income got a pop from the company's Azure cloud business, which reported a 33% jump in revenue.

That was partly driven by AI-related demand. Shares of Meta and Microsoft soared in after-hours trading. John Ruehich, NPR News. Note Meta is a financial supporter of NPR. More than a quarter of a million customers are still without power in Western and Central Pennsylvania. Powerful storms swept through earlier this week. Four people were killed in Pennsylvania. You're listening to NPR News.