NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-12-2025 3AM EDT

Episode Date: May 12, 2025

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These days, there's a lot of news. It can be hard to keep up with what it means for you, your family, and your community. Consider This from NPR is a podcast that helps you make sense of the news. Six days a week, we bring you a deep dive on a story and provide the context, backstory, and analysis you need to understand our rapidly changing world. Listen to the Consider This podcast from NPR. Live from NPR News, I'm Dale Willman. Hamas says it will release Israeli-American Edan Alexander this morning. Alexander is being held captive in Gaza.

His release is part of Hamas' effort to reach a ceasefire with Israel. NPR's Daniel Estrin reports from Tel Aviv. In a statement, Hamas said it had been holding secret talks with the U.S. for the last several days, and that the captive Edan Alexander quote, will be released as part of the steps taken to establish a ceasefire. Alexander is a 21-year-old Israeli soldier with dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship who was captured in the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023. He's the last remaining American citizen held by Hamas and Gaza, who is believed to

still be alive. Hamas said his release would come as part of ceasefire efforts to open Gaza's border crossings and bring aid to Gaza after more than 10 weeks of an Israeli blockade. This comes shortly before President Trump departs for the region to visit Arab allies in the Gulf. Daniel Estrin, NPR News, Tel Aviv. Negotiating teams from both the US and China have ended two days of trade talks in the Swiss city of Geneva, as tensions remain between the world's two largest economies. As Ville-en-Marx reports, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant said Sunday evening that parties to the talks had made what he called substantial progress.

Besant and the US Trade Representative Jameson Greer talked up the quote productive discussions once they concluded, promising further details Monday. Besant's Chinese counterpart, the Vice Premier for Economic Affairs, Hete Le Feng, announced a new consultation mechanism to continue the dialogue in a bid to end the massive trade disruption over tariffs at its royal businesses and financial markets in recent weeks. That's Vildemar with our report. A Kurdish militant group announced today a decision to disband and disarm. The move is part of a new peace initiative with Turkey after four years of armed conflict there. The decision by the

Kurdistan Workers Party comes just days after it convened a party congress in northern Iraq. About 50 white South Africans are on their way to the U.S. President Trump has given them refugee status. Kate Bartlett reports from Johannesburg. The white South Africans are Afrikaners, the descendants of mainly Dutch colonists. In a February executive order, President Trump invited Afrikaners to apply for refugee status. On Thursday, NPR learned several dozen Afrikaners had been quickly processed and would arrive at Dulles Airport on Monday. The South African government

is not happy. Here's President Cyril Ramaphosa's spokesman Vincent Maguena. One has to admit that our sovereignty as a country has been grossly undermined and violated by the United States. He said, quote, none of the provisions of international law on the definition of refugees are applicable in this case. For NPR News, I'm Kate Butler in Johannesburg. And you're listening to NPR News. President Trump says he'll sign an executive order today to cut prescription drug prices.

In a social media post, he says he wants to bring prices for at least some drugs to the level paid by other high-income countries. He did not, however, say how he would accomplish that. People in the U.S. pay the most in the world for many prescription drugs. Catholic churches around the world celebrated their first Sunday mass since the election of Pope Leo XIV. For the Pope's college alma mater in Pennsylvania, the gathering was extra special. Andrew Steltzer reports. Habemus Papam, we have a Pope!

Father Jeremy Hyers spoke to a standing room only crowd inside the St. Thomas of Villanova Church. And he's Augustinian through and through. And he's Villanovan. As a Villanova University undergrad back in the 1970s, Robert Kravost was just another math major. Now he's the first pope from the United States. And for class of 96 graduate Katie Culver, that's something to be proud of.

Villanova has always been a really cool place to have somebody from this community represented on the world stage. It's pretty amazing. Father Jeremy said church attendance has doubled since Pope Leo was chosen. For NPR News, I'm Andrew Stelzer in Villanova, Pennsylvania. It was a relatively quiet weekend for the nation's movie theaters, but Marvel's Thunderbolts still did well in its second weekend of release, bringing in $33.1 million in ticket sales. The vampire movie Sinners, meanwhile, added $21.1 million in the U.S. and Canada, pushing

its four-week domestic total over $200 million threshold. I'm Dale Willman, NPR News. You may have heard that President Trump has issued an executive order seeking to block I'm Dale Willman, NPR News.