NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-13-2025 12AM EDT

Episode Date: May 13, 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, I'm Childe Snyder.

On Capitol Hill, House Republicans are hoping to finish crafting their massive spending bill this week. President Trump has called the measure a big, beautiful bill, but there are divisions among Republicans, including on cuts to Medicaid to pay for tax cuts. NPR's Deidre Walsh. Not all Republicans think that they should be doing these major changes to Medicaid. One of them, Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley, wrote an editorial in the New York Times today criticizing some in his party who he

says want to slash health care for the working poor. He called that move quote both morally wrong and politically suicidal. Republicans hold a slim majority in the House. They'll need nearly all of the GOP caucus to vote for the plan to advance it. President Trump is on his way to the Middle East. He's due to visit Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar,

which has offered him a luxury jet to use as Air Force One. The White House says the plane would be a donation to the Defense Department, but Democrats say accepting the plane would be a donation to the Defense Department, but Democrats say accepting the plane would be a clear violation of the Constitution's ban on gifts from foreign heads of state. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says he's racing to upgrade decades-old technology that caused repeated meltdowns and delayed hundreds of flights at Newark Liberty International

Airport in recent weeks. Ramsey Calife of member station WNYC reports on the plan to fix the problem. The terminals used to manage flights in and out of the busy airport rely on copper wires and technology dating back to the 1970s. Duffy says the Federal Aviation Administration will immediately replace those old wires with modern fiber optic cables. But he warns much more needs to be done. This system is so old that even if you have high speed fiber information coming in to a tower, the information has to be slowed down. It comes in too fast. The Trump administration is planning to invest billions to replace air traffic control systems across the country. Duffy says Newark will be the first to receive upgrades if the plan is funded by Congress.

For NPR News, I'm Remzi Halife in New York. 59 white South Africans arrived in the US on Monday. Their private charter plane landed at an airport just outside Washington, DC. Trump administration welcoming them as refugees refugees as Kate Bartlett reports. The group of Afrikaners, the descendants of mainly Dutch colonists, touched down at Dulles Airport. They were given refugee status after President Trump signed an executive order saying the minority group faced persecution at home. Trump doubled down on his unfounded claims today saying they faced quote genocide at home.

The South African government firmly denies that and President Sirah Ramaphosa says the Trump administration has been taken in by disinformation. For NPR News I'm Kate Butler in Johannesburg. The financial markets in Asia are following Wall Street higher advancing in Tuesday trading. This is NPR News. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says he will be in Istanbul on Thursday, but there's been no response from the Kremlin to Zelensky's offer to meet face-to-face with Russian leader Vladimir Putin. And it remains unclear who will represent Russia at possible peace talks.

On Monday, President Trump offered to join the potential negotiations. A federal judge has handed the Trump administration a win. The judge has refused to block the Internal Revenue Service from sharing immigrants' tax data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Former Acting IRS Commissioner Melanie Krause resigned less than a month ago over allowing ICE agents to use tax records to identify and deport people in the U.S. illegally. Good night and good luck, starring George Clooney as broken Broadway box office records

this year. The show has now recouped its $9.5 million investment, officially making it a hit, as Jeff London reports. George Clooney's play about journalist Edward R. Murrow going up against Senator Joseph McCarthy has not just resonated with Broadway audiences, it's been bringing them in in droves. There are a certain kind of people wired a certain kind of way. With a top ticket price of $799, the play was the first to gross over $4 million in

weekly box office tallies. It plays in a large Broadway house better known for such long-running musicals as Cats and Mamma Mia. The production has offered 2,000 subsidized tickets to New York school kids and received five Tony nominations, including George Clooney for Best Actor. For NPR News, I'm Jeff London in New York. This is NPR News, I'm Jeff London in New York. This is NPR News. On this week's Wild Card podcast, Wanda Sykes says she can have a hard time understanding God. What is the plan, man? You know? What is the lesson here?

Yeah, it's like, oh boy, you are in a pickle right now, God. What you gonna do about this? I'm Rachel Martin. Wanda Sykes is on Wild Card, the show where cards control the conversation.