NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-16-2025 2AM EDT

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

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Conductor Robert Franz says a good melody captures our attention. And then it moves you through time. Music is architecture in time. If you engage in the moment with what you're listening to, you do lose a sense of the time around you. How we experience time. That's on the TED Radio Hour from NPR. That's on the TED Radio Hour from NPR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Shea Stevens. Russian President Vladimir Putin skipped a meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart Thursday in Turkey. The aim was to hold high-level talks on ending Russia's war in Ukraine.

President Trump says he knows why Putin was a no-show. Nothing's going to happen until Putin and I get together, OK? And obviously he wasn't going to go. He was going to go, but he thought I was going to go. He wasn't going if I wasn't there. And I don't believe anything's going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together. But we're going to have to get it solved,

because too many people are dying. Trump was speaking in Abu Dhabi, the last stop of his three-nation visit to the Middle East. Students in Oklahoma will be required to identify, Danielle Pletka, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News

Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor, NPR News Anchor numerous reviews affirming the outcome of the election. The standards have been championed by Ryan Walters, Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction and a conservative firebrand. Ryan Walters, Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction, These new standards will ensure that kids have an accurate and comprehensive view of historical events while also reinforcing the values that make our country great. While Republican leadership raised concerns about a rushed procedure to get the standards

through the State Board of Education, the content of the standards has gotten little pushback from the majority party. A lawsuit filed by a former GOP Oklahoma attorney general could stall the implementation of the standards, which are set to take effect next school year. But like other Republican criticisms, the lawsuit takes issue with how the standards were approved, not the standards themselves. For NPR News, I'm Beth Wallace. In November, Missouri voters approved constitutional protections for abortion rights.

As St. Louis Public Radio's Jason Rosenbaum reports, Republican lawmakers in the state are preparing to ask those voters if they've changed their minds. Missouri Republicans like Senator Adam Schmelting want to repeal a measure that legalized abortion up to fetal viability and replace it with a ban with exceptions for medical emergencies and rape and incest up to 12 weeks of pregnancy. Missouri's women need the protections that are contained in this bill. Missouri's babies, Missouri's children. But during a rally on the Missouri Capitol steps, speakers such as Nancy O'Brien said they were prepared to defend protections voters already support.

Every Missourian deserves to have agency and control over their own body. Missourians will likely vote in 2026 on whether to ban most abortions or keep abortion rights protections. For NPR News, I'm Jason Rosenbaum in Jefferson City. U.S. futures are flat in after hours trading on Wall Street. On Asia Pacific markets, shares are lower down a fraction. This is NPR. The U.S. Supreme Court appears to be divided on whether a single lower court judge may

block a presidential order nationwide. At issue are lower court orders blocking President Trump's effort to reinterpret the 14th Amendment Clause on Birthright Citizenship. Snow totals in the mountain ranges supplying water to the Colorado River are far lower than normal for this time of year. That reality might be getting lost amid disarray at federal offices that manage water for 40 million people across the nation's west. From member station KUNC, Alex Hager has details. Look at maps of snow totals across the Rockies right now and you'll see a whole lot of red. Eric Balkin is with the nonprofit Glen Canyon Institute.

I think some of that chaos within the agencies, the broader negotiations happening on the Colorado River, all of these other factors I think are sort of drowning out the severity of the drought situation right now. Low snow totals now could spell catastrophe for Lake Powell as soon as next year. The nation's second largest reservoir could lose the ability to generate hydropower or even send water downstream to the millions of people who depend on it. For NPR News, I'm Alex Hager in Fort Collins, Colorado. Roughly 350,000 commuters in New York and New Jersey will be scrambling for alternative

transportation on Friday during the morning rush hour. Engineers for the New Jersey transit system have walked off their jobs and plan to set up pickets within a few hours. The announcement followed mediation and marathon contract talks that failed to resolve differences over salaries. A threatened strike caused travel disruptions on Thursday. This is NPR News.