NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-16-2025 7AM EDT

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

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Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Korova Coleman. President Trump is completing his Mideast trip today. He spent the past week meeting with Gulf Arab leaders and striking multi-billion dollar defense and tech deals. But NPR's Eya Batraoui reports Trump leaves the region with the war in Gaza still flaring. Trump's Mideast visit began just after Hamas released the last living American Israeli hostage held in Gaza. Hamas says it did so on the understanding the U.S.

would call for a permanent ceasefire and push for aid to enter Gaza. Instead, while in the region, Trump appeared to double down on his idea that Palestinians in Gaza should be permanently relocated outside the territory, saying the U.S. should get involved there and make it a, quote, freedom zone. He then said his administration's looking at people

starving in Gaza under Israel's total blockade, saying, We've got to get that taken care of, without elaborating. His comments come as Israel says it struck more than 100 Hamas sites in recent days, and attacks that have killed hundreds, including entire families. Aya Batraoui, MPR News, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Some see President Trump's Mideast trip as an economic success. Former Ambassador Doug Silliman is the head of the Arab Gulf

States Institute, a Washington-based nonprofit think tank. I think he's really trying to shift the focus of American traditional meetings with the Gulf from the Carter Doctrine of 45 years ago, which was essentially oil for security, to new longer-term and deeper economic partnerships. And I think he has had a pretty good success on this one because the Gulf states also want to have this kind of relationship with the United States. He spoke to NPR's Morning Edition. The Department of Homeland Security is asking the Pentagon

to provide some 20,000 National Guard members to help in removing migrants who are illegally in the U.S. This story was first reported by the New York Times, and PR has learned that military lawyers are reviewing this request. State governors would be asked for volunteers among their guard forces. It's not clear when this might happen. Air traffic controllers at another airport have experienced a communications blackout for well over a minute, this time

in Colorado. NPR's Jacqueline Diaz reports this comes on the heels of several outages at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey. Multiple radio transmitter failures left pilots flying into Denver International Airport on Monday unable to communicate with air traffic controllers. The outage lasted for about two minutes, hitting the Denver Air Route Traffic Control Center in Longmont, Colorado. That's according to Frank McIntosh, an official with the Federal Aviation Administration, who shared

the details in testimony before a House committee hearing this week. Local reports in Denver claim the outage lasted for six minutes. McIntosh said those reports were, quote, over-exaggerated. Planes were able to remain at safe distances in the sky during the outage. Jacqueline Diaz, NPR News. You're listening to NPR News from Washington. Talks are underway in Istanbul, Turkey among Ukrainian, Russian and Turkish representatives. They're discussing ways to end Russia's war in Ukraine. But Russian President Vladimir Putin did not go, sending a low-level delegation instead.

President Trump says he thinks there won't be significant progress in ending the war unless he meets Putin himself. Trump did not mention Ukraine. Shares in United Health Group tumbled nearly 11 percent yesterday. That was after the health care and insurance conglomerate dismissed reports of a federal government investigation. And Piers Maria Aspin reports. United Health Group is one of the largest and most powerful companies in the world. It controls how tens of millions of Americans access and pay for health care.

But it's having a terrible year, which kept getting worse this week. On Tuesday, United Health abruptly replaced its CEO and suspended its financial guidance for this year. Now it's facing reports of a potentially criminal investigation by the Department of Justice into its Medicare business. The company says it has not been notified by the DOJ of such an investigation and that it stands by the integrity of its business. But investors are spooked. Shares in UnitedHealth have fallen more than 50 percent in the past month, shaving hundreds of billions of dollars off its market cap.

Maria Aspin, NPR News, New York. People going to the beach in Florida this year will need to watch out for record levels of smelly seaweed. It's called sargassum. Researchers say there's been a record amount of it in the Atlantic Ocean. It's piling up on beaches and could drive away tourists. This is NPR.