NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-19-2025 5PM EDT

Episode Date: May 19, 2025

NPR News: 05-19-2025 5PM EDTLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

When Malcolm Gladwell presented NPR's Throughline podcast with a Peabody Award, he praised it for its historical and moral clarity. On Throughline, we take you back in time to the origins of what's in the news, like presidential power, aging, and evangelicalism. Time travel with us every week on the Throughline podcast from NPR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack Spear. President Donald Trump and Russian leader, Vladimir Putin spoke about the ongoing conflict in Ukraine

for about two hours today. NPR's Marla Eisen reports the results were modest. After the phone call, President Trump posted that Russia and Ukraine would begin talks about a ceasefire. Ukraine has already agreed to a US ceasefire plan, but Russia has not. Trump said the tone of the conversation was excellent and that Russia wants quote large-scale trade with the US. But there was no indication that the call had produced a breakthrough. After the call, Putin repeated his view that the root causes of the crisis need to be addressed,

his way of saying that Ukraine would return to its former status as a satellite of Russia. Trump has shown increasing frustration with the lack of progress. Before the call, Vice President J.D. Vance repeated that the U.S. was willing to walk away from the negotiations if they made no headway. That's one of the outcomes Russia would welcome and Ukraine would not. Mara Eliason, NPR News, The White House. The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of the Trump administration, ending temporary protected status for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans in the U.S. Protected status had been extended under President Biden. High Court granted the Justice Department's request to lift a judge's order.

They'd blocked Homeland Security Secretary Christine Noem from moving to deport Venezuel's under temporary protected status. Officials with the National Transportation Safety Board say they have determined there was no structural damage done to the Brooklyn Bridge when it was struck by a Mexican sailing vessel. NPR's Greg Allen reports investigators say the ship accelerated before hitting the bridge Saturday killing two crew members. NTSB investigators say they haven't yet been granted access to the Mexican Navy ship or allowed to speak to the crew members,

the harbor pilot or the captain of the tugboat that was guiding the vessel before it hit the bridge. At a briefing investigator Brian Young says the tall-masted sailing ship gained speed before the collision. We do have a bit of time where it was maintaining a constant speed of about 2, 2.3 knots, and then the speed began to increase. Winds were at 11 miles per hour and the current was pushing the ship toward the bridge. The ship was moving at 6 knots, about 7 miles per hour, when its mass struck the bridge. Greg Allen, NPR News.

The yield on Treasury bonds is rising after Moody's stripped the federal government of its AAA bond rating. NPR's Scott Horstley reports it could result in higher borrowing costs for everyone. Moody's was the last of the big three credit rating agencies to lower its estimate of the U.S. government's creditworthiness. The company warned that U.S. policymakers have failed to address a rising tide of government debt. The move comes as congressional Republicans are weighing an extension of the 2017 tax cut, which is expected to add trillions of dollars in additional red ink over the next decade. That additional borrowing is only partially offset by GOP spending cuts.

Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington. Stocks closed mostly higher on Wall Street today. The Dow is up 137 points. The NASDAQ rose four points. You're listening to NPR. When President Trump hosts the board of the Kennedy Center at the White House tonight, it's an indication how much time he's apparently devoting to remark remaking one of the nation's premier cultural institutions.

Tonight's meeting of the Center's Board of Trustees follows the firing of the board's previous members and the announcement Trump will serve as chair. A big barrier for those who want to start biking regularly is safety. NPR's Regina Barber reports on a new device that might help make safer cycling routes. Cycling can be seen by many as a great eco-friendly way of transportation. But it can be dangerous sharing roads with cars. To better understand which routes were safer than others, a team of computer scientists created a sensor to monitor how close cars get to cyclists.

Over the span of two months in Seattle, Washington, 15 bikes were equipped with the sensor. During that time, the team recorded over 2,000 close passes from cars. These passes were compared to five years of bike collisions in the area, and locations of those close passes matched historically dangerous routes.

The researchers hope to deploy more sensors in more cities where all of the crowdsourced data can feed into a map that helps anyone find safer bike-riding routes. Regina Barber, NPR News. A vanishing species of whale appears to be giving birth to fewer babies, heightening concerns about the survivability of the animals. So I have to say the endangered right whale continues to see its numbers decline. Currently it's believed there are only about 370 of the whales left. Right whales give birth to calves off the southeastern U.S. from mid-November to mid-April. While federal authorities say at least 50 will calves per season are needed, they found

only about 11 mother calf pairs this year. I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington.