NPR News Now - NPR News: 05-22-2025 10AM EDT

Episode Date: May 22, 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 as 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 in Washington, I'm Korova Coleman. The House has managed to pass the multi-trillion-dollar government spending bill this morning. It won by a single Republican vote. The bill is backed by President Trump, who met yesterday with Republican holdouts at

the White House. Several were concerned about cutting Medicaid and food assistance programs. Others are worried about the deficit. Trump is now urging the Senate to pass the bill, but MPs Claudia Crisales says the legislation has a long way to go in that chamber. Senate Majority Leader John Thune is gonna face a tough task threading the needle between this House plan and concerns from his own members that includes fiscal hawks in that chamber as well as moderates who have concerns about those Medicaid cuts.

So they've already made clear they plan to make a lot of changes to this House bill. And Piers Claudia-Grasales reporting. Police in Washington, D.C., say that two staffers at the Israeli embassy were shot and killed last night as they left an event at a Jewish museum. D.C. Police say they arrested a suspect who chanted, Free Palestine, when he was in handcuffs. The Israeli government has identified the staffers as Yaron Leshinsky and Sarah Milgram.

A federal judge has ruled the Trump administration has violated his court order against deporting certain migrants to third countries that are not their own. NPR's Tovia Smith reports. Eight migrants were flown out of the U.S. 17 hours after they were told they were being deported to South Sudan. Government lawyers argue that was enough time for them to raise concerns about their safety, but none did. In a stern rebuke, federal judge Brian Murphy said officials unquestionably violated his order to ensure due process, and he wants

DHS to hear any concerns from the men now, either back in the U.S. or where they are, which remains unclear. Tina Real-Muto, a lawyer for the migrants, is skeptical. We think that will be a legal and logistical nightmare when we have concerns. Government attorneys meantime raise concerns for the safety of the ICE agents holding what officials have described as criminals and barbaric monsters. Tovia Smith, NPR News, Boston. Stocks opened higher this morning after another lackluster month of home sales.

NPR's Scott Horsley reports the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose about 20 points in early trading. The National Association of Realtors says sales of existing homes were down again in April after an already disappointing March. Home prices continued to climb, however, with an average selling price last month of $414,000. There are more homes on the market for would-be buyers to choose from. The number of homes for sale jumped 9% between March and April. Housing affordability is still a challenge, though, with interest rates hovering around

6.8%. Gasoline prices are inching higher, ahead of what's expected to be a record-setting Memorial Day travel weekend. AAA says the average price of regular gas is up three cents a gallon from a month ago, but still down from this time last year. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington. On Wall Street, the Dow is now up 25 points. You're listening to NPR News. The fire department in Memphis, Tennessee,

says a fire that broke out late last month at a historic black church was intentionally set. The Claiborne Temple was undergoing renovations. The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was at this church to meet with striking sanitation workers in 1968. Officials in San Diego say a small plane crashed directly into a neighborhood overnight. Assistant Fire Chief Dan Eddy says several houses are on fire.

We have probably, I'd say, on that block itself at least 15 homes that are affected. It's not known if there are any injuries. The sensation that we get in our teeth causing them to ache? Well, NPR's Ari Daniel reports it appears to come from ancient fish. Scientists have been reasonably sure our teeth evolved from the bumpy, armored exoskeletons of prehistoric fish. Yara Haridi is an evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago. It becomes very advantageous to have pointy things around your mouth.

But researchers didn't know whether there was more to the bumps than self-defense. Haridi and her colleagues have now shown, through experiments on both extinct and living animals, that that armor likely allowed the ancient fish to sense the water around them. They lived in mucky, shallow bottomed seas. They probably needed every inch of sensation they could get. Hundreds of millions of years later, our teeth, which originated from that armor, have inherited the ability to sense cold and pain as well. Ari Daniel, NPR News.

Again on Wall Street, the Dow is now up more than 30 points. I'm Korva Kuhlmann, NPR News in Washington. On NPR News in Washington.