NPR News Now - NPR News: 06-06-2025 12AM EDT

Episode Date: June 6, 2025

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On Fridays, the 1A podcast is all about helping you cut through the info fog and get to what's important in the news. Close out the week with us on our Friday News Roundup. Hear from reporters who've been embedded with the biggest news of the week. Join us every week for the Friday News Roundup. Listen to the 1A podcast from NPR and WAMU. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Dan Ronan. President Trump is threatening to end billions of dollars in contracts and subsidies given

to Elon Musk's companies. As NPR's Bobby Allen reports, it comes amid a growing feud between the president and the world's richest man. President Trump says ending federal support to Musk's companies would be the easiest way to save government money. Musk's business empire is backed by billions of dollars in government contracts, tax breaks, and other support. Much of the federal money flowing to Musk's companies supports SpaceX through Department

of Defense contracts. In response, Musk wrote that SpaceX will begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft, which delivers U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station and brings them home. Musk's tensions with Trump escalated when the president said Musk disliked Trump's signature tax and spending bill because it ended electric vehicle tax credits. Musk replied that it is unfair EV solar incentives would be slashed with no cuts to oil and gas subsidies. Bobby Allen, NPR News.

A federal judge says AmeriCorps must restore its programs in 24 states after the Trump administration gutted them. But as NPR's Jennifer Ludden reports, the decision is only a partial victory for the service agency. The judge agreed with two dozen Democratic-led states that AmeriCorps did not follow proper procedure in dismantling its programs. The agency ended grants and abruptly fired tens of thousands of mostly young service members who work in schools, national parks,

and communities hit by disaster. Programs in the states that sued could now be restarted, but the judge declined to block the firing of about 85 percent of AmeriCorps staff. She said it was too speculative to argue that the agency could not function without those jobs, and she said states made an unfounded assumption that those employees could return smoothly to the jobs they held before. Jennifer Lutten in Peer News, Washington. The U.N. Secretary General is paying tribute to fallen U.N. staff members, particularly in Gaza. He says the world should not grow numb and accept

the killing of humanitarian workers as a new normal. NPR's Michel Kalaman reports. Secretary General Antonio Guterres says this past year has been especially devastating for UN workers in Gaza. 126 have been killed. Nearly all of them worked with UNRWA, the UN agency that aids Palestinians. More than one in every 50 UNRWA staff in Gaza has been killed in this atrocious conflict. This is the highest staff death toll in United Nations history. The U.S. has stopped funding UNRWA and is promoting an aid operation in Gaza that the UN says does not meet its standards of neutrality. On Wednesday, the Trump administration vetoed

a Security Council resolution that would have demanded a ceasefire in Gaza and the free flow of aid. Michelle Kelliman, NPR News, the State Department. Game one of the NBA Finals Thursday went to the Indiana Pacers against Oklahoma City. You're listening to NPR. Pope Leo and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke by phone yesterday, and they addressed

the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. From Rome, Claire Jeanette Gravy reports. In his first phone call with Vladimir Putin, Pope Leo XIV appeared eager to continue the efforts of his predecessor, Pope Francis. He spoke to Putin about prisoner exchanges and the abduction of children taken from Ukraine by Russia. The Pope made an appeal for Russia to make a gesture that would favor peace, emphasizing the importance of dialogue, the Vatican said. Putin countered that Ukrainian leaders were banking on escalating the conflict. The call came after the latest round of talks in Istanbul ended with little movement toward ending Russia's three-year-long war in Ukraine.

For NPR News, I'm Claire Jean-Gravet in Rome. On June the 14th, when the United States Army holds its 250th anniversary parade in Washington, D.C., the nearby Ronald Reagan National Airport across the Potomac River will suspend its operations during the event, airport officials announced on Thursday. Officials said the move is being taken to accommodate military aircraft flyers along the parade road. On January the 29th, a Blackhawk Army helicopter

hit an American Airlines flight as it was landing at the airport, killing 67 people on board the two aircraft. There have also been close calls involving military and civilian aircraft in the past year near the airport, 67 people on board the two aircraft. There have also been close calls involving military and civilian aircraft in the past year near the airport, which is in some of the most complex airspace in the country. Passengers with reservations on that date are being urged to contact their airlines for their reservations. From Washington, this is NPR

News. I'm Dan Ronan. Fall in love with new music every Friday at All Songs Considered. That's NPR News, I'm Dan Ronan.