NPR News Now - NPR News: 06-18-2025 7PM EDT

Episode Date: June 18, 2025

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President Trump has spent the first few months of his term testing the limits of presidential power. He's tried to upend decades of established trade policy and foreign policy, and taken over powers long ceded to Congress. NPR's podcast, Trump's Terms, curates the network's coverage of the Trump administration. It helps you follow the latest and understand what it means. Trump's Terms. Listen in the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack Spear.

President Trump has not announced a decision on whether to order US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. But as NPR's Franco Ordoñez reports, Trump once again convened his national security team in the Situation Room today. Speaking from the Oval Office, President Trump says he has some ideas about what to do about Iran's nuclear sites that are hidden deep inside a mountain, but that he likes to make decisions just before they're due because things change, especially with war. We're the only ones that have the capability to do it, but that doesn't mean I'm going to do it. Trump says ultimately the decision boils down to not allowing Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

I'm not looking to fight, but if it's a choice between fighting and them having a nuclear weapon, you have to do what you have to do. Trump says the Iranians want to meet and even offer to come to the White House, but he says it may be too late. Franco, Ordonez, NPR News, The White House. The UN World Food Program says it's only been able to bring in about 400 trucks of food to Gaza in the past month as compared to as many as 600 trucks per day during a short-lived ceasefire earlier this year. The UN warns of the risk of famine.

Morf Manpere's Ayah Batraoui. Gaza's Health Ministry says 140 people were killed in Israeli attacks over the past 24 hours, making it the second deadliest day since Israel broke a ceasefire in March. At least half of those killed, the ministry says, were people trying to get food. Some were killed waiting for aid trucks. Others were shot dead trying to reach sites distributing some food under a new Israeli plan restricting its distribution. Dr. Mark Brunner, an emergency physician from Oregon, is volunteering at a hospital flooded by

casualties. It's you know day after day you know every time we know that there's a so-called food distribution we know that there's gonna be annihilation. Israel's military says it's fired warning shots at crowds and that some incidents are under review. Ayel Batraoui, NPR News, Dubai. Home building is slumping amid economic uncertainties and high mortgage rates. As NPR's Laura Wamsley explains, the latest figures show a decline in housing starts and builder confidence. Housing starts dropped nearly 10 percent in May. The drop-off was concentrated in buildings with five or more units, which declined 30 percent compared to a month earlier.

Those figures are from the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Permits and starts for single-family homes rose slightly last month, but builders are worried about the future. A survey by Wells Fargo and the National Association of Home Builders found that confidence among single-family home builders

dropped another two points this month to one of the lowest readings since 2012. With more homes for sale than buyers in many markets, nationally it's been a slow spring for existing home sales. Laurel Wamsley, NPR News, Washington. A mixed close on Wall Street. The Dow fell 44 points today. The Nasdaq was up 25 points.

You're listening to NPR. A new study finds addiction to social media, mobile phones and video games is linked to a higher rate of suicidal thoughts and behaviors. In fact, we do chatter. She has more. Researchers looked at data from a long-term study that followed more than 4,000 kids for four years, starting at when they were between nine and 10 years old. By age 14, about a third of the kids had become increasingly addicted to social media. About a quarter had become increasingly addicted to their mobile phone,

and more than 40% to video games. Study author Yunyu Zhao is a professor at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York. And these youths are significantly more likely to report suicidal behaviors and thoughts. Xiao says researchers and health care providers often use screen time to gauge problematic use among teens, but her findings show that they should be looking for symptoms of addiction to screens in social media and young people. The study is published in JAMA, Ritu Chatterjee, NPR News. A major storm churning in the waters off the coast of Mexico has now become a hurricane.

Officials at the National Hurricane Center say Eric has strengthened to a Category 2 storm with maximum sustained winds of 110 miles an hour as the storm heads toward Mexico's southern coast. Eric is expected to intensify over the eastern Pacific before making landfall. The storm at Las Check was 105 miles south of Puerto Angel. It's expected the storm could start battering the Mexican coast tomorrow with damaging winds and possible life-threatening flooding. Oil prices rose for a sick straight day amid tensions in the Mideast. Oil gained 30 cents a barrel to 75.14 a barrel in New York.

I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington. The best kind of celebrity interview is one where you find out that the person who made York. I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington.