NPR News Now - NPR News: 08-06-2025 11PM EDT

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

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I'm Rachel Martin, host of Wildcard from NPR. I've spent years interviewing all kinds of people, and I've realized there are ideas that we all think about, but don't talk about very much. So I made a shortcut, a deck of cards with questions that anyone can answer, questions that go deep into the experiences that shape us. Listen to the Wild Card podcast only from NPR. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Shay Stevens.

President Trump says there is a good chance that he'll soon meet with the leaders of Russia and Ukraine. NPR Sprinkle Ordonez reports that the White House is reporting progress following a U.S. envoy's visit to Russia. President Trump says that his special envoy, Steve Whitkoff, has had what he called a highly productive meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The road was long and continues to be long, but there's a good chance that there will be a meeting very soon. But he did not give specifics for a future meeting. meeting, and he was careful to temper expectations, declining, for example, to call this a breakthrough. I've been disappointed before with this one.

Trump is threatening Russia with heavy sanctions if Moscow doesn't agree to a peace deal with Ukraine in the coming days. Trump has been increasingly frustrated with Putin for not ending the war sooner. Franco, Ordonez, NPR News. The Trump administration has announced a deal with the state of Indiana to house my detainees at a state prison. NPR's Jimenez-Bustillo reports that the prison will have 1,000 beds for migrants. DHS said the agreement with the Indiana Department of Corrections was made possible by an influx of congressional funding. The large tax and spending bill signed into law gave ICE $45 billion for immigration detention centers. The American Immigration Council

estimates that the new funding could expand detention capacity to at least 600,000 beds. Immigration detention has continued to max out capacity. Federal agents face pressure to increase arrests, and the administration now mandates detaining anyone who entered the country illegally. Jimenez-Bustillo, NPR News, Washington. McDonald's is back in growth mode after months of declines. As NPR's Alina Selyuk reports, the fast food giant says its U.S. business rebounded recently, aided by special deals and a boost in sales to higher income customers. McDonald says its sales in the U.S. grew, two and a half percent in the latest quarter, with global sales rising as well for the first time

in over a year. The company credits recent promotions, like the return of the crispy chicken strips and meal deals tied to a Minecraft movie. Still, McDonald's CEO says in the U.S., he remains cautious about the overall health of the consumer. That's because people are still not visiting McDonald's as often as they used to, especially lower-income shoppers whose visits are down by double digits from last year. Executives note that inflation is eroding wages, people are eating at home more, choosing cheaper items on the menu, and generally feeling down on the economy. Alina Seluk, NPR News.

United Airlines has requested ground stops at all of its main domestic hubs because of an unspecified technical issue. The carrier says the problems do not affect planes already in mid-air, but that additional flight delays were expected. You're listening to NPR. At Fort George, Fort Stewart, Georgia, investigators are trying to find a motive for mass shooting at the military base. An Army sergeant identified as 28-year-old Cornelius Radford is accused of shooting and wounding five soldiers.

The victims are in stable condition. Brigadier General John Lubas says Radford was subdued by fellow soldiers. Female guerrillas seek familiar female faces when they leave one social group in order to join another. As NPR's Nell Greenfield-Boase reports, a new study shows the long-term power of female relationships in this species. For decades, workers with the Diane Fosse Gorilla Fund have been closely observing groups of mountain gorillas in Rwanda. Now, in a science journal called Proceedings of the Royal Society Bee, researchers say they've used all this data to figure out what matters to female guerrillas when they leave one social group and go live with

another, something they can do multiple times over the course of their lives. It turns out that and picking a new group to join, female gorillas are strongly attracted to ones with other females they've lived with and been friendly with before, even if they hadn't been together for years. Nell Greenfield Boyce, NPR News. Band leader in pianists, Eddie Palmieri, has died at the age of 88. Palmieri released a string of albums in the 1960s and 70s that fused jazz and Afro-Caribbean beats to create a new style of Latin music. He's best remembered for his signature piano playing on songs like Belongo and La Malanga.

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