NPR News Now - NPR News: 08-14-2025 3PM EDT

Episode Date: August 14, 2025

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Live from NPR news, I'm Lakshmi Singh. President Trump predicts his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin can make peace after tomorrow's summit. I think it's going to be a good meeting, but the more important meeting will be the second meeting that we're having. We're going to have a meeting with President Putin, President Zelensky, myself, and maybe we'll bring some of the European leaders along, maybe not. Trump has referenced boundaries and lens when he talked about what it might take for Russia to agree to a ceasefire with Ukraine. Ukraine has categorically rejected any proposal to cede territory as a condition of securing a truce in his country's more than three-year defense against Russia's full-scale invasion. Mississippi can still require users to verify their ages before they're allowed on social media sites such as Instagram or Snapchat. Today, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Net Choices' emergency appeal on grounds the law threatens rights to privacy and free expression.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote that the tech industry group could eventually see. succeed in showing Mississippi's law is unconstitutional, but he ultimately agreed with the High Court's current position saying net choice failed to sufficiently demonstrate legal harm. More than 100 aid organizations have issued a demand to end what they describe as Israel's weaponization of aid to Gaza. Here's NPR's Jane Arraf. The statement says most organizations have been unable to deliver a single truckload of aid to Gaza since March when Israel introduced new registration rules. Aid groups describe the rules as

unlawful, unsafe, and incompatible with humanitarian principles. Israel issued a statement saying that the refusal of some non-governmental organizations to register raises the possibility of ties between those groups and the militant group

Hamas. One U.S. based group, Anera, says Israel is blocking more than $7 million worth of its aid, including food for 6 million meals, just a few miles from the border. Jane Aref, NPR News, Amman. Residents in Washington, D.C.,'s most dangerous neighborhoods say they welcome more law enforcement, but question whether President Trump's deployment of soldiers and federal agents is a solution.

NPR's Frank Langford has this from Washington. Aaron lives in Congress Heights in a section of D.C. where there have been 38 homicides so far this year. But Aaron, who asked NPR not to reveal his last name, to protect. his federal government job is skeptical that National Guard troops who aren't trained in law enforcement will help. I would have loved to have seen maybe more funding for police or maybe getting some of the command folks behind the desk and put them out on the street for presence. Instead, Aaron says he thinks Trump is making a show of force to embarrass a Democratic-led city instead of addressing the capital's very real crime problem in a lasting way. Frank Langford, NPR News, Washington.

From Washington, this is NPR News. Florida is on track to building a second immigration jail, as the fate of the Everglades facility known as Alligator Alcatraz, remains under litigation. Today, Governor Rondi Santos said his administration plans to use and now close Baker County Prison as a, quote, deportation depot. And he adds federal agents are planning for many more deportations on top of the thousands of people already detained or removed from the U.S. President Trump has signed an executive order to speed deregulation of commercial space launches. NPR's Jeff Brownfield reports the order seeks to roll back several

environmental protections. The executive order's goal is to promote new space-based industries and cutting-edge defense systems. To speed the process, it calls on the Department of Transportation to, quote, eliminate or expedite environmental reviews and some safety requirements for commercial spacecraft. It also instructs the Secretary of Transportation to look into waiving environmental requirements for launch pads and other ground-based facilities. The order could benefit several commercial space companies, including SpaceX, which has been fined in recent years for multiple environmental and safety violations at its facilities. Jeff Brumfield, NPR News. The United States experience its biggest month-to-month jump in wholesale inflation in more

than three years. The Labor Department reports a producer price index, which tracks the average change over time in prices before they reach consumers, rose nine-tenths of a percent last month from June. Rising wholesale prices are often passed down to consumers. I'm Lakshmi Singh, NPR News.