NPR News Now - NPR News: 08-16-2025 2AM EDT

Episode Date: August 16, 2025

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Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Dan Roman. President Trump said he had a very productive meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. As NPR's Franco Ordonez reports, he's suggesting it's now up to Ukraine's president Vladimir Zelensky to close the deal. After meeting with Vladimir Putin, President Trump sat down for an interview with Fox's Sean Hannity. Trump reiterated that there were still some sticking points to reaching an agreement, but that they made some progress. Now it's really up to President Zelensky to get it done. And I would also say the European nations, they have to get involved a little bit. Trump suggested there could be follow-up meetings between the Russian and Ukrainian leaders and that he could be there. Trump characterized the

talks as a 10 out of 10 because of how the two sides got along. And he added that he was pleased with Putin's remark that he would not have invaded Ukraine if Trump had been president instead of Joe Biden. Franco, Ordonez, NPR News. A federal judge in Washington, D.C., Friday, approved a plan where Washington, D.C.,'s police chief will remain in place while federal police and the National Guard patrol the city alongside local officers. The Trump administration Thursday sought to install the administrator of the food and drug, excuse me, the drug enforcement agency into the post. City officials filed a lawsuit to stop that. NPR's Kerry Johnson explains. Judge Anna Reyes, a Biden appointee is overseeing the case. She encouraged both sides to come to some kind of a practical solution because there are police who need to know who's the boss and what they're doing. The judge said the White House has a lot of power here to ask D.C. to provide services like help with immigration, but that the order is written may go too far.

DC officials call the Trump administration's move an attempted hostile takeover of the city's police force. The judge said the DEA official, working with the city can remain in that position. A recent executive order signed by President Trump paves the way for retirement accounts to start including assets such as crypto, real estate, and private equity. NPR's Laurel Wansley reports. Most people's retirement accounts are full of stock and bond funds, but this executive order directs several federal agencies to start clearing the path for assets like crypto and private equity in accounts like 401Ks.

There's no law banning these more. exotic investments in a retirement account. But federal law requires that employers be prudent in what they offer in employees' retirement plans, or they risk being sued by their workers. Experts say these new kinds of assets may not be well-suited to everyone's 401k. Private equity, for example, often charges very high fees and can tie up money for a decade, and crypto has high volatility and is loosely regulated. Laurel Wamsley and PR News. Stocks closed the week. Mix. The Dow was down the S&P and NASDAQ were up. This is NPR. U.S. Steel says it believes a gas valve failure led to an explosion at one of the plants

near Pittsburgh that killed two workers and injured 10 more Monday. Reporter Reid Frazier says the company has been reviewing video of the explosion. The plant in Clarton, Pennsylvania, makes coke, a key material in steelmaking by baking coal at high temperatures. The main byproduct of the process is a flammable and potentially explosive gas. In a statement, the company says its initial investigation indicates the explosion happened when workers were flushing a gas valve in preparation for maintenance. The company says pressure had built inside the valve leading to the valve failure. It says this allowed gas to escape into the open and that the gas exploded when it found an ignition source. The U.S. Chemical Safety Board is also

investigating. For NPR News, I'm Reid Fraser in Pittsburgh. After a six-month freeze and a long legal battle with states, the Trump administration says it will reopen a federal program to fund the installation of high-speed electric vehicle chargers along freeways across the country from coast to coast. The U.S. DOT froze some of the estimated $5 billion that Congress appropriated for the program after it was approved and passed by Congress during the Biden administration. Trump administration officials made it clear they have not changed their minds about the program, However, they now acknowledge the separation of powers gives Congress, not the executive branch, the ultimate authority over spending money that Congress has already appropriated. From Washington, this is NPR News.