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Episode Date: August 18, 2026

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Live from NPR News, I'm Jail Snyder. The 60-day ceasefire with Iran has come and gone with no indication that the conflict is any closer to a settlement. President Trump has ruled out extending the interim agreement reached in June. And speaking to Fox News on Monday, he threatened to bomb Oman if it gets in the way. He was asked about that remark by a White House reporter later in the day. This morning you said you would bomb the ass out of Oman if they got in the way of real opening the straight of four moves. Would you say you're out of patience with Oman, as strategic...

No, I don't think they behaved very well, but we'd handle them very easily, just like we do other things. Just being... Oman has been in separate negotiations with Iran on an agreement to manage the strait of Hormuz. Parts of Indiana and Ohio dealing with the aftermath of severe flooding over the last week, extreme rainfall becoming more common in the Midwest, as NPR's Lawrence Summer reports. Storms in the Midwest are getting stormier. could say. The most extreme storms in the Great Lakes region are now dropping 45% more rain than they did back in the 1950s, according to the national climate assessment. That's due in large part

because of climate change. A warmer atmosphere can hold more water vapor, which leads to more rainfall when big storms hit. That trend is expected to continue as the climate keeps warming. The federal government is now updating rainfall records nationwide. Cities can use that data to plan for future storms and build infrastructure that's more likely to withstand them. Lauren Summer, NPR News. West Virginians also cleaning up from flooding that officials say killed a woman whose car was swept away by rising water. More than four inches of rain fell over the weekend, causing mudslides, tearing up roads,

and prompting dozens of water rescues. The Trump administration facing a legal challenge over withheld anti-terrorism dollars. Cynthia Abrams of member station WPLN in Nashville. reports of four localities, Nashville, Columbus, plus two Texas counties, are arguing that the federal government should not be able to tie election security mandates to grant funding. The grant is intended to help cities and states prevent terrorist acts. But in June, FEMA placed new eligibility mandates on the grant. These require states to enact new election policies,

like using a controversial system to check voter eligibility and manually audit some paper back. If states don't comply with these new requirements, the federal government says it will withhold 20% of the grant. But the lawsuit says that only Congress can set the terms of federal spending. According to the Constitution, plaintiffs are asking a district court to declare the election requirements on the grant unlawful. For NPR news, I'm Cynthia Abrams in Nashville. Stocks are largely down in Asia. Japan's benchmark in D.K. declined 2.5% in 2%. and Tuesday trading. This is NPR. The Supreme Court will not hear President Trump's appeal in the E. Jean Carroll case. MPR's Rachel Treasman reports on the second time the High Court has rejected Trump's bid to overturn the $5 million verdict.

Writer E. Jean Carroll alleges that Trump sexually assaulted her in a department store dressing room in the 1990s. A federal civil jury found Trump liable in 23, ordering him to pay Carol $5 million in damages. received the money last month, her lawyer said, after years of Trump's appeals and delays. The Supreme Court rejected Trump's initial appeal in June. The president asked the Supreme Court to reconsider, but it denied that request on Monday. Trump has separately asked the court to overturn a different federal civil defamation verdict that would award Carol more than $83 million. Rachel Treasman and PR News. The opening statements have begun in Las Vegas in the trial of a man linked to the killing of Tupac Shakur.

Chouc was killed in a drive-by shooting in 1996. Few have been willing to speak about it, but a prosecutor told jurors Monday that the man accused of orchestrating the shooting is the one person who has a hard time being silent. Dwayne Davis is charged with murder. He wrote a tell-all memoir in 2019 that revived the cold case.

The vaccination rate for American kindergartners is down as exemptions reach a record high. Federal data released. Monday show vaccine exemptions rose to 4.2% up from 3.6% the previous year, marking the fourth consecutive year of rising exemption rates, mostly due to non-medical reasons. This is NPR News.