NPR News Now - NPR News: 10-28-2025 6AM EDT

Episode Date: October 28, 2025

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Live from NPR News in Washington, on Corva Coleman, the federal government shutdown is nearly a month old. Democratic and Republican lawmakers still cannot agree on a spending measure that would end it. Most federal workers are not getting paid. The largest union for these employees is demanding the Congress pass a spending measure immediately. A federal judge in California holds a hearing today on President Trump's layoffs of some federal workers during the shutdown. NPR's Andrea Shoe reports the layoffs have been paused for the last two. weeks. The Trump administration has been pushing back against U.S. District Judge Susan Ilston's decision to temporarily halt layoffs, including at agencies that have yet to announce plans for

layoffs. The administration says the court lacks jurisdiction to hear the case and that the unions have failed to show that they are suffering irreparable harm as a result of the administration's actions. The federal employee unions that brought the case, meanwhile argue that federal workers are suffering emotional trauma as a result of the recent layoffs coming on top of funding and staffing cuts to their agencies earlier this year. Andrea Shue and PR News. The National Hurricane Center says Hurricane Melissa has kept its monster's strength overnight. The top-rated Category 5 hurricane has top-sustained winds of 175 miles per hour.

Its outer wind bands are already striking Jamaica. Reporter Nick Davis says Melissa is expected to make. a direct hit on the Caribbean island. Rain's starting to get a little bit heavier. We knew that we'd get up to 30 inches of rain in some parts of Jamaica, which will lead to inevitably plenty of flooding and also landslides, especially in the more mountains parts of the country. And it's this constant rainfall which is going to sit over the island,

which is it's going to create a real issue for the country. Combine that with the winds, combine that with the storm surge. Jamaica kind of waits. We're on a bit of a holding pattern at the moment to see how it's progresses. But everybody kind of knows it's going to get worse. Nick Davis reporting from Jamaica. New York City is testing a new program to alert police officers to potential active shooters, rather school shooters. It includes a panic button that schools can use to get a quicker response than by calling 911. Matthew Fraser is New York City's chief technology officer. being able to have emergency responders respond in real time and not just know that something's

happening at a school, but where in the school is actually happening. However, the emergency button will only be piloted in 25 school buildings in New York this school year. Game 3 of the World Series went 18 innings last night. The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Toronto Blue Jays 6 to 5 when Dodger Freddie Freeman homered with a walkoff. That game lasted for more than six and a half hours and they're going to play game for tonight in L.A. This is NPR. President Trump is in Japan. He has signed a trade deal involving rare earth minerals.

He's also meeting Japanese business leaders. Big tech company Amazon says it will lay off some 14,000 roles in its corporate workforce. In an online message to employees, Amazon officials say artificial intelligence is letting companies innovate more quickly. But Amazon did not specify how AI may. have changed any of its workers' roles. Amazon is a financial supporter of NPR. The Federal Reserve opens its two-day policy meeting today in Washington. Policymakers are widely expected to cut interest rates by as much as a quarter of a percentage point. Any Fed announcement will come tomorrow. A Halloween trend is scaring up customers at some car washes. NPR's Netta Ullaby

reports they're all over the country. Fast splash car wash has about a dozen locations. This one in Detroit is only haunted on the weekends leading up to Halloween. Employees costumed as ghouls and horror movie monsters, tap on your windows and brandish chainsaws as you wait in line for a wash. The tunnel is lit blood red. Evil clowns pop out to scare you. Or, okay, to scare me. No one's keeping track of the exact number of haunted car washes, but at least one national chain says it's adding more of them every year. Tommy's Express has hundreds of locations from Virginia to Alaska. It says half of its car washes are haunted over Halloween.

Netta Ulibee, NPR News. And I'm Corva Coleman, NPR News in Washington.