NPR News Now - NPR News: 12-15-2025 7AM EST

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

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Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Corva Coleman. Tributes are pouring in for director Rob Reiner and his wife, producer and photographer Michelle Singer-Riner. The Los Angeles Times and Variety Magazine have published a statement from the Reiner family that says the couple have died. Los Angeles police were called to their home yesterday afternoon and said they found two bodies there. LA Deputy Police Chief Alan Hamilton would not identify any suspects in the case. At this time, the Los Angeles Police Department is not seeking anyone as a suspect or as a person of interest or in any other manner, and we will not be doing that until we conduct our investigation and we move forward. However, the L.A. Police Department is treating the case as an apparent homicide.

Australia's Prime Minister says he wants to discuss his country's gun laws following yesterday's mass shooting that killed 15 people and injured dozens of others. Video shows two men opening fire at people selling. celebrating the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. A bystander is being called a hero after he disarmed one of the men during the attack at Australia's Bondi Beach. NPR Shandales, Duster, has more.

Video shared on social media shows an unarmed man walking up behind one of the suspected gunmen and grabbing him around the neck. The civilian wrestles and disarms the gunman who falls to the ground before walking away. New South Wales Premier Chris Menz praised the man's actions.

A man walking up to a gunman who had fired on the community and single-handedly disarming him, putting his own life at risk to save the lives of countless other people. That man is a genuine hero. NPR has not independently verified the man's identity. But several reports say that the man is 43-year-old Ahmed al-A-Mead, a fruit shop owner. Shandalees Duster, NPR News. One of the suspected gunman was later killed by. Australian police. The second suspect was seriously wounded. It's been raining almost nonstop for the past

five days in Washington State. That's triggered heavy flooding. Some parts of Washington State will see more rainfall all this coming week. From member station KUOW, Scott Greenstone reports the ground is saturated. In Seattle's suburbs, dams are straining to hold back all the water as even more rainfall is about to hit the region. Heavy winds of around 50 miles per hour are also expected. Reed Wolcott is a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. We are completely saturated. There are still trees submerged. Soils are extremely loose. It does not take 50-mile-hour winds to knock over trees. Landslide risk is high in many areas. Mudslides have already hit the tiny town of

to heiken on the shores of Lake Chelan. For NPR news, I'm Scott Greenstone in Seattle. This is NPR. Prosecutors in South Korea alleged the country's impeached former president tried to incite North Korea into attacking South Korea. They claim former president Yun Song-Yal used a pretext in order to impose martial law. They say he wanted to get rid of his political rivals. Chile's next president will be far-right candidate Jose Antonio cast. He one decisively against his left-wing rival in yesterday's presidential runoff. John Barlow reports from Kast's campaign headquarters in Santiago, Chile. Kast ran a campaign based almost entirely on public security and demigration,

claiming that he would install an emergency government in a country which he describes as being in crisis and which is deeply traumatized by a recent rise in crime. Kast's father, Michael, was a Nazi party member who fought in the German army in the Second World War and emigrated to Chile in 1950. His son, Jose Antonio, the president-elect, is a staunch supporter of Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet, and will become the first president since democracy returned in 1990 to openly support the dictatorship. Cast will take office on the 11th of March, 26, the deadline he has repeatedly given

for illegal migrants to leave the country or face persecution and deportation. For NPR news, I'm John Bartlett in Santiago, Chile. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary declared its word of the year. It is slop, as in artificial. intelligence slop. Merriam Webster says AI Slop is digital content of low quality. That's like cheesy propaganda videos and weird ads. A flood of AI Slop has raised concern about miss and disinformation. You're listening to NPR.