NPR News Now - NPR News: 12-28-2025 6PM EST

Episode Date: December 28, 2025

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Support for NPR comes from NPR member stations and Eric and Wendy Schmidt through the Schmidt Family Foundation, working toward a healthy, resilient, secure world for all. On the web at theshmit.org. Live from NPR News, I'm Janine Herbst. President Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky met in Florida today over a revised 20-point ceasefire deal in Russia's nearly four-year-old war. Trump says they have the making. of a deal. You can say 95%, but I don't like to say percentages. I just think we're doing very well. We're very, we could be very close. There are one or two very thorny issues, very tough issues, but I think we're doing very well. We've made a lot of progress today, but really we've made it over the last month. Zelensky says the U.S. wants the U.S. to agree to

security guarantees against further Russian aggression, and says progress was made to that end. We agree that our teams will meet in upcoming weeks to finance. all discussed matters and we agreed with President Trump that he will host us and maybe in Washington, European leaders and Ukrainian delegation. Yes, in January and Ukraine is ready for peace. Both men spoke to European leaders after the call and Trump spoke to Russian President Putin before meeting with Zelensky. Somalia has called for an emergency UN Security Council meeting tomorrow after Israel decided to formally recognize the breakaway. region of Somalia land. And peers, Michelle Kellerman has more. More than 20 Arab and African states

have joined Somalia in condemning the move, calling Israel's recognition a blatant disregard to international law. There are fears in the region that the Israelis want to move Palestinians in Gaza to Somaliland, though authorities in Somaliland say Gaza was not part of the talks on establishing relations. Somaliland plans to join the Abraham Accords, the normalization deals with Israel, that started during the first Trump administration. It's a topic that could come up in Trump's talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday in Florida. Michelle Kellerman, NPR News, Jerusalem. The legal advocacy firm Democracy Forward is asking a federal whistleblower agency to investigate

violations of the Hatch Act by the Trump administration. That restricts federal employees from engaging in partisan political activities while on duty. MPR's Andrea Shue reports. The law is meant to ensure federal workers can do their jobs free from partisan political influence or coercion. Democracy Forward alleges the Trump administration violated the law in multiple ways during the government shutdown. They point to messaging on government websites and out-of-office email replies, blaming Democrats for the shutdown, sometimes referring to them as the radical left. But it's unclear where the complaint will go.

Earlier this year, President Trump fired the special counsel, who leads the agency that enforces is the Hatch Act and replaced him with one of his cabinet members. And in a press release, the Office of Special Counsel said 2025 has been one of the most productive and impactful years in its history. In Piers, Andrea Hsu, you're listening to NPR News. In 2025, a generative AI came out of its novelty phase and fully entered the cultural mainstream. And Piers, Chloe Veltman reports, in one major shift, entertainment giants started to strike deals with AI companies. In one of the most prominent such deals, Universal Music Group settled its copyright infringement lawsuit with the AI music creation platform UDio in October and announced a partnership with its former adversary to launch a subscription service in 2026. Users will be able to customise, stream and share licensed music on UDio's platform.

And Disney announced earlier this month it would invest $1 billion in Open AI. The Mouse House will license many of its characters, including from the Marvel and Pixar universes, for users to create videos with the AI companies' technology. Despite the new collaborative spirit, dozens of ongoing lawsuits in which artists and media corporations allege tech companies use their works without permission or compensation to train their AI models are still working their way through the courts. Chloe Valtman, NPR News. At the weekend box office, Disney's Avatar, Fire and Ash,

took the top spot with an estimated $64 million in ticket sales. The James Cameron sequel has made $542 million globally. That's against a $400 million production budget. In second place, Disney's 3D animated Zootopia with $20 million in ticket sales. I'm Janine Herbst, and you're listening to NPR News from Washington. This message comes from Wise, the app for using money around the globe. When you manage your money with Wise, you'll always get the mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Join millions of customers and visit Wise.com.

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