NPR News Now - NPR News: 12-29-2025 12AM EST

Episode Date: December 29, 2025

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This holiday season, the team at up first is still hard at work with all new episodes, but the news does not take a holiday. And we know it's harder than ever to keep up this time of year. Listen for three essential stories in under 15 minutes. Get caught up and get on with your day. Up first, listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Live from NPR News, I'm Dale Wilman. President Trump and Ukrainian president, President Volodymyr Zelensky met at Trump's Mar-a-Lago home Sunday to discuss a revised 20-point peace plan for the war in Russia. Trump said the two leaders made progress today, but they need more time. Most importantly, Zelensky said he was optimistic about security guarantees. We discussed all the aspects of the peace framework, which includes, and we have great achievements.

20-point peace plan, 90% agreed, and U.S. Ukraine security guarantees 100% agreed. And Zelensky says he plans to meet with Trump. again in the new year to finish this 20-point plan. That's NPR's Luke Garrett. Before the two met, Trump said he had a two-and-a-half-hour phone call with Russian leader of Vladimir Putin. He said that discussion was very productive, and he insisted that Putin wants peace, even as Moscow continues to launch deadly strikes at Ukraine. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, is now on his way to the U.S. to meet President Trump in Florida on Monday. He's planning to raise Israel's concerns about Iran,

Hezbollah and Hamas. MPIRs, Michelle Kellerman, has more. Trump's 20-point peace plan for Gaza is still in phase one. The president has yet to name his so-called Board of Peace for Gaza, and there's still no international force there. Israel has set up a yellow line in the territory controlling one side and continuing to carry out strikes on the other. Netanyahu has said the peace plan can't move to the next phase until Hamas returns the

body of the last Israeli hostage, though Hamas is. as everyone who knew where that body was, has been killed. Gaza isn't the only thing on Netanyahu's agenda. Israeli officials say that Iran is building up its arsenal of ballistic missiles, months after Trump ordered massive strikes on nuclear sites in Iran. Michelle Kellerman, NPR News, Jerusalem. An intense cyclone storm is expected to dump heavy snow from the upper Midwest to the Great Lakes as people head home following the Christmas holidays.

That's according to the National Weather Service, MPR's Frank Lankfit has more on our story. The Weather Service forecast more than a foot of snow across parts of the Upper Great Lakes and as much as two feet along the southern shore of Lake Superior. As of Sunday afternoon, nearly 180 flights or more than half were delayed at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Nearly three quarters were delayed at Minneapolis-St. Paul International. The Transportation Security Administration expects Sunday to be the heaviest travel day of the holiday season, with nearly 2.9 million people in transit across the nation. The winter storm is expected to continue to move east, with freezing rain forecast for the interior of the northeast later Sunday. A mix of snow, sleet, and freezing rain is projected for northern

New England by Monday morning. Frank Langford, NPR News. I'm Dale Wilman, and you're listening to NPR News. Preliminary results of a snap parliamentary election in in Kosovo show that the party of the country's prime minister has won by a clear margin. The Self-Determination Party won almost 50% of the votes, while the opposition Democratic Party of Kosovo was in second with 21%. State election authorities, say around 44% of those eligible vote, did so. 2025 will go down as a year of chaos for anti-poverty groups in the country. As NPR's Jennifer Ludden reports, they've had to scramble to keep operating

as the Trump administration targeted a string of safety net programs. The turmoil started in January with a presidential order to freeze all funding and came a string of budget cuts, pauses, and some reversals. Kelly Haddis at Community Action Group Hap in Ohio says the biggest challenge is uncertainty. The panic and like the day-to-day not knowing was just really difficult. The group laid off some people and shifted others to part-time, including front-desk clerk Kelsey Sexton. It cut my paychecks completely in half. You know, we have a mortgage, a car payment.

My husband was like, what are we going to do? And I'm like, I don't know. Advocates see little relief ahead as major cuts to Medicaid and snap food aid take hold. Jennifer Lutton and P.R. News, Logan, Ohio. One person was killed and another was critically injured Sunday when two helicopters crashed in midair. The accident happened in southern New Jersey. Video taken at the scene of the crash shows one of the helicopters spinning rapidly down to ground. An investigation into the cause of that crash is now underway. I'm Dale Wilman and

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