Ryland Barton

Scientists have found evidence that a sea creature from 300 million years ago previously thought to be the world's earliest octopus is actually a nautilus relative.

A University of Reading zoology lecturer found that the fossil had too many teeth to be an octopus.

It had puzzled scientists for years because it's much older than the next earliest known octopus.

I'm Ryland Barton, and you're listening to NPR News from Washington.

Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Ryland Barton.

President Trump says he asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reduce his country's attacks on Lebanon.

Trump said in an interview with NBC News that he made the request in a call yesterday.

NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben has more.

Energy traffic in the Middle East remains snarled despite a ceasefire between the U.S.

and Iran.

NPR's Scott Horsley has more on the ripple effects here at home.

The number of babies born in the U.S.

dropped again last year, according to preliminary data from the CDC.

And as NPR's Brian Mann reports, immigration into the U.S.

is also plunging.

Since 2007, there's been a decline in the general fertility rate of 23 percent.

First Lady Melania Trump says she did not know Jeffrey Epstein.

In a rare public statement, she addressed an email she sent to his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell.

and specifically denied that Epstein introduced her to Trump.

She called it casual correspondence.