Consider This from NPR

A fact checker hangs up his Pinocchios

31 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"In an era where false claims are the norm, it's much easier to ignore the fact-checkers." Those are the final words of the final column of Glenn Kess...

How firing hundreds of employees this year has transformed the Justice Department

30 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This year, hundreds of employees at the Justice Department have been fired, sometimes over clashes with the Trump administration, and other times for ...

A new executive order tackles causes of homelessness. Why are some advocates worried?

29 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Donald Trump is aiming to fundamentally shift how the country manages homelessness with a new executive order he signed last week. It calls ...

What reporting in Gaza shows amid Trump's break from Netanyahu on starvation

28 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

New light has emerged between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump, with the latter disputing Israel's claim that ther...

Facing persistent scrutiny over Epstein, the Trump administration rehashes 2016 probe

27 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump traveled to Scotland to talk trade with the EU and play golf. But as soon as he landed he was asked about Jeffrey Epstein, the convict...

Texas floods: how to talk to people on the worst day of their lives

26 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

At least 135 people died earlier this month when floods swept through the Texas Hill Country. As in any other natural disasters, journalists from arou...

How have RFK Jr.'s vaccine policies impacted America's public health?

25 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Before he entered politics, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made a career out of stoking doubt about vaccines, promoting theories contradicted by mountains of s...

Six months in, how Trump has changed the Education Department.

24 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Federal education policy has seen a lot of changes since President Trump's inauguration. For example, the Department of Education itself, which Trump ...

Six months of 'shock and awe' on immigration enforcement

23 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Since returning to office, President Trump has moved swiftly to upend decades of federal policy—from education to healthcare to vaccines...but nowhe...

A civil rights organization declares a 'state of emergency' in the U.S.

22 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As a candidate in 2024, President Trump promised – often – to end what he and other conservatives describe as "woke" policies.On his first day in ...

Is Emil Bove the face of a new MAGA judiciary?

21 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump helped reshape the federal courts during his first term in office. And he relied heavily on the Federalist Society in that effort, whi...

With plea deals canceled, what happens next with the Guantanamo 9/11 trials?

20 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Plea deals with the 9/11 defendants, including for the alleged ringleader, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, have been canceled. Families of those who died on S...

Florida: The front line of Trump's immigration crackdown

19 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

NPR correspondent Jasmine Garsd has taken several reporting trips to Florida recently, a state seeing some of the most aggressive immigration enforcem...

Trump says no one cares about Epstein. Why won't his base let it go?

18 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

One of the narratives at the heart of President Trump's political movement is this: American society is dominated by a shadowy group of elites, and th...

Congress has voted to eliminate government funding for public media

18 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Act now to ensure public media remains free and accessible to all. Your donation will help this essential American service survive and thrive. Visit d...

Will air traffic control's $12.5 billion update fix employee morale?

17 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Earlier this week, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy testified on Capitol Hill, where he thanked Congress for recently approving $12.5 billion dolla...

Tariffs are a tax. Are you already paying it?

16 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been over three months since President Trump announced very big across-the-board tariffs on imports from nearly every territory on Earth–includ...

Climate change is fueling brutal rainstorms. Here's how to stay safe

15 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's not just Texas. In the past couple of weeks, communities all around the country have been hit with torrential rains and deadly flash flooding. Ex...

Trump threatens Russia over Ukraine. Will it make a difference?

14 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump has made some big shifts in U.S. policy on Russia's war with Ukraine lately. In the course of two weeks, Trump halted and reinstated w...

What do we know about what's driving political violence?

13 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been a year since the assassination attempt on President Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania and the motivations of the shooter are still unclear.The U...

Inside the Diddy trial: why it felt like a watch party at the courthouse

12 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On July 2nd, Sean Combs was acquitted of the most serious charges he faced: racketeering and sex trafficking. He was found guilty on two counts of tra...

When old oil wells become 'orphans,' that's a problem

11 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

All across the U.S., there are aging oil and natural gas wells no longer in use.A lot of them don't have anyone on the hook to seal them up. Some esti...

A harrowing journey to find food in Gaza

10 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Israel bans international journalists from independent access to Gaza. But NPR's Anas Baba is from Gaza, and in the 21 months he has been reporting on...

After devastating floods a Central Texas community comes together

10 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been nearly a week since devastating flooding tore through Kerr County, Texas killing more than a hundred people.Now, after unimaginable tragedy,...

The U.S. birth rate is falling fast. Why? It's complicated

08 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The total fertility rate is a small number with big consequences.It measures how many babies, on average, each woman will have over her lifetime. And ...

Flooding is common in Texas Hill Country. This was different

07 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Imagine standing in water shallow enough to just barely hit the soles of your feet. And then it rises so fast that in just about ten minutes, it's up ...

When it comes to vaccines, how are pediatricians restoring trust?

06 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If you're a parent, decisions about vaccines have gotten a lot more confusing recently. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.'s health department is walking back lon...

The songs that define America

04 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Independence Day means different things to each of us. On this 249th birthday for America, we spend some time looking at different definitions of Amer...

The Trump domestic policy megabill is set to become law

03 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump put essentially his entire domestic agenda in one bill.It would significantly cut clean energy incentives, Medicaid and food assistanc...

Saving history one story at a time

02 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This summer marks 80 years since the end of World War II when Allied forces liberated Nazi-occupied Europe, and also began to discover the horrific sc...

House Speaker may have to make a lot of promises to get bill to Trump's desk

01 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The massive tax and spending bill central to President Trump's agenda is one step closer to reality.After weeks of negotiations and 49 consecutive vot...

Why a GOP senator says the budget bill breaks Trump's promise

30 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The massive budget bill that Senate Republicans are debating pays for some of its tax cuts by slashing hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid spe...

What this term says about where the Supreme Court is headed

29 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A number of Supreme Court decisions handed down this term have expanded the power of the president while limiting the power of the courts. How has thi...

Iran's nuclear sites got bombed. North Korea? It's another story

28 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Although President Trump launched air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities, the administration has chosen a different path when dealing with Kim ...

The Supreme Court just lifted a key check on presidential power

27 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Three different federal judges have issued nationwide blocks to President Trump's executive order to deny U.S. citizenship to some babies born to immi...

Autism rates have exploded. Could the definition be partly to blame?

26 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has spent years spreading doubt about the safety of vaccines and linking them to autism....

We're not built for this heat

25 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tens of millions of people across the US are currently under a heat advisory. And the extreme heat isn't just affecting people. You may have seen vide...

Medical views on self-managed abortion shifting since overturn of Roe

24 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Three years ago, the Supreme Court ended the constitutional right to an abortion in the United States.As the legal landscape shifted, the medical land...

Iran launches missiles at U.S. base in Qatar

23 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On Monday, Iran struck back against the United States, firing missiles at a U.S. base in Qatar. The retaliatory strikes come two days after the U.S. a...

What are the wider repercussions of the U.S. bombing of Iran's nuclear sites?

22 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The U.S. joined Israel's war on Iran and over the weekend bombed three of the country's nuclear sites, including Fordo, located deep inside a mountain...

Covering the military parade and a No Kings rally on the same day

21 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Frank Langfitt has covered the world. Now he reports for NPR as a roving correspondent, focusing on stories that help us understand a changing America...

How Gabby Giffords is grappling with the rise in political violence

20 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last weekend, Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman, a Democrat, and her husband, Mark, were shot and killed at their home by a man impersonating a pol...

Afghans in the US have lost protected status. What happens now?

19 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Many Afghans who helped the US military or who were persecuted by the Taliban for other reasons found refuge in the United States. They were granted T...

Lessons from Iraq, as Trump teases attacks on Iran

18 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2003, the U.S. launched a war in Iraq based on what turned out to be bad intelligence about weapons programs, then spent years mired in a conflict ...

What's at stake in the conflict between Israel and Iran?

17 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The United States has worked for decades to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon. Now Israel says it is attacking Iran to remove that threat. W...

The big SCOTUS decisions looming

16 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Around this time every year, the U.S. Supreme Court ends its term with a bang. The Justices typically save their biggest rulings for June.Outstanding ...

Is this the end of the rule of law in America?

15 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Since the start of his second term, President Trump has been at odds with the federal courts.The protests in Los Angeles are just the latest series of...

The spending cuts one state could face if Trump's massive bill becomes law

14 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Kentucky is one of the poorest states and is likely to see billions of dollars cut from Medicaid and other government benefits if Trump's spending bil...

Israel struck Iran. What's next?

13 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Early Friday local time, Israel finally did what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been threatening to do for years: It launched a massive attack ...

What's next in the case that symbolizes Trump's immigration crackdown?

12 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Kilmar Abrego Garcia: a name that's become near-synonymous with the Trump Administration's immigration crackdown.Abrego Garcia was arrested by ICE age...

Is Trump's immigration bet working?

11 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The White House's message on what's happening in Los Angeles is simple: this is what President Trump was elected to do.It is true that polls have foun...

Fentanyl deaths among the young are dropping. Can the trend continue?

10 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Fentanyl and other street drugs killed more than 230,000 people under the age of 35 in the U.S. over the last decade. But now new federal data shows d...

The Insurrection Act is back on the table

09 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The last time a President deployed the National Guard over a governor's objections was more than 50 years ago.Over the weekend, President Trump did ju...

Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass reacts to federalized National Guard troops in her city

08 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Citing a rarely used law, President Trump bypassed California's governor Gavin Newsom, and ordered two thousand national guard troops to Los Angeles f...

Reporting on abuse by federal judges means cracking open a culture of fear

07 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In March, NPR Justice Correspondent Carrie Johnson reported on problems with the way federal courts police sexual harassment and bullying. A culture ...

Do private school voucher programs work?

06 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

House Republicans' reconciliation bill, which includes a first-of-its-kind national private school voucher program, is now in the hands of the Senate....

A new travel ban is coming. Will it hold up in court?

05 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump has signed a new travel ban. Travelers from 12 countries will be barred from entering the US, and people from an additional seven coun...

How New Zealand's Jacinda Ardern broke the political mold

04 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Whether it was her history making win in 2017.Or the history she made as only the second woman elected to lead a country to give birth while IN office...

What's going wrong with aid in Gaza?

03 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tuesday morning brought another shooting near a food distribution site in Gaza — the third in as many days. This time, more than two dozen people we...

What's the message behind Trump's military parade?

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the past, most military parades in the U.S. were staged to signal the end of a war and welcome home of those who fought. The last major military pa...

Three years into his war on Ukraine, what does Putin really want?

01 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump wants to make a deal with Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine. Putin says Russia wants to engage in peace talks, but Putin has al...

What's behind Trump's crackdown on universities — and why it matters

30 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Trump administration has thrown so many curveballs at colleges and universities, it can be hard to keep track. But there's logic behind the many e...

The CDC changed its COVID vaccine guidance. What does that mean for you?

29 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced new COVID recommendations this week, it raised questions among clinicians and...

Children of ISIS fighter find new life in Minnesota

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When ISIS was at its height, its ranks included several hundred Americans. They were often young men radicalized online by savvy marketing that promis...

NPR takes Trump to court

27 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

NPR and three public radio stations in Colorado sued President Trump on Tuesday over his executive order that seeks to end federal funding for NPR and...

What Trump's cuts to intelligence could mean for national security

26 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's a classic Washington power move — the late-on-Friday news dump. This past Friday, at 4:30pm, start of a long holiday weekend, about half the st...

Misinformation channels to the Oval Office

25 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump's spreading of the false claim that South Africa is perpetrating a genocide against its white inhabitants is just the latest example o...

The Supreme Court's Trump Dilemma

24 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Supreme Court has become the focal point of the legal battle over President Donald Trump's executive authority – and presidential power more bro...

Can Trump suspend habeas corpus?

23 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem got a pop quiz at a senate hearing this week. The question came from Democratic Senator Maggie Hassan, of N...

Two Israeli embassy staffers killed amid a rise in antisemitism

22 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim worked for the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C.This weekend, they were slated to go to Jerusalem — Milgrim was...

A Newark air traffic controller on the moment systems went dark

21 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Federal regulators are now limiting the number of flights in and out of Newark Liberty International Airport. This comes after a harrowing month for t...

Advice for navigating a volatile economy

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The U.S. economy is in flux. And for millions of Americans, a new line item in their budget includes repaying federal student loans.Making ends meet i...

New book alleges Biden aides hid his decline

19 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Joe Biden has stage four metastatic prostate cancer.The former president made that announcement Sunday afternoon. It came just days before the publica...

Over tea, a deal with Damascus and a possible turning point for Middle East diplomacy

18 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On the first major foreign trip of his second term, President Trump met with leaders in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE. His arrival was greeted with...

The whiplash of covering the trade war from inside China

17 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Earlier this week, the White House announced that the U.S. and China had agreed to lower the reciprocal tariffs they had put in place in April – but...

Connecting the dots on DOGE

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been six months since President Trump first announced the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency initiative, which has dramatically ...

Birthright citizenship goes to the Supreme Court

15 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump's order that would end automatic citizenship for the children of many categories of immigrants has been blocked from going into effect...

Palestinians are counting lentils, as Gaza food crisis worsens

14 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Nearly half a million people in Gaza now face starvation, according to a new report from the IPC, the international panel of famine experts who advise...

Poland's plan to resist a Russian attack

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As a neighbor of Ukraine's and host to more than 2 million of its war refugees, Poland has seen, heard and felt what Russia is capable of, and it's no...

Why Bill Gates is giving away his money faster

12 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last week, the Gates Foundation announced it would spend more than $200 billion over the next 20 years — including nearly all the personal wealth of...

Looking for clues from Pope Leo XIV's sermons

11 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The election of the first American pope is a remarkable moment in the two thousand year history of the Catholic Church. But in choosing his name, it's...

Why covering the Vatican is a really tough reporting assignment

10 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When NPR listeners think of reports from Italy or the Vatican, usually one name comes to mind: Sylvia Poggioli. She covered much more, of course, ove...

After two years of civil war, Sudan's capital is a shell of its former self

09 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It's been more than two years since civil war exploded in Sudan. By some estimates the conflict has killed as many as 150-thousand people, and displac...

This American pope

08 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The cardinals have elected a new pope: Robert Prevost, a cardinal born in Chicago. He has taken the name Leo XIV. He is the first American pope in the...

America's air traffic control problem

07 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Newark Liberty International Airport has been a mess the past week, with hundreds of flights cancelled and hundreds more delayed. It was triggered in ...

For LGBTQ Catholics, a lot depends on the next pope

06 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On the eve of the conclave to elect a new pope, some of the biggest questions hanging in the air have to do with LGBTQ Catholics. Will the church cont...

Trump's spending cuts are hitting communities of his supporters

05 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump's rapid-fire spending cuts have affected communities all over the country–including strongholds of his supporters. One of them is Ri...

Prelude to a conclave: understanding the selection process of a new pope

04 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Days before the beginning of the conclave to select the next pope, NPR's Scott Detrow is in Rome. He speaks with Sylvia Poggioli about the rituals and...

Despite talk of peace, Ukraine is still under a barrage of deadly attacks

03 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Over the past few months, world leaders and diplomats have talked about grand plans for ending the war in Ukraine. But what about daily life there ri...

A legal architect of Guantanamo questions Trump's El Salvador plan

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The U.S. has sent people it has detained — people it calls terrorists — to a prison overseas — indefinitely.This is true in 2025, after the Trum...

Ford CEO does the math on Trump's auto tariffs

01 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Americans are rushing to car dealerships as they worry about what President Trump's tariffs will do to car prices in the coming months. New vehicle sa...

Trumps first 100 days have pushed the limits of presidential power to new levels

30 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump is pushing the boundaries of executive power in nearly every area of policy. From his trade war, to immigration, to education, to the ...

Trump uses government powers to target perceived enemies

29 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

An NPR investigation has been following President Trump's efforts to retaliate against his perceived enemies since he returned to the Oval Office in J...

A severe autism advocate responds to RFK Jr.'s research initiative

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

About one in 31 children in the U.S. has been identified with autism spectrum disorder, according to CDC data released this month.When Health and Huma...

How Canada's national election has been largely shaped by Donald Trump

27 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

U.S. President Donald Trump's trade war and threats to make Canada the 51st state have become some of the biggest issues facing Canadians as they head...

How a punishing two years shaped Pope Francis

26 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Long before he was elected to run the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis was essentially exiled from his Argentinian Jesuit order. Francis often refe...

Federal agencies are reeling from Trump administration cuts to government

25 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Whether a "chainsaw," per Elon Musk, or "scalpel," as President Trump has said — the Trump administration is making deep cuts to the federal governm...

Americans are protesting the Trump administration. Do they work?

24 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When you think of a successful protest movement, most Americans probably think of the American Civil Rights movement, and the March on Washington in 1...

Israel's changing story of an attack on rescue workers

23 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On March 23, the death toll in Gaza surpassed 50,000 people killed by Israeli fire in the war with Hamas.This is the story of 15 people who were kille...

Maintaining stability is key to the economy. That's getting harder.

22 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What does it take to keep the economy stable? That is a question that Jerome Powell considers every day in his role as Chair of the Federal Reserve. I...