NPR News: 07-17-2026 6AM EDT
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Windsor Johnston.
What did President Trump emphasize about election security in his primetime address?
President Trump used a primetime address last night to put election security at the center of his midterm message. He once again urged Congress to pass the Save America Act, which would require voters to show proof of citizenship. NPR's Miles Parks reports the White House also released declassified documents that says support the president's claims of voting irregularities and foreign interference in the 2020 election.
What evidence did the White House release and how did NPR assess it?
He hit on a bunch of the themes that will sound really familiar to anyone who's heard the president over the last few years. The idea that voting machines can't be trusted. The idea that non-citizens are voting en masse in American elections. Shadowy schemes by foreign governments to try to influence voting, that sort of thing. But our team at NPR started looking through all of these documents that the White House published, and it's not really clear what is actually new here that impacts our understanding of the security of America's elections.
That's NPR's Miles Parks reporting. In a speech from the White House, President Trump also accused China of interfering in the 2020 election. That drew immediate backlash from the Chinese embassy in Washington. Ashish Valentine reports Beijing says it does not interfere in other countries' internal affairs.
In a statement issued to CBS News and CNN ahead of the president's primetime speech on election interference, Beijing's embassy denied allegations it had interfered with the American democratic process. It notes that, quote, elections are an internal matter of the U.S. and that China has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the U.S. President Trump alleged that China gained access to information on 220 million voters during the 2020 election, calling it the largest compromise of election data in history. The National Intelligence Council publicly assessed that China did not attempt to interfere with technical aspects of the election like vote counting. For NPR News, I'm Ashish Valentine in Taipei.
The partner of the Colombian national that was shot and killed by an ICE officer in Maine this week spoke publicly for the first time on Thursday. R.A. Snyder from Maine Public reports.
Speaking with an interpreter at a press conference in the city of Biddeford, Carolina Rojas Alvarez said Yohan Sebastian Duran Guerrero's life revolved around the couple's three-year-old daughter.
I remember he would always look at her and say, she's getting so big and beautiful, and the tears would come to his eyes. He lived for her.
Now, Rojas Alvarez says she doesn't have the strength to tell her daughter that her dad isn't coming back. Duran Guerrero was not the person ICE agents were looking for on Monday, according to Maine's independent senator, Angus King. For NPR News, I'm Ari Snyder in Portland, Maine.
This is NPR. Torrential rain has triggered widespread flooding across parts of central Texas. Governor Greg Abbott says at least two people have died.
One is a male near Comfort who was swept away in an RV. Another is a female in New Valley who was swept away while driving on a road.
More than 200 people have been rescued as rivers surged. Some areas have received up to 28 inches of rain, with more than 2,000 emergency responders deployed. The two largest reservoirs on the Colorado River have fallen to a record low. Alex Hager of member station KJZZ reports Lake Powell and Lake Mead now hold less water combined than at any time since 1957.
The last time there was this little water stored along the Colorado River, Lake Powell hadn't even been built yet. Jack Schmidt directs the Center for Colorado River Studies at Utah State University.
It's a real reminder of what a remarkably small amount of water we have left in the system. We've never been in this position. We are truly in uncharted territory.
Schmidt said Western policymakers aren't doing enough to turn things around. He compared current negotiations over sharing the Colorado River to a bus careening toward a cliff, with state policymakers arguing about who should steer rather than hitting the brakes.
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