NPR News: 07-18-2026 11AM EDT
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Nora Rahm. Iran and the U.S. exchanged airstrikes last night for the seventh consecutive night. The U.S.
What happened in the latest round of U.S.-Iran airstrikes and where were targets located?
says it targeted military and surveillance sites across Iran. Iran launched strikes against U.S. military targets in Kuwait, Bahrain, and Jordan. There's no sign of an end to the conflict. NPR's Ron Elving reports the war in Iran is likely to be an issue in the midterm elections in November.
It is not going away, and it is not turning into a positive for the president. The war itself has been less than popular. Heating it up again, expanding it, is likely to be less popular still. But some of the economic damage from the war, higher gas prices, food prices, that's likely to persist through the fall. And in that sense, Iran will persist as an issue, even if the fighting ends.
NPR's Ron Elving. Millions of people across the Great Lakes, Northeast and Mid-Atlantic are facing another day of unhealthy air as wildfire smoke spreads from Minnesota and Canada. Dan Karpinchuk reports more than 900 fires are burning, forcing thousands of people from their homes.
Some of the worst-hit regions are northern Ontario and northern Quebec. Flames have destroyed buildings and smoke has blanketed much of central Canada and drifted into the northeastern U.S. At least one indigenous community in northern Ontario has been destroyed, many residents only able to grab a few belongings and flee by boat. People have also been displaced by fires in Manitoba, British Columbia, and the Northwest Territories. The Ontario government and the Assembly of First Nations have called on Ottawa for support. Although officials say it hasn't been the worst fire season on record, research has linked climate change with longer wildfire seasons across Canada. For NPR News, I'm Dan Karpenchuk in Toronto.
Federal health officials improperly shared Medicaid data with ICE in January, and the immigration agency later provided the information to contractor Palantir. NPR's Jude Jaffe-Block reports.
Palantir pulls together various data sources in an app that ICE officers can use to locate immigrants' home addresses. Last year, more than 20 states sued to stop federal health officials from sharing Medicaid data with ICE.
How could the Iran-U.S. conflict affect the 2026 midterm elections and the economy?
A federal judge ruled Medicaid officials could share limited data about immigrants in the country unlawfully. But the judge put the agreement on hold this spring after it came out that health officials had shared two data sets that were not limited to unlawful immigrants' data. In recent weeks, federal officials acknowledged inadvertently resharing one of those data sets again with ICE last month. ICE officials said in court filings the data in question was not used for law enforcement purposes. Jude Jaffeblock, NPR News.
Protests are planned across the country today against the construction of data centers that support artificial intelligence. They're being coordinated by a group called Humans First. Residents are concerned about higher power bills and the effects of the environment. This is NPR News in Washington. As the Democratic Republic of Congo deals with an Ebola outbreak, the World Health Organization is raising concerns about the rate of transmission of the disease in one particular area of the country. Michael Koloke has more.
In a statement yesterday, the WHO Director General Tedros Ghebreyesus said that his agency was concerned of a, quote, intense transmission of of Ebola in Congo's Ituri province. Debreyesus added that armed conflict in the Central African nation poses a risk to both health responders and Ebola patients. The WHO chief said that if the warring parties were to call for a temporary ceasefire, the truce would assist in helping deal with the outbreak. A report last month by Congolese authorities said the presence of armed groups in parts of the country is limiting humanitarian access to several areas that have either been hit by the Ebola outbreak or are at risk of being affected by the disease.
And we have liftoff of Vikram 1, India's first private orbital launch vehicle.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:10
2
What happened in the latest round of U.S.-Iran airstrikes and where were targets located?
0:10–2:13
3
How could the Iran-U.S. conflict affect the 2026 midterm elections and the economy?
2:13–4:40
4
Which regions are being impacted by wildfire smoke and how widespread is the damage?
4:40–5:02