NPR News: 09-04-2025 1PM EDT
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Why is Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. facing bipartisan pushback over COVID‑vaccine policies?
Live from NPR News, I'm Lakshmi Singh. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is encountering bipartisan pushback from the Senate Finance Committee this afternoon over his vaccine skepticism and availability of COVID vaccines. One of the most combative exchanges was between him and Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren.
You just changed the classification of the COVID vaccine. I'm not taking them away from people, Senator. It takes it away if you can't get it from your pharmacy. Well, most Americans
are gonna be able to get it from their pharmacy for free.
What allegations did former NIH officials make in their whistleblower complaint against the administration?
Most Americans will be able to get it from their pharmacy free. The
question is everyone who wants it, that was your promise.
I mean I never promised that I was gonna recommend products with which there is no indication.
Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who was crucial in Kennedy's confirmation, also challenged Kennedy. Over his decision to cancel contracts related to COVID vaccines and High profile departures from the CDC. Two former top officials at the National Institutes of Health have filed a whistleblower complaint. Charging the administration retaliated against them for resisting attempts to undermine vaccines and other scientific research. Here's NPR's Rob Stein.
How are new U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs affecting Campbell Soup’s production costs?
The former director of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Gene Mrazo, filed the complaint along with the former director of the NIH's Fogarty International Center, Dr. Kathleen New Zeal. In the filing with the Independent Office of Special Counsel, the pair charged the Trump administration illegally retaliated against them for pushing back against the cancellation of critical research. Church politicizing scientific studies and taking hostile moves against vaccines. In a statement, HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon defended the administration's actions. Rob Stein, NPR News.
Campbell says new tariffs are accounting for a growing share of its costs, expecting to offset them in part by raising prices. And Pierre Zalina Solyuch reports the food giant is particularly affected by President Trump's tariffs on the steel and aluminum needed to make cans for soups.
What is the current impact of the 6.0‑magnitude earthquake on relief efforts in eastern Afghanistan?
Campbell says tariffs are expected to account for about four percent of its cost of goods sold over the next fiscal year. That's hundreds of millions of dollars in costs. The company says it faces tariffs on various products. One is Rey's pasta sauce, which relies on imports from Italy. And the big one is steel used for soup cans. President Trump has added a new 50% tariff on steel, and Campbell's executives say there's simply not a way to source the needed amount. amount of steel in the United States, so they have to import this key raw material. The company expects to cover these new costs in part by negotiating with suppliers, improving productivity, finding other cost savings, but also quote surgical and responsible price increases.
Alina Seluch, NPR News.
Why was Amy Sherald’s Smithsonian retrospective canceled and moved to the Baltimore Museum of Art?
From Washington,
this is NPR. Afghanistan's ruling Taliban say hundreds more bodies have been recovered from mountain village homes in eastern Afghanistan, pushing the earthquake death toll past two thousand two hundred. Most are in Kunar Province. A magnitude six point zero tumbler struck Sunday. First responders and aid workers are reporting remote villages have been cut off by landslides that were caused by the quake. They say the rough terrain is hindering relief efforts. Local authorities deployed helicopters and airdropped army commandos to try to help survivors. The Baltimore Museum of Art has announced it will host Amy Sherold's retrospective American Sublime Exhibit, and Pierre's Elizabeth Blair reports Sherald recently canceled the show's run at the Smithsonian.
Amy Sherold's boldly colored portraits of African Americans have graced magazine covers.
What are today’s movements in U.S. stock markets as reported by NPR?
She is best known for her painting of Michelle Obama that was commissioned by the Smithsonians National Portrait Gallery, and that's where her retrospective was set to open on september nineteenth. But Sherald cancelled it after she was told her portrait of a transgender woman might need to be removed.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
Why is Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. facing bipartisan pushback over COVID‑vaccine policies?
0:02–0:37
2
What allegations did former NIH officials make in their whistleblower complaint against the administration?
0:37–1:16
3
How are new U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs affecting Campbell Soup’s production costs?
1:16–2:12
4
What is the current impact of the 6.0‑magnitude earthquake on relief efforts in eastern Afghanistan?
2:12–2:55
5
Why was Amy Sherald’s Smithsonian retrospective canceled and moved to the Baltimore Museum of Art?
2:55–3:55
6
What are today’s movements in U.S. stock markets as reported by NPR?
3:55–4:38