NPR News: 10-17-2025 8AM EDT
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Support for NPR comes from NPR member stations and Eric and Wendy Schmidt through the Schmidt Family Foundation, working toward a healthy, resilient, secure world for all. On the web at theschmidt.org.
Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Korova Coleman. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky meets President Trump today at the White House. The meeting comes after Trump announced he'll meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Hungary in a couple of weeks. NPS Michelle Kellerman reports they spoke by phone yesterday.
President Trump says it was a productive call with Putin. One of the topics was Ukraine's request for long-range Tomahawk missiles. I did actually say, would you mind if I gave a couple of thousand Tomahawks to your opposition? I did say that to him. I said it just that way. He didn't like the idea. Before the call, Trump suggested he might sell Tomahawks to Ukraine and expressed frustration with Putin, saying the Kremlin leader doesn't want to end the war that is making Russia look bad. Now, he says he will meet Putin after top U.S. and Russian diplomats make the arrangements, and he'll talk to Zelensky about what he heard on the call. Michelle Kellerman, NPR News, Washington.
Hamas has issued a statement saying it may take some time to locate bodies of deceased Israeli hostages in Gaza. Hamas says they could be in the rubble of bombed tunnels. The exchange of hostages and jailed Palestinians is part of phase one of the ceasefire deal, but the next stage is unclear. NPR's Greg Myrie says Gaza doesn't yet have a functioning government.
The ceasefire calls for a committee of technocrats to be formed, but we don't know when that might happen. The security conditions are still very volatile. Hamas police are back on the streets. Hamas gunmen are waging gun battles with Palestinian clans. A new Palestinian police force is being trained in Egypt. It's supposed to take over at some point, but we don't know when.
NPR's Greg Myhre reporting. Republican leaders in New York will convene today to decide whether to disband the New York State Young Republicans. From member station WNYC, Jimmy Veilkind tells us the move comes after leaders of the Young Republicans group. reportedly exchanged offensive messages in a group chat.
The NYGOP executive committee is considering a resolution to revoke the young Republican's charter in the wake of the scandal. Erie County Republican Chairman Michael Cracker says he'll vote yes. He wants the party to refocus on winning elections. Politico reported this week that New York young Republican leader Peter Junta led a group chat that included racist comments and jokes referencing Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust. Junta and other young Republicans in the chat lost government jobs after the messages were made public. Vice President J.D. Vance has downplayed the racist and misogynistic chat as, quote, edgy jokes, but other Republicans point out these were professional GOP operatives, not kids.
For NPR News, I'm Jimmy Vilkind in New York.
Today's the deadline for the Trump administration to give a federal judge a list of all federal government employees being laid off in the shutdown. The judge has temporarily halted the layoffs. This is NPR. NPR has learned that a constellation of classified defense satellites built by the commercial company SpaceX is emitting a mysterious signal. NPR's Jeff Brumfield explains.
An amateur satellite observer in Canada named Scott Tilley discovered the signal accidentally.
It was just a clumsy move at the keyboard. I was just resetting some stuff.
When all of a sudden, up popped a signal from space. It came from Starshield, a network of classified satellites built by SpaceX for the U.S. government. Starshield is broadcasting on radio frequencies normally reserved to send commands from Earth to satellites in orbit. Tilly worries it might disrupt communications with other scientific and commercial satellites. It's unclear what the signal is for. SpaceX and the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office did not respond to NPR's request for comment.
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