NPR News: 12-12-2025 4AM EST
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Shea Stephens.
What recent actions has Homeland Security taken regarding oil tanker seizures?
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is defending the seizure of an oil tanker off Venezuela. The Trump administration says the vessel was being used to transport sanctioned oil. Noem told a House panel Thursday that the seizure was part of an ongoing effort to protect the U.S. from illicit drug activity.
It was a successful operation directed by the president to ensure that we're pushing back on a regime that is systematically covering and flooding our country with deadly drugs and killing our next generation of Americans.
Noem also defended DHS deportations. When asked, she promised to review some of the cases, including that of a Purple Heart veteran who was forcibly sent to Korea. Gilmar Abrego-Garcia, the Maryland man fighting deportation, has been released from custody by order of a judge. Abrego-Garcia was wrongfully sent to El Salvador in March and then returned to the U.S. but kept in custody. He was accused of gang activity, which he denies. President Trump has signed an executive order to override state laws regulating artificial intelligence. As NPR's Bobby Allen reports, the tech industry lobbied for the move.
The order instructs the Justice Department to challenge state AI laws it views as burdensome. States this year have passed more than 100 laws attempting to regulate AI, while Congress hasn't passed any. Trump says a patchwork of state laws could give China an edge in the AI race.
Every time you make a change, and it could be a very reasonable change, you still won't get it approved if you have to go to 50 states. So this centralizes it.
But trying to override state AI laws has been met with opposition from both parties and prominent members of the MAGA movement. White House AI and crypto czar David Sachs helped advance the order. Sachs is a longtime venture capitalist with deep connections to Silicon Valley. Bobby Allen, NPR News.
The House has voted to restore collective bargaining rights for about a million federal workers. President Trump issued an executive order in March to end those rights. Twenty Republicans sided with Democrats yesterday to repeal the order. In South Carolina, at least 254 people are in quarantine after being exposed to a measles outbreak. As NPR's Maria Godoy reports, some state health officials have reported 27 new cases in the past week.
South Carolina State Epidemiologist Linda Bell says the measles outbreak in the northwest area of the state, known as the upstate region, is accelerating.
That is a significant increase in our cases in a short period of time. I think accelerating is an accurate term. I mean, that is a spike in cases that we're concerned about.
As of Tuesday, Bell said 111 measles cases had been recorded in the region. The 27 newest of those stemmed from exposures at a church. The vast majority of cases have occurred in unvaccinated people. Three cases were in people who had received only one of the recommended two doses of measles vaccine. This is NPR.
A tsunami advisory for northeastern Japan has been lifted. The advisory was prompted by a magnitude 6.7 earthquake in the region that caused small tsunami waves. A stronger quake struck off the region's coast earlier in the week, causing dozens of injuries but no reported deaths or major damage. China will soon begin collecting taxes on contraceptives. Beginning January 1st, a 13% value-added tax will be imposed on contraceptive products. The move is in keeping with Beijing's effort to encourage procreation following a decades-long policy that limited births to one per family until 2015. Some ancient plant species attract pollinating insects by producing heat. As NPR's Nell Greenfield-Boyce reports, this makes the plants glow with infrared light.
The palm-like plants, called cycads, live in the tropics. They make pollen and seeds in long, pinecone-like structures, and the plant can heat these cones up. In the journal Science, researchers report that the nocturnal beetles that pollinate these plants...
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