NPR News: 12-13-2025 5PM EST
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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, I'm Janine Herbst. President Trump says the U.S. will respond after two U.S. service members and an American civilian were killed in an attack in Syria today. Three others were injured. The Pentagon says the gunman was also killed. NPR's Sage Miller has more.
Before departing on Marine One to the Army-Navy football game in Baltimore, Trump said he is mourning the loss of those killed in the ambush. He also told reporters that he blames ISIS for the attack. He added that it's an attack on Syria and the United States, and Trump doesn't plan to sit idly by. We will retaliate. He did not specify how the U.S. would retaliate, but Trump did say the three injured, quote, seemed to be doing pretty well.
What recent event prompted President Trump's response in this episode?
Sage Miller, NPR News, the White House.
House Republicans are unveiling a health care policy package that they say will reduce health costs. But as NPR's Jude Duffy Block reports, Democrats are blasting the proposal for not extending Affordable Care Act tax credits.
The enhanced tax credits are slated to expire at the end of the year. And when they do, the out-of-pocket costs for millions of Americans who buy their insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace will skyrocket. House Speaker Mike Johnson says the GOP proposal instead tackles, quote, the real drivers of health care costs. It will allow small businesses to band together to buy health insurance plans. It also attempts to lower drug costs by imposing new requirements on pharmacy benefit managers. A Democratic bill to extend the tax credits for three years failed in the Senate, as did a Republican proposal. Members of Congress are running out of time to address health care costs before the holiday recess at the end of the week.
Jude Jaffeblock, NPR News.
The Skagit River north of Seattle crested yesterday at a record high. Evacuation orders were out, but hundreds of people in western Washington state who didn't evacuate in time had to be rescued from their homes, sometimes from the rooftops and even their cars. Scott Greenstone from member station KUOW has more.
In Burlington, just about an hour north of Seattle, the water levels have begun to recede and some people are returning to their homes assessing damage. Jocelyn Alm's home was still too submerged to get in, so a friend waited in to look in the windows and told her...
He goes, all your couches are floating. All your stuff is just floating. He goes, your bananas are floating. And I said, oh, well, God, if we lost our bananas, we lost everything. We had in this back bedroom there was pictures that we had forever.
That's her husband, Kenneth. Officials are saying it's still a little early to tell the extent of the damage statewide, especially with more rain in the forecast Sunday. For NPR News, I'm Scott Greenstone in Burlington.
And for the thousands who did evacuate, they may not be able to return to their homes for days. The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to eliminate as many as 35,000 health care positions this month. That's according to the Washington Post, citing an internal memo. The jobs eliminated are mostly unfilled jobs, and the cuts come after a massive reorganization effort that's already resulted in the loss of around 30,000 jobs this year. On social media, VA Secretary Doug Collins says no VA employees are being removed in this round, and there will be zero impact on veterans' care. The Post reports the VA hopes the cuts will reduce the workforce to around 372,000, a 10 percent cut from last year. Actor Peter Green has died at the age of 60.
He was known for playing villains in movies like Pulp Fiction and The Mask. NPR's Chloe Veltman has more.
The tall, angular character actor excelled at playing bad guys, sometimes in comedies. Here Green is, hamming it up as Jim Carrey's nemesis in the 1994 slapstick superhero movie The Mask.
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