Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Thank you.
President Trump says the U.S.
Chapter 2: What did President Trump say about U.S. strikes in Nigeria?
launched strikes on Islamic State targets in Nigeria to protect Christians. Plus, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he's meeting with Trump in Florida over the weekend. And what the Make America Healthy Again movement could mean for next year's midterms.
They're saying you need to demonstrate that you're going to deliver after the midterms and you need to engage Maha in order to win as a Republican in today's political era.
It's Friday, December 26th. I'm Alex Osola for The Wall Street Journal. We're on a holiday schedule in your feed once a day. And this is What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving the world today. President Trump has announced that the U.S. launched strikes on Islamic State targets in Nigeria on Christmas Day to protect the country's Christian population from the terrorist group.
Posting on social media, Trump wrote that he had warned the group to stop killing Christians, saying, quote, there would be hell to pay and tonight there was. Trump's post didn't say how many people were killed. Nigeria's population of 237 million people is roughly split between Muslims and Christians, and the violence against Christians has escalated in northern Nigeria during the past decade.
The Trump administration says Islamist groups are targeting Christians, but the Nigerian government doesn't agree. Here's journal reporter Alexandra Wexler in Johannesburg.
The Nigerians and the Americans have had some differences framing this issue. The Nigerians have been saying these Islamist groups are a big problem, but they target indiscriminately. They kill and kidnap Muslims as well as Christians.
A Defense Department official said Nigeria's government approved the Christmas Day strikes and worked with the U.S. to carry them out. Nigerian authorities today said that they aided the U.S. strikes, but were adamant that the effort wasn't aimed at protecting any particular religious group.
Alexandra says that the cooperation comes after President Trump last month threatened military action in Nigeria if the government didn't do more to protect Christians.
And since then, the Nigerian government has made quite a big effort to engage with U.S. officials on what is going on in Nigeria and how the U.S. could potentially help fight some of these groups, Islamist terrorists and armed gangs that aren't necessarily affiliated with a religious group.
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Chapter 3: How does Nigeria's government view the U.S. military strikes?
So changing the CDC webpage to say that vaccines might cause autism. firing the director of the CDC because she did not want to sign off on some of his proposed changes to vaccines, and then firing all of the members of a key vaccine advisory panel and replacing that panel with Kennedy's own handpicked advisors, many of whom are vaccine skeptics.
And now they're going to be examining the childhood vaccine schedule more broadly.
When the CDC changes its recommendations for vaccines, does that mean that people actually lose access, like health insurers won't cover it anymore?
When the CDC makes a change to vaccine recommendations, it does not necessarily mean that those vaccines are no longer available, but it does change what some of the insurance coverage might look like, especially when it comes to federal programs.
shifting slightly from vaccines, one of the more controversial points that was made by the Trump administration was saying that there's a connection between taking Tylenol during pregnancy and autism in the child that's born later. Can we expect this kind of focus on other types of medications in the year ahead?
You had President Trump saying quite definitively that pregnant women shouldn't take Tylenol. And while there are some studies that have shown a potential link between acetaminophen and autism, other studies have found no link. Even where there are some studies that have shown a potential link, those studies have not said that the Tylenol has caused autism.
So the big concern that emanated from that moment and that could give us a sense of what's to come is that this administration is not relying on what the abundance of evidence shows. The bigger concern that we've been hearing from physicians and public health experts is they're just planting these seeds of doubt.
I interviewed many pregnant women who said they were thinking twice about whether or not they should take Tylenol. I think the way the Trump administration sees it is that for too long, there has not been a willingness to challenge public health agencies and that Americans have just been told to take what they say as sacrosanct and that they're just asking questions.
They're just reviewing guidelines. They're just looking at the role of the pharmaceutical industry and where there may be conflicts of interest
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of the U.S. strikes for Christians in Nigeria?
You need to demonstrate that you're going to deliver. So if you're not running on policies that fit within the Maha agenda, they're not necessarily going to come out and vote just because there's a Republican on the ticket.
That was WSJ National Politics reporter Sabrina Siddiqui. Thanks so much, Sabrina.
Thank you.
And finally, have your gifts from overseas been delayed? If you haven't gotten them yet, they may have also been destroyed. In recent months, tens of thousands of imports have been blocked from entering the US and stacked in enormous warehouses.
Many do get to their destinations after buyers complete government paperwork, but some that can't clear customs because of missing or incomplete information are returned or smashed to bits. The stranded parcels are casualties of shifting US tariffs and tougher customs enforcement and import restrictions. Thank you. And that's What's News for this week.
Heads up that What's News and Markets and What's News Sunday are on hiatus this weekend for the holidays, and we'll be publishing just one show a day through January 2nd. We'll be back Monday afternoon. Today's show is produced by Daniel Bach and Julie Chang, with supervising producer Tali Arbel. Michael LaValle wrote our theme music. Jessica Fenton is our technical manager.
Aisha Al-Muslim is our development producer. Chris Zinsley is our deputy editor. And Falana Patterson is the Wall Street Journal's head of news audio. I'm Alex Osola. Thanks for listening.
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