Consider This from NPR

Consider This from NPR

The hosts of NPR's All Things Considered help you make sense of a major news story and what it means for you, in 15 minutes. New episodes six days a week, Sunday through Friday. Support NPR and get your news sponsor-free with Consider This+. Learn more at plus.npr.org/considerthis

Episodes

April 15, 2025 8 mins
President Trump's Department of Government Efficiency team, or DOGE, appears to be grabbing sensitive data from all over the government.

A whistleblower has come forward by filing an official disclosure to Congress about concerning activity on the systems at one independent federal agency, the National Labor Relations Board.

Elon Musk says DOGE is searching for savings throughout the government. But is the data ...
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Measles is an extremely contagious disease. It's also extremely preventable. There's a vaccine. It's highly effective.

For decades it has made measles outbreaks in the U.S. relatively rare, and measles deaths rarer still. But the U.S. has now seen more than 700 measles cases this year, and 3 deaths so far with active outbreaks across six states.

The federal response is under scrutiny because Health and Human Serv...
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The Trump administration admitted that it wrongfully deported a man named Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

It had also been arguing that courts cannot compel the U.S. government to return him to this country.

The U.S. Supreme Court has unanimously determined the government must "facilitate" his release from the El Salvador prison where he is being held, but the Department of Justice has so far only confirmed his presence at ...
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April 12, 2025 11 mins
For weeks, President Trump has been targeting certain law firms with executive orders. Some have fought back, but others have cut deals to avoid the damage.

For our weekly Reporter's Notebook series, we dive into this legal drama with NPR's Justice Correspondent Ryan Lucas, to see how this use of executive power is changing the landscape of the American legal system.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, s...
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During his second Presidential campaign, Donald Trump vowed to carry out the largest deportation program the U.S. has ever seen.

And true to his word – Trump's administration is arresting, detaining and deporting immigrants without legal status.

But as part of the crackdown on illegal immigration, legal immigrants are getting caught up in the mix.

And then there's people like Amir Makled – a U.S. Citizen...
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It's pretty rare for one person to do one thing that affects nearly every business in the United States. But that's the power of the presidency and the new tariffs that took effect this week.

Over the last few days, as the tariffs have gone up and down, NPR has been talking to Americans who run different kinds of businesses.

Even though their companies don't have much in common, all of them are doing the same th...
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After a week of market turmoil, President Trump announced he would reset his most extreme tariffs to 10 percent across the board, with the exception of China — which he boosted to a 125% tariff rate. Even at the reduced level, the tariff rates are the highest the nation has seen in many decades.

And higher tariffs translate to higher prices for American consumers. Martha Gimbel of the Budget Lab at Yale takes an imaginary ...
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It's been 25 years since measles was officially "eliminated" from the United States.

That's a technical term. In public health, it means measles has not had a steady twelve month spread.

Right now there are measles cases in several states The biggest number of cases are in West Texas where two kids have died.

A quarter of a century after measles was officially eliminated in the US, the disease is once ...
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Billionaire Elon Musk told Fox News recently that falling birth rates keep him up at night. It's a drum he's been beating for years.

Musk is one of the world's most visible individuals to elevate this point of view. Vice President JD Vance also talks about wanting to increase birthrates in the U-S.

But it's not just them. There are discussions across the political spectrum about birth rate decline and what it mea...
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April 6, 2025 9 mins
Deportation is a complicated process — with lots of layers. As the Trump administration expands the number and scope of deportations – what does that mean in practice? NPR's Asma Khalid and Ximena Bustillo unpack how deportations are supposed to work — and why so many lawsuits have been filed saying court process has been sidestepped in recent cases.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices...
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The video game industry is huge. Last year alone it generated an estimated $187 billion dollars in revenue.

But it's also facing a host of serious issues: massive layoffs, the advent of A.I., games that take years to be released, and a schism between big and small developers.

This week's Reporter's Notebook takes us inside this evolving industry with NPR's Vincent Acovino, who recently covered the annual Game Dev...
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The country of Myanmar has been in crisis for years. A civil war has been going on since 2021.

And then, last Friday, a devastating earthquake hit, leaving at least 3,000 people dead. The tragedy only deepened the humanitarian crisis in the country.

One person watching the situation closely is Kim Aris. His mother is Aung San Suu Kyi, who was the country's de facto leader before the military ousted and imprisoned...
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Whatever you think of President Trump's tariffs, there's one point you have to concede: his interest in them is not a passing whim.

He noted that on Wednesday, in the Rose Garden, when he was announcing the latest, massive round of tariffs. "I've been talking about this for 40 years," he said.

The use of tariffs are a core belief for Donald Trump. Trade deficits are bad, other countries take advantage of the U....
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Eight-point-seven billion.

Four-hundred million.

One-hundred-seventy-five million.

These are just some examples of the money the federal government has withheld or is threatening to withhold from various colleges and universities, including the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University and Harvard University.

That $8.7 billion figure was announced earlier this week by the Trump administ...
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In President Donald Trump's telling, tariffs are the political equivalent of duct tape: you can use them to fix anything.

For example, they're a negotiating tool — he used the threat of tariffs to pressure Canada and Mexico to implement border policies he liked. He also sees tariffs as a revenue source that might help offset his proposed $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and as a shield to protect American manufacturing jobs from...
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Last week, South Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission found that Korean adoption agencies were responsible for widespread fraud, malpractice and even human rights violations.

More than 140,000 South Korean children were adopted by families living abroad in the decades after the Korean war. The report documented cases in which agencies fabricated records and others in which abandoned children were sent abroad after ...
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March 30, 2025 11 mins
The AI boom has caused a huge surge in energy consumption, so how is the tech industry thinking about its environmental footprint as it invests in new AI models?

Emily Kwong, host and reporter for NPR's Short Wave podcast, finds out what solutions are being considered that might meet both consumer demand and address climate concerns.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple...
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After reaching historic levels, fatal overdoses from opioids are dropping rapidly.

Today we bring you a reporter's notebook from NPR's national addiction correspondent Brian Mann. He tells host Scott Detrow what it's been like to cover America's addiction crisis and explains the significance of the recent decline in opioid deaths.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple P...
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Bezalel Smotrich's views were once fringe in Israel. He's an ultranationalist West Bank settler, who has repeatedly called for Israel to resettle the Gaza Strip.

Today, as finance minister, he's a key figure influencing the future of Israel's war against Hamas.

NPR's Hadeel Al-Shalchi has the story of Smotrich's rise to power in Israel politics.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Con...
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Six months ago, Southern Appalachia was devastated by Hurricane Helene.

Now, after a dry spell and a windy March — the region faces wildfires that are feeding on the downed trees and vegetation that the hurricane knocked to the forest floor.

The North Carolina Forest Service has declared one of them "the highest priority fire in the U.S."

And due to climate change and population growth, the Carolinas must...
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