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Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

It’s time now for “My Unsung Hero,” our series from the team at the Hidden Brain podcast. “My Unsung Hero” tells the stories of people whose kindness left a lasting impression on someone else. Today’s story comes from Lia Eastep. When Eastep was 21, her father had a stroke. His mind was sharp as ever, but he lost the use of his left arm and became unsteady on his feet. A few years later, around Christmas, their family took a trip to New York City. To make it easier to get around, her dad rented a wheelchair. One afternoon, they got on a crowded subway.

LIA EASTEP: And so my dad decided that he would stand up, and he could hold onto the pole, and we could collapse up the wheelchair. And just as he got up, the train took off, and it just pitched my dad forward. And, we all gasped. And there was a man sitting in a seat with a bicycle across his lap. And it happened so fast, but the guy just opened his arms and my dad fell right into him. I mean, he caught him, and it was like they were just embraced in this hug, like kind of just this extended hug of strangers.

But it was clear that he was not going to be able to get him up while the train was moving. And, you know, I think either me or my brother must have said, Dad, because the guy goes, I got Dad. And it was just the sound of his voice. I’ll never forget that. I was just very cheerful, but also very reassuring. Like, I got this. And he did. And, you know, he talked to my dad, and it wasn’t too much, but it was more like chit chat. It was like, oh, are you guys in town? You know, what have you seen?

And so the train stopped, and the guy got off before we did, and he got some people that were next to him to get my dad up on his feet. Like, it was no big deal. I mean, just kind of set him on his feet, wished us a happy holidays and went on.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

EASTEP: Because I was 21, I didn’t really realize the significance until later on. And as I learned to really kind of recognize my dad’s vulnerability – right? – like, that could have been a really terrible – it would have probably ended our trip, and we would have gone to the emergency room. So he provided some kind of dignity to my dad I think by just making it no big deal.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

EASTEP: You know, this man who we knew for, I don’t know, three minutes really kinda of became a role model to me of how I would like to be with people if I’m ever called upon in an emergency. The way that man was with my dad, it really made a big impact.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

DETROW: Lia Eastep lives in Columbus, Ohio. Her dad was Larry Eastep. You can find more stories of unsung heroes and learn how to submit your own at hiddenbrain.org.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

Our series, America In Pursuit, explores culture, history and objects in American life. Two-hundred-fifty years ago, the founders of the U.S. signed the Declaration of Independence. Today, NPR’s Clare Lombardo tells us how Thomas Jefferson drafted it.

CLARE LOMBARDO, BYLINE: Thomas Jefferson wasn’t just designing a new nation 250 years ago. He was also designing himself a portable desk.

ANTHEA HARTIG: Which almost looks like a laptop to us because it has a hinge case on a box, beautiful sliding out drawers for your pens and your ink and your blotters.

LOMBARDO: Anthea Hartig, director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.

HARTIG: The hinge also has a small rail on the front so you can prop up a book and read it. Or you can open it.

LOMBARDO: To create a perfect writing surface. Jefferson had it made out of mahogany in Philadelphia.

HARTIG: So, we think this is probably made very late 1775 or early 1776.

LOMBARDO: And in the steamy summer months of 1776, he used this desk to draft the Declaration of Independence.

HARTIG: And, of course, it went through many drafts and each word was debated. What kind of – are these sacred rights? Are these inalienable rights? They land, of course, on that beautiful kind of two paragraphs of some of the most soaring prose in U.S. history and then a long series of grievances.

LOMBARDO: Years later, in 1825, his granddaughter is getting married, and he designs a brand new desk, ships it, and it’s lost at sea. So he ships the couple his desk, the one he’d designed himself and had been using for the past 50 years. And he leaves two notes.

HARTIG: He wrote, quote, “politics, as well as religion, has its superstitions. These gaining strength with time may one day give imaginary value to this relic for its great association with the birth of the great charter of our independence.”

LOMBARDO: That was under the writing board. And there was another for his granddaughter’s new husband.

HARTIG: Mr. Coolidge must do me the favor of accepting this gift. Its imaginary value will increase with years.

LOMBARDO: And if he lives to my age or another half century, Jefferson wrote, he may see it carried in the procession of our nation’s birthday, as the relics of the saints are in those of the church. Jefferson wasn’t far off. The desk is on display this summer in a special exhibit called American Aspirations at the Smithsonian Castle in Washington, D.C.

Clare Lombardo, NPR News.

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

The tennis world has never been quite the same since Serena Williams walked away back in 2022. Well, at age 44, she is returning this week to play Wimbledon, both singles and doubles, alongside her big sister, Venus Williams. Since the GOAT is back, so is the buzz. So we had to have sports writer and author Howard Bryant on the show to talk Williamses. Welcome back.

HOWARD BRYANT: Thank you for having me.

DETROW: There is something – there’s a lot of things I love about this comeback, but I love the fact that, like, I can specifically remember reading about Venus and Serena in Sports Illustrated for Kids (ph) when I was a kid.

BRYANT: (Laughter).

DETROW: And all these years later, they are making a comeback, and they have, of course, in the meantime, established themselves as two of the greatest tennis players of all time. How are you thinking about this return to the courts?

BRYANT: Well, I think it depends. I mean, I think when you look at it from a sisters standpoint, Venus really never left. I mean, she’s been playing on the tour for, you know, since she was – what? – 14 years old. There’s the difference between the watchers and the doers. We’re the watchers. We believe in the narratives. We create the poetry. We do all of these things. And they’re the doers. They’re the athlete. And when you’re the athlete, you have to play until the tank is empty because as the great Satchel Paige once said, you only come around this way once.

DETROW: (Laughter).

BRYANT: And when you’re Venus, you’re here, and you’ve been playing, but you’re not Venus Williams anymore. So the poetry is not there. And so a lot of people are like, why are you still doing this? And she still wants to play. And she’s a legend. And then when you think about Serena, it’s a bit of a different story. Serena Williams was clearly chasing that 24th and 25th major. She got to 23. She beat Venus at the 2017 Australian Open, and nobody knew at the time, but she was pregnant when she won.

And then when she came back, there was this – the narrative of wanting to win a major as a mother and that this was an inspirational thing for her. And she got back. She got to four finals, and she didn’t win a set. She lost all four. And when she left, she never quite said she was retiring. And I was at that match. I was at her match against Ajla Tomljanovic at the 2022 U.S. Open. And she said she was evolving and not retiring. And there’s always been something when it comes to Serena that feels unfinished. She’s come out and said that she has no pressure, that she’s done more than anyone could ever dream of, that she’s done more than she ever dreamed of, and that there’s no pressure and that she wants to see her two daughters see her play tennis.

DETROW: Do you believe that?

BRYANT: But I don’t believe that.

DETROW: (Laughter).

BRYANT: I don’t believe that at all. I have a very hard time believing that Serena Williams is going to come out here to get crushed.

DETROW: Yeah.

BRYANT: Maybe there’s more enjoyment in it now, but I don’t think she’s just back for funsies (ph). I think she’s looking and she’s recognizing that even though she’ll be 45 in September, that she may be looking at that field and thinking, I can beat them.

DETROW: I want to try something out here and kind of watch a couple examples of their play over the years with you. Let’s both pull up a clip from 2016 Wimbledon and take a look at that and tell me what, if anything, is different to you in terms of the style, in terms of how they play, in terms of how the match is going?

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED TENNIS PLAYER #1: (Grunting).

(SOUNDBITE OF TENNIS BALL BEING HIT BACK AND FORTH)

BRYANT: Still Venus on the back line and Serena playing up. You know, quicker points. Obviously, when you’re on grass, it’s – you know, it’s first strike tennis.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED TENNIS PLAYER #1: (Grunting).

UNIDENTIFIED TENNIS PLAYER #2: (Grunting).

(APPLAUSE)

BRYANT: And of course, you know, that Serena serve is something that they should just put in the Louvre. You know, the pressure they put on the opposition and the forcing the opposition to also hit with them. Once again, I mean, one of the things that they always say in tennis is, is the match on your racket? Meaning, is it in your control, or are you being controlled? And the thing about watching them is that so many times the match is on their racket because of the power that they bring to it and the coordination, as well, and the hands and the whole thing.

I mean, we talk about the power all the time, but the beauty of Serena, especially, is the fact that she is such a complete tennis player – offensive, defensively, at the net, the volleys, the overheads, all of it. She’s just so technically sound. And the beauty of the two of them together is the number of times we watch them compete against each other – they really have fun playing together. It is such a joy to watch them compete and recognizing as well that they’re a family. And that is the – it’s the most unique relationship, I think, in the history of American sports.

DETROW: Given all of that, what are you hoping for and what do you think is likely as they set out on Wimbledon together over the coming weeks?

BRYANT: I think the expectations are very, very low. I think it’s joy. I think you have to go into it with joy. The one thing that you’re absolutely hoping is that, you know, you want them to stay healthy. And usually, what happens in these tournaments, especially because Serena is deciding to go all-in – she’s jumping into the deep end of the pool – you just want them to be able to stay on the court. And then the rest of it, who knows? This is why we watch the games. We haven’t seen Serena play in a singles match since September of 2022, but the one thing that I think everyone is hoping that there’s some magic here that we’ll never forget.

DETROW: Howard Bryant, thanks so much for talking.

BRYANT: Thank you.

DETROW: You can hear Howard talking sports in NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday, and his most recent book is “Kings And Pawns: Jackie Robinson And Paul Robeson In America.”

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

This week, the U.S. will celebrate its 250th anniversary. Among the many ways the semiquincentennial milestone is being marked in Washington, D.C. – a special exhibit at the Smithsonian Castle displaying artifacts like the portable desk where Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence. But history is more than objects.

JENNIFER TIMMICK: These things tell the stories of people. Our history is just the stories of things that people say and things that people do, and they fascinate me.

DETROW: That’s Jennifer Timmick. She’s volunteered at the National Museum of American History since 2013. And for the past few years, Timmick has been giving tours to visitors.

TIMMICK: I always thought those people who give tours are awesome. Someday, I would love to do that. And then I finally got up the courage to do the training and learn the facts and the skills and whatever it is that you need to just walk around and tell stories. And I love, love, love doing it.

DETROW: We accompanied her on a tour for our series on volunteerism called Here to Help.

TIMMICK: Julia Child changes the way we cook, and – yes?

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: What’s the dog for?

TIMMICK: Oh, the dog. I’m so glad you asked about the dog. The dog’s name is Stubby. The dog was also in World War I. He got smuggled over by a soldier who kind of adopted him as his…

This is one of our most popular objects. It’s the ruby slippers from “The Wizard Of Oz.”

Personally, my role is – I love this museum and I want you visitors also to love it as much as I do. So anything I can do to help you appreciate the awesomeness of what is here. To me, you have to know where you came from to know where you’re going. All of these stories of me talking about people who have changed American history, a lot of these are ordinary people.

We used to call it the five-and-dime.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: We did.

TIMMICK: It’s like a – I mean, it has a little bit of everything, but it also has a lunch counter. If you’re shopping…

The Greensboro lunch counter is one of my favorites because the power of those four young men just amazes me, and what they did and the change that they made.

We are in an exhibit called the Presidency, and…

Friday night of the performance, President Lincoln and Mrs. Lincoln and their guests take a carriage from the White House to the theater. They actually arrive late. The play has already started.

So, you know, our country has been divided many times. Obviously, it’s not just a straight line. We go forward and we go backward, and our country is divided and together all throughout, many times. I know I’ve done a successful tour if I look back and I see people who were random strangers an hour ago talking to each other. I’m calling that success because to me, if we can just keep talking to each other, then we – we’ll be OK.

Thank you all so much for sticking with me. You guys were great.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

TIMMICK: Thank you. Thank you for spending time here with us in this museum. Just by you…

DETROW: Jennifer Timmick is a volunteer at the National Museum of American History. You can find more stories of volunteerism in America at npr.org/heretohelp.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARC DE SOLEIL’S “GOT CAUGHT IN AMSTERDAM”)

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

We’re going to hear a reaction to one of today’s rulings, the ruling about the Federal Reserve. Neel Kashkari is president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. As we’ve heard the Supreme Court rule, the Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook can keep her job, following President Trump’s move to fire her, at least for now. Neel Kashkari, thanks for joining us.

NEEL KASHKARI: Thanks for having me.

DETROW: What was your overall reaction to this decision?

KASHKARI: I was relieved. I was relieved when the majority opinion – or the majority of the court went to great lengths to explain why independent monetary policy, monetary policy independent of short-term political considerations, is not only of paramount importance for the economy today, but it’s rooted in American history. And I was gratified that the court understood why that is so important.

DETROW: As we heard, though, this was a narrow decision, essentially, that Lisa Cook didn’t receive due process. She could still be fired, theoretically, if the lower court determines she committed mortgage fraud, which she denies. Are you worried about that outcome?

KASHKARI: Well, I have to defer to the lawyers to sort out those details, but I think at the end of the day, the Supreme Court has clearly expressed its – you know, it segmented the Federal Reserve from all of the other independent or formally independent agencies. And it said that monetary policy has this unique history in America and it should be kept independent of the political process. The fact that the court so strongly reached that conclusion, which I, of course, agree with, that gives me great comfort that whatever may come forward, that they are going to do their best within the bounds of the law and the Constitution to keep the Fed independent. And I feel good about that.

DETROW: So despite the fact that this was a narrow ruling on the legal side of things, you feel like – you read this, you see this opinion, and you feel like this is a clear-cut vote for an independent Fed?

KASHKARI: Exactly. Yes.

DETROW: You know, I do want to ask. You and Governor Cook are both members of the Federal Open Market Committee, the group that meets eight times a year to set monetary policy, including interest rates. Have you discussed this case with her? Has she said anything to you about her concerns about this case as it played out?

KASHKARI: You know, Lisa is not only a colleague. She’s a friend. I’ve talked to her a number of times on a personal level just saying, hey, how are you doing? How are you hanging in there? She’s been under enormous pressure. I think that she has carried herself – first of all, she’s done her job throughout this process. She comes, you know, fully prepared to her FOMC meetings. She fully contributes with very rich and robust analysis backing up her views. And so I think I’ve just shared with her my admiration for the way that she’s continued to do her job, given the pressure that she’s been under, and that’s really been the extent of our conversations.

DETROW: For people who don’t follow this as closely, why, to you is an independent Fed so important? And why was this such a dangerous case?

KASHKARI: Well, what history has shown, not just in America but around the world, is that politicians of both sides of the aisle, both leanings, would prefer when they’re in power to have lower interest rates to boost the economy, to make their constituents happy and boost their political chances. And when central banks have acted in terms of – in favor of politics over analysis and data, it ends up leading to much worse economic outcomes for the public over the long term. It leads to higher inflation. It leads to more volatility. It can even lead to financial crises. And so every single advanced economy in the world has adopted the view that monetary policy should be kept independent of short-term political considerations, and the Supreme Court did its part today to affirm that view.

DETROW: I mean, given how central interest rates were to all of this and the pressure that President Trump was putting on the Fed to lower them, I am curious. You’ve made comments in the past. You know, given what is happening with inflation, how likely is Trump to get his way as the rest of the year plays out?

KASHKARI: Well, I mean, we’re all going to focus on the data. I certainly am, and I know my colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee are. And inflation is still too high. And if we look at most of the readings of inflation, it’s not moving down. It’s moving sideways or maybe even moving up. It’s not just related to oil. I mean, oil prices are a big driver of inflation, but so is what we call services inflation, which is not directly related to oil or energy prices. And so there are a lot of factors that have been pushing inflation higher. Inflation has been too high for five years. The American people really don’t like high inflation. And we have a job to do, and that’s get inflation back down to our 2% target. And I know that we are committed to doing so.

DETROW: I wanted to ask about the other case that we heard about. I’m curious – have you had a chance to think about this economically? Do you have any concerns about what this ruling about broader regulatory agencies could mean for the economy if suddenly these agencies that have a big say over commerce can suddenly be a lot more at the whim of a current administration?

KASHKARI: You know, I think it’ll lead to more volatility in the economy. We hear about this in different sectors where there are regulatory policies that Congress passes for, let’s say, a two-year period or a four-year period, and then it’s due to renewal, and there’s uncertainty about whether Congress would renew it. And many businesses say, hey, we can’t make long-term investment decisions if we don’t know that the regulatory apparatus is going to be consistent for the life of our investment, say, a 10-year investment. If we end up in a world where every four years or every eight years, the pendulum swings dramatically across different sectors of the economy, I think it would lead to more volatility, and that could be more challenging environment for businesses to make long-term investment decisions.

DETROW: Neel Kashkari is president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Thank you so much for talking to us.

KASHKARI: Thank you for having me.

(SOUNDBITE OF THE OFFLINE’S “LES DUNES”)

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

A growing number of research scientists in the United States are moving their labs to other countries. NPR’s Jon Hamilton reports on three U.S. researchers heading for the United Kingdom.

JON HAMILTON, BYLINE: For decades, the U.S. was seen as a nation that prized its universities and scientists. Megan Peters, a cognitive scientist at the University of California, Irvine, thinks that changed when President Trump began his second term.

MEGAN PETERS: It became very apparent very quickly that the new administration did not value higher education, and not only did they not value it, but they actively were trying to dismantle it and to dismantle scientific research that goes along with that.

HAMILTON: Grants were delayed or terminated, universities came under fire, and government agencies like the National Institutes of Health were reshaped to reflect White House priorities. The Department of Health and Human Services, which runs the NIH, says it is focusing on gold standard science, reducing bureaucracy and conducting essential research at a more practical cost. Peters, who studies how the brain deals with uncertainty, had already been considering options beyond her tenured position at UC Irvine. Now she was having doubts about any job in the U.S.

PETERS: So when I went on the job market, I started looking around overseas.

HAMILTON: Meanwhile, overseas universities had begun stepping up efforts to recruit international scientists. Steve Fleming is a professor at University College London who had worked with Peters. He realized it might be possible to bring her to the school’s department of experimental psychology.

STEVE FLEMING: I was aware that a role had – was going to be advertised in that department, and we started having a conversation about how that could be a good fit for her.

HAMILTON: It helped that groups like the U.K.’s Royal Society and the European Research Council had begun offering grants designed to attract international scientists like Peters, and she was interested, even though the move would mean a pay cut.

PETERS: London was a big draw in general and University College London, in particular, was a huge draw scientifically and professionally.

HAMILTON: So this summer, Peters and her partner are moving to London. She says one benefit of her position there will be the ability to tap into new funding sources.

PETERS: There are certainly opportunities that are not available to me here in the United States that I will now be eligible for, and that is – that’s a big part of this draw.

HAMILTON: Steve Fleming says Peters is just one of the U.S. scientists expected to arrive this summer.

FLEMING: There are two other individuals, high-profile recruits from the U.S. Both had tenure.

HAMILTON: Such moves reflect a shift among U.S. researchers. The journal Nature found that in the first quarter of 2025, U.S.-based scientists submitted nearly a third more applications for overseas jobs than they had the previous year. A survey of academic researchers last year showed that 75% were considering leaving the U.S. Tamara Swaab and her husband, Ron Mangun, are neuroscientists who spent more than three decades at the University of California, Davis before deciding to take jobs at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. Swaab, who got her Ph.D. in the Netherlands, says one reason she came to the U.S. was that back then, Europe was less accepting of women scientists.

TAMARA SWAAB: What I always loved about science in the United States was how open it was and how people saw opportunities and would work for them, and there was this optimism.

HAMILTON: Now, Swaab says, that optimism is more present in British and European scientists. Also, the University of Birmingham was able to offer her husband a grant from the U.K.’s newly created Global Talent Fund. But Mangun says their move is more than just a reaction to the current state of science in the U.S.

RON MANGUN: It certainly is a factor. Was it the factor or was it the motivating factor for me? I’d say the answer to that was no.

HAMILTON: Mangun says the big attraction was trying something new while still maintaining ties with UC Davis. He also thinks voters in the U.S. will eventually restore the nation’s commitment to research.

MANGUN: They want science. They want exploration. They want discovery. They want cures, and I think they’re going to demand it.

HAMILTON: When that happens, he says, U.S. scientists will have more reason to stay. Jon Hamilton, NPR News.

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

Israel and Lebanon have agreed on a road map for ending the war that has killed thousands of Lebanese people. Israel has destroyed whole villages and occupied large parts of Southern Lebanon in its military campaign against the Hezbollah militia. In signing the U.S.-brokered agreement, Lebanon’s ambassador to the U.S., Nada Moawad, called this a first step.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

NADA MOAWAD: The first step on the road to restoring Lebanese sovereignty and territorial integrity.

DETROW: But Hezbollah immediately rejected the agreement. And in Lebanon, as NPR’s Ruth Sherlock reports, it’s been widely attacked as unworkable.

RUTH SHERLOCK, BYLINE: Even with the deal between Israel and Lebanon signed, Israeli drones still circle – menacing – over Beirut.

(SOUNDBITE OF DRONES FLYING OVERHEAD)

SHERLOCK: Outside Lebanon’s Parliament, protesters against the agreement blast songs celebrating the fight against Israel.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIEDI MUSICAL ARTIST: (Singing in non-English language).

SHERLOCK: Hezbollah’s leader, Naim Qassem, has called it, quote, “a surrender of Lebanese sovereignty.” It’s a view widely shared across Lebanon.

SELENA NASIR: It is not in the interest of the Lebanese. And it is not in the interest of Lebanon.

SHERLOCK: This is Selena Nasir (ph), a Lebanese human rights expert now focused on the war in the south. The agreement makes Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon conditional on Hezbollah giving up its weapons. Israel claims it’s weakened the Iranian-backed militia enough that the Lebanese army can enforce this. Nasir says this is simply not the case. The Lebanese military is small, with limited combat experience.

NASIR: The Lebanese state will not be able to disarm Hezbollah, and therefore, the Israeli army will not do their commitments of redeployment and allowing people to return to their villages.

SHERLOCK: All over Beirut, crammed into courtyards between skyscrapers and along the seafront, are tents housing those whose homes in south Lebanon have been destroyed in the bombardment or are now beyond their reach in territory occupied by the Israeli army. These are the people most affected by the deal.

Hi.

IMAN HAREZ: (Non-Enlish language spoken).

SHERLOCK: Four-year-old Selene (ph) comes up to us shyly, as we speak with her mother, Iman Harez (ph).

HAREZ: (Non-Enlish language spoken).

SHERLOCK: “This little one has lived through two wars,” Harez says – this one and the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah a few years ago.

HAREZ: (Non-Enlish language spoken).

SHERLOCK: She says her daughter knows what to do when she hears a warplane – rush to try to shelter against a wall. All this suffering has bolstered support for Hezbollah by many who see the militia as stopping Israel from taking more land. Ali Shaito (ph), a mechanical engineer and refugee from the south says, especially now, it’s unthinkable to disarm the group.

ALI SHAITO: No one could take the weapon of Hezbollah.

SHERLOCK: And in Lebanon, a country of many religions with a history of sectarian violence, if the Lebanese army tries to remove Hezbollah’s weapons, Shaito warns, it could push the country to civil war.

SHAITO: To have a war between each other, not with another country. (Non-Enlish language spoken)..

SHERLOCK: A few meters away, Mohammad Asmar (ph) sits on an orange sofa outside a tent he shares with his wife and three young children. A Lebanese flag flutters in the breeze.

MOHAMMAD ASMAR: (Non-Enlish language spoken).

SHERLOCK: Asmar says he put up the flag even before the tent and that he would like to see a strong Lebanon, where the army controls its borders.

ASMAR: (Non-Enlish language spoken).

SHERLOCK: He served in the Lebanese army for 14 years. He’s also a Shia Muslim from the south, the block from which Hezbollah draws much support. When asked if he were in the military today, if he would carry out orders to disarm Hezbollah, he avoids giving a clear answer.

Ruth Sherlock, NPR News, Beirut.

Transcript:

SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

Cleaning up road trash often involves people in orange vests walking along a highway with those little grabbers and plastic bags. In Oregon, there is an annual trash pickup event that’s more like a party. Thousands of people come together to drive hundreds of miles of forest service roads, picking up trash by day and then camping out with live music at night. KUOW’s Matt Martin was there this weekend.

(SOUNDBITE OF ITEM BANGING IN DUMPSTER)

MATT MARTIN, BYLINE: That’s trash crashing into a huge dumpster in a field in the small town of Madras, Oregon. It’s part of the Gambler 500. The gimmick is to buy a junky car for $500 and gamble on whether or not you can get it running. Once you do, you take that car to race on public lands and collect as much garbage as possible.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSICAL HORN HONKING)

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Woah.

MARTIN: These cars are heavily modified and painted wild colors. A truck with a dragon on the hood that spits real flames or a car frame with a boat Frankensteined (ph) onto it, known as a Lam-boat-ghini (ph). Tate Morgan founded the Gambler 500. He says it’s a way to gamify public service.

TATE MORGAN: It’s the “Mary Poppins,” you know, a spoonful of sugar thing, you know? If you just said, hey, let’s go pick up trash, you would get a half a dozen people. But if you set up this big, cool challenge where people could let their freak flag fly and build crazy, weird cars and not be put in a box, then this is what happens.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSICAL HORN HONKING)

MARTIN: It really is a party. RVs and tents dot the field. There are food vendors and concerts. It’s like Burning Man meets “Mad Max” meets the Sierra Club. Robert Kenton wears a top hat and jacket covered in patches from past Gambler events. He’s never missed one since 2018. He says all the regulars have grown up and experienced life together.

ROBERT KENTON: We’ve gotten married. We’ve gotten divorced. We’ve had kids – you know, cancer, births, suicides, stuff like that. So we all kind of just become this kind of weirdly dysfunctional off-roading group family.

MARTIN: The Gambler 500 has spread beyond Oregon. Satellite groups have popped up from California to New York. Tate Morgan is happy his idea has taken hold.

MORGAN: I think we’ve also addressed a certain portion of our society and outdoor users who didn’t fit in the archetype of how people wanted to define environmentalists and stewardship.

MARTIN: These gamblers have removed more than 5 million pounds from public lands in Oregon over the years – a testament to the group’s slogan, ABG – always be gambling.

For NPR News, I’m Matt Martin in Madras, Oregon.

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SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

The conservative Supreme Court took sides against the Republican Party in a ruling today. The case was about mail-in voting. The court upheld a Mississippi law that allows election officials to count mail-in ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but received after Election Day. Here to explain the court’s ruling is NPR political correspondent Ashley Lopez. Hey, Ashley.

ASHLEY LOPEZ, BYLINE: Hey there.

DETROW: Tell us more about the case.

LOPEZ: Yeah. So this case was centered on a Mississippi law that allows election administrators to count postmarked ballots that arrive up to five days after Election Day. The Republican National Committee and the Trump campaign filed a challenge to that law before the 2024 election, arguing that these sorts of grace periods for voters amount to an unlawful extension of elections. They argued that Congress sets an election day, and counting votes after that jeopardizes the integrity of American elections.

DETROW: And it seems like the court’s majority did not buy that argument.

LOPEZ: They did not. In a 5-4 ruling where two conservative justices, Amy Coney Barrett and John Roberts, sided with the liberal wing of the court, they said that Mississippi’s law isn’t violating federal statute. Justice Barrett authored this opinion. She wrote that states have the right to maintain some latitude in how they run their elections, which includes how they run their mail-in ballot programs. And while this might be out of step with President Trump and some GOP officials, this is actually, historically, a pretty conservative principle. The majority also said in clear language that voting is happening when voters fill out a ballot, not when ballots are making their way through the mail.

DETROW: I mean, the split from the conservatives to the court is pretty interesting, but I’m curious what the reaction has been from conservatives not sitting in the Supreme Court.

LOPEZ: Yeah. Well, I mean, President Trump was obviously upset, right? He renewed his call to severely restrict mail-in ballots nationwide, even though he often votes by mail himself. He also urged Congress to pass an elections overhaul bill that, so far, has gone nowhere in the Senate and notably doesn’t include anything about ballot receipt deadlines.

There is Mississippi’s Republican governor, too, Tate Reeves. Even though the court upheld his state’s own law, he said he disagreed with the ruling and plans to get rid of the state’s grace period. He said this is a COVID-era law that doesn’t need to stay in place. I think it’s worth noting the Republican-led state legislature could have changed the law years ago, but this case was part of a larger GOP effort to undermine access to mail-in voting that just didn’t pan out in this case.

DETROW: Because of the way that President Trump attacks this, this gets a lot of attention, but how many voters are we really talking about – big picture – who have their mail ballots arrive after Election Day?

LOPEZ: You know, so right now, 18 states and territories have a grace period for most voters casting ballots by mail. And it’s even more voters when you factor in people overseas, including members of the military. A good example of this is Washington state. In 2024, a quarter million mail-in ballots were counted that were received after Election Day. So I mean, it’s a pretty significant number of people who could have been affected.

DETROW: Interesting. Tell me more about how this would affect people beyond voters – right? – like election officials.

LOPEZ: Yeah. I mean, this would have been a big change for them. This could have been a lot of chaos – right? – especially in states that have universal mail-in ballot programs. I’ve seen statements from various secretaries of state that say that educating voters about changes to deadlines would have been, like, this huge undertaking ahead of the midterms. And look, there’s data that suggests that voters, in general, adapt to tighter deadlines over time, but changing the rules so close to an election could create a lot of upheaval in some states. So voting rights advocates say they’re relieved the court did not side with Republicans on this.

DETROW: NPR’s Ashley Lopez, thank you so much.

LOPEZ: Yeah. Thank you.

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SCOTT DETROW, HOST:

There is a rising wave of xenophobic violence in South Africa as some locals blame migrants from other African countries for unemployment, crime and other social problems. Foreign-owned businesses have been attacked. People have been chased from their homes. Several migrants have been killed. Kate Bartlett in Johannesburg reports that the xenophobic group leading the charge has given foreigners until June 30 to leave the country or else.

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KATE BARTLETT, BYLINE: A group of men are hard at work in a makeshift carpentry and upholstery workshop in Jeppestown, a rundown suburb east of Johannesburg’s city center. They’re all immigrants to South Africa, mainly from Zimbabwe and Malawi – some legal, some not. And the upbeat music streaming from the radio belies the apprehension they’re feeling.

VICTOR SITHOLE: We’re all scared. I’ve got quite a lot of friends who’ve been affected. Their homes have been destroyed, their businesses.

BARTLETT: Victor (ph) Sithole is a 55-year-old upholsterer from Zimbabwe who came to South Africa decades ago. He has a residence permit but says he doesn’t believe that will protect him if the xenophobic groups who’ve been marching in the area pass by. He likens South Africa to conflict zone.

UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS #1: (Chanting in non-English language).

BARTLETT: Anti-immigrant protesters have taken hold in South Africa, marching in cities across the country, chanting, mabahambe – a Zulu phrase meaning they must go.

UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTER: (Shouting) Go back to your countries. We are tired of you guys. Go back to your countries.

BARTLETT: In Durban, thousands of Malawians who have fled their homes to escape the violence are in makeshift camps, in winter, waiting for their country to send buses to rescue them. Nigeria and Ghana weren’t waiting, and they’ve already repatriated their citizens who wanted to leave.

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UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS #2: (Shouting in non-English language).

BARTLETT: Their fears are valid. In 2008, xenophobic riots left more than 60 dead, some burned alive by mobs, and tens of thousands displaced. This year, so far, several Mozambicans and a Malawian have been killed, according to South African authorities. The main xenophobic movement is called March and March. It’s led by this media-savvy, former radio presenter from Durban, named Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma.

JACINTA NGOBESE-ZUMA: South Africa will be great again. It just needs all of us to rise and defeat our enemy, and God bless South Africa.

BARTLETT: Groups like this blame immigrants for stealing jobs and the country’s high crime levels. South Africa’s official unemployment rate is one of the worst in the world. Sixty percent of young people don’t have work, but the data shows neither unemployment nor crime can be blamed solely on immigrants. South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa has tried to calm tensions.

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PRESIDENT CYRIL RAMAPHOSA: We recognize that many communities are frustrated by crime, unemployment and the pressure on public services.

BARTLETT: But migrants who NPR spoke to in Johannesburg say it might be too little too late. In the inner-city suburb of Yeoville, I met Bona Mapezi Bahati from the Democratic Republic of Congo. She’s 33 and heavily pregnant.

BONA MAPEZI BAHATI: (Speaking Swahili).

BARTLETT: Speaking Swahili, she tells me how she fled Eastern Congo in her teens after being gang raped by a militia group. She made her way to South Africa 15 years ago and initially had an asylum seeker visa. That’s expired, and she’s in bureaucratic limbo.

BAHATI: (Speaking Swahili).

BARTLETT: And now, she says there’s this new threat from anti-immigrant groups.

BAHATI: (Speaking Swahili).

BARTLETT: “I feel so sad, especially as I’m pregnant,” she says, struggling to hold back tears. “It’s like I’m in Congo. I feel like it’s a war zone here. I’m scared they’ll kill me.” Kate Bartlett, NPR News, Johannesburg.

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