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Nowadays’s best tales
Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth confronted scrutiny on two fronts the previous day. Whilst lawmakers seen video of the fatal September moves on an alleged drug boat within the Caribbean, he was once one after the other faulted for the usage of Sign to talk about a U.S. assault on Yemen. In a closed-door assembly, lawmakers addressed questions on the second one spherical of moves at the alleged drug boat, which killed two survivors.
Secretary of Protection Pete Hegseth (R) speaks along President Trump throughout a Cupboard Assembly within the Cupboard Room of the White Space in Washington, D.C. on December 2, 2025.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP by means of Getty Pictures
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Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP by means of Getty Pictures
- 🎧 Army Adm. Frank M. Bradley, who oversaw the operation with the alleged drug boat, defended the second one strike to lawmakers the previous day, NPR’s Tom Bowman tells Up First. He justified the motion, announcing that the survivors had been actively speaking with comrades by means of radio and making an attempt to salvage medication from the just about destroyed boat, which resulted in the order for a 2nd spherical of moves. Whilst Republicans proceed to toughen the assaults at the alleged drug boats, Democrats are hard the unencumber of the entire video to the general public and preserving Hegseth in the end accountable.
The FBI mentioned the previous day that it arrested a person who it believes is chargeable for striking pipe bombs close to the U.S. Capitol advanced on Jan. 6, 2021. The person suspected of planting the gadgets is 30-year-old Brian J. Cole Jr., who was once arrested in Woodbridge, Va. He’s being charged with transportation of an explosive tool by means of interstate trade and tried malicious destruction by way of an explosive tool, in keeping with an arrest warrant filed in his case.
- 🎧 The FBI affidavit presentations monetary proof that Cole purchased pieces that had been in line with those used to construct the pipe bombs that government discovered, in keeping with NPR’s Ryan Lucas. Mobile phone location information confirmed that, at the night time the bombs had been positioned, the suspect’s telephone was once pinging cellular towers within the space the place the pipe bombs had been left. Solutions to questions surrounding the motives at the back of the pipe bombs are anticipated to emerge in court docket over the approaching months because the Justice Division prosecutes this situation.
The Ideally suited Court docket has cleared the best way for Texas to make use of a brand new congressional map that might assist the Republican Birthday party win 5 extra U.S. Space seats. This offers President Trump and the GOP a large spice up within the ongoing gerrymandering battle. The Court docket overturned a decrease court docket’s ruling that discovered a chance of racial discrimination within the map.
- 🎧 The prime court docket’s conservative majority necessarily sided with Texas state lawmakers, NPR’s Hansi Lo Wang says. The lawmakers claimed their motivation at the back of drawing new districts was once now not about race, however that they had been pushed to extend the possibility of electing Republicans. The Ideally suited Court docket is not executed with redistricting circumstances, because it nonetheless has to rule on a big balloting rights case involving Louisiana’s congressional map. Relying on what and when the court docket makes a decision on that case, there may well be any other wave of congressional gerrymandering in Southern states.
Image display
Ariana Grande as Glinda in Depraved: For Just right.
Lara Cornell/Giles Keyte/Common Footage
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Lara Cornell/Giles Keyte/Common Footage
Depraved: For Just right not too long ago got here to the massive display screen, charming audience with its tune, magical tale and costumes. Gown fashion designer Paul Tazewell’s paintings at the first Depraved movie made him the primary Black guy to win an Academy Award for gown design. He used iconic outfits, together with Glinda’s iridescent blue and lavender get dressed and Elphaba’s weathered trench coat, to put across the ladies’s trips with out phrases. Discover one of the crucial costumes he has designed for the brand new movie. You’ll additionally concentrate to him speak about his adventure with textiles in his interview with Contemporary Air, or learn the transcript right here.
Weekend choices
Creative Director Alicia Graf Mack with contributors of the Corporate
Andrew Eccles
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Andrew Eccles
Take a look at what NPR is gazing, studying and being attentive to this weekend:
🍿 Films: Feeling festive and able to dive into a few of this 12 months’s notable vacation films? Smartly, you’re in success as a result of Pop Tradition Glad Hour has the easiest information.
📚 Books: The Aquatics tells the tale of a political candidate’s spouse in a fictional African nation. She is stuck between her formidable husband and her creative easiest pal, whose unorthodox lifestyles and political complaint put him within the ruling regime’s crosshairs.
🎵 Tune: Nowadays marks the overall 2025 episode of New Tune Friday. From Dove Ellis’ Snow fall to TEED’s At all times With Me, listed here are the highlights of the new tune launched nowadays and a playlist to move at the side of it.
🎭 Theater: This week, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater introduced its first season underneath Alicia Graf Mack, a former major dancer with the corporate. The season may have 5 global premieres, together with Maija García’s Jazz Island.
🎮 Gaming: All Issues Regarded as manufacturer Vincent Acovino describes Metroid Top 4: Past as “baffling.” Whilst he praised the sport’s sound design and graphics, Acovino criticized the loss of puzzle-solving and traumatic sidekicks.
❓ Quiz: I scored a easy 9 out of eleven this week, which it sounds as if lands me at the “great record.” Now it’s your flip to see if you’re making the record too.
3 issues to understand ahead of you pass
Spotify Wrapped is telling customers their “listening age” this 12 months, in response to what generation of tune they listened to greater than their friends.
Spotify
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Spotify
- This 12 months’s Spotify Wrapped is bluntly taking a crack at their customers’ “listening age,” which is in response to what generation of tune they concentrate to. Many customers are finding that this calculated age is many years older or more youthful than their exact age.
- Pantone has introduced the 2026 Colour of the Yr, and for the first time, this can be a coloration of white. The corporate says it “serves as an emblem of calming affect.”
- Canadian Museum of Nature researchers have recognized a brand new species of rhino that when roamed Canada’s Prime Arctic 23 million years in the past. The invention alters the working out of when many historic animals dispersed around the continents.
This article was once edited by means of Suzanne Nuyen.
