Profile
Sections
Local
tv
Featured
More From NBC
Follow NBC News
news Alerts
There are no new alerts at this time
Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Kyiv’s NATO aspirations, and land will likely be on the table this morning when Trump tries to convince Russian President Vladimir Putin to accept a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine.
The two leaders are set to speak on a phone call scheduled for between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. EST that will go on for “as long as they deem necessary,” the Kremlin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday.
Read the full story.
The State Department has reauthorized scholarship funding for Afghan women studying in Oman who said they faced persecution by the Taliban if their program was canceled and they were deported to Afghanistan.
Last Wednesday, the U.S. government authorized the continuation of funding to the American University of Afghanistan and Texas A&M University until June 30, a State Department spokesperson said. It is unclear whether funding would then be further extended for the program, which is administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development.
The women had appealed for urgent help to allow them to continue their studies abroad, saying that their return to Afghanistan, where the Taliban has severely curtailed women’s rights, “would mean the permanent loss of our education and exposure to severe risks, including oppression, insecurity, and a future without opportunities.”
Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence, has retweeted a post by a far-right commentator who praised the dismantling of Voice of America and other U.S. government-funded news outlets.
Ian Miles Cheong, a contributor to the Russian state media outlet RT, claimed that Voice of America, Radio Free Asia and other outlets run by the U.S. Agency for Global Media “produced and disseminated far-left propaganda, including media hostile to conservatives in Central European countries such as Poland, Slovakia and Hungary” and perpetuated “pro-war narratives against Russia.”
The U.S. Agency for Global Media, an independent U.S. government agency, was one of seven entities Trump designated for elimination in an executive order last Friday, in a move critics said was a win for authoritarian regimes such as China, where state media cheered the decision to shut the outlets known for their reporting on issues such as human rights and religious freedom.
Speaking earlier today, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson declined to comment on Chinese state media reports or U.S. domestic policy, but said “it is not a secret that those U.S. media outlets make biased reporting on China.”
The issue of diversity, equity and inclusion programs is among the most tightly divided and polarizing questions in the United States, with wide gaps emerging along partisan and racial lines, according to the latest national NBC News poll.
Trump has made dismantling DEI programs an early focus of his administration, and voters are split over the future of DEI programs in the workplace, with deep differences depending on their political party.
Half of registered voters (49%) in the NBC News poll say DEI programs should be eliminated “because they create divisions and inefficiencies in the workplace by putting too much emphasis on race and other social factors over merit, skills and experience.”
And 48% say DEI programs in the workplace should continue “because diverse perspectives reflect our country, create innovative ideas and solutions, encourage unity and make our workplaces fair and inclusive.”
Read the full story here.
Trump is expected to speak today with Putin as the United States tries to mediate a diplomatic solution to end Russia’s three-year war with Ukraine.
“We have tremendous things to report tomorrow, speaking with President Putin of Russia to save some soldiers who are in deep trouble. They’re captured,” Trump told reporters yesterday afternoon.
Trump said that “it’s a bad situation” in both Ukraine and Russia.
“What’s happening in Ukraine is not good, but we’re going to see if we can work a peace agreement, a ceasefire and peace, and I think we’ll be able to do it. I’m speaking to President Putin tomorrow morning,” he said.
He later posted on Truth Social, “Many elements of a Final Agreement have been agreed to, but much remain.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters at yesterday’s briefing that “we’ve never been closer to a peace deal than we are in this moment.”
Trump said Sunday that he and Putin will discuss “land” and “power plants, because that’s a big question.”
“But I think we have a lot of it already discussed, very much by both sides, Ukraine and Russia. We’re already talking about that, dividing up certain assets. They’ve been working on that,” Trump said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said Putin can’t be trusted because Russia hasn’t stuck to its previous agreements with Ukraine. That was the message he communicated to Trump in late February when he clashed with Trump and Vice President JD Vance at the White House. Trump, meanwhile, recently threatened to ramp up sanctions on Russia until it reached a peace agreement.
The Democratic National Committee has launched a six-figure investment in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race in support of liberal candidate Susan Crawford.
The investment comes exactly two weeks ahead of the technically nonpartisan April 1 election that will determine the state Supreme Court’s ideological balance for the second time in two years and coincides with today’s kickoff of early voting.
The DNC describes the move as the party’s earliest-ever electoral investment after a November election.
Party officials said the investment, which will officially go to the Wisconsin Democratic coordinated campaign, is intended to help counter the millions of dollars spent so far by outside groups with ties to Elon Musk.
“When I went to Wisconsin to knock doors last month, folks told me they don’t want billionaires like Elon Musk running our federal government and they certainly don’t want him buying our elections,” DNC Chair Ken Martin said in a statement. “After what I heard on the ground, we’re investing earlier than ever before. The best way to curb Elon Musk’s influence is to organize everywhere, win races, and stop him in his tracks.”
The investment, which will also aid the Democratic candidate in the battleground’s state school superintendent race, will help fund grassroots organizing efforts aimed at phone and text banking to reach voters.
The race features a face-off between Brad Schimel, a conservative state judge in Waukesha County who previously was the state’s Republican attorney general, and Crawford, a liberal state judge in Madison.
© 2025 NBCUniversal Media, LLC
