Special Series Up First Newsletter All Up First Stories Up First Podcast Morning Edition LISTEN & FOLLOW NPR App Apple Podcasts Spotify Amazon Music iHeart Radio YouTube Music RSS link Sign up for the [TITLE] Newsletter Get perks with [Podcast Title]+ Your support helps make our show possible and unlocks access to our sponsor-free feed.
By
Brittney Melton
Good morning. You're reading the Up First newsletter. Subscribe here to get it delivered to your inbox, and listen to the Up First podcast for all the news you need to start your day.
The U.S. and Iran are expected to meet today in Geneva for negotiations. This marks the second round of talks to discuss limits on Iran's nuclear program. The U.S. wants concessions from Iran beyond its nuclear program and has paired the talks with a threat by building up its military forces in the region.
Protesters hold Iranian pre-Islamic revolution of 1979 flags in front of the United Nations office ahead of indirect nuclear talks between the United States and Iran in Geneva on Feb. 17. U.S. President warned Iran of potential consequences should it fail to strike a deal with the United States, as negotiators prepare for the latest round of talks in Geneva. Harold Cunningham/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Nine people face trial today in a Fort Worth, Texas, federal court in connection to a nonfatal shooting that happened outside an ICE detention facility last July. Around a dozen people protested Trump's immigration crackdown and deportation efforts outside the Prairieland Detention Center in nearby Alvarado. At some point, police and prosecutors say shots were fired, injuring a local police officer.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, an American civil rights leader, minister and politician, and Martin Luther King Jr.'s protégé, died today at the age of 84. Jackson helped to reshape Democratic politics in the 1980s with two galvanizing presidential campaigns. According to his family, public commemorations will take place in Chicago. Here's a closer look at Jackson's life, from his presidential bids to his recent years of activism.
Federal authorities have again denied Minnesota criminal investigators access to evidence and other materials they collected after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, state officials said yesterday. Pretti, an ICU nurse, was killed by Border Patrol agents last month in Minneapolis. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has faced exclusion from the investigation since the shooting happened. Despite this, the BCA continues to seek access to evidence as the state conducts its own probe.
Andrea D'Aquino for NPR Living Better is a special series about what it takes to stay healthy in America.
The U.S. government is urging Americans to avoid highly processed foods, saying they fuel diet-related diseases. Many people want to reduce these foods but struggle to identify them, especially when it comes to carbs. Ultra-processed foods are factory-made with ingredients rarely found in your pantry, like preservatives and artificial sweeteners. Studies have shown these foods increase the risks of multiple health problems, including diabetes and depression. Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, who leads the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University, says he gives his patients two practical rules of thumb to follow when selecting grains and starches:
by Michel Martin, Morning Edition and Up First host
When I first heard the story about what happened to Giséle Pelicot, I couldn't believe it. Or maybe it's more accurate to say I didn't want to believe it — and it turns out neither did she.
Her husband of nearly half a century had been drugging and raping her while she was unconscious in their home in southeastern France. He had been doing it for almost a decade — and not only that, he had actively solicited other men to do the same thing. He coached some 70 men to rape his own wife. And he filmed the whole thing. He's serving a maximum 20-year sentence for his crime. And all of the men who could be identified — some 20 were not — were also convicted.
Penguin Random House When I spoke to Madame Pelicot for a story you'll hear on Morning Edition and The Sunday Story this week, tied to the release of her new book A Hymn to Life, one of the first things she told me was that when she first saw the tapes she didn't recognize herself. Her brain could not accept that it was her.
It's one of the most disturbing stories you've ever heard about sexual assault —- and that is saying something in a world in which we know that women, children and yes, men, have been viciously abused in war time and peace time, here rich and powerful men have traded girls between them for fun and where vulnerable migrants seek work and become enslaved. It goes on and on.
It's hard to understand how humans can do that to each other under any circumstance. But as a person who has enjoyed a long marriage myself, I could not and cannot understand how someone could do that to someone that he supposedly loved, who birthed his children, who carefully prepared his favorite foods and someone who, on the day he was arrested for what he did to her, dropped off a bag of warm clothing and clean underwear to jail for him.
I still don't understand. But what I carried away from my conversation with Pelicot was awe. She was calm, open and unafraid. She spoke of the hardest things with such gentleness and kindness that I could only marvel at the source of it. She ended her book, and our conversation, by saying that she still believes in love. "To fight the emptiness," she writes, "I need to love." What a message. What a challenge. What a gift.
Actor Robert Duvall in 2005. Mark Mainz/Getty Images North America hide caption
This newsletter was edited by Treye Green.
Sponsor Message
Become an NPR sponsor