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Live from NPR News, I'm Giles Snyder. Attorney General Pam Bondi is out at the Justice Department. President Trump made the announcement on social media today. NPR's Carrie Johnson reports. Deputy Todd Blanche will serve in the acting role for now.
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In a post on social media. President Trump calls Pam Bondi a great American patriot and loyal friend and says she'll transition to a job in the private sector. Trump has blamed Bondi for mishandling law enforcement files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and he' demanded the Justice Department do more to go after his perceived political enemies. Bondi presided over a huge exodus at the doj. The group Justice Connection, which supports current and former justice workers, says DOJ's Independence, Integrity and workforce have degraded more under her leadership than any other time during the department's history. Todd Blanche, one of Trump's former personal lawyers, will run the Justice Department on an acting basis. Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has asked Army Chief of Randy George to step down. A Pentagon spokesman confirmed the move in a statement saying General George is retiring effective immediately. The Pentagon has not given a reason for George's departure. NASA's Artemis II mission, with its crew of four astronauts now on a path to the moon, the crew fired a thruster that sent the spacecraft on the trajectory that will take the astronauts around the moon and back. As Central Florida Public Media's Brendan Byrne
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reports, the spacecraft, named Integrity, fired its engine for 5 minutes and 50 seconds, conducting a maneuver called a trans lunar injection.
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Integrity looks like a good burn.
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We're confirming Integrity copies.
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The engine burn now puts the spacecraft and its crew of four on a free return trajectory where it will fly around the moon and then come back home at the end of its roughly 10 day mission. With this trajectory, it's expected that the Artemis 2 mission will surpass the record for the farthest distance a human has traveled from Earth at over 248,000 miles, set by Apollo 13. Artemis 2 is a key test flight of NASA's lunar ambitions, aiming to land astronauts on the moon by 2028. For NPR News, I'm Brendan Byrne in Orlando.
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The Trump administration is designating microplastics and pharmaceuticals as contaminants in the nation's drinking water. Here's NPR's Will Stone.
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The Environmental Protection Agency is placing microplastics and pharmaceuticals on what's known as the contaminant candidate list alongside other chemicals like pfas. The list gets updated every five years. The action doesn't require the agency to move forward with regulations, though it could set the ST. Administrator Lee Zeldin said it was a landmark step. But some environmental groups pushed back, saying the administration is doing this even as it works to unravel regulations on chemicals in the environment. The administration also said it would be investing more than $140 million in a research effort to study microplastics in the human body. Will Stone, NPR News.
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And you're listening to NPR News. President Trump is planning to bypass Congress when it comes to the shutdown of the Homeland Security Department. In a social media post, Trump said he will soon sign an order to temporarily pay all DHS employees who have gone without paychecks during the shutdown, which has reached 48 days. He made a similar move to resume paying TSA agents in the Democratic Republic of Congo. There's a kind of fish that can scale a 50 foot rock wall behind a waterfall. Researchers say it's the first time the behavior has been documented in Africa. Here's reporter Ari Daniel.
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Pacifique kiwele Mutumbala, a PhD student at the Universit de Lubumb, spent a few rainy seasons at the waterfall where he saw thousands of these upwardly mobile fish called shell ears.
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Ah, the first time I was very excited.
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Yes. Yes, very excited.
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CT scans revealed their front fins have an array of single celled hooks which they use to grip the rock. The fish alternate between wriggling rapidly upwards and mostly resting. The entire ascent takes almost 10 hours. Mutumbala says the findings have conservation implications because cutting the water supply to this waterfall to fill a dam or for irrigation could harm the fish. For NPR News, I'm Ari Daniel.
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Japan's benchmark Nikkei stock average is rallying in Friday, trading up 1% as stocks in the US overcame early losses to finish with slim gains and closing out the first winning week since the start of the Iran war. Wall street will be closed for good Friday. I'm Jael Snyder, NPR News.