Summary6 min read

The NewsWorthy with Erica Mandy

Episode: Ukraine Attacks Russia, Stock Sell-Off & Dog Emotions
Date: March 11, 2025

Overview

In this brisk and engaging episode, host Erica Mandy serves up the day's biggest stories in ten minutes. She covers Ukraine's unprecedented drone attack on Russia, fallout on Wall Street, ongoing global impacts of COVID-19 five years later, shifting U.S. energy policies, tech troubles facing Elon Musk, a major real estate acquisition, key developments on gender equality at the UN, and fascinating research about human understanding of dog emotions.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Ukraine’s Largest Drone Attack on Russia

Timestamp: 01:01

Reports emerged of Ukraine launching what appeared to be the largest drone attack on Russian territory since the start of the invasion three years ago.
- "The AP cites Russian officials who say hundreds of Ukrainian drones were launched. At least one person in Russia was killed and others were forced to evacuate. The attack sparked fires, and transportation in the region was suspended, though many drones were shot down." — Erica Mandy (01:10)
The strike followed a weekend of heavy Russian drone attacks on Ukraine.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is in Saudi Arabia for peace talks with Ukrainian leaders, reportedly pushing for Ukraine to give up territory in any peace deal—a significant sticking point.
Military aid and intelligence sharing from the U.S. to Ukraine remain suspended amid ongoing discussions.

2. Wall Street’s Slump and Trade Tensions

Timestamp: 02:22

The stock market plunged to its lowest in months, attributed to uncertainty from President Trump’s fluctuating tariffs on major trading partners (Mexico, Canada, China).
- "Economists are blaming President Trump's on and off again tariffs. Investors have said they worry the moves will either hurt the economy directly or create enough uncertainty to keep people and businesses from spending money." — Erica Mandy (02:28)
China retaliated with tariffs of up to 15% on American farm products.
A Canadian province hiked electricity prices by 25% for U.S. states.
Further tariffs targeting steel, aluminum, and more products from Mexico and Canada are expected unless trade progress is made.

3. Immigration Crackdown & Free Speech

Timestamp: 04:04

The Trump administration is working to deport Palestinian protest leader Mahmoud Khalil over his role in anti-Israel protests at Columbia University.
Khalil holds both a student visa and green card, but the government argues that organizing for a group labeled as a terror organization constitutes grounds for revoking his immigration status.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the deportation as protests erupt, calling it a free speech issue.
- "Hundreds of protesters have been rallying in New York City, calling Khalil's arrest an attack on free speech." — Erica Mandy (04:34)

4. Five Years Since COVID-19 Declared a Pandemic

Timestamp: 05:10

Exactly five years have passed since the WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic.
The U.S. has seen more COVID-19 deaths than the combined total of Civil War and Vietnam War fatalities.
While hundreds still die weekly, COVID-19 is now considered an endemic disease.
- "Only one in five adults say COVID 19, is a major threat to the health of the American population as a whole, though life is still different because of the virus socially, economically and politically." — Erica Mandy (05:40)
The pandemic's legacy continues to shape healthcare, work, technology, and society.

5. UN Declaration on Gender Equality

Timestamp: 07:12

The UN’s 193 member states unanimously adopted a renewed declaration to advance gender equality—thirty years after the landmark Beijing Women’s Conference.
- "No country has actually achieved the goal and there are major obstacles left to overcome." — Erica Mandy (07:22)
Key goals:
- Prevent violence against women and girls.
- Ensure access to education.
- Reduce women’s unpaid work.
- Expand childcare and promote domestic responsibility among men.
- Proposal to nominate a woman as the next UN Secretary-General for 2027.

6. U.S. Policy Shift: Fossil Fuels Follow-up

Timestamp: 08:02

New Energy Secretary Chris Wright, former fracking executive, vows to prioritize fossil fuels.
- "He called climate change a side effect of building the modern world. He said poor countries especially need oil, gas, and coal to lift themselves out of poverty." — Erica Mandy quoting Chris Wright (08:10)
Pledges to reverse climate-focused policies, suspending clean energy projects on federal lands.
Despite the rhetoric, fossil fuel production reached records even under the previous administration.

7. Elon Musk’s Tech Troubles

Timestamp: 09:05

Musk’s platform X experienced a cyberattack, allegedly initiated from Ukraine, knocking the service offline for many users.
- "Musk told Fox Business attackers had IP addresses originating in Ukraine...cybersecurity experts say that doesn't mean much and the hackers could still be anywhere in the world." — Erica Mandy (09:12)
Rival platform Blue Sky trends with the exodus from X.
Meanwhile, Tesla faces backlash and a coordinated campaign to sell its stock and vehicles due to Musk’s political actions. Tesla stock has halved since last year.

8. Real Estate Shakeup: Rocket Companies Acquires Redfin

Timestamp: 10:13

Rocket Companies is set to acquire Redfin for $1.75B in stock.
The move is intended to create a more seamless real estate experience, rivaling similar efforts by Zillow.
- "The goal is to streamline the process so people can connect with their real estate agent, lender, title company and mortgage servicer, all at the same place." — Erica Mandy (10:20)

9. Study: Humans Can't Read Dog Emotions Well

Timestamp: 11:08

A new study reveals people struggle to accurately gauge their dog’s feelings when unaware of the context.
- "In other words, people seemed to pay more attention to the situation than the dog's actual behavior." — Erica Mandy (11:38)
The research may inspire pet owners to focus more directly on their pets' cues, not just context.
Caveat: More pronounced emotional displays might be easier for owners—especially with their own dogs.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

“Any peace deal is going to have to include Ukraine giving up territory, which so far Ukraine's government has not been willing to do.”
— Erica Mandy, 01:39
“Investors have said they worry the moves will either hurt the economy directly or create enough uncertainty to keep people and businesses from spending money.”
— Erica Mandy, 02:31
“The pandemic changed healthcare, work, technology, travel, media, relationships and so on, and anthropologists plan to study the impacts for many years to come.”
— Erica Mandy, 05:56
“What the world needs now is more fossil fuels. That's the message from President Trump's new energy secretary.”
— Erica Mandy, 08:05
“People seemed to pay more attention to the situation than the dog's actual behavior.”
— Erica Mandy, 11:38

Timestamps for Important Segments

Ukraine Drone Attack: 01:01 – 02:22
Stock Sell-Off & Trade Tensions: 02:22 – 04:04
Palestinian Protest Leader Arrest: 04:04 – 05:10
Five Years Since COVID-19 Declared: 05:10 – 07:12
UN Gender Equality Declaration: 07:12 – 08:02
Energy Policy - Fossil Fuels: 08:02 – 09:05
Elon Musk’s Tech and Business Woes: 09:05 – 10:13
Redfin Acquisition: 10:13 – 11:08
Dog Emotion Study: 11:08 – 12:07

Final Thoughts

Erica Mandy moves quickly through each topic, offering both context and conciseness in her signature upbeat, fair, and friendly tone. The episode is particularly rich in current affairs, policy turns, and unique research tidbits—proving why The NewsWorthy remains a go-to daily catchup for a fast, balanced news rundown.

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Transcript5 lines

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Today is Tuesday, March 11th. We'll tell you what's behind Wall Street's worst day of the year so far and what concessions the US Wants Ukraine to make in peace talks today. Plus, the world is marking five years since the start of a global pandemic. Criminals may be targeting at least two of Elon Musk's companies. And how well do you know your dog? One study found humans are actually pretty clueless. Those stories and even more news to know coming up.
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Welcome.
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Welcome to the Newsworthy. All the day's news in around 10 minutes. Fast, fair, fun and on the go. I'm Erica Mandy. Thanks so much for being here. You ready? Let's do this. Early this morning, reports say Ukraine unleashed what seemed to be the biggest Ukrainian drone attack on Russia in the three years since Russia invaded. The AP cites Russian officials who say hundreds of Ukrainian drones were launched. At least one person in Russia was killed and others were forced to evacuate. The attack sparked fires and transportation in the region was suspended, though many drones were shot down. It came after Ukraine reported hundreds of Russian drone strikes over the weekend that killed dozens of people in Ukraine. And it came the same day America's top diplomat is meeting with his Ukrainian counterparts to talk about peace. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is in Saudi Arabia for talks with Ukrainian leaders. He says he at least wants to talk about a framework to end the war. But Rubio also says any peace deal is going to have to include Ukraine giving up territory, which so far Ukraine's government has not been willing to do. Of course, this comes after a heated Oval Office meeting that came to a head when Ukrainian President Zelensky told President Trump he would not agree to a ceasefire without security guarantees. Since then, the US has cut off military aid and intelligence sharing, though that will be up for discussion today. The US Stock market tumbled to the lowest point in several months. Economists are blaming President Trump's on and off again tariffs. Investors have said they worry the moves will either hurt the economy directly or create enough uncertainty to keep people and businesses from spending money. So there's been a sell off. And remember, President Trump says he won't rule out a recession sometime this year. For now, though, by most measures, the economy is still in good shape. The White House notes that since President Trump came back into power, multiple companies have made huge investments and promised to create thousands of American jobs. Many economists agree the way the economy goes depends largely on how the trade war shakes out between the US and its three largest trading partners, Mexico, Canada, and China. Just yesterday, China imposed retaliatory tariffs of up to 15% on American farm products, for example, corn, soybeans and beef. And the Canadian province that exports electricity to Americans raised power prices by 25% for Minnesota, Michigan and New York. Things won't end here either. The Trump administration has said it will put in place a 25% tariff on all US steel and aluminum imports later this week. And many more tariffs are set to go into effect next month on Canada and Mexico unless President Trump sees more progress on the borders. To be continued. You know how yesterday we told you about a Palestinian protest leader who was arrested by immigration agents? The Trump administration is now trying to deport Mahmoud Khalil, even though he does have a student visa and a green card. The issue, though, is U.S. officials say the anti Israel protests he helped organize at Columbia University glorified a terror organization, and that means they can revoke his visa and green card. Even the president himself spoke about this case, saying more arrests will soon follow. Not everyone agrees it's warranted, though. Hundreds of protesters have been rallying in New York City, calling Khalil's arrest an attack on free speech. And yesterday, a federal judge blocked the Trump administration's attempt to deport Khalil, at least for now. A hearing is now set for tomorrow where the protest leader is expected to make an appearance. At this point, he has not been charged with a crime. Stay tuned. Today marks exactly five years since the World Health Organization declared the COVID 19 outbreak a pandemic. In these five years, the US has recorded more deaths from COVID 19 than the civil world and Vietnam wars combined. Sadly, hundreds of Americans still die from it every week. But COVID 19 is no longer considered to be an emergency. It's transitioned from a pandemic to an endemic disease, meaning it's accepted as part of normal life. The latest variants of the disease are no longer as severe or as contagious and a new Pew Research poll found these days only one in five adults say COVID 19, is a major threat to the health of the American population as a whole, though life is still different because of the virus socially, economically and politically. The pandemic changed healthcare work, technology, travel, media relationships and so on, and anthropologists plan to study the impacts for many years to come. More news ahead, but first I want to take a moment to talk about today's sponsor. Collagen is not a miracle, but it is proven to help you look and feel healthier. And Ancient Nutrition makes a great high quality version that has 10 types of collagen from 10 real food based sources. I love that Ancient Nutrition's mission is to combine the best of ancient wisdom and modern science. Because yes, their multi Collagen Advanced Lean Supplement is powered by clinically studied ingredients that promotes healthy weight management, building lean muscle and more. Collagen can also reduce joint discomfort and improve the look and growth of your skin, hair and nails. I know I've already felt a difference and it's really simple to use. I've been scooping some into my morning smoothie and I love knowing I'm doing something good for my body and my health. It's totally normal that our body's natural building processes slow down as we age, but that doesn't mean there's nothing we can do about it. So right now, Ancient Nutrition is offering 25% off your first order when you go to ancientnutrition.comnewsworthy that's an ancientnutrition.comnewsworthy for 25% off your first order ancientnutrition.comnewsworthy now back to the news. All 193 countries in the United nations agreed on one thing this more needs to be done to achieve gender equality. They adopted a new declaration to promote equality for women and girls. It actually came exactly 30 years after the Beijing Women's Conference where the world's nations famously adopted a roadmap for gender equality. Thirty years later, the UN says no country has actually achieved the goal and there are major obstacles left to overcome. So this week's new declaration calls for concrete action to do things like prevent violence against women and girls, make sure girls get access to quality education, put a stop to women's unpaid work by expanding childcare systems and encouraging men to take on household responsibilities and more. The Declaration also suggests UN member nations nominate a woman as the next Secretary General for the first time. That decision will be made next year for a term that starts in 2027. What the world needs now is more fossil fuels. That's the message from President Trump's new energy secretary, who promised this week to reverse America's focus on climate change. Energy Secretary Chris Wright is a former fracking executive, and in a speech to oil and gas executives this week, he called climate change a side effect of building the modern world. He said poor countries especially need oil, gas and coal to lift themselves out of poverty. But Wright made it clear he's not against renewable energy, but he said there's no way wind, solar and batteries alone could ever replace natural gas. It was a big turnaround from a year ago, when President Biden's energy secretary told the same gathering the transition to renewables is unstoppable. Even still, oil and gas production soared to record levels under Biden, and Trump has said he wants to top that. He's also suspended all clean energy development on federal lands for now. Tech billionaire Elon Musk says his social media platform is under cyber attack, and with that, thousands of users have tried to log on only to find X not available. Musk told Fox Business attackers had IP addresses originating in Ukraine, and he says the attack was done with a lot of resources. But cybersecurity experts say that doesn't mean much and the hackers could still be anywhere in the world. At this point, it's not clear who is exactly behind this cyber attack, but it may have pushed people to X's competitors. X outage has been trending on the rival platform Blue sky, with some posts welcoming users to the site and urging them to stick around. This all comes in the face of growing backlash against one of Musk's other businesses, Tesla. The so called Tesla takedown movement encourages people to, quote, sell your Teslas, dump your stock, join the picket lines, mostly over Musk's involvement in cutting government workers and spending. Many protests have been peaceful, but there have also been some reports of violence, vandalism and arson. Tesla stock is struggling too, and the company has lost more than half of its value since last year. Real estate broker Redfin has a new buyer with a new vision for one stop home buying. Rocket Companies is acquiring Redfin already. The finance and real estate holding firm owns brands like Rocket Mortgage, Rocket Money and Rocket Loans. But now that it's also getting Redfin, the goal is to streamline the process so people can connect with their real estate agent, lender title company and mortgage servicer, or all at the same place. Zillow actually has a similar goal. A couple of years ago, Zillow announced a housing super app it's since rolled out a smoother process for buyers to connect with agents, home tours and mortgage financing, though it's not available in all markets just yet. As for Rocket, the All stock deal values Redfin at $1.75 billion. The acquisition is expected to close later this year. It may seem simple to know when your dog is happy or or sad, but new research found humans actually aren't so great at reading animal emotions. In the study, people were shown videos of a dog reacting to both negative and positive things, like a treat or a punishment. Then researchers asked what the dog was feeling. What they found was when people could actually see what the dog was reacting to, they were more likely to rate the dog's emotions correctly. But when the context was removed, they couldn't see a real difference in the positive or negative reactions. And when the footage was edited so it looked like the dog was shown something positive when it was really something it didn't like, people judged the emotion as a positive one. In other words, people seemed to pay more attention to the situation than the dog's actual behavior. Granted, this study did have some limitations. For example, researchers say people probably would have noticed if the dog's emotions were extreme, but scientists didn't want to subject the dog to extremely negative experiences, and people may have also performed better if they were evaluating their own dogs. Still, researchers say they hope the study is a wake up call to pet owners that if they want to really understand, they might have to block out the situation and zero in on the dogs themselves. Well, that's it for the Maine News today. So now it's time for Trivia Tuesday when we ask a different trivia question every week. But first, a quick break to thank our sponsor bombas. I admit it, I've held onto socks way too long in the past. It wasn't until I started getting holes in the toes that I realized yes, it was time for an upgrade. And wow, I did not realize what I was missing. I Bomba socks are so high quality, functional and stylish. I love my Bomba socks and I love that they have a sock for every occasion. For example, if you want to be more active this spring, Bomba's athletic socks are a must have. Their engineers have somehow created a blister fighting sweat wicking sock that can help you thrive or grab their socks for your everyday errands with arch hugging cushioned pairs that'll keep you comfy. Whatever you need, Bombas has you covered. And of course, I love that every comfy pair you purchase, Bombas donates another comfy pair to someone facing homelessness. How great is that? That plus now bombas is going international. Enjoy worldwide shipping to over 200 countries. Head over to bombas.comnewsworthy and use our code newsworthy for 20% off your first purchase. That's bombas b o m b a s dot com newsworthy with the code newsworthy for 20% off YOUR first purchase. Bombas.comnewsworthy and use code Newsworthy okay, now back to Trivia Tuesday and today's trivia question is what is the only ancient wonder of the world still standing? You can play along with us in our weekly roundup email that comes out every Friday. As for last week's trivia question, what was the most expensive movie to make? The answer is Star the Force Awakens. The budget was $447 million, but it did actually make some money too, and the Force Awakens became one of the highest grossing movies of all time, bringing in more than $2 billion worldwide. Other movies that took more than $300 million to make include other big name franchises, for example Jurassic Fallen Kingdom, as well as a few of the Avengers installments, the Way of Water, Pirates of the On Stranger Tides and another Star wars movie, the Rise of Skywalker. Thank you so much for joining us to get caught up on the news today. If you enjoy this show, we always appreciate you telling others about it. Or you can further support our work here and get access to ad free episodes by becoming a newsworthy insider. You can start a free trial@thenewsworthy.com Insider and Wondry plus subscribers can listen to episodes of the Newsworthy ad free in the Wondry app. We'll be back tomorrow with the latest news to know. Until then, have a great day.
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