Trump At The Superbowl, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Turmoil, Air Aid To Gaza

Summary

Up First from NPR – February 10, 2025

NPR’s Up First provides the essential news to kickstart your day. In this episode, hosts Leila Fadel, Steve Inskeep, Michel Martin, and A. Martinez delve into three major stories: President Trump’s presence at the Super Bowl, the turmoil within the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), and humanitarian air aid to Gaza.

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1. President Trump at the Super Bowl

Super Bowl Dominance and Trump’s Presence

The episode opens with Michelle Martin reporting on the Philadelphia Eagles' decisive victory over the Kansas City Chiefs, securing Super Bowl 59 with a score of 40-22. Amidst the festivities in New Orleans, President Donald Trump attended the game, drawing mixed reactions from the crowd. Martinez highlights the diversity of the audience’s response:

“Some cheered, some booed.” [00:20]

Trump’s Wide-Ranging Interview

President Trump engaged in an extensive interview during the pre-game show, addressing various policy issues. Franco Ordonez, NPR’s White House correspondent, provides insights into Trump’s statements:

“He’s going to send Elon Musk to check out the Department of Education this week and he expects more cuts like we've seen at USAID and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.” [03:32]

Trump also touched upon his administration's recent executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico, a move aimed at implementing his vision for government efficiency. He emphasized the role of technology companies in this initiative, with Interior Secretary Doug Burgum noting the involvement of major map makers like Google Maps and Apple Maps in updating the new nomenclature.

Tariffs and Foreign Policy Initiatives

In his interview, Trump announced plans to impose new 25% tariffs on all imports of steel and aluminum, aiming for immediate implementation:

“He promised to slap new 25% tariffs on all imports of steel and aluminum. That's going to happen today.” [04:21]

Regarding international relations, Trump confirmed ongoing discussions with Russian President Vladimir Putin about ending the war in Ukraine but refrained from sharing specific details.

Franco Ordonez anticipates a busy week ahead for Trump, with significant focus on foreign policy:

“Trump is expected to meet with the King of Jordan on Tuesday... and the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, to talk trade and illegal immigration.” [05:01]

Public and Political Reactions

Trump’s presence at the Super Bowl marked a historical moment as he became the first sitting president to attend the title game. While some fans celebrated, others expressed dissent, reflecting the polarized political climate. Martinez notes the unpredictability of Trump’s actions and their impact on public sentiment.

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2. Turmoil at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)

Shutdown Announcement and Immediate Implications

Michelle Martin introduces a critical development: employees at the CFPB have been instructed to cease all operations:

“Employees at a U.S. agency set up to protect consumers from financial fraud have been told to stop doing any work.” [00:27]

Laurel Wamsley, NPR’s personal finance correspondent, elaborates on the gravity of the situation:

“They're shutting down, literally, the cops on the beat.” [00:30]

Impact on Consumer Protection

The CFPB has been instrumental under President Biden in enforcing rules to cap overdraft fees and eliminate medical bills from credit reports. With the agency’s operations halted, Wamsley outlines the potential consequences for American consumers:

“The agency has hundreds and hundreds of employees who go across the country... to make sure they're following important consumer protections.” [06:17]

Political Maneuvering and Leadership Changes

The turmoil appears linked to broader efforts by the current administration to dismantle independent agencies. The newly appointed acting director, Russell Vogt, associated with conservative Policy Agenda Project 2025, ordered a cessation of the CFPB’s supervisory work:

“Vogt... sent an all staff email ordering a halt to virtually all of their work.” [07:30]

Complicating matters, Elon Musk’s Government Efficiency team gained access to key internal systems at the CFPB, raising concerns about the potential misuse of proprietary information:

“It looks like he has access to all of CFPB's records, including companies proprietary information.” [06:08]

Legal and Union Responses

In response to the shutdown, the CFPB’s union filed a lawsuit against Russell Vogt, challenging the abrupt halt to the agency’s functions. Wamsley draws parallels to previous attempts to defund the CFPB during Trump’s first term, highlighting a recurring pattern of undermining consumer protection efforts.

“If this whole thing is being done for government efficiency, CFPB isn't really where you'd start.” [08:06]

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3. Humanitarian Air Aid to Gaza

Jordan’s Humanitarian Efforts

Amidst ongoing conflict, Israel and Hamas have maintained a fragile ceasefire in Gaza, allowing limited entry of food and medical supplies. Jordan has ramped up its humanitarian assistance by initiating helicopter flights to deliver aid directly into the territory. Jane Araf, NPR’s reporter in Amman, recounts her firsthand experience aboard one of these flights:

“The helicopters can carry only a fraction of the capacity of a truck, and they are much more expensive... These airlifts are still subject to Israeli regulations, but Jordanian aid officials say they can get medicine into Gaza this way much more reliably and much faster.” [10:22]

On the Ground Observations

Araf describes the stark contrast visible from the air between the relatively untouched regions of Israel and the devastation in Gaza:

“From the air, we could see skeletons of buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes and others in rubble.” [10:59]

Restricted access has limited photographers to capturing only buffer zones and logistical elements, preventing comprehensive visual documentation of the destruction within Gaza.

Challenges and Geopolitical Tensions

The humanitarian efforts face significant geopolitical challenges. President Trump’s proposal to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to Jordan and Egypt has been met with resistance from Jordan, viewing it as a threat to their sovereignty and peace treaty with Israel. Araf anticipates tense discussions as King Abdullah of Jordan engages with President Trump:

“Jordan is a key ally and security partner, and it's made clear it would see Israel trying to relocate more Palestinians here as a breach of their peace treaty and a declaration of War.” [12:51]

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Conclusion

Today's episode of Up First encapsulates significant developments in U.S. politics, consumer protection, and international humanitarian efforts. From President Trump's influential presence at the Super Bowl and his subsequent policy announcements to the unsettling shutdown of the CFPB and Jordan's critical role in delivering aid to Gaza, these stories underscore the complex interplay of domestic policy and international relations shaping our world.

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Notable Quotes:

• “They're shutting down, literally, the cops on the beat.” – Laurel Wamsley on CFPB shutdown [00:30]
• “He’s going to send Elon Musk to check out the Department of Education this week...” – Franco Ordonez on Trump's interview [03:32]
• “From the air, we could see skeletons of buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes and others in rubble.” – Jane Araf on Gaza [10:59]

Produced by:
Roberta Rampton, Emily Kopp, Nishant de Gea, Janaya Williams, Alice Wolfley
Produced by Monte Carana, Katie Klein, Christopher Thomas
Engineering Support: Arthur Laurent
Technical Director: David Greenberg

Stay Informed:
Subscribe and listen to Up First on the NPR app or plus.npr.org/upfirst. Support your local NPR station at donate.npr.org.

Transcript

[Michelle Martin]

The Eagles dominated Kansas City to win Super Bowl 59.

[Martinez]

In New Orleans, President Trump was in the audience and did a wide ranging interview that aired during the pre game show. What did he say about his plans for tariffs, Gaza and other issues?

[Michelle Martin]

I'm Michelle Martin. That's a Martinez. And this is up first from NPR News. Employees at a U.S. agency set up to protect consumers from financial fraud have been told to stop doing any work.

[Laurel Wamsley]

They're shutting down, literally, the cops on the beat.

[Michelle Martin]

What will it mean for Americans if the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau cannot function.

[Martinez]

And the country of Jordan has started sending humanitarian helicopter flights into Gaza? Our NPR reporter took one of the flights to get a rare look inside a territory few foreign journalists have been allowed to see. Stay with us. We've got all the news you need to start your day.

[Ron Rutson]

This message comes from NPR sponsor Saatva, maker of quality handcrafted mattresses. Founder and CEO Ron Rutson shares one of their core values.

[Martinez]

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[Martinez]

President Trump took a trip to New Orleans last night to watch the super.

[Michelle Martin]

Bowl, and the fans there had some mixed reaction to that. Some cheered, some booed. The game count a whirlwind last few days for Trump, and he told reporters to expect another busy week.

[Martinez]

NPR White House correspondent Franco Ordonez always gets cheered wherever he goes. He was traveling with the president joins us now. So, Franco, before we get to the heavier news, let's talk about the game for a second. Tell us more about Trump taking it in.

[Franco Ordonez]

Thanks a yeah. Trump took the field about an hour ahead of the game to meet with first responders and victims of the terror attack in New Orleans on New Year's Day. And he got largely a positive reception from people who saw him that first time. But later when they flashed a picture on the Jumbotron in his box during the national anthem, he really did get a strong mix of cheers and jeers. Now, Trump is the first sitting president to attend the title game. Ahead of the game he said he thought Kansas City would win. That obviously did not happen. It was a very one sided game. And I don't know about you a but I was pretty surprised by that.

[Martinez]

No one expected what we saw in the actual game. Yeah. Not even Vegas in the in the line. Now Trump did an interview that aired during the pregame show where the highlights there.

[Franco Ordonez]

Yeah. He says he's going to send Elon Musk to check out the Department of Education this week and he expects more cuts like we've seen at USAID and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. But there was more questions that he took yesterday. He actually also brought us to the cabin on his plane on Air Force One flying to the game. This really doesn't happen very often. And the reason was he wanted to highlight kind of the body of water that was below us right now.

[Martinez]

We're flying over a thing called the Gulf of America.

[Franco Ordonez]

He was actually underscoring that executive order that he signed a couple of weeks ago renaming the Gulf of Mexico. Now next to him was Doug Burgum, the interior secretary. And Burgum added that the team is now calling map makers like Google Maps and Apple Maps to kind of put the name change into effect.

[Martinez]

All right, so what else did he talk about?

[Franco Ordonez]

Yeah, he promised to slap new 25% tariffs on all imports of steel and aluminum. That's going to happen today. On Tuesday or Wednesday. He's planning to announce reciprocal tariffs. He didn't say on what countries, but did promise that they would take effect almost immediately.

[Martinez]

Reciprocal tariffs. And very simply, it's if they charge us, we charge them.

[Franco Ordonez]

He also addressed the war in Ukraine. He confirmed that he's been speaking with Russian President Vladimir Putin about ending the war, but he didn't want to give any details about what they discussed.

[Martinez]

Now, okay, new tariffs this week. There always seems to be a lot, though, in any given Trump week. So what else are you watching for?

[Franco Ordonez]

Yeah, I think there's going to be a lot of focus on foreign policy this week. Now, Trump's expected to meet with the King of Jordan on Tuesday. That's important because he's calling for Jordan and other regional leaders to allow Palestinians from Gaza to live there. It's a plan that the Jordanians have so far rejected. Now on the plane, he doubled down on his commitment to buy and own Gaza. Now, he didn't outright deny the possibility of Palestinians coming to the US but he did emphasize that it would be better if they stayed in the region during those years it would take to rebuild Gaza. And just one other thing, A Trump is also meeting with the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi this week. The two leaders are expected to talk trade and illegal immigration.

[Martinez]

That's White House correspondent Franco Ordonez. Thanks a lot.

[Franco Ordonez]

Thanks a.

[Martinez]

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ground to a halt over the weekend.

[Michelle Martin]

Under President Biden, the agency issued and enforced rules to cap overdraft fees and to remove medical bills from credit reports. Now employees have been told to stay home this week.

[Martinez]

NPR personal finance correspondent Laurel Wamsley has been following this. Laurel, if the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau cannot do its work, what does that mean for Americans?

[Laurel Wamsley]

Well, it's quite troubling because the bureau is the country's consumer finance watchdog and it's an enforcement agency. I've talked with several CFPB staff, staff and former staff in recent days and they named a few big concerns. One is that a new stop work order from its new acting director halts the agency's supervision work. They said the agency has hundreds and hundreds of employees who go across the country who go into companies and make sure they're following important consumer protections. As Julie Marguetta Morgan, who was CFPB's associate director of research and monitoring until she left the agency last month, put it, they're shutting down, literally the cops on the beat. They make sure your student loan company is actually processing your payments and that mortgage companies follow the rules put in place after the Great Recession. And there's a second big concern, which is that all of this is happening under Elon Musk, who is the CEO of Tesla and has talked about wanting his X company to be a whole commerce and payments platform. And now it looks like he has access to all of CFPB's records, including companies proprietary information. That'd be a huge competitive advantage to someone like Musk. And of course, there are worries that that sensitive information will be mishandled.

[Martinez]

I mean, it's been a mile a minute with news out of the cfpb. What's the latest?

[Laurel Wamsley]

Yeah, it's been a tumultuous few days. On Friday, staff from Elon Musk's Government Efficiency team were seen at CFPB headquarters, and they've gained access to those key internal systems. Then over the weekend, Trump tapped Russell Vogt as the new acting director. Vogt was an architect of the conservative Policy Agenda Project 2025, and he sent an all staff email ordering a halt to virtually all of their work. Shortly thereafter, Vote posted on X that he would not be drawing the HR agency's next round of funding from the Federal Reserve. And then just yesterday, an email was sent to all staff and contractors saying that CFPB's DC headquarters would be closed for the week and that they have to work remotely.

[Martinez]

All of this kind of sounds like what we've been seeing happening with usaid.

[Laurel Wamsley]

Totally. It appears to be the same playbook. I mean, both are independent agencies that this current administration appears to be trying to dismantle. Republicans have targeted the consumer protection agency for years, though they've often accused its regulators of overreach. And then on Friday, Musk tweeted, cfpb RIP Yeah, I saw that tweet.

[Martinez]

All right, so what happens now?

[Laurel Wamsley]

Well, staffers are just bracing themselves for whatever comes next. One told me that they went to the D.C. headquarters yesterday just to grab some personal items before the building closed for the week, and they weren't allowed in. And, you know, at USC id, the vast majority of staff were put on administrative leave before a federal judge put a hold on that. And last night, CFPB's union filed a lawsuit against Vote, the agency's new head. In terms of that funding being slashed at cfpb, we actually saw the same thing happen during Trump's first term. But then later on, they went back to taking the money. And the thing is that if this whole thing is being done for government efficiency, CFPB isn't really where you'd start. It has a relatively small budget, and since its launch in 2011, it's delivered more than $20 billion back to Americans.

[Martinez]

That's NPR's Laurel Wamsley. Thanks a lot.

[Laurel Wamsley]

You're welcome.

[Martinez]

Israel and Hamas are maintaining a fragile.

[Michelle Martin]

Ceasefire in Gaza that has allowed more food and medicine to enter the Palestinian territory that's been devastated by more than a year of war. It's still not enough. According to aid officials, Jordan has begun helping out, delivering medical supplies via what it refers to as an air bridge, flying helicopters to land inside Gaza.

[Martinez]

NPR's Jane Araf went on a recent flight. She joins us from Amman. Jane, so Jordan has carried out a lot of airdrops throughout the war in Gaza about these latest efforts.

[Jane Araf]

Well, Those were part of multinational efforts that dropped aid from the air on pallets with parachutes. Some of them ended up in the sea. And there was also the danger of those heavy pallets landing on people. So these flights, 16 a day, over 18 days, have actually landed in Gaza, although on the outskirts, which makes the aid much more targeted.

[Martinez]

Okay, now tell us about the flight you took. I mean, what were the aircrafts carrying?

[Jane Araf]

They were Blackhawk helicopters, and they were loaded with cardboard boxes containing anesthesia drugs, antibiotics and other medications. They also contained things like disposable diapers and infant formula. So the helicopters can carry only a fraction of the capacity of a truck, and they are much more expensive. These airlifts are still subject to Israeli regulations, but Jordanian aid officials say they can get medicine into Gaza this way much more reliably and much faster.

[Martinez]

Okay, what else did you see?

[Jane Araf]

Well, we took off from an air base about an hour from Amman and flew along the Dead Sea, then into Israel. In Israel, you can see built up communities and green fields. And then it's a very stark difference when you cross over into Gaza. From the air, we could see skeletons of buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes and others in rubble. And in the distance there was that Mediterranean coastline. So we landed just within Israel's buffer zone in Gaza, not far from the city of Deirbala. And it was a very rare glimpse of Gaza, even that limited view, because Gaza journalists have been reporting from there at great risk from the start. But Israel for the most part, bans foreign organizations, news organizations from Gaza.

[Martinez]

Jane, before we get to President Trump and who he's going to meet this week, I mean, how was it to just to see everything from the air? I mean, it's one thing to have a ground's eye view, but then to have this overview like you had. What was that like?

[Jane Araf]

It was really surreal because you don't see anything living in that part of it. Diral Bella, which has been heavily hit. I mean, really, it, from what we were seeing, it was just rubble. And it's important to note that Israel prevented us, according to the Jordanian authorities, from taking photographs on the ground of what we were seeing. The, the only thing we could take photos of once we landed were the buffer zone and the helicopter. But to actually see it real in real life was. Was really unreal.

[Martinez]

Yeah. Now, President Trump last week announced that he wanted to relocate Palestinians in Gaza to Jordan, Egypt. Jordan's King Abdullah is arriving in the United States for talks with President Trump tomorrow. How are those talks expected to go?

[Jane Araf]

Those are going to be tough. That coveted coastline that Trump officials have their eye on is Palestinian territory. And Jordan sees the plan as an existential threat threat. So Jordan is a key ally and security partner, and it's made clear it would see Israel trying to relocate more Palestinians here as a breach of their peace treaty and a declaration of War.

[Martinez]

That's NPR's Jane Araf in Amman. Jane, thank you.

[Jane Araf]

Thank you.

[Michelle Martin]

The Kansas City Chiefs attempt at a Super Bowl 3 Pete was picked apart by the Philadelphia Eagles in a 40 to 22. Yeah.

[Martinez]

Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes was sacked six times and threw a pair of interceptions as Philly had a 24 zip halftime lead.

[Michelle Martin]

At least Kendrick Demar's halftime show featuring SZA, Samuel L. Jackson and a dancing Serena Williams brought some life back into New Orleans Superdome.

[Martinez]

And Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts was Super Bowl's most valuable player after running for a touchdown and throwing for two more. As all of Philly today will likely be saying, fly, Eagles, fly. And that's up first for Monday, February 10th.

[Michelle Martin]

Emi Martinez and I'm Michelle Martin. Make your next listen. Consider this the team behind NPR's All Things Considered goes deep into a single news story in just 15 minutes. Listen now on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Martinez]

Today's episode of up first was edited by Roberta Rampton, Emily Kopp, Nishant de Gea, Janaya Williams and Alice Wolfley was produced by Monte Carana, Katie Klein and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent, and our technical director is David Greenberg. Join us again tomorrow.

[Ron Rutson]

This message comes from NPR sponsor Rosetta Stone, an expert in language learning for 30 years. Right now, NPR listeners can get Rosetta Stone's lifetime membership to 25 different languages for 50. Learn more at RosettaStone.com NPR this message.

[Laurel Wamsley]

Comes from Warby Parker. What makes a great pair of glasses at Warby Parker? It's all the invisible extras without the extra cost, like free adjustments for life. Find your [e-mail] or visit one of their hundreds of stores around the country.