News Roundup for January 21, 2022
1A
NPR
4.3 • 4.5K Ratings
🗓️ 21 January 2022
⏱️ 74 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Democrats failed in the Senate to pass voting rights reforms and end the filibuster. Now there are questions of what's next for President Joe Biden's agenda.
Reports indicate that in 2021 Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction John Sopko alerted the Department of Defense before the U.S.'s withdrawal from Afghanistan that the Afghan air force would not survive once the military had left.
And the western world is watching the border of Ukraine and Russia as Valdimir Putin continues to threaten invasion. In a press conference this week, President Joe Biden warned Russia against moving against Ukraine, but said the U.S. would not send troops in the event of invasion.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, it's Jen. Just a quick heads up before we start the show. |
| 0:03.8 | The news is rapidly developing and things may have changed by the time you hear this episode. |
| 0:09.0 | For the latest news tune into your public radio station and follow updates at npr.org. |
| 0:22.1 | This is the 1A podcast. I'm Jen White and you're listening to the news roundup. |
| 0:27.1 | It's one year into the Biden presidency and he marked it with his first solo press conference in 10 |
| 0:32.7 | months. He spoke for nearly two hours on everything from COVID to Ukraine to the Democrats' |
| 0:38.1 | failure to pass a slew of his legislative priorities. So what did we learn? And after one pretty tough |
| 0:43.4 | year, what's ahead for Biden and the Democrats? Joining us this week, Susan Page, the Washington |
| 0:48.9 | Bureau Chief for USA Today. Her latest book is Madam Speaker, Nancy Pelosi and the Lessons of Power. |
| 0:55.0 | Susan, such a pleasure to have you. Hey, it's great to be back with you. |
| 0:59.1 | Also with us, Lauren Weber, the Midwest correspondent for Kaiser Health News. Lauren, welcome to the program. |
| 1:05.6 | Thanks for having me. And Claudia Grasalis, NPR's Congressional reporter. |
| 1:10.0 | Claudia, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. So the number of new COVID-19 cases has begun to |
| 1:16.2 | dip in seven states across the U.S. It's a hopeful sign that the Omicron surge is slowing, |
| 1:21.1 | but that comes as the death toll heads toward 2,000 people per day. Lauren, how likely is it that we |
| 1:26.7 | are at least closing in on the peak of Omicron cases? You know, I think it's a little too early to say |
| 1:33.3 | definitively, but I will say that in the areas that we're hardest hit with Omicron, you are |
| 1:38.4 | starting to see a definite leveling off of cases. So New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., their |
| 1:43.9 | cases are going down pretty dramatically. And nationally, the numbers are on the down tick. That's |
| 1:49.8 | that, you know, look, I'm based in St. Louis, Missouri. We are starting to really get into the |
| 1:54.4 | heat of it now. This virus invariant is definitely hitting different parts of the country at different |
| 2:00.5 | times. So severe stress is still happening in other places around the country. |
... |
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