Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Janine Hurst.

Iran says the Strait of Hormuz is now open to commercial vessels,

while the fragile temporary ceasefire with the U.S. is in place,

and ships have to coordinate their transit through Tehran.

But the White House says the U.S. blockade also remains in place.

Wall Street liked the news that sent crude oil prices tumbling and stocks soaring, and Pierre

Scott Horsley has more.

If the straight remains open long term, and I will underscore if, that would remove a sort of cloud of

uncertainty that's been hanging over the economy.

You know, when families or businesses

are making plans, they like to have some idea of what to expect. And it's really hard to make a

big purchase or plan a vacation or make an investment or hire a new worker if you don't know

what your energy bill is going to look like in the next month or two. The good news is,

even as gas and diesel prices soared over the last six weeks, we didn't see people cutting back very much in other spending.

And Pierre Scott Horsley reporting.

Congress has approved a short-term extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA.

And peers Claudia Grisales reports the controversial law was set to expire on Monday.

Congressional leaders had sought to extend the key national intelligence tool for five years. However,

members from both sides of the aisle thwarted that plan as they sought more stringent privacy

protections for U.S. citizens. Now, members must go back to the drawing table to come up with a compromise

before the new April 30th deadline. The tool is Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance

Act, which allows targeted warrantless surveillance. The government says the intelligence

...