--:-- Gideon Resnick: Good morning. It's Monday, March 25th. I'm Gideon Resnick in for Shumita Basu. This is Apple News Today.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Coming up on today's show, what we know so far about the deadly terror attack in Russia. President Biden continues to chip away at student debt. And how many brackets have been busted in March Madness.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: But first, let's take a quick look at some other stories that are in the news. Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun is leaving the company at the end of this year. The company's chair and another high-level executive are also departing.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: This management shakeup comes as Boeing has gotten heavy criticism for quality control issues, highlighted by the panel that flew off an Alaska Airlines flight in January.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Abroad, talks continued over the weekend for a possible ceasefire in Gaza. There are conditions on the table for a temporary truce that would stop fighting for weeks and include an exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: But Israel and Hamas still disagree on key details. Two Israeli delegations are in Washington this week meeting with U.S. officials, and the allies don't agree on how to move forward.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: The Biden administration says Israel should not launch a major offensive in the southern city of Rafa.
--:-- Vice President Kamala Harris: [Audio clip plays] Let me tell you something. I have studied the maps. There's nowhere for those folks to go.
--:-- Vice President Kamala Harris: And we're looking at about a million and a half people in Rafah who are there because they were told to go there, most of them.
--:-- Vice President Kamala Harris: And so we've been very clear that it would be a mistake to move into Rafah with any type of military operation.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Meanwhile, there are some reported concerns about aid trucks being held up by Israel on their way into Gaza.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: This comes as the U.S. Congress voted to strip hundreds of millions of dollars from the U.N. agency that distributes most food and basic services in the region.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: That cost-cutting was part of a spending package that passed over the weekend.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: In legal news, today is the deadline for former President Donald Trump to post a nearly half-billion-dollar bond as he appeals a civil fraud ruling in New York.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Trump's legal team says it's unable to get a company to do a bond that big.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: The attorney general says she could move to seize assets if Trump doesn't pay up.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Today is also the day that Trump could get a trial date in a separate criminal case. He pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records, that in connection to hush money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And an update on a story from a couple weeks ago. More than 100 abducted Nigerian school children have been released.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: They were taken by gunmen and held hostage in a forest. Some were as young as eight years old.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Nigeria's army says they were rescued in a military operation. And the local governor says the children were unharmed.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Some local leaders say that all of the hostages were freed. But there were differences in the numbers reported by government and school officials.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So it's unclear if any children are still in captivity.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Now to the terrorist attack at a concert hall near Moscow on Friday, where at least 137 people were killed, including several children.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Attackers gunned down concertgoers and set the building on fire. A branch of the Islamic State claims responsibility.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Earlier this month, the U.S. State Department had issued a public warning to Americans that extremists had imminent plans to attack large gatherings in Moscow.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: It told them to avoid crowds. Former CIA officer Mark Polymeropoulos talked to MSNBC about how American intelligence also shared information with Russian counterparts before the attack.
--:-- Mark Polymeropoulos: Privately, we passed this to the Russian security services. Now, you can lead a horse to water, you can't make them drink.
--:-- Mark Polymeropoulos: So how they action this, we don't know. But the fact is, we passed them the information, and tragically, Russian security services didn't follow up on it or couldn't find the perpetrators.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Just three days before the attack on the concert hall, Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed the warning, accusing the U.S. of trying to frighten and destabilize Russia.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And after the attack, Putin made no mention of U.S. warnings or the Islamic State.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Instead, he made references to a possible Ukrainian connection. There's no known evidence for this, and Ukraine denies it.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: The Washington Post looks at how this is a massive security failure for Russia.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: When terrorist attacks like this have come in the past, Putin has often tried to blame them on the West, despite clear evidence to the contrary.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And there are already signs that's the game plan this time around.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Experts on Russia tell the Post that security failures have been common under Putin.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: This latest deadly attack comes just days after he won another term. That election though was rigged with no serious challengers allowed on the ballot.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And just as major opponents were kept out of the race there's no sign that serious criticism of security lapses under Putin will get much attention in the country, given his firm grip on power.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down President Biden's student loan forgiveness plan, he's been trying to chip away at student debt through a mix of policies.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: The latest announcement came just last week. The administration announced that it was forgiving nearly $6 billion in student loans.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: That's debt from close to 80,000 borrowers. White House correspondent Ed O'Keefe broke down the details for CBS.
--:-- Ed O'Keefe: This latest wave of forgiveness applies to public service workers, firefighters, nurses, teachers, and others who've been on the job 10 years or more.
--:-- Ed O'Keefe: $6 billion in debt cancellation, all thanks to an existing federal program that had been little used until the last few years.
--:-- Ed O'Keefe: This program, called Public Service Loan Forgiveness, has been around since 2007.
--:-- Ed O'Keefe: But CBS reports that its rules were so hard to navigate and so restrictive that only 7,000 borrowers had ever received student loan forgiveness from the plan before the Biden administration made changes.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And O'Keefe told CBS more announcements are on the way.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And in a sign of how the president is now trying to take a little more credit for this program, in a tough election year, the White House says he'll be emailing another roughly 380,000 public service workers to let them know they're about two years away from being eligible for similar relief.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Perhaps the subtle message she's sending is, that is, if I get reelected and decide to go through with this.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Student debt relief was a big campaign promise of Biden's in 2020.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: But making good on it got harder after the Supreme Court decision.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: It torpedoed his plan to wipe out some $400 billion in student debt.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: It's a plan that could have affected more than 40 million Americans.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: As a result of that decision, the Biden administration has had to rely on piecemeal efforts.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: A few billion here, a few billion there. The administration says it adds up to about $144 billion in debt for about 4 million people.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And it's looking for ways to do more.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: But while billions of dollars may sound like a lot of money, it's pretty small compared to the amount of student debt in America, which is more than $1.7 trillion.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: We're going to close today with an update on March Madness.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: There have been a lot of great storylines so far.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: On the men's side, there was number 14 Oakland taking out the number three seeded Kentucky.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And there was number 13 Yale defeating the number four seed Auburn.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Yale riding the March Magic High once again.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: On the women's side, No. 7 Duke knocked out No. 2 Ohio State.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And earlier, there was another shocker when Middle Tennessee, the No. 11 seed, rallied to defeat No. 6 Louisville.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Middle Tennessee hangs on 71-69. They have won 20 in a row.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: They are on to round two in a thriller.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So at this point, I hate to break it to you, your bracket is busted.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And you are not the only one.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: As of Friday, all of the 22 million men's brackets in ESPN's contests were busted.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: For the women's tournament, it's not a whole lot better.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And it's not just because of upsets.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Sometimes it's the opposite. NPR explains that the failure of so many brackets is in part because many popular Cinderella picks got knocked out early.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Often, it can be a good move to just pick the highest seeds, even if it makes your bracket look kind of boring.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: As the tournament progresses, all bets are off, of course.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Still though, in two-thirds of men's NCAA tournaments, the title has been won by a number one seed.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Higher seeds tend to be even better on the women's side.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Historically, there are fewer upsets in the women's tournament with bigger gaps between the best and worst teams than in the men's.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So if you're bummed about your results so far, NPR has a sneaky tip for next year.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Fill out a whole bunch of brackets and only mention the ones that end up doing the best.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: You can find all the March Madness stories and scores in the Apple News app.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we've got a Narrated article coming up next from New York Magazine.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: This one's about college admissions.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: It looks at how with more applicants and new rules, this admission season is likely the wildest one yet.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: If you're listening in the podcast app, you can follow Apple News Plus Narrated to find that story.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And I'll be back with the news tomorrow.
