--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Thursday, February 2nd. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today.
--:-- Shamita Basu: On today's show, a rare inside look at Putin's secretive mercenary group, WNBA players fight for equity with men in the sky, and how you might be wasting money, energy, and time because of how you use your home appliances.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But before we get to those stories, the first official Republican challenger to former President Donald Trump is set to enter the 2024 race. Nikki Haley, who was governor of South Carolina and Trump's U.N. ambassador, is reportedly announcing her campaign on February 15th.
--:-- Shamita Basu: This news comes just days after Trump hit the campaign trail. The latest fundraising numbers show that he's off to a modest start with donors.
--:-- McKay Coppins: I checked with more than a dozen high-profile Republicans about how they're feeling about Trump. Privately, many say he's a problem and would like for the party to move on.
--:-- McKay Coppins: But I was told nobody has much of a plan B for a post-Trump GOP.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The conversation quickly veered into kind of hypotheticals. Well, maybe he'll drop out or maybe he'll get bored and kind of wander away from politics or maybe he'll get indicted and his legal problems will overwhelm him.
--:-- McKay Coppins: Some of the hypotheticals are grim. Some Republicans even suggested to me, unironically, that perhaps he would pass away before the 2024 election.
--:-- Shamita Basu: McKay, you've been covering Trump for years. All this talk of hoping he'll just go away somehow reminds you of the run-up to 2016.
--:-- McKay Coppins: Lots of Republicans dismissed Trump, but he won the nomination. That was the most striking thing, that in seven years, there's been basically no change in how Republicans talk and think about Trump behind closed doors.
--:-- McKay Coppins: They all are still embarrassed by him. They all recognize his weaknesses. But they're all terrified of incurring a backlash from his supporters.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A lot of the people you spoke to for this piece requested anonymity. But if the GOP really wants to move past Trump, you say people will have to speak out and step up. Trump is not going to just go away unless a Republican beats him right?
--:-- McKay Coppins: That's the only way for this to happen. Like, he is an enormously influential figure in his party. He's not just going to drift into obscurity.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Nikki Haley appears to be the first who's willing to take on the challenge.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A quick update on the winter storm that's bringing dangerous weather to a stretch of the south from Texas to Tennessee. At least eight people have died.
--:-- Shamita Basu: In Texas, close to 400,000 electricity customers were without power as of this morning. And there were also outages in other states.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can get updates on the storm on the Apple News app.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We're going to take a rare look inside one of the most brutal and controversial forces fighting in Ukraine. The Russian mercenary army called the Wagner Group, often called Putin's private army, it's been accused of war crimes in Ukraine and around the world.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It recruits heavily from Russian prisons, and it's known for vicious tactics on the battlefield.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A Ukrainian soldier says fighting Wagner troops is like being in a zombie movie, where masses of attackers just keep coming.
--:-- Shamita Basu: CNN got an interview with Andrei Medvedev, a former Wagner commander who defected and is seeking asylum in Norway.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It's one of the most detailed accounts of the mercenary army's role in Ukraine yet.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: I saw Wagner troops publicly executed for disobeying orders. Such cases happen very often there.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: There was a question of how to persuade new recruits who arrived at the front lines and saw what is going on there and decided they don't want to fight to still go ahead and fight.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: They would round up those who did not want to fight and shoot them in front of the newcomers to develop their self-preservation instinct.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The Wagner group claims Medvedev tried to mistreat prisoners. He refused to comment to CNN about this.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: I planned to leave Wagner for a while but I didn't have the opportunity. I was afraid I will be captured and shot as a traitor.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: I am ready for serious action but I also want to live. By the end I knew they won't let me go. I will return as part of the dead or the wounded.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It was time to make a radical decision.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: Medvedev says he's speaking out so that Putin and Wagner's leadership face justice.
--:-- Andrei Medvedev: He says at some point, Kremlin propaganda will stop working and a new leader will emerge.
--:-- Shamita Basu: This week, some WNBA players could change teams as free agents. One of the biggest stars to move is Breonna Stewart.
--:-- Shamita Basu: She's leaving the Seattle Storm to play for the New York Liberty.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Stewart has been calling attention to an equity issue, saying that women in pro basketball should get private flights like pro men get.
--:-- Shamita Basu: She offered to help raise money. Stewart is one of the highest-paid players in the WNBA.
--:-- Shamita Basu: She also has a lot of endorsement deals.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: So she was volunteering to say, like, I'll help pay for it. And almost every other high-profile player chimed in and said the same thing that they would chip in.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: The athletes say it's not just about having the same level of comfort as the men. It's also about privacy and safety.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: And Chanel told us sometimes relying on commercial flights has wrecked WNBA games.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: And we've seen some horror stories. Last year, the L.A. Sparks had to sleep in the D.C. airport, I believe it was, because their flight got canceled.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: A couple of years ago, there was a travel issue with the Las Vegas Aces. Their game wound up getting canceled because they couldn't make their flight.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Another reason this air travel conversation is gaining a lot of steam in the league right now is because of Brittany Griner, who was wrongfully detained in Russia for nearly 10 months and released in December.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now she's back, and the league has acknowledged that she has unique safety concerns.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: Agents and players argue that it's not just Griner who needs a charter. Of course, she's in a different situation than everyone, and all the players support her.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: But other players want charters, too. You know, this is a league that's really active when it comes to activism.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: The very outspoken advocates of the LGBTQ community, of Black Lives Matter, and that has angered people.
--:-- Lindsay Schnell: Any of them could be harassed in an airport. Anyone could walk up to a WNBA player and make them uncomfortable.
--:-- Shamita Basu: WNBA Commissioner Kathy Engelbert has said private flights can't happen unless a sponsor or someone steps up to pay for them.
--:-- Shamita Basu: She estimates it would cost millions for private jets for the season.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Then she points out that in the last round of contract negotiations with players they asked for more pay, not chartered flights.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Current and former NBA players are backing the women on this issue, from Ja Morant to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The question now is whether there's enough pressure to change things in time for when the WNBA season starts in May.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Did your parents used to follow you around the house, shutting off the lights, telling you that you're wasting money and energy?
--:-- Shamita Basu: Yeah, mine did too. Now I'm the person who reminds everyone to switch off the lights.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We are living in a different era now, thanks to advancements in technology, stricter federal regulation, and more climate-friendly appliances.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And sometimes the ways to save energy now are different than they were in our parents' time.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The Washington Post asked engineers, energy efficiency experts, and appliance makers about some common ways that we misuse our appliances, and how to save money and help the planet by making some small changes.
--:-- Shamita Basu: First, you can tell your parents, turning off the lights doesn't save as much as you might think.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Sure, back in the 80s, up to 10% of home electricity bills went toward lighting.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But these days, about half of U.S. homes have energy-efficient LED bulbs, which use a fraction of the energy of old incandescent bulbs.
--:-- Shamita Basu: In fact, those old bulbs are being phased out of stores in the U.S. this year.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Another place to watch? Your dishwasher.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, this might be a hard habit to shake, but you don't have to scrub before loading.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Modern dishwashers are designed to get dried food off of your plates, so pre-rinsing is just a waste of water.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And if you've ever felt guilty about running a half-empty dishwasher, don't.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Research shows that it takes more water to wash by hand.
--:-- Shamita Basu: So just sit back and let the machine take the lead.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can read more tips on how to let go of your appliance misconceptions, along with all the stories that we talked about today in the Apple News app.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And if you're already listening in the News app right now, stick around. We've got a narrated article coming up next.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Sports Illustrated spent time with the Howard University swim team. It's the nation's only all-Black team in a sport that hasn't been very welcoming to Black athletes.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You'll hear how Howard built one of the most exciting programs in college swimming.
--:-- Shamita Basu: So enjoy listening to that, and I'll be back with the news tomorrow.
