--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Welcome to Up First from NPR News. I'm Aisha Roscoe.
Scott Simon: And I'm Scott Simon.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: World leaders meet in Munich to discuss the fate of Ukraine. Now that President Trump has abruptly changed U.S. foreign policy toward that country's war with Russia.
--:-- Scott Simon: Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky calls for security guarantees in any peace agreement.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Right now, Ukraine's army, supported by Global Aid, is holding back Russia. But if not us, then who will stop them? We'll have more on that.
--:-- Scott Simon: Plus a tumultuous week at a federal consumer protection agency. And more on last month's fatal plane crash outside of Washington, D.C. So stay with us.
--:-- [Upbeat music fades out]
--:-- Announcer: This message comes from NPR sponsor Adobe. Introducing the all-new Adobe Acrobat Studio, now with AI-powered PDF spaces.
--:-- Scott Simon: President Trump has called for a speedy end to Russia's war in Ukraine. And is pressing Zelensky for concessions.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: NPR's Ukraine correspondent Joanna Kakissis joins us from Kiev.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Thanks for having me, Scott.
--:-- Scott Simon: And this has been a very important few days, the security conference in Munich, hasn't it, for Ukraine?
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Yeah. Scott, it's given Zelensky an opportunity to publicly advocate for his country, surrounded by European allies who want to see Ukraine in the strongest possible position going into any negotiations to end the war.
--:-- Scott Simon: And Scott, this is important because the U.S., Ukraine's strongest single ally, is now speaking directly to Russia, the country that invaded Ukraine and continues to attack it.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: President Trump says he plans to visit Russia. His defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has poured cold water on two of Ukraine's most important goals, joining NATO in getting back all of its territory occupied by Russia.
--:-- Scott Simon: And these developments have really unsettled Ukrainians. I've spoken to many who say they feel like the U.S., the country they most admire for its democratic values, is betraying them.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: And what's President Zelensky's response been?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, Zelensky admitted that he has a lot of work to do to convince President Trump and his team that Russia is dangerous.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Speaking in Munich today, Zelensky said he will not give up pushing for Ukraine to join NATO. He sees this Western alliance as Ukraine's strongest security guarantee against Russia.
--:-- Scott Simon: Though he did question why NATO is so cautious around Russian President Vladimir Putin.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Right now, the most influential member of NATO seems to be Putin. Because his whims have the power to block NATO decisions.
--:-- Scott Simon: And that despite the fact that it was Ukraine army that stopped Russia not a NATO country.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Now, the U.S. and other NATO member states are cautious about Moscow because they don't want this war to escalate. Russia is indeed a nuclear power.
--:-- Scott Simon: So Zelensky has tried to use the moment as a call for unity in Europe.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: And why is unity in Europe such an important theme for Mr. Zelensky?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, you know, Ukraine is in talks to be a European Union member state.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Zelensky wants to tie the EU's fate with Ukraine's, reminding Europeans that it's Ukraine's army that's holding back Russian troops from further aggression into Europe.
--:-- Scott Simon: And he told them, look, Russia takes advantage of perceived weakness and Europeans must be strong and united.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: Zelensky echoed President Trump's call for Europe to take the lead in its own security. Europe must decide its own future.
--:-- Scott Simon: We need confidence in our own strengths so that others have no choice but to respect Europe's power.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: And without the European army, that is impossible.
--:-- Scott Simon: Now, European army is not something that can be pulled together very quickly, of course.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: And, you know, negotiations are moving very quickly. Talks about how to end this war, this three-year war, are set to continue next week when the U.S. Special Envoy to Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, is expected in Ukraine.
--:-- Scott Simon: And here's Joanna Kakissis in Kiev.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: You're welcome, Scott.
--:-- Scott Simon: The Trump administration continues its efforts to shrink the federal workforce.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: This past week, it has taken aim at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
--:-- Scott Simon: That's an agency set up after the 2008 financial crisis to make sure banks stick to rules about credit cards, home loans, and other forms of debt.
--:-- Joanna Kakissis: And Pierre's Laurel Walmsley has been following all the twists and turns at the Bureau.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: Hey there, Scott. Catch us up. What's been happening with this agency?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, there's been a lot of layoffs this week. That's part of Trump's plan to massively reduce the federal workforce.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: At CFPB, some 150 employees lost their jobs. That's about 9% of the staff.
--:-- Scott Simon: Those cuts were largely folks who'd been at the Bureau for less than four years.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: One of the employees who lost her job this week was Johanna Hickman, who was an attorney in the Bureau's enforcement division.
--:-- Scott Simon: She received her termination notice at 9 p.m. on Tuesday.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And because her work email had already been turned off, it came to her personal email.
--:-- Scott Simon: You know, it's heartbreaking.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: I think we do exceptional work at the Bureau, and I have been honored to serve in this role for the last, you know, over a year and a half.
--:-- Scott Simon: I expected to be here for another 15 years.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And it's shocking. It's unlawful, for one thing, and extraordinarily disappointing.
--:-- Scott Simon: And right now, essentially, all of CFPB's work has been halted.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: Employees have been locked out of the building and told they can't do any work.
--:-- Scott Simon: And Elon Musk's team, meanwhile, has been given access to the building and to its systems.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And where does that leave events now this weekend?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, staff are bracing for even further cuts.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: According to a legal complaint by CFPB's union, they're expecting that perhaps 95 percent of all employees could be fired.
--:-- Scott Simon: A reporter asked President Trump on Monday whether his goal was to have CFPB totally eliminated, and Trump said yes.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: But for now, a federal judge ruled yesterday that they can't conduct layoffs at CFPB, at least through March 3rd when a hearing is scheduled, and they can't delete any agency data either.
--:-- Scott Simon: Laurel, remind us, the Bureau was created in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: That's right. That's when millions of Americans lost their homes due to lax lending standards, and it brought the global economy tumbling with it.
--:-- Scott Simon: The Dodd Act established the Bureau to prevent such a disaster from happening again
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: At a high level, what the Bureau is supposed to do is that it been tasked by Congress to regulate consumer financial products and services like credit cards, mortgages, etc.
--:-- Scott Simon: So consumer protection responsibilities are now unified under one agency that's tasked with being on the side of the consumer against big banks and financial services companies.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And it's really done a lot. I mean, just in recent months, it's made rules capping credit card late fees and overdraft fees.
--:-- Scott Simon: It sued the payment app Zelle and the banks that operate it, saying they didn't protect consumers from fraud.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And it sued Capital One for advertising a high-yield checking account that paid close to zero in interest.
--:-- Scott Simon: Why has the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau become such a target for some now?
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: Well, all those actions I just mentioned have made it unpopular with some Republicans, as well as big banks and Silicon Valley.
--:-- Scott Simon: They say the Bureau is too heavy-handed in its regulation, and they argue it's overstepped its authority.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And you know, if it wasn't so politicized, CFPB would be an unlikely target for cost-cutting.
--:-- Scott Simon: Since its launch in 2011, it's returned more than $21 billion to Americans by means such as returning fees, canceling debt, reducing loans.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And it's done that on a pretty small budget for a federal agency.
--:-- Scott Simon: What kind of opposition against this is going on now?
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: Yeah, there's a lot of legal action happening against these moves, as there is with other actions that Trump has taken.
--:-- Scott Simon: A union representing CFPB employees says the stop work order is unlawful, and it filed a second suit arguing that Musk's team's access to CFPB systems violates the Privacy Act.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: A key idea, they're arguing, is the executive branch can't just get rid of an agency created by Congress with all the work it's required to do.
--:-- Scott Simon: So a lot of this is going to play out in court, but for now there's just no real financial cop looking out for consumers in this country.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: And Paris-Lora Walmsley, thank you so much for being with us.
--:-- Scott Simon: You're welcome, Laurel.
--:-- Scott Simon: Members of the National Transportation Safety Board have been sorting through black box data for the past two weeks.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: They're trying to figure out why a Blackhawk military helicopter crashed into a commercial jet above the Potomac River two weeks ago.
--:-- Scott Simon: 67 people were killed.
--:-- Laurel Walmsley: Now investigators say the helicopter's pilots may not have heard a critical instruction from air traffic control.
--:-- Scott Simon: Aviation reporter David Shaper joins us now.
--:-- David Shaper: My pleasure, Scott.
--:-- Scott Simon: I gather this latest information offers some detail on what the Black Hawk helicopter pilots may not have heard.
--:-- David Shaper: Right. The National Transportation Safety Board investigators outlined the exact paths both aircraft were flying that Wednesday night.
--:-- Scott Simon: One important thing to note about aviation, which is the safest mode of transportation, is that even experienced, skilled pilots often undergo training and retraining, and they are tested on their skills.
--:-- David Shaper: So the Blackhawk helicopter was on what they call a check ride in which the crew is being tested on their use of night vision goggles and flying by instruments.
--:-- Scott Simon: And they were flying along this familiar corridor along the Potomac while the American Airlines CRJ regional jet was approaching for a landing at Reagan National Airport.
--:-- David Shaper: Investigators say cockpit voice recordings indicate that an air traffic controller seemed concerned that the helicopter was flying toward the path of the incoming plane and asked the Blackhawk pilots to fly behind it.
--:-- Scott Simon: Here's NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy.
--:-- David Shaper: So the instructions from ATC were to pass behind the CRJ that transmission was interrupted. It was stepped on.
--:-- Scott Simon: How many says the mic in the helicopter cockpit was keyed open for just a second or two, but the pilots may have missed the key words passed behind the
--:-- David Shaper: That critical instruction that had the pilots actually heard and followed this disaster might have been averted
--:-- Scott Simon: We also heard that the helicopter may have been flying too high at an altitude that put it near the path of the plane
--:-- David Shaper: Any new information on that?
--:-- Scott Simon: Yes. You know, Hamidi says the helicopter pilots might not have been receiving correct information about their exact altitude.
--:-- David Shaper: Hamidi says a radio altimeter which uses radio waves bounced off the ground to measure the aircraft's altitude and information gleaned from a flight data recorder were in conflict and showing different altitudes.
--:-- Scott Simon: We are looking at the possibility of there may be bad data.
--:-- David Shaper: We're looking at were they seeing something different in the cockpit that differs from the FDR data, which was radio altimeter.
--:-- Scott Simon: Hamendy says it's still not clear why there was erroneous or conflicting data, and the investigation is still in its early stages, but she says this is definitely something the NTSB is focusing on.
--:-- David Shaper: We've also heard about the speculation that the two pilots just may not have seen each other's aircraft.
--:-- Scott Simon: The crew of the helicopter in particular may have mistaken another plane for the one into which they crashed.
--:-- David Shaper: What do investigators say about that now?
--:-- Scott Simon: Well, investigators did say that the crew of the American jet did pull up aggressively just before the impact, indicating that they likely saw the helicopter at the very last moment.
--:-- David Shaper: In addition, they did confirm the Black Hawk crew was likely wearing night vision goggles, and they acknowledged there is some concern in an area with a lot of aircraft lights and city lights that it could have been difficult to see the airplane.
--:-- Scott Simon: Chair Homendy says the MDSB will conduct a visibility study to try to determine what the pilots could and could not see.
--:-- David Shaper: Aviation reporter David Shaper, thanks so much.
--:-- Scott Simon: You're welcome, David.
--:-- Scott Simon: And that's up first for Saturday, February 15th.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: I'm Aisha Roscoe.
--:-- Scott Simon: And I'm Scott Simon.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: This podcast was produced by Martin Patience with help from Fernando Naro, Samantha Balaban, Elena Twark, and Gabe O'Connor.
--:-- Scott Simon: Our director, director, director is Danny Hensel.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: He keeps us on track.
--:-- Scott Simon: Our editors were Miguel Macias, Dee Parvaz, Nick Spicer, Rafael Nam, Russell Lewis, and Matthew Sherman.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Our technical director today, David Greenberg.
--:-- Scott Simon: Engineering support from Stacey Abbott, Simon Laszlo Jansen, and Arthur Halliday-Lorent.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Evie Stone is our senior supervising editor, and Sarah Lucy Oliver is our executive producer.
--:-- Scott Simon: Jim Cain is our deputy managing editor.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Tomorrow on the Sunday story, how advocates for homeless people devise the housing first strategy and why conservative lawmakers oppose it.
--:-- Scott Simon: And for more news, interviews, sports, and music, you can tune in to Weekend Edition Saturday and Sunday.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: Why don't they do it Monday and Tuesday, too?
--:-- Scott Simon: It's such a good show.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: On your radio, go to stations.npr.org to find your local NPR station.
--:-- Scott Simon: But on Monday and Tuesday, it's not me and you, Scott.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: You answered it. Okay, thank you.
--:-- Scott Simon: They're nice.
--:-- Aisha Roscoe: This message comes from Ritual.
--:-- Announcer: What makes Ritual vitamins different? Ritual vitamins are made with bioavailable, clinically studied key ingredients, as well as the essence of mint.
--:-- Scott Simon: Get 25% off your first purchase when you visit ritual.com slash NPR.
