NPR News: 03-11-2026 10AM EDT

0:00Live from NPR News in Washington, encore of a Coleman, the U.S. military says it struck and sank 16 Iranian vessels today. The Pentagon says these were capable of placing mines in the state of Hormuz. That very narrow body of water is effectively closed by the conflict. It's cut off oil shipments to the world from Persian Gulf countries. A British maritime organization says three ships have been hit in the region today. NPR's Abetrawi reports the U.S. and Israel continue to hit sites within Iran as well. People who've left to Iran through the Turkish border have been telling NPR their fleeing because the sky is red from bombings and they have also reported multi-story residential buildings being flattened into Iran. Now in addition to Hormuz, we've also seen damage emerging from centuries-old landmarks and palaces into Iran and cities south like Isfahan, 300 miles south of Tehran. NPR's Abetrawi reporting. Stocks open-mix this morning as investors digest a fairly mild report on inflation. NPR Scott Horsley reports the Dow Jones industrial average slipped about 80 points in early trading.

1:05A new report from the Labor Department shows annual inflation in February was 2.4 percent about what forecasters had expected and similar to the previous month. The March cost of living index could be a lot uglier. Now the U.S. war with Iran has triggered a spike in gasoline prices. The U.S. military base says gas prices have jumped about 60 cents a gallon since the war began. Gas prices were already creeping up last month along with rent and grocery prices, falling prices for used cars and auto insurance help keep the February inflation rate in check. The Campbell Soup Company is forecasting a drop in sales this year, as it says lower income shoppers are cutting back. The soup maker also says tariffs are raising costs. Scott Horsley in Pairnews, Washington. A special congressional election in Georgia yesterday will go to a run-off in April. Democrat Sean Harris will face Republican Clay Fuller, who was endorsed by President Trump. They're running to fill the seat of former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. A new survey shows nearly half of all Americans say they'd support the idea of National Guard members patrolling polling places in the U.S. in the November elections.

2:10The survey finds Republicans are especially open to the move, but as NPR's Miles Parks reports, such action is not legal. President Trump hasn't explicitly said he wants to use the National Guard to monitor this year's elections, but it's something voting officials have been worried about since Trump did say he wished he had deployed the Guard in 2020. A new NPR-PBS News Maris poll finds such unprecedented action would be supported by 46 percent of Americans and roughly three in four Republicans. Experts NPR spoke with said those numbers could indicate that many people do not know its illegal for the federal government's deploy troops to monitor voting. And that Trump has falsely but effectively convinced many that voter fraud is a widespread problem in American elections. Miles Parks and Piers News, Washington. On Wall Street, the Dow is now down about 100 points. This is NPR. Officials in northern Indiana say a tornado there yesterday killed two people in Lake Township. It's about 50 miles southeast of Chicago. Lake Township Fire Chief Rob Churchill says the tornado wreckage is extensive.

3:14Total devastation. There were houses that were collapsed. There were people trapped in houses. There's livestock loose. There were tornadoes in southern Illinois yesterday as well. And the National Weather Service says the storms dropped exceptionally large hail up to five inches wide in some cases. This morning, forecasters have posted fresh tornado watches for parts of Indiana and Eastern Ohio. Washington state and Oregon have passed new restrictions on the use of masks by law enforcement. As NPR's Martin Costee reports, the states are trying to rein in federal officers. Oregon passed its bill last week, Washington on Monday. The bill's restrict masks for all law enforcement, local, state and federal, but legislators are primarily concerned with federal immigration officers. The sponsor of the Washington bill is Democratic State Senator Javier Valdez. He says last year's surge in masking by those immigration officers inspired the legislation. No one should have to live in fear when they are dealing with our law enforcement officials.

4:17We need to work with them and they may need to know who they are and can't hide their identity. A similar law passed in California last year, but it was blocked by a federal judge because it had a carve out for state police. The Oregon and Washington bills now await the signatures of the state's governors. Martin Costee, NPR News. And I'm Corva Coleman, NPR News, from Washington. Listen to this podcast sponsor-free on Amazon Music with a prime membership or any podcast app by subscribing to NPR News Now Plus at plus.npr.org. That's plus.npr.org.