NPR News: 03-27-2026 1PM EDT

0:00Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Lakshmi Singh. The TSA staffing shortages at airports that triggered historic screening delays could end as early as today. The Senate passed a bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security except for immigration and customs enforcement. The House is considering it now. TSA officers have been working without pay for weeks. The White House is disputing any notion of administration ties to insider trading and connection with oil market trades around the time President Trump announced Monday he was pausing plans to bomb Iran's energy infrastructure. There was a point where the price of oil had dramatically fallen, anyone who bet on crude prices dropping made a lot of money. Bloomberg reported that trades were made in the oil market with an estimated value of more than $500 million. Paul Krugman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist at the City University of New York tells NPR that he thinks all of it adds up to insider trading that could be linked to members of the Trump administration.

1:00There was nothing else going on that would justify large transactions at that specific moment. We don't know that it was somebody linked to the Trump administration that would be pretty weird that someone else would have suddenly decided to make these big bets on the future. It really strains credulity to suggest that this wasn't somebody with inside information. A White House spokesperson tells NPR in an email that any implication that administration officials are engaged in such activity without evidence is, quote, baseless, any responsible. The White House reaffirms that all federal employees are barred from using non-public information for financial benefit. A White House lawyer says the President, quote, performs his constitutional duties in an ethically sound manner and to suggest otherwise is either ill-informed or malicious. The House Ethics Committee has found clear and convincing evidence that representative Sheila Turfless McCormick violated House rules.

2:01NPR's Robert Sprint reports this comes after a rare marathon public hearing. The Florida Democrat was indicted in November on charges alleging she stole $5 million in disaster relief funds and used it to banquerel her 2021 campaign. She pleaded not guilty. By partisan investigators have been probing the matter for two years. They alleged more than two dozen violations, including improper receipt of funds and co-mingling of personal and campaign funds. In April, the Committee will recommend a punishment to be voted on by the full House, something that could range from a censure to expulsion itself. In a statement to NPR, the Congresswoman says she looks forward to proving her innocence. Barbara Sprint and Peer News. U.S. stocks are trading lower this hour. The Dow Jones industrial average down 496 points are more than 1%, at 45,463, the S&P and NASAC are both down 1% to 1.5%. It's NPR news.

3:01The federal government could soon loosen restrictions on a handful of peptide therapies for wellness and longevity. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has signaled the Food and Drug Administration will soon reclassify some of them. NPR's Will Stone reports compounding pharmacies in the U.S. will be able to make them. Kennedy made the comments about a month ago on Joe Rogan's podcast. He said to expect an announcement on about 14 of these peptides in a few weeks. The peptides in question are big in the world of biohacking and longevity, used for immune function, skin health, tissue repair and more. Scott Bruner with the Alliance for Pharmacy compounding hopes Kennedy makes the changes, but says it will take time for the supply to be available. We're going to have prescribers and patients dashing to their compounding pharmacy only to be frustrated. A sketchy market for peptides has flourished under the FDA restrictions, but researchers also warn there is very little human clinical data on safety and efficacy of these therapies, which haven't been approved by the FDA.

4:02Will Stone and P.R. News. A high school freshman has his sights set on the governor's mansion in Vermont. Dean Roy is 14 and in November, he will be the first candidate under the age of 18 to appear on Vermont's general election ballot. Roy says he doesn't really expect to win, but he does expect to galvanize more young people to get serious about getting politically involved and affecting change. U.S. Stocks trading low or the Dow's down 475 points, it's NPR News.