NPR News: 04-18-2026 10AM EDT

0:00Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Windsor Johnston. The Iranian military is carrying out attacks on tanker ships in the Strait of Hormuz, hours after re-imposing restrictions in the waterway. The announcement came the morning after President Trump said an American blockade would remain until a peace agreement with Tehran is reached. There's no word on when negotiations between the two sides will resume with a ceasefire set to expire next week. NPR's Catalan store reports from they route. Iran reversed course Saturday, after announcing Friday that it would open the Strait for commercial vessels during its ceasefire with the U.S. and Israel. It accused the U.S. of violating the deal. Iran's military said that control of the Strait has, quote, returned to its previous state, under strict management and control of the armed forces. It said it would remain this way as long as the U.S. blockade on Iranian ports continued. The ceasefire deal between the U.S. and Iran is set to expire early next week. On Friday night, Trump said that attacks on Iran could resume if no deal is reached.

1:02Meanwhile, a 10-day ceasefire is an effect to pause the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah and Lebanon, something Iran required in order to continue talks with the U.S. Catalan store for NPR News, Beirut. Air Canada says it's suspending some flights to New York this summer. Dan Carpenecek reports the conflict in Iran is making certain routes unprofitable. The decision over rising jet fuel prices will affect flights from Toronto and Montreal to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport from June 1 to the end of October. Air Canada says jet fuel prices have doubled since the beginning of the Iran conflict and it no longer makes sense economically to continue some routes. Effected customers will be contacted with alternate travel options such as flying to LaGuardia and Newark Liberty, daily from six Canadian cities. Aviation experts say that jet fuel crisis is getting serious, and airlines will have to consolidate the routes, some are already passing on fuel price increases to their customers. For NPR News, I'm Dan Carpenecek in Toronto.

2:03President Trump signed an executive order at the White House this morning, expanding access to a psychedelic drug that's used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder. Today, the federal government is making a $50 million research investment in its own, and so that was just approved just last night. We're also opening a pathway for IBOGain to be administered to desperately ill patients under the right to try law. That's a law that I started and I got right to try. The drug IBOGain has been explored as a treatment for addiction, depression, and anxiety, but it remains illegal in the United States. There was a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2025. It showed that a single dose of the psychedelic LSD could ease anxiety and depression for months. You're listening to NPR News from Washington. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will cut the ribbon on its new David Geffen galleries

3:06this weekend. Nina Gregory reports the $724 million building will house the museum's permanent collection. Standing 6,000 years of world history, LACMA's encyclopedic collection will now call the Peter Zump tour design building home. The Pritzker Prize winning Swiss architect, notes museums can feel elitist. Not this one. No columns to walk through, no architecture that makes you feel small. That's a thinking behind the curation as well. CEO Michael Govan explains. Instead of thinking about the way the 19th century was obsessed with categorization and chronology, what if we look at the opposite, which is migration and connection? The new building already has a connection with LA traffic. Its organic shape is elevated 30 feet above Wilshire Boulevard, cars, drive under, pedestrians, peaking, look up at the right time, and you might see a sphinx. Expect to see many selfies from LACMA. For NPR News, I'm Nina Gregory. A federal judge has blocked the proposed $6.2 billion merger between Nextar and Tegna,

4:09ending the outcome of an antitrust lawsuit. The deal will create one of the largest local TV station groups in the country with holdings in more than 40 states. State attorneys general and direct TV argue it could raise prices and hurt local journalism. In a statement, California attorney general Rob Bonta said the merger is illegal, plain and simple. Nextar says the merger has already cleared federal review. I'm Windsor Johnston, NPR News, in Washington. What happens when our political party becomes the prism through which we see every other aspect of our identities? What we're living through, I think, is really the two parties taking opposite sides on whether we want to keep making this type of social progress, or whether we want to go back in time. Listen to NPR's code switch podcasts in the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.