Politics and views in the United States.

The Trump administration wants stepped up voter deregistration efforts, the U.S. will help get more food to starving Palestinians, and a federal judge rules Medicaid payments to Planned Parenthood must continue.

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to 2025 Talks, where we're following our democracy in historic times.

How will you ever be able to contact that many people?

How many will fall through the cracks?

If contacted, will they be able to navigate a system that isn't always easy?

Raleigh, North Carolina's Mary Kay Helling wonders how many eligible voters know their names risk being scrubbed from voter rolls.

She told a congressional hearing on registration list maintenance hers was one of 60,000 votes legally last fall that was nearly erased in a months-long legal challenge brought by a Republican court candidate.

The Trump administration is now suing the state, claiming its registration database is inaccurate and more names have to be removed.

In a break with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Donald Trump says the U.S. will work to set up food centers in Gaza, as aid groups report of widespread starvation.

Those children look very hungry, but we're giving a lot of money and a lot of food.

And Israel is facing intense pressure to lift restrictions on food and other supplies entering the territory.

The White House says there's a preliminary trade agreement with the European Union with a 15 percent tariff on most goods.

That's less than the 30 percent Trump originally proposed, but the import taxes will still likely raise costs for Americans.

Federal workers are free to express their religious beliefs and persuade their coworkers to quote, "Rethink their own without fear of retaliation," according to a new White House memo.

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Harmeet Dhillon, says she's committed to rooting out what she calls "woke ideology," harming all people of faith.

The freedom to exercise one's faith is a core founding principle of our nation.

An obvious example is the work this administration has already done to protect Jewish students from anti-Semitism on college campuses.

The new directive follows the formation of a new federal task force to expose, quote, "anti-Christian bias" in government.

A federal judge has ruled the Trump administration must continue Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood clinics.

A provision in the recently passed federal budget would have prohibited health care providers that offer abortion from accepting Medicaid payments for any other services.

Opponents sued, arguing that amounts to a backdoor abortion ban in states where it remains legal.

The White House has restored nearly $6 billion in federal funding for education.

Following bipartisan criticism and chaos at some local school districts, The money is designated for teacher training, English language education, and adult literacy programs.

But Emily Wildow with New Mexico Voices for Children says she's still worried about what's next.

The proposal from the White House does include permanently cutting a lot of these programs that had their funding frozen in this fiscal year.

So I think it's a bad omen for what's to come.

New Mexico had joined a lawsuit with more than 20 other states to challenge the funding freeze.

I'm Katherine Carley for Pacifica Network and public news service, find our trust indicators at publicnewsservice.org.