by Brittney Melton

February 17, 2026

Good morning. Today marks the beginning of the Lunar New Year, one of the most important festivals in many Asian countries. Check out these ways you can celebrate to ensure good luck this year. Here’s the news we’re following today:

The U.S. and Iran are expected to meet today in Geneva for negotiations. This marks the second round of talks to discuss limits on Iran’s nuclear program. The U.S. wants concessions from Iran beyond its nuclear program and has paired the talks with a threat by building up its military forces in the region.

Protesters hold Iranian pre-Islamic revolution of 1979 flags in front of the United Nations office ahead of indirect nuclear talks between the United States and Iran in Geneva on Feb. 17.

Harold Cunningham / AFP via Getty Images

🎧 Today’s meeting is a good sign that both sides are still open to these talks, though the U.S. and Iran remain firm in their demands, NPR’s Jackie Northam tells Up First. President Trump wants Iran to possess zero nuclear weapons and zero enrichment. Iran insists it has the right to enrich uranium for research and civilian uses. Iran indicated it could be open to curbing, not eliminating, its nuclear program, Northam says. Iran has brought a large technical team with it to Geneva as a gesture that shows its seriousness.

Nine people face trial today in a Fort Worth, Texas, federal court in connection to a nonfatal shooting that happened outside an ICE detention facility last July. Around a dozen people protested Trump’s immigration crackdown and deportation efforts outside the Prairieland Detention Center in nearby Alvarado. At some point, police and prosecutors say shots were fired, injuring a local police officer.

🎧 The case is unique due to the U.S. attorney’s office calling the indictment against the defendants the first in the nation against "violent Antifa cell members," Penelope Rivera with NPR network station KERA says. Eight of the individuals face charges of providing material support to terrorists, and one is accused of attempted murder of a federal officer. Jason Blazakis, executive director of the Center on Terrorism, Extremism and Counterterrorism, says connecting the case to Antifa members is a stretch. No federal statute exists for domestic terrorism. So if the government succeeds in convicting these individuals, it could set a nationwide precedent for prosecuting alleged left-wing movements, according to Rivera.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, an American civil rights leader, minister and politician, and Martin Luther King Jr.’s protégé, died today at the age of 84. Jackson helped to reshape Democratic politics in the 1980s with two galvanizing presidential campaigns. According to his family, public commemorations will take place in Chicago. Here’s a closer look at Jackson’s life, from his presidential bids to his recent years of activism.

Federal authorities have again denied Minnesota criminal investigators access to evidence and other materials they collected after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, state officials said yesterday. Pretti, an ICU nurse, was killed by Border Patrol agents last month in Minneapolis. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has faced exclusion from the investigation since the shooting happened. Despite this, the BCA continues to seek access to evidence as the state conducts its own probe.

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Living better

An illustration of a child wearing a green shirt, slicing bread, and a glass of water is beside her.

Andrea D'Aquino for NPR

Living Better is a special series about what it takes to stay healthy in America.

The U.S. government is urging Americans to avoid highly processed foods, saying they fuel diet-related diseases. Many people want to reduce these foods but struggle to identify them, especially when it comes to carbs. Ultra-processed foods are factory-made with ingredients rarely found in your pantry, like preservatives and artificial sweeteners. Studies have shown these foods increase the risks of multiple health problems, including diabetes and depression. Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, who leads the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University, says he gives his patients two practical rules of thumb to follow when selecting grains and starches:

🍞 The 10 to 1 test means a food should have at least one gram of fiber for every 10 grams of carbohydrates.
🍞 Try the water test in which you take starchy food and put it in a glass of water. Let it sit for a few hours. If it doesn’t dissolve in water, then it is likely minimally processed food.

by Michel Martin, Morning Edition and Up First host

When I first heard the story about what happened to Giséle Pelicot, I couldn’t believe it. Or maybe it’s more accurate to say I didn’t want to believe it — and it turns out neither did she.

Her husband of nearly half a century had been drugging and raping her while she was unconscious in their home in southeastern France. He had been doing it for almost a decade — and not only that, he had actively solicited other men to do the same thing. He coached some 70 men to rape his own wife. And he filmed the whole thing. He’s serving a maximum 20-year sentence for his crime. And all of the men who could be identified — some 20 were not — were also convicted.

A book cover of Giséle Pelicot’s ‘A Hymn to Life.’ Pelicot leans on a table and holds her hands. She is wearing a light blue button up shirt.

Penguin Random House

When I spoke to Madame Pelicot for a story you’ll hear on Morning Edition and The Sunday Story this week, tied to the release of her new book A Hymn to Life, one of the first things she told me was that when she first saw the tapes she didn’t recognize herself. Her brain could not accept that it was her.

It’s one of the most disturbing stories you’ve ever heard about sexual assault —- and that is saying something in a world in which we know that women, children and yes, men, have been viciously abused in war time and peace time, here rich and powerful men have traded girls between them for fun and where vulnerable migrants seek work and become enslaved. It goes on and on.

It's hard to understand how humans can do that to each other under any circumstance. But as a person who has enjoyed a long marriage myself, I could not and cannot understand how someone could do that to someone that he supposedly loved, who birthed his children, who carefully prepared his favorite foods and someone who, on the day he was arrested for what he did to her, dropped off a bag of warm clothing and clean underwear to jail for him.

I still don’t understand. But what I carried away from my conversation with Pelicot was awe. She was calm, open and unafraid. She spoke of the hardest things with such gentleness and kindness that I could only marvel at the source of it. She ended her book, and our conversation, by saying that she still believes in love. “To fight the emptiness,” she writes, “I need to love.” What a message. What a challenge. What a gift.

Robert Duvall from the shoulders up. He is wearing a black suit, a white shirt and a silver tie.

Mark Mainz/Getty Images North America

Robert Duvall, who appeared in more than 90 films over the decades of his acting career, died on Sunday. He was 95.

Kristi Reeves, reeling from the news of her finalized divorce, sought solace in the mountains. On the trail, she encountered a couple, her unsung heroes, descending as she climbed. The woman commended Reeves for doing the hike solo. Reeves began to cry and explained her divorce was final. The woman then gave Reeves a comforting hug that left her feeling changed.

Yesterday, a federal judge ruled the Trump administration must restore the slavery exhibits at Philadelphia’s President’s House Site on Independence Mall. (via WHYY)

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This newsletter was edited by Treye Green.

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