Get the app

Shadowing practice: News Wrap: Judge orders Kennedy Center to remove Trump's name from building

Listen to the line, then say it out loud
Line 1

Full transcript

  1. The day's other headlines begin with the war in Iran.0:00
  2. President Trump huddled in the White House situation room for roughly two hours today to, in his words, make a final determination about a potential deal to end the war.0:03
  3. The president made no announcement, and that meeting has ended.0:13
  4. U .S.0:16
  5. officials described the possible agreement as a memorandum of understanding.0:17
  6. That would open the Strait of Hormuz and then kickstart a second phase of negotiations over limiting Iran's nuclear program and lifting U .S.0:21
  7. sanctions.0:29
  8. But today in public, Tehran insisted that current negotiations did not include the nuclear issue.0:30
  9. And a key negotiator, Mohamed Barak Khalibov, struck a hard -line tone on X, saying no step will be taken before the other side acts.0:37
  10. A federal judge has temporarily blocked the Trump administration's so -called anti -weaponization fund, a $1 .8 billion fund to compensate people who claim they have been targeted by the0:47
  11. justice system.0:58
  12. The order stops the fund's formation and any potential payouts for at least the next two weeks.0:59
Show all 57 lines Show fewer lines
  1. Since it was announced last week, the fund has been challenged in at least three lawsuits.1:05
  2. It's also drawn bipartisan criticism on Capitol Hill, including from Senate Majority Leader John Thune.1:09
  3. Meantime in another legal setback for the president, a federal judge has ordered the Kennedy Center to remove Donald Trump's name from the building.1:16
  4. Judge Christopher Cooper ruled that the venues board violated the law, writing, quote, Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name and only Congress can change it.1:24
  5. In response to the judge's ruling and in a major concession, President Trump said he will pursue a full and complete transfer of responsibility for the Kennedy Center to Congress.1:34
  6. In Louisiana, Republican state lawmakers have approved a new congressional map that could help the GOP pick up another House seat in the upcoming midterms.1:45
  7. Just one month ago, the U .S.1:55
  8. Supreme Court struck down the state's current map as an illegal racial gerrymander.1:56
  9. The new boundaries would eliminate one of the state's two majority black districts, leaving just one Democratic stronghold around New Orleans.2:02
  10. The state's U .S.2:09
  11. House primary was postponed until the summer, so the map could be redrawn.2:10
  12. Turning overseas to Lebanon, Israel says its troops have pushed deeper into Lebanese territory, widening its offensive against Hezbollah in spite of a ceasefire that's had little effect.2:15
  13. Israeli forces entered the village of Debin today, crossing the Lattani River, a long -time ceasefire boundary between the two countries.2:26
  14. The IDF's advance came as Israeli airstrikes killed at least six people across southern Lebanon, according to state media.2:34
  15. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told troops on a visit to the northern border that the fighting will remain relentless.2:42
  16. We are operating in Beirut, in Bikha, across the entire width of the front, and we are both eliminating Hezbollah and causing them to flee.2:50
  17. In the midst of all of this, dialogue continues.3:00
  18. Delegations from Lebanon and Israel met in Washington today for the first direct military talks between the two countries in decades.3:03
  19. More talks are expected next week.3:11
  20. Romania says that a Russian drone crashed into an apartment building near its border with Ukraine, injuring several people in the NATO country.3:14
  21. Last night's stray drone is not the first to fall inside Romania, but was the first to cause injuries.3:23
  22. President Putin questioned that the drone was a Russian origin.3:28
  23. Romania responded by closing the Russian consulate there.3:32
  24. NATO allies condemned the incident, including Secretary -General Mark Rutte, who vowed to quote, defend every inch of Allied territory.3:36
  25. Back in the U .S.3:44
  26. in Texas, an ICE agent was arrested today.3:46
  27. He was wanted for the non -fatal shooting of a Venezuelan man during the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in Minnesota earlier this year.3:49
  28. Hennepin County officials had charged 52 -year -old Christian Castro with assault and falsely reporting a crime.3:57
  29. Castro was one of two federal agents to face charges related to the Minnesota crackdown, which raised concerns about officer conduct, especially after two U .S.4:03
  30. citizens were shot and killed.4:13
  31. On Wall Street, the major stock indices kept adding to their record gains.4:15
  32. The Dow Jones industrial average ticked up 0 .7 percent, posting another record high.4:20
  33. The Nasdaq also reached new heights with a 55 -point gain.4:24
  34. The S &P 500 ended with a ninth straight weekly gain.4:28
  35. And 14 -year -old Shrey Parikh spelled his way to victory last night in the Scripps National Spelling Bee, which ended in a rapid -fire tiebreaker round.4:32
  36. Letter by letter, he zipped through a record 32 words in just 90 seconds.4:43
  37. Fellow finalist, 12 -year -old Ishan Gupta, correctly spelled 25 words.4:48
  38. It's the third time a spell -off has decided to be since it was introduced in 2021.4:53
  39. Parikh's win marks an astounding comeback.4:58
  40. Just last year, an illness and shaky performance at his school spelling bee knocked him out of competition.5:01
  41. Our congratulations to Shrey, who we are very confident can spell redemption.5:07
  42. Still to come on the NewsHour, a massive rocket explosion casts doubt on the future of NASA's moon mission.5:12
  43. Jonathan Capehart and Matthew Contanetti weigh in on the week's political headlines.5:20
  44. And journalist Martha Raditz on her new book, featuring inspiring stories of U .S.5:25
  45. military service members.5:31

American Accent Training with a Fast Paced PBS NewsHour Bulletin

This clip is a straight news narration from PBS NewsHour, read at 173 words per minute, faster than 38 percent of the catalogue, so it gives you real material for english speaking practice at a C1 level, not a slowed down lesson clip.

The anchor moves through five separate stories: Iran negotiations, a blocked federal fund, the Kennedy Center ruling, a Louisiana redistricting map, and Israeli operations in Lebanon, each told in a few clipped sentences. That density is the point of this english shadowing practice: keeping pace with an american accent that does not slow down for you, the way it does not slow down for native listeners either.

How to Pronounce the Legal and Political Terms in This Bulletin

The recording is dense with proper nouns and legal phrasing that the anchor says quickly and evenly, with almost no extra stress on any single word.

  • "Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name and only Congress can change it." is a judge's ruling read aloud as a direct quote. Listen for how the anchor's voice flattens to mark it as someone else's words, then lifts again once the quote ends.
  • "struck a hard -line tone on X, saying no step will be taken before the other side acts." packs a compound modifier and a clause into one breath. Say it as a single unit, not word by word, to match the pace.
  • "a federal judge has ordered the Kennedy Center to remove Donald Trump's name from the building." is the headline sentence of the segment. The stress stays even across every word: nothing is dramatized, which is typical broadcast delivery and useful pronunciation practice for a neutral American accent.

A Line by Line Way to Shadow This News Clip

Work the clip story by story rather than start to finish in one pass.

  • Start at line 2, the Iran huddle sentence, and shadow it alone five times before moving on: it is one long sentence with no pause, good for building stamina at this pace.
  • Move to line 9, the hard line tone sentence, and isolate the closing clause until "no step will be taken before the other side acts" comes out as one phrase, not four.
  • Take lines 15 and 16 together, the Kennedy Center ruling and the judge's quoted words, and practice the shift in tone between reported speech and direct quotation.
  • Finish with line 24, the Lebanon line, and read it once with the video and once with audio only, to check you kept the pace without the visual cue.
  • Repeat the whole clip at full speed only after each piece above sits comfortably on its own.
Download on the App Store