John Burnett

The President's Daily Brief is one of the most secretive documents in Washington. The CIA has made public hundreds of briefs covering 8 years during John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson's presidencies.

In a dense, wooded lot, 17-year-old Justis Jackson lies on a mound of dirt. He doesn't seem to mind the sticky heat or buzzing mosquitoes. Jackson's attention is fixed on a buried object at the bottom of a neatly dug hole.

"Sounds like metal," he says, knocking. "But what type ...

Texas is the first state to create its own police force along the U.S.-Mexico border, even though the area is already patrolled by federal agencies. Some question whether state police is needed.

When Hurricane Katrina made landfall on the Gulf Coast, devastating regions of Louisiana and Mississippi, three of NPR's correspondents saw the storm firsthand. These are their stories.

People in New Orleans say the city finally has the storm defense system it should have had before Hurricane Katrina — at a cost of $14.5 billion. Now someone needs to cover the cost to keep it strong.

Ten years ago, 25,000 people huddled inside the Morial Convention Center in New Orleans seeking shelter from Hurricane Katrina. The fiasco there came to epitomize the chaotic, inadequate response.

The popular New Orleans club welcomed everyone, even when the city code enforced segregation. It's been closed since 1972, but there's now a crusade to rescue the venue for a new generation.

In the decade since Hurricane Katrina, tens of thousands of New Orleans residents fled the city and never returned. This week New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu went on the road to call his people home.

Donald Trump had lacked for policy specifics until he came out with his very specific, hard-line immigration plan. But some of those in the trenches of immigration reform say it's dead on arrival.

A shop owner in Reynosa, Mexico, found a hit product with his Donald Trump piñatas. Now, he's swinging for the other side of the aisle.

Donald Trump visited the border with Mexico and said he would crack down on illegal immigration if elected president. But he was less strident than he has been in other recent remarks.

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's harsh description of immigrants has galvanized his base of supporters. He says he wants tougher border restrictions.

This summer, NPR is getting crafty in the kitchen. As part of Weekend Edition's Do Try This At Home series, chefs are sharing their cleverest hacks and tips — taking expensive, exhausting or intimidating recipes and tweaking them to work in any home kitchen.

This week: A play on ...

There are two things that have put El Rito on the map. In the little village in northern New Mexico, there's a tiny cafe that serves the best red-chili Frito pie in the world. And then there's the santero — Nicholas Herrera.

"This is where I live," says Herrera. ...

If you're a true meat lover, the slab you'll want searing this summer is the rib-eye. One Texas ranch shares its secret. This story originally aired on April 23, 2015 on All Things Considered.

ICE is again changing the way it handles mothers and children who come here illegally, beginning to release most of them instead of detaining them in controversial "family-friendly" jails.

It's a time-honored tradition in South Texas: Local candidates who need votes go to campaign workers known as politiqueras. But some of those workers are now charged with manipulating mail-in ballots.

How does a promising young cop go from town hero to drug trafficker? A former rogue officer details what led him to the dark side in a region known for corruption.

The FBI is cracking down on rampant corruption in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas. With voter fraud, drug smuggling and bribery a big part of border culture, it's proving to be a difficult task.