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Join The New Yorker’s writers and editors for reporting, insight, and analysis of the most pressing political issues of our time. On Mondays, David Remnick, the editor of The New Yorker, presents conversations and feature stories about current events. On Wednesdays, the senior editor Tyler Foggatt goes deep on a consequential political story via far-reaching interviews with staff writers and outside experts. And, on Fridays, the staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos discuss the latest developments in Washington and beyond, offering an encompassing understanding of this moment in American politics.
- 1022 - Should Big Tech Stop Moderating Content?
The New Yorker staff writer Jay Caspian Kang joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss the tension between protecting children from the effects of social media and protecting their right to free speech. Kang considers the ways in which social-media companies have sought to quell fear about misinformation and propaganda since Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election, and why those efforts will ultimately fail. “The structure of the Internet, of all social media,” he tells Foggatt, “is to argue about politics. And I think that is baked into it, and I don’t think you can ever fix it.”Read Jay Caspian Kang’s latest column.To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send feedback on this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com.
Wed, 27 Mar 2024 - 34min - 1021 - Adam Gopnik on Hitler’s Rise to Power
In 2016, before most people imagined that Donald Trump would become a serious contender for the Presidency, the New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik wrote about what he later called the “F-word”: fascism. He saw Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric not as a new force in America but as a throwback to a specific historical precedent in nineteen-thirties Europe. In the years since, Trump has called for “terminating” articles of the Constitution, has marked the January 6th insurrectionists as political martyrs, and has called his enemies animals, vermin, and “not people,” and demonstrated countless other examples of authoritarian behavior. In a new essay, Gopnik reviews a book by the historian Timothy W. Ryback, and considers Adolf Hitler’s unlikely ascent in the early nineteen-thirties. He finds alarming analogies with this moment in the U.S. In both Trump and Hitler, “The allegiance to the fascist leader is purely charismatic,” Gopnik says. In both men, he sees “someone whose power lies in his shamelessness,” and whose prime motivation is a sense of humiliation at the hands of those described as élites. “It wasn’t that the great majority of Germans were suddenly lit aflame by a nihilist appetite for apocalyptic transformation,” Gopnik notes. “They [were] voting to protect what they perceive as their interest from their enemies. Often those enemies are largely imaginary.”
Mon, 25 Mar 2024 - 29min - 1020 - The Political Books That Help Us Make Sense of 2024
The Washington Roundtable reflects on the books they’ve been reading to understand the 2024 Presidential campaigns and the state of international politics. Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos swap recommendations of works about all things political, from the anger of rural voters to the worldwide rise of authoritarian rule, including a fictionalized imagining of a powerful real-life political family. Read with the Roundtable: “America Last: The Right’s Century-Long Romance with Foreign Dictators,” by Jacob Heilbrunn“Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism,” by Rachel Maddow“The Longest Con: How Grifters, Swindlers, and Frauds Hijacked American Conservatism,” by Joe Conason“Offshore: Stealth Wealth and the New Colonialism,” by Brooke Harrington“The Wizard of the Kremlin,” by Giuliano da Empoli“The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family,” by Joshua Cohen“The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the C.I.A., and the Origins of America's Invasion of Iraq,” by Steve Coll (The New Yorker)“The Sentinel State: Surveillance and the Survival of Dictatorship in China,” by Minxin Pei“White Rural Rage: The Threat to American Democracy,” by Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman“Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture,” by Kyle Chayka (The New Yorker)“Romney: A Reckoning,” by McKay Coppins“The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism,” by Tim Alberta“Unholy: How White Christian Nationalists Powered the Trump Presidency, and the Devastating Legacy They Left Behind,” by Sarah Posner“Playing God: American Catholic Bishops and The Far Right,” by Mary Jo McConahay“Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism,” by Stephen Breyer“The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court,” by Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong“What It Takes: The Way to the White House,” by Richard Ben CramerTheodore Roosevelt Trilogy: “The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt,” “Theodore Rex,” and “Colonel Roosevelt,” by Edmund MorrisTo discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send feedback about this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com with “The Political Scene” in the subject line.
Sat, 23 Mar 2024 - 34min - 1019 - Why Robert Hur Described Joe Biden as an “Elderly Man with a Poor Memory”
The New Yorker contributor Jeannie Suk Gersen joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss her interview with Robert Hur, the special prosecutor who caused a political uproar with his report on his investigation into President Biden’s handling of classified documents. The report, which referred to Biden as “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” elicited a furious response from the White House—but, Gersen argues, its meaning and Hur’s motivations may have been misunderstood. Gersen and Foggatt also discuss the likelihood that the federal cases against Trump will go to trial before Election Day, and what Americans might expect if they do not.Read Jeannie Suk Gersen’s piece on Robert Hur here.To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send feedback on this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com.
Fri, 22 Mar 2024 - 38min - 1018 - Judith Butler on the Global Backlash to L.G.B.T.Q. Rights
Long before gender theory became a principal target of the right, it existed principally in academic circles. And one of the leading thinkers in the field was the philosopher Judith Butler. In “Gender Trouble” (from 1990) and in other works, Butler popularized ideas about gender as a social construct, a “performance,” a matter of learned behavior. Those ideas proved highly influential for a younger generation, and Butler became the target of traditionalists who abhorred them. A protest at which Butler was burned in effigy, depicted as a witch, inspired their new book, “Who’s Afraid of Gender?” It covers the backlash to trans rights in which conservatives from the Vatican to Vladimir Putin create a “phantasm” of gender as a destructive force. “Obviously, nobody who is thinking about gender . . . is saying you can’t be a mother, that you can’t be a father, or we’re not using those words anymore,” they tell David Remnick. “Or we’re going to take your sex away.” They also discuss Butler’s identification as nonbinary after many years of identifying as a woman. “The young people gave me the ‘they,’ ” as Butler puts it. “At the end of ‘Gender Trouble,’ in 1990, I said, ‘Why do we restrict ourselves to thinking there are only men and women?’ . . . This generation has come along with the idea of being nonbinary. [It] never occurred to me! Then I thought, Of course I am. What else would I be? . . . I just feel gratitude to the younger generation, they gave me something wonderful. That also takes humility of a certain kind.”
Mon, 18 Mar 2024 - 26min - 1017 - How Gaza, Ukraine, and TikTok Are Influencing the Election
The Washington Roundtable: Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos discuss how foreign policy is shaping the 2024 campaign, such as a possible ban on Chinese-owned TikTok and the wars in Europe and the Middle East. The panel also considers Joe Biden and Donald Trump’s sharply conflicting views of America’s role in the world.This week’s reading:“I Listened to Trump’s Rambling, Unhinged, Vituperative Georgia Rally—and So Should You,” by Susan B. Glasser To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send feedback about this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com with “The Political Scene” in the subject line.
Fri, 15 Mar 2024 - 37min - 1016 - What Biden’s Budget Means for His Reëlection Battle with Trump
John Cassidy joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss President Biden’s “bold proposal” to shift the tax burden back to the wealthy and tackle inflation, both key concerns for voters in the run-up to Election Day. The pair also considers why companies continue to rake in “bigger profits than ever before,” even as the economic fallout of the pandemic recedes.To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send feedback on this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com.
Wed, 13 Mar 2024 - 34min - 1015 - Vinson Cunningham on His New Book, “Great Expectations”
Like most Americans, Vinson Cunningham first became aware of Barack Obama in 2004, when he gave a breakout speech at the Democratic National Convention. “Very good posture, that guy,” Cunningham noted. “We hang our faith on objects, on people, based on the signs that they put out,” Cunningham tells David Remnick. “And that’s certainly been a factor in my own life. The rapid and urgent search for patterns.” Although Cunningham aspired to be a writer, he got swept up in this historic campaign, working on Obama’s longshot 2008 run for the Presidency, and later worked in his White House. Cunningham’s adventures on the trail inspire his first novel, “Great Expectations,” an autobiographical coming-of-age story about where and how we seek inspiration. Cunningham recalls that Obama was seen as the “fulfillment” of so many hopes and dreams for people like himself. Now he wishes the former President were playing a larger role. “I will admit that it has been dispiriting,” in Obama’s post-Presidential life, “to see him making movies and being on Jet Skis as the world burns. … more like a movie star than someone whose great hope is to change the world.”
Tue, 12 Mar 2024 - 18min - 1014 - At the State of the Union, Biden Came Out Swinging
The Washington Roundtable: Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos discuss President Biden’s energetic State of the Union address, the positive response among Democrats in the polls, and how press coverage is shaping the public’s perceptions of Biden’s campaign.“He wasn’t looking to convince anybody,” Glasser says. “What he was looking to do was to tell his side, ‘Stop freaking out. I’m in the fight.’ ”This week’s reading: “So Much for ‘Sleepy Joe’: On Biden’s Rowdy, Shouty State of the Union,” by Susan B. Glasser “Joe Biden’s Last Campaign,” by Evan Osnos To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send in feedback on this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com with “The Political Scene” in the subject line.
Fri, 08 Mar 2024 - 38min - 1013 - The Mood at Mar-a-Lago on Super Tuesday
Benjamin Wallace-Wells joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss the results of Super Tuesday, and how a “general decay” in Biden’s support, on top of his tight margins, could be exploited by a third-party candidate. Plus, Antonia Hitchens takes us behind the gilded curtain at a Mar-a-Lago primary-night watch party. Read Benjamin Wallace-Wells on the primaries and Antonia Hitchens on experiencing Super Tuesday at Mar-a-Lago.To discover more podcasts from The New Yorker, visit newyorker.com/podcasts. To send in feedback on this episode, write to themail@newyorker.com.
Thu, 07 Mar 2024 - 29min - 1012 - Biden Reveals His Thoughts on the 2024 Election
Despite hand-wringing among Democrats about Joe Biden’s age and his discouraging poll numbers, the President’s campaign for reëlection displays an “ostentatious level of serenity,” Evan Osnos says about the election. “This is a matter of great personal importance to Joe Biden. He feels almost, viscerally, this contempt for Trump and for what Trump did to the country,” Osnos tells David Remnick, after a rare private interview at the White House. “And let’s remember, he didn’t just try to steal this election—from Biden’s perspective—he tried to steal it from him.” Although Biden once referred to himself as a “bridge” President, he told Osnos that he had never considered stepping aside after one term. His gait has slowed, but Osnos found the President quick to jab at his questions and at “you guys” in the media, whom he blames for naysaying his campaign. But alongside complacent media coverage, threats to the President’s reëlection are many. The war in Gaza has alienated many voters from Biden, especially in Arab American communities, and it resonates even more widely. “When Houthi rebels started firing rockets at ships in the Red Sea,” Osnos points out, “it had an immediate effect on global shipping, to the point that it could have, and could yet still, push inflation back up. . . . I know this is the worst cliché in journalism, but this election has an element that is beyond anything we’ve ever really dealt with before.”
Mon, 04 Mar 2024 - 21min - 1011 - Why the Primary System Is “Clearly Failing”
The Washington Roundtable: In the Michigan primary on Tuesday, more than a hundred thousand Michigan Democrats chose “uncommitted” instead of voting for Biden, as a protest of his support for Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. In Dearborn, which is home to a large Arab American and Muslim population, fifty-seven per cent of the vote was “uncommitted.” And, while former President Trump has so far swept the Republican contests, Nikki Haley has seized on college-educated and moderate-to-liberal Republican voters, taking forty per cent of the primary vote in South Carolina, her home state. This week, the Supreme Court announced that it would hear oral arguments on Trump’s claims of immunity, delaying the possibility of a trial before the election in the federal January 6th case.“It’s practically a kind of game-over moment for our democracy, what the Supreme Court did this week,” the staff writer Susan B. Glasser says. Will apathy among Democrats and the Supreme Court’s delay of Trump’s trial lead to a second Trump term? The New Yorker staff writers Jane Mayer and Evan Osnos join Glasser to weigh in.
Fri, 01 Mar 2024 - 32min - 1010 - With Navalny’s Death, Putin is Feeling More Confident than Ever
After a decade of provoking Russian President Vladimir Putin through organized protest, anti-corruption investigations, and taunting social-media posts, the opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died in a Russian prison, from what the Kremlin claims was a pulmonary embolism. The New Yorker staff writer Masha Gessen, who knew Navalny, calls his death “a shock, but not a surprise,” and says that, had Navalny been killed a decade ago, the incident might have led to even more widespread outrage. But Russian citizens and the world have since grown accustomed to Putin’s iron grip on power. With Putin gaining momentum in his war on Ukraine and Western sanctions seeming to be unable to stop him, Navalny’s death does not appear to signal Putin’s weakness; rather, it suggests that the Russian President feels as emboldened as ever. Despite this, Gessen sees a future for Russia’s political opposition movement. “They’re not going to organize to bring down the regime,” Gessen tells Tyler Foggatt. “That’s not the project. The project is to have a politics in place for when the regime collapses under its own weight. And I think it’s not impossible that they could do it.”
Wed, 28 Feb 2024 - 38min - 1009 - Ty Cobb on Trump's Admiration for Putin
Ty Cobb represented the Trump White House during the height of the Mueller-Russia probe, so he has a unique insight into the former President’s admiration for all things Putin, and his refusal to condemn the dissident Alexey Navalny’s death in prison. Trump’s response, bizarrely, was to compare his own legal troubles to Navalny’s political persecution and likely murder. Yet Cobb still feels certain that Russia has nothing concrete on Trump, which was the question of the Mueller investigation. Rather, Putin “has what Trump wants,” he tells David Remnick, “total control and adulation and riding the horse with his shirt off.” His quest to secure that power, seemingly by any means necessary, has made Trump “the greatest threat to democracy we’ve ever seen.” Cobb has been following Trump’s myriad of criminal cases closely, and he has concluded that only the January 6th case concerning Trump’s attempt to prevent the peaceful transfer of power has the potential to derail his political career. If a trial decision is not reached before the November election, and Trump were to win again, he can order the Justice Department to dismiss the case, and “it will be as though it never existed."
Mon, 26 Feb 2024 - 13min - 1008 - Does Impeachment Mean Anything Anymore?
Since Joe Biden’s earliest days in the Oval Office, some House Republicans have sought to remove the President and his Cabinet members from office. Last week, the Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, was impeached—on a second attempt—by a slight margin, in regard to the Biden Administration’s handling of the U.S.-Mexico border crisis. Meanwhile, the House’s other impeachment investigation, into Biden, is on the verge of collapse, after its star witness was charged with providing false information about Biden and his son Hunter to F.B.I. agents. The F.B.I. informant also, by his own account, has ties to Russian intelligence agencies. The ubiquity of impeachment cases today signal a change in our politics. “What was once a pretty rare and solemn instrument of accountability now looks more and more like just another partisan tool,” the staff writer Evan Osnos says. The New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser and Jane Mayer join him to weigh in.
Fri, 23 Feb 2024 - 30min - 1007 - Why Matt Gaetz Keeps Getting Away with It
Representative Matt Gaetz is one of the most outspoken critics of the status quo in Washington, which he demonstrated most recently by playing a key role in removing fellow-Republican Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House. How was Gaetz able to pull off such a feat given his deep unpopularity in Congress, and the fact that he’s under a House Ethics Committee investigation for the sex trafficking of a minor? The New Yorker staff writer Dexter Filkins, who recently profiled Gaetz in the magazine, joins Tyler Foggatt to explore the congressman’s motivations, including how fractured party politics have played a role in his rise to fame. “The party has to decide what it is,” Filkins says. “It’s not what it used to be, and it’s rapidly becoming something else. . . . In the interregnum, we’re seeing all these morbid symptoms as the party kind of convulses and tries to figure out its new identity.”
Thu, 22 Feb 2024 - 28min - 1006 - “Pod Save America” ’s Jon Lovett on Biden’s Accomplishments
Jon Lovett had been deep inside politics, as a speechwriter in the Obama Administration, before he joined his colleagues Tommy Vietor and Jon Favreau to launch Crooked Media, a liberal answer to the burgeoning ecosystem of right-wing news platforms. “There was too much media that treated people like cynical observers,” Lovett tells David Remnick, “and not enough that treated them like frustrated participants.” Crooked Media has gathered millions of politically engaged listeners—“nerds,” Lovett calls them—to “Pod Save America,” “Lovett or Leave It,” and other podcasts. But Lovett is more worried about voters who no longer get a steady stream of reliable political coverage at all, as local news outlets wither and platforms like Facebook downplay the sharing of news. “The vast majority of people do not know about Joe Biden’s accomplishments,” he says. “When they say to a pollster that this is not someone they view as being up to the job, they’re not . . . understanding how he performed in the job so far.” Lovett shares the widespread concerns about Biden’s apparent aging, but notes that his performance remains effective, whereas, “in Trump, the reverse: he is more energetic—I think the threat of federal jail time sharpens the mind!—but by all accounts is emotionally, psychologically, and mentally not up to the job.”
Mon, 19 Feb 2024 - 30min - 1005 - Do Democrats Have a Biden Backup Plan?
The Biden campaign has come out in full force against a special-counsel report that refers to the President as an “elderly man with a poor memory.” But, as the staff writer Andrew Marantz points out, this “October-surprise-level political stumbling block” may require a more substantial response if Democrats hope to recapture the White House in November. Marantz joins Tyler Foggatt to outline the issues the Democratic Party is facing right now, and discuss why one lesson from Lyndon B. Johnson may come back to haunt the President later. “There is just a fundamental cleavage within the coalition over what’s going on in Israel and Gaza the way there was with Vietnam,” he tells Foggatt. “I honestly don’t know what the ace-in-the-hole political move is here for him.”
Thu, 15 Feb 2024 - 24min - 1004 - Can Joe Biden Squash Concerns About His Age?
The Washington Roundtable: The special counsel investigating President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents, Robert Hur, released a report Thursday that describes the President as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.” Biden will not face charges for “willfully” retaining classified documents, but the report has reignited concerns about the President’s mental acuity. In a late-night press conference, Biden forcefully pushed back against the report’s findings, declaring, “My memory is fine.” But the incident could be “incredibly damaging” to the President, the staff writer Jane Mayer says, because people recognize it as “potentially true and potentially a giant campaign issue.” Another octogenarian politician, the Senate Republican Leader, Mitch McConnell, also had a bad week in Washington. The long-awaited bipartisan deal on border security and Ukraine aid collapsed, with Senate Republicans turning on their own leader. The New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser and Evan Osnos join Mayer to weigh in.
Sat, 10 Feb 2024 - 40min - 1003 - Why the Trump Ballot Case Is the Ultimate Test of Originalism
This week, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case that has the potential to remove Donald Trump from the ballot in Colorado, and possibly across the country. At issue is the Fourteenth Amendment provision that prohibits the leader of an insurrection from holding office, and whether the clause can be applied to Trump’s role in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore, along with other notable historians, wrote an amicus brief that contextualizes the law. “This court has made momentous decisions in the last few years, certainly in the last two decades, in the name of an originalist interpretation of the Constitution,” she tells Tyler Foggatt. “And the only originalist interpretation of the Constitution available to them in this case is that Donald Trump cannot run for President of the United States.”
Thu, 08 Feb 2024 - 27min - 1002 - The Last Real Legislative Battle of 2024
The Washington Roundtable: Prospects for the passage of a long-negotiated aid package that includes funding for Ukraine and Israel, and policy changes for the U.S. southern border, rapidly shrank this week, after the deal met resistance from House Republicans and former President Donald Trump. Meanwhile, President Biden’s approval rating on immigration has sunk to eighteen per cent. Why are Republicans simultaneously concerned about the crisis at the border while also stymying bi-partisan legislation to address it? The New Yorker staff writer Jonathan Blitzer, who is the author of “Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis,” joins the hosts Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos to weigh in on the implications that our knotted immigration politics have for the 2024 election.
Sat, 03 Feb 2024 - 35min - 1001 - Why You Keep Seeing Biden Falling on Instagram
If your Instagram Reels and TikToks are inundated with videos of President Joe Biden tripping or stumbling over his words, you’re not alone. Americans are increasingly tuning out the news and turning to social media for their political fix, and the online world is delivering an abundance of right-wing memes and misinformation. The New Yorker staff writer Clare Malone joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss our shifting media habits, why the 2016 election is surfacing in new contexts online, and how both campaigns are relying on algorithms to gain momentum ahead of November.
Thu, 01 Feb 2024 - 31min - 1000 - Introducing The Runaway Princesses, from In the Dark
The wives and daughters of Dubai’s ruler live in unbelievable luxury. So why do the women in Sheikh Mohammed’s family keep trying to run away? The New Yorker staff writer Heidi Blake joins In the Dark’s Madeleine Baran to tell the story of the royal women who risked everything to flee the brutality of one of the world’s most powerful men. In four episodes, drawing on thousands of pages of secret correspondence and never-before-heard audio recordings, “The Runaway Princesses” takes listeners behind palace walls, revealing a story of astonishing courage and cruelty.“The Runaway Princesses” is a four-part narrative series from In the Dark and The New Yorker. To keep listening, follow In the Dark wherever you get your podcasts or via this link: https://link.chtbl.com/itd_f
Tue, 30 Jan 2024 - 14min - 999 - The Oscar Nominee Cord Jefferson on Why Race Is So “Fertile” for Comedy
The writer and director Cord Jefferson has struck gold with his first feature film, “American Fiction.” Nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay for Jefferson, the film is winning praise for portraying a broader spectrum of the Black experience than most Hollywood movies. It’s based on the 2001 novel “Erasure,” by Percival Everett, a satire of the literary world. And Jefferson, who began his career as a journalist before branching out into entertainment, has long seen up close how rigid attitudes about what constitutes “Blackness” can be. “Three months before I found ‘Erasure,’ I got a note back on a script from an executive” on another script, Jefferson tells his friend Jelani Cobb, “that said, ‘We want you to make this character blacker.’ ” (He demanded that the note be explained in person, and it was quickly dropped.) Jefferson hopes that his film sheds some light on what he calls the “absurdity” of race as a construct. He finds race “a fertile target for laughter. … On the one hand, race is not real and insignificant and [on the other hand] very real and incredibly important. Sometimes life or death depends on race. And to me that inherent tension and absurdity is perfect for comedy.”
Mon, 29 Jan 2024 - 25min - 998 - Biden’s Dilemma in the Israel-Hamas War
The Washington Roundtable: After more than a hundred days, the Israel-Hamas conflict appears to be approaching an inflection point. Pressure has mounted on Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to reduce military activity in Gaza and plan for an end to the violence. Meanwhile, Netanyahu remains committed to “total victory” and the elimination of Hamas, and President Biden, reportedly frustrated behind closed doors, has been left to navigate the fraught politics of the conflict in the United States during an election year. David Remnick, the editor of The New Yorker, has travelled to Israel twice since the war began, and recently published “The Price of Netanyahu’s Ambition.” Remnick joins the New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos to weigh in on the political ramifications of the Israel-Hamas war in the Middle East and within the Democratic Party.
Sat, 27 Jan 2024 - 36min - 997 - How “the Élite” Became the Most Convenient Straw Man in Politics
Everyone loves to rail against the élites. But to whom does the term refer? For right-wing politicians and pundits, it’s the mainstream media and the Ivy League-educated. For progressives, it’s corporate honchos. The malleable language of élite-blaming makes it easy for the American public to talk past one another without addressing an underlying grievance: entrenched income inequality. The New Yorker staff writer Evan Osnos has written about this fraught concept in this week’s magazine. He joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss his findings, and to consider the nuances of how they manifest in the political lives of Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
Thu, 25 Jan 2024 - 35min - 996 - Pramila Jayapal on Biden’s Fragile Coalition
Pramila Jayapal, a Democratic representative and the leader of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, has been sounding the alarm about President Joe Biden’s reëlection prospects. She fears that the fragile coalition that won him the White House in 2020—which included suburban swing voters, people of color, and younger, progressive-leaning constituents—is “fractured” over issues like immigration and Biden’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza. Gaza in particular “is just a very difficult issue, because we don’t all operate from the same facts,” Jayapal tells David Remnick. “It is probably the most complex issue I have had to deal with in Congress. And I certainly didn’t come to Congress to deal with this issue.” But Jayapal sees a longer-term problem facing the Democratic Party. “The problem I think with a lot of my own party is we are very late to populist ideas,” she says. “The two biggest things people talk to me about are housing and child care. They saw that we had control of the House, the Senate, and the White House—and we didn’t get that done. And I can explain till the cows come home about the filibuster . . . but what people feel is the reality.” Of the political struggle that accompanied the President’s Build Back Better plan, she thinks, “A road or a bridge is extremely important, but if people can’t get out of the house, or they don’t have a house, then it’s not going to matter.”
Mon, 22 Jan 2024 - 29min - 995 - Polling, Money, Trump Fatigue: Your 2024 Election Questions
The Washington Roundtable: The 2024 election season has kicked off. Former President Donald Trump took the Iowa caucuses in a landslide, and the New Hampshire primary is just around the corner. In recent weeks, The Political Scene’s listeners have sent in questions about American politics. Some themes emerged: How should the media cover a potential Trump-Biden rematch? Are polls reliable? How will fatigue and dread influence this election? “It’s not just the candidates; it's who’s behind them, who’s around them, what’s the money, what’s the religious organization, how does the media ecosystem work,” the New Yorker staff writer Jane Mayer says. Susan B. Glasser and Evan Osnos join Mayer to answer these questions, and more.If you have questions about this political season you would like Glasser, Mayer, and Osnos to answer, please send them to themail@newyorker.com.
Fri, 19 Jan 2024 - 36min - 994 - Where Does Ron DeSantis Go From Here?
On Monday, Ron DeSantis lost the Iowa caucuses to Donald Trump by thirty points, despite dedicating a great deal of his campaign funds and time to the state. Yet the Florida governor still insists he is in the 2024 Presidential race for the “long haul.” Sarah Larson, a New Yorker staff writer, calls Tyler Foggatt from Des Moines to discuss the meaning of these results, and the challenges of covering this unusually uncompetitive election.
Wed, 17 Jan 2024 - 32min - 993 - How Donald Trump Broke the Iowa Caucuses
This time last year, Republicans were reeling from a poorer-than-expected performance in the 2022 midterm elections; many questioned, again, whether it was time to move on from their two-time Presidential standard-bearer. But Donald Trump is so far ahead in the polls that it would be shocking if he did not clinch the Iowa caucuses. The New Yorker’s Benjamin Wallace-Wells and Robert Samuels have seen on the ground how much staying power the former President has despite some opposition from religious leaders and establishment power brokers. For MAGA voters, “The core of it is, ‘If Donald Trump is President, I can do anything I want to do,’ ” Samuels tells David Remnick. “ ‘I won’t have anyone . . . telling me I’m wrong all the time.’ ” Since 2016, Trump has honed and capitalized on a message of revenge for voters who feel a sense of aggrievement. Among evangelical voters, Wallace-Wells notes, Trump seems like a bulwark against what they fear is the waning of their influence. “To them, [Biden] is the head of something aggressive and dangerous,” he says. Susan B. Glasser, who writes a weekly column on Washington politics, takes the long view, raising concerns that we’re all a little too apathetic about the threats Trump’s reëlection would pose. “What if 2024 is actually the best year of the next coming years? What if things get much much worse?” she says. “Now is the time to think in a very concrete and specific way about how a Trump victory would have a specific effect not just on policy but on individual lives.”
Mon, 15 Jan 2024 - 20min - 992 - The 2024 Primaries That Weren’t
The Washington Roundtable: With former President Donald Trump dominating the polls in Iowa and other early-primary states, this primary season looks like it may be brief and uncompetitive. “We’ll see what happens when the voters actually get a say, but it’s fair to say already that the political story of 2023 was Donald Trump’s consolidation of the Republican Party behind him,” the New Yorker staff writer Susan B. Glasser says. Meanwhile, President Biden, despite his low approval ratings, has had only “token” opposition inside the Democratic Party, Glasser says, referring to Dean Phillips of Minnesota, whose Presidential campaign has not gained traction. The New Yorker staff writers Jane Mayer and Evan Osnos join Glasser to discuss the absence of a competitive 2024 primary, the effort by some Democrats to test the waters rather than declare a campaign, and what the coming months may bring in this historic race for the Presidency.
Sat, 13 Jan 2024 - 32min - 991 - Is Nikki Haley the G.O.P.’s Trump Contingency Plan?
On Monday, with the Iowa Caucus, the 2024 Presidential race officially begins. A year ago, Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and United Nations ambassador under Donald Trump, seemed like a longshot candidate. Now she appears poised to become the runner-up behind the former President. Antonia Hitchens, taking a break from her reporting in Iowa, joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss Haley’s unexpected rise and the unusual significance of second place in this Republican primary.
Wed, 10 Jan 2024 - 28min - 990 - How the Journalist John Nichols Became Another January 6th Conspiracy-Theory Target
The Wisconsin-based Nation reporter wasn’t at the Capitol when it was attacked. That hasn’t stopped Donald Trump’s attorneys from holding him responsible.
Mon, 08 Jan 2024 - 15min - 989 - How Will January 6th Shape the 2024 Election?
The attack on the U.S. Capitol, in 2021, is set to be a central issue for both the Trump and the Biden campaigns in different ways.
Sat, 06 Jan 2024 - 32min - 988 - Ronan Farrow on the “Shadow Rule” of Elon Musk
How the tech billionaire built a one-man monopoly over American infrastructure and became too powerful for the U.S. government to rein in.
Wed, 03 Jan 2024 - 32min - 987 - Dexter Filkins Reports on the Border Crisis
The last major overhaul of the immigration system was in 1986. Changing conditions and a political impasse have created a state of chaos that the Biden Administration can no longer deny.
Mon, 01 Jan 2024 - 23min - 986 - From Vanity Fair: How Donald Trump’s Lack of Faith Attracts Conservative Christians
Inside The Hive host Brian Stelter explores the fracturing of the evangelical church with Tim Alberta, an Atlantic staff writer and author of “The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory.” Alberta, the son of an evangelical pastor, charts the church’s rightward trajectory and embrace of Donald Trump, who is seen as a champion in an Us vs. Them political showdown. Stelter and Alberta also discuss how a steady diet of outrage on cable news, talk radio, and social media has helped radicalize the flock.
Wed, 27 Dec 2023 - 35min - 985 - Christmas in Tehran: Bringing the Holidays to Hostages
In 1979, a minister received a telegram from Iranian militants who had taken hostages in the American embassy, inviting him to perform Christmas services. Two days later, he was inside.
Mon, 25 Dec 2023 - 28min - 984 - Was 2023 a Year of Denial?
With an embattled House of Representatives, a four-time indicted former President, and wars raging overseas, 2023 was a year comparable to none.
Fri, 22 Dec 2023 - 33min - 983 - The Year in Getting “Chotinered”
Tyler Foggatt looks back on 2023 with The New Yorker’s infamously relentless interviewer, Isaac Chotiner.
Wed, 20 Dec 2023 - 32min - 982 - Mosab Abu Toha’s Harrowing Detention in Gaza
The Palestinian writer and New Yorker contributor was wrongly accused of being a Hamas activist by Israeli forces while he tried to flee Gaza with his family.
Mon, 18 Dec 2023 - 20min - 981 - How the American Right Came to Love Putin
Many Republicans are resisting calls for more U.S. aid for Ukraine. Part of the explanation is the right’s affinity for the projects of Viktor Orbán, in Hungary, and Vladimir Putin, in Russia.
Sat, 16 Dec 2023 - 36min - 980 - Masha Gessen on the Holocaust, Israel, and the Politics of Memory
The New Yorker staff writer discusses the enforcement of “memory culture” in Germany, and the ongoing battle over the definition of antisemitism.
Wed, 13 Dec 2023 - 36min - 979 - Liz Cheney: Donald Trump Should Go to Jail if Convicted
Once a top Republican, Cheney is calling out her former colleagues in Congress—including Speaker Mike Johnson—for “enabling” a would-be dictator.
Mon, 11 Dec 2023 - 24min - 978 - Why Are House Republicans Leaving Congress?
Former Representative Jim Cooper of Tennessee joins The Political Scene to discuss the rush of lawmakers leaving Congress and what’s driving them away.
Sat, 09 Dec 2023 - 37min - 977 - The Post-Civil War Precedent for the Trump Trials
Jill Lepore revisits the overlooked story of Jefferson Davis, an insurrectionist ex-President, and considers the lasting cost of leniency.
Wed, 06 Dec 2023 - 33min - 976 - How Did Our Democracy Get so Fragile?
Jelani Cobb, Jill Lepore and Evan Osnos on the precarious state of American democracy and why—yet again—we risk losing it in the upcoming Presidential election.
Tue, 05 Dec 2023 - 25min - 975 - How Henry Kissinger Conquered Washington
Henry Kissinger, a shaper of the twentieth-century world order, died this week, at the age of 100. He leaves behind a complicated legacy.
Sat, 02 Dec 2023 - 39min - 974 - Geoffrey Hinton: “It’s Far Too Late” to Stop Artificial Intelligence
The so-called godfather of A.I. believes we need to put constraints on the technology so it won’t free itself from human control. But he’s not sure whether that’s possible.
Wed, 29 Nov 2023 - 31min - 973 - What Draws Latino Voters to Trump
Geraldo Cadava, a historian and contributing writer at The New Yorker, considers the issues that might be attracting a traditionally Democratic voting bloc to the Republican Party.
Wed, 22 Nov 2023 - 37min - 972 - A Rise in Antisemitism, at Home and Abroad
Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt talks about antisemitism “from all ends of the political spectrum, and in between.” It threatens not only Jews, she says, but the stability of democracies.
Mon, 20 Nov 2023 - 16min - 971 - Trump’s Vindictive Second-Term Agenda
What would a second Trump Administration look like in comparison to the first, and how would America’s democratic institutions fare?
Sat, 18 Nov 2023 - 35min - 970 - We've Been Wrong to Worry About Deepfakes (So Far)
Daniel Immerwahr, a history professor at Northwestern University, discusses why videos generated by artificial intelligence haven’t had more influence on electoral politics.
Wed, 15 Nov 2023 - 28min - 969 - Will the Government Rein in Amazon?
The Federal Trade Commission is suing the company. Lina Khan, the chair of the F.T.C., tells David Remnick that Amazon exploits its position as a monopoly to invisibly drive up costs.
Mon, 13 Nov 2023 - 20min - 968 - The Issue That Will Decide the 2024 Election
Protecting access to abortion was a powerful motivator among voters during this week’s off-cycle elections, in which Democrats made significant victories. What do Tuesday’s results portend for 2024 elections?
Sat, 11 Nov 2023 - 37min - 967 - Inside the Democratic Party’s Rift Over Israel and Gaza
Andrew Marantz discusses the divided political response to Hamas’s terror attack and Israel’s counter-offensive.
Wed, 08 Nov 2023 - 33min - 966 - Sybrina Fulton: “Trayvon Martin Could Have Been Anybody’s Son”
The mother whose teen-age boy’s death inspired a movement a little more than a decade ago continues to grieve his loss, and to demand accountability.
Mon, 06 Nov 2023 - 13min - 965 - Clarence Thomas’s R.V. Loan and Supreme Court Scrutiny
The High Court’s system of self-policing is in question as revelations about Clarence Thomas’s gifts lead the Senate to escalate its investigation into Supreme Court ethics.
Sat, 04 Nov 2023 - 33min - 964 - Tim Scott, and the Republican Party’s Vexed Relationship with Race
Robert Samuels discusses his recent reporting on the South Carolina senator and Presidential candidate.
Wed, 01 Nov 2023 - 39min - 963 - Is there a Path Forward for Israel and Gaza?
David Remnick hears from two sources about how Israelis and Palestinians feel about the October 7th attacks, and what the future may hold for the region.
Mon, 30 Oct 2023 - 49min - 962 - Mike Johnson and the Power of the Big Lie
In court, Donald Trump’s former associates renounce the fallacy of a stolen 2020 election in order to avoid prison time. But in Congress, standing by “the Big Lie” can make you Speaker.
Sat, 28 Oct 2023 - 31min - 961 - Why Jim Jordan Is Still “the Man for the Moment”
Despite his failed bid for Speaker, the Ohio representative is the face of a Republican Party that is more interested in launching investigations than it is in passing laws
Wed, 25 Oct 2023 - 28min - 960 - Spike Lee on His “Dream Project”
The iconic filmmaker tells David Remnick how he got his start, how to direct Denzel Washington, and when he wants to retire.
Mon, 23 Oct 2023 - 24min - 959 - Joe Biden’s Bear-Hug Diplomacy in Israel
This week, President Biden made a diplomatic visit to Tel Aviv, and sought aid from Congress for both Israel and Ukraine.
Fri, 20 Oct 2023 - 32min - 958 - What Is Hamas’s Strategy?
The New Yorker reporters David Kirkpatrick and Adam Rasgon, who recently spoke with a political leader of Hamas, discuss the group's decision-making and evolution.
Wed, 18 Oct 2023 - 32min - 957 - Rodrigo Duterte’s Deadly Promise
When an outrageous yet charismatic candidate for president promises to kill suspected criminals, reporter Patricia Evangelista says, we should listen: it may not be just a talking point.
Mon, 16 Oct 2023 - 22min - 956 - “It’s Just an Impossible Situation”: Tragedy in Israel and Gaza
Reporting from Tel Aviv, Ruth Margalit discusses Hamas’s massacre of Israeli civilians and Netanyahu’s siege of Gaza.
Wed, 11 Oct 2023 - 30min - 955 - Al Gore on the Solution to the Climate Crisis
The former Vice-President and self-described “recovering politician” explains the stakes and the necessary response to our ongoing environmental emergency.
Mon, 09 Oct 2023 - 20min - 954 - Inside Matt Gaetz’s Congressional Coup
This week, Kevin McCarthy lost his Speakership in an ouster led by the Florida congressman. How did Gaetz become, briefly, one of the most powerful people in Washington?
Sat, 07 Oct 2023 - 34min - 953 - Should Biden Push for Regime Change in Russia?
The Russia scholar Stephen Kotkin says that Ukraine must exchange Russia-held territory for security guarantees. But the U.S. must also threaten Putin’s hold on power.
Mon, 02 Oct 2023 - 22min - 952 - Remembering Dianne Feinstein, and Biden Clashes With The Hard Right
The Senate has lost its longest-serving female member; plus, President Joe Biden warns that MAGA Republicans threaten American democracy.
Fri, 29 Sep 2023 - 39min - 951 - Inside a Trump 2024 Rally in Iowa
Following a trip to Dubuque, Benjamin Wallace-Wells considers why the former President has maintained such a significant lead in the race for the Republican Party’s nomination.
Wed, 27 Sep 2023 - 32min - 950 - Which War Does Washington Want?
As President Volodymyr Zelensky lobbied Congress for more war-related aid, House Republicans continued to fight their own battle over government spending.
Fri, 22 Sep 2023 - 38min - 949 - How New York, a City of Immigrants, Became Home to a Migrant Crisis
Eric Lach discusses why Eric Adams—who once personally welcomed buses of asylum seekers at Port Authority—is now saying that migrants are going to “destroy New York City.”
Wed, 20 Sep 2023 - 37min - 948 - Jennifer Egan Discusses a Solution for Chronic Homelessness
Egan spent a year chronicling a new supportive-housing building in New York. This kind of facility works to end homelessness. What would be needed to scale it up nationwide?
Mon, 18 Sep 2023 - 18min - 947 - A Week of Chaos in Kevin McCarthy’s Washington
This week in Congress: a Biden impeachment inquiry, a frozen House of Representatives, and a looming government shutdown.
Sat, 16 Sep 2023 - 34min - 946 - A Master Class with David Grann
The author of “Killers of the Flower Moon” and “The Wager” on his writing and reporting process, and adapting his work to the screen.
Mon, 11 Sep 2023 - 33min - 945 - Mark Meadows and the “Congeniality of Evil”
Trump’s former chief of staff wants the Georgia racketeering case against him moved to federal court. What’s his strategy, and what does it portend for Trump?
Sat, 09 Sep 2023 - 34min - 944 - From “Amicus”: The Environmental Legacy of William O. Douglas
A special episode from Slate’s Supreme-Court podcast, about a controversial Justice who was also a champion for the environment.
Fri, 08 Sep 2023 - 54min - 943 - Washington’s Age-Old Problem
Susan B. Glasser discusses the baby-boomer generation’s hold on American politics, and the role that age may play in the 2024 election.
Wed, 06 Sep 2023 - 35min - 942 - Bob Woodward Discusses His Trump Tapes
The legendary journalist has chronicled the White House going back to Nixon. He knows how to interview Presidents. But, with Donald Trump, Woodward got more than he bargained for.
Mon, 04 Sep 2023 - 23min - 941 - Does Diplomacy Have a Chance of Ending War in Ukraine?Wed, 30 Aug 2023 - 33min
- 940 - How Does Extreme Heat Affect the Body?
During the hottest summer in history, The New Yorker’s Dhruv Khullar undergoes testing in a specialized chamber where researchers monitor the effects of heat on the body.
Mon, 28 Aug 2023 - 15min - 939 - At a Trumpless G.O.P. Debate, Trumpism Dominates
As Republican Presidential hopefuls took the stage for the first debate of the primary, Donald Trump’s mug shot reclaimed the news cycle.
Fri, 25 Aug 2023 - 37min - 938 - Ronan Farrow on the Rule of Elon Musk
How the tech billionaire built a one-man monopoly over American infrastructure and became too powerful for the U.S. government to rein in.
Wed, 23 Aug 2023 - 32min - 937 - Talking to Conservatives About Climate Change: The Congressional Climate Caucus
Mariannette Miller-Meeks, an Iowa Republican, feels that the G.O.P. hasn’t engaged enough with this critical issue. But she won’t vote for Democratic bills that “take away choice.”
Mon, 21 Aug 2023 - 12min - 909 - Will the Summer of Trump Indictments Shake Up the Election?
The Washington Roundtable: It has been a summer of history-making indictments against Donald Trump. This week, he received his fourth—this one from Georgia, where the former President and eighteen co-defendants are accused of conducting a “criminal enterprise” to reverse his 2020 defeat in the battleground state. Despite all of Trump’s legal troubles, he remains the overwhelming front-runner for the Republican Presidential nomination in 2024, and a rematch with Joseph Biden appears imminent. Yet history cautions that, with fifteen months to go before Election Day, all kinds of factors could derail his campaign. How damaging are these criminal charges in Georgia? Can anything actually shake up the race? The New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos weigh in.
Fri, 18 Aug 2023 - 31min - 908 - Will the End of Affirmative Action Lead to the End of Legacy Admissions?
The practice of legacy admissions—preferential consideration of the children of alumni—has emerged as a national flash point since the Supreme Court banned affirmative action in June. Even some prominent Republicans are joining the Biden Administration in calling for its end. David Remnick speaks with the U.S. Education Secretary, Miguel Cardona, about the politics behind college admissions. Cardona sees legacy preference as part of a pattern that discourages many students from applying to selective schools, but notes that it is not the whole problem. How can access to higher education, he asks, be more equitable when the quality of K-12 education is so inequitable? Plus, Jeannie Suk Gersen, a professor at Harvard Law School, looks at the problems facing admissions officers now that race cannot be a consideration in maintaining diversity. Gersen has been reporting for The New Yorker on the legal fight over affirmative action and the movement to end legacy admissions. She speaks with the dean of admissions at Wesleyan University, one of the schools that voluntarily announced an end to legacy preference after the Supreme Court’s decision on affirmative action. “So far, the responses have been overwhelmingly positive,” Amin Abdul-Malik Gonzalez tells her. “But we’re obviously some time removed from the results of the decision. . . . I think it’s both symbolic and potentially substantive in terms of signalling our value to not have individually unearned benefits.”
Mon, 14 Aug 2023 - 29min - 907 - The One-Per-centers Pushing Democrats to the Left
Andrew Marantz, in the August 14th, 2023, issue of The New Yorker, wrote about Leah Hunt-Hendrix, a major donor to progressive causes whose grandfather was a politically conservative oil tycoon. Hunt-Hendrix’s use of her money and influence to support progressive social movements is remarkable in that the goals of these projects run counter to her class interests, and even aim to put her family’s company out of business: raising taxes on the rich, pushing for more corporate regulation, and passing a Green New Deal. She funds grassroots organizations, and also co-founded the political organization Way to Win, which works to elect candidates on the left. In this episode of the Political Scene, Marantz, a guest host, invites the writer Anand Giridharadas to discuss the unexpected nexus between big money and movement politics. Giridharadas is the author of four books, including, most recently, “Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World” and “The Persuaders: Winning Hearts and Minds in a Divided Age.”
Wed, 09 Aug 2023 - 38min - 906 - Emily Nussbaum on Country Music’s Culture Wars
The New Yorker Radio Hour: Last month, the country singer Jason Aldean released a music video for “Try That in a Small Town,” a song that initially received little attention. But the video cast the song’s lyrics in a new light. While Aldean sings, “Try that in a small town / See how far ya make it down the road / ’Round here, we take care of our own,” images of protests against police brutality are interspersed with Aldean singing outside a county courthouse where a lynching once took place. Aldean’s defenders—and there are many—say the song praises small-town values and respect for the law, rather than promoting violence and vigilantism. The controversy eventually pushed the song to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The staff writer Emily Nussbaum has been reporting from Nashville throughout the past few months on the very complicated politics of country music. On the one hand, she found a self-perpetuating culture war, fuelled by outrage; on the other, there’s a music scene that’s diversifying, with increasing numbers of women, Black artists, and L.G.B.T.Q. performers claiming country music as their own. “I set out to talk about music, but politics are inseparable from it,” Nussbaum tells David Remnick. “The narrowing of commercial country music to a form of pop country dominated by white guys singing a certain kind of cliché-ridden bro country song—it’s not like I don’t like every song like that, but the absolute domination of that keeps out all sorts of other musicians.” Nussbaum also speaks with Adeem the Artist, a nonbinary country singer and songwriter based in East Tennessee, who has found success with audiences but has not broken through on mainstream country radio. “I think that it’s important that people walk into a music experience where they expect to feel comforted in their bigotry and they are instead challenged on it and made to imagine a world where different people exist,” Adeem says. “But, as a general rule, I try really hard to connect with people even if I’m making them uncomfortable.”
Mon, 07 Aug 2023 - 35min - 905 - “This is The Big One”: The Third Trump Indictment
The Washington Roundtable: This week, in a federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., former President Donald Trump pleaded not guilty to four charges in relation to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his role in the January 6th insurrection. Those include counts of conspiracy to defraud the United States, to obstruct an official proceeding, and to oppress citizens’ rights to vote. This third Trump criminal indictment is the most serious and far-reaching yet, going to the heart of the former President’s efforts to undermine American democracy. The trial, which will coincide with the height of campaign season, could create a number of “constitutional sci-fi” scenarios. Hosted by the New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos.
Sat, 05 Aug 2023 - 41min - 904 - How the Wagner Group Became Too Powerful for Putin to Punish
On June 23, 2023, tanks rolled into Moscow and into the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, and troops surrounded military and government buildings. They were fighters from the Wagner Group, a private battalion. The group’s leader is Yevgeny Prigozhin, who sold hot dogs and ran a restaurant on a boat where Putin liked to dine before he became the head of this mercenary outfit. On that June day, he was initiating the strongest challenge to the Kremlin since the fall of the Soviet Union. Joshua Yaffa has written an extraordinary piece about the Wagner Group’s global reach, its brutal battlefield tactics in Ukraine, and its mysterious decision to mutiny. He joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss it, and to examine how Prigozhin became such a strange and significant player within Russia’s military apparatus.
Wed, 02 Aug 2023 - 37min - 903 - How to Buy Forgiveness from Medical Debt
Nearly one in ten Americans owe significant medical debt, a burden that can become crippling as living costs and interest rates rise. Over the past decade, a nonprofit called RIP Medical Debt has designed a novel approach to chip away at this problem. The organization solicits donations to purchase portfolios of medical debt on the debt market, where the debt trades at steeply discounted prices. Then, instead of attempting to collect on it as a normal buyer would, they forgive the debt. The staff writer Sheelah Kolhatkar reports on one North Carolina church that partnered with RIP Medical Debt as part of its charitable mission. Trinity Moravian Church collected around fifteen thousand dollars in contributions to acquire and forgive over four million dollars of debt in their community. “We have undertaken a number of projects in the past but there’s never been anything quite like this,” the Reverend John Jackman tells Kolhatkar. “For families that we know cannot deal with these things, we’re taking the weight off of them.” Kolhatkar also speaks with Allison Sesso, the C.E.O. of RIP Medical Debt, about the strange economics of debt that make this possible.
Mon, 31 Jul 2023 - 13min - 902 - Hunter Biden and the Mechanics of the “Scandal Industrial Complex”
The Washington Roundtable: This week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy moved one step closer to calling for Congress to begin impeachment proceedings against President Biden, on the grounds that Biden has used the “weaponization of government to benefit his family.” For years, Hunter Biden’s dealings with Ukrainian and Chinese companies have been the focus of Republicans’ efforts to undermine the President, although investigations in the House and Senate have found no evidence of wrongdoing by Biden in relation to his son’s business dealings. Also this week, the federal judge Maryellen Noreika, in Wilmington, Delaware, put the brakes on Hunter Biden’s plea deal for tax and gun-possession crimes. Hunter Biden is not the first family member of a President to cause political headaches; the brothers of Presidents Nixon, Carter, and Clinton preceded him. What should we make of the latest news about the President’s son? More broadly, how do Oval Office political scandals arise and take hold of the public’s imagination? Hosted by the New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos.
Fri, 28 Jul 2023 - 37min - 901 - The Historic Battles of “Hot Labor Summer”
This summer, the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild are on strike together for the first time in sixty-three years. At the same time, hotel workers across Southern California are organizing coordinated rolling work stoppages. The Teamsters just successfully negotiated substantial wage increases and averted a strike for workers at UPS. But now the United Auto Workers, whose contract is up in September, are threatening to strike. What is behind all of this labor unrest? Is it a lingering effect of the pandemic, or something larger? E. Tammy Kim, a contributing writer and a former lawyer, joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss the forces that led to what organizers are calling “hot labor summer,” and to imagine what may come after.
Thu, 27 Jul 2023 - 34min - 900 - Adapting Oppenheimer’s Life Story to Film, with Biographer Kai Bird
In making “Oppenheimer,” which opens in theatres this weekend, the director Christopher Nolan relied on a Pulitzer Prize-winning 2005 biography of the father of the atomic bomb, “American Prometheus,” by Kai Bird and the late Martin J. Sherwin. Bird is credited as a writer of Nolan’s movie, and he spoke with David Remnick about Oppenheimer’s life story—in particular, about the ambivalence that the scientist felt, and expressed publicly, about the use of the bomb, which led to a McCarthyist show trial that destroyed his career and reputation. “He’s very complicated and he’s highly intelligent, so he’s capable of understanding and holding in his head contradictory ideas,” Bird says. On the one hand, “He feared that if [the bomb] was not used, or the war ended without the use of this weapon, the next war was going to be fought by two nuclear-armed adversaries and it would be Armageddon.” On the other hand, after Hiroshima, Oppenheimer used his status as a celebrity scientist to educate the public about the dangers of nuclear warfare, a move that landed him in the crosshairs of federal officials. “What happened to him in 1954 sent a message to several generations of scientists, here in America but [also] abroad, that scientists should keep in their narrow lane. They shouldn’t become public intellectuals. And if they dared to do this, they could be tarred and feathered,” Bird notes. “The same thing that happened to Oppenheimer in a sense happened to Tony Fauci.”
Mon, 24 Jul 2023 - 19min - 899 - What Happens if Trump Is Elected While on Trial?
The Washington Roundtable: The midsummer Presidential campaign is full of surprises, including a deluge of upcoming legal battles for the G.O.P. front-runner, former President Donald Trump. Recent federal disclosures have painted a preliminary picture of the race to raise money taking place between Republican primary contenders. The campaign of Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, who was initially viewed as a powerful competitor to Donald Trump in the Republican primary, has spent much of its cash and been forced to lay off staff. Meanwhile, the centrist group No Labels hosted an event in New Hampshire this week co-headlined by Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, and former Utah Governor and Republican Presidential candidate Jon Huntsman, raising concerns among Democrats of a possible third-party “unity ticket” shaking up the race. Plus, Trump may face his third indictment—this time, for his role in attempting to overturn the 2020 election. In a separate case against Trump, regarding classified documents, a federal judge in Florida has set the trial date for next May, shortly before the Republican nominee for President will be named in Milwaukee. Hosted by the New Yorker staff writers Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos.
Sat, 22 Jul 2023 - 39min - 898 - The Family Heritage That Led to Hunter Biden
Many Americans have been fascinated by the story of Hunter Biden, who has allegedly leveraged his father’s prominence for his own financial gain. Hunter’s spiral into alcoholism and drug addiction has been chronicled by the press. Recently, federal prosecutors announced a deal in which Hunter would plead guilty to two tax charges and be sentenced to two years of probation, bringing a five-year-long investigation into his business dealings to an end. In July, 2019, The New Yorker published a groundbreaking investigation titled “The Untold History of the Biden Family.” Its author, Adam Entous, uncovered the rags-to-riches-to-rags story behind the President’s modest upbringing in Scranton. It’s a very different tale from the one that Joe Biden has shared with the public, replete with polo matches, war profiteering, addiction, and scandal. It’s a story that, until recently, even the President and his children may not have known in full. It provides crucial context for the Hunter Biden saga, and a deeper understanding of Joe Biden himself—and the people and events that have shaped the choices he’s made during his decades-long political career.
Wed, 19 Jul 2023 - 37min - 897 - A Mysterious Third Party Enters the 2024 Presidential Race
No Labels, which pitches itself as a centrist movement to appeal to disaffected voters, has secured a considerable amount of funding and is working behind the scenes to get on Presidential ballots across the country. The group has yet to announce a candidate, but “most likely we’ll have both a Republican and Democrat on the ticket,” Pat McCrory, the former governor of North Carolina and one of the leaders of No Labels, tells David Remnick. Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema are reportedly under consideration, but McCrory will not name names, nor offer any specifics on the group’s platform, including regarding critical issues such as abortion and gun rights. That opacity is by design, Sue Halpern, who has covered the group, says. “The one reason why I think they haven’t put forward a candidate is once they do that, then they are required to do all the things that political parties do,” she says. “At the moment, they’re operating like a PAC, essentially. They don’t have to say who their donors are.” Third-party campaigns have had significant consequences in American elections, and, with both Donald Trump and Joe Biden historically unpopular, a third-party candidate could peel a decisive number of moderate voters away from the Democratic Party.
Mon, 17 Jul 2023 - 18min - 896 - Will Record Temperatures Finally Force Political Change?
On Tuesday, July 4th, it was the hottest day ever recorded on Earth. That is just one of many heat-related records that have been broken this summer. Historically high temperatures have been recorded around the planet, causing fires, floods, and other extreme weather events. In a recent article for The New Yorker, Bill McKibben explained that, even as we enter a terrifying new era for our planet, there is still a brief window in which it's possible to avoid the worst effects of climate change. Major technological strides in recent years have made green energy the cheapest form of power available. The question is how quickly this new infrastructure can be implemented. McKibben joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss what’s needed to make the necessary changes in time: an organized climate movement to break the fossil fuel industry’s grip on political power. “There's a very hopeful case for the world that we could be building,” McKibben says. “It's just we have to build it fast.”
Wed, 12 Jul 2023 - 32min
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