The killing of two US citizens by federal agents in Minneapolis has made January a dark month for many across America. Both Alex Pretti and Renee Good were quickly labeled “domestic terrorists" by the Trump administration, which accused them of endangering the lives of law enforcement. Video evidence soon appeared to contradict government claims, but it’s still a label that filmmaker Laura Poitras says she finds chilling. Poitras has been producing and directing documentaries for more than 20 ye...
Jan 30, 2026•46 min
Rutger Bregman knows what appearing at Davos can do for your profile. His reputation was made when he went there in 2019 and attacked the rich. The clip went viral. A historian and author originally from the Netherlands, Bregman has been focused on elites ever since, most recently in his book Moral Ambition , and in a series of lectures on the BBC, after which he accused the organization of censoring his views on Donald Trump. In this conversation with Mishal Husain, we hear more about his world...
Jan 23, 2026•38 min
What is Donald Trump’s plan for Venezuela? Does he have one? Will he go beyond threats in supporting the uprising in Iran or invading Greenland? Jeanne Shaheen has been in the US Senate since 2009 and is now the most senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee. Her position has given her access to information most lawmakers don’t have. She’s also known as someone prepared to work with Republicans. Indeed, she was one of the eight Democrats who joined the GOP to end last year’s government ...
Jan 16, 2026•33 min
US President Donald Trump’s tough talk about China and tariffs can be traced back in large part to economist Peter Navarro. A well-known China hawk, he has written books arguing Beijing poses a threat to the US economy and its national security. Navarro is a loyalist who has served as a key trade adviser in both Trump administrations. In between, he spent four months behind bars for refusing to comply with a Congressional subpoena tied to the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. It is Navarro ...
Jan 09, 2026•35 min
Kara Swisher has followed the story of Silicon Valley for three decades, having started work as a tech journalist at a time when few people were interested in the beat. But through relationships she built with the likes of Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and many others, she became a formidable voice, and eventually more of a commentator and critic. Swisher now hosts the podcasts Pivot and On with Kara Swisher . Following a year in which Silicon Valley titans lined up behind Donald Trump...
Jan 02, 2026•37 min
As the year draws to a close, we are bringing you one of Mishal Husain’s biggest conversations of the year, in full. In May 2025, Elon Musk joined Bloomberg's Qatar Economic Forum, in a rare media appearance. He remains as consequential a global figure today, as he was then, even if he is no longer working with Donald Trump. Within 10 days of this conversation, he had left DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, and soon after that he was publicly trading insults with the president. Musk ...
Dec 26, 2025•44 min
Lynsey Addario’s life work means taking great risks to tell other people’s stories. She is a Pulitzer Prize winning war photographer who has been abducted twice while documenting conflicts from Afghanistan to Ukraine and Sudan. There aren’t many women in her field. In a new National Geographic documentary called “Love+War,” currently streaming on Disney+, she lets us into that world, one she’s made her profession for three decades. Addario shows how she adjusts from a work environment of grave d...
Dec 19, 2025•44 min
Mustafa Suleyman co-founded AI lab DeepMind when he was just 26 years old. Four years later, it was acquired by Google for a reported $400 million. He is now head of Microsoft’s AI unit, where he just unveiled a new superintelligence team tasked with creating an AI that can outperform humans at all tasks. In this conversation with Mishal Husain, Suleyman talks about the decisions society has to make about AI, the white-hot war over tech talent and the competition with other tech bros. 00:00 - In...
Dec 12, 2025•45 min
Salman Rushdie was nearly killed when he was stabbed 15 times on stage in upstate New York in 2022. His injuries were so severe that he lost an eye. It was an attack that came decades after he was first subjected to death threats over his novel, The Satanic Verses . Once he had recovered, he found he was unable to write fiction. However, after publishing an account of what happened to him, the stories returned, with five brought together in his latest book, The Eleventh Hour. In this conversatio...
Dec 05, 2025•43 min
Ken Burns has been telling stories about America for almost 50 years. The lauded documentary filmmaker has a new series on PBS, The American Revolution, which charts the period before and after 1776. It will air internationally ahead of the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence. Mishal Husain asked Burns to join the show to mark Thanksgiving, looking at today’s America through the lens of its past and the characters who made history. 02:15 - The complexity of the American Revol...
Nov 28, 2025•36 min
Stanford University Professor Fei-Fei Li has been at the forefront of artificial intelligence research for 25 years, which is why she’s been called the “godmother of AI.” In this conversation she tells Mishal Husain how she arrived in the US as a teenager after her parents decided to emigrate from China. She also talks about the high school teacher who inspired her and a deep love of physics, leading her to ask what she calls “audacious” questions. These days, amid her excitement about AI and it...
Nov 21, 2025•44 min
For almost 40 years, Richard Moore was a career spy in Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service. Only his closest friends and family knew what he did for a living. When he was appointed chief of the agency in 2020, that changed: The name of the person in the top role is the only one made public. In his first broadcast interview since leaving his post in September 2025, Moore talks to Mishal Husain about managing China, the psychology of Vladimir Putin and why spies shouldn’t expect recognition. 03:...
Nov 14, 2025•43 min
How do you tell the history of a whole country through its women? And what can it tell us about the world today? These are the questions Russian-American journalist Julia Ioffe set out to answer in her new book, Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy. Having reported from, and on, Russia for publications including The New Yorker and Foreign Policy for more than a decade, Ioffe says she has repeatedly been asked to explain the actions and motivations of one ...
Nov 07, 2025•40 min
Three weeks after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado finds herself supporting US intervention in her native country. Mishal speaks to Maria Corina on recent US boat strikes, Nicolas Maduro’s fate and the need for strength to secure peace. 03:24 - "I had to go into hiding" 03:51 - Impact of the Nobel Peace Prize 05:38 - US Military build up 10:21 - Prospect of US ground strikes 13:10 - Is Machado speaking to the Trump Administration? 16:00 - Pro...
Oct 31, 2025•37 min
After successfully pushing for Brexit, political disruptor Nigel Farage announced his retirement. Last year, he returned to frontline politics as the leader of Reform UK, an insurgent party that’s never held national power but is now polling ahead of Labour and the Conservatives. Mishal speaks with Farage about dismantling consensus politics, Britain’s future relationship with the European Union and what he thinks Donald Trump is getting right. 4:02 - “We’ve not had enough change” 7:10 - Working...
Oct 24, 2025•51 min
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney talks to Mishal Husain about trade battles, Vladimir Putin's miscalculations and what he's learned from Donald Trump. 3:41 - Mark Carney's parents and his path to power 4:58 - What does he miss about his old life? 6:34 - Did President Trump help him get elected? 14:05 - "I've learned lots of things from President Trump" 16:42 - Ukraine and NATO 22:18 - Putin's miscalculations 22:49 - Next steps on a Palestinian state 25:00 - The climate crisis, where is the ol...
Oct 16, 2025•38 min
Welcome to The Mishal Husain Show. In a world of confusion, let Mishal guide you through some of the most complex stories of our times, through questions, curiosity and decades of journalistic experience. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Oct 10, 2025•2 min
