Parts of the federal government are being dismantled. But although the decisions from President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are unusual—perhaps even unprecedented—are they constitutional? The Atlantic staff writers Jonathan Chait and Shane Harris break down the administration’s latest moves and who might really end up paying for them later. Read more from Chait and Harris about this story on The Atlantic here and here. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy u...
Feb 06, 2025•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Our attention is finite and valuable. And it’s nearing its breaking point. In a new book, MSNBC host Chris Hayes explains how everything—from politics to media to technology—has come to revolve around the pursuit of it and how we’ve lost control of where we actually want our attention to go. Read more about Hayes’ book The Sirens’ Call: How Attention Became the World’s Most Endangered Resource at The Atlantic here. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unli...
Jan 30, 2025•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast In a matter of hours after being sworn into office, President Donald Trump delivered on a promise in a way that even high-level Republicans didn’t see coming. Trump granted sweeping pardons for more than 1,500 January 6 defendants. In this episode of Radio Atlantic, Hanna encounters Oath Keeper leader Stewart Rhodes, who is walking free after a commutation from Trump, and she talks with the families of two men who were convicted of crimes for their actions on January 6, and are now newly freed. ...
Jan 23, 2025•19 min•Transcript available on Metacast As Donald Trump prepares to take office again, the country is still coming to terms with what happened on January 6, 2021. But perhaps the best way to move forward is to neither forgive nor forget the past—but obliterate it. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/podsub. Learn more...
Jan 16, 2025•35 min•Transcript available on Metacast The MAGA alliance that helped elect Donald Trump is starting to show signs of fracturing. It recently came to a head after an important argument broke out over H-1B visas between Silicon Valley and the nativist wing. We talk with Atlantic staff writer Ali Breland, who writes about the internet, technology, and politics, about the public infighting, and staff writer Rogé Karma takes us beyond the politics by discussing what the research shows about the relationship between immigrant labor and the...
Jan 09, 2025•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Hanna talks to the creators of an AI project called Future You. She also has a conversation with a future version of herself. But the person she meets is not who she expected. Share understanding this holiday season. For less than $2 a week, give a year-long Atlantic subscription to someone special. They’ll get unlimited access to Atlantic journalism, including magazine issues, narrated articles, puzzles, and more. Give today at TheAtlantic.com/podgift. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit me...
Jan 02, 2025•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast Why should a teenager bother to read a book, when there are so many other demands on their time? We hear from Atlantic staffers about the books they read in high school that have stuck with them. Books you read in high school are your oldest friends, made during a moment in life when so many versions of yourself seem possible, and overidentifying with an author or character is a safe way to try one out. Later in life, they are a place you return—to be embarrassed by your younger, more pretentiou...
Dec 26, 2024•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Recently, professors at elite colleges told Atlantic writer Rose Horowitch that their students don’t read whole books anymore. They blamed cell phones, standardized tests, and extracurriculars, and they mostly agreed that the shift began in high school. In this episode of Radio Atlantic, we make the case for reading books, one memory at a time. We talk to Horowitch, and we hear from several Atlantic writers about the books they read in high school that stuck with them, and how their views of the...
Dec 19, 2024•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast As Donald Trump returns to the White House, his desire to recast January 6 as a day of “love and peace,” as he called it during his campaign, seems as strong as ever. Earlier this week, he told the NBC reporter Kristen Welker that he would “most likely” pardon Capitol rioters on day one. This week’s Radio Atlantic shares the first episode of our series about January 6 published just before the 2024 election, called We Live Here Now. Hanna Rosin and co-host Lauren Ober enter a universe of alterna...
Dec 12, 2024•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Anti-vaccine sentiment is, more or less, as old as vaccines. When Cotton Mather promoted inoculations against smallpox in the 1720s, someone threw a firebomb through his window with a message attached: “Mather, you dog, Damn you, I’ll inoculate you with this.” Today's vaccines are as safe and effective as ever. So why, suddenly, is the anti-vax movement at the height of its power and influence? Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nominee to be the next secretary of the Department of Health and Human Serv...
Dec 05, 2024•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast We warned you last month to “Throw Out Your Black Plastic Spatula.” In a recent study conducted about consumer products, researchers concluded kitchen utensils had some of the highest levels of flame retardants, which you do not want anywhere near your hot food. After the article was published, its author received reports, possibly exaggerated, of people in Burlington, Vermont, throwing their black plastic spatulas out en masse. You should too. That article was just the appetizer. This episode o...
Nov 28, 2024•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast With all the noise around Donald Trump’s nominees, it’s easy to lose sight of his administration’s bigger plan: placing people who are unfailingly loyal to Trump in key positions, so that the real power lies with the White House. The Atlantic staff writer Tom Nichols explains why Trump’s picks to oversee the military and intelligence community could be two of the most consequential—and dangerous. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pul...
Nov 21, 2024•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast We hash out the “Democrats are too woke” theory with New York Rep. Ritchie Torres, who tweeted the day after the election: “The far left is a gift to Donald Trump.” Torres, who represents a district that is over 50 percent Latino, explains why he believes Democrats need to shift their position on immigration if they don’t want urban working class neighborhoods to keep shifting to the right. If you'd like to participate in our listener survey, visit TheAtlantic.com/survey. And get more from your ...
Nov 14, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In the last few months of his campaign, Trump was free and open with his dictatorial impulses, as he talked about punishing “enemies from within.” Now that he’s won, have we crossed the line into a different kind of country? Staff writers Anne Applebaum and McKay Coppins help us learn how to find the line. Does this resounding win mean the electorate gave Trump a mandate to act on all his impulses? Will he make good on his campaign threats? And how will we know? If you'd like to participate in o...
Nov 07, 2024•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast One thing tomorrow’s election will test is Americans’ appetite for chaos, particularly the kind that Donald Trump has been exhibiting in the last few months of his campaign. After weeks of running a disciplined campaign, Trump’s advisers lost control of their candidate, the Atlantic staff writer Tim Alberta reported this week. Trump grew restless and bored and drifted off script in his campaign appearances. During a summer interview with the National Association of Black Journalists, for example...
Nov 04, 2024•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast On the campaign trail, Donald Trump has mused, a few times, about throwing reporters in jail if they refuse to leak their sources and taking away broadcast licenses of networks he’s deemed unfriendly. These last couple of weeks, we’ve had clear signals that maybe his threats are having an impact when both The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times pulled their endorsements of Kamala Harris. We talk to Jeffrey Goldberg, editor in chief of The Atlantic, about navigating both pressures from owne...
Oct 31, 2024•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast The way Donald Trump talks about January 6 has evolved over time. Directly after the insurrection, he condemned the rioters, although he added that they were “very special.” For the next few years, he played around with different themes, implying the protests were peaceful or that the people jailed for their actions that day were “political prisoners.” But these descriptions are mild compared to the outrageous ways he’s been talking about January 6 in these weeks leading up to the election. Rece...
Oct 24, 2024•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Autocrats often dare their followers to believe absurd claims, as a kind of loyalty test, because “humor and fear can be quite close together sometimes,” says Peter Pomerantsev, a Soviet-born British journalist and co-host of Autocracy in America, an Atlantic podcast series. In this episode of Radio Atlantic, we talk to Pomerantsev and Atlantic staff writer and co-host Anne Applebaum about how to detect the signs of autocracy, because, as they say, if you can’t spot them, you won’t be able to ro...
Oct 17, 2024•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast North Carolina has voted for a Democratic president only once since the 1970s. But the party’s dream to flip the state never dies—and in fact, could be realized this year. Polls show the presidential race in North Carolina is dead even, and Democrats are making a massive effort to reach more rural voters. “Doug Emhoff should just get a pied-à-terre here, at this point,” says David Graham, an Atlantic political writer who lives in Durham, North Carolina. Donald Trump can’t win without the state. ...
Oct 10, 2024•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast The American family continuously evolves. People are marrying later, and having fewer children. Gay people get married. People can publicly swear off marriage altogether without being ostracized. But in politics the attachment to the traditionally nuclear family seems unwavering, and especially this year. As Republicans are losing support among women, more candidates are leaning on their wives and daughters to soften their image. So strong is the pressure that one candidate in Virginia posed wit...
Oct 03, 2024•35 min•Transcript available on Metacast One prevailing stereotype of a political assassin is someone with strong convictions. Another stereotype conjures up James Bond, a professional with a silencer acting on higher orders. But Thomas Matthew Crooks and Ryan Routh, the two men who attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump earlier this year, represent an evolution in the idea of this kind of attacker. Nothing in their backgrounds turned up consistent themes about their political beliefs. Neither left behind a manifesto or...
Sep 26, 2024•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast Rachel had a hit song. Then it became inextricably linked with a failed presidential campaign. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/podsub. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Sep 19, 2024•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast Kamala Harris expertly manipulated Trump. It won her the debate. Can it win her the White House? Staff writers Elaine Godfrey and Mark Leibovich to explore the potential long term effects of Tuesday's drama. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/podsub. Learn more about your ad ch...
Sep 12, 2024•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast After successive heat waves across the country this summer, people finally found an unexpected source of relief: the neck fan. Consumer-product geniuses made the latest model look like Beats headphones, and suddenly they were on many hot, hot necks. Why did the neck fan take off? Does it actually cool you down or just make you feel cooler? We talk with Saahil Desai, who notices new and interesting things at the intersection of technology and consumer culture. Desai brings his own beloved neck fa...
Sep 05, 2024•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Democrats are lately employing a strategy against Donald Trump that he has been using effectively against his opponents for years: mockery. Where did this strategy come from? Will it remain effective? And can it backfire? We talk with the Atlantic staff writer David Graham, who was at the Democratic convention and also covers Trump. And we talk with a surprising muse for the politics of mockery: Conservative lawyer and activist George Conway has been using targeted mockery against Trump for year...
Aug 29, 2024•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast The patients had tried everything. Except ketamine. This is the third and final part of Scripts, a new three-part miniseries from Radio Atlantic about the pills we take for our brains and the stories we tell ourselves about them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Aug 22, 2024•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast Cooper thought he understood how his psych meds were affecting him. There was a lot he didn’t know. This is part two of a new three-part miniseries from Radio Atlantic—Scripts—about the pills we take for our brains and the stories we tell ourselves about them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Aug 15, 2024•35 min•Transcript available on Metacast One medication could help end the opioid crisis. Why are so few people taking it? This episode is the first in a new three-part miniseries from Radio Atlantic—Scripts—about the pills we take for our brains and the stories we tell ourselves about them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Aug 08, 2024•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Liat Beinin Atzili was kidnapped on October 7 and spent more than 50 days in a Gazan home, We spoke with her in Washington, where she traveled to talk with President Joe Biden, about grief and about the war. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/podsub. Learn more about your ad ch...
Aug 01, 2024•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast After a 2018 Supreme Court decision kicked off a wave of legalization across America, sports gambling has become an integral part of how fans consume sports and how leagues make money. But with high-profile athletes caught up in betting scandals, a windfall welcomed by the sports industry also poses serious risks to it. Sports journalist and Atlantic contributor Jemele Hill joins guest host Adam Harris to discuss whether leagues can manage the mess of banning athletes who gamble, all while adver...
Jul 25, 2024•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast