President Donald Trump is about halfway through his first 100 days in office. In this episode of The Opinions, Patrick Healy talks with the columnist Michelle Goldberg and contributor Frank Bruni about the moments that have defined Trump’s second term so far and what his first 50 days portend for the rest of Trump’s second term. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Opinions” at nytimes.com/column/the-opinions . This epis...
Mar 12, 2025•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast Time is running out for transgender service members in the U.S. military. The Trump administration has put in motion plans to identify and remove transgender troops, with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth saying they are unfit to serve. In this episode with the Opinion editor Sarah Wildman, Col. Bree Fram, one of the highest-ranking transgender members of the military, speaks about her journey and her uncertain future. Note: The views presented are Colonel Fram’s and do not reflect the official ...
Mar 10, 2025•21 min•Transcript available on Metacast The columnist David Brooks joins Patrick Healy to take stock of President Trump’s fifth address to Congress, to analyze the Democrats’ response, and to discuss where Americans who care about moral leadership should put their energies today. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Opinions” at nytimes.com/column/the-opinions . This episode of “The Opinions” was produced by Jillian Weinberger. Edited by Kaari Pitkin and Aliso...
Mar 06, 2025•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast As a fiscal conservative, the columnist David French would normally be excited about a Department of Government Efficiency and the opportunity to rein in spending. But Elon Musk’s approach to cost cutting has left much to be desired. In this conversation with the Manhattan Institute's Jessica Riedl, French reckons with what Musk and his department have wrought on the government, and argues that DOGE will do little to ameliorate the proposed tax cuts in the budget resolution recently passed by th...
Mar 05, 2025•17 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Trump’s outsize performance of masculinity has won him attention, elections and the support of manosphere influencers like Andrew Tate and Joe Rogan. In this episode of “The Opinions,” the deputy editor of Times Opinion, Patrick Healy, speaks with its columnist Tressie McMillan Cottom about what Trump’s focus on gender means for women, minorities and American politics. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com. You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Opin...
Mar 03, 2025•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast When Hillary Frank took her middle-school-age daughter to see “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.,” she was surprised to learn that the fictional Margaret had more sex education than her daughter. In this episode, Frank reflects on what she wishes she learned in health class as a teenager and how we might improve sex education in schools across the country. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com. You can find transcripts (posted within 24 hours) and more episodes of “The Opinions” at n...
Feb 27, 2025•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Trump has appointed Dan Bongino — a former U.S. Secret Service agent, right-wing podcaster and an outspoken critic of the F.B.I. — as the agency’s deputy director. In this episode, the Opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg examines what Bongino’s appointment means for the bureau and for the new order of American politics. Thoughts? Emails us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 26, 2025•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast Turning our back on Ukraine would only weaken America. The Trump administration may be considering negotiating a peace deal with Russia that would end the war in Ukraine. “No American president in the last 80 years and probably 100 years before that would have made this bargain,” Kori Schake, the director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, tells the Opinion columnist David French. Thoughts? Questions? Get in touch at theopinions@nytimes.com....
Feb 24, 2025•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Trump appears ready to cut a deal that could end Russia’s war in Ukraine without ever consulting Ukraine. In this episode, the deputy Opinion editor Patrick Healy talks to the Opinion columnist Thomas L. Friedman about Trump’s unpredictable approach to foreign policy. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 20, 2025•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode, the Opinion editor Aaron Retica and the columnist Jamelle Bouie discuss how President Trump, Elon Musk and their supporters are trying to sidestep Congress and reshape executive power. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 19, 2025•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast Kirk Wallace Johnson served with U.S.A.I.D. in Baghdad and Fallujah. When he returned to the United States, he spent much of his career helping thousands of Iraqis and Afghans, many of whom risked their lives working with American troops, gain refugee status in the United States through the List Project . As President Trump closes the door on the American refugee program, Johnson and the Times columnist Lydia Polgreen grapple with how to live now, through Trump’s second term, in the face of a mu...
Feb 17, 2025•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast It’s Valentine’s Day, and if you celebrate, the chances of giving or receiving a bouquet of flowers is high. But have you considered the environmental impact of those flowers? In this audio essay, the contributing Opinion writer Margaret Renkl explains the true cost of bouquets and argues for other, less environmentally harmful ways to express your love. This episode originally aired February 14, 2024.
Feb 14, 2025•8 min•Transcript available on Metacast The deputy editor of Opinion, Patrick Healy, speaks with the columnist M. Gessen about why so many people and institutions, including Democrats, have bent the knee to Trump, despite strongly disagreeing with him. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 13, 2025•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast In June 2020, Manuel Bayo Gisbert, a visual anthropologist and artist, was abducted by members of a drug cartel outside of Mexico City. He was beaten, tortured and ultimately released, making him one of the few survivors of kidnappings in Mexico. A crisis of violence and disappearances has plagued the country for decades. In this episode, hear Gisbert tell his own story and how it led him to collect the memories of those who are still missing. Read Gisbert’s essay and see his photos of the survi...
Feb 12, 2025•12 min•Transcript available on Metacast The biggest challenge to President Trump’s executive orders may be the American judicial system. In this episode, the Times Opinion columnist David French is joined by the federal judge Jeffrey S. Sutton to talk about the principles that guide the courts and how the calls made in those rooms could decide the future of American democracy in the next four years. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 10, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The New York Times Opinion writer Binyamin Appelbaum has been writing and thinking about President Trump’s economic policy since his first term in office. In this episode, he joins the deputy Opinion editor Patrick Healy to talk tariffs, economic expansion and Trump’s recklessness. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Feb 06, 2025•20 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode, the actor Hank Azaria, known in part for his numerous roles on “The Simpsons,” confronts how A.I. is already shaking up the vocal acting world. As he explains the human touches that shape his characters, he also offers hope for a future in which there is still a need for performers like himself. Is it inevitable that artificial intelligence will soon put him and his fellow creatives out of a job? Read Hank Azaria’s essay and watch him perform his most famous “Simpsons” character...
Feb 04, 2025•13 min•Transcript available on Metacast On his first day back in office, President Trump signed an executive order to end unconditional birthright citizenship. Lawsuits immediately began pouring in, and a federal judge blocked the order for now. But as the columnist Carlos Lozada and the editor Aaron Retica point out in this discussion, the true impact of the order might not be in changing the law — at least right away — but in challenging the very idea of what it means to be American. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com....
Feb 03, 2025•21 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Trump’s pick for F.B.I. director, Kash Patel, is no stranger to controversy. And despite a vigorous Senate hearing on Thursday, he appears to be coasting toward confirmation. The New York Times politics correspondent Michelle Cottle spoke to the journalist and author Garrett Graff on what Patel’s F.B.I. appointment could mean for America, and of all of Trump’s nominees, why Patel is among the most dangerous. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 31, 2025•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast Maureen Dowd got her start in journalism during the Nixon era. Over her decades in Washington, she’s developed a keen understanding of how presidents wield power to further their goals. In this episode of “The Opinions,” she joins the deputy Opinion editor, Patrick Healy, to examine the breathtaking speed with which President Trump is carrying out his agenda. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 30, 2025•20 min•Transcript available on Metacast What can the 1890s tell us about 21st-century problems and a second Trump administration? According to the Opinion columnist Jamelle Bouie, quite a lot. In this episode, he speaks with Aaron Retica, an editor in Opinion, about what the 19th century and Donald Trump’s surprising new favorite president can tell us about our shifting culture. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 28, 2025•20 min•Transcript available on Metacast In 1993, Polly Klaas was kidnapped and murdered at the age of 12. Following her death, Polly’s tragic story became a plotline in true crime podcasts, TV shows and books. In this audio essay, Polly’s sister Annie Nichol argues that the popularization of true crime not only re-traumatized victims’ families but also helped create demand for “tough on crime” legislation. “Our legal system actually became more reactionary and more fixated on punishment and fundamentally less just,” she says. Thoughts...
Jan 27, 2025•8 min•Transcript available on Metacast President Trump has declared that his second term will begin with the “most extraordinary first 100 days of any presidency in American history.” To track, interrogate and challenge his most consequential actions during his first few months in office, Times Opinion’s deputy editor, Patrick Healy, is beginning a weekly series on “The Opinions” focused on Trump’s first 100 days. He kicks things off with the Times writer David Wallace-Wells, exploring the president’s executive orders on climate and ...
Jan 23, 2025•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast Opinion's deputy editor, Patrick Healy, was joined by the columnists David French and Michelle Goldberg to makes sense of President Trump’s first day in office. We're learning “how much the American experiment has depended on the honor system,” French says.
Jan 21, 2025•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Times columnist Thomas Friedman says this is a rare moment in the Middle East when “everything is in play and everything is possible." In this episode of The Opinions, he speaks to editor Dan Wakin about the forces brewing in the Middle East, what he expects of the relationship between Netanyahu and Trump and the one gig he would give up his column to try to do. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 21, 2025•14 min•Transcript available on Metacast Donald Trump has promised to severely curtail legal and illegal immigration as he takes office for the second time. In this episode of “The Opinions,” the writer Binyamin Appelbaum argues that while the United States needs to improve its immigration enforcement, the country also desperately needs immigrants for cultural and economic vibrancy. Immigrants, Appelbaum explains, are the country’s “rocket fuel,” and he argues for specific legal changes to ensure the United States’ immigration policy m...
Jan 20, 2025•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Maine has one of the highest rates of opioid use disorder in the nation. But a program at a rural Maine jail initiated by an addiction medicine specialist, Alane O’Connor, is offering hope and saving lives. She’s spearheading a pilot program that offers a monthly injection of the drug Sublocade to addicted inmates, which curbs opioid cravings continuously for a month. In this episode, she argues, “jails are an incredible opportunity to help people enter recovery.” Thoughts? Email us at theopinio...
Jan 16, 2025•14 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Los Angeles wildfires offer a stark reminder that we no longer live in an era of reliable home insurance. An exodus of insurance companies from disaster-prone areas has put the American dream of homeownership in peril. In this episode, the climate reporter Nick Mott makes the case for a national climate catastrophe insurance plan that could help protect families from the devastating losses being experienced in California. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 15, 2025•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast Argentina’s head of state, Javier Milei, is the latest inspiration for Donald Trump and his supporters, including Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. As Trump prepares to return to the White House, the Times Opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg explains what his admiration for Milei and his austerity policies might mean for Trump’s new administration. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 14, 2025•9 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Supreme Court seems ready to uphold the law that would ban TikTok unless the app’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, sells it to a U.S. buyer. The Opinion columnist David French talks with the politics editor Katherine Miller about why he believes the app poses a unique threat to U.S. security. Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.
Jan 13, 2025•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
