The Daily
This is what the news should sound like. The biggest stories of our time, told by the best journalists in the world. Hosted by Michael Barbaro. Twenty minutes a day, five days a week, ready by 6 a.m.
This episode contains strong language.
The pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol on Wednesday made their plans in plain sight. They organized on social media platforms and spoke openly of their intentions to occupy the Capitol.
But leaders in Washington opted for a modest law enforcement presence. In the aftermath, those security preparations are attracting intense scrutiny.
Today, we explore how the events of Jan. 6 could have happened.
Guest: Sheera Frenkel, who covers cybersecurity for The New York Times; Zolan Kanno-Youngs, a homeland security correspondent for The Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Inside Trump supporters’ online echo chambers, the chaos of Jan. 6 could be seen coming.
- Failures by the police have spurred resignations and complaints of double standards.
- During the storming of the Capitol, social media sites were used by the mob to share information, including directions on which streets to take to avoid the police and which tools to bring to help pry open doors.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This episode contains strong language.
It was always going to be a tense day in Washington. In the baseless campaign to challenge Joe Biden’s victory, Wednesday had been framed by President Trump and his allies as the moment for a final stand.
But what unfolded was disturbing and previously unthinkable: A mob, urged on by the president, advanced on the Capitol building as Congress was certifying the election results and eventually breached its walls.
Today, the story of what happened from Times journalists who were inside the Capitol.
Guests: Nicholas Fandos, a national reporter for The New York Times; Jonathan Martin, a national political correspondent for The Times; and Emily Cochrane, a congressional reporter for The Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Journalists from The Times witnessed the violence and mayhem. Here’s how it unfolded.
- One of the most disturbing aspects of Wednesday’s events was that they could be seen coming. The president himself had all but circled the date.
- Here is an explanation of how the pro-Trump mob managed to storm the Capitol
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
The long fight for control of the U.S. Senate is drawing to a close in Georgia, and the Democrats appear set to win out — the Rev. Raphael Warnock is the projected winner of his race against Senator Kelly Loeffler, while Jon Ossoff is heavily favored to beat the other incumbent Republican, Senator David Perdue.
Today, we look at the results so far from these history-making Senate races and at what they mean for the future and fortunes of the two main parties.
Guest: Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot at The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- A Baptist preacher born and raised in Georgia, Raphael Warnock has defeated Kelly Loeffler to become his state’s first Black senator, breaking a barrier with distinct meaning in American politics.
- A surge in turnout from Georgia’s Black voters has powered the fortunes of Mr. Warnock and Jon Ossoff.
- You can follow the results here.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Since the presidential election was called for Joe Biden, President Trump has relentlessly attacked the integrity of the count in Georgia. He has floated conspiracy theories to explain away his loss and attacked Republican officials.
Today, we speak to Republican activists and voters on the ground and consider to what extent, if at all, Mr. Trump’s rhetoric could discourage Republicans from voting in the runoff elections.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue have sought to motivate a conservative base that remains loyal to Mr. Trump while also luring back some of the defectors who helped deliver Georgia to a Democratic presidential candidate for the first time since 1992.
- Democrats may have claimed a bigger share of the early vote than they did in November’s vote, election data shows. Here’s what else we know about the voting in Georgia so far.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
A strong Black turnout will be integral to Democratic success in the U.S. Senate races in Georgia this week.
In the first of a two-part examination of election strategies in the Georgia runoffs, we sit down with Stacey Abrams, a Georgia Democrat who has become synonymous with the party’s attempts to win statewide, to talk about her efforts to mobilize Black voters.
And we join LaTosha Brown, a leader of Black Voters Matter, as she heads out to speak to voters.
Guest: Audra D.S. Burch, a national correspondent for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Control of the Senate could hinge on Black voters in Georgia — and on an ambitious effort by the likes of Black Voters Matter to get them to the polls in the largest numbers ever for the runoff elections on Tuesday.
- Democrats are making their final push to rally supporters, targeting Black voters in regions far from Atlanta but equally important to Georgia’s emerging Democratic coalition.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This week, The Daily is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened in the time since they first ran.
When Alaska was hit by a devastating earthquake in 1964, it was the voice of Genie Chance — a journalist, wife and mother — that held the state together in the aftermath.
In the episode, we heard about sociologists from Ohio State University’s Disaster Research Center rushing to Anchorage to study residents’ behavior.
Today, Jon Mooallem, who brought us Genie’s story in May, speaks to a sociologist from the University of Delaware to make sense of the current moment and how it compares with the fallout of the Great Alaska Earthquake.
Guest: Jon Mooallem, writer at large for The New York Times Magazine and author of “This Is Chance!,” a book about the aftermath of the earthquake.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background Reading:
- For our Opinion section, Jon Mooallem wrote about the lessons of the 1964 earthquake.
- Listen to Jon talk about his experience writing and researching for his book about the aftermath of the disaster on an episode of The Times’s Book Review podcast.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This week, The Daily is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened in the time since they first ran.
Scott Watson — a Black police officer in his hometown, Flint, Mich. — has worked to become a pillar of the community. And he always believed his identity put him in a unique position to discharge his duties.
After watching the video of the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody in May, his job became a source of self-consciousness instead of pride.
Today, we call up Scott once again and ask how he’s been doing and how things have been in his police department.
Guest: Scott Watson, a police officer in Flint, Mich.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Lynsea Garrison wrote about interviewing Scott in an edition of The Daily newsletter.
- Many Black and Hispanic officers in New York City have found themselves caught between competing loyalties in the wake of the killing of George Floyd.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This week, The Daily is revisiting some of our favorite episodes from this year and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran.
In our society, the public part of mourning is ritualized by a coming together. What do we do now that the opportunity for collective mourning has been taken away?
Earlier this year, we heard the story of Wayne Irwin. A retired minister of the United Church of Canada who lost his wife, Flora May, during the coronavirus pandemic.
He never once considered delaying her memorial, opting to celebrate her life over the internet — a new ritual that, as it turned out, felt more authentic and real.
Today, we check back in with Wayne to find out how he’s been doing in the months since his wife’s passing.
Guest: Catherine Porter, Toronto bureau chief for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- The rituals of our lives have been transformed. An expert on gathering shares advice for birthdays and baby showers in our audio series “Together Apart.”
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This week, The Daily is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened in the time since they first ran.
When Jack Nicas, a technology reporter for The Times, first moved to California five years ago, he set about finding a local bar of choice. Unpretentious, cheap and relaxed, the Hatch fit the bill.
Over six months during the coronavirus pandemic, he charted the fortunes of the bar and its staff members as the lockdown threatened to upend the success of the small business.
Today, Jack checks in with the bar’s owner — Louwenda Kachingwe, known to everyone as Pancho — to see what has happened since we last heard from him in the fall.
Guest: Jack Nicas, a technology reporter for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Here’s the full article about the Oakland tavern and its staff members as they try to weather the fallout from the pandemic.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
The escapism of movies took on a new importance during pandemic isolation. Caity Weaver, the author of this week’s Sunday Read, says that to properly embrace this year’s cinematic achievements, the Academy Awards should not only hand out accolades to new releases, but also to the older films that sustained us through this period.
If they did, Caity argues, Cher would be on course to win a second Oscar for her performance as Loretta Castorini in 1987’s “Moonstruck” — a film that, under lockdown, was a salve to many.
On today’s episode, a conversation with Cher about the film’s production, cast and legacy.
This story was written by Caity Weaver and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
This episode contains strong language.
This week, The Daily is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened in the time since they first ran.
When New York City was the epicenter of the coronavirus crisis in the U.S., Sheri Fink, a public health correspondent for The Times, was embedded at the Brooklyn Hospital Center.
In April, she brought us the story of a single day in its intensive care unit, where a majority of patients were sick with the virus.
Today, we check back in with one of the doctors we heard from on the episode, the unflappable Dr. Josh Rosenberg.
Guest: Sheri Fink, a correspondent covering public health for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- “Covid will not win” — here are some portraits and interviews with the staff members powering the Brooklyn Hospital Center.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
A few weeks ago, we put a callout on The Daily, asking people to send in their good news from a particularly bleak year.
The response was overwhelming. Audio messages poured into our inboxes from around the world, with multiple emails arriving every minute. There was a man who said that he had met Oprah and realized he was an alcoholic, a woman who shared that she had finally found time to finish a scarf after five years and another man who said he had finished his thesis on representations of horsemanship in American cinema. Eventually, we decided to construct the entire show out of these messages.
This episode is the result — a Daily holiday card of good news, from our team to you.
It is a very human thing, at the end of a year, to stop and take stock. Part of that involves acknowledging that some remarkable people who were here in 2020 will be not joining us in 2021.
Today, we take a moment to honor the lives of four of those people. And in marveling at the extraordinary and sometimes vividly ordinary facets of their time among us, we hold a mirror up to the complexities of our own lives.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
The radio host Delilah has been on the air for more than 40 years. She takes calls from listeners across the United States, as they open up about their heavy hearts, their hopes and the important people in their lives.
She tells callers that they’re loved, and then she plays them a song. “A love song needs a lyric that tells a story,” she says. “And touches your heart, either makes you laugh, or makes you cry or makes you swoon.”
On today’s episode, producers Andy Mills and Bianca Giaever do what millions before them have done: They call Delilah.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
“If death practices reveal a culture’s values,” writes Maggie Jones, the author of today’s Sunday Read, “we choose convenience, outsourcing, an aversion to knowing or seeing too much.”
Enter home-funeral guides, practitioners who believe families can benefit from tending to — and spending time with — the bodies of the deceased.
On today’s Sunday Read, listen to Ms. Jones’s story about the home-funeral movement and the changing nature of America’s funeral practices.
This story was written by Maggie Jones and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
For years there has been an evictions crisis in the United States. The pandemic has made it more acute.
On today’s episode, our conversations with single mother of two from Georgia over several months during the pandemic. After she lost her job in March, the bottom fell out of her finances and eviction papers started coming. The federal safety net only stretched so far.
And we ask, with Congress seeking to pass another stimulus bill, what do the next few months hold for renters in the United States?
Guest: Matthew Desmond, a Professor of Sociology at Princeton University and contributing writer for The Times Magazine.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Emergency pandemic funding to help renters must be distributed by Dec. 30. But getting the money to those who need it is no small task.
- Residents of weekly rentals worry they will be kicked out if they can’t pay the rent. It’s unclear if the federal moratorium on evictions applies to them.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This episode contains strong language.
When the photo-sharing app Instagram started to grow in popularity in the 2010s, the chief executive of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, had two options: build something comparable or buy it out. He opted for the latter.
The subsequent $1 billion deal is central to a case being brought against Facebook by the federal government and 48 attorneys general. They want to see the social network broken up.
Will they succeed? On today’s episode, we look at one of the biggest cases to hit Silicon Valley in decades.
Guest: Mike Isaac, a technology correspondent for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Regulators have accused Facebook of buying up rising rivals to cement its dominance over social media.
- The cases against Facebook are far from a slam dunk — the standards of proof are formidable.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Undetected for months, sophisticated hackers working on behalf of a foreign government were able to breach computer networks across a number of U.S. government agencies. It’s believed to be the handiwork of Russian intelligence.
And this is far from the first time.
Today, why and how such hacks keep happening and the delicate calculation that dictates how and if America retaliates.
Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- In one of the most sophisticated and perhaps largest hacks in more than five years, email systems were breached at the Treasury and Commerce Departments. Other breaches are under investigation.
- The sophistication and scope of the attack has stunned experts. About 18,000 private and government users downloaded a Russian tainted software update — a Trojan horse of sorts — that gave its hackers a foothold into victims’ systems, according to SolarWinds, the company whose software was compromised.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
North Dakota and New Orleans have been hit particularly hard by the coronavirus.
On today’s episode, we speak to health care workers in both places as they become some of the first to receive and administer the vaccine, and tap into the mood of hope and excitement tempered by a bleak fact: The battle against Covid-19 is not yet over.
Guest: Jack Healy, a national correspondent for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Monday’s vaccinations, the first in a staggeringly complicated national campaign, were a moment infused with hope and pain for hundreds of America’s health care workers.
- Some of the very medical centers that have endured the worst of the coronavirus found the gloom that has long filled their corridors replaced by elation. The vaccine campaign, however, began on the same day that America surpassed 300,000 deaths from Covid-19.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
The Food and Drug Administration authorized Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use on Friday, clearing the way for millions of highly vulnerable people to begin receiving the vaccine within days.
The authorization is a historic turning point in a pandemic that has taken more than 290,000 lives in the United States. With the decision, the United States becomes the sixth country — in addition to Britain, Bahrain, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Mexico — to clear the vaccine. Today, we ask the science and health reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr. what might happen next.
Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Pfizer has a deal with the U.S. government to supply 100 million doses of the vaccine by next March. Under that agreement, the shots will be free to the public.
- The vaccines are on their way, but experts still say a difficult winter of coronavirus infection and death lies ahead.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Amid the death and desperation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, two inmates, David Wisnia and Helen Spitzer, found love.
On today’s episode, the story of how they found each other — first within the camp and again, seven decades later.
This story was written by Keren Blankfeld and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
In three weeks, an election will take place that could be as important as the presidential vote in determining the course of the next four years.
The Jan. 5 runoff elections in Georgia will determine whether two Republican senators, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, keep their seats. If their Democratic challengers, Jon Ossoff and the Rev. Raphael Warnock, both win, Democrats would claim control of the Senate, giving President-Elect Joe Biden expanded power to realize his policy agenda.
Today, we offer a guide to the two Senate races in Georgia.
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, a national political reporter for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- In the runoffs, Republicans are focusing attacks on the Rev. Raphael Warnock, portraying him as radical, a claim he has rejected.
- Some Atlanta suburbs that used to be “blood red” went blue in November. After helping deliver the presidency to Democrats, we examined whether they might give them the Senate, too.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
From the start of the pandemic, the Trump administration said it was committed to ordering and stockpiling enough potential vaccine doses to end the outbreak in the United States as quickly as possible.
But new reporting from The Times has revealed that Pfizer, the maker of the first vaccine to show effectiveness against the coronavirus, tried unsuccessfully to get the government to lock in 100 million extra doses.
Today, we investigate how the Trump administration missed that opportunity and what the repercussions might be.
Guest: Sharon LaFraniere, an investigative reporter for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- U.S. officials had the opportunity to secure enough doses of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine to inoculate most of the country — at no upfront cost to the government. Instead, they turned down the offer.
- With a smaller-than-expected order from the United States, Pfizer turned to fulfilling orders from other countries, like Britain, which began vaccinating people this week.
In Britain, news that the country had become the first to start administering a fully tested coronavirus vaccine was met with hope, excitement — and some trepidation.
Amid the optimism that normal life might soon resume, there is also concern. Has the vaccine been developed too fast? Is it safe? On today’s episode, we examine how Britons feel about the prospect of receiving a shot and attend a vaccination clinic in Wales.
Guest: Megan Specia, a story editor based in London for the New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- For the first recipients of the vaccine, among them older Britons and hundreds of doctors and nurses who pulled the National Health Service through the pandemic, the shots offered a glimpse at a return to normalcy.
- Dr. Chris Hingston was one of the first health care workers in Britain to receive the vaccine. He was clearly aware that the simple act had a greater purpose: protecting not only himself, but hopefully his family, colleagues and patients from a potentially life-threatening virus.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Caitlin Dickerson, an immigration reporter for The Times, says there is one word that sums up the Trump administration’s approach to border crossing: deterrence. For nearly four years, the U.S. government has tried to discourage migrants, with reinforced walls, family separation policies and threats of deportation.
Those policies have led to the appearance of a makeshift asylum-seeker camp of frayed tents and filthy conditions within walking distance of the United States.
Today, we ask: What will the legacy of President Trump’s immigration policies be? And will anything change next year?
Guest: Caitlin Dickerson, an immigration reporter for The New York Times.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- This is what we saw inside the tent camp on the U.S.-Mexico border.
- The Trump administration’s immigration policies have not deterred pregnant women from trying to enter the United States. Here are some of their experiences.
- A federal judge last week ordered the Trump administration to fully restore the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era program designed to shield young, undocumented immigrants from deportation.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
The state of the 2020 U.S. election is, still, not a settled matter in Georgia. For weeks, conservatives have been filing lawsuits in state and federal courts in an effort to decertify results that gave a victory to Joe Biden. On Twitter, President Trump has been making unsubstantiated claims that the state has been “scammed.”
With Georgia in political turmoil, threats of violence have been made against state election officials, who have been scrambling to recount votes by hand, and against their families.
Still, dozens of prominent national Republicans have stayed silent.
Last week, Gabriel Sterling, a little-known election official in Georgia, did something his party is refusing to do: condemn the president’s claims.
For today’s episode, we called him to ask why he decided to speak up.
Guest: Gabriel Sterling, a Republican official who is the voting system implementation manager in Georgia.
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here
Background reading:
- “Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed. And it’s not right,” Mr. Sterling said in a four-minute rebuke of the president last week.
- The last act of the Trump presidency has taken on the stormy elements of a drama more common to history or literature than a modern White House.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Foresters once regarded trees as solitary individuals: They competed for space and resources, but were otherwise indifferent to one another.
The work of the Canadian ecologist Suzanne Simard upended that, finding that while there is indeed conflict in a forest, there is also negotiation, reciprocity and even selflessness.
Ms. Simard discovered that underground fungal threads link nearly every tree in a forest.
On today’s Sunday Read, listen to an exploration of these links and the influential and contentious work of Ms. Simard.
This story was written by Ferris Jabr and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
The power to pardon criminals or commute their sentences is one of the most sacred and absolute a president has, and President Trump has already used it to rescue political allies and answer the pleas of celebrities.
With his term coming to an end, the president has discussed granting three of his children, his son-in-law and personal lawyer pre-emptive pardons — a rarity in American history.
We look ahead to a potential wave of pardons and commutations — and explore who could benefit.
Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, a Washington correspondent for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here
Background reading:
- Speculation about pardon activity at the White House is churning furiously, underscoring how much the Trump administration has been dominated by investigations and criminal prosecutions of people in the president’s orbit.
- The president’s pardoning of Michael Flynn, a former national security adviser, signals the prospect of a wave of pardons and commutations in his final weeks in office.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This episode contains descriptions of sexual assault.
When the Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy this year, it created a final window for claims of sexual abuse against the organization’s leaders.
Within nine months, nearly 100,000 victims filed suits — that far eclipses the number of sexual-abuse allegations that the Roman Catholic Church faced in the early 2000s.
Today, we hear from one of the victims, Dave Henson, a 40-year-old naval officer who was sexually abused for five years by one of his scout troop’s leaders. Alcoholism and emotional trauma followed. Now, he has joined the ranks of thousands of people seeking redress.
Guest: Mike Baker, Seattle bureau chief for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here
Background reading:
- The bankruptcy proceedings allowed the Boy Scouts organization to keep operating while it grapples with questions about the future of the century-old movement.
- The deluge of sex-abuse claims documents a decades-long accumulation of assaults at the hands of scout leaders across the nation who had been trusted as role models.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
What kind of foreign policy is possible for the United States after four years of isolationism under President Trump?
Antony Blinken, President-elect Joe Biden’s pick for secretary of state, has an interventionist streak, but some vestiges of Trump-era foreign policy will be hard to upend.
If confirmed, Mr. Blinken faces the challenge of making the case at home that taking a fuller role abroad is important, while persuading international allies that the United States can be counted on.
What course is he likely to steer through that narrow channel?
Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Mr. Blinken’s extensive foreign policy credentials are expected to help calm American diplomats and global leaders after four years of the Trump administration’s ricocheting strategies and nationalist swaggering.
- European allies of the United States have welcomed a president who doesn’t see them as rivals. But with the possibility of a Republican-controlled Senate, they are also wary.
- Mr. Biden wants to reactivate the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, but the killing of the top nuclear scientist in the Middle Eastern nation, which Tehran has blamed on Israel, could complicate that aim.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Janet Yellen, who is poised to become secretary of the Treasury, will immediately have her work cut out for her. The U.S. economy is in a precarious state and Congress is consumed by partisan politics.
Ms. Yellen, however, is no stranger to crisis. She has already held the government’s other top economic jobs — including chairwoman of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2018, helping the country through the last major financial emergency.
Now, facing another steep challenge, we look at the measures she might take to get the economy humming again.
Guest: Jeanna Smialek, who covers the Federal Reserve and the economy for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Read the latest edition here.
Background reading:
- Ms. Yellen became an economist when few women entered the discipline. She is now set to become the first female Treasury secretary and one of the few people ever to have wielded economic power from the White House, the Federal Reserve and the president’s cabinet.
- While she may have excelled at some big jobs in the past, this role may be her hardest yet.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
For Americans, months of collective isolation and fear could soon be winding down. A coronavirus vaccine may be just weeks away.
According to Dr. Moncef Slaoui, head of Operation Warp Speed, the federal effort to accelerate vaccine development, the first Americans could receive the vaccine in mid-December.
With the vaccine within reach, we turn to more logistical questions: Who will receive the shots first? Who will distribute them? And what could go wrong?
Guest: Katie Thomas, who covers the drug industry for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Promising clinical trials have buoyed hope that the end of the pandemic is in sight. But even if the vaccines are authorized, only a sliver of the American public will be able to get one by the end of the year.
- In mid-December, 6.4 million doses of Pfizer’s vaccine are expected to be shipped across the United States in an initial push.
On a day early this fall, Nikita Stewart, who covers social services for The New York Times, and the Daily producers Annie Brown and Stella Tan spent a day at Council of Peoples Organization, a food pantry in Brooklyn, speaking to its workers and clients.
As with many other pantries in the city, it has seen its demand rocket during the pandemic as many New Yorkers face food shortages. And with the year drawing to a close, many of New York City’s pantries — often run with private money — face a funding crisis.
Today, the story of one day in the operations of a New York food pantry.
Guest: Nikita Stewart, who covers social services for The New York Times; Annie Brown, a senior audio producer for The Times; and Stella Tan, an associate audio producer for The Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here are five key statistics that show how hunger is worsening in New York City.
- An estimated 1.5 million New Yorkers can’t afford food, and tens of thousands have shown up at the city’s food pantries since the pandemic began. But there is relief and hope when they are at home cooking.
Pressure and litigation appear to have been the pillars of President Trump’s response to his general election loss.
His team filed a litany of court cases in battleground states. In some, such as Georgia and Michigan, the president and his allies took an even more bullish approach, attempting to use their influence to bear down on election officials.
As preparations for the transfer of power finally get underway, we take a look at how the Trump campaign’s attempts to overturn the election played out.
Guest: Jim Rutenberg, a writer-at-large for The New York Times and The Times Magazine, walks us through the Trump campaign’s strategy in key states.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Trump administration’s authorization of the transition process is a strong sign that the president’s last-ditch bid to overturn the results of the election is coming to an end. But he has yet to concede the election.
- In a chaotic effort to overturn the election results, the president and his campaign lawyers have spent weeks claiming without convincing proof that rampant fraud corrupted vote tallies in many battleground states.
- These efforts heavily targeted cities with large Black populations.
This week New York City’s public schools will close their doors and students will once again undertake online instruction.
The shutdown was triggered when 3 percent of coronavirus tests in the city came back positive over seven days. There are questions, however, around this number being used as a trigger — some health officials maintain that schools are safe.
When is the right time for schools to reopen and what is the right threshold for closures? We explore what lessons New York City’s struggles hold for the rest of the nation.
Guest: Eliza Shapiro, who covers New York City education for The New York Times, walks us through the city’s decision to reopen schools and the difficult decision to shut them down.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- New York City’s public school system will close this week, moving to all-remote instruction and disrupting the education of roughly 300,000 children.
- As schools close again, frustrated and angry parents say the decision does not make the city safer.
For years, Wil S. Hylton had been drawn to his cousin’s strength and violence. He was pulled in by the archetype that he embodied and was envious of the power he seemed to command.
Wil describes his relative’s violence as “ambient” and “endemic,” but he was sure it wouldn’t turn on him. Until a few years ago, when his cousin tried to kill him.
“My attraction to my cousin and my detachment as a husband both reside in the pantheon of male tropes,” he wrote. “Masculinity is a religion. It’s a compendium of saints: the vaunted patriarch, the taciturn cowboy, the errant knight, the reluctant hero, the gentle giant and omniscient father.”
On today’s Sunday Read, Wil’s wide-ranging exploration of masculinity.
This story was written by Wil S. Hylton and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
When the pandemic struck, Patty Schachtner, in her capacity as both a member of the Wisconsin State Senate and chief medical officer for St. Croix County, tried to remain one step ahead. It was an approach criticized by many in her conservative community.
She was preparing for the worst-case scenario. And now it has arrived — cases and deaths are on the rise in Wisconsin.
We chart her journey through the months of the pandemic.
Guest: Julie Bosman, who covers the Midwest for The New York Times, spoke with Patty Schachtner over several months about how she was experiencing the pandemic.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The recent coronavirus outbreak in Wisconsin has escalated rapidly. Here is our case tracker for the state.
- As coronavirus cases rise across the United States, death rates have been rising far more slowly. But there are signs that this is shifting. Last week, Wisconsin was among a number of states that recorded more deaths in the previous seven days than in any other week of the pandemic.
There are several figures that tell the story of the American economy right now.
Some are surprisingly positive — the housing market is booming — while others paint a more dire picture.
Using seven key numbers, we look at the sectors that have been affected most profoundly and consider what the path to recovery might look like.
Guest: Ben Casselman, who covers economics and business for The New York Times, walks us through the pandemic’s impact.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here is Ben’s snapshot of the key data points for understanding the impact of the pandemic on the economy.
- The expiration of two critical programs at the end of this year could leave millions of Americans vulnerable and short-circuit the nation’s precarious recovery.
President Trump is pushing the military to accelerate the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, all but guaranteeing a major place for the Taliban in the country’s future.
As a child, Mujib Mashal lived through the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. Now a senior correspondent there for The New York Times, he has for years reported on the extremist group and, more recently, has covered the progress of peace talks.
In this episode of “The Daily,” he shares memories of his childhood and tales from his reporting, and reflects on whether a peaceful resolution is possible.
Guest: Mujib Mashal, senior correspondent in Afghanistan for The New York Times.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- President Trump is expected to order the U.S. military to withdraw thousands of troops from Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia by the time he leaves office in January.
- The Taliban have outlasted a superpower through nearly 19 years of grinding war and now stand on the brink of realizing their most fervent desire: U.S. troops leaving Afghanistan. They have given up little of their extremist ideology to do it.
- Children of men who played key roles in the war against the Soviets in the 1980s are on both sides of the negotiations between the Afghan government and the Taliban. They know all too well what is at stake.
As it became clear that Europe was heading into another deadly wave of the coronavirus, most of the continent returned to lockdown. European leaders pushed largely similar messages, asking citizens to take measures to protect one another again, and governments offered broad financial support.
Weeks later, the effort seems to be working and infection rates are slowing.
In several parts of the United States, it’s a different story. In the Midwest, which is experiencing an explosion of cases similar to that seen earlier in Europe, leaders have not yet managed to come up with a coherent approach to loosen the virus’s grip.
Is it too late for the New World to learn from the Old?
Guests: Matina Stevis-Gridneff, who covers the European Union for The New York Times, and Mitch Smith, a national correspondent for The Times based in the Midwest.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Much of Europe went back into lockdown late last month to try to stop the spread of the virus and ease the strain on hospitals.
- After weeks of warnings that cases were again on the rise, a third surge of coronavirus infection has firmly taken hold in the United States.
- As cases grow, the pandemic is becoming so widespread in the United States that every American will know someone who has been infected.
For four years, Democrats had been united behind the mission of defeating President Trump.
But after the election of Joe Biden, the party’s disappointing showing in congressional races — losing seats in the House and facing a struggle for even narrow control of the Senate — has exposed the rifts between progressives and moderates.
In interviews with The New York Times, House members on each side of that divide — Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Representative Conor Lamb of Pennsylvania — shared their views about how the Democrats can win back support in local races.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about The Daily and other shows at: nytimes.com/thedailysurvey
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, a national political reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In the wake of Joe Biden’s victory, the divides that have long simmered among Democrats are now beginning to burst into the open.
- In an interview with The New York Times, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez dismissed criticism from House moderates and said the next few weeks would set the tone for how the incoming administration would be received by liberal activists.
- Representative Conor Lamb told The Times that he expected the Biden team to govern as it had campaigned: with progressives at arm’s length.
For the folk duo Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, pandemic isolation brought about a creative boon. In a year that has been defined by uncertainty, they have returned to what they know: songs about the slow, challenging, beautiful heat of living.
This story was written by Hanif Abdurraqib and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Maggie Haberman on why the traditional transfer of power is not happening this year, and the implications of that delay.
Guest: Maggie Haberman, a White House correspondent for The New York Times
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Days after President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. was declared the winner of the election, President Trump has still refused to concede.
- Advisers to the president say Mr. Trump is seeing how far he can push his case and ensure the continued support of his Republican base.
- A number of leading Republicans have rallied around the president, declining to challenge the false narrative that it was stolen from him. Instead, senators have tiptoed around the reality of Mr. Trump’s loss, and the lack of evidence to suggest widespread election fraud or improprieties that could reverse that result.
It’s a dark time in the struggle with the coronavirus, particularly in the United States, where infections and hospitalizations have surged.
But amid the gloom comes some light: A trial by the drug maker Pfizer has returned preliminary results suggesting that its vaccine is 90 percent effective in preventing Covid-19.
With the virus raging, how strong is this new ray of hope?
Guest: Carl Zimmer, a science writer and author of the “Matter” column for The New York Times.
Background reading:
- Pfizer has announced positive early results from its coronavirus vaccine trial, cementing the lead in a frenzied global race that has unfolded at record-breaking speed.
- Meet the couple behind the German company, BioNTech, that partnered with Pfizer to develop the vaccine.
We want to hear from you. Fill out our survey about this show and others at nytimes.com/thedailysurvey.
After the tumult of last week’s voting, one crucial question remains: Who will control the Senate?
The answer lies in Georgia, where two runoff elections in January will decide who has the advantage in the upper chamber.
With so much at stake, we look at how those races might shake out.
Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, congressional editor for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler have leveled unfounded claims of foul play in Georgia’s elections, a signal that their campaigns will focus on turning out President Trump’s conservative base.
- What’s a runoff, and why are there two? Here’s an explainer on the Senate races in Georgia.
Nate Cohn, an expert on polling for The New York Times, knows that the predictions for the 2016 presidential election were bad.
But this year, he says, they were even worse.
So, what happened?
Nate talks us through a few of his theories and considers whether, after two flawed performances, polling should be ditched.
Guest: Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot at The New York Times, speaks to us about the polls and breaks down the election results.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- As the results rolled in on Tuesday night, so did a strong sense of déjà vu. Pre-election polls, it appeared, had been misleading once again.
- Leading Republicans — including Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader — have backed President Trump’s refusal to concede.
This episode contains strong language.
The sound of victory was loud. It was banging pots, honking horns and popping corks as supporters of President-elect Joe Biden celebrated his win.
But loss, too, has a sound. In the days after the U.S. election result was announced, some of the 71 million-plus Americans who backed President Trump are grieving.
Can the country overcome its differences? In discussions with voters in areas both red and blue, we traced the fault lines of the country’s deep rifts.
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, a Times national political reporter, spoke with voters in Mason County, Texas. Robert Jimison, Jessica Cheung and Andy Mills, producers of “The Daily,” and Alix Spiegel, an editor, also reported from across the country.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In his victory speech, President-elect Biden vowed to try to unite all Americans, despite ideological differences. But President Trump’s refusal to concede could undermine Mr. Biden’s perceived legitimacy in some corners of the country.
- In the aftermath of the election, a crucial question emerged for divided families and a divided nation: What happens now?
On the afternoon of Sept. 15, 1942, the U.S.S. Wasp, an aircraft carrier housing 71 planes, 2,247 sailors and a journalist, was hit by torpedoes fired by a Japanese submarine, sending it more than two and a half miles to the bottom of the Pacific. It has remained there ever since.
Last year, a team on the Petrel — perhaps the most successful private vessel on Earth for finding deepwater wrecks — set out to find it.
In his narrated story, Ed Caesar, a contributor to The New York Times Magazine, joins the team aboard the Petrel and speaks to the family of Lt. Cmdr. John Joseph Shea, a heroic naval officer killed in the attack on the Wasp.
This story was written by Ed Caesar and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
After days of uncertainty, Joe Biden has been elected president, becoming the first candidate in more than a quarter of a century to beat an incumbent. His running mate, Kamala Harris, is the first woman and person of color elected vice president.
Mr. Biden’s win is set to be contested — President Trump said in a statement that “the election is far from over.”
Today we host a roundtable of three Times political journalists who discuss the election results, Mr. Biden’s victory and Mr. Trump’s next move.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times; Maggie Haberman, a White House correspondent for The Times; and Jim Rutenberg, a writer-at-large for The Times and The New York Times Magazine.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden achieved victory offering a message of healing and unity. He will return to Washington facing a daunting set of crises.
- He has spent his career devoted to institutions and relationships. Those are the tools he will rely on to govern a fractured nation.
When President Trump took to the podium in the White House briefing room Thursday evening to give a statement on the election count, he lied about the legality of the votes against him in key battleground states and called into question the integrity of poll workers, laying a conspiracy at the feet of Democrats.
Both the Republican establishment and the conservative news media have been split in their responses to his claims.
Inside the White House and the Trump campaign, there is shock at the direction the contest has taken — many in his camp believed that a win was certain.
Guest: Maggie Haberman, a White House correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In a stunning appearance in the White House, Mr. Trump lied about vote-counting, conjuring up a conspiracy of “legal” and “illegal” ballots being tabulated and claiming without evidence that states were trying to deny him re-election.
By the end of election night, the results in six key states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — were still to be called.
On Wednesday, as mail-in ballots were totaled up, Joe Biden gained ground, taking Michigan and Wisconsin and placing him within striking distance of the Electoral College votes needed to win the White House.
The count is still in progress in many places. Mr. Biden is leading by a decent margin in Arizona and slightly in Nevada, while President Trump’s advantage in Georgia and Pennsylvania has been narrowing.
As the former vice president formed paths to victory, Mr. Trump continued to raise the specter of litigation and escalated his baseless attacks on the legitimacy of the vote.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent, speaks to us about the latest on an unfinished election.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden may be closing in on victory, but the “blue wave” that some hoped would sweep the Democrats to shore never materialized.
- We have live updates on the progress of the count, and you can follow the election results here.
The U.S. presidential election is a lot closer than the polls indicated. Millions of votes, many in key battleground states, are yet to be counted.
Florida — which went for President Trump — is the only bellwether to have confirmed its result. Other crucial states, including Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina, are yet to be called.
For the moment, it looks like both Mr. Trump and Joe Biden will need to break through in the Midwest and Pennsylvania to clinch victory.
The race to control the Senate is also tight, though the Republicans seem to be in a better position.
With the picture still foggy, Mr. Biden called for patience as the votes were counted, while Mr. Trump falsely claimed victory and threatened court action.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times, speaks to us about where things stand with the election and the remaining paths to victory.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- You can follow the election results here.
- We also have live updates on the progress of the vote.
This episode contains strong language.
At the heart of one race for the Wisconsin State Assembly are some of the same political cracks splitting the U.S. as a whole. Some believe keeping businesses running is a priority during the coronavirus pandemic; others think keeping people safe and healthy should be given precedence.
What do the different approaches reveal about Wisconsin politics and about broader American divisions? Reid J. Epstein, a politics reporter for The New York Times, and Andy Mills and Luke Vander Ploeg, audio producers for The Times, went to the state to find out.
Guests: Reid J. Epstein, who covers campaigns and elections for The New York Times; Andy Mills, a senior audio producer for The Times; Luke Vander Ploeg, an audio producer for The Times.
Bonus Election Day special: The Daily is going LIVE today. Listen to Michael Barbaro and Carolyn Ryan, a deputy managing editor at The Times, as they call our correspondents for the latest on a history-making day.
Tune in from 4 - 8 p.m. Eastern, only on nytimes.com/thedaily and on The New York Times iPhone app. Click here for more information.
Background reading:
- Here’s Reid’s story about how the virus has divided the conservative town of Minocqua, Wis.
- President Trump and Joe Biden barnstormed through battleground states, concluding an extraordinary campaign conducted amid a health crisis and deep economic anxiety.
The Daily is going live today! Join us at 4 p.m. Eastern time for our first-ever Election Day broadcast. You can listen at nytimes.com/thedaily and on The New York Times iPhone app.
Michael Barbaro and Carolyn Ryan, a deputy managing editor at The Times, will call our correspondents for the latest on a history-making day. We’ll get live updates from key battleground states and break down the state of the race. We hope to see you soon.
There are many permutations of the U.S. presidential election — some messier than others.
Joe Biden’s lead in national polls suggests he has a number of paths to victory. If states like Florida or Georgia break for him early on, then the Trump campaign could be in for a long night.
The task for President Trump is to close those paths. If he can hold Florida and quickly add the likes of Arizona and North Carolina, then the signs could point to re-election.
And then there is a third scenario. If fast-counting states are too close to call immediately and battlegrounds in the Midwest take a long time to tally votes, then a long wait for a final result — and bitter, lengthy legal challenges — could be on the cards.
We speak to Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The Times, on the likely plotlines for election night.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times, walks us through possible election night scenarios.
In addition to our regular show on Election Day, The Daily is going LIVE tomorrow afternoon. Spend your Election Day with Michael Barbaro and Carolyn Ryan, deputy managing editor at The Times, as they call our correspondents for the latest on a history-making day.
Tune in from 4 - 8 p.m. Eastern, only on nytimes.com/thedaily. Click here for more information.
Background reading:
- The Trump and Biden campaigns are intensifying their efforts in Pennsylvania — an increasingly critical state.
- How long will counting take? We asked officials about their election results processes and about what share of the vote they expect to be finished by Wednesday.
- Americans are pushing through challenges like the pandemic and long lines to cast their ballot. The United States is on course to surpass 150 million votes for the first time.
At 16, Reginald Dwayne Betts was sent to prison for nine years after pleading guilty to a carjacking, to having a gun, and to an attempted robbery.
“Because Senator Kamala Harris is a prosecutor and I am a felon, I have been following her political rise, with the same focus that my younger son tracks Steph Curry threes,” Mr. Betts said in an essay he wrote for The New York Times Magazine.
He had hoped that her presidential bid would be an opportunity for the country to grapple with the injustice of mass incarceration in a thoughtful way. Instead, he explained, the basic fact of her profession as a prosecutor was used by many as an indictment against her.
On today’s “Sunday Read,” listen to Mr. Betts’s exploration of his experiences with the criminal justice system, Kamala Harris and the conversations that America needs to have about mass incarceration.
This story was written and introduced by Reginald Dwayne Betts and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Florida’s seniors played an important role in President Trump’s victory there in 2016. Older voters, who are mostly conservative, make up around 25 percent of the swing state’s electorate and turn out in astonishing numbers.
They are also disproportionately affected by the pandemic, and polling suggests that Joe Biden is making inroads with Republican-leaning older voters.
In Florida’s conservative retirement communities, however, the decision to switch from Mr. Trump can have consequences and many stay quiet for fear of reprisals.
Some of these consequences are obvious: One resident who erected a sign in support of Mr. Biden woke up to “Trump” written in weedkiller on his lawn. Other effects are more personal, and more insidious.
Today, Annie Brown, a senior audio producer at The Times, speaks to some of Florida’s seniors about their voting intentions — including one, Dave Niederkorn, who has turned his back on Mr. Trump and almost lost a close friend in the process.
Guests: Annie Brown, a senior audio producer for The New York Times; and Patricia Mazzei, the Miami bureau chief of The Times, who covers Florida and Puerto Rico.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Older people are a crucial voting bloc in Florida. In a speech earlier this month, Joe Biden made his pitch to them.
- “If it’s here, it’s here” — how retirees in Florida’s Villages confronted the coronavirus in the summer.
This episode contains strong language.
With an election in which uncertainty may abound, concerns are swirling around the possibility of political violence. Experts and officials — including those charged with the security of polling stations and ballot counting facilities — have been taking extra precautions.
Americans across the political spectrum appear to be preparing themselves for this possibility, too: Eight of the 10 biggest weeks for gun sales since the late 1990s took place since March this year. Many of those sales were to people buying guns for the first time.
Today’s episode examines these anxieties from two perspectives.
Andy Mills, a senior audio producer for The New York Times, speaks to patrons of gun stores in Washington State about their motivations and sits down with a first-time gun owner who relays his anxiety, ignited by the unrest and protests in Seattle over the summer.
And Alix Spiegel, a senior audio editor for The Times, visits three women of color in North Carolina, one of whom says the scenes in Charlottesville, the killing of Black people at the hands of the police and the threat of white militias have encouraged her to shift her anti-gun stance.
Guests: Andy Mills, a senior audio producer for The New York Times; Alix Spiegel, a senior audio editor for The Times; and Reid J. Epstein, who covers campaigns and elections for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Gun buyers say they are motivated by a new sense of instability that is pushing them to purchase weapons for the first time, or if they already have them, to buy more.
Local news in America has long been widely trusted, and widely seen as objective. But as traditional local papers struggle, there have been attempts across the political spectrum to create more partisan outlets.
Few can have been as ambitious or widespread as the nationwide network of 1,300 websites and newspapers run by Brian Timpone, a television reporter turned internet entrepreneur.
He has said that he sees local news as a means of preserving American civil discourse. But a Times investigation has found that Republican operatives and public relations firms have been paying for articles in his outlets and intimately dictating the editorial direction of stories.Today, we speak to the Times journalists behind the investigation.
Guests: Davey Alba, a technology reporter for The New York Times covering online misinformation and its global harms; and Jack Nicas, who covers technology for The Times from San Francisco.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s the full investigation into a nationwide operation of 1,300 local sites that publishes coverage ordered up by Republican groups and corporate P.R. firms.
What does the specter of the 2000 election mean for the upcoming election? The race between George W. Bush and Al Gore that year turned on the result in Florida, where the vote was incredibly close and mired in balloting issues. After initially conceding, Mr. Gore, the Democratic nominee, contested the count.
What followed was a flurry of court cases, recounts, partisan fury and confusion. It would be months until — after a Supreme Court decision — Mr. Bush would become the 43rd president of the United States.
The confrontation held political lessons for both sides. Lessons that could be put to the test next week in an election likely to be shrouded in uncertainty: The pandemic, the volume of mail-in voters and questions around mail delivery could result in legal disputes.
Today, we take a look back at the contest between Mr. Gore and Mr. Bush.
Guest: Jim Rutenberg, a writer-at-large for The New York Times and The Times Magazine.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A number of legal battles over voting rights are in the pipeline. Any ruling could resonate nationwide.
- Elections supervisors say they have learned the hard lessons of the 2000 presidential recount and other messes. But challenges are already apparent.
In America’s increasingly divided political landscape, it can be hard to imagine almost any voter switching sides. One demographic group has provided plenty of exceptions: white suburban women.
In the past four years, the group has turned away from the president in astonishing numbers. And many of them are organizing — Red, Wine and Blue is a group made up of suburban women from Ohio hoping to swing the election for Joe Biden. The organization draws on women who voted for the president and third parties in 2016, as well as existing Democratic voters.
In today’s episode, Lisa Lerer, who covers campaigns, elections and political power for The New York Times, speaks to white suburban women on the ground in Ohio and explores their shifting allegiances and values.
Guest: Lisa Lerer, a reporter for The New York Times covering campaigns, elections and political power.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The white suburban voters the president needs to carve a path to victory have turned away from him, often for deeply personal reasons.
During months of pandemic isolation, Wesley Morris, a critic at large for The New York Times, decided to grow a mustache.
The reviews were mixed and predictable. He heard it described as “porny” and “creepy,” as well as “rugged” and “extra gay.”
It was a comment on a group call, however, that gave him pause. Someone noted that his mustache made him look like a lawyer for the N.A.A.C.P.’s legal defense fund.
“It was said as a winking correction and an earnest clarification — Y’all, this is what it is,” Wesley said. “The call moved on, but I didn’t. That is what it is: one of the sweetest, truest things anybody had said about me in a long time.”
On today’s episode of The Sunday Read, Wesley Morris’s story about self-identity and the symbolic power of the mustache.
This story was written by Wesley Morris and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
At the start of Thursday night’s debate its moderator, Kristen Welker of NBC News, delivered a polite but firm instruction: The matchup should not be a repeat of the chaos of last month’s debate.
It was a calmer affair and, for the first few segments, a more structured and linear exchange of views.
President Trump, whose interruptions came to define the first debate, was more restrained, seemingly heeding advice that keeping to the rules of the debate would render his message more effective.
And while there were no breakthrough moments for Joseph R. Biden Jr., the former vice president managed to make more of a case for himself than he did last month, on issues such as the coronavirus and economic support for families and businesses in distress.
Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent, gives us a recap of the night’s events and explores what it means for an election that is just 11 days away.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- While the tenor of Thursday’s forum was more sedate, the conflict in matters of substance and vision could not have been more dramatic.
- Here are some highlights from last night’s debate.
The winner-take-all system used by the Electoral College in the United States appears nowhere in the Constitution. It awards all of a state’s electors to the candidate with the most votes, no matter how small the margin of victory. Critics say that means millions of votes are effectively ignored.
The fairness of the Electoral College was seriously questioned in the 1960s. Amid the civil rights push, changes to the system were framed as the last step of democratization. But a constitutional amendment to introduce a national popular vote for president was eventually killed by segregationist senators in 1970.
Desire for an overhaul dwindled until the elections of 2000 and 2016, when the system’s flaws again came to the fore. In both instances, the men who became president had lost the popular vote.
Jesse Wegman, a member of The Times’s editorial board, describes how the winner-take-all system came about and how the Electoral College could be modified.
Guest: Jesse Wegman, a member of The New York Times’s editorial board.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s a guide to how the Electoral College works.
- Watch Jesse’s explainer, from our Opinion section, on how President Trump could win the election — even if he loses.
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have invested a significant amount of time and money trying to avoid the mistakes made during the 2016 election.
A test of those new policies came last week, when The New York Post published a story that contained supposedly incriminating documents and pictures taken from the laptop of Hunter Biden. The provenance and authenticity of that information is still in question, and Joe Biden’s campaign has rejected the assertions.
We speak to Kevin Roose, a technology columnist for The Times, about how the episode reveals the tension between fighting misinformation and protecting free speech.
Guest: Kevin Roose, a technology columnist for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s Kevin’s full report on the efforts by Twitter and Facebook to limit the spread of the Hunter Biden story.
- The New York Post published the piece despite doubts within the paper’s newsroom — some reporters withheld their bylines and questioned the credibility of the article.
- Joe Biden’s campaign has rejected the assertions made in the story.
In the struggle to control the U.S. Senate, one race in North Carolina — where the Republican incumbent, Thom Tillis, is trying to hold off his Democratic challenger, Cal Cunningham — could be crucial.
North Carolina is a classic purple state with a split political mind: progressive in some quarters, while firmly steeped in Southern conservative tradition in others.
Two bombshells have recently upended the race: Mr. Tillis fell ill with the coronavirus after attending an event for Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s Supreme Court nomination without a mask. And Mr. Cunningham’s image was sullied by the emergence of text messages showing that he had engaged in an extramarital affair.
Jonathan Martin, a national political correspondent for The Times, talks us through the race and examines the factors that could determine who prevails.
Guest: Jonathan Martin, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- North Carolina is a linchpin in the 2020 election — the presidency and the Senate could hinge on results in the state.
- Here’s how the critical senate race was engulfed in chaos in a single night.
This episode contains strong language.
In the last decade, elections have tightened in Arizona, a traditionally Republican stronghold, as Democrats gain ground.
According to polls, Joe Biden is leading in the state — partly because of white suburban women moving away from President Trump, but also because of efforts to activate the Latino vote.
Will that turn states like Arizona blue? And do enough Hispanic voters actually want Mr. Biden as president?
To gauge the atmosphere, Jennifer Medina, a national politics reporter for The New York Times, spoke to Democratic activists and Trump supporters in Arizona.
Guests: Jennifer Medina, a national politics reporter for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Though a majority of Latino voters favors Democrats, Hispanic men are a small but enduring part of Trump’s base. Those supporters see him as forceful, unapologetic and a symbol of economic success.
- If Joe Biden wins Arizona, he would be only the second Democratic presidential candidate to have done so since 1952. But the state has been trending more friendly to the party for years.
Jim Dwyer, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for The New York Times, died earlier this month. He was 63.
Throughout his nearly 40-year career, Jim was drawn to stories about discrimination, wrongly convicted prisoners and society’s mistreated outcasts. From 2007, he wrote The Times’s “About New York” column — when asked whether he had the best job in journalism, he responded, “I believe I do.”
Dan Barry, a reporter for The Times who also wrote for the column, has called Jim a “newsman of consequence” and “a determined voice for the vulnerable.” Today, he reads two stories written by Jim, his friend and colleague.
These stories were written by Jim Dwyer and read by Dan Barry. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
In the second of a two-part examination of the presidential candidates’ policies, we turn to Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s agenda and how he plans to govern a nation wracked by a public health and economic crisis.
The themes of Mr. Biden’s Democratic primary campaign were broad as he eschewed the policy-intensive approach of opponents like Senator Elizabeth Warren. But the onset of the pandemic helped shape and crystallize his policy plans.
His approach stands in stark contrast to that of President Trump: Mr. Biden wants to actively mobilize federal resources in addressing the pandemic, an expansion to health care that he hopes will endure beyond the coronavirus.
Today, we speak to Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent, about Mr. Biden’s plans for dealing with the current crisis and beyond.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political reporter at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- We delve into the candidates’ backgrounds and present key questions about the campaigns of Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
- With 18 days to go, here’s a guide to the 2020 election with the latest updates, polling news and information on how to vote.
In a two-part examination of the policies of the president and of the man seeking to replace him, Joe Biden, we first take a look at what Donald Trump said he would do four years ago — and what he’s actually accomplished.
On some of the big issues, Mr. Trump has been the president he told us he was going to be, keeping commitments on deregulation, taxes, military spending and the judiciary.
But other potent promises — such as replacing Obamacare, draining “the swamp” in Washington and forcing Mexico to pay for a border wall — have withered.
Today, we speak to Peter Baker, The Times’s chief White House correspondent, about Mr. Trump’s record. Tomorrow, we scrutinize Mr. Biden’s plans for the presidency.
Guest: Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- We delve into the background of the candidates and present key questions about the campaigns of Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
- With 19 days to go, here’s a guide to the 2020 election with the latest updates, polling news and information on how to vote.
It was a 12-hour session. Twenty-two senators took turns questioning Judge Amy Coney Barrett on her record and beliefs.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, evoked personal experience of life before Roe v. Wade and asked Judge Barrett whether she would vote to overturn abortion rights.
On that question, Judge Barrett demurred — an approach she would take to other contentious issues, including whether she would recuse herself if a presidential election dispute came before the court.
With Judge Barrett’s confirmation all but certain, Democratic senators pressed her more with the election in mind than out of any hope of derailing her rise.
Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times, gives us a rundown of the second day of the hearings.
Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In declining to detail her legal views, Judge Barrett said she would not be “a pawn” of President Trump.
- With the hearing taking place closer to an election than any other Supreme Court confirmation — and with the Senate Republican majority at real risk — the proceeding was riddled with electoral politics.
- Judge Barrett’s testimony was a deft mix of expertise and evasion. She demonstrated easy familiarity with Supreme Court precedents but said almost nothing about whether they should stand.
In March, Congress pushed through a relief package that preserved the U.S. economy during the pandemic. It felt like government functioning at its best.
But now, that money is running out and bipartisanship has given way to an ideological stalemate.
While Republicans balk at plans for further significant government spending — even those coming from the White House — Democrats are holding out for more money and a broader package of measures.
The absence of a deal could have dire consequences. One economist estimates that without a stimulus package, there could be four million fewer jobs next year.
We talk to Jim Tankersley, who covers the economy for The Times, about what’s getting in the way of an agreement.
Guest: Jim Tankersley, who covers economic and tax policy for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- After posting on Twitter that he was ending talks, President Trump reversed course, raising the stimulus offer to $1.8 trillion. But his own party may reject that plan, handing Democrats fresh leverage.
- While Democrats hold out for more concessions, deep divisions among Senate Republicans stand in the way of any relief bill.
Most Americans say that abortion should be legal with some restrictions, but President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, Amy Coney Barrett, signed a statement in a 2006 newspaper advertisement opposing “abortion on demand.” Her accession would bolster a conservative majority among the justices.
How did that happen? According to Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, abortion rights advocates have for too long taken Roe v. Wade for granted.
Ms. Hogue describes how Republican attacks on abortion were not countered forcefully enough. “I think most people in elected positions had been taught for a long time to sort of ‘check the box’ on being what we would call pro-choice and then move on,” she said.
Guest: Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The 2006 statement signed by Amy Coney Barrett appears to be the most direct evidence of her personal views, ones she has vowed to set aside on the bench.
- The issue of abortion contains political risks for both Democrats and Republicans, even as it energizes parts of their bases.
“We are conditioned to believe that art is safe,” Sam Anderson, a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, explained in this week’s The Sunday Read. “Destruction happens in a number of ways, for any number of reasons, at any number of speeds — and it will happen, and no amount of reverence will stop it.”
Today, Sam explores his personal relationship with Michelangelo's David and the imperfections that could bring down the world’s most “perfect” statue.
This story was written by Sam Anderson and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
This episode contains strong language.
Over the summer, Dave Mitchko started a makeshift pro-Trump sign operation from his garage. By his estimate he has handed out around 26,000 signs, put together with the help of his family.
Mr. Mitchko might seem like the kind of voter Joseph R. Biden Jr. wants to peel away from the Republicans in November. He had always been a Democrat — he voted for Barack Obama twice — but opted for Donald Trump in 2016.
Today, we speak to voters and politicians on the ground in northeastern Pennsylvania, exploring the factors that swung former Democratic strongholds toward Mr. Trump and asking whether Mr. Biden can win them back.
Guest: Shane Goldmacher, a national political reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- After the turbulent first presidential debate, Mr. Biden embarked on an old-fashioned train tour to cities where the president won over working-class white voters four years ago.
During most campaigns, the job of the vice-presidential candidates focuses on boosting the person heading the ticket. Proving their suitability for the top job is secondary.
But this year is different. The president is 74 and spent much of the past week in the hospital, and his Democratic rival is 77. So it was vital for their running mates, Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris, to show in Wednesday night’s debate that they would be capable of stepping up if necessary.
We speak to Alexander Burns, a Times national political correspondent, about the candidates’ strategies and whether anything new emerged four weeks before the election.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The back-and-forth between Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Kamala Harris was more civil than the unruly presidential event, but featured sharp exchanges over the coronavirus, China policy, job creation and health care.
- Here are six takeaways from the night.
The pandemic has killed more than one million people around the world, at least 210,000 in the United States alone. The illness has infiltrated the White House and infected the president.
Today, we offer an update on measures to fight the coronavirus and try to predict the outbreak’s course.
Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Fearing a “twindemic” — the onset of both the flu and the coronavirus — health experts are pushing people to get influenza shots.
- Here’s how to identify the different symptoms of the flu and Covid-19.
- Donald tells us about his job trying to “cover the future.”
This episode contains strong language.
Jack Nicas, a technology reporter for The New York Times, moved to Oakland, Calif., five years ago. When he arrived, he set out to find a bar of choice. It quickly became the Hatch.
Unpretentious, cheap and relaxed, the Hatch was a successful small business until the coronavirus hit.
After the announcement in March that California would order bars and restaurants to shut down, Jack decided to follow the fortunes of the Hatch. Over six months, he charted the struggle to keep the tavern afloat and the hardship suffered by its staff.
“I can’t afford to be down in the dumps about it,” Louwenda Kachingwe, the Hatch’s owner, told Jack as he struggled to come up with ideas to keep the bar running during the shutdown. “I have to be proactive, because literally people are depending on it.”
Guest: Jack Nicas, a technology reporter for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s the full story of the Oakland tavern and its staff as they try to weather the fallout from the pandemic.
On Saturday morning, the doctors treating President Trump for the coronavirus held a news conference outside Walter Reed National Military Medical Center — a show of strength, aimed at reassuring the American public that he was in capable hands.
But instead of allaying concern, it raised questions, casting doubt on the timeline of the president’s illness and the seriousness of his condition.
We speak to Maggie Haberman and Peter Baker, White House correspondents for The Times, about the efforts to control the narrative, and pick through what is known about the president’s condition a month before the election.
Guest:Maggie Haberman and Peter Baker, White House correspondents for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The president made a surprise outing from the hospital in an effort to show his improvement, but the murky and shifting narrative of his illness was rewritten again with grim new details.
- Dr. Sean P. Conley, who acknowledged that he had misled the public about the president’s treatment, has lost credibility with some colleagues.
- We have a timeline of the president’s symptoms and treatment.
They came from Tel Aviv, Aleppo and a “small house by the river.” They were artists, whiskey drinkers and mbira players. They were also fathers, sisters and best friends.
Today, we hear people from around the world reflect on those they’ve lost.
For more information on today's episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
He assured the country the pandemic would “disappear” soon. Then he tested positive. We explore how President Trump testing positive for the coronavirus could affect the last days of the 2020 race — and consider what might happen next.
Guests: Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman, White House correspondents for The Times.
For more information about today's episode, visit: nytimes.com/thedaily.
This episode contains strong language.
During much of this election cycle, Julius Irving of Gainesville, Fla., spent his days trying to get former felons registered to vote.
He would tell them about Florida’s Amendment Four, a ballot initiative that extended the franchise to those who had, in the past, been convicted on felony charges — it added an estimated 1.5 million people to the electorate, the nation’s largest voting expansion in four decades.
On today’s episode, Nicholas Casey, a national politics reporter, spends time with Mr. Irving in Gainesville and explores the voting rights battle in Florida.
Guest: Nicholas Casey, a national politics reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Former prisoners can now go to the polls in Florida. But fines remain one obstacle. Believing anything will make a difference is another. That’s where Julius Irving comes in.
The pandemic will mean that many more Americans vote by mail this year.
All 50 states require people to register before they can cast a mail-in vote. But from there, the rules diverge wildly.
And a lot could still change. Our correspondent Luke Broadwater, a reporter in Washington, says there are more than 300 challenges to voting-related rules winding through courts across the country.
Americans should probably brace for a different kind of election night — it could be days or longer before the full picture of results emerges.
Guest: Luke Broadwater, a congressional reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Republicans fear that President Trump’s messaging on voting by mail could depress turnout. But Democrats worry an overreliance on the mail could leave more of their votes uncounted.
- A New York Times Magazine investigation found that misleading and false claims about widespread voter fraud are part of a long disinformation effort — one that Mr. Trump has taken to new extremes.
- Here’s how to vote in your state.
This episode contains strong language.
Both presidential candidates had clear goals for their first debate on Tuesday.
For Joseph R. Biden Jr., the contest was an opportunity to consolidate his lead in polls before Election Day. President Trump’s task was, politically, a taller order — to change the course of a race that he seems to be losing. His tactics for doing that emerged quickly: interrupt and destabilize.
The result was a chaotic 90-minute back-and-forth, an often ugly melee in which the two major party nominees expressed levels of acrid contempt for each other.
We speak to our correspondent Alexander Burns about the mood and themes of the debate and whether any of it moved the dial for the election.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- With cross talk, lies and mockery, President Trump made little attempt to reassure swing voters about his leadership. Mr. Biden hit back: “This is so unpresidential.”
- In his second time moderating a presidential debate, Chris Wallace of Fox News struggled to rein in the president’s behavior.
- Here are six takeaways from the debate.
Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig, investigative reporters for The Times, have pored over two decades and thousands of pages of documents on Donald J. Trump’s tax information, up to and including his time in the White House.
What they found was an existential threat to the image he has constructed about his wealth and lifestyle. The tax documents consistently appeared to call into question the business acumen he has cited in his presidential campaign and throughout his public life.
The records suggest that whenever Mr. Trump was closely involved in the creation and running of a business, it was more likely to fail. They show no payments of federal income taxes in 11 of 18 years that The Times examined, and reveal a decade-long audit by the Internal Revenue Service that questions the legitimacy of a $72.9 million tax refund. They also point to a reckoning on the horizon: The president appears to be personally on the hook for loans totaling $421 million, most of which is coming due within four years.
We speak to Russ and Susanne about their findings and chart President Trump’s financial situation.
Guest: Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig, investigative reporters for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Long-concealed records on Mr. Trump’s tax information reveal struggling properties, vast write-offs, an audit battle and hundreds of millions in debt coming due.
- Here are some of the key findings from the previously hidden tax information.
- While the president’s Republican allies have mostly remained silent on the situation, Democrats have pounced.
Judge Amy Coney Barrett, President Trump’s pick to fill the empty seat on the Supreme Court, is a product of the conservative legal movement of the 1980s. She clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia, a giant of conservative jurisprudence, and his influence is evident throughout her judicial career.
Opponents of abortion, in particular, are hoping that her accession to the Supreme Court would be a crucial step forward for their movement.
Her nomination ceremony in the Rose Garden this weekend appeared unremarkable. But it took place just weeks from a presidential election and barely eight days after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Republicans have the votes in the Senate to confirm Judge Barrett and a timetable that suggests that they would be able to do so before Election Day. With her path seemingly clear, we reflect on Judge Barrett’s career and her judicial philosophy.
Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In choosing Judge Barrett, President Trump opted for the candidate most likely to thrill his conservative base and outrage his liberal opponents.
- Judge Barrett’s record suggests that she would push the Supreme Court to the right. Here’s a guide to her stance on abortion, health care, gun rights and the death penalty.
In August, Abrahm Lustgarten, who reports on climate, watched fires burn just 12 miles from his home in Marin County, Calif.
For two years, he had been studying the impact of the changing climate on global migration and recently turned some of his attention to the domestic situation.
Suddenly, with fires raging so close to home, he had to ask himself the question he had been asking other people: Was it time to move?
This week on The Sunday Read, Abrahm explores a nation on the cusp of transformation.
This story was written by Abrahm Lustgarten and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
This episode contains strong language.
In June, weeks after George Floyd was killed by the police, a veto-proof majority of the Minneapolis City Council expressed support for dismantling the city’s police department.
The councilors’ pledges to “abolish,” “dismantle” and “end policing as we know it” changed the local and national conversation about the police.
President Trump has wielded this decision and law-and-order arguments in his campaigning — Midwestern states like Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota may be decisive in the general election.
He has claimed that Joseph R. Biden Jr. wants to defund the police — which he does not — and told voters that they would not be safe in “Biden’s America.”
On the ground in Minneapolis, Astead Herndon, a national politics reporter, speaks to activists, residents and local politicians about the complexities of trying to overhaul the city’s police.
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, a national politics reporter for The New York Times, speaks to Black Visions Collective co-director, Miski Noor; Jordan Area Community Council executive director, Cathy Spann; and Minneapolis City Council president, Lisa Bender.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Across America there have been calls from some activists and elected officials to defund, downsize or abolish police departments. What would efforts to defund or disband the police really mean?
- In the wake of George Floyd’s killing, some cities asked if the police are being asked to do jobs they were never intended to do. Budgets are being re-evaluated.
This episode contains strong language.
Breonna Taylor’s mother and her supporters had made their feelings clear: Nothing short of murder charges for all three officers involved in Ms. Taylor’s death would amount to justice.
On Wednesday, one of the officers was indicted on a charge of “wanton endangerment.” No charges were brought against the two officers whose bullets actually struck Ms. Taylor.
In response, protesters have again taken to the streets to demand justice for the 26-year-old who was killed in her apartment in March.
We speak to our correspondent Rukmini Callimachi, who is on the ground in Louisville, Ky., about the reaction to the grand jury’s decision.
Guest: Rukmini Callimachi, a correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A former Louisville police detective has been charged with “reckless endangerment” for his role in the killing of Breonna Taylor. Protesters poured into the streets, and two officers were shot in Louisville after the announcement. The city’s police chief said that neither of the officers’ injuries were life-threatening.
- A Times investigation explores the events leading up to the shooting of Ms. Taylor and its consequences.
President Trump appears to be on course to give conservatives a sixth vote on the Supreme Court, after several Republican senators who were previously on the fence said they would support quickly installing a replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
In our interview today with Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion Susan B. Anthony List, she says she senses a turning point. “No matter who you are, you feel the ground shaking underneath,” she said. “I’m feeling very optimistic for the mission that our organization launched 25 years ago.”
In pursuit of that mission, the Susan B. Anthony List struck a partnership with Mr. Trump during the 2016 election. The group supported his campaign and provided organizational backup in battleground states in exchange for commitments that he would work to end abortion rights.
Ms. Dannenfelser described the partnership as “prudential.”
“Religious people use that term quite a lot because it acknowledges a hierarchy of goods and evils involved in any decision,” she said. “and your job is to figure out where the highest good is found.”
Guest: Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The transformation of groups like the Susan B. Anthony List from opponents of Mr. Trump early in the 2016 campaign into proud and unwavering backers of his presidency illustrates how intertwined the conservative movement has become with the president — and how much they need each other to survive politically.
- For months, abortion has been relegated to a back burner in the presidential campaign. The death of Justice Ginsburg and the battle to replace her has put the issue firmly back on the agenda.
This episode contains strong language and descriptions of sexual violence.
The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the ensuing battle to fill her seat is set to dominate American politics in the lead up to the election. A poll conducted for The New York Times before Justice Ginsburg’s death found voters in the battleground states of Arizona, Maine and North Carolina placed greater trust in Joseph R. Biden Jr. than in President Trump to fill the next Supreme Court vacancy.
Now that it’s longer a hypothetical scenario, what impact will the vacant seat have on the thinking of swing voters?
We take a look at the polling and ask undecided voters whether the death of Justice Ginsburg and the president’s decision to nominate another justice have affected their voting intention.
Guest: Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In surveys before Justice Ginsburg’s death, Joe Biden led by a slightly wider margin on choosing the next justice than he did over all against President Trump.
When Ruth Bader Ginsburg graduated from law school, she received no job offers from New York law firms, despite being an outstanding student. She spent two years clerking for a federal district judge, who agreed to hire her only after persuasion, and was rejected for a role working with Justice Felix Frankfurter because she was a woman.
With her career apparently stuttering in the male-dominated legal world, she returned to Columbia University to work on a law project that required her to spend time in Sweden. There, she encountered a more egalitarian society. She also came across a magazine article in which a Swedish feminist said that men and women had one main role: being people. That sentiment would become her organizing principle.
In the first of two episodes on the life of Justice Ginsburg, we chart her journey from her formative years to her late-life stardom on the Supreme Court.
Guest: Linda Greenhouse, who writes about the Supreme Court for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in her home in Washington on Friday. She was 87. The second woman appointed to the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg’s pointed and powerful dissenting opinions made her a cultural icon.
- “Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s life and landmark opinions moved us closer to a more perfect union,” former President Bill Clinton, who nominated her for the court, wrote on Twitter. Other tributes have poured in from leaders on all sides of the political spectrum.
In the second episode of a two-part special, we consider the ramifications of Justice Ginsburg’s death and the struggle over how, and when, to replace her on the bench.
The stakes are high: If President Trump is able to name another member of the Supreme Court, he would be the first president since Ronald Reagan to appoint three justices, tipping the institution in a much more conservative direction.
Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, a congressional editor for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- President Trump’s determination to confirm a replacement before the election set lawmakers in Congress on a collision course.
According to Ludmila Savchuk, a former employee, every day at the Internet Research Agency was essentially the same.
From an office complex in the Primorsky District of St. Petersburg, employees logged on to the internet via a proxy service and set about flooding Russia’s popular social networking sites with opinions handed to them by their bosses.
The shadowy organization, which according to one employee filled 40 rooms, industrialized the art of “trolling.”
On this week’s Sunday Read, Adrien Chen reports on trolling and the agency, and, eventually, becomes a victim of Russian misinformation himself.
This story was written by Adrian Chen and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
“Nothing comes easily out here,” Terry Tempest Williams, a Utah-based writer, said of the American West. Her family was once almost taken by fire, and as a child of the West, she grew up with it.
Our producer Bianca Giaever, who was working out of the West Coast when the wildfires started, woke up one day amid the smoke with the phrase “an obituary to the land” in her head. She called on Ms. Williams, a friend, to write one.
“I will never write your obituary,” her poem reads. “Because even as you burn, you throw down seeds that will sprout and flower.”
Guest: Bianca Giaever, a producer for The New York Times, speaks to the writer Terry Tempest Williams.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Iolani teaches dual-language kindergarten in Washington Heights in New York City, where she has worked for the last 15 years.
She, like many colleagues, is leery about a return to in-person instruction amid reports of positive coronavirus cases in other schools. “I go through waves of anxiety and to being hopeful that it works out to just being worried,” she told our producer Lisa Chow.
On top of mixed messaging from the city about the form teaching could take, her anxiety is compounded by a concern that she might bring the coronavirus home to her daughter, whose immune system is weaker as a result of an organ transplant.
Today, we look at how one teacher’s concerns in the lead up to the first day back illustrates issues around New York City’s reopening of public schools.
Guest: Lisa Chow, a producer for The New York Times, speaks to a kindergarten teacher in New York City.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- New York City was scheduled to reopen public schools on Monday. Mayor Bill de Blasio this week delayed the start of in-person instruction.
- Nearly 40 percent of parents have opted to have their children learn fully remotely through at least the first few months of the school year. That number reflects the deep divide among the city’s families about how to approach in-person learning.
Among the olive groves of Moria, on the Greek island of Lesbos, a makeshift city of tents and containers housed thousands of asylum seekers who had fled conflict and hardship in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere.
Already frustrated at the deplorable conditions, inhabitants’ anger was compounded by coronavirus lockdown restrictions. The situation reached a breaking point this month when fires were set, probably by a small group of irate asylum seekers, according to the authorities. The flames decimated the camp and stranded nearly 12,000 of its residents in the wild among tombstones in a nearby cemetery and on rural and coastal roads.
We chart the European refugee crisis and the events that led up to the blaze at Moria.
Guest: Matina Stevis-Gridneff, who covers the European Union for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The fires at the Moria camp have intensified what was already a humanitarian disaster. Originally built to hold 3,000 newly arrived people, it held more than 20,000 refugees six months ago
- The camp’s inhabitants had for years resented the squalid conditions and the endless delays in resolving their fates. Those frustrations collided with the restrictions imposed to combat the coronavirus, and the combination has proved explosive.
This episode contains strong language.
Infected with the coronavirus and separated from their peers in special dorms, some college students have taken to sharing their quarantine experiences on TikTok.
In some videos posted to the social media app, food is a source of discontent; one student filmed a disappointing breakfast — warm grape juice, an unripe orange, a “mystery” vegan muffin and an oat bar. Others broach more profound issues like missed deliveries of food and supplie.
It was within this TikTok community that Natasha Singer, our business technology reporter, found 19-year-old Zoie Terry, a sophomore at the University of Alabama, who was one of the first students to be sequestered at her college’s isolation facility.
Today, we speak to Ms. Terry about her experience and explore what it tells us about the reopening of colleges.
Guest: Natasha Singer, a technology reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Zoie Terry, a sophomore at the University of Alabama.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Across America, colleges that have reopened for in-person teaching are struggling to contain the spread of the coronavirus. To this end, the institutions are using one of the oldest infection control measures: quarantine.
- While universities in other states were closing their doors, the University of Alabama opened up to students, banking on its testing and technology program to prevent an outbreak.
“The entire state is burning.” That was the refrain Jack Healy, our national correspondent, kept hearing when he arrived in the fire zone in Oregon.
The scale of the wildfires is dizzying — millions of acres have burned, 30 different blazes are raging and thousands of people have been displaced.
Dry conditions, exacerbated by climate change and combined with a windstorm, created the deadly tinderbox.
The disaster has proved a fertile ground for misinformation: Widely discredited rumors spread on social media claiming that antifa activists were setting fires and looting.
Today, we hear from people living in the fire’s path who told Jack about the toll the flames had exacted.
Guest: Jack Healy, a national correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- “The long-term recovery is going to last years,” an emergency management director said as the fires left a humanitarian disaster in their wake.
- The fearmongering and false rumors that accompanied a tumultuous summer of protests in Oregon have become a volatile complication in the disaster.
This episode contains strong language.
After Donald Trump was elected president, two filmmakers were granted rare access to the operations of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Since Mr. Trump had campaigned on a hard-line immigration agenda, the leaders of the usually secretive agency jumped at a chance to have their story told from the inside. Today, we speak to the filmmakers about what they saw during nearly three years at ICE and how the Trump administration reacted to a cut of the film.
Guests: Christina Clusiau and Shaul Schwarz, the filmmakers behind the six-hour documentary series “Immigration Nation.”
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Trump administration has threatened the two filmmakers with legal action and fought to delay the release of “Immigration Nation” until after the election.
Prince is 9 years old, ebullient and bright; he has spent much of the pandemic navigating the Google Classroom app from his mother’s phone.
The uncertainty and isolation of the coronavirus lockdown is not new to him — he is one of New York City’s more than 100,000 homeless schoolchildren, the largest demographic within the homeless population.
Families like Prince’s are largely invisible.
Samantha M. Shapiro, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, has spent the last two years speaking with over a dozen homeless families with children of school age. On this week’s The Sunday Read, she explores what their lives are like.
This story was written by Samantha M. Shapiro and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
When many in California talk about this year’s wildfires, they describe the color — the apocalyptic, ominous, red-orange glow in the sky.
The state’s current wildfires have seen two and a half million acres already burned.
Climate change has made conditions ripe for fires: Temperatures are higher and the landscape drier. But the destruction has also become more acute because of the number of homes that are built on the wildland-urban interface — where development meets wild vegetation.
The pressures of California’s population have meant that towns are encouraged to build in high-risk areas. And when a development is ravaged by a fire, it is often rebuilt, starting the cycle of destruction over again.
Today, we explore the practice of building houses in fire zones and the role insurance companies could play in disrupting this cycle.
Guest: Christopher Flavelle, who covers the impact of global warming on people, governments and industries for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- “People are always asking, ‘Is this the new normal?’” a climate scientist said. “I always say no. It’s going to get worse.” If climate change was an abstract notion a decade ago, today it is all too real for Californians.
- Research suggests that most Americans support restrictions on building homes in fire- or flood-prone areas.
This episode contains strong language.
“So there’s just shooting, like we’re both on the ground,” Kenneth Walker, Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend, said of the raid on her home. “I don’t know where these shots are coming from, and I’m scared.”
Much of what happened on the night the police killed Ms. Taylor is unclear.
As part of an investigation for The New York Times, our correspondent Rukmini Callimachi and the filmmaker Yoruba Richen spoke to neighbors and trawled through legal documents, police records and call logs to understand what happened that night and why.
In the second and final part of the series, Rukmini talks about her findings.
Guest: Rukmini Callimachi, a correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Run-ins with the law by Jamarcus Glover, Ms. Taylor’s ex-boyfriend, entangled her even as she tried to move on. An investigation involving interviews, documents and jailhouse recordings helps explain what happened the night she was killed and how she landed in the middle of a deadly drug raid.
At the beginning of 2020, Breonna Taylor posted on social media that it was going to be her year. She was planning a family with her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker; she had a new job and a new car. She had also blocked Jamarcus Glover, a convicted drug dealer with whom she had been romantically involved on and off since 2016, from her phone.
But forces were already in motion. The Louisville Police Department was preparing raids on locations it had linked to Mr. Glover — and Ms. Taylor’s address was on the target list.
In the raid that ensued, Ms. Taylor was fatally shot. Her name has since become a rallying cry for protesters. Today, in the first of two parts, we explore Ms. Taylor’s life and how law enforcement ended up at her door.
Guests: Rukmini Callimachi, a correspondent for The Times, and Yoruba Richen, a documentary filmmaker, talk to Ms. Taylor’s mother, Tamika Palmer; her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker; and her cousin, Preonia Flakes.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The story of what happened the night Breonna Taylor was killed remains largely untold. A Times Investigation explores the path to the shooting and its consequences.
This episode contains strong language.
In March, Daniel Prude was exhibiting signs of a mental health crisis. His brother called an ambulance in the hopes that Mr. Prude would be hospitalized, but he was sent back home after three hours without a diagnosis.
Later, when Mr. Prude ran out of the house barely clothed into the Rochester night, his brother, Joe Prude, again called on the authorities for help, but this time it was to the police.
After a struggle with officers, Daniel Prude suffered cardiac distress. It would be days before Joe Prude was able to visit him in the hospital — permitted only so he could decide whether to take his brother off life support — and months before the family would find out what had happened when he was apprehended.
Today, we hear from Joe Prude about that night and examine the actions taken by the police during his brother’s arrest, including the official narrative that emerged after his death.
Guest: Sarah Maslin Nir, a reporter for The New York Times, who spoke to Daniel Prude’s brother, Joe Prude.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In the minutes after Mr. Prude’s heart briefly stopped during a struggle with officers, an unofficial police narrative took hold: He had suffered a drug overdose. But the release of body camera footage complicated that version of events.
- The Monroe County medical examiner ruled Mr. Prude’s death a homicide caused by “complications of asphyxia in the setting of physical restraint.” Seven Rochester police officers have now been suspended.
Three months into Broadway’s shutdown because of the coronavirus pandemic, Michael Paulson, a theater reporter for The New York Times, got a call from a theater in western Massachusetts — they planned to put on “Godspell,” a well-loved and much-performed musical from 1971, in the summer.
Today, we explore how, in the face of huge complications and potentially crushing risks, a regional production attempted to bring theater back to life.
Guest: Michael Paulson, a theater reporter for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Masks, partitions and a contactless crucifixion — the Berkshire Theater Group’s production of Godspell, labeled one of the “huggiest musicals ever created,” is also a kind of public health experiment.
This episode contains strong language.
Jimmy Lai was born in mainland China but made his fortune in Hong Kong, starting as a sweatshop worker and becoming a clothing tycoon. After the Tiananmen massacre in 1989, he turned his attention to the media, launching publications critical of China’s Communist Party.
“I believe in the media,” he told Austin Ramzy, a Hong Kong reporter for The New York Times. “By delivering information, you’re actually delivering freedom.”
In August, he was arrested under Hong Kong’s new Beijing-sponsored national security law.
Today, we talk to Mr. Lai about his life, his arrest and campaigning for democracy in the face of China’s growing power.
Guests: Austin Ramzy, who covers Hong Kong for The New York Times, spoke with Jimmy Lai, a pro-democracy media tycoon and founder of Apple Daily.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In August, Mr. Lai, his two sons and four executives from Apple Daily were arrested under the new national security law. The publication was a target and a test case for the government’s authority over the media.
Aleksandr Lukashenko came to office in Belarus in the 1990s on a nostalgic message, promising to undo moves toward a market economy and end the hardship the country had endured after gaining independence from the Soviet Union. As president, he acquired dictatorial powers, removing term limits, cracking down on opposition and stifling the press.
In recent years, however, economic stagnation has bred growing discontent. And when Mr. Lukashenko claimed an implausible landslide victory in a presidential election last month, he found himself facing mass protests that have only grown as he has attempted to crush them.
Today, we chart Mr. Lukashenko’s rise to power and examine his fight to hold on to it.
Guest: Ivan Nechepurenko, a reporter with the Moscow bureau of The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The protests in Belarus present the greatest challenge yet to Mr. Lukashenko’s hold on power. Formerly apolitical people have taken to the streets against him.
- Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the opposition candidate who has galvanized the movement against Mr. Lukashenko, is a newcomer to politics who took up the role when more established figures were jailed or exiled.
Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s plan for winning the presidential election relies on putting together African-American voters of all ages, including younger Black people who are less enthusiastic about him, and white moderates who find President Trump unacceptable.
At last week’s Republican National Convention, the Trump campaign appeared to be sowing discord within that coalition. By framing the response to unrest in cities as binary — you are either for violence or for the police — Republicans seemed to be daring Mr. Biden to challenge young Black voters.
In a speech in Pittsburgh yesterday, Mr. Biden rejected that choice. Instead, he recognized the grievances of peaceful protesters, while denouncing “the senseless violence of looting and burning and destruction of property.”
Today, we examine whether the speech worked — and what it means for the rest of the election campaign.
Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Over the weekend, protesters and Trump supporters clashed in Portland, resulting in the fatal shooting of a man affiliated with a right-wing group. The shooting immediately reverberated in a presidential campaign now entering its most intense period.
- In his speech in Pittsburg, Joe Biden deflected Republican criticism and attempted to refocus the spotlight on the president’s character and leadership in the midst of the pandemic.
This episode contains strong language.
As a police officer in his hometown of Flint, Mich., Scott Watson has worked to become a pillar of the community, believing his identity has placed him in a unique position to do his job. He has given out his cellphone number, driven students to prom and provided food and money to those who were hungry.
After watching the video of the killing of George Floyd, his identity as a Black police officer became a source of self-consciousness instead of pride.
Today, we speak to Mr. Watson about his career and the internal conflicts that have arisen from his role.
Guest: Scott Watson, a Black police officer in Flint, Mich.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Many Black and Hispanic officers in New York City have found themselves caught between competing loyalties in the wake of the killing of George Floyd.
Many American states use the labor of inmates to help fight its fires, but none so more than California. Using incarcerated firefighters saves the state’s taxpayers an estimated $100 million a year.
The women that choose to enter the firefighting camps are afforded better pay, by prison standards, and an improved quality of time served. However, the money they earn from putting their lives on the line is dwarfed by the salaries of the civilian firefighters they work alongside — one woman reports to earn $500 a year, compared with the $40,000 starting salary on the outside.
On today’s episode of The Sunday Read, Jaime Lowe explores California’s invisible line of defense against wildfires.
This story was written by Jaime Lowe and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
For much of his life, Donald Trump Jr. has been disregarded by his father. He played only a bit part in the 2016 campaign and when the team departed for Washington, he was left to oversee a largely unimportant part of the Trump Organization. But after The New York Times revealed that he had played an integral role in organizing the Trump Tower meeting between campaign officials and Russians promising information on Hillary Clinton, the younger Mr. Trump struck back hard at his father’s detractors and the media, finding a voice and an audience. Aggressive, politically incorrect and with an instinctual understanding of the president’s appeal, he has become a conservative darling and his father’s most sought-after surrogate. Today, we look at his rise to prominence. Guest: Jason Zengerle, a writer at large for The New York Times Magazine.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Read Jason Zengerle’s account of how Donald Trump Jr.’s became his father’s most valuable political weapon.
This episode contains strong language.
The shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black father from Kenosha, Wis., by a white police officer has reverberated through the city, fueling protests and unrest. There have been marches and demonstrations, as well as instances of destruction: businesses and property set alight, fireworks launched at the police.
On Tuesday night, a group of armed men, who claimed to be there to protect the community, arrived. Three protesters were shot, two of whom died. Kyle Rittenhouse, a white 17-year-old from Illinois, is suspected of being the gunman.
We speak with Julie Bosman, a national correspondent for The Times, about what is happening in her hometown.
Guest: Julie Bosman, a national correspondent for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Kenosha has become the latest flash point in a season of unrest that began with the killing of George Floyd.
- Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, is facing a charge of first-degree intentional homicide. The Times’s visual investigation team tracked his movements on Tuesday night.
- The turmoil in Wisconsin has led some residents to feel that Democratic leaders are failing to keep control of the situation.
At the 1968 Republican National Convention, Richard Nixon made an appeal to voters in the suburbs concerned about racial unrest across the United States after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. They helped deliver him the presidency that year, cementing suburbanites’ role as an integral voting bloc.
The 2020 election is also taking place against a backdrop of mass protests and unrest over racial justice. And speaker after speaker at the Republican National Convention has used the themes and language of 1968 to play on the perceived fears of suburban voters — cities on fire, the need to restore law and order.
But a strategy that worked for Richard Nixon in 1968 might not be effective for Donald Trump in 2020.
Today, we speak to Emily Badger about the power of the suburban vote and explore whether Republican messaging on the Black Lives Matter protests and law and order will land.
Guest: Emily Badger, who covers cities and urban policy for The New York Times
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Republican National Convention has presented the president as a steady steward of the country’s promise — a message that seemed tailored to suburban voters.
- President Trump is attempting to win over suburban voters by playing to their perceived fears. But polls show they disapprove of the president’s job performance in general and his handling of race relations in particular.
In the U.S., emergency-use authorization has been granted for convalescent plasma, the efficacy of which is yet to be robustly tested. For some, this echoes the situation with hydroxychloroquine and the government’s subsequent U-turn on its rollout.
Meanwhile, America’s infection rate appears to be flattening out — but at tens of thousands of cases per day. This stands in stark contrast to China, where daily cases are under 40.
Overseas, a Hong Kong resident has been reinfected with the virus, the first recorded instance of a second bout. And Russia and China have begun distributing vaccines, sidestepping Phase 3 safety trials to the incredulity of immunologists and vaccine executives.
We check back in with Donald G. McNeil Jr. on the coronavirus and the impact of these developments.
Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A 33-year-old man in Hong Kong was infected with the coronavirus for a second time. It is unclear how often people might become reinfected, and how soon after the first bout.
- Despite flattening, America’s infection rate remains one of the highest in the world.
- The F.D.A. has permitted the expansion of convalescent plasma treatment after pressure from President Trump.
- Russia has approved a coronavirus vaccine and is set to begin mass vaccinations in the fall. China has reportedly been giving experimental vaccines to high-risk groups since July.
Gun violence is on the rise in New York City. By the end of July, there had been more shootings in 2020 than in all of 2019. Shootings have risen in other metropolises, too, including Atlanta, Chicago, Denver and Houston.
Several theories have been advanced about why. Experts on crime say the coronavirus outbreak has deepened the endemic problems that often underlie gun violence, including poverty, unemployment, housing instability and hunger.
Police leaders also cite budget cuts and a political climate that has made officers reluctant to carry out arrests because of what they see as unfair scrutiny of their conduct.
Today, we look at how the various diagnoses could influence activists’ calls for the police to be defunded.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- “Right now, communities are being held hostage by the cops and the robbers at the same time,” a City Council member from Queens said. The summertime surge in shootings is unlike anything New York has seen in two decades.
- The summer usually brings with it an increase in violent crime. Across the U.S., as many states emerge from lockdown, the increase has been steeper than usual.
Much of the fashion industry has buckled under the weight of the coronavirus — it appears to have sped up the inevitable.
This story was written by Irina Aleksander and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
When the coronavirus hit the United States, the N.B.A. was faced with a unique challenge. It seemed impossible to impose social distancing in basketball, an indoor sport with players almost constantly jostling one another for more than two hours. However, there was a big financial incentive to keep games going: ending the 2019 season early would have cost the league an estimated $1 billion in television revenue.
The solution? A sealed campus for players, staff and selected journalists at Disney World in Florida.
Marc Stein, who covers the N.B.A. for The New York Times, has been living out of a hotel room in the complex for the last 40 days. Today, we speak to him about what life is like inside the bubble.
Guest: Marc Stein, a sports reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Twenty-two of the league’s 30 teams are living in the Disney World complex. Life on the campus is both strange and mundane.
- The N.B.A. has sought to replicate the home-court edge through music, audio cues and graphics from the “home” teams’ arenas.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. first ran for president in 1988, when his campaign was cut short after he made a series of blunders. After six terms in the Senate, he tried again in 2008 but failed to gain any traction in a contest won by Barack Obama. In the current political landscape, however, his focus on personal integrity and experience, which were also centerpieces of his previous campaigns, has proved much more compelling. Today, we chart Mr. Biden’s political journey and explore the baggage he will carry into the November election. Guest: Matt Flegenheimer, a national politics reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden’s political career has been marked by personal loss. Eulogies he has delivered offer an insight into how he would lead a nation grappling with death and crisis.
- “I’ve done some dumb things. And I’ll do dumb things again.” The former vice president’s campaign for the 1988 Democratic nomination reveals the political flaws that continue to color his public life.
The installation of Louis DeJoy as postmaster general has caused alarm. Since taking up the role in June, he has enacted a number of cuts to the Postal Service: ending overtime for workers, limiting how many runs they can make in a day, reassigning more than 20 executives and, from the perspective of the unions, speeding up the removal of mail-sorting machines.
The actions of Mr. DeJoy, a Republican megadonor and Trump ally, have been interpreted by many Democrats as an attempt to sabotage the election in concert with President Trump, who has himself admitted to wanting to limit funding that could help mail-in voting.
Today, we explore to what extent Mr. Trump is using the post office, and the postmaster general, to influence the election.
Guest: Luke Broadwater, a congressional reporter at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Postmaster General DeJoy has ushered in measures that, three months out from an election that is expected to rely heavily on mail-in voting, have caused widespread delays.
- Amid warnings that changes to the agency may disenfranchise voters, Speaker Nancy Pelosi recalled the House from summer recess to vote on legislation blocking any further steps. Mr. DeJoy will testify before the Senate on Friday.
- In response to mounting criticism, the Postal Service has suspended operational changes until after the election. It is unclear whether changes already in place will be reversed.
In March 2018, Mark Landler — then a White House correspondent at The New York Times — attended a dinner party hosted by the United Arab Emirates’ ambassador, Yousef al-Otaiba, at a Washington restaurant. There he witnessed a chance encounter between the ambassador and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel — one the ambassador asked to keep private. Two years after that delicate conversation, Israel and the United Arab Emirates have agreed to normalize diplomatic and trade relations. Today, we speak to Mr. Landler about Trump administration’s role in the agreement, what normalization means for Palestinians and what it says about the Middle East’s political climate. Guest: Mark Landler, London bureau chief at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Arab Spring, growing power of Iranian proxies and demographic changes — how changing dynamics in the Middle East set the stage for the deal.
- The U.A.E. has agreed to normalization in exchange for Israel’s suspending annexation of areas in the occupied West Bank. Many Palestinians see the deal as less of a balm and more of a stab in the back.
Operation Warp Speed has in some ways lived up to its name: The U.S. government has awarded almost $11 billion to seven different companies to develop vaccines, three of which — Moderna, AstraZeneca and Pfizer — are in late-stage trials.
Things are going according to the most aggressive schedule.
However, accelerating the development process has increased the likelihood of cronyism and undue political influence.
Today, we ask whether the White House’s defiance of the timelines that have long governed the development of vaccines is working.
Guest: Katie Thomas, a reporter at The New York Times who covers the health care sector, with a focus on the drug industry.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- There is a lot of optimism surrounding the coronavirus vaccine and its potential to usher in a return to normality in the near future — but doctors warn that those expectations ought to be tempered.
- With thousands dying, economic tumult and a looming election, the U.S. government is eager to start vaccinating as soon as possible. Experts worry that the Trump administration will push the Food and Drug Administration to overlook insufficient data.
- The vaccine effort has spelled big profits for corporate insiders.
What is the extent of Russia’s interest in the 2020 U.S. election? Last year, a classified report written by intelligence officials tried to answer this question.
In this episode, Robert Draper, a writer-at-large at The New York Times Magazine, explores what happened after the report — which stated that President Trump was Russia’s favored candidate in the upcoming election — was drafted.
This story was written by Robert Draper and recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
“As a Black woman who works at Adidas my experiences have never been business as usual.”
Julia Bond, an assistant apparel designer at the sportswear giant, says she had resigned herself to experiencing and witnessing racism at work — until she saw the George Floyd video.
Today, we speak to Ms. Bond, an assistant apparel designer at Adidas, who has brought the global racial reckoning to the company’s front door.
Wanting more than just schemes and targets, she has been protesting in front of the company’s Portland headquarters every day since June, awaiting an apology from leadership and an admission that they have enabled racism and discrimination. Guest: Julia Bond, Julia Bond, assistant apparel designer at Adidas, who has been protesting outside the company’s Portland headquarters for the last three months. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Adidas has made a number of pledges to diversify its work force. However, Black employees want more: an admission that the company’s leadership has enabled racism and an apology.
- From Facebook’s pledge to double the number of Black and Latinx by 2023 to YouTube creating a $100 million fund for Black creators, organizations across the U.S. have committed to redressing racial imbalance.
With the possibility that millions or tens of millions of American children will not enter a classroom for an entire year, school districts face an agonizing choice: Do the benefits of in-person learning outweigh the risks it poses to public health in a pandemic? Today, we explore how teachers and their unions are responding to demands from some parents, and the president, to reopen their schools this fall. Guest: Dana Goldstein, a national correspondent for The New York Times, who covers the impact of education policies on families, students and teachers. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- With almost 1,200 staff and students now quarantined, the reopening of Atlanta’s Cherokee County School District could presage a difficult back-to-school season.
- Many teachers are anxious and angry: They say crucial questions about how schools will stay clean, keep students physically distanced and prevent further spread of the virus have not been answered.
- Our illustrator imagined what going back to school might look like this fall.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. picked Senator Kamala Harris of California as his running mate, making her the first Black woman and the first Asian American woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket. Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times, shares his thoughts on the decision. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Joe Biden selected Kamala Harris as his vice-presidential running mate on Tuesday. She will be the first is the first Black woman and the first person of Indian descent to be nominated for the office by a major party.
- The selection of Ms. Harris was conventional by some political standards, and groundbreaking in others. Democrats hope that having her on the ticket will attract moderates and Black voters in swing states.
- Here’s what you should know about the California senator and her stances on key policy issues.
Yesterday on “The Daily,” the New York Times reporter Jonah Bromwich explained how the idea of cancel culture has emerged as a political and cultural force in 2020. In the second of two parts, he returns with a case study.
Guest: Jonah Engel Bromwich, who writes for the Styles section of The New York Times, spoke with Zeeshan Aleem about his experience of cancel culture.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s the first episode in this two-part series exploring cancel culture’s origins and political power.
- There’s an emerging class of people canceled for bad, conservative or offensive opinions. Cancellation is bringing many of them together.
- For teenagers, cancellation on social media is not a new phenomenon. Here are some of their own experiences with being canceled.
In the first of two parts, the New York Times reporter Jonah Bromwich explains the origins of cancel culture and why it’s a 2020 election story worth paying attention to.
Guest: Jonah Engel Bromwich, who writes for the Styles section of The New York Times
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- What does it mean to be canceled? It can take only one thing — and sometimes, nothing — for fans to dump a celebrity.
- Many figures in the public eye — including Kanye West and J.K. Rowling — have fretted about being, or claimed to have been, canceled. When an open letter published by Harper’s and signed by 153 prominent artists warned against an “intolerant climate” engulfing the culture, the reaction was swift.
- The prevalence of “call-out culture” is something former President Barack Obama has challenged.
John Aldridge fell overboard in the middle of the night, 40 miles from shore, and the Coast Guard was looking in the wrong place. This is a story about isolation — and our struggle to close the space between us.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
This is the article read in this episode, written by Paul Tough.
It’s been four years since the 2016 election laid bare the powerful role that social media companies have come to play in shaping political discourse and beliefs in America.
Since then, there have been growing calls to address the spread of polarization and misinformation promoted on such platforms.
While Facebook has been slower to acknowledge a need for change, Twitter has embraced the challenge, acknowledging that the company made mistakes in the past. But with three months to go until the 2020 election, these changes have been incremental, and Twitter itself is more popular than ever.
Today, Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s C.E.O., discusses the platform’s flaws, its polarizing potential — and his vision for the future.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A 17-year-old in Florida was recently responsible for one of the worst hacking attacks in Twitter’s history — successfully breaching the accounts of some of the world’s most famous people, including Barack Obama, Kanye West and Elon Musk. But did the teenager do the country a favor?
- Twitter is in hot water with the government for sharing with advertisers phone numbers given to the company for personal security purposes
A mangled yellow door. Shattered glass. Blood.
A devastating explosion of ammonium nitrate stored at the port in Beirut killed at least 135 people and razed entire neighborhoods on Tuesday. This is what our correspondent in the Lebanese capital saw when the blast turned her apartment “into a demolition site” — and what happened in the hours after.
Guest: Vivian Yee, our correspondent based in Beirut. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- As the shock of the blast turns to anger in Lebanon, this is what we know so far about the explosion.
- In a land conditioned by calamity, Vivian wrote about what it felt like to emerge from the debris into the kindness of strangers and friends.
Demonstrations against police brutality are entering their third month, but meaningful policy action has not happened. We speak with one demonstrator about her journey to the front lines of recent protests — and the lessons she’s learned about the pace of change.
Caitlin Dickerson, an immigration reporter at The New York Times, spoke with Sharhonda Bossier, deputy director at Education Leaders of Color, an advocacy group.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- While protests in most American cities have tapered off, the confrontation between protesters and federal agents in downtown Portland, Ore., continues.
- Here is our latest reporting on the protests against racism and police violence that spread around the world after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May.
The United States is preparing to hold its first ever socially distant presidential election. But will it actually work?
Guest: Reid J. Epstein, who covers campaigns and elections for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- President Trump’s suggestion that the Nov. 3 vote could be delayed — something he cannot do on his own — drew unusually firm Republican resistance and signaled worry about his re-election bid.
- Georgia’s troubled primary elections in June may be a preview of graver battles coming in the general election.
Facial recognition is becoming an increasingly central component of police departments’ efforts to solve crimes. But can algorithms harbor racial bias?
Guest: Annie Brown, a producer for The New York Times, speaks with Kashmir Hill, a technology reporter, about her interview with Robert Julian-Borchak Williams, who was arrested after being misidentified as a criminal by an algorithm. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In response to Mr. Williams’s story being published by The New York Times, the Wayne County prosecutor’s office said that he could have the case and his fingerprint data expunged.
In this episode, Leslie Jamison, a writer and teacher, explores the potentially constructive force of female anger — and the shame that can get attached to it.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
The remains of Vanessa Guillen, an Army specialist, were discovered last month about 25 miles from Fort Hood in central Texas. She was the victim, officials said, of a fellow soldier. Now her death has attracted the attention of the nation — veterans, active-duty service members and civilians.
Today, we examine what some claim to be a pervasive culture of sexual harassment inside the U.S. military. Guest: Jennifer Steinhauer, a Washington reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Women from the military say the response to Specialist Guillen’s killing is their #MeToo moment and a prompt to examine racial inequities in the service.
The C.E.O.s of America’s most influential technology companies — Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook — were brought before Congress to answer a question: Are they too powerful?
Today, we talk to our colleague who was in the room about what happened. Guest: Cecilia Kang, a technology and regulatory policy reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In the hearing, the chiefs of Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook faced withering questions from Democrats about anti-competitive practices and from Republicans about anti-conservative bias.
A cooperative relationship with China has been a pillar of U.S. foreign policy for more than half a century. So why does the Trump administration think it’s time for a change? Guest: Edward Wong, a diplomatic correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Why top aides to President Trump want to leave a lasting legacy of ruptured diplomatic ties between China and the United States.
A fight has erupted among congressional Republicans over how long and how generously the government should help those unemployed during the pandemic. But what is that battle really about? Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Supplemental checks for laid-off workers are set to stop at the end of July. Republicans and Democrats disagree on what to do next.
- Why the two parties are unlikely to reach a deal before the end of the month.
A New York Times investigation found that surviving the coronavirus in New York had a lot to do with which hospital a person went to. Our investigative reporter Brian M. Rosenthal pulls back the curtain on inequality and the pandemic in the city.
Guest: Brian M. Rosenthal, an investigative reporter on the Metro Desk of The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- At the peak of New York’s pandemic, patients at some community hospitals were three times more likely to die than were patients at medical centers in the wealthiest parts of the city.
- The story of a $52 million temporary care facility in New York illustrates the missteps made at every level of government in the race to create more hospital capacity.
When the university told one woman about the sexual-harassment complaints against her wife, they knew they weren’t true. But they had no idea how strange the truth really was.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
This episode contains strong language.
Today, we go inside the fraught weeks that led up to the opening game of the 2020 professional baseball season — from the perspective of the commissioner of Major League Baseball. Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security for The New York Times, spoke with Rob Manfred, the commissioner of Major League Baseball. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The schedule is short. The stadiums will be empty. This is what our baseball writer thinks the season might look like this year.
This episode contains strong language.
Federal agents dressed in camouflage and tactical gear have taken to the streets of Portland, Ore., unleashing tear gas, bloodying protesters and pulling some people into unmarked vans. Today, we go behind protest lines to ask why militarized federal authorities are being deployed to an American city. Guests: Zolan Kanno-Youngs, The New York Times’s homeland security correspondent, and Mike Baker, a Pacific Northwest correspondent for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The federal authorities said they would bring order to Portland, after weeks of protests. But local leaders believe the federal presence is making things worse, and a backlash has grown since the deployment began.
- Protesters have used everyday home items, including pool noodles, to try to fight the militarized force. This is what our reporter saw on the streets of Portland.
Around the world, safely reopening schools remains one of the most daunting challenges to restarting national economies. While approaches have been different, no country has tried to reopen schools with coronavirus infection rates at the level of the United States. Today, we explore the risks and rewards of the plan to reopen American schools this fall. Guest: Pam Belluck, a health and science writer at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The pressure to bring American students back to classrooms is intense, but the calculus is tricky with infections out of control in many communities.
- Local economies might not fully recover until working parents can send children to school. Here’s why the plan to reopen New York City schools is so important.
Public health officials and private researchers have vowed to develop a coronavirus vaccine in record time. But could that rush backfire? Guest: Jan Hoffman, a health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Billions of dollars are being poured into developing a coronavirus vaccine, but the rapid timetable may be creating even more vaccine-hesitant patients.
- Three vaccine developers report that early trials showed promising results with minimal side effects, but one researcher cautioned, “There is still a long way to go.”
This episode includes disturbing language including racial slurs.
Representative John Lewis, a stalwart of the civil rights era, died on Friday. We take a look at his life, lessons and legacy.
Guest: Brent Staples, a member of the Times editorial board.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Lewis, a son of sharecroppers and an apostle of nonviolence who was bloodied at Selma, Ala., and across the Jim Crow South in the historic struggle for racial equality, and who then carried a mantle of moral authority into Congress, died on Friday. He was 80.
- Bipartisan praise poured in for the civil rights leader, as friends, colleagues and admirers reached for the appropriate superlatives to sum up an extraordinary life.
- Mr. Lewis risked his life for justice, The Times’s editorial board wrote.
When the Iowa Attorney General's office began investigating an unclaimed lottery ticket worth millions, an incredible string of unlikely winners came to light, and a trail that pointed to an inside job. Today, listen to a story about mortality — about our greed, hubris and, ultimately, humility.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
For the remainder of this week, “The Daily” is revisiting episodes with people we met in the early weeks of the pandemic to hear what’s happened to them since our original conversations were first aired.
Climbing on the roof to look at stars in the middle of summer. Making French toast and popcorn. Kind eyes. These are some of the memories Tilly Breimhorst has of her grandfather, Craig. We spoke with Tilly in May about losing her grandfather to coronavirus. Today, we check back in with her.
Guest: Matilda Breimhorst, a 12-year-old who recently lost her grandfather to the coronavirus. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In personal and profound ways, the coronavirus crisis has created a sense of jasmincollective loss. Here are some ways to grieve.
For the remainder of this week, “The Daily” is revisiting episodes with people we met in the early weeks of the coronavirus pandemic to hear what has happened to them since our original conversations were first aired.
As state stay-at-home orders expired, small business owners faced a daunting question: Should they risk the survival of their company, or their health? Today, we speak again with one restaurant owner about the decision she made.
Guest: Jasmine Lombrage, a restaurant owner in Baton Rouge, La. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In personal and profound ways, the coronavirus crisis has created a sense of collective loss. Here are some ways to grieve.
For the remainder of this week, “The Daily” is revisiting episodes with people we met in the early weeks of the coronavirus pandemic to hear what has happened to them since our original conversations were aired.
One of the largest coronavirus outbreaks in the United States was inside the Smithfield pork factory in Sioux Falls, S.D. Today, we revisit our conversation with a worker at the plant, a refugee who survived civil war and malaria only to find her life and livelihood threatened anew — and ask her how she has been doing since. Guests: Caitlin Dickerson, who covers immigration for The New York Times, and Achut Deng, a Sudanese refugee who works for Smithfield. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Refugees from around the world worked at the Smithfield pork factory. Then they faced mounting illness and the sudden loss of their jobs.
For the remainder of this week, “The Daily” is revisiting episodes with people we met in the early weeks of the coronavirus pandemic to hear what has happened to them since our original conversations were first aired.
Italy was an early epicenter of the pandemic in Europe. In March, we spoke to a doctor who was triaging patients north of Milan about the road that might lie ahead for the United States. Today, we call him again to hear what it was like to discharge his last coronavirus patient while the American caseload soars. Guest: Dr. Fabiano Di Marco, a professor at the University of Milan and the head of the respiratory unit of the Hospital Papa Giovanni XXIII in Bergamo. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Italy was one of the first countries in Europe to institute a nationwide lockdown and, later, to choose a cautious approach to reopening public spaces. Here is a comparison of how successful other countries have been in their subsequent responses to the pandemic.
After protests convulsed Hong Kong for much of the last year, the city’s pro-democracy movement has been chilled by a new law that some say may change the semiautomonous territory forever. Today, we examine why China chose this moment to assert control, and what the new law means for the city’s future. Guest: Austin Ramzy, a reporter in Hong Kong for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The new legislation grants Beijing broad powers to crack down on a variety of political crimes in Hong Kong and schools are being overhauled to teach loyalty to China.
- Here’s how the city’s residents are navigating its new reality.
As the coronavirus pandemic swept the world, The New York Times Magazine asked 29 authors to write new short stories inspired by the moment — and by Giovanni Boccaccio’s “The Decameron,” which was written as a plague ravaged Florence in the 14th century. We’ve selected two for you to hear today.
These stories were written by Tommy Orange and Edwidge Danticat. They were recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that President Trump cannot block the release of his financial records. Today, we hear the story behind the two cases the justices heard — and the meaning of their decisions.
Guest:
- David Enrich, the business investigations editor for The New York Times.
- Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Court cleared the way for prosecutors in New York to seek President Trump’s financial records — but stopped Congress from accessing the records by subpoena for now.
- Our chief White House correspondent writes that the Supreme Court affirmed the power of judicial independence by dismissing President Trump’s claims of immunity.
At the end of January, long before the world understood that seemingly healthy people could spread the coronavirus, a doctor in Germany tried to sound the alarm. Today, we look at why that warning was unwelcome.
Guests: Matt Apuzzo, an investigative reporter for The New York Times based in Brussels.
Dr. Camilla Rothe, an infectious disease specialist at Munich University Hospital.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- At the end of March, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that as many as 25 percent of those infected by the coronavirus may not show symptoms.
- Some scientists have criticized the World Health Organization over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, saying its statements and advice sometimes lag behind research.
For months, the U.S. government has been quietly collecting information on hundreds of thousands of coronavirus cases across the country. Today, we tell the story of how The Times got hold of that data, and what it says about the nation’s outbreak.
Plus: a conversation with three U.S. astronauts aboard the International Space Station.
Guests: Robert Gebeloff, a reporter for The New York Times specializing in data analysis.
Bob Behnken, Doug Hurley and Chris Cassidy, NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The C.D.C. figures provide the fullest and most extensive look yet at the racial inequity of the coronavirus.
- A Times analysis published in late May found that Democrats were far more likely to live in counties that had been ravaged by the virus, while Republicans were more likely to live in counties that had been relatively unscathed.
- A team of New York Times journalists is also working to track every coronavirus case in the United States, and The Times has made its data open to the public.
What President Trump’s divisive speech at Mount Rushmore reveals about his re-election campaign.
Guest: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Missteps by a fractured campaign and a series of self-inflicted wounds added up to a very bad June for President Trump.
- In speeches at the White House and Mount Rushmore last weekend, the president promoted a version of the “American carnage” vision from his inaugural address.
Infection rates broke records across the United States over the holiday weekend, with many of the most severe surges in areas that reopened fastest. One thing that seems to have played a factor: transmission indoors, such as in restaurants and bars. We break down the risk, and look at what else scientists have learned about the coronavirus and how it spreads. Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Many scientists have been saying for months that the coronavirus lingers in the air indoors, infecting those nearby. But the World Health Organization has been slow to agree.
- Black and Latino residents of the United States are nearly twice as likely to die from Covid-19 as their white neighbors, according to new data that provides the most comprehensive look yet at coronavirus patients in America.
Brazil has a long, distinguished history of successfully navigating public health crises. But in recent weeks, it has emerged as one of the world’s most severe coronavirus hot spots, second only to the United States. What went wrong?
Guest: Ernesto Londoño, The Times’s Brazil bureau chief
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s an overview of what you need to know about the coronavirus in Brazil.
- The country’s pioneering responses to past health crises, including AIDS and Zika, won global praise.
A New York Times investigation has revealed evidence of a secret Russian operation to kill U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan — and of the failure of the Trump administration to act on that intelligence. As lawmakers from both parties react with fury, one of the journalists who first reported the story tells us what has come to light so far.
Guest: Eric Schmitt, who covers terrorism and national security for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The Times reported on Monday that President Trump was provided a written briefing on the intelligence about the suspected Russian plot in late February.
- “If it does come out as true, obviously the heartache would be terrible,” said the father of a Marine who died in a 2019 car bombing in Afghanistan, which is reportedly the focus of investigators’ work.
The Supreme Court on Monday struck down a Louisiana law that could have left the state with a single abortion clinic. It was a setback for conservatives in the first major ruling on abortion since two Trump appointees joined the bench. We examine the implications for future challenges, and why — for the third time in two weeks — Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. sided with his four more liberal colleagues.
Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Chief Justice Roberts also voted with the court’s liberal wing in rulings on job discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. workers and on a program protecting young immigrants.
- The ruling on Monday stalled anti-abortion momentum for now, but the movement has a long pipeline of new cases.
- Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote that the Louisiana law was “almost word-for-word identical” to a law from Texas, which the court struck down in 2016.
In the weeks since George Floyd was killed by the Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, Americans have been confronting hard questions about bias and racism within law enforcement — and what the role of the police should be.
In the process, many have asked whether the culture of policing can be changed or if the system needs to be reimagined entirely. Today, we talk to an officer at the center of that debate inside one of the country’s largest police unions.
Guest: Vince Champion, the southeast regional director of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Protesters across the country are calling for the abolition of police forces. But what would that actually look like?
- Last week, the House passed a sweeping police overhaul bill, aimed at combating racial bias and excessive use of force, by a vote of 236 to 181. The bill is not expected to pass the Republican-controlled Senate.
In this episode of The Sunday Read, we look at the complexity, diversity and humanity of America through the eyes of Robert Frank — one of the most influential photographers in history — who, through his camera, collected the world.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Gregg Breinberg has been directing the chorus at Public School 22 on Staten Island for twenty years. He tells his fourth and fifth grade students that participation is not about whether they can sing on key or not. It’s about expressing the meaning of a song — and the music inside themselves. Today, we listen to the voices of P.S. 22 as they harmonize from afar.
Texas has become the latest hot spot in the coronavirus pandemic, forcing its governor to pause the state’s reopening process after a surge of infections and hospitalizations. We speak with our Houston correspondent about the state’s dilemma. Guest: Manny Fernandez, The New York Times’s bureau chief in Houston. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A growing number of state leaders are pausing plans to reopen as case counts rise. Among them is Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas, who did so reluctantly after facing mounting pressure in the Republican-controlled state.
- We analyzed travel patterns, hidden infections and genetic data to show how the epidemic has spun out of control in the United States.
This fall’s presidential race is likely to be decided by a handful of battleground states won by President Trump in 2016. So how do voters in those states view the candidates? Guest: Nate Cohn, who covers elections, polling and demographics for The Upshot at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- A New York Times/Siena College poll found that Joseph R. Biden Jr. is ahead of the president by 14 points, leading among women and nonwhite voters and cutting into his support with white voters.
Three months after mass layoffs began across America, 20 million Americans remain out of work because of the pandemic. Federal employment benefits are about to run out, and Congress can’t agree on more financial help. We called people struggling with unemployment to hear how they are doing. Guest: Julie Creswell, Sabrina Tavernise and Ben Casselman, reporters at The New York Times, spoke with Nicolle Nordman, Analía Rodríguez and Nakitta Long about being laid off. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Some people have started to return to work, but the recovery is uneven. More than a million new jobless claims continue to be filed each week, and certain industries are far outpacing others in the rebound from the mass job losses in April.
- The unemployment rate isn’t the whole story when it comes to understanding the economic impact of the pandemic.
This episode contains strong language.
Today’s Senate primary in Kentucky has been transformed by the outcry over police brutality. What can the election tell us about the future of Democratic politics? Guest: Jonathan Martin, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Amy McGrath was considered a safe bet in the Democratic primary in Kentucky. But the recent movement for racial justice has elevated the candidacy of her African-American rival, Charles Booker, in the race to defeat Mitch McConnell.
Companies like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have come out in support of Black Lives Matter and its mission. But are their platforms undermining the movement for racial justice? Guest: Kevin Roose, who covers technology, business and culture for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Kevin Roose explains why shows of support for Black Lives Matter from Facebook, Twitter and YouTube don’t address the way racists and partisan provocateurs have weaponized the platforms.
In today’s episode of The Sunday Read, Carvell Wallace considers why, for his kids, a global pandemic that shut down the world was not news — it was the opposite of news. It was a struggle that had, in some ways, always been a part of their lives.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
After 155 years, Juneteenth, a celebration of the emancipation of enslaved Americans, is being acknowledged as a holiday by corporations and state governments across the country. Today, we consider why, throughout its history, Juneteenth has gained prominence at moments of pain in the struggle for black liberation in America. We also ask: What does freedom mean now?
Guest: Dr. Daina Ramey Berry, a professor of history at the University of Texas at Austin. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In a project examining the history and import of Juneteenth, we ask: What is freedom in America?
- Opal Lee, 93, an activist and lifelong Texan, has campaigned to make June 19 a national holiday for years. This is her vision for honoring the emancipation of enslaved Americans.
In a 5-to-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that President Trump may not shut down Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, the program that shields immigrants brought to the United States as children from deportation. But is this the end of challenges to DACA?
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories.
Host: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times.
Background reading:
- This is the reasoning Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. gave for reversing the Trump administration decision.
- For thousands of “Dreamers,” as DACA recipients are known, following the ups and downs of the program’s fate has been a wild ride. Here’s why it’s not over yet.
Joseph R. Biden Jr. is looking for a potential vice president in one of the most tumultuous moments in modern American history. His selection committee is attempting to winnow an exceptionally diverse field. So who’s on the list? Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- This is where the top candidates stand in Mr. Biden’s search for a running mate.
This episode contains strong language.
Rayshard Brooks fell asleep in his car at a Wendy’s drive-through. Soon afterward, he was shot. We look closely at what happened in the minutes in between — and at the unrest his killing has sparked in Georgia.
Guest: Richard Fausset, a correspondent based in Atlanta. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here is our visual investigation into how Rayshard Brooks was shot and killed by the Atlanta police.
- The resignation of Atlanta’s police chief, Erika Shields, was the latest in a series of shake-ups at several large police departments.
The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that a landmark civil rights law protects gay and transgender workers from workplace discrimination. We examine the three words the case hung on; what the written opinions had to say about bathrooms, locker rooms, sports, pronouns and religious objections to same-sex marriage; and the implications for the ruling. Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times and Aimee Stephens, the lead plaintiff in a transgender discrimination case heard by the Supreme Court. Ms. Stephens died in May; she was 59. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Ms. Stephens was fired after she announced that she would live as a woman. She did not live to see the Supreme Court rule in her favor.
- Until Monday’s decision, it was legal in more than half of the states to fire workers for being gay, bisexual or transgender.
- The justices are confronting an unusually potent mix of political and social issues in the middle of both a presidential election year and a public health crisis. Here’s an overview of the major cases this year to get you up to speed.
States are reopening. Parks are crowded. Restaurants are filling, again, with diners. But is this dangerous? Six months into the pandemic, we reflect on what we’ve learned about the virus — and ask how that knowledge should chart the course forward. Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- As New York businesses reopened, Gov. Andrew Cuomo warned that a second wave of infections was almost inevitable if residents did not abide by social-distancing rules. “It will come,” he said. “And once it comes, it’s too late.”
- Restrictions are easing across the United States, but Arizona, Florida and Texas are reporting their highest case numbers yet. As of Saturday, coronavirus cases were climbing in 22 states.
In this episode of The Sunday Read, one man reflects on what it was like to go to prison as a child and to attempt to become an attorney upon his release. In doing so, he asks: What is punishment in America? What is it for? And how should we think about it?
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
The Times critic Wesley Morris had listened to Patti LaBelle’s live rendition of “If You Don’t Know Me by Now” over a hundred times before. But one recent Sunday, the song came on and he heard something new. “I heard her thinking through an ultimatum now being laid down in the streets of this country,” he went on to write. Soon after, he got a call from one Ms. Patti LaBelle.
Ronda McIntyre’s classroom is built around a big rug, where her students crowd together often for group instruction. But since March, when schools across the country shut down because of the coronavirus, she has had to try to create the same sense of community remotely. Her class, and her job, are not the same — and they may never be.
Guest: Ronda McIntyre, a grade-school teacher at Indianola Informal K-8 school in Columbus, Ohio. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Elizabeth A. Harris, a Times reporter, spoke with Ms. McIntyre earlier this year in the course of reporting about the frustrations of parents trying to do their jobs while helping children with class work.
- The realities of remote learning for fourteen other teachers, in illustrated vignettes.
- Restarting classes is central to reviving economies. But even as students in Europe return to school, a question hangs over the efforts: What’s the risk of children getting, and spreading, the virus?
A full-scale meltdown of new voting systems in Georgia is alarming Democratic leaders — and revealing a new national playing field — ahead of the general election in November. Today, we explore why voting access in Georgia has become a national issue for the party.
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Long lines and malfunctioning voting machines marred Georgia primary elections, renewing attention on voting rights there, and raising questions about how to ensure access to voting in the general election.
- With both Senate seats in play and President Trump up for re-election in November, Georgia Democrats are telling anyone who will listen: This time will be different.
This episode contains strong language.
Nearly 30 years ago, George Perry Floyd Jr. told a high school classmate he would “touch the world” someday. We went to the funeral in Houston of an outsize man who dreamed equally big and whose killing has galvanized a movement against racism across the globe.
Guest: Manny Fernandez, The New York Times’s bureau chief in Houston.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Floyd’s funeral served as both a national reckoning and a moment of personal mourning. The Rev. Al Sharpton demanded more action against police brutality.
- As a young man, Mr. Floyd had big plans for his future. This is the story of his life and dreams.
This episode contains strong language.
Several major U.S. cities are proposing ways to defund and even dismantle their police departments. But what would that actually look like? Guest: John Eligon, a national correspondent covering race for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In protests across the country, pleas for changes in policing have ranged from reform to abolition. Some proposed measures include restricting police use of military-style equipment and requiring officers to face strict discipline in cases of misconduct.
- Nine members of the Minneapolis City Council — a veto-proof majority — pledged to dismantle the city’s Police Department, promising to create a new system of public safety.
This episode contains strong language.
Across the country, the police have responded to protests over police brutality with more force. Today, we listen in on confrontations at demonstrations in New York. Guest: Ali Watkins, a crime and law enforcement reporter at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Across the country, police officers have responded to growing protests over police brutality with increasingly violent crowd control techniques, using batons, tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets on protesters, bystanders and journalists.
- In New York, officers have charged and swung batons at demonstrators after curfew with seemingly little provocation. The mayor said he would review any reports of inappropriate enforcement.
Today on “The Sunday Read,” listen to Claudia Rankine reflect on the precariousness of being black in America. Her words were written five years ago after avowed white supremacist Dylann Roof killed nine black people at a Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina. We are revisiting them now that they have — yet again — been rendered relevant.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing the series finale of “Rabbit Hole,” a Times podcast with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, we follow one QAnon believer’s journey through faith and loss — and what becomes of reality as our lives move online.
For more information on “Rabbit Hole” and today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/rabbithole.
This episode includes disturbing language including racial slurs.
They came together to protest the killing of George Floyd — and because what happened to him had echoes in their own experiences. Today, we speak with five protesters about the moments in their lives that brought them onto the streets.
Guests: Donfard Hubbard, 44, from Minneapolis; Rashaad Dinkins, 18, from Minneapolis; Joe Morris, 32, from Tallahassee, Fla.; Azalea Hernandez, 12, from Minneapolis; and Joyce Ladner, 76, from Washington. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
This episode contains sounds of explosives and descriptions of violence.
Today, we go inside a high-stakes White House debate over how President Trump should respond to reports that he was hiding in a bunker while the nation’s capital burned. This is the story of what happened in Lafayette Square. Guest: Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Our chief White House correspondent explains why, when the history of the Trump presidency is written, the clash with protesters that preceded President Trump’s walk across Lafayette Square may be remembered as one of its defining moments.
- “He did not pray,” said Mariann E. Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington, said of Mr. Trump’s militarized visit to St. John’s church for a photo opportunity. “He did not mention George Floyd.”
As nationwide protests about the death of George Floyd enter a second week, we speak with the leader of the city where they began. Guest: Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Frey came into office in 2018 on promises to fix the broken relationship between the community and law enforcement in the wake of two fatal police shootings. This is what he has done in the years since.
The Minneapolis police officer whose tactics led to George Floyd’s death had a long record of complaints against him. So why was he still on patrol? Guest: Shaila Dewan, a national reporter covering criminal justice for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Efforts to hold problem officers accountable often face resistance from unions, and juries are reluctant to second-guess police decisions.
- Violence escalated overnight in protests across the country, with police officers under fire in St. Louis and Las Vegas. Here are the latest updates.
This episode contains strong language.
Demonstrations have erupted in at least 140 cities across the United States in the days since George Floyd, a black man, died in police custody in Minneapolis. We were on the ground in some of them, chronicling 72 hours of pain and protest. Guests: Nikole Hannah-Jones, who writes for The New York Times Magazine; John Eligon, a national correspondent who covers race for The Times; and Mike Baker, a Pacific Northwest correspondent. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- The video discussed by Nikole Hannah-Jones in the episode is featured here.
- The Times has reporters on the ground in dozens of cities across the country. Here’s a look at what they’re seeing.
- George Floyd died one week ago today. Here’s a timeline of what has happened since.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 7 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, our reporter investigates the QAnon conspiracy theories. The story of QAnon believers, united in a battle against what they see as dark forces of the world, reveals where the internet is headed.
For more information on “Rabbit Hole” and today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/rabbithole.
As protests spread over the death of George Floyd, the former officer at the center of the case has been charged with murder. We listen in on the demonstrations, and examine why this tragedy — though too familiar — may be a turning point. Guest: Audra D. S. Burch, a national enterprise correspondent for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Derek Chauvin, a former police officer, was charged with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter for kneeling on the neck of Mr. Floyd for nearly nine minutes as he repeatedly pleaded “I can’t breathe.”
- In the year before their fatal encounter, Mr. Floyd and Mr. Chauvin worked at the same nightclub.
- Protests over racism and police violence have erupted across the U.S. Follow the latest updates.
Barbara Krupke won the lottery. Fred Walter Gray enjoyed his bacon and hash browns crispy. Orlando Moncada crawled through a hole in a fence to reach the United States. John Prine chronicled the human condition. Cornelia Ann Hunt left the world with gratitude.
Over 100,000 people have died from the coronavirus in the United States. Today, we glimpse inside the lives of just a few of them.
Background reading:
- Memories collected from obituaries across the country help us visualize and reckon with the incalculable loss of more than 100,000 lives.
After nearly a decade on the sidelines of space travel, Cape Canaveral is again launching a shuttle into space. But this time, a private company will be sending NASA astronauts into orbit. What does this moment mean for human exploration of the solar system? Guests: Kenneth Chang, a science reporter at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Here’s a look inside the vessel that is scheduled to become the first crewed spacecraft launched in the United States since the end of the shuttle program in 2011.
- Meet SpaceX’s first NASA astronauts: Robert L. Behnken and Douglas G. Hurley, who have been friends and colleagues for two decades.
The U.S. Postal Service has survived the telegraph, the fax machine and the dawn of the internet. But will it survive coronavirus? Guests: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times and Derek Harpe, a Postal Service worker with a mail route in Mocksville, N.C. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- With the coronavirus threatening the Postal Service’s financial viability, a rescue for the organization has become a political battle.
Two brothers, Javier Morales, 48, and Martin Morales, 39, died of coronavirus within hours of each other in their adopted home of New Jersey. Their last wish was to be buried at home in Mexico, but, to make that happen, their family must navigate the vast bureaucracies of two countries, international airfare and the complications of a pandemic. Guest:Annie Correal, an immigration reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Shaila and Melanie Cruz Morales, twin sisters from New Jersey who are the men’s nieces. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- In Mexico, being buried near home is a sacred rite. These are the obstacles the Morales family has faced as they try to return their uncles’ bodies home.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 6 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, we hear from PewDiePie, one of the biggest and most polarizing YouTube celebrities. He sat down with our reporter to discuss how he’s coming to grips with his influence — and looking to the future.
If you're tuning in to “Rabbit Hole” for the first time, start with the prologue. You can find more information about the podcast at nytimes.com/rabbithole.
There are moments when the world we take for granted changes instantaneously — when reality is upended and replaced with the unimaginable. Though we try not to think about it, instability is always lurking, and at any moment, a kind of terrible magic can switch on and scramble our lives.
You may know the feeling.
In 1964, it happened to Anchorage, Alaska, and to a woman named Genie Chance. Today, the author Jon Mooallem tells her story — and the story of the biggest earthquake to hit North America in recorded history — using sonic postcards from the past.
Guest: Jon Mooallem, author of the book “This Is Chance.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
From the earliest days of the coronavirus outbreak, health officials believed that it was largely sparing children and teenagers. But the rise of a mysterious inflammatory syndrome — with symptoms ranging from rashes to heart failure — in children testing positive for the virus is challenging that belief. Guest: Pam Belluck, a health and science writer for The New York Times, spoke with Jack McMorrow, 14, and his parents in Queens about his experience contracting the coronavirus. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- “If I send you home today, you’ll be dead by tomorrow.” This is what Jack heard after learning he had a mysterious illness connected to the coronavirus in children. “I would say that scared me to death but it more like scared me to life.”
- The new syndrome has been compared to a rare childhood illness called Kawasaki disease. But doctors have learned that it affects the heart differently and is appearing mostly in school-age children, rather than infants and toddlers.
Some have called the pandemic “the great equalizer.” But the coronavirus is killing black Americans at staggeringly higher rates than white Americans. Today, we explore why. Guest: Linda Villarosa, a writer for The New York Times Magazine covering racial health disparities, who spoke to Nicole Charles in New Orleans, La. about the death of her husband, Cornell Charles, known as Dickey. He was 51. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- How Mardi Gras accelerated the spread of the coronavirus among an already vulnerable population in New Orleans.
- The coronavirus has killed black and Latino people in New York City at twice the rate that it has killed white people. Black Britons are also twice as likely to die from coronavirus.
- Black Americans can face subconscious bias from medical professionals when they seek care. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have advised health professionals to be on the lookout for such bias, but some say the issue is far more systemic.
It used to be rare for a president to fire an inspector general, a position created within government agencies after Watergate and assigned to fight waste and corruption. Today, we look at what President Trump’s pattern of replacing inspectors general reveals about the nature of the independent office — and about presidential power. Guest: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Mr. Trump decided to fire Steve A. Linick, the Department of State’s inspector general, last week. Mr. Linick had opened an investigation into Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s spending habits. Congressional Democrats have now opened an investigation into the firing.
- The president also recently fired the intelligence community’s inspector general. Our chief White House correspondent explains why Mr. Trump’s drive against those he considers disloyal continues even during a pandemic.
As the American economy plunges toward a recession, economists and policymakers are triaging proposals to stanch the bleeding. All of their ideas will cost money the government doesn’t have. That leaves Democrats and Republicans with two major questions: How much should be borrowed for bailouts — and what spending is needed to avoid permanent economic damage? Guest: Ben Casselman, an economics reporter at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Background reading:
- Jerome H. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, has urged Congress to spend more on economic relief — even if doing so means increasing the federal deficit. He warned that the United States was experiencing an economic hit “without modern precedent.”
Our worlds have contracted; once expansive, our orbits are now measured by rooms and street blocks. But there are still ways to travel. Today, escape to the worlds contained in three letters — one about the summer of 1910, another describing an upended misconception and a third about how superstitions can offer release. We hope they can offer you some meaning — or at least a distraction.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 5 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, our reporter investigates how a Swedish gamer with a webcam grew to become the biggest YouTuber in the world. We follow PewDiePie’s path to megastardom — and the war that unfolds when his reign is threatened.
If you're tuning in to “Rabbit Hole” for the first time, start with the prologue. You can find more information about the podcast at nytimes.com/rabbithole.
On today’s “A Bit of Relief,” two critics at The Times share the home rituals that they're leaning on for comfort. For the television critic James Poniewozik, it’s binge-watching television with his family (“Experiencing good or even brilliantly dumb art is a form of self-care,” he reassures). And for the restaurant critic Tejal Rao, the act of rewatching cinematic food scenes is surprisingly delightful.
When Louisiana’s stay-at-home order expires today, restaurants across the state can begin allowing customers back inside, at their own discretion. So how do restaurant owners feel about the decision they now face? For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily
Guest: Jasmine Lombrage, a restaurant owner in Baton Rouge, La.
Background reading:
- America’s reopening has begun in force, just weeks after the coronavirus put most of the country on lockdown. See which states are reopening and which are still shut down.
- Even before the C.D.C. released checklists to help businesses decide when to reopen, chefs and public officials began considering how a post-pandemic restaurant might look.
Federal prosecutors are asking a court to throw out their own criminal case against the former national security adviser Michael Flynn. We look at what led to that decision. Guest: Mark Mazzetti, a Washington investigative correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Attorney General William Barr’s extraordinary decision to drop the criminal case against Mr. Flynn shocked legal experts, won President Trump’s praise and prompted a career prosecutor to quit the case
- The federal judge overseeing the case has appointed a hard-charging former prosecutor and judge to oppose the Justice Department’s efforts. The dropped charges against Mr. Flynn granted him another turnabout in a life filled with them.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court debated the nature of presidential power in two sets of cases regarding demands for President Trump’s personal records: one about his taxes, the other about claims that during his campaign he paid to silence women with whom he previously had affairs. This is what a constitutional clash on a conference call sounded like. Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Based on the court’s questions, our reporter thinks the two sets of cases may well be decided in different ways. Here are the full arguments, if you want to listen in.
- Aimee Stephens, the transgender plaintiff in another Supreme Court case who we spoke with on the show in November, has died of complications related to kidney failure. She was 59.
As Italy, France and Spain entered national lockdowns, Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain was still shaking hands with coronavirus patients in hospitals, and then joking about it on national television. Then he was hospitalized with the virus — and by the time he returned, both his attitude and his approach to the crisis were transformed. Today, we explore why the country that was most skeptical of the virus may be the slowest to reopen. Guest: Mark Landler, the London bureau chief of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Johnson announced a cautious plan for reopening over the weekend, including a new 14-day quarantine for foreign arrivals.
- While the British government frequently says it’s “guided by the science” in managing the crisis, the membership of its scientific advisory group, SAGE, has been a secret.
Ahmaud Arbery would have turned 26 on Friday. Instead of celebrating, a crowd of protesters, protected by masks, demanded justice for his death in front of a courthouse in Georgia. So what do we know about the killing of Mr. Arbery by two armed white men? Guest: Richard Fausset, a correspondent based in Atlanta. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- On Feb. 23, Mr. Arbery was jogging not far from his home on the outskirts of Brunswick, Ga. Then he was confronted by two white men in a pickup truck and fatally shot.
- After video footage of Mr. Arbery’s killing was leaked, two men were arrested and charged with murder. Widespread protests and 2.23 mile solidarity runs ensued, posted on social media with the hashtag #IRunWithMaud.
He was Batman. He was Iceman. Until he wasn’t. So what happened to Val Kilmer?
In this weird, dark time, Taffy Brodesser-Akner tells a story about how sometimes, in the end, everything is different but everything is good.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 4 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, our reporter interviews the woman running the world’s largest and most influential video empire: Susan Wojcicki, the chief executive of YouTube.
"If you're tuning in to "Rabbit Hole" for the first time, start with the prologue. You can find more information about the podcast at nytimes.com/rabbithole.
Rick Steves is a travel evangelist, always in motion, traversing faraway places and inspiring others to do the same. So when the world shuts down, and Rick Steves can no longer travel, then who is Rick Steves?
Sam Anderson, a writer for The Times Magazine, profiled the travel guru last year. Today, Sam asks Rick how he’s been expanding his horizons from home. Dreaming of travel, we learn, is nearly as sweet as the real thing.
It came to the United States from Asia and first appeared in Washington State. The country was slow to recognize it. Deaths mounted as it circulated for weeks undetected. And now, if it’s not stopped, it could reshape populations and industries across the country. Today, we discuss the arrival of the Asian giant hornet. Guest: Mike Baker, a Pacific Northwest correspondent for The New York Times who spoke with Ted McFall, a beekeeper in Washington State. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Asian giant hornet can kill humans with its stings. It also decapitates bees methodically. If the hornets spread across the United States and devastate bee populations, which we depend on for one out of every three bites of food we eat, our food supply could be threatened.
- Although the Asian giant hornet kills honeybees in their hives, some bees have developed a remarkable defense: cooking the hornets alive.
Everyone wants to know where the coronavirus came from. In the absence of a clear explanation, several theories are circulating — including one, pushed by the Trump administration, that the pandemic started because of malpractice in a lab in Wuhan, China. But is that a secret the Chinese government is keeping, or a mystery no one knows the answer to? Guest: Julian E. Barnes, who covers national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Leaders in the intelligence community have said there is no indication the virus is man-made, but have yet to reach a conclusion on its origins. While many scientists say the virus most likely made the leap from an animal to a human in southern China, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and President Trump continue to link the outbreak to a government lab.
- Some national security analysts are worried that pressure from senior Trump administration officials could distort assessments about the origin of the coronavirus and be used as a weapon in an escalating battle with China.
The congressional doctor expressed reservations about whether it was safe for the House and Senate to reconvene. Instead, only senators have returned to Capitol Hill, bringing our new normal — elbow bumps, masks and sanitizer — with them. So why was one chamber so determined to portray its members as essential workers in the pandemic? Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- With the Senate back in session, masked lawmakers, hushed corridors and socially distanced news conferences and hearings gave an eerie feel to the Capitol Hill routine.
- The confirmation hearing for Representative John Ratcliffe, the president’s pick to lead the nation’s intelligence agencies, was the first to employ social distancing rules for senators since the coronavirus pandemic took hold.
Universities across the United States have long prided themselves on bridging the differences between their students. How the coronavirus has instead reinforced inequalities that campus life can hide. Guest: Nicholas Casey, a national politics reporter at The New York Times, who spoke to faculty and students at Haverford College, a liberal arts school near Philadelphia. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- When the students were sleeping in the same dorms and eating the same dining hall food, the disparities in their backgrounds weren’t as clear as they are over video chat. Here’s a peek inside two students’ vastly different worlds.
One of the largest coronavirus outbreaks in the United States has been inside the Smithfield pork factory in Sioux Falls, S.D. Today, we speak with a worker at the plant, a refugee who survived civil war and malaria only to find her life and livelihood threatened anew. Guests: Caitlin Dickerson, who covers immigration for The New York Times, spoke with Achut Deng, a Sudanese refugee who works at Smithfield. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Refugees from around the world worked at the Smithfield pork factory. Now they face mounting illness and the sudden loss of their jobs.
For Aleksander Doba, pitting himself against the wide-open sea — storms, sunstroke, monotony, hunger and loneliness — is a way to feel alive in old age. Today, listen to the story of one man who chose to paddle toward the existential crisis that is life, crossing the Atlantic alone in a kayak. Three times.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 3 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, our reporter continues to trace the journey of a young man named Caleb. Five years into a rabbit hole on YouTube, Caleb discovers a parallel universe.
If you're tuning in to "Rabbit Hole" for the first time, start with the prologue. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/rabbithole.
In this week’s episode of “A Bit of Relief,” we turn to tea and toast for comfort. First, Kim Severson, a food writer at The Times, shares her love for buttered toast sprinkled in cinnamon and sugar. Then we hear Mark Thompson, C.E.O. at The Times, explain how to brew his ideal cup of British tea: using a stovetop kettle, loose black tea leaves, a strainer and a splash of milk. It's more complicated than you'd think.
Climbing on the roof to look at stars in the middle of summer. Making French toast and popcorn. Kind eyes. These are some of the memories 12-year-old Tilly Breimhorst has of her grandfather, Craig. Today, we talk to her about how she is processing sadness, anger and grief after losing him to coronavirus. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In personal and profound ways, the coronavirus crisis has created a sense of collective loss. Here are some ways to grieve.
Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is the first candidate in American history to wage a presidential campaign in quarantine. From his basement in Delaware, he has struggled to attain the same visibility as his opponent, President Trump. But is that a good thing? Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Over livestream, Mr. Biden is trying to conduct the functions of a normal presidential campaign — taking voters’ questions, fund-raising and appearing on television.
- Insulated from the spotlight of a normal campaign trail, he has stayed silent on an allegation of sexual assault against him, angering activists and women’s rights advocates.
- As President Trump’s approval ratings have dropped, his re-election campaign is working to rewrite the story of his presidency.
She ordered Michigan to stay on lockdown through mid-May. He thinks the measures are too extreme. Today, we speak to them both.
Guests: Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Phil Campbell, a vice president of a pest control company whose revenues have been halved during lockdown. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Two weeks ago, President Trump announced that governors would be on their own to decide when to ease lockdown restrictions. The day after his announcement, he called for Michigan’s liberation on Twitter. Raucous protests ensued.
- After becoming a prominent foil of the president, Ms. Whitmer is now being considered as a potential vice-presidential pick in the election.
Across the United States, governors are weighing the difficult question of when, and how, to begin to lift lockdown restrictions. Without federal coordination, some are looking abroad to see what has worked in countries like New Zealand, Australia and South Korea, which have effectively controlled the spread of the virus. The answer? Widespread testing. Guest: Katie Thomas, a business reporter covering the health care industry for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- How flawed diagnostic tests, scarce supplies and limited access to screening have hurt the United States’ ability to monitor Covid-19.
- Antibody tests have been hailed as a way to identify a person’s immunity to the virus and reopen the economy. But when a team of scientists worked around the clock to evaluate 14 antibody tests, only a few worked as advertised.
Something weird happened last week. It was something that millions of people who have faced years of painful prices at the gas pump never expected: The cost of a barrel of oil dropped into the negatives. Today, we explore why this happened, and what it reveals about the state of the economy. Guest: Clifford Krauss, an energy correspondent for The Times based in Houston. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The bizarre dip in oil prices was based on a quirk in the way barrels are traded, one that appears only when the market is “undergoing extreme stress.”
- “I’m just living a nightmare,” one leader of a large petroleum association said. This is a look inside how the pandemic is decimating the oil industry.
On today’s episode of “The Sunday Read,” one restaurateur reflects on closing the kitchen that saw her through 20 years of life — marriage and children and divorce and remarriage, with funerals and first dates in between. She doesn’t know if it will reopen.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Today, we’re sharing Episode 2 of “Rabbit Hole,” a New York Times audio series with the tech columnist Kevin Roose.
In this episode, we hear from a young man named Caleb who was pulled into a vortex on YouTube: “The truth is down there, and you’ve got to go down and dig for it.” What was he watching on the platform? And why was it so transfixing?
If you're tuning in to "Rabbit Hole" for the first time, start with the prologue. You can find more information about the podcast at nytimes.com/rabbithole.
A columnist for The Times reflects on living in a ghostly version of New York, the city with a “hum that never ceases — until it did.” He yearns for the subway soliloquies, wandering tourists, overcrowded sidewalks and stenches. Today, we listen to Roger Cohen's ode to the city.
He was a pastor. She was a poet. They found a second chance at love and traveled the world together, visiting Antarctica, Mount Sinai and Alaska. Today, we hear how he memorialized her life when she died in quarantine. Guest: Catherine Porter, an international reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Wayne Irwin, a retired minister of the United Church of Canada, about the loss of his wife, Flora May. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The rituals of our lives have been transformed. An expert on gathering shares advice for birthdays and baby showers in our new audio series, “Together Apart.”
Across the United States, jails and prisons have become petri dishes for the coronavirus — dangerously cramped, unsanitary quarters where residents lack the resources to keep safe. This has prompted local governments to release thousands of inmates. But who got to go, and who had to stay? And how was that decision made?
Today, we hear the story of one inmate trying to get out of the second-largest jail in the country, the Rikers Island prison complex in New York. Guests: Alan Feuer, who covers criminal justice for The New York Times, and Mitch Pomerance, a resident of Rikers Island. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
For weeks, public defenders warned of a public health catastrophe if inmates weren't released and prisons weren’t sanitized to guard against the coronavirus. Now, the pandemic is hitting jail systems across the country.
Across the United States, protests are erupting against orders to remain at home, close nonessential businesses and limit travel. So who is behind these protests? And what do they stand to gain? Guest: Jim Rutenberg, a writer-at-large for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Conservative groups in a loose coalition have tapped their networks to drive up turnout at recent rallies and financed lawsuits, polling and research to combat the stay-at-home orders.
- Crowd sizes at the protests remain small — ranging from a few dozen to several thousand at a rally in Michigan. Polls suggest that most Americans are in favor of cautious lockdown measures.
This week, the Supreme Court began rolling out a series of major rulings on the jury system, immigration, abortion rights and presidential power. In normal times, this would be a blockbuster week for the court. But these are not normal times. Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In one of their first decisions this week, the Supreme Court ruled against Montana landowners in their fight against an oil company over the cleanup of contaminated land.
- Across the country, the coronavirus crisis is colliding with the culture wars. This is how issues like abortion, gun rights and religious freedom are being debated in public now.
As President Trump urges states to begin reopening their economies, a debate is raging over when and how to end lockdowns across the country. Our reporter spoke to dozens of public health experts to try to understand our path out of lockdown — and how our world will change in the meantime. Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- While the economy is likely to reopen slowly, there is hope that society will adapt to manage the uncertainty of our new circumstances. Here’s what experts say the next year (or more) will look like.
On today’s episode of “The Sunday Read,” we tell the story of a woman who has spent her life trying to find the light of other worlds. We hope it can offer an escape when our own feels so dark.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
What is the internet doing to us? Today, we’re sharing the first episode of a new Times audio series called “Rabbit Hole.”
In the episode, “Wonderland,” we hear from a young man named Caleb, who finds escape and direction on the internet. We follow his journey into the YouTube universe.
“Rabbit Hole," a New York Times audio series with tech columnist Kevin Roose, explores what happens when our lives move online. You can find more information about it here.
Her mentor and political inspiration has dropped out of the presidential race, and her congressional district has been described as the “epicenter of the epicenter” of the pandemic in New York City. It’s one of the hardest-hit districts in the country, and many of her constituents are having to work outside their homes during the crisis.
Today, a conversation with Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In a city ravaged by an epidemic, few places have been as hard hit as Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s district. Here’s a look inside the crisis in Queens.
- In a recent interview with The Times, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez revealed that she had never met Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president. Although she intends to support him, she said that the “process of coming together should be uncomfortable for everyone involved.”
Note: This episode contains strong language.
The New York Times’s reporters working in China have been expelled by the Chinese government, alongside reporters covering China for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. Today, we speak with one of our correspondents about his experience learning that he would have to leave the place he has called home for the last decade — and about the last story he reported before he left. Guest: Paul Mozur, the Asia technology reporter for The New York Times, formerly based in Shanghai. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- China’s announcement of the journalists’ expulsion came weeks after President Trump limited the number of Chinese citizens who can work in the United States for five state-run Chinese news organizations.
- While the Chinese government’s official statement cited diplomatic tension as the reasoning for the expulsion, state media outlets pointed to our critical reporting of China’s mass detention of Muslims, government surveillance and its response to the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan as reasons for the move.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
More than a month since the onset of the coronavirus crisis, the majority of patients — some of whom are doctors themselves — in Brooklyn Hospital Center’s critical care unit have Covid-19. With permission from staff, patients and their families, we shadowed one doctor for a day to get a sense of what it is like on the front lines of the pandemic.
Guest: Sheri Fink, a correspondent for The New York Times covering public health, who spoke with Dr. Josh Rosenberg and his colleagues at Brooklyn Hospital Center’s intensive care unit.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Test kits and protective gear have been in short supply, doctors are falling sick, and every day gets more difficult. But the staff at Brooklyn Hospital Center keeps showing up.
- On their shifts, medical workers throughout the hospital face unrelenting chaos. At one point while our reporter shadowed, three “codes” — emergency interventions when someone is on the brink of death — occurred at once.
Note: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence.
A former Senate aide to Joseph R. Biden Jr., the prospective Democratic presidential candidate, has accused him of sexually assaulting her in 1993. A Biden spokeswoman said the allegation was false, and people who had worked in Mr. Biden’s office did not recall talk of such an incident. Today, we examine what we know about the allegation, who Ms. Reade spoke to about her experience at the time and what her former colleagues say now. Guest: Lisa Lerer, a reporter at The New York Times who covers campaigns, elections and political power, who spoke with Ms. Reade. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Reade recently filed a report with the Washington, D.C., police, saying she was the victim of a sexual assault in 1993. While not naming Mr. Biden directly, Ms. Reade said the complaint was about him.
- Last year, Ms. Reade and seven other women came forward to accuse Mr. Biden of kissing, hugging or touching them in ways that made them feel uncomfortable.
Most of America is entering its second month of lockdown in an ongoing effort to contain the coronavirus. Still, our reporters are — as safely as they can be — spread across the country, doing their best to document this unique, and at times scary, moment in our lives. Today, we listen in as they ask people in Pittsburgh, Kansas City, New York and Seattle about their new realities. Guests: Campbell Robertson, John Eligon, Alan Feuer and Mike Baker, reporters for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Once-crowded American cities now feel abandoned, as if everyone suddenly moved out. There is no rush hour on the nation’s highways. “Closed” signs hang from the front doors of business after business. This was 24 hours in our new country.
On this episode of “The Sunday Read,” staff writer Sam Anderson claims Weird Al Yankovic is not just a parody singer — he’s “a full-on rock star, a legitimate performance monster and a spiritual technician doing important work down in the engine room of the American soul.” In these absurd times, Sam reaches into his childhood to explain the enduring appeal of an absurd artist.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Ali Jaffe and her grandmother Roslyn are self-quarantining 1,200 miles apart. Lately, they’ve been connecting — and coping — by cooking together over FaceTime.
Ali is learning the recipes her grandmother cooked for her own children in the 1960s, a period when she had limited time and resources. Today, we listen in as they make matzo ball soup.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
As the death toll from the coronavirus rises in the U.S., so do reports of verbal and physical attacks against Asian-Americans, who say hostile strangers are blaming them for the pandemic. Today, one writer shares her story. Guest: Jiayang Fan, a staff writer at The New Yorker magazine. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Fan’s story is echoed across the country by others who say they have been spit on, yelled at and attacked. Asian-American community and political leaders have tried to comfort their constituents. But they, too, admit to feeling unnerved.
- Some have turned to social media to share their stories and procure medical supplies in an effort to aid the crisis response.
The outbreak of the coronavirus in Louisiana has become one of the most explosive in the country. Today, we explore how New Orleans became a petri dish for the virus, why Mardi Gras was likely to have been an accelerator for the spread of infections and what it is like now inside the city’s hospitals. Guest: Yanti Turang, a nurse in New Orleans. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- As Mardi Gras came to a close, patients with mysterious respiratory illnesses began appearing in hospitals — many who had not recently left the country. The first Covid-19 diagnosis soon followed.
Bernie Sanders has suspended his 2020 presidential campaign, marking the end of a quest to the White House that began five years ago. We look at why Sanders is calling his campaign an ideological victory, and how he plans to champion his messages as a senator working with the Democratic Party.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories. You can find more information about it here.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
The upheaval and anguish caused by the pandemic led to a series of actions that cost both the captain of an aircraft carrier and the head of the Navy their jobs. Today, we explore how the coronavirus has created a crisis inside the service.
Guest: Eric Schmitt, who covers terrorism and national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In a letter that leaked to the news media, Capt. Brett E. Crozier described what he said were the Navy’s failures to provide the resources to combat the virus spreading aboard his aircraft carrier. Now the captain himself has tested positive for Covid-19.
- Thomas B. Modly, acting Navy secretary, condemned the ousted captain to his former crew on the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt. Days later, Mr. Modly resigned.
Against the advice of public health officials and the wishes of its own governor, Wisconsin will hold its Democratic primary today — in the middle of a pandemic. So how did that happen? Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The political and legal fight between Wisconsin’s conservative state legislature and its Democratic governor was only the first round of an expected national fight over voting rights during the coronavirus crisis.
To contain the pandemic, the U.S. government has brought the economy to a halt. Today, we explore one result of their containment efforts: one of the worst unemployment crises in American history. Guest: Jim Tankersley, a reporter covering economic and tax policy for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The national unemployment rate is probably around 13 percent, The Times estimated. “Scary things are going on in our life right now,” one idled Lyft driver said.
- Whole sectors of the U.S. economy have gone dark to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Here’s what comes next.
On this week’s “Sunday Read,” the magazine writer Jack Hitt introduces his story of how one 1960s bondage-film actress waged legal combat with a toy company for ownership over her husband’s mail-order aquatic-pet empire. The story is as crazy as it sounds.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Today, we’re sharing an excerpt from a new Times audio series called “Sugar Calling,” hosted by the best-selling author Cheryl Strayed. Each week, Cheryl will call a writer she admires in search of insight and courage. She’s turning to some of the most prolific writers of our time — all over the age of 60 — to ask the questions on all our minds: How do we stay calm when everything has been upended? How do we muster courage when fear is all around us?
To start, Cheryl reaches out to the author George Saunders, her old friend and mentor.
"Sugar Calling" is a new podcast by The New York Times. You can listen to the full version of the first episode here.
In recent years, governors have sat on the sidelines as the federal government has commanded most of the attention and airtime. Today, we explore how the pandemic has generated a revival of state and local politics — and made governors into national heroes. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Governors of both parties have taken a lead role in confronting the crisis, asserting themselves in ways that have only highlighted the initial lack of seriousness from the White House.
- With his widely watched coronavirus briefings, one governor in particular has stood out: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. Here’s how the leader of New York State has become a figurehead for the Democratic Party.
Today, we speak with Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s leading expert on infectious diseases, about his experience in the trenches of the government’s response to the coronavirus crisis. “We are in a war. I mean, I actually think this is exactly what generals or leaders in real, you know, violent combat wars feel.”
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Dr. Fauci has been clear about the need to practice social distancing to contain the spread of the virus, but that stance has made him the target of online conspiracy theorists.
- This week, scientists with the coronavirus task force used models to deliver an update on the expected spread of the disease, projecting the coronavirus could kill up to 240,000 Americans. They pledged to do everything possible to reduce that number.
Scientists are racing to make a vaccine for the coronavirus, collaborating across borders in what is usually a secretive and competitive field. But their cooperation has been complicated by national leaders trying to buy first claim on any breakthrough. Today, we explore how the fight to own a future coronavirus vaccine is revealing the boundaries of international solidarity.
Guest: Katrin Bennhold, Berlin bureau chief for The New York Times, spoke with Lidia Oostvogels, who researches infectious diseases with the German biotech company CureVac. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The United States says it will share any vaccine breakthroughs with the world. So why did President Trump reportedly try to purchase a German biotech company that is trying to develop a shot for the coronavirus?
- The latest updates from top U.S. government scientists project that the coronavirus could kill 100,000 to 240,000 Americans — even with strict social distancing.
States and cities across the United States are reporting dangerous shortages of the vital medical supplies needed to contain the coronavirus. Why is the world’s biggest economy suffering such a scramble to find lifesaving equipment?
Guest: Sarah Kliff, an investigative reporter covering health care for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The scarcity of ventilators has become an emergency, forcing doctors to make life-or-death decisions. The collapse of a government effort to produce an emergency stockpile reveals much about the challenges now being faced in fighting the pandemic.
- This map of the United States shows gaps in the existing health care infrastructure — and which areas may face a shortage of hospital beds as the virus spreads.
Across the United States, many hospitals are confronting their first cases of coronavirus. Today, we speak to New Jersey’s first confirmed coronavirus patient, a medical professional, about what having the virus was like for him, what he learned from the experience and why he thinks, “America is not ready.”
Guests: Susan Dominus, a staff writer at The New York Times Magazine, spoke with James Cai, a physician assistant. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- James Cai was told his test for coronavirus had not been completed. Then he heard from the governor on the news that he was the first confirmed case in New Jersey. Why states must ask knotty questions about how much to tell the public — and when.
- President Trump, listening to his health advisers, has said that the country should be practicing social distancing until at least the end of April. Here are the latest updates.
After weeks of caring for her sick husband, our colleague wanted to write an essay about her family’s battle against the coronavirus — a warning to those in isolation who haven’t experienced the ravages of the virus intimately. Today, we read her letter from the future aloud.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Jody Rosen, a writer for The Times Magazine, transports us into his current soundtrack. From Alberta Hunter's “voice of longevity” to the “transfixing performance” of Missy Elliott, Jody shares the music that’s helping him find new rhythms — during these days stuck inside.
Music discussed:
- “My Castle’s Rockin’” by Alberta Hunter
- “I’ll Get By” by Nick Lucas
- “Lick Shots” by Missy Elliott
- “Simply Beautiful” by Al Green
Over the last few weeks, children have called into “The Daily” with a lot of questions about the coronavirus: How did the virus get on earth? What color is coronavirus? And can dogs get it? Today, we try to answer them. Guest: Carl Zimmer, science reporter and author of the “Matter” column for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Do your children still have more questions? Here’s a guide on how to talk to them about the coronavirus.
- With many kids home from school, we have some tips for creating structure around your children’s school days, and some recommendations for podcasts to help keep little ones occupied — and learning.
To rescue the American economy in the coronavirus crisis, Congress is on the verge of adopting the most expensive stimulus bill in U.S. history. But how much is the battle over this measure being influenced by the last financial crisis? Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The bill promises a $1,200 payout to millions of Americans, increased jobless aid and grants to save small businesses from permanent closure. Here’s what it means for you.
Last week, President Trump called himself a “wartime president” as he faced up to the threat caused by the coronavirus. But only days later — and with the crisis escalating — he has abandoned that message. What changed?
Guest: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House for The New York Times For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Despite the warnings, President Trump said he believed a crippled economy and forced social isolation would inflict more harm than the spread of the virus.
- Mr. Trump is now facing a personal dilemma as he responds to the crisis: How can he save his campaign for re-election when so much is suddenly going so wrong?
- The White House and Congress have reached a $2 trillion stimulus deal, the biggest such package in modern American history. The plan would offer jobless benefits to individuals and direct cash payments to taxpayers.
So far, the United States has been losing the battle against the pandemic, with a patchwork of inconsistent measures across the country proving unequal to halting the spread of the virus. Today, we ask: What will it take to change the course of the crisis?
Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump has played down the threat of the virus, while at least 16 states institute stay-at-home orders. Here are the latest updates.
- The rampant spread of the coronavirus has left a trail of loss across most people’s lives. Here is some advice on how to cope.
Two weeks ago, the biggest story in the country was the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. Now, with the dramatic onset of the coronavirus crisis, the primary has largely gone off the radar. Today, we talk to Alexander Burns, a political reporter at The New York Times, about what happened when those two stories collided. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In a presidential debate without an in-person audience earlier this month, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Bernie Sanders clashed over how to handle the coronavirus crisis. With so much news, you may have missed the debate — here are six takeaways to catch you up.
- Mr. Sanders is now reassessing his campaign as Mr. Biden plans for the nomination, announcing he will pick a woman as his running mate should he be chosen as the candidate.
One magazine writer reflects on life’s unpredictability and shares her story of a hospital error that scrambled two pairs of Colombian identical twins. This is the story of how the four brothers found one another — and of what happened next.
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
Kevin Roose, a tech reporter for The Times, shares what he’s realized after a week in self-isolation: The internet has become kinder. From virtual birthday parties and singalongs, to happy hours and yoga classes, people are pulling together on the internet, in real time, all over the world. We listen in on what that sounds like.
Across America, businesses are scaling back, firing workers and shutting their doors because of the coronavirus. New York’s Chinatown has been experiencing a downturn for weeks as anxiety and discrimination affected business. Now, the state government has mandated nonessential businesses in the city keep 75 percent of their workers home. So what did it sound like as one of the busiest cities in the world ground to a halt? Five producers at “The Daily,” Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Jessica Cheung, Daniel Guillemette and Andy Mills, spoke to small business owners to find out. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- With so many businesses being forced to close, some indefinitely, claims for jobless benefits surged 33 percent last week. Here are the latest updates on the crisis and its impact on daily life across America.
- As so much of life begins to shift, we have answers to some common questions about the coronavirus crisis.
New Rochelle, a suburb north of New York City, has one of the largest clusters of coronavirus infections in the U.S. We visited the community to find out how the containment measures were being implemented and how successful they have been. On today’s episode: Sarah Maslin Nir, a breaking news reporter at The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York created a “containment zone” in New Rochelle last week, hoping to curb the spread of the virus in “the single most troubling area in the state.” Soon after, the National Guard arrived to help implement the measures.
- New York is among about 10 states that have set up drive-through testing centers, as state and local leaders try to figure out how to safely screen more people.
New York was one of the earliest states with confirmed cases of coronavirus, and it now has the most confirmed infections in the U.S. To control the outbreak, the authorities have begun taking increasingly drastic steps, including closing schools and businesses. Today, we talk with the governor, Andrew M. Cuomo, to hear about how he is handling the crisis.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Life in New York, a city of 8.6 million people and an economic engine for the country, is grinding to a shocking halt.
- The White House issued plans for an economic stimulus that included sending $1,000 to every American. In Europe, leaders voted to seal the borders of 26 countries. Here are the latest updates on the spread of the virus.
On Monday, President Trump announced sweeping new guidelines to control the spread of the coronavirus. Among them: encouraging Americans to work from home and to avoid gatherings of more than 10 people. We look at a report that may have inspired the president’s change in tone — and whether U.S. hospitals are prepared for the potentially staggering projections.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories.
Italy has become the epicenter of the pandemic’s European migration, with nearly 30,000 infections and more than 2,000 deaths in just a few weeks. These numbers are soaring by the day, even after the government took extreme measures to lock down much of the country. Now, the U.S. surgeon general is warning that America is on a strikingly similar path. Today, we speak to one Italian doctor triaging patients north of Milan about the road that may lie ahead. Guest: Dr. Fabiano Di Marco, a professor at the University of Milan who is also the head of the respiratory unit of the Hospital Papa Giovanni XXIII in Bergamo, a nearby town. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In less than three weeks, the virus has overloaded hospitals in northern Italy, leaving doctors to decide who lives and who dies. Now, with the country on lockdown, families are having to delay the burial of their loved ones.
- President Trump released suggested guidelines to control the virus, stopping short of the mandatory lockdown now in place in Italy. Here are the latest updates on the crisis.
- We hope you are well, wherever you are. Here are a few tips on staying safe and coping in this moment.
In past financial crises, central banks across the world developed a time-tested tool kit to rescue national economies. So why don’t previous interventions seem to be working this time? Guest: Peter S. Goodman, who writes about the economy for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Federal Reserve cut interest rates to near zero and said it would buy hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. government debt, moves reminiscent of its actions during the 2008 financial crisis.
- The coronavirus is upending life as we know it — and news is changing rapidly. Here are the latest updates on school closings, travel restrictions and governmental directives.
A magazine writer for The Times reflects on her experience interviewing Tom Hanks last fall — and on the generosity he showed her in a difficult personal moment. In this time of collective stress, we wanted to bring the story to you in audio as a reminder that “contagion is real, but it doesn’t just work for viruses,” our writer said. “It works for kind words and generous thoughts, and acts of selflessness and honesty.”
This story was recorded by Audm. To hear more audio stories from publishers like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.
We’re in a moment that feels scary, uncertain and unsettling, and may feel this way for a while. While we’ll continue to cover the coronavirus pandemic until it’s over, we realize that this time requires more than news and information. We also need release — and relief. And we’ll do our best to provide that in the coming weeks. To start, we asked a few of our colleagues at The Times to share what’s bringing them comfort right now. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Guests:
- Taffy Brodesser-Akner reads from “Love in the Time of Cholera” by Gabriel García Márquez.
- Wesley Morris reads from “In Pursuit of Flavor” by Edna Lewis.
- Dean Baquet reads from “On Living in an Atomic Age” by C.S. Lewis.
Now that the coronavirus is a pandemic, with both infections and deaths surging in many places across the world, we return to a reporter who has covered the story from the start and ask him how best to navigate this new reality. Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The World Health Organization now describes the coronavirus as a pandemic, and the number of cases continues to rise worldwide. These basic steps can help you reduce your risk of getting sick or infecting others.
- The global pandemic is affecting many aspects of daily life. Here are the latest updates on school closures, social distancing measures and event cancellations.
Global health officials have praised China and South Korea for the success of their efforts to contain the coronavirus. What are those countries getting right — and what can everyone else learn from them?
Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- While world leaders are finally speaking out about the gravity of the pandemic, their response lacks unity with the United States absent from its traditional conductor role in managing global crises.
- Stocks tanked again as the outbreak was officially declared a pandemic and policies to address its impact proved lacking or ineffective.
- All flights to the U.S. have been suspended from Europe. Many schools announced they would close indefinitely, some nursing homes banned visitors, and workplaces across the country have urged their employees to work from home. Here are the latest updates.
Developing a strategy for testing was supposed to be a relatively simple part of preparing for the coronavirus in the United States. So what went wrong? Guests: Sheri Fink, a correspondent for The Times reporting on global public health, and Dr. Helen Y. Chu, an infectious disease expert in Seattle. Dr. Chu was part of a research project that tried to conduct early tests for the coronavirus but failed to obtain state and federal support.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- During the early days of the outbreak, when containment would have been easier, the federal government missed a series of chances to ensure more widespread testing.
- After weeks of playing down the potential effects of the coronavirus, President Trump proposed an emergency relief package to bolster the economy — one that has been met by bipartisan opposition.
- The number of known U.S. cases of coronavirus infection has passed 1,000, with the virus found in every region of the country. Universities continue to close classrooms. Here are the latest updates on the outbreak.
Last night was a make-or-break moment for Senator Bernie Sanders, who needed a comeback from a loss to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. in the Super Tuesday primaries. After Mr. Sanders lost the primary in Michigan, a state he won in an upset in 2016, we ask: Is Mr. Biden now the presumptive Democratic nominee for president? And if not, what is Mr. Sanders’s path forward? “The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories.
Today, millions of voters across six states will cast their ballots for the two viable Democratic candidates left: former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Bernie Sanders. What began as a contest with historic diversity of race, gender and sexual orientation has come down to two heterosexual white men over 70.
Astead W. Herndon, who covered Senator Senator Elizabeth Warren for The New York Times, asks: How did we get here? With Austin Mitchell and Jessica Cheung, producers for “The Daily,” Mr. Herndon traveled to Massachusetts to find out. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Warren’s position as one of the top-polling candidates early in the race made her a target for attack. Some say the personal criticism she weathered, especially from Mr. Biden, was sexist.
- She began her campaign with an avalanche of progressive policy proposals, but dropped out after failing to attract a broader political coalition in a Democratic Party increasingly, if not singularly, focused on defeating President Trump.
Within minutes of the U.S. stock market opening on Monday, the S&P 500 sunk so swiftly that it triggered a 15-minute pause in trading, a rare event meant to prevent stocks from crashing. We look at why this happened and what it means for the U.S. economy.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories. You can find more information about it here.
A case before the Supreme Court is the first big test of abortion rights since President Trump created a conservative majority among the justices. We traveled to the Louisiana health clinic at the center of the case to ask what was at stake in the decision. Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The Times, spoke with Kathaleen Pittman, director of Hope Medical Group for Women in Shreveport, La. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The justices are considering whether Louisiana can require doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. While the law is specific, their decision may be a test for the future of abortion rights in America more broadly.
- Ms. Pittman remembers when there were 11 abortion clinics in Louisiana. Now there are only three, hers among them. After the Supreme Court’s upcoming ruling, there may be only one.
After years of false starts, the United States has signed a landmark deal with the Taliban to end the war in Afghanistan. We traveled to the front lines of the war — and to the signing ceremony in Doha, Qatar — to investigate whether peace is actually possible.
Guest: Mujib Mashal, senior correspondent for The New York Times in Afghanistan.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The agreement between Washington and the Taliban seemed to be an important first step in ending the war in Afghanistan. Then the violence started again.
- Zalmay Khalilzad, the Afghan-born American envoy and architect of the deal, seemed to have been handed an impossible and thankless assignment. Here’s how he pulled it off.
A strategy of containment was supposed to protect Washington State from the coronavirus. It didn’t. So what led to the first major outbreak of the pathogen in the United States?
Guests: Mike Baker, a Pacific Northwest correspondent for The New York Times and Bridget Parkhill, a woman whose 77-year-old mother is on lockdown inside a coronavirus-affected nursing facility in Kirkland, Washington. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A cruise ship off San Francisco has 21 sick passengers on board and is linked to California’s first death from the virus. In the Seattle area, schools have closed, tech workers have been told to work from home and a nursing facility is on lockdown. Here are the latest updates.
- Officials in California, Oregon and Washington State have said that some patients tested positive for the coronavirus without a known explanation for how they became ill, raising concerns that the virus may be spreading faster than previously thought.
- We spoke to six Americans with coronavirus. Here’s what they said about their experience while sick.
The results of Super Tuesday make clear that the race for the Democratic presidential nomination is increasingly a battle between former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Senator Bernie Sanders. Today, we explore what happened on the biggest night of the race so far. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden is back as front-runner after sweeping states across the south thanks to moderates and African-American voters, while Mr. Sanders harnessed the backing of liberals and young voters to claim California, the biggest delegate prize of the night.
- Primary results are still coming in. Here are the latest updates and The Times’s live analysis.
In the weeks leading up to Super Tuesday, Senator Bernie Sanders was the only candidate to win across multiple states. With his more moderate competitors splitting the vote, his success was built on a coalition of union workers, Hispanics and the college-educated.
Then South Carolina happened. Now, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is banking on a different coalition — this time, of suburban, black and older voters. Is the contest for the Democratic nomination now a two-person race? Guest: Brian Keane, a 52-year-old Democratic voter from Arlington, Va, who spoke with Michael Barbaro about his experiences with Mr. Biden and his thoughts on the 2020 election. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Here’s what’s at stake in the 14 states (as well as American Samoa and Democrats Abroad) voting on Super Tuesday.
- Senator Klobuchar and Mr. Buttigieg both dropped out of the race after the South Carolina primary. Can their backing for Mr. Biden help him capture the moderate vote?
- Mr. Sanders’s strength has complicated the Democratic establishment’s effort to coalesce support around a single candidate.
For more than 30 years, over three presidential runs, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. has been waiting to notch a victory like the one he received in the South Carolina primary this weekend. The win also prompted former Mayor Pete Buttigieg to end his presidential bid, potentially resetting the race for the Democratic nomination. How did Mr. Biden do it? And what could his success mean for Super Tuesday?
Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden has moved quickly to capitalize on his victory and to recast the Democratic primary campaign as a two-man contest between himself and Senator Bernie Sanders.
- To maintain momentum, he will have to win again in some states on Super Tuesday. That effort has some notable hurdles to overcome.
Former vice president Joseph R. Biden Jr. was once a clear front-runner in the race for the Democratic nomination. Now, he is fighting back from a string of losses and staking his candidacy on his ability to win tomorrow’s South Carolina primary, the first in a state with a large black population. But will he win, and if the margin isn’t as decisive as he hopes, can he stay in the race? Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times traveled to South Carolina with Clare Toeniskoetter and Annie Brown, producers on “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A new poll showed Mr. Biden with a wide lead in South Carolina, with Senator Bernie Sanders and hedge fund billionaire Tom Steyer trailing behind.
- Mr. Biden lashed out after reports that Mr, Sanders considered mounting a primary challenge to President Barack Obama in 2012, saying it was “one of the reasons I resent Bernie.”
- Churches have long played the primary role in mobilizing black support in South Carolina. So how are candidates faring among congregations?
What began as a public health crisis in China is well on the way to becoming a pandemic. And while there is a lot of news about the coronavirus, there is also a lack of understanding about the severity of the threat. As officials warn of a potential outbreak in the U.S., we ask: How bad could the coronavirus get? Guest: Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump sought to reassure the country that the U.S. government was controlling the spread of the coronavirus after his administration weathered days of criticism.
- Here are the latest updates on the illness’s sweep around the world, with cases in at least 44 countries.
- What can you do to protect yourself and your family from the virus?
U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that the Russian government is attempting to interfere in the 2020 presidential race — but it is doing so by supporting two very different candidates. So why is Russia rooting for both President Trump and Senator Bernie Sanders? Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent and a senior writer at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sanders was briefed on potential interference, and when details of the attempts emerged, he ratcheted up his attacks on Russia, warning President Vladimir V. Putin to stay out of the presidential election.
- Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get the president re-elected. Mr. Trump was angry the intelligence briefing was held at all.
- What exactly do intelligence officials mean by “interference”? We don’t know, and officials can’t seem to agree on the scope of the meddling.
On the debate stage in Charleston, candidates went after Senator Bernie Sanders, painting his potential nomination as dangerous for the party and questioning his chances of winning against President Trump.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories. You can find more information about it here.
Harvey Weinstein was found guilty on Monday of two felony sex crimes, and he now faces a possible sentence of between five and 29 years. We asked the reporters who first broke the story about the accusations of sexual misconduct against Mr. Weinstein to explain to us what the jurors in his Manhattan trial were asked to do — and what it means that they did it.
Guests: Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, investigative reporters for The New York Times and the authors of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Weinstein was found guilty of two felony sex crimes after a trial at which six women testified that he had sexually assaulted them.
- Sex crimes are notoriously difficult to litigate, often because the cases are so intricate. But for many, Mr. Weinstein’s trial was a crucial landmark in the effort to hold influential men accountable for sexual misconduct.
- Mr. Weinstein built a network of complicity that dozens of women say kept them silent for years.
In recent weeks, several of the largest and most profitable American companies have introduced elaborate plans to combat climate change. So why are they doing it now? And just how meaningful are their plans? Guest: Andrew Ross Sorkin, a financial columnist for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Laurence D. Fink, the founder of the world’s largest asset management company, sparked the shift toward climate-focused corporate policies in his annual letter to C.E.O.’s. Here’s what the letter said, and why it matters.
- Protecting the environment and tackling climate change have climbed the list of Americans’ political priorities this year as economic concerns have faded. But the issue is as partisan as ever.
Note: This episode contains strong language.
Senator Bernie Sanders is a staunchly pro-union candidate. But he has found himself mired in an escalating battle over health care with the largest labor union in Nevada. With what some call “the best insurance in America” — the fruit of struggles including a six-year strike — members of the Culinary Workers Union have been reluctant to support Mr. Sanders’s “Medicare for All” plan. We went to Nevada to ask how what is effectively an anti-endorsement of Mr. Sanders from the union’s leaders may affect his support in the state’s caucuses on Saturday.
Guests: Jennifer Medina, who is covering the 2020 presidential campaign for The Times traveled to Nevada with Clare Toeniskoetter and Austin Mitchell, producers for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sanders, who is betting on the Latino vote to win the nomination, is trying to convince Nevada’s union members his policies are in their best interest. His rivals are trying to capitalize on the fight.
- The Nevada Democratic Party has been scrambling to put in effect safeguards in its caucuses to avoid the technical issues that created a debacle in Iowa. Here’s how the caucuses will work.
Last night, the Democratic debate in Nevada revealed more open hostility and made more personal attacks than in any of the previous six debates in the race for the nomination. Today, we explore what these attacks reflect about the state of the Democratic race and the urgency that the candidates are feeling.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories. You can find more information about it here.
Yesterday on “The Daily,” we heard about the government’s failure to crack down on the explosive growth of child sexual abuse imagery online. In the second half of this series, we look at the role of the nation’s biggest tech companies, and why — despite pleas from victims — the illicit images remain online. Guest: Michael H. Keller, an investigative reporter at the The New York Times, and Gabriel J.X. Dance, an investigations editor for The Times, spoke with the mother and stepfather of a teenager who was sexually abused as a child. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The tech industry has recently been more diligent in identifying online child sexual abuse imagery, but it has consistently failed to shut it down, a Times investigation found. Facebook accounted for more than 85 percent of the imagery flagged by tech companies last year.
- Two sisters opened up about their lives after being sexually abused as children. Photos and videos of them online continue to remind them of the horrors they experienced.
- Here’s the first episode in this two-part series, describing how a finding from a tipster led to The Times’s monthslong investigation of online child abuse imagery.
Note: This episode contains descriptions of child sexual abuse.
A monthslong New York Times investigation has uncovered a digital underworld of child sexual abuse imagery that is hiding in plain sight. In part one of a two-part series, we look at the almost unfathomable scale of the problem — and just how little is being done to stop it. Guests: Michael H. Keller, an investigative reporter at The New York Times, and Gabriel J.X. Dance, an investigations editor for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Last year, tech companies reported over 60 million online photos and videos of children being sexually abused. Lawmakers foresaw this crisis years ago, but enforcement has fallen short. Our reporters investigated the problem and asked: Can it be stopped?
- Tech companies detected a surge in online videos of child sexual abuse last year, with encrypted social messaging apps enabling abusers to share images under a cloak of secrecy.
- Here are six takeaways from The Times’s investigation of the boom in online child sex abuse.
Despite being a late entry into the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, Michael R. Bloomberg, the billionaire media tycoon and former mayor of New York City, has surged in the polls and is winning key endorsements before he’s even on the ballot. Today, we explore the hidden infrastructure of influence and persuasion behind his campaign — and the dilemma it poses for Democrats. Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Who is Mr. Bloomberg? And where does he stand on the key issues?
- We took a look at how Mr. Bloomberg’s enormous wealth helped build a national political network, and an empire of influence, for his campaign.
- His run has proved complicated to cover for the media empire he owns.
Since his acquittal in the Senate, President Trump has undertaken a campaign of retribution against those who crossed him during the impeachment inquiry — while extending favors to those who have tried to protect him. Today, we explore what has happened so far in this new phase of his presidency. Guest: Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Trump called those who testified against him in the impeachment “evil,” “corrupt” and “crooked.” After he was acquitted, he began firing witnesses.
- A handful of senators reached out to the White House to warn the president not to dismiss Gordon D. Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union who testified in the House hearings. Mr. Trump removed him anyway.
Note: This episode contains strong language in both English and Mandarin.
What started as a story about fear of a new and dangerous virus has become a story of fury over the Chinese government’s handling of an epidemic. Today, one of our China correspondents takes us behind the scenes of Beijing’s response to a global outbreak. Guest: Amy Qin, a China correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Xi Jinping faces an accelerating health crisis that is also a political one: a profound test of the authoritarian system he has built around himself over the past seven years.
- China’s leader, who rarely mingles with the public, visited several sites in Beijing and spoke to medical workers in Wuhan via video conferencing.
- Here are the latest updates on the global outbreak.
Senator Bernie Sanders won New Hampshire’s Democratic primary last night, with Pete Buttigieg and Senator Amy Klobuchar close behind in second and third. After two candidates once considered front-runners, Senator Elizabeth Warren and former Vice President Joe Biden, finished toward the back of the pack, we consider what Mr. Sanders’s win means for the rest of the race for the Democratic nomination. Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- With his New Hampshire win, Mr. Sanders tightened his grip on the Democratic Party’s liberal wing, benefiting from a field that has divided moderate voters.
- Here are the full results. Unlike in Iowa, where we have yet to declare an official winner, we can confidently say Mr. Sanders won in New Hampshire in a tight race with Mr. Buttigieg.
Voters in New Hampshire pride themselves on helping winnow the nomination field. While many polls show Senator Bernie Sanders leading in this year’s primary, the caucus debacle in Iowa meant no single candidate left that first contest with full momentum. We flew from Iowa to New Hampshire, following the campaign trail and talking to voters about whether Democrats who don’t support Sanders are coalescing around another choice.
Guests: Lisa Lerer, a reporter at The New York Times, covering campaigns, elections and political power, and Clare Toeniskoetter and Jessica Cheung, producers on “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sanders and Mayor Pete Buttigieg, of South Bend, Ind., are hoping to make the race for the nomination a two-person contest.
- Still, after a voting fiasco in Iowa, it’s possible that five leading candidates will survive beyond New Hampshire.
- President Trump is coming to New Hampshire, too: He’s scheduled to hold a campaign rally in Manchester tonight and will be on the Republican ballot Tuesday. Here are the latest updates from the state’s last day of primary campaigning.
A secretive start-up promising the next generation of facial recognition software has compiled a database of images far bigger than anything ever constructed by the United States government: over three billion, it says. Is this technology a breakthrough for law enforcement — or the end of privacy as we know it?
Guest: Annie Brown, a producer on “The Daily,” spoke with Kashmir Hill, a technology reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Federal and state law enforcement officers are using one company’s app to make arrests in 49 states. So what is Clearview AI, and what influence does it hold?
- Clearview’s app is being used by police to identify victims of child sexual abuse. Some question both the ethics and the accuracy of the results.
Note: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence.
In the trial of Harvey Weinstein, six women have taken the stand, each making similar accusations of rape and sexual assault against the movie producer. Throughout their testimony, Weinstein’s defense lawyers have portrayed those encounters as consensual and suggested that in many cases it was the women who wanted something from Mr. Weinstein. His lawyers have seized on the fact that the two women whose accounts are at the center of the criminal charges in his New York trial agreed to have sex and friendly contact with Mr. Weinstein after they were allegedly victimized. Today, one of The Times reporters who broke the story of Mr. Weinstein’s alleged abuse more than two years ago speaks with Donna Rotunno, the lawyer behind Mr. Weinstein’s legal strategy.
Guests: Megan Twohey, an investigative reporter for The Times and co-author of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement," spoke with Donna Rotunno, Harvey Weinstein’s lead defense lawyer. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Long before an avalanche of allegations against Mr. Weinstein set off a global reckoning over sexual harassment, Ms. Rotunno was steadily building a career as a criminal lawyer in Chicago with an unusual specialty: defending men accused of sex crimes.
- Haven’t been following the trial? Here’s what’s happened so far.
President Trump was acquitted by the Senate on Wednesday of both articles of impeachment. While the vote largely fell along party lines, one senator crossed the aisle to vote to convict him. Today, we hear from Senator Mitt Romney about that choice.
Guest: Senator Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, who spoke with Mark Leibovich, the Washington-based chief national correspondent for The New York Times Magazine. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In a speech before voting to convict, Mr. Romney grew emotional as he pronounced the president “guilty of an appalling abuse of public trust.”
- “I think this is Senator Romney’s moment to shine,” Senator Amy Klobuchar said before the vote, “I hope he can bring some people with him.” Here’s a behind-the-scenes look at Mr. Romney’s isolation in the Senate and the expectations placed on him before his vote.
Hours after Iowa kicked off the process to choose President Trump’s 2020 opponent, and just a day before the verdict is expected in his Senate impeachment trial, the president gave his third State of the Union address. Today, we take you to The New York Times’s Washington bureau, where we examined the speech — and the unique moment in which it was delivered.
Guest: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Though Mr. Trump didn’t mention impeachment, the process hung over his address, and his refusal to shake Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s hand put the bitterness between them on full display.
- The speech sounded like a re-election pitch, with the president claiming credit for a “great American comeback.”
After a night of chaos and confusion at the Iowa caucuses, and nearly a full day since the results were initially expected, the state’s Democratic Party has announced only partial numbers, from 62 percent of precincts. We look at what the debacle in Iowa will mean for the results — when they’re finally released.
“The Latest,” from the team behind “The Daily,” brings you the most important developments on today’s biggest news stories. You can find more information about it here.
The kickoff to the 2020 voting was undercut Monday night by major delays in the reporting of the Iowa caucus results. We traveled to Johnston, Iowa, to tell the story of the day — from the perspective of one caucus in a middle school gym. Guests: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times and Reid J. Epstein, a political reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A new system of reporting caucus results led to confusion and few solid numbers — forcing the Iowa Democratic Party to delay the release of results until a winner could be verified later Tuesday.
- Here’s where you can see live results as they become available.
With Iowa voters making their choice and the 2020 election getting underway, we’re introducing a new show: one covering the country and its voters in the lead up to Nov. 3. In our first episode of “The Field,” we ask Democratic caucusgoers how they’re feeling about the election. Traveling around the state, we found anxious Iowans asking one question over and over: Who can beat President Trump? Note: This episode contains strong language.
Guests: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times, and Austin Mitchell and Andy Mills, producers for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Confused by the Iowa caucuses? Here’s how they work.
- The New York Times polled 584 Democrats likely to caucus in Iowa. Fifteen of them agreed to talk to us on camera. Here is what they told us.
- The state with a huge influence in picking presidential candidates doesn’t look much like the country as a whole, except in one very striking way: a rapidly aging population.
In a 51-to-49 vote, Republicans shut down an effort by Democrats to bring new witnesses and documents into the Senate impeachment trial. As they cleared a path toward acquittal, some Republicans stepped forward to explain why they voted as they did — even though they believed what President Trump did was wrong.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment process, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
The media’s coverage of the 2016 presidential campaign has come to be criticized for operating under three key assumptions: that Hillary Clinton was certain to be the Democratic nominee, that Donald Trump was unlikely to be the Republican nominee, and that once Clinton and Trump had become their party’s nominees, she would win.
With voting for 2020 set to begin in Iowa on Monday, “The Daily” sat down with Dean Baquet, the executive editor of The New York Times, to discuss the lessons he — and the organization — learned from 2016. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- This is our guide to the 2020 election.
- We’ve sent reporters to every corner of the country and told them not to make any assumptions in this election cycle. Here are some of the most in-depth stories we’ve told in an effort to help the country understand itself.
- As part of a new approach to election coverage, The Times’s editorial board has re-examined how — and why — it makes presidential endorsements.
Nearly two decades ago, China was at the heart of a public health crisis over a deadly new virus. It said it had made lifesaving reforms since. So why is the Wuhan coronavirus now spreading so rapidly across the world? Our correspondent went to the center of the outbreak to find out. Guest: Javier C. Hernández, a New York Times correspondent based in Beijing. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- What is the coronavirus? And why is China struggling to control its spread around the world?
- Unless you are at high risk for catching the disease, it may be a good idea to avoid buying a face mask. There is now a shortage of masks, leaving health care workers unprotected and expediting the spread of the disease.
In the question-and-answer stage of the Senate impeachment trial, Alan Dershowitz, the celebrity lawyer on President Trump’s legal team, made an argument that stunned many who heard it. Say that Mr. Trump did extend a quid pro quo to Ukraine, and that he did it to improve his own re-election prospects. Says Mr. Dershowitz: What’s wrong with that?
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
Today, we sit down with Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, to discuss what it’s like to be the leader of a party out of power at this moment in the impeachment trial of President Trump. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- "Look, is it an uphill fight? Yes.” he said. “Are we making progress? Yes.” Why Mr. Schumer believes he can persuade his Republican colleagues to allow new witnesses in the trial.
- Here are the latest updates on impeachment, including the Senate’s response to a Times investigation revealing new claims about the president’s conduct from his former national security adviser John Bolton.
A firsthand account by John R. Bolton, the former national security adviser, directly linked President Trump to a quid pro quo in the Ukraine affair, undercutting a central plank of the defense’s argument. What could that mean for the final phase of the impeachment trial? Guests: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House and Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A Times investigation revealed that Mr. Bolton privately expressed concern to the attorney general last year that the president was effectively granting personal favors to autocratic leaders around the world.
- Republican senators had been ready to swiftly acquit President Trump. But Mr. Bolton’s revelations in the manuscript of his new book could change the calculus.
Across the United States, parents and school districts have been wrestling with the question of whether the country’s most popular and profitable sport is too dangerous for children. Today, we explore how that dispute is playing out in one Texas town. Guests: Ken Belson, who covers the N.F.L. for The New York Times, spoke with Jim Harris and Spencer Taylor in Marshall, Texas. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Repeated blows to the head while playing football have been linked to a degenerative brain disease called C.T.E.
- Football is a powerful, cultural force in Marshall, a city of about 24,000 people in East Texas. But residents, coaches and educators have questioned the safety of a sport they cannot imagine living without.
Three Rust Belt swing states are critical to winning the presidency this year — Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. In Pennsylvania, there is one issue that could be decisive: fracking natural gas.
Opposition to fracking could be fatal for a candidate in the state, yet front-runners for the Democratic nomination have committed to banning fracking nationwide if elected. We went to western Pennsylvania, where fracking affects residents daily, to see whether electability in the state could really be reduced to this single issue.
Guests: Shane Goldmacher, a national political reporter for The New York Times, traveled to Pennsylvania with Andy Mills and Monika Evstatieva, producers for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Our investigative team revealed how immense amounts of methane, the primary gas acquired by fracking, are escaping from oil and gas sites nationwide, worsening global warming.
- What is fracking? And why is it so harmful to the communities that come in contact with the toxins it leaves behind?
In a moment of national insecurity, with the future of the United Kingdom seemingly hanging in the balance, a new royal couple offered the vision of a unified, progressive future. But the same forces that pushed for Britain to leave the European Union have now pushed Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, to leave the country.
Guest: Mark Landler, the London bureau chief of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A wish to carve out more “progressive” roles has led to the loss of perks, privileges and titles — a more thorough break than the Duke and Duchess of Sussex seem to have expected.
- The couple’s push for greater independence has resurfaced the same questions that animated the Brexit debate.
- Black Britons expressed support for Harry and Meghan. “Thank God they are free,” one Londoner said. “All of this is about her race. I know it because as a Caribbean woman who did not grow up here, I have experienced it myself.”
Opening arguments in the Senate impeachment trial are underway. For House impeachment managers, that means an opportunity to formally make their case, uninterrupted, for three straight days. For President Trump’s lawyers and Republican allies, that means three straight days of sitting in the Senate chamber, bound by a vow of silence.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment process, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
After nearly 12 hours of vicious debate, the Senate voted early Wednesday to adopt the rules that will govern the rest of the impeachment trial. But in a Republican-controlled chamber, why weren’t they the rules that Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, had originally wanted?
Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, congressional editor for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Voting along party lines, Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ efforts to subpoena witnesses and documents related to President Trump’s dealings with Ukraine.
- As the trial began in earnest, Mr. Trump was 4,000 miles away, touting the United States’ economic growth at the World Economic Forum, an elite gathering of business leaders in Davos, Switzerland.
As President Trump’s impeachment trial resumes this afternoon, we look back two decades to a time when Google was in its infancy, Y2K was stoking anxiety and partisanship in Congress was not quite so entrenched. That year, 1999, was the last time the Senate considered whether a president had committed high crimes and misdemeanors. So what has changed since the Senate trial of President Bill Clinton, and why is this impeachment such a different story?
Guest: Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Four journalists at The Times tell their stories of covering the last impeachment trial.
- Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican majority leader, announced rules to try to implement a speedy trial. Here’s how the framework differs from the Clinton precedent.
The Obama coalition has become almost mythic within the Democratic Party for having united first-time voters, people of color and moderates to win the presidency in 2008. This year, Senator Bernie Sanders is betting that he can win with the support of young voters and people of color — but without the moderates.
To do that, he’s counting on winning over and energizing the Latino vote. The ultimate test of whether he will be able to do that is in California, where Latinos are the single biggest nonwhite voting bloc. While young Latinos in California overwhelmingly support Mr. Sanders, to become the Democratic nominee, he will need the support of their parents and grandparents as well.
Guests: Jennifer Medina, a national political correspondent who is covering the 2020 presidential campaign for The New York Times, traveled to California with Jessica Cheung and Monika Evstatieva, producers on “The Daily,” to speak with Latino voters. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Though Mr. Sanders is a 78-year-old white senator from Vermont, in California, some Latino supporters are calling him “Tío Bernie,” as if he were an uncle or a family friend.
- Mr. Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren, the two leading progressive candidates, sparred publicly in the last debate.
The impeachment trial of President Trump begins this morning. Today, we answer all of your questions about what will happen next — including how it will work and what is likely to happen. Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The House’s long-anticipated vote to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate fell largely along party lines, setting the stage for what promises to be a fiercely partisan trial.
- Here’s a step-by-step guide to the process.
At the heart of President Trump’s impeachment is his request that Ukraine investigate how his political rival, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., could be connected to an energy company called Burisma. New reporting from The Times suggests that Russian hackers may be trying to fulfill that request — and potentially hack into the 2020 election itself. Guests: Nicole Perlroth, who covers cybersecurity for The Times, spoke with Oren Falkowitz, a former analyst at the National Security Agency and co-founder of the cybersecurity company Area 1. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Times has evidence that the same Russian military hackers that stole emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016 have been infiltrating Burisma, the energy company at the center of the Ukraine affair. Here’s what we know about the hackers.
- New details emerged on Tuesday of Mr. Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine, intensifying demands on Senate Republicans to include witness testimony and additional documents in the impeachment trial.
Carlos Ghosn’s trial was poised to be one of the most closely watched in Japanese history — a case involving claims of corporate greed, wounded national pride and a rigged legal system. Then the former Nissan chief pulled off an unimaginable escape. Guest: Ben Dooley, a business reporter for The New York Times based in Japan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Ghosn leaves behind a contentious history at one of the world’s largest car manufacturers, a record which is now unlikely to be scrutinized in Japanese courts. “Nobody’s going to take it from me,” Mr. Ghosn said of his legacy.
- The tycoon’s escape preparations spanned the globe, revealing the means by which the well-connected can evade legal accountability.
Wildfires are devastating Australia, incinerating an area roughly the size of West Virginia and killing 24 people and as many as half a billion animals. Today, we look at the human and environmental costs of the disaster, its connection to climate change and why so many Australians are frustrated by Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s response.
Guest: Livia Albeck-Ripka, a reporter for The Times in Melbourne a reporter for The Times in Melbourne who spoke with Susan Pulis, a woman who fled the fires with kangaroos and koalas in her car. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- After Australia’s hottest and driest year on record, Mr. Morrison has minimized the connection between the wildfire crisis and climate change and declined to make moves to curb the country’s carbon emissions.
- Many Australians entered the new year under apocalyptic blood-red skies as smoke from the fires choked the country’s southeastern coast. “I look outside and it’s like the end of the world. Armageddon is here,” one woman in Canberra said.
- The fires have burned through dozens of towns, destroying at least 3,000 homes. Now, unbridled by continuous fire fighting, the blazes have returned to some scorched areas to level what is left.
- Rupert Murdoch controls the largest news company in Australia, and his newspapers have contributed to a wave of misinformation about the cause of the fires.
Note: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence.
Yesterday on “The Daily,” we heard the story of Lucia Evans, whose allegation of sexual violence against Harvey Weinstein helped launch his criminal trial in New York. After Ms. Evans was dropped from the case, questions were raised about how a man accused of sexual misconduct by more than 80 women could end up facing so few of them in court. In the second half of this series, what happened next in the case against Harvey Weinstein. Guests: Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, investigative reporters for The New York Times and the authors of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Weinstein built a network of complicity that dozens of women say kept them silent for years.
- Opening statements in the trial have yet to be made, as this week has focused on jury selection and clashes over the rules of decorum in court.
Note: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence.
The story of Harvey Weinstein is a story of patterns. Scores of women — more than 80 — have given eerily similar accounts of abuse and harassment by the powerful movie mogul.
This week, two years after those allegations were first reported in The New York Times, Mr. Weinstein’s trial opens in New York. In the first part of a two-part series, we investigate why the case went from 80 potential plaintiffs to two.
Guest: Megan Twohey, an investigative reporter for The Times and co-author of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Weinstein’s reputation preceded him as he stepped into a Manhattan courthouse this week to face charges of rape and criminal sexual activity, making it difficult to find jurors who did not already have strong opinions about the case.
- The reporters who broke the first investigation into Mr. Weinstein explain why the trial rests on a narrow legal case with an already fraught back story and why the result is highly unpredictable.
- On the first day of Mr. Weinstein’s trial, two other criminal allegations against him were released in Los Angeles.
John R. Bolton, the former White House national security adviser, has announced that he is willing to give evidence in the impeachment trial of President Trump. The question is: Will the Senate — and the majority leader, Mitch McConnell — let that happen? Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Bolton’s announcement was an unexpected turn that could alter the political dynamic of the impeachment process, raising the possibility of Republican defections.
- In response, Mr. McConnell said that he had the votes he needed to quickly acquit the president without calling witnesses or hearing new evidence.
The killing of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, Iran’s most formidable military and intelligence leader, displayed the fault lines in a fractious region. From Iraq to Israel, many victims of the commander’s shadow warfare celebrated his death; but in Tehran, thousands filled the streets to grieve. Today, we explore who General Suleimani was, and what he meant to Iranians.
Guest: Farnaz Fassihi, a reporter covering Iran for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- As we break down how religious differences have fueled conflict in Iraq and Iran, here’s a refresher on the distinction between Sunni and Shia Islam.
- At General Suleimani’s funeral, a senior military leader vowed to set America “ablaze.” But it remains uncertain how, or even whether, Iran will strike back.
- President Trump and his defense secretary have said different things about how the United States might respond to any Iranian retaliation. One of our Interpreter columnists is struggling to see a deeper strategy.
- Dozens of American citizens of Iranian descent have been detained while trying to enter the United States. “My kids shouldn’t experience such things,” one woman said after being held overnight upon return from a ski trip in Canada. “They are U.S. citizens. This is not O.K.”
Iran has promised “severe revenge” against the United States for the killing of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani. But what made the high-ranking military leader an American target in the first place? Guest: Helene Cooper, who covers the Pentagon for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani was known as the instigator behind proxy wars that fueled instability in the Middle East. His death further disturbed the region’s delicate power balances — and effectively ended a landmark nuclear deal.
- Some Iranian officials called the American strike on General Suleimani an act of war. As the consequences of the killing ripple outward, our columnist asks: Was the strike a good idea?
- Catching up after a weekend offline? Here’s what else you need to know about the death of General Suleimani.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of 2019 and checking in on what has happened since they first appeared. Today, we return to our conversation with the whistle-blower John Barnett, known as Swampy, about what he said were systemic safety problems at Boeing. After two 737 Max jet crashes killed a total of 346 people and a federal investigation left the company in crisis, we ask: Is something deeper going wrong at the once-revered manufacturer?
Guest: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The New York Times, spoke with John Barnett, a former quality manager at Boeing. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Boeing successfully lobbied to reduce government oversight of airplane designs, allowing them to regulate faulty engineering internally.
- A congressional investigation last fall asked what Boeing knew before the two crashes.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of 2019 and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran. Today, we return to the exclusive interview in the Oval Office between the publisher of The Times, A. G. Sulzberger, and President Trump about the role of a free press. Guest: A. G. Sulzberger, The Times’s publisher, who joined two White House reporters, Maggie Haberman and Peter Baker, to interview Mr. Trump. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In his remarks on the media, Mr. Trump took credit for popularizing the term “fake news,” but declined to accept responsibility for a rise in threats against journalists since he took office. Read excerpts from his exchange with Mr. Sulzberger.
- Here are five takeaways from the interview.
- Mr. Trump said he wanted evidence the world was getting more dangerous for journalists. Here it is.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened since they appeared. Today, we introduce Ella Maners, 9, from our kids’ episode on facing fears, to Barbara Greenman, 70, who heard Ella’s story and felt compelled to reach out. Guests: Julia Longoria and Bianca Giaever, producers for “The Daily”; Ella and her mother, Katie Maners; and Ms. Greenman, a listener who used Ella’s tips to confront her own fears. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ella’s fears of sickness and tornadoes were taking over her life — until she went to summer camp. How the University of Florida is helping children learn to deal with obsessive-compulsive and anxiety disorders.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran. Today, we talk to our critic about his reckoning with abuse allegations against Michael Jackson and his efforts to abstain from the pop star’s music. Ten months later, he shares why he still has a Shazam feed full of Jackson’s hits — and reflects on what the ubiquity Jackson’s music in public reveals about our society. Guest: Wesley Morris, a critic at large for The Times and a host of the podcast “Still Processing.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
This episode contains descriptions of abuse.
Background coverage:
- Read Wesley Morris’s piece about confronting his own fandom in the face of the allegations made against Michael Jackson in “Leaving Neverland,” an HBO documentary.
- We look at Jackson’s history of sexual abuse accusations, and answer some questions about why child abuse victims often take years to come forward.
- A musical about the pop star’s life is set to open in New York next summer. Because of Jackson’s fierce fan base, the show’s producers are confident tickets will sell.
- Listen to the hosts of “Still Processing” discuss how to respond to a problematic artist whose influence has so thoroughly permeated modern culture.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran. Today: the unexpected story of how family history websites have been used by law enforcement to track down suspects and win convictions — and why retroactive regulation won’t be able to reverse the trend. Guest: Heather Murphy, a reporter at The New York Times who spoke with CeCe Moore, a genetic genealogist, and Curtis Rogers, a creator of the genealogy website GEDMatch. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Today, we revisit Part 2 of our series on genetic privacy. If you’d like to catch up on the full story, make sure to listen to Part 1 as well.
- Do you think your DNA profile is private? A warrant granted by a judge in Florida could open up all consumer DNA sites for use by law enforcement agencies across the country.
- At a conference this fall, “rockstars” of the DNA industry and top law enforcement officers grappled with how to regulate the use of genetic material in policing. They also practiced solving murders together.
- Here’s how to protect yourself if you take a genetic test at home.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran. After we sat down with Leo, a third grader, to talk about the impeachment inquiry, we were flooded with emails expressing gratitude for our guest. So we called Leo back and asked him about what he’s been up to while the impeachment inquiry has unfolded. Guests: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times; Bianca Giaever, a producer for “The Daily”; and Leo, a third grader who was obsessed with the impeachment inquiry. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Leo predicted President Trump would be impeached in the House of Representatives. He was right.
- The impeachment process was paused after Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would wait to see what the trial in the Senate would look like before sending the two charges there.
This week, “The Daily” is revisiting some of our favorite episodes of the year and checking in on what has happened since the stories first ran. Today, we return to the story of Rachel Held Evans and speak to her husband, Daniel, as he heads into his first holiday season since her death.
In her absence, the community she created still engages with her work online. “It tells me there’s a lot of pain in the world,” Mr. Evans said. “I find hope that there are people not yet born who may still read her words.” Guests: Elizabeth Dias, who covers religion for The Times and Daniel Evans, Rachel Held Evans’s husband. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Rachel Held Evans, the best-selling author who challenged conservative Christianity and gave voice to a generation of wandering evangelicals wrestling with their faith, passed away in May after experiencing excessive brain swelling.
Our first episode of 2019 opened the year with a question: “What will Democrats do with their new power?” One of our last offered the answer: “impeach the president.” This audio time capsule captures the weeks in between — a crescendo of controversy and culture wars to wrap up the decade. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Here’s some nostalgia as we head into 2020:
- Our photo editors pored over ten years of images to bring you: The decade in pictures.
- And if you’re looking for a longer read over the holidays, check out our editors’ picks for the 10 best books of 2019.
He built a career, and a presidential campaign, on a belief in bipartisanship. Now, critics of the candidate ask: Is political consensus a dangerous compromise?
In Part 4 of our series on pivotal moments in the lives of the 2020 Democratic presidential contenders, we examine the long Senate career, and legislative legacy, of former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden now plays down his role overhauling crime laws with segregationist senators in the 1980s and ’90s. In an investigation, our reporter found that the portrayal is at odds with his actions and rhetoric back then.
- The former vice president and current Democratic front-runner wants to unite the country in a divisive time. Here’s more on what Mr. Biden stands for.
- This Supreme Court battle explains why Mr. Biden firmly believes in bipartisanship.
The House of Representatives has impeached President Trump, charging him with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. We traveled to Michigan to understand how a fractious Democratic Party ultimately united around impeachment, having started the year divided over the issue. Guests: Representative Elissa Slotkin and Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrats of Michigan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Trump became only the third president in American history to be impeached, as the House charged him with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The votes were largely along party lines.
- Moderate Democrats encouraged their party to begin the impeachment inquiry. Now, those representatives face a reckoning with that decision.
- Are you confused by the impeachment process? Here’s how it works.
The House is expected to vote tonight along party lines to impeach the president. But before that can take place, there must be speeches — lots of them. These speeches are the last chance lawmakers have to get their words in the history books before they cast their ballots. Here’s what they had to say.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment process, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
President Trump has issued an executive order cracking down on anti-Semitism. But some Jewish Americans fear that the plan could end up deepening prejudice instead of curbing it. Guest: Max Fisher, a Times international reporter and columnist for The Interpreter. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The executive order touches on a defining issue of our time: Who belongs, and who decides?
- Some students across the United States said they were afraid that the order would backfire, worsening anti-Semitism on college campuses.
House members are preparing for a vote on two articles of impeachment against President Trump, while their counterparts gear up for the next phase: a trial in the Senate. As the impeachment process moves from a Democratic-controlled chamber to one dominated by Republicans, the rules of engagement are changing — and party leaders are battling over who gets to decide them.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
To pull off its landslide victory in last week’s election, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party flipped dozens of districts in the “red wall” of British politics — a gritty stronghold of coal and factory towns that had supported the Labour Party for decades. Our correspondent traveled across the United Kingdom to understand what the region’s political realignment may foretell about the future of the country.
Guest: Patrick Kingsley, an international correspondent for The New York Times, who spoke with constituents in Shirebrook, England. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- “Votes for the pro-Brexit Conservatives had 10 times the effective power of votes for the anti-Brexit Liberal Democrats.” Our columnist writes that this is thanks to the electoral system used in Britain and the United States.
- On a road trip from London to Glasgow, our correspondent found a country longing for a past that may be impossible to revive.
For nearly two decades, U.S. government officials crafted a careful story of progress to justify their ongoing military campaign in Afghanistan. Newly disclosed documents reveal to what extent that story was not the reality of the war. Today, one former Marine speaks about the missteps the government concealed for years. Guest: Thomas Gibbons-Neff, a reporter in The New York Times Washington bureau and a former Marine infantryman and Eric Schmitt, who covers terrorism and national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Afghans have endured four decades of conflict, with little prospect of peace. This is the story of the last 18 years since the American invasion, as told by the men and women who’ve lived it.
- “We were devoid of a fundamental understanding of Afghanistan — we didn’t know what we were doing,” one retired three-star Army general said in hundreds of classified memos obtained by The Washington Post.
- Here are our key takeaways from the declassified documents.
As the House Judiciary Committee pushed toward a historic vote to send two articles of impeachment to the full House, lawmakers made their final appeals to the other side. Democrats implored committee members to vote with their conscience and put country over party. Republicans, in turn, asked for the exact same thing.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
In Part 3 of our series on pivotal moments in the lives of the 2020 Democratic presidential contenders, we spoke with Elizabeth Warren about how she came to be known as the blow-it-up candidate. With help from Andrew Ross Sorkin, a financial columnist at The Times and founder of DealBook, Harry Reid, a former Senate majority leader, and David Axelrod, a former Obama adviser, we explore Ms. Warren’s rise to prominence as an advocate for overhauling the financial system — and how that rise helps us understand her run for president now. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The New York Times Magazine spoke to Ms. Warren in June, discussing the double standards that can confront professional women — and female presidential candidates.
- Ms. Warren has lots of plans. Together, they would remake the economy.
- We asked 21 candidates the same 18 questions. Hear Ms. Warren’s answers.
Britain is voting in a general election today. During his re-election campaign, Prime Minister Boris Johnson hitched his re-election campaign to a promise to “get Brexit done” — while selling bankers and blue-collar workers two very different visions for the country.
Some hope his promise will mean restoring the United Kingdom to its past glory. But what does it actually mean? Guest: Mark Landler, London bureau chief of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- There is growing anxiety among some voters that the prime minister’s vow to complete Brexit could undermine the country’s national health service, a key social safety net. The service is at the center of an election scandal in the final days of the campaign.
- As Britain prepared for the election, a Times reporter spent two weeks driving from London to Glasgow. He found a country united only by its disunity.
- With agitations for secession in Scotland and Northern Ireland, our chief correspondent asks: Could completing Brexit spell the end of the United Kingdom as we know it?
House Democratic leaders have introduced two articles of impeachment against President Trump: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. But they did not include obstruction of justice. In today’s episode, we delve into the unseen fight among Democrats over whether two articles of impeachment was enough. Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In the draft articles, House Democrats claim that Mr. Trump used as leverage against Ukraine two “official acts”: the delivery of $391 million in security assistance and a White House meeting for Ukraine’s president.
- Here are key takeaways from yesterday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing.
A trove of private government documents offers an unprecedented look inside China’s highly organized crackdown on Uighur Muslims — revealing Beijing’s systematic detention of as many as one million people in camps and prisons over the past three years. In one speech, China’s president ordered his subordinates to show prisoners in Xinjiang “absolutely no mercy.” Guest: Paul Mozur, a technology reporter for The New York Times based in Shanghai. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In one of the biggest leaks of the last half-century, The Times obtained more than 400 pages of internal documents revealing the meticulous planning that has gone into the Chinese government’s crackdown on ethnic minorities.
- Yesterday we followed our correspondent into the heart of Xinjiang, where one woman risked her life to talk about her experience in China’s system of torture and surveillance.
To mention the Mueller report in articles of impeachment against President Trump, or not? That’s the question Democrats have been asking. Today’s impeachment hearing before the House Judiciary Committee gave us a clue about which way they’re leaning.
“The Latest” is a series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
A last-minute booking, a furtive cab ride and a spy in the window. For the past year, Paul Mozur has been investigating the story of a son determined to free his mother from a repressive system of detention and surveillance in western China. In doing so, he found a crack in China’s surveillance state — and a mother on her deathbed in Xinjiang.
Today, we hear from the man’s mother for the first time.
Guest: Paul Mozur, a technology reporter for The New York Times based in Shanghai, spoke with Ferkat Jawdat, a Uighur who is an American citizen and lives in Virginia, and his mother in Xinjiang, China. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Chinese authorities are using a vast secret system of facial recognition technology to control the Uighurs, a largely Muslim minority in western China. The government may also be taking citizens’ DNA without consent to enhance the system.
- “We must be as harsh as them, and show absolutely no mercy.” Leaked documents reveal how the Chinese authorities orchestrated the crackdown on one million or more ethnic Uighurs.
- If you missed our previous interviews with Mr. Jawdat, here are Part 1 and Part 2.
Today: Part 2 of our series on pivotal moments in the lives of the 2020 Democratic presidential contenders. Michael Barbaro speaks with Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist senator from Vermont.
Mr. Sanders reflected on his early schooling in politics and how he galvanized grass-roots support to evolve from outraged outsider to mainstream candidate with little shift in his message.
Guest: Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator and candidate for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. We also speak with Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sanders has staked his presidential campaign, and much of his political legacy, on transforming health care in America. His mother’s illness and a trip he made to study the Canadian system help explain why.
- We asked 21 candidates the same 18 questions. Hear Mr. Sanders’s answers.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced this morning that the House of Representatives would draft articles of impeachment against President Trump. But what our colleague found most striking today happened a few hours later, when a reporter for a conservative television network asked the speaker, “Do you hate the president?”
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
For decades, the U.S. spent billions of dollars trying to close its education gap with the rest of the world. New data shows that all that money made little difference. Today, we investigate how that could be. Guest: Dana Goldstein, a national correspondent for The New York Times who covers education. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The past three American presidents have tried to help the U.S. education system compete with other countries. Test scores haven’t improved.
- The “Nation’s Report Card” came out this fall. It indicated that two-thirds of children in the U.S. are not proficient readers.
The House Judiciary Committee opened a new phase of the impeachment inquiry by tackling a fundamental constitutional question: What is an impeachable offense? All the witnesses testifying in today’s hearing were in agreement, except one.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
The House Intelligence Committee has released its impeachment report to the Judiciary Committee, signaling the end of one phase of impeachment and the beginning of another. Today, we break down the report and explore why those two phases will look so different. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The House Intelligence Committee released its impeachment report this week, concluding that President Trump tried to “use the powers of his office to solicit foreign interference on his behalf in the 2020 election.” Here are our key takeaways from the report.
- Confused by what happens next? Our step-by-step guide to the impeachment process has you covered.
Behind the curtain of an internet blackout, the Islamic Republic’s security forces have killed at least 180 unarmed protesters.
Natalie Kitroeff speaks to Farnaz Fassihi about Iran’s deadliest political unrest in decades and why the United States wanted that unrest — and has helped fuel it.
Guest: Farnaz Fassihi, a reporter covering Iran for The New York Times, in conversation with Natalie Kitroeff. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- How a peaceful protest over fuel prices quickly evolved into nationwide demonstrations against the Islamic Republic and its leaders, unrest which scores of people would not survive.
- After the United States condemned the extrajudicial killings, Iran pointed to the rebuke as evidence that the demonstrations were backed by Western enemies.
For decades, hospitals could assume that patients with jobs and health insurance would pay their medical bills. That’s no longer the case. We speak to one woman about her skyrocketing medical costs — and the aggressive new way hospitals are forcing patients to pay up.
Guest: Sarah Kliff, an investigative reporter covering health care for The New York Times, speaks with Amanda Sturgill, 41, whose health care provider took her to court in Virginia. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- One in four Americans have skipped medical treatment because of the cost, and nearly half fear bankruptcy in the event of a health emergency. Meet some of the employed and insured Americans who cannot afford health care.
- The American health care system is not the norm for developed countries. Here’s a look at how socialized and privatized systems compare internationally.
- Why doesn’t the United States have universal health care? The 1619 Project found that the answer is linked to segregation.
In a ruined palace in the woods, rummaging through discarded papers, our reporter finds a clue.
For more information, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
“Ellen, have you been trying to get in touch with the royal family of Oudh?” Our reporter receives an invitation to the forest.
For more information, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
The story passed for years from tea sellers to rickshaw drivers to shopkeepers in Old Delhi. In a forest, they said, in a palace cut off from the city, lived a prince, a princess and a queen, said to be the last of a Shiite Muslim royal line. Some said the family had been there since the British had annexed their kingdom. Others said they were supernatural beings.
It was a stunning and tragic story. But was it real? On a spring afternoon, while on assignment in India, Ellen Barry got a phone call that sent her looking for the truth.
In Chapter 1, we hear of a woman who appeared on the platform of the New Delhi railway station with her two adult children, declaring they were the descendants of the royal family of Oudh. She said they would not leave until what was theirs had been restored. So they settled in and waited — for nearly a decade.
For more information, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Yesterday, we looked at the origins of President Trump’s baseless theory that Ukraine, not Russia, meddled in the 2016 election. This theory inspired one of the two investigations he sought from Ukraine that triggered the impeachment inquiry. Today, we look at the origins of the president’s second theory. Guest: Kenneth P. Vogel, a reporter in The New York Times’s Washington bureau. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s diplomatic record on corruption in Ukraine contradicts President Trump’s claims.
- There are a lot of accusations flying back and forth between the president and the former vice president. Let us help you sort them out.
In the phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry, President Trump asked Ukraine for two different investigations. Today, we explore the unexpected story behind one of them. Guest: Scott Shane, a national security reporter in the Washington bureau of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- How a fringe theory about Ukraine took root in the White House.
- Moscow has run a yearslong operation attempting to essentially frame Ukraine for its own 2016 election interference, according to United States intelligence agencies.
An unusual battle has broken out between President Trump and top military commanders over the future of a Navy SEAL commando.
Today, how a high-profile war-crimes investigation has prompted a war of words from the commander in chief — rocking the highest levels of the military. Guest: Dave Philipps, a national correspondent covering veterans and the military for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Why Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher was investigated for war crimes, and why his fellow SEAL members broke the group’s code of silence to testify against him.
- Order within his ranks was a “deadly serious business.” Now, Richard V. Spencer, the secretary of the Navy, has resigned after clashing with the president over Chief Gallagher’s demotion.
President Trump called into ‘Fox & Friends’ this morning to respond to all that has been said over two weeks of public impeachment hearings. The conversation offered a preview of what may become the president’s impeachment defense.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
Today we launch Part One in our series on pivotal moments in the lives of the 2020 presidential front-runners. In studio with “The Daily,” Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Ind., talks about how his lifelong political ambitions were complicated by the secret he kept for decades.
Guests:
- Pete Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Ind., and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate.
- Jeremy W. Peters, a politics reporter in the Washington bureau of The New York Times.
“The Candidates” is a new series from “The Daily” exploring pivotal moments in the lives of top presidential contenders in the 2020 election. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Throughout the impeachment inquiry, an image has surfaced of the Trump administration’s two policymaking channels on Ukraine — one regular, one not. Today’s testimony from Fiona Hill, President Trump’s former top adviser on Russia and Europe, raised the question: Which was which?
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
Gordon D. Sondland, the United States ambassador to the European Union, has evolved from a loyal Trump campaign donor to a witness central to the impeachment inquiry. But his testimony has been contradicted on multiple occasions.
Today, we look at how both Democrats and Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee handled their most complicated witness to date.
Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sondland implicated Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in the nation’s biggest foreign policy controversy in nearly two decades. Reciting emails that he had written to Mr. Pompeo, he said that “everyone was in the loop.”
- Confused about what this moment might mean? Here are answers to seven key questions about the impeachment process.
In explosive testimony, Gordon D. Sondland, the United States ambassador to the European Union, directly implicated President Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and other top administration officials in what he said was a push for a “clear quid pro quo” with the president of Ukraine. But during questioning, things got complicated.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
When Senator Kamala Harris started her presidential campaign 10 months ago, she drew a crowd of 20,000 to her kickoff rally — the biggest of any candidate’s. She was talked about as a potential heir to the political coalition that carried Barack Obama to the White House. We followed her campaign to South Carolina to explore why, after such fanfare, she’s now polling in the single digits.
Guest: Astead W. Herndon, a national political reporter for The New York Times, and Monika Evstatieva, a producer on “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Harris said she wanted relevant policy, not “a beautiful sonnet.” Here are the signature issues of her campaign.
- We asked 21 candidates the same 18 questions. Hear Kamala Harris’s answers.
Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, gave public testimony of his alarm at what he heard during President Trump’s July phone call with the leader of Ukraine. Appearing in his Army dress uniform trimmed with military ribbons, Colonel Vindman spoke of himself as a patriot, an account that Democrats echoed. The president’s Republican allies, however, told a different story.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
As they lobbied the Trump administration for a $1.5 trillion tax cut, corporations vowed to invest the savings back into the U.S. economy. Today, we investigate whether they made good on that promise.
Guest: Jim Tankersley, who covers economic and tax policy for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- FedEx’s leadership lobbied unsuccessfully for tax reform for years. Then it wrote its own tax proposal for President Trump — cutting the company’s corporate tax rate to zero.
- How the Trump administration’s tax cuts may have affected you, and why you might not believe it.
Four witnesses will appear in tomorrow’s public hearings — three of whom listened directly to the July phone call between President Trump and Ukraine’s president that is now at the center of the impeachment inquiry. Plus, impeachment investigators are looking into whether Mr. Trump lied to Robert S. Mueller III.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
It was one of the most valuable start-ups in the United States, with bold plans to revolutionize how and where people worked around the world. Today, we look at how the dream of WeWork crumbled — and explore the story of the man responsible for the wreckage.
Guest: Amy Chozick, a writer at large for The New York Times covering the personalities and power struggles in business, politics and media.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Adam Neumann had an inexplicably persuasive charisma and a taste for risk. Then he found a kindred spirit with an open checkbook.
- WeWork is preparing to eliminate at least 4,000 employees, cutting nearly a third of its work force in an effort to staunch further financial losses.
Marie Yovanovitch, who was ousted as the ambassador to Ukraine on President Trump’s orders, came before the House Intelligence Committee on the second day of public hearings in the impeachment inquiry. At the very moment she was testifying about feeling threatened by the president, the president was tweeting about her.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
Free-market economists once talked about “the miracle of Chile,” praising its policies as Latin America’s great economic success story. But recently, over a million people have flipped the script, taking to the streets and facing down a violent police response as they demand a reckoning on the promise of prosperity that never came.
Today, we explore how, in Chile, capitalism itself is now on trial.
Guest: Amanda Taub, who explores the ideas and context behind major world events as a columnist for The Interpreter at The New York Times, spoke with Annie Brown, a producer for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- “It’s not 30 pesos, it’s 30 years.” Our correspondent went to Santiago, the Chilean capital, to understand how a small hike in public transportation fares ignited mass protests.
- After weeks of demonstrations, Chile’s president said he would support a new Constitution. But for many, it was too little, too late.
- Our correspondent went inside a trauma unit in Chile that’s responding to “an epidemic” of protesters who have been shot in the eye by police pellet guns. Watch the video below.
We’ve been hearing a lot about the “quid pro quo.” But this week, Democrats started using a new term, one that shows up in the impeachment clause of the Constitution, to describe President Trump’s actions toward Ukraine. Republicans started using it, too — to reject it.
“The Latest” is a new series on the impeachment inquiry, from the team behind “The Daily.” You can find more information about it here.
The House of Representatives opened historic impeachment hearings on Wednesday, with William B. Taylor Jr. and George P. Kent, senior career civil servants, caught in the crossfire. Democrats underscored the constitutional import of the proceedings, while Republicans branded the whole investigation into President Trump’s dealings with Ukraine a sham. Mr. Taylor and Mr. Kent — carefully, if cinematically — detailed the emergence of a shadow foreign policy, one which had the capacity to determine the fate of an ally in the face of Russian aggression.
We discuss what this phase of the impeachment inquiry could mean for the president — and for the 2020 election.
Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Taylor said that, in a call with Gordon D. Sondland, the American ambassador to the European Union, President Trump had made clear he cared “more about the investigations of Biden” than Ukraine’s security.
- Here are key moments from the first public impeachment hearing.
On the first day of public hearings in the Trump impeachment inquiry, lawmakers questioned two diplomats, and laid out two competing narratives about the investigation. This is the first episode in our new series on the impeachment inquiry. For more information, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
This morning, the House of Representatives begins public hearings in the impeachment inquiry against President Trump. Before those hearings get underway, we sat down with someone who’s unafraid to ask all the questions we’ve been too embarrassed to say out loud.
Guests: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times, spoke with Bianca Giaever, a producer for “The Daily,” and Leo, a third grader, to answer his questions about the impeachment inquiry. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In the first nationally televised hearings of the impeachment inquiry, Democrats will look to make the case that Mr. Trump’s dealings with Ukraine constitute high crimes and misdemeanors.
- These will be the first presidential impeachment hearings in more than two decades. Here’s how this inquiry is likely to be different than the last.
- Meet the public officials likely to be most prominent in the inquiry.
Today, the Supreme Court begins hearing arguments about whether the Trump administration acted legally when it tried to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. The Obama-era program known as DACA shields immigrants who were brought to the United States as children, known as Dreamers, from deportation.
In this episode, we explore why the outcome of the case may turn on a small act of rebellion by one of President Trump’s former cabinet members.
Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Elaine C. Duke, a former Acting Secretary of Homeland Security, refused to echo the White House’s policy justifications for ending DACA. Her decision led to a Supreme Court case addressing presidential power over immigration.
- Meet two of the nearly 700,000 Dreamers whose families, homes and jobs may be affected by the justices’ ruling.
The question of whether President Trump leveraged military assistance to Ukraine for personal gain is at the heart of the impeachment inquiry. Today, we speak with our Ukraine correspondent on why that assistance was so important to Ukraine — and the United States — in the first place.
Guest: Andrew E. Kramer, who covers Ukraine for The New York Times and is based in Moscow. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Petro O. Poroshenko, who was Ukraine’s president until May, knew his country’s independence hinged on American support. So he waged a campaign to win over President Trump.
- As vice president, Joe Biden tried to press Ukraine’s leaders to clean up corruption and reform the energy industry. The story of that effort has been overtaken by his son’s work for a Ukrainian gas company.
Gordon D. Sondland, the United States ambassador to the European Union, told impeachment investigators he knew “nothing” about a quid pro quo in Ukraine.
Now Mr. Sondland, a blunt-spoken hotelier, has changed tack. In a new four-page sworn statement released by the House, he confirmed his role in communicating President Trump’s demand that Ukraine investigate the Bidens in exchange for military aid.
Today, we discuss the road to Mr. Sondland’s sudden reversal, and what his new testimony means for the impeachment investigation.
Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, a Washington correspondent for The Times who covers national security and federal investigations. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Sondland’s reversal offers a potentially critical piece of evidence to investigators trying to determine whether Mr. Trump abused his power.
- Late-night show hosts mocked Mr. Sondland, saying he had reversed his testimony after remembering “one important detail: that I don’t want to go to jail for perjury.”
In 2013, Aimee Stephens watched her boss read a carefully worded letter.
“I have felt imprisoned in a body that does not match my mind. And this has caused me great despair and loneliness,” she had written. “With the support of my loving wife, I have decided to become the person that my mind already is.”
Ms. Stephens was fired after coming out as transgender. Now, she is the lead plaintiff in a Supreme Court case that will determine the employment rights of gay and transgender workers across the nation.
Guests: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times, and Aimee Stephens, the lead plaintiff in the transgender discrimination case heard by the Supreme Court. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The forthcoming Supreme Court ruling hangs on justices’ interpretation of wording in the Civil Rights Act that prohibits employment discrimination “because of sex.”
- The case came to the Supreme Court from a federal appeals court, which found in favor of Ms. Stephens last year.
Kentucky’s unpopular Republican governor, Matthew G. Bevin, was facing a losing battle. So he turned to President Trump, and a polarized political landscape, for help. Today, we look at why Tuesday’s race for governor in Kentucky is drawing outsized attention, what it may tell us about the politics of impeachment, and how a state race became a national test.
Guest: Jonathan Martin, a national political correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Matthew G. Bevin, the incumbent governor in Kentucky, was deeply unpopular after blaming striking teachers for violence against children.
- Mr. Bevin pivoted away from his own agenda to make the race for governor a referendum on national politics.
- Andrew G. Beshear, Mr. Bevin’s Democratic challenger, has claimed victory, but Mr. Bevin has not conceded. Explore our map of the results: A few thousand votes separate the candidates after all precincts reported.
The New York Times and Siena College conducted a major new poll, tackling the biggest questions about the 2020 presidential race: How likely is President Trump to be re-elected and which Democrat is best positioned to defeat him?
The results reveal that the president remains highly competitive in the battleground states likeliest to decide his re-election, with Democratic candidates struggling to win back the support of white working-class voters who backed Mr. Trump in 2016.
The poll also presents a snapshot of how the top Democratic candidates might fare in the general election — a critical question for Democratic voters hoping to take back the White House.
Guest: Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The new poll suggests Senator Elizabeth Warren might struggle with some battleground swing voters, and found evidence that both gender bias and ideological doubts were hurting her.
- The top Democratic presidential candidates are locked in a close race in the Iowa caucuses, a key early test in the nomination race. But there, Ms. Warren currently has a slight edge.
- Here are five theories about what “electability” means in the 2020 race.
In just three months, the first election of the Democratic presidential race will be held in Iowa.
Over the weekend, the party held its most important political event yet in the prelude to that vote — including a fabled annual dinner attended by almost every remaining candidate in the campaign. At this dinner in 2007, Barack Obama, then a senator, delivered a searing critique of Hillary Clinton’s electability, helping him pull ahead in the polls. Candidates this time around were hoping for a similar campaign-defining moment.
We traveled to Des Moines to find out how the candidates are trying to stand out in a crowded field and to try to discern who might have the political support, financial might and organizational prowess to become the nominee.
Guest: Reid J. Epstein, a campaigns and elections reporter for The Times based in Washington D.C.
Clare Toeniskoetter and Monika Evstatieva, producers for “The Daily,” who traveled to Des Moines to speak with campaign supporters.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- With the Iowa caucuses fast approaching, the ideological debate has remained the same, but the key players have shifted, with Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Senator Elizabeth Warren appearing to have gained momentum.
- The latest poll in Iowa suggested that Ms. Warren had seized much of Bernie Sanders’s youthful following. Here are five takeaways from the survey.
The House of Representatives voted to begin the next phase of the impeachment inquiry into President Trump — one which will be open to public scrutiny. Two Democrats in the House broke ranks and voted against the resolution, which outlined rules for the impeachment process. That was the only complication to an otherwise clean partisan split, with all House Republicans voting against the measure. The tally foreshadowed the battle to come as Democrats take their case against the president fully into public view. Today, we discuss what the next phase of the inquiry will look like. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- House Democrats decided they now have enough confidence in the severity of the underlying facts about Mr. Trump’s dealings with Ukraine to open the inquiry to the public, despite the risk that doing so would further polarize the electorate.
- This is a timeline of the events that prompted the impeachment inquiry.
- Here’s how Democrats and Republicans voted on the impeachment rules resolution.
In testimony before a House committee on Wednesday, Dennis A. Muilenburg, Boeing’s chief executive, said, “If we knew everything back then that we know now, we would have made a different decision.” Congress is investigating two crashes of Boeing 737 Max jets which killed 346 people, cost the company billions of dollars and raised new questions about government oversight of aviation. So what did Boeing executives know about the dangers of the automated system implicated in the crashes — and when did they know it? Guest: Natalie Kitroeff, who covers the economy for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Boeing successfully lobbied to reduce government oversight of airplane design.
- Evidence presented to House investigators on Wednesday revealed that Boeing was aware of potentially “catastrophic” concerns about the 737 Max’s safety before the first crash.
When Juul was created, the company’s founders told federal regulators that its product would save lives. Those regulators were eager to believe them. Today, part two in our series on the promise and the peril of vaping.
Guest: Sheila Kaplan, an investigative reporter for The New York Times covering the intersection of money, medicine and politics. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Here’s the first episode in this two-part series, describing how one man’s mysterious death changed our understanding of vaping and its consequences.
- The federal government has repeatedly delayed or weakened efforts to regulate e-cigarettes, allowing a new generation to become addicted to nicotine.
After a five-year international manhunt, the leader of the Islamic State, who at one point controlled a caliphate the size of Britain, was killed in a raid by elite United States forces in Syria over the weekend.
Today, we explore the life and death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi — and the legacy he leaves behind. Guest: Rukmini Callimachi, who covers terrorism and the Islamic State for The Times, in conversation with Natalie Kitroeff. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Kurdish forces were essential in the mission to track and identify Mr. al-Baghdadi. President Trump’s decision to withdraw American troops from northern Syria threw the operation into turmoil.
- Some survivors of Islamic State brutality said Mr. al-Baghdadi’s death came too late. “He deserves a worse and more abhorrent death,” one added.
When John Steffen died, his family had little doubt that a lifetime of cigarette smoking was to blame. Then, the Nebraska Department of Health got an unusual tip.
Today, we begin a two-part series on the promise and the peril of vaping. Guest: Julie Bosman, a national correspondent for The New York Times, spoke with Kathleen Fimple and her daughter, Dulcia Steffen, in Omaha, Nebraska. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- John Steffen trusted vaping could help him quit smoking. Instead, he became one of vaping’s first victims in Nebraska.
- Vaping can cause lung damage resembling toxic chemical burns, according to researchers at the Mayo Clinic.
At a rally in New York City last weekend, Senator Bernie Sanders drew the largest crowd of his presidential campaign — at a moment when his candidacy may be at its most vulnerable. After a heart attack this month, Mr. Sanders faced a challenge in convincing voters that he had the stamina to run both a campaign and the country. His first rally since his hospital stay attracted supporters still resentful of his loss in 2016, and of a party establishment they feel favored Hillary Clinton over Mr. Sanders in the primary. The question for Democratic candidates now is how to respond to this grievance and harness the fervor of Sanders supporters to mobilize support for the Democratic Party more broadly.
Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Revitalized by an endorsement from Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders proclaimed “I am back” as he rebooted his campaign after a health scare.
- The response to Sanders’s rally from public housing residents in Queens exposed the race and class tensions in a gentrifying slice of New York City.
Before the career diplomats working in Ukraine discovered a “highly irregular” power structure around President Trump determined to undermine and derail them, a Trump cabinet secretary said the same thing happened to him.
Today, David J. Shulkin, former secretary of Veterans Affairs, speaks about his experience with “a dual path of decision making in the White House” and how falling out of favor with President Trump’s political appointees ended his tenure. Guest: David J. Shulkin, a former secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs in the Trump administration. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background listening and reading:
- Mr. Shulkin’s story matches a pattern described that career diplomats have described to the impeachment inquiry. Here’s a “Daily” episode about their testimony.
- Back channels to the White House are at the heart of the investigation.
The Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry are calling testimony from the acting envoy to Ukraine the “most damning” yet, implicating President Trump himself in a quid pro quo over military aid to the country. William B. Taylor Jr., a career diplomat who has served under both Democratic and Republican administrations, prepared a 15-page opening statement for investigators on Tuesday. He described his testimony as “a rancorous story about whistle-blowers, Mr. Giuliani, side channels, quid pro quos, corruption and interference in elections.” In his statement, Mr. Taylor documented two divergent channels of United States policymaking in Ukraine, “one regular and one highly irregular.” He said Mr. Trump had used the shadow channel to make America’s relationship with Ukraine — including a $391 million aid package — conditional on its government’s willingness to investigate one of his political rivals, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., and his family. The question of a quid pro quo for the military aid has been pursued by House Democrats since the beginning of the impeachment inquiry. In Mr. Taylor, investigators have a former ambassador testifying under oath that the allegations are true.
Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Here are six key takeaways from Mr. Taylor’s opening statement to impeachment investigators.
- This is the evidence collected and requested in the impeachment inquiry so far.
Yesterday on “The Daily,” we met Kamalle Dabboussy, who said his daughter had been tricked by her husband into joining the Islamic State. His daughter and three grandchildren are being held in a Syrian detention camp for the relatives of ISIS fighters.
When we left off, Mr. Dabboussy had just received a call from a journalist that suggested his family’s situation was about to become far more precarious. President Trump had announced that he would withdraw U.S. troops from the Syrian border, and Kurdish forces who had been guarding the prisons were expected to abandon their posts, leaving the detainees’ lives in imminent danger.
Today, we follow Mr. Dabboussy’s struggle to convince the Australian government that his daughter and her children are worth saving — despite their ties to the Islamic State.
Guest: Livia Albeck-Ripka, a reporter for The Times in Melbourne, Australia, spoke with Kamalle Dabboussy, whose daughter Mariam is trapped in Syria with her children. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Here’s the first episode in this two-part series, in which we introduced Kamalle Dabboussy and his fight to bring his family home from a war zone.
- Mr. Dabboussy is one of a cohort of parents in Australia lobbying the government to help release their loved ones from detention camps in northern Syria.
Since the fall of the Islamic State, many of the group’s fighters and their families have been held in prison camps controlled by U.S.-allied Kurdish forces. Parents around the world have been trying to get their children and grandchildren out of the camps and back to their home countries. Now, the fate of those detainees has become an urgent question after President Trump’s abrupt recall of American troops from the Syrian border.
We follow one father as he fights to get his daughter, a former ISIS bride, and her children back to Australia.
Guest: Livia Albeck-Ripka, a reporter for The Times in Melbourne, Australia, spoke to Kamalle Dabboussy, whose daughter Mariam is trapped in Syria with her three children. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- “There will be ethnic cleansing of the Kurdish people from Syria, and the American administration will be responsible for it,” said Mazlum Kobani, a Kurdish military commander, when asked about a full American withdrawal from northern Syria.
- President Trump is now said to be considering leaving a few hundred troops in eastern Syria to defend against an ISIS resurgence.
Members of the American diplomatic corps testified about the state of U.S. foreign policy in private hearings on Capitol Hill this week. According to our national political correspondent, their testimonies revealed “a remarkably consistent story” about the ways in which career diplomats have been sidelined to make room for Trump administration officials. The conduct of those officials, and the nature of the directives they received, is at the center of the House impeachment investigation.
We look back at a week inside the U.S. Capitol as that inquiry enters a pivotal phase. Guest: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Gordon D. Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, told impeachment investigators on Thursday that President Trump delegated Ukraine policy to his personal lawyer Rudolph Giuliani.
- Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, threw Washington into turmoil on Thursday when he first confirmed, then retracted, that Mr. Trump had withheld military aid to pressure Ukraine.
The presence of U.S. troops in northern Syria was designed to protect America’s allies and keep its enemies there in check. President Trump’s unilateral withdrawal from the region quickly, and predictably, unraveled a tenuous peace on the volatile border between Syria and Turkey. His decision handed a gift to four American adversaries: Iran, Russia, the Syrian government and the Islamic State. David E. Sanger of The Times explains why “the worst-case scenario is even worse than you can imagine.” Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent and a senior writer at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- President Trump lashed out in defense of his decision to remove U.S. troops from northeastern Syria in response to rare bipartisan condemnation from Congress.
- Russian troops have already occupied abandoned American outposts in Syria as Moscow moves to fill the power vacuum.
- “Don't be a fool! I will call you later.” Read the letter President Trump sent to Turkey’s leader.
Last night in Ohio, The New York Times co-hosted a presidential debate for the first time in more than a decade. Marc Lacey, The Times’s National editor, moderated the event with the CNN anchors Erin Burnett and Anderson Cooper.
It was also the first debate since Democrats started an impeachment inquiry into President Trump and his efforts to pressure Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Candidates denounced the president, calling for his impeachment, without wading into the specifics of the investigation. Instead, moderates focused on winning over Biden voters by differentiating themselves from more progressive candidates. Guests: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The Times, and Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Senator Elizabeth Warren was the primary target of moderates’ attacks, illustrating her status as an emergent front-runner. Candidates avoided criticism of Joe Biden, wary of echoing President Trump’s attacks on his family.
- Here are six takeaways from the debate.
This week, we’re producing episodes of “The Daily” from The New York Times’s Washington bureau.
The impeachment inquiry is entering a pivotal phase as Congress returns from recess. The White House’s strategy to block the investigation is beginning to crumble, with five administration officials set to testify before House investigators.
On Monday, those committees heard testimony about why the president removed the longtime ambassador, Marie L. Yovanovitch, just two months before the call in which he asked the Ukrainian president for a favor. Today, we look at how Ms. Yovanovitch ended up at the center of the impeachment process.
Guests: Sharon LaFraniere, an investigative reporter based in Washington, and Rachel Quester and Clare Toeniskoetter, producers for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Marie L. Yovanovitch told House investigators that she was removed from office on the basis of “false claims by people with clearly questionable motives.”
- The effort to pressure Ukraine so alarmed John Bolton, then the national security adviser, that he told an aide to alert White House lawyers. “Giuliani’s a hand grenade who’s going to blow everybody up,” an aide quoted him as saying of President Trump’s personal lawyer.
Turkey has invaded Kurdish-controlled territory in Syria, upending a fragile peace in the region and inciting sectarian bloodshed. The Trump administration has ordered a full evacuation of the 1,000 American troops that remain in northeastern Syria, leaving Mazlum Kobani, the commander of the Kurdish-led militia, and his forces to rely on Russia and Syria for military assistance.
Who are the Kurds? How is it that Kurdish fighters came to be seen as allies to the United States and terrorists to Turkey? And what would the fall of Kurdish territory in northeastern Syria mean for the region?
Guest: Ben Hubbard, Beirut bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Turkey’s invasion upended a fragile peace and risks enabling the resurgence of the Islamic State.
- American troops who fought alongside Kurdish allies have expressed regret after the U.S. abandoned posts in northeastern Syria. “It’s a stain on the American conscience,” one Army officer said.
Today on “The Daily,” we present Episode 5, Part 2 of “1619,” a New York Times audio series hosted by Nikole Hannah-Jones. You can find more information about it at nytimes.com/1619podcast.
The Provosts, a family of sugar-cane farmers in Louisiana, had worked the same land for generations. When it became harder and harder to keep hold of that land, June Provost and his wife, Angie, didn’t know why — and then a phone call changed their understanding of everything. In the finale of “1619,” we hear the rest of June and Angie’s story, and its echoes in a past case that led to the largest civil rights settlement in American history.
Guests: June and Angie Provost; Adizah Eghan and Annie Brown, producers for “1619”; and Khalil Gibran Muhammad, a professor of history, race and public policy at Harvard University and the author of “The Condemnation of Blackness.”
Background reading:
- “The number of black sugar-cane farmers in Louisiana is most likely in the single digits,” Khalil Gibran Muhammad writes in his essay on the history of the American sugar industry. “They are the exceedingly rare exceptions to a system designed to codify black loss.”
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
A seven-word tweet in support of Hong Kong’s antigovernment protests by Daryl Morey, general manager of the Houston Rockets, triggered a furor in both China and the United States. The ensuing controversy revealed the unspoken rules of doing business with Beijing. Guest: Jim Yardley, the Europe editor of The New York Times and author of “Brave Dragons: A Chinese Basketball Team, an American Coach, and Two Cultures Clashing.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- An exhibition game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Brooklyn Nets in Shanghai this week was nearly canceled because of China’s dispute with the league. At the game, even longtime fans said they would choose patriotism over the N.B.A.
- President Trump declined to criticize China’s handling of the controversy, instead opting to publicly condemn two basketball coaches who have spoken out against him in the past.
The White House response to the impeachment inquiry has been to dismiss the allegations, deflect the facts and discredit the Democrats. It’s the same approach that Republicans used in 2018 to push through the Supreme Court nomination of Brett M. Kavanaugh.
The New York Times reporters Kate Kelly and Robin Pogrebin, the authors of “The Education of Brett Kavanaugh,” talk to the Republican strategist who wrote the political playbook used — then and now.
Guest: Kate Kelly, a reporter for The Times covering Wall Street and Robin Pogrebin, a reporter on The Times’s Culture Desk, spoke to Mike Davis, a Republican strategist. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- The White House’s declaration of war against the House impeachment inquiry this week has set the stage for a constitutional clash with far-reaching consequences.
- Mr. Davis crafted a “brass knuckles” approach to help confirm conservative Supreme Court justices.
- Here’s the latest on the impeachment inquiry.
Days after moderate House Democrats announced they would support an impeachment inquiry against President Trump, a recess began and they returned home to their swing districts. Now they would face their constituents. Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin of Michigan went to three town halls last week. We went with her. Guest: Representative Elissa Slotkin, Democrat of Michigan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Democrats face a tricky balancing act in battleground districts: protecting political gains from 2018 while selling voters on an inquiry into the president.
President Trump vowed to withdraw United States troops from the Syrian border with Turkey. But such a move could harm one of America’s most loyal partners in the Middle East, the Kurds, who have been crucial to fighting the Islamic State. Guest: Eric Schmitt, who covers terrorism and national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- President Trump’s announcement raised fears that he was giving Turkey the go-ahead to move against Kurdish forces in northern Syria.
- The American pullback could create a void in the region that could benefit Iran, Russia and the Islamic State.
- American troops have “operated between two allies: Turkey and the Kurds,” our colleagues write in a news analysis. “The problem for Washington has been that the two hate each other.”
The House Democrats leading the impeachment inquiry of President Trump called their first witness: Kurt Volker, a top American diplomat involved in the negotiations with Ukraine. We look at what Mr. Volker’s testimony — and the text messages he turned over to Congress — revealed about the inquiry’s direction. Guest: Julian E. Barnes, who covers national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- A text exchange appears to show a dispute among American diplomats over whether President Trump was seeking a quid pro quo from Ukraine.
- A second whistle-blower, said to have firsthand knowledge about the president’s dealings with Ukraine, has come forward.
Today on “The Daily,” we present Episode 5, Part 1 of “1619,” a New York Times audio series hosted by Nikole Hannah-Jones. You can find more information about it at nytimes.com/1619podcast.
More than a century and a half after the promise of 40 acres and a mule, the story of black land ownership in America remains one of loss and dispossession. June and Angie Provost, who trace their family line to the enslaved workers on Louisiana’s sugar-cane plantations, know this story well. Guests: The Provosts, who spoke with Adizah Eghan and Annie Brown, producers for “1619.”
Background reading:
- The story of the Provosts contains “echoes of the policies and practices that have been used since Reconstruction to maintain the racial caste system that sugar slavery helped create,” Khalil Gibran Muhammad writes in his essay on the history of sugar in the United States.
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
The investigation of Harvey Weinstein that helped give rise to the #MeToo movement had seemed, for a moment, to unite the country in redefining the rules around sex and power. But as a backlash emerged, the Supreme Court confirmation of Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh became a kind of national trial of the movement.
On the one-year anniversary of Judge Kavanaugh’s confirmation, we look at new reporting on the story of the woman at the center of it — Dr. Christine Blasey Ford — and the journey that led to her searing testimony in Washington. Guests: Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, investigative reporters for The New York Times and the authors of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.”
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Last month, several Democratic presidential candidates called for the impeachment of Justice Kavanaugh after The Times published new information about allegations of sexual misconduct against him.
In 2018, President Trump hired Rudolph W. Giuliani, his longtime friend and the former New York City mayor, to In 2018, President Trump hired Rudolph W. Giuliani, his longtime friend and the former mayor of New York City, to defend him against the special counsel’s Russia investigation. So how is it that Mr. Giuliani helped get the president entangled in another investigation, this time involving Ukraine?
Our colleague investigated the remarkable behind-the-scenes campaign, encouraged by Mr. Trump and executed by Mr. Giuliani, to gather and disseminate political dirt from a foreign country. Guest: Kenneth P. Vogel, a Washington correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The story of a shadow foreign policy in Ukraine unfolded against the backdrop of three elections — this year’s vote in Ukraine and the 2016 and 2020 presidential races in the United States.
- Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed he listened in on the phone call at the center of the impeachment inquiry.
- Follow our live updates from the investigation in Washington.
As China celebrated 70 years of Communist Party rule, scenes of pageantry, pride and unity in Beijing contrasted with the firebombs, rubber bullets and mass protests in Hong Kong. We look at what this day of contradictions tells us about the simmering unrest in the territory. Guests: Javier C. Hernández, a China correspondent for The New York Times reporting from Hong Kong, spoke with Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The violent confrontations in Hong Kong have presented a challenge to the image of unshakable control that President Xi Jinping of China has sought to project.
- As an American journalist in Beijing, our colleague was accustomed to a watchful Chinese government. But never before had the police insisted on occupying his home.
- A timeline of the summer of protests in Hong Kong: how they started, why they grew and how the government has responded.
Three past American presidents have confronted the possibility that members of their own party would support their impeachment. Only one, Richard M. Nixon, left office because of it, when Republicans eventually abandoned him. But what can we expect this time, in the impeachment inquiry of President Trump?
Guests: Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times and an author of “Impeachment: An American History,” in conversation with Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The impeachment inquiry was prompted by a July call between President Trump and the Ukrainian leader. Details of a second call have now emerged, in which Mr. Trump pressed the Australian prime minister to help investigate the Mueller inquiry’s origins.
- In a news analysis, Peter Baker explains how preventing foreign influence is one of the oldest issues in America’s democratic experiment.
It took just days for a whistle-blower complaint to prompt an impeachment inquiry of President Trump. But it took weeks for the concerns detailed in the complaint to come to light — and they nearly never did. Guest: Julian E. Barnes, who covers national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Trump administration’s handling of the accusations is certain to be scrutinized by lawmakers.
- President Trump was repeatedly warned by his own staff that the Ukraine conspiracy theory was “completely debunked.”
Nine-year-old Ella was terrified of tornadoes and getting sick. So she did something that was even scarier than her fears: confront them. Guests: Ella Maners and her mother, Katie Maners, and Julia Longoria, a producer for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ella spent a week at Fear Facers Summer Camp, a day camp in Florida that helps children learn to deal with obsessive-compulsive and anxiety disorders.
The whistle-blower complaint at the center of the impeachment inquiry was released on Thursday as the Trump administration official who had declined to turn it over — Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence — testified before Congress. Here’s the latest from Capitol Hill. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The complaint accused President Trump of pressuring Ukraine’s leader to investigate a political rival and alleged that the White House tried to “lock down” the transcript of the call.
- Here’s what we’ve learned about the whistle-blower.
- Read a declassified version of the complaint, with annotations, and eight takeaways from the document.
The White House released a reconstructed transcript of President Trump’s phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky, the leader of Ukraine. In it, Mr. Trump asks for an investigation into Joseph R. Biden Jr., a potential 2020 rival. We consider what that request means for the impeachment inquiry now underway. Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Different interpretations of the phone call are shaping a debate over whether the president committed high crimes and misdemeanors.
- Read the full declassified record of the call, with annotations.
- Here’s what we know so far about the whistle-blower complaint that set off this controversy.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has begun a formal impeachment investigation of President Trump, saying he “must be held accountable.” We spoke to our colleague who was at the announcement and to one of the lawmakers who helped convince Ms. Pelosi that it was time. Guests: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times, and Representative Mikie Sherrill, Democrat of New Jersey. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Though the outcome is uncertain, the inquiry raises the possibility that Mr. Trump could become only the fourth president in American history to face impeachment.
- After months of caution from House Democrats, why is this happening now? “They believe the new accusations against Mr. Trump are simple and serious enough to be grasped,” our colleague Carl Hulse writes in a news analysis.
- Here’s how the impeachment process works.
President Trump vowed to crack down on undocumented immigration and empower the Border Patrol. Three years later, the agency is the target of outrage, protest and investigation into its mission and conduct, and many of the agents who have supported Mr. Trump say that morale is low. We spoke with one of them. Guest: Art Del Cueto, a Border Patrol agent in Arizona and vice president of the National Border Patrol Council. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Overwhelmed by desperate migrants and criticized for mistreating those in their care, many agents, whose work has long been viewed as a ticket to the middle class, have grown frustrated and bitter.
Over the weekend, reports of a secret whistle-blower complaint against President Trump turned into allegations that the president had courted foreign interference from Ukraine to hurt a leading Democratic rival, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Mr. Trump called the allegations a “witch hunt” and accused Mr. Biden of corruption.
Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump acknowledged that he discussed Mr. Biden during a phone call with Ukraine’s president, but he did not directly confirm news reports that he had pressured the foreign leader for an investigation.
- Here’s what we know about the role of Mr. Biden and his son Hunter in the controversy.
With crowds that are said to number 15,000 to 20,000 people, Senator Elizabeth Warren’s campaign events frequently dwarf those of her Democratic rivals. This week, we experienced the growing phenomenon that is the Warren rally. Guest: Thomas Kaplan, a political reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Warren, running on a message of sweeping change, is solidifying her place in an exclusive club of presidential candidates who have become crowd magnets.
- At her campaign events, Ms. Warren’s speech is only the first act. Act Two? The selfie line.
- Back-to-back rallies by Ms. Warren and President Trump laid out competing versions of populism that could come to define the 2020 presidential campaign.
In Part 1 of this series, our colleagues Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey reported on Lisa Bloom, a victims’ rights attorney who used her experience representing women to defend Harvey Weinstein. In Part 2, we look at the role of Ms. Bloom’s mother, the women’s rights lawyer Gloria Allred.
Guests: Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, investigative reporters for The New York Times and the authors of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- “She Said” reveals new information about the labyrinth of secret settlements and nondisclosure agreements that allowed Mr. Weinstein and other powerful men to conceal their behavior.
- Ms. Allred’s law firm helped negotiate a confidential settlement in 2004 between Mr. Weinstein and Ashley Matthau, a dancer who accused him of sexual assault.
- Ms. Allred represents two women who are expected to testify against Mr. Weinstein at his trial, scheduled to begin in January.
Last week, our colleagues Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey published a book documenting their investigation of Harvey Weinstein. In writing it, they discovered information about two feminist icons — Gloria Allred and her daughter, Lisa Bloom — that raises questions about their legacies and the legal system in which they’ve worked. Today, we look at the role of Ms. Bloom, a lawyer who represented Mr. Weinstein.
Guests: Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, investigative reporters for The New York Times and the authors of “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- New reporting in “She Said” shows how some figures who have presented themselves as allies of victims have helped maintain their silence — and, in some cases, profited from it.
- Read more about Ms. Bloom’s involvement in the Weinstein case.
President Trump is saying that Iran appears to be responsible for the weekend attacks on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia. We look at where things are likely to go from here. Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump said that the United States was prepared for war if necessary, but that he would “like to avoid” a military conflict with Iran.
- Mr. Trump’s response to the attacks offered insight into his deference to the Saudi royal family.
Last week, CNN broke the story that the United States had secretly extracted a top spy from Russia in 2017. What does that mean now for American intelligence operations? Guest: Julian E. Barnes, who covers national security for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Moscow informant was instrumental to the C.I.A.’s conclusion that President Vladimir V. Putin had ordered and orchestrated Russia’s election interference campaign.
Today on “The Daily,” we present Episode 4 of “1619,” a New York Times audio series hosted by Nikole Hannah-Jones. You can find more information about it at nytimes.com/1619podcast.
Black Americans were denied access to doctors and hospitals for decades. From the shadows of this exclusion, they pushed to create the nation’s first federal health care programs. Guests: Jeneen Interlandi, a member of The New York Times’s editorial board and a writer for The Times Magazine, and Yaa Gyasi, the author of “Homegoing.”
Background reading:
- “One hundred and fifty years after the freed people of the South first petitioned the government for basic medical care, the United States remains the only high-income country in the world where such care is not guaranteed to every citizen,” Jeneen Interlandi writes.
- The Times Magazine asked 16 writers to bring pivotal moments in African-American history to life. Read Yaa Gyasi’s story “Bad Blood” here.
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
Just 10 candidates qualified for the stage in Houston, but that didn’t change some recurring themes: Joe Biden was again the target of fierce scrutiny, and health care was a central point of contention. But what else did we learn?
Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading:
- Attacks on Mr. Biden highlighted the divide over the Obama legacy, with the former vice president repeatedly invoking his old boss’s name.
- Many Democrats hoped that defeating an unpopular, rampaging president would be relatively simple. But party officials are wary of some potential vulnerabilities that this debate re-emphasized.
- Here are six takeaways from the contest.
Andrew Yang, a former tech executive, remains one of the least known candidates in a Democratic presidential field that includes senators, mayors, a governor and a former vice president. But by focusing on the potential impact of automation on jobs, he has attracted surprisingly loyal and passionate support. One of our technology writers has been following his campaign since before it officially began. Guests: Andrew Yang, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination; and Kevin Roose, who writes about technology for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Armed with numbers, history lessons and the occasional self-deprecating joke, Mr. Yang has been preaching a grim gospel about automation. And voters are responding.
- The top 10 Democrats will share one stage for the first time starting at 8 p.m. Eastern. Here’s what to watch for.
John Bolton, the national security adviser, was ousted after fundamental disputes with President Trump over how to handle foreign policy challenges like Afghanistan, Iran and North Korea. But the two men disagreed about how they parted ways. Guest: Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump said he fired John Bolton; Mr. Bolton insisted that he had resigned. Regardless, they had a fundamental disagreement over foreign policy, most recently Afghanistan.
- Mr. Trump is now looking for the fourth national security adviser of his presidency. Here is a short list of possibilities.
President Trump abruptly called off negotiations between the United States and the Taliban that could have ended the war in Afghanistan and canceled a secret meeting at Camp David. We look at how a historic peace deal went off the rails. Guest: Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The United States and the Taliban, after nine rounds of painstaking negotiations in Doha, Qatar, appeared to have ironed out most of the issues between them. But President Trump canceled a secret meeting at Camp David and called off the talks.
- What jarred many Afghans was how a single attack and the death of one American, cited by Mr. Trump, could upend 10 months of negotiations.
In a battle over what kind of democracy would prevail in Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson seemed to have gained the upper hand by cutting Parliament out of Brexit — until last week. Guest: Mark Landler, the London bureau chief of The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In Washington, scarcely a handful of Republicans have stood up to President Trump. In comparison, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has found lawmakers in his Conservative Party to be much more rebellious.
- Mr. Johnson has received messages of support from President Trump, and there are some obvious parallels in the rise of the two leaders. But the “bromance” between Mr. Johnson and Mr. Trump is more complex than it might seem.
- Mr. Johnson’s chief aide, Dominic Cummings, who appeared to revel in the feud with Parliament, has become a lightning rod for criticism of the government’s strategy.
Today on “The Daily,” we present Episode 3 of “1619,” a New York Times audio series hosted by Nikole Hannah-Jones. You can find more information about it at nytimes.com/1619podcast.
Black music, forged in captivity, became the sound of complete artistic freedom. It also became the sound of America. Guest: Wesley Morris, a critic-at-large for The New York Times.
This episode contains explicit language.
Background reading:
- “The proliferation of black music across the planet — the proliferation, in so many senses, of being black — constitutes a magnificent joke on American racism,” Wesley Morris writes.
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
For almost two decades, the United States and Israel have tried to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Israeli leaders — including the current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu — have pushed for a military strike on Iran, a prospect that American presidents have long opposed. But a Times investigation reveals a secret history that shows how close the three countries came to war. Guest: Mark Mazzetti, a Washington investigative correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Interviews with dozens of current and former American, Israeli and European officials over several months reveal the startling details of a narrowly averted war and raise questions about how President Trump will respond.
- Moving further away from the 2015 nuclear agreement, Iran said on Thursday that it had stopped honoring the deal’s limits on research and development.
A month after a gunman killed 22 people at a Walmart store in El Paso, the nation’s largest retailer, said that it would stop selling ammunition used for handguns and military-style weapons and call on Congress to consider a new ban on assault rifles. We look at what Walmart’s move means, and how corporate America could play a role in curbing the epidemic of gun violence. Guest: Andrew Ross Sorkin, a financial columnist for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Walmart, whose reach has reshaped communities nationwide, largely avoids publicly wading into politics. That made its decision to limit ammunition sales even more notable.
- The move by Doug McMillon, Walmart’s chief executive, “to engage in a meaningful conversation about responsible gun sales in America could give license to other business leaders to enter the conversation,” Andrew Ross Sorkin writes.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
The Democratic presidential race has entered a phase that is specifically designed to reward front-runners and push out lesser-known candidates. We look at how that will influence the campaign. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Which candidates are leading the Democratic primary? Here’s a look at the state of the race.
- Listen to an episode of “The Daily” about the intended and unintended consequences of the Democratic National Committee’s new debate qualifying rules.
After months of negotiations in Qatar, the United States appeared to have reached an agreement with the Taliban that could take a step to end America’s longest-running war. We spoke with our colleague about what he learned while covering the peace talks. Guest: Mujib Mashal, a senior correspondent for The New York Times based in Afghanistan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- The American special envoy who led talks with the Taliban said that the United States had reached an agreement “in principle” with the Afghan insurgents, but that final approval rested with President Trump.
Today on “The Daily,” we present Episode 2 of “1619,” a New York Times audio series hosted by Nikole Hannah-Jones. You can find more information about it at nytimes.com/1619podcast.
The institution of slavery turned a poor, fledgling nation into a financial powerhouse, and the cotton plantation was America’s first big business. Behind the system, and built into it, was the whip. Guests: Matthew Desmond, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine and the author of “Evicted,” and Jesmyn Ward, the author of “Sing, Unburied, Sing.”
This episode includes scenes of graphic violence.
Background reading:
- “As the large slave-labor camps grew increasingly efficient, enslaved black people became America’s first modern workers,” Matthew Desmond writes.
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
Two battles over the meaning of democracy are now playing out in Europe. We look at the political power maneuvers this week in Britain and Italy. Guest: Katrin Bennhold, the Berlin bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Facing a furious backlash over his decision to suspend Parliament next month, Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain promised to speed up Brexit negotiations with Brussels.
- In Italy, two political parties that had been sworn political enemies struck a deal to form a new government that sidelined Matteo Salvini, the hard-right leader.
- Listen to “The Battle for Europe,” a series from “The Daily” with Katrin Bennhold about the future of liberal democracy in the European Union.
Uber transformed American transportation and changed the United States economy. But a decade after its founding, the once-swaggering company is losing more money and growing more slowly than ever. What happened? Guest: Mike Isaac, a technology reporter for The New York Times and the author of “Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- The Uber of 2019 displays little of the braggadocio of its past, and competitors and critics are moving in.
More than 26,000 fires have been recorded inside the Amazon rainforest in August alone, leading to global calls for action. But Brazil’s government has told the rest of the world to mind its own business. Guest: Ernesto Londoño, the Brazil bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- Brazil began a military operation to battle the fires after European leaders threatened to cancel a trade deal and calls to boycott Brazilian products spread on social media.
- In many parts of Brazil, there is strong support for President Jair Bolsonaro’s Amazon policy, which prioritizes economic development over environmental protections.
- Here’s what we know about the fires.
At the Group of 7 summit in France, President Trump seemed determined to prove that he can wage a trade war with China without hurting the economy. But there are already signs of distress. Guest: Peter S. Goodman, an economics correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- President Trump can confront China or expand the economy, but he can’t do both at the same time, our economics correspondent writes in a news analysis.
- Mr. Trump shifted his tone on the trade war yet again on Monday, calling President Xi Jinping of China a “great leader” three days after branding him an “enemy.”
This episode contains descriptions of sexual assault.
Nearly a decade before any police investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s predatory actions toward young girls, two sisters came forward to say they had been lured in and abused by the financier and his companion, Ghislaine Maxwell. Now that he’s dead, the sisters are wrestling with what might have happened if someone had listened.
Guests: Mike Baker, a national correspondent for The New York Times, spoke with Maria and Annie Farmer, and shared their story with Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background coverage:
- The Farmer sisters spoke to The Times about their accusations, offering a look at how Mr. Epstein, who killed himself in prison this month, managed to avoid significant scrutiny for years.
Four hundred years ago, in August 1619, a ship carrying more than 20 enslaved Africans arrived in the English colony of Virginia. No aspect of the country that would be formed here has been untouched by the 250 years of slavery that followed.
“1619,” a New York Times audio series, examines the long shadow of that fateful moment. Today, instead of our usual show, we present Episode 1: “The Fight for a True Democracy.”
Host: Nikole Hannah-Jones, who writes for The New York Times Magazine. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
This episode includes scenes of graphic violence.
Background reading:
- “Without the idealistic, strenuous and patriotic efforts of black Americans, our democracy today would most likely look very different — it might not be a democracy at all,” Nikole Hannah-Jones writes.
- The “1619” audio series is part of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. Read more from the project here.
Song playlists at presidential campaign rallies can be about more than music — they can reflect a candidate’s values, political platform, identity and target audience. We examine the role of these playlists in the 2020 campaign. Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Times analyzed playlists used by nine Democratic candidates and President Trump to see how they help set the tone for each campaign. Turn your sound on.
For decades, American corporations have prized profits for shareholders above all else. Now, the country’s most powerful chief executives say it’s time to do things differently. What’s driving that change? Guest: Andrew Ross Sorkin, a financial columnist for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Almost 200 chief executives, including the leaders of Apple, Pepsi and Walmart, argued that companies must invest in employees, protect the environment and deliver value to customers.
- Shareholder democracy seemed like a good idea at the time, but it hasn’t worked, Andrew Ross Sorkin writes in his latest column.
Al Franken resigned from the Senate more than 18 months ago over allegations of sexual harassment. New reporting about those allegations has revived the debate over whether the Democratic Party — particularly senators currently seeking the presidency — moved too fast in calling for him to step down. In an interview, one of those senators, Kirsten Gillibrand, says absolutely not.
Guest: Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat and 2020 presidential candidate. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Gillibrand’s stance on Mr. Franken’s departure has come up persistently during her struggling presidential campaign.
- Our colleague Lisa Lerer interviewed Ms. Gillibrand for the On Politics newsletter.
The New York Times investigated how Cordelia Scaife May, an heiress to the Mellon family’s banking and industrial fortune, used her wealth to sow the seeds of the modern anti-immigration movement — and of Trump administration policy. Guests: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The Times, spoke with Nicholas Kulish, who covers immigration issues. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Newly unearthed documents show how an environmental-minded socialite became a nativist whose vision for strictly limiting immigration has, in many ways, reached a culmination in the Trump presidency.
- Groups that Mrs. May funded shared policy proposals with the Trump campaign, sent staff members to join the administration and have close ties to Stephen Miller, the architect of the president’s immigration agenda.
At least seven people were killed by a mysterious explosion in northern Russia, and U.S. officials believe it happened during the test of a prototype for a nuclear-propelled cruise missile. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has hailed the weapon as the centerpiece of Moscow’s arms race with the United States — but what will this mean for an arms race that both countries want to win? Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Intelligence officials suspect the blast involved a prototype known as Skyfall, a missile that Mr. Putin has boasted can reach any corner of the earth and evade American missile defenses.
- As the death toll has risen from the explosion, Russia’s silence and contradictory accounts have conjured dark memories of Chernobyl.
Under international pressure, China has said it has released a vast majority of the Muslim Uighurs it had placed in detention camps. We follow up with an American citizen who says the Chinese government cannot be trusted, and find out how Beijing’s propaganda machine has responded to his efforts to protect a relative who was detained. If you missed the previous interview, listen to it here. Guest: Paul Mozur, a technology reporter for The New York Times based in Shanghai, spoke with Ferkat Jawdat, a Uighur and American citizen who lives in Virginia. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Reporters from The Times found, over seven days of traveling through the Xinjiang region, that the vast network of detention camps erected by the government of China’s authoritarian leader, Xi Jinping, continues to operate, and even expand.
- China’s most recent campaign echoes tactics used by other countries, principally Russia, to inundate domestic and international audiences with bursts of information, propaganda, and in some cases, outright disinformation.
Protesters have flooded Hong Kong’s airport, paralyzing operations and escalating tensions between the semiautonomous territory and Beijing. The protesters are trying to send a message to government officials — and to people in mainland China. Guest: Javier C. Hernández, a New York Times correspondent based in Beijing. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Demonstrations led the airport, one of the world’s busiest, to suspend check-ins for two days in a row this week, causing hundreds of flight cancellations. On Wednesday, some protesters apologized for the disruption.
- The unrest is exposing the inherent conflict in Hong Kong’s political system since China reclaimed the territory from Britain in 1997: an effort to unite Beijing’s authoritarianism with civil liberties.
- Here’s a guide to what prompted the Hong Kong protests, and a look at how they have evolved.
Federal prosecutors were confident that, this time, justice would be served in the case of Jeffrey Epstein. What happens to the case against him now that he is dead? Guest: Benjamin Weiser, an investigative criminal justice reporter for The New York Times.
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Despite Jeffrey Epstein's death, the criminal investigation that led to the sex-trafficking charges continues. Prosecutors will focus on those who may have aided him.
- At Mr. Epstein’s Palm Beach home, it was hard for workers to miss what was happening, with about 100 masseuses seen there at various times.
Since Democrats retook the House last November, the world has come to know the progressive and divisive vision of four freshmen congresswomen known as “the squad.” But it was moderates — less well-known and laser-focused on common ground between Democrats and Republicans — who were responsible for flipping seats and winning back the House. Today, we meet a moderate Democrat who offers a competing vision of the party ahead of the 2020 election.
Guests: Representative Mikie Sherrill, Democrat of New Jersey; Kate Zernike, a political reporter for The New York Times; and Lisa Chow and Rachel Quester, producers for “The Daily.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Disconnects between liberal and moderate House Democrats have exploded into public view at critical moments during their seven months in power.
- The two rounds of Democratic presidential debates showcased divisions over ideology and identity in a party that appears united only in its desire to defeat President Trump.
India has guaranteed a degree of autonomy to the people of Kashmir, a disputed territory between India and Pakistan, since 1947. Why did India unilaterally erase that autonomy this week? Guest: Jeffrey Gettleman, the South Asia bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- To Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, eliminating the autonomy of Kashmir was an administrative move. But to his critics, the decision was a blow to India’s democracy and secular identity.
- On Thursday, Mr. Modi addressed the nation about the decision against a backdrop of rising protests, mass arrests and escalating tensions with Pakistan.
- Read more about the roots of the crisis and what could happen next.
President Trump traveled on Wednesday to Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, where mass shootings killed 31 people. Our colleagues described the scene in both cities. Guests: Mitch Smith, who covers the Midwest for The New York Times, and Michael Crowley, a White House correspondent. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump began a day set aside for healing in Dayton and El Paso by lashing out at rivals, using the kind of divisive language that prompted protests in both cities even before he arrived.
- Across El Paso, some residents worried that Mr. Trump’s visit might do more harm than good.
In the years before his death, Osama bin Laden seemed to be grooming a successor to lead Al Qaeda: his own son. Here’s what we learned this week about those plans. Guest: Rukmini Callimachi, who covers terrorism for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The care Osama bin Laden showed his son was not just fatherly, but appears to have been an attempt by the world’s most hunted terrorist to secure his legacy.
- The United States had a role in the operation that killed Hamza bin Laden, officials said. But other details, including where he died, are unknown.
At least three mass shootings this year — including one in El Paso — have been announced in advance on the online message board 8chan, often accompanied by racist writings. We look at the battle over shutting down the site. Guests: Kevin Roose, who writes about technology for The New York Times, spoke with Fredrick Brennan, the founder of 8chan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Fredrick Brennan started 8chan as a free speech utopia. But the site became known as something else: a megaphone for mass shooters, and a recruiting platform for violent white nationalists.
- Several tech providers pulled support for 8chan, temporarily taking the site offline. The decision to do so was not a straightforward one for the security company Cloudflare.
In two days, in two cities — El Paso and Dayton, Ohio — two mass shootings have left at least 29 people dead. We look at two stories from one of those shootings. Guests: Simon Romero, a national correspondent for The New York Times, and Jennifer Medina, who is covering the 2020 presidential campaign, spoke with us from El Paso. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The back-to-back bursts of gun violence left a nation stunned and shaken.
- The shooting rampage in El Paso was the deadliest anti-Latino attack in modern American history. It is being investigated as domestic terrorism.
- The Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke, who represented El Paso for years in Congress, said that President Trump had “a lot to do with what happened.”
Twenty Democratic presidential candidates have appeared on the debate stage for the last time. That’s in part because the Democratic National Committee has introduced a set of rules explicitly designed to narrow the field. We look at the intended and unintended consequences of that change. Guest: Reid J. Epstein, a political reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- It will be twice as hard for the 2020 Democrats to qualify for the next debate. In addition to the seven who already have, three are within striking distance.
- Democratic candidates aiming to replace President Trump are forced to choose between adopting his media tactics or being left behind as others do.
The United States economy is in the middle of a record-long expansion. So why is the government deploying an economic weapon it last used during the 2008 financial crisis? Guest: Ben Casselman, who covers the economy for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Federal Reserve cut its benchmark interest rate for the first time in more than a decade as it tried to insulate the economy from President Trump’s trade war and a global slowdown.
- The quarter-point reduction is unlikely to get you a better mortgage rate. Here’s where you might see effects.
Democratic voters have been drawn to Senator Kamala Harris as a messenger, even though her message remains a work in progress. Ahead of her second presidential debate appearance, we consider what the candidate says she believes. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times, spoke with Ms. Harris. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Ms. Harris says she wants relevant policy, not “a beautiful sonnet.” Is that enough for voters?
- Read a transcript of our reporter’s conversation with Ms. Harris.
Two crashes involving Boeing 737 Max jets have been linked to a software system that helped send the planes into a deadly nose-dive. Our colleague investigated what federal regulators responsible for ensuring the safety of the jets knew about that system. Guest: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A Times investigation found that the Federal Aviation Administration’s regulatory process, which gave Boeing significant oversight authority, compromised the safety of the 737 Max.
The Supreme Court ruled last month that federal courts cannot rule on cases of partisan gerrymandering, saying that judges are not entitled to second-guess the decisions made by state legislators who draw voting maps. We spoke to one man who has long believed there’s a way to address the issue without the courts. Guest: Eric H. Holder Jr., who served as the United States attorney general for six years under President Barack Obama. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The Supreme Court’s decision on gerrymandering instantly raised the stakes for the nation’s state legislative races, which are often overlooked by voters, but can shape the course of policy from abortion rights to education.
- What is gerrymandering, and why did the Supreme Court rule on it? Here’s a refresher.
Maxwell’s yearslong relationship with Jeffrey Epstein has raised questions about what she may have known about the allegations of sex trafficking against him. Now, thousands of pages of sealed documents stemming from their relationship are about to be made public. Guest: Megan Twohey, an investigative reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- With Mr. Epstein under federal indictment on charges of sexually trafficking and abusing young girls, there are growing questions about his relationship with Ms. Maxwell. For more than a decade she helped manage Mr. Epstein’s homes, facilitate his social relationships and recruit masseuses, according to his former employees.
The former special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, testified on Wednesday before Congress. He declared that his two-year investigation did not exonerate President Trump and that Russia would meddle again in American elections. Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who has been covering the special counsel investigation for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Lawmakers hunted for viral sound bites and tried to score political points, but Mr. Mueller consistently refused to accommodate them in his long-awaited appearance before Congress.
- Here are seven takeaways from the hearings.
The majority of Americans disapprove of President Trump. But in 2020, Democrats will still have a hard time defeating him. Here’s why. Guest: Nate Cohn, who covers elections, polling and demographics for The Upshot at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump’s edge in the Electoral College may leave him closer to re-election than one might think based on his approval ratings — and may also blunt the electoral cost of actions like his attacks against four congresswomen of color.
Robert S. Mueller III, the former special counsel, will testify before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee beginning at 8:30 a.m. Eastern on Wednesday. We spoke to our colleague about what to expect. Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who has been covering the special counsel investigation for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Read more about what you need to know before the testimony.
- Here are 19 lingering questions for Mr. Mueller, along with what we know or don’t know about the answers.
Dr. Leana Wen, the first physician to lead Planned Parenthood in decades, was ousted after just eight months on the job. Her departure highlights a central tension over the direction of the group: Is it a political organization first, or a health organization? Guest: Sarah Kliff, an investigative reporter for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- As states began to pass ever more restrictive laws on abortion, Planned Parenthood’s leaders felt they needed a more aggressive political leader to fight efforts to roll back abortion access.
- “I was asked to leave for the same reason I was hired: I was changing the direction of Planned Parenthood,” Dr. Wen wrote in an Op-Ed for The Times.
After trying and failing to withdraw Britain from the European Union, Theresa May will resign this week as the country’s prime minister. Here’s how the man expected to succeed her, Boris Johnson, made Brexit — and how Brexit may soon make him prime minister. Guest: Sarah Lyall, a writer at large for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Johnson has become one of the great escape artists of British politics.
- Some of Mr. Johnson’s family members, once staunch opponents of Brexit, have had to perform a complicated political jujitsu around his candidacy for prime minister.
- Prime Minister Theresa May is scheduled to step down on Wednesday. Only 160,000 Conservative Party members can vote for the next leader, sidelining 99 percent of registered voters.
There are two stories from the 1960s that America likes to tell about itself — the civil rights movement and the space race. We look at the brief moment when the two collided. Guest: Emily Ludolph, who covered this story for The New York Times, spoke with Ed Dwight, a former Air Force pilot who had trained to be the first black astronaut. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President John F. Kennedy was Ed Dwight’s champion. Within weeks of the president’s assassination, Mr. Dwight’s career as a prospective astronaut ended.
Hundreds of leaked text messages revealed the governor of Puerto Rico mocking his own citizens. For many Puerto Ricans, it was the last straw. Guest: Patricia Mazzei, the Miami bureau chief for The New York Times, spoke with us from San Juan, P.R. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Tens of thousands of people from across Puerto Rican society have united in nearly a week of protests that reveal deep dissatisfaction with how the island is governed.
The first Democratic debate brought renewed attention to busing as a tool of school desegregation. We spoke to a colleague about what the conversation has been missing. Guest: Nikole Hannah-Jones, who writes about racial injustice for The New York Times Magazine. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- “The school bus, treasured when it was serving as a tool of segregation, became reviled only when it transformed into a tool of integration,” Nikole Hannah-Jones writes in a news analysis.
One day before the fifth anniversary of Eric Garner’s death at the hands of police officers in New York, the Justice Department said it would not bring federal civil rights charges against an officer involved. We look at that decision. Guest: Ashley Southall, who covers New York for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Attorney General William P. Barr made the call not to seek a civil rights indictment against Officer Daniel Pantaleo.
- “The D.O.J. has failed us,” Mr. Garner’s mother, Gwen Carr, said. “Five years ago, my son said ‘I can’t breathe’ 11 times. Today, we can’t breathe. Because they have let us down.”
In a second day of attacks, President Trump said that four Democratic congresswomen hated the United States and were free to leave the country. The lawmakers — Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna S. Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan — said they refused to be silenced. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. This episode includes disturbing language.
Background reading:
- President Trump appeared determined on Monday to amplify remarks that members of his own party called racist. The lawmakers he singled out responded by charging that the president was pressing the agenda of white nationalists.
This past weekend, immigration officials were scheduled to begin arresting and deporting thousands of undocumented immigrants who had been ordered to leave the United States but had remained. On Friday evening, we spoke to one woman who feared she was on the list. Guest: Herminia, an undocumented immigrant who has been living in the United States with her husband and children for more than a decade. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A small number of raids targeting recently arrived undocumented migrant parents and their children took place over the weekend. More raids are expected to follow throughout the week.
As mass shootings became commonplace, attempts to hold gun makers accountable kept hitting the same roadblock — until now. We look at a lawsuit that could transform the firearms industry. Guests: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The New York Times, spoke with David Wheeler, whose 6-year-old son, Ben, died in the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School; and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A Connecticut Supreme Court ruling has created a potential opening for Sandy Hook families to maneuver around the gun industry’s legal shield and hold companies liable for the attack.
- The families are hoping to replicate a tactic used in lawsuits against cigarette manufacturers.
Federal courts keep rejecting President Trump’s attempts to ask about citizenship on the 2020 census. But no matter what the courts decide, the president may have already achieved his goal. Guest: Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A day after pledging that the census would not ask about citizenship, Justice Department officials said they were seeking a way to restore the question on orders from President Trump.
- But for many immigrant communities, the damage may be done when it comes to the census.
Out of 198 Republicans in the House of Representatives, just 13 are women. This week, a closely watched election in North Carolina may help determine how serious the party is about changing that. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, who covers Congress for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Dr. Greg Murphy, a state representative and urological surgeon, defeated Dr. Joan Perry, a pediatrician, in a race that set off a clash at the highest levels of the Republican Party.
- After watching Democratic women make historic gains in the 2018 midterm election, Republican women have decided to adopt the Democrats’ strategy for themselves.
Prosecutors in New York have accused the billionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls and of asking them to recruit others. We spoke with our colleague about what happened in a similar case against Mr. Epstein over a decade ago. Guest: Patricia Mazzei, the Miami bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The new indictment of Mr. Epstein could prompt a reckoning for the Justice Department, which is facing fresh scrutiny over a plea deal in 2008 that protected him from federal charges.
- Alexander Acosta, President Trump’s labor secretary and the former United States attorney in the Southern District of Florida, was personally involved in negotiating that plea deal.
The trial of Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, a decorated member of the Navy SEALs, offered rare insight into a culture that is, by design, difficult to penetrate. Our colleague tells us what he learned from the verdict. Guest: Dave Philipps, who covers the military for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- After a key witness for prosecutors changed his story on the stand, Chief Gallagher was found not guilty of the most serious charges against him, including the first-degree murder of a captive ISIS fighter and attempted murder of civilians in Iraq.
- Some SEAL commanders expressed worry that the verdict would discourage others from reporting possible war crimes in the future.
In 2016, Lordstown, Ohio, helped deliver the presidency to Donald J. Trump, betting that he would fulfill his promise to save its auto industry. Our colleague went there to examine the political fallout from the fact that he didn’t. Guests: Sabrina Tavernise, a national correspondent for The New York Times, met with Brian Milo, who worked at the General Motors plant in Lordstown for a decade; Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The Times, spoke with Sabrina. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The path to the White House next year runs through places like Lordstown, but many voters there say the G.M. plant shutdown has left them even more at sea politically.
- For more from Sabrina Tavernise on G.M.’s big tech move and how it’s leaving thousands of workers behind, watch The Times’s new TV show, “The Weekly,” this Sunday night on FX at 10/9c, or Monday on Hulu.
In the contest to become the Democratic candidate for president, Joseph R. Biden Jr. is being asked to confront his record on race, including past positions that some in his party now see as outdated and unjust. We look at the policies Mr. Biden embraced and how they were viewed at the time. Guest: Astead W. Herndon, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Mr. Biden’s efforts to play down his role in overhauling crime legislation with segregationist senators in the 1980s and ’90s is at odds with his actions and rhetoric back then.
- Though a liberal on most civil rights issues, Mr. Biden was a leading opponent of busing as a tool to integrate schools.
President Trump made history over the weekend when he became the first sitting American president to step into North Korea. But the biggest impact of that gesture may have been on Iran. Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times and the author of “The Perfect Weapon: War, Sabotage, and Fear in the Cyber Age.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Trump administration officials are at odds over what demands to make in new talks with North Korea, with some now considering a nuclear freeze as a first step.
- Iran on Monday violated a key element of the 2015 nuclear deal, from which Mr. Trump withdrew the United States last year.
Federal courts have ruled that migrant children inside the United States must be housed in “safe and sanitary” accommodation. So what explains the conditions at a Border Patrol station in Clint, Tex.? Guest: Caitlin Dickerson, who covers immigration for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Soiled clothes, no diapers and no access to showers or soap — read more about the conditions that migrant children faced in an overcrowded border station in Texas.
- The authorities emptied the station, then moved more than 100 children back in. A Times reporter toured the site last week.
- Congress sent President Trump a $4.6 billion border aid package that left Democratic lawmakers badly divided.
Fifty years after the Stonewall riots, as the largest L.G.B.T.Q. Pride celebration in the world takes place in New York this weekend, some leaders of the community are asking a difficult question: What’s lost as the Pride movement becomes mainstream? Guests: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Shane O’Neill, a video editor. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Divisions have emerged in the L.G.B.T.Q. community over the role of corporate sponsors and of the police in Pride celebrations.
- Who threw the first brick during the Stonewall uprising? Whatever you’ve heard, it’s probably a myth — and that’s O.K. Here’s why.
- To capture the evolving ways in which we describe ourselves, The Times asked readers to tell us who they are. More than 5,000 people wrote in.
Twenty Democrats seeking their party’s presidential nomination have now made their case to American voters. We take a look at their visions for the future, the breakout performances and the state of the race. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Here are takeaways from the first night and the second night of the debates.
- See which candidates spoke the most on Wednesday and on Thursday.
- Read more of our 2020 election coverage.
Note: This episode contains detailed descriptions of an alleged sexual assault.
The writer E. Jean Carroll came forward last week with explosive accusations that Donald Trump sexually assaulted her in the 1990s. Today, the two women she privately confided in after the alleged attack go on the record for the first time with our colleague. Guests: Megan Twohey, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Ms. Carroll, Lisa Birnbach and Carol Martin. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Read more about why Ms. Carroll, Ms. Birnbach and Ms. Martin went public with the allegations against the president.
- Ms. Carroll alleges in a forthcoming book that Mr. Trump sexually assaulted her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s.
- The president denied the accusations by resorting to a familiar insult: “She’s not my type.”
- The Times’s top editor, Dean Baquet, acknowledged “we were overly cautious” in our initial coverage of Ms. Carroll’s accusations.
Over the next two days, 20 Democrats will take the stage for the first debates of the 2020 presidential race. We look at the competing visions for America they’ll be fighting over this week, and throughout the campaign. Guest: Alexander Burns, who covers national politics for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Does anyone deserve to have a billion dollars? How many hours of sleep do you get? The Times asked 21 Democratic presidential candidates the same set of questions. Here’s what they said, and here are some takeaways.
- For the candidates, these early debates may represent the first, best — and, in some cases, only — opportunity to stand out from competitors and build national momentum in the primary. Here’s how they’re preparing.
- Senator Elizabeth Warren is the only candidate on the first night who is polling in double digits, but there are plenty of story lines and political dynamics to watch for.
In the weeks since the Mueller report, nearly 80 House Democrats have called for impeaching the president. But with the 2020 campaign underway, the likelihood of such action appears to be fading. That may be exactly what some Democratic leaders want. Guests: Peter Baker, who covers the White House for The New York Times, spoke with Representative Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat and a member of the House Judiciary Committee. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- In a House that can be dominated by voices on the left, centrist freshman Democrats who flipped seats in 2018 may have the final say on impeachment.
- Here’s a refresher on how impeachment works.
A military crackdown in Sudan has left more than 100 pro-democracy protesters dead, just weeks after the military offered support in overthrowing the country’s dictator. Our colleague spoke with us from Sudan’s capital, Khartoum. Guest: Declan Walsh, the Cairo bureau chief for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- Lt. Gen. Mohamed Hamdan, the leader of the paramilitary forces that carried out the killings, is now considered by many to be the de facto ruler of Sudan.
- Listen to an episode of “The Daily” about the fall of Sudan’s longtime dictator, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who was deposed by his own generals in May.
The Trump administration has been debating a military strike against Iran as tensions with the country escalate. Here’s how we got to this point. Guest: Mark Landler, who covers the White House for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump approved military strikes against Iran in retaliation for downing an American drone, but abruptly called them off on Thursday night.
- Mr. Trump has veered between bellicose threats against America’s enemies and promises to get the United States out of foreign wars. He may soon have to choose.
- The United States and Iran, two longtime adversaries, are once again hurtling toward potential crisis. That course was set a year ago.
With asylum requests at a record high, the Trump administration is telling migrants to wait in Mexico. We look at how that policy could fundamentally change immigration in the United States. Guests: Natalie Kitroeff, a business reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Zolan Kanno-Youngs, who covers homeland security. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- A recent State Department report acknowledged the possibility that migrants from Central America were no safer in Mexico than at home from the gangs that had threatened them.
- The cornerstone of President Trump’s deal to avert tariffs with Mexico — the terms of which were largely already agreed-upon in December — was an expansion of the “Remain in Mexico” program.
The president kicked off his re-election campaign on Tuesday with a rally in Orlando, Fla. We spoke with a colleague who was there. Guest: Maggie Haberman, who covers the White House for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- President Trump’s messaging at the rally signals a bet that his 2020 campaign will be a replay of 2016 — but this time, with the full support of the Republican Party.
- Here are eight things our reporters learned from attending the rally.
- The 2020 election is shaping up as a test: Was Mr. Trump’s victory a historical fluke, or a genuine reflection of America today?
A New York Times investigation found that the United States is actively infiltrating Russia’s electric power grid. We look at what that means for the future of cyberwarfare. Guest: David E. Sanger, a national security correspondent for The New York Times and the author of “The Perfect Weapon: War, Sabotage, and Fear in the Cyber Age.” For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.
Background reading:
- The cyberattacks on Russia’s power grid are intended partly as a warning, and partly to be poised to act if a major conflict broke out between Washington and Moscow.
- In response to The Times’s report, the Kremlin warned that American attacks could escalate into cyberwar.
In Hong Kong, hundreds of thousands remain in the streets, even after city officials sa