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The Washington Roundtable is joined by Rahm Emanuel, the former White House chief of staff under Barack Obama, for a discussion about the Democratic Party’s odds heading into the midterm elections. In 2006, as chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Emanuel helped engineer his party’s sweeping electoral victories against an unpopular Republican President. Two decades later, he anticipates Democratic wins across the board, including in the Texas and Iowa Senate races. Emanuel lays out what he sees as an affirmative agenda for the Party, should they take control of Congress for the final two years of President Donald Trump’s term: ethics reform, a minimum-wage increase, an overhaul of the tax code, and a focus on corruption. “The way I talk about corruption is, He wants his ballroom and you’re getting the bill. He wants his arch, and you can’t afford a meal at the Golden Arches. He gets a $450 million plane from Qatar, and you get $4.50 a gallon of gas,” says Emanuel. “You gotta drive the corruption into the wallet.” This week’s reading: “Trump’s Repudiation Is at Hand, Right?,” by Susan B. Glasser “How ICE Is Targeting the 2026 Midterms,” by Jonathan Blitzer “Can Justin J. Pearson Win in Tennessee?,” by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor “How Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Gave Florida Democrats a Chance,” by Daniel Castro “How the D.S.A. Learned to Love Elections,” by Benjamin Wallace-Wells The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A growing portion of the electorate appears to recognize the mayhem President Donald Trump has instigated since returning to the Oval Office. That segment includes some of the people who put him back into office, including Rich Baris, who goes by the People’s Pundit on social media. Baris runs Big Data Poll, and appears regularly on “The Charlie Kirk Show” and other right-wing outlets. But he concurs with nonpartisan pollsters that MAGA is fracturing, and he talks with David Remnick about how the President lost the trust of his base; the contempt MAGA voters have for the old Republican Party; and who might take the reins after Trump.  Further reading: “The Week Republicans Finally Panicked About Trump,” by Susan B. Glasser “A Never Trumper and a Democrat on Beating MAGA for Good,” by Isaac Arnsdorf “How the Internet Fringe Infiltrated Republican Politics,” by Antonia Hitchens “Tucker Carlson’s Nationalist Crusade,” by Jason Zengerle “Does MAGA Have Ideas?,” by Joshua Rothman The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Washington Roundtable is joined by Alex Gibney, the Oscar-winning filmmaker, to discuss his new documentary, “Musk.” Since July, Elon Musk has poured more than a quarter of a billion dollars into Republican campaigns, more than any other donor in the midterms by a wide margin, and all in plain view. Jane Mayer, the New Yorker staff writer and the author of “Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right,” explains how Musk is bringing political financing by the ultra-wealthy out of the shadows: “He’s the coming-out party for the billionaires.” Gibney argues that Musk’s flagrant spending is less a matter of ideology than one of self-preservation—a way to forestall investigations, protect his companies, and keep the federal contracts coming. How did a single person come to wield this kind of power over our elections, our technology, and even a war on the other side of the world? “He sold us all a dream,” Gibney says, “and we fell for it.” Get Tickets to The Political Scene Live at The New Yorker Festival on October 24th Get Tickets to The Political Scene Live at Sith & I in Washington D.C. on November 18th This week’s reading: “Trump’s October Surprise Is a Pivot to Putin,” by Susan B. Glasser “Who Won the Redistricting War?,” by Jon Allsop “Kimberly Who?,” by Ruth Marcus “Donald Trump After the Midterms,” by David Remnick “Pity the Poor Passport,” by Adam Gopnik The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The New Yorker staff writers Isaac Chotiner and Benjamin Wallace-Wells join Tyler Foggatt to discuss what Democrats might do after the midterms if they win a majority in the House or the Senate, and how Donald Trump might respond to attempts to check his power. If Trump has been willing to circumvent Congress on issues like military action and tariffs, how much difference would a Democratic majority make during the remainder of his second term? They also talk about how large a Democratic victory could be, and ask what the results might reveal about voters’ views of Donald Trump and the Republican Party. This conversation was recorded for a live video on Substack. Follow The New Yorker on Substack » Recommended reading: “Donald Trump After the Midterms,” by David Remnick “The Dumocrats Are Coming for Trump, and All He Can Do Is Call Them Names,” by Susan B. Glasser “Who Won the Redistricting War?,” by Jon Allsop “The Well-Funded Fight to Keep Latinos Voting Republican,” by Jesús Rodríguez “A Populist Revival in Iowa,” by Peter Slevin The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The economic punishment and threats of aggression that Donald Trump has launched against Canada are so severe that its government has looked at how to prepare for U.S. military action. David Remnick sits down with a former senior Canadian politician, Chrystia Freeland, to talk about the disintegration of a rock-solid partnership. Freeland served as the Deputy Prime Minister under Justin Trudeau, and has also held the roles of Minister of International Trade and Minister of Foreign Affairs; she helped negotiate a trade deal in Trump’s first term, which he subsequently broke. Freeland’s new book about the U.S.-Canada relationship is called “Unreliable Boyfriend,” but that title may soft-pedal it. “The vast majority of Canadians see this as a rupture” that will be permanent, she tells Remnick. “They think America is toxic and broken and can never be trusted again. . . . I actually am an outlier, because I think we shouldn’t write America off quite yet.”   Further reading: “What If Canada Joined the E.U.?,” by Ishaan Tharoor “Canada, the Northern Outpost of Sanity,” by Bill McKibben “The Historical Roots of Donald Trump’s Aggressive Nationalism,” by Isaac Chotiner The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Washington Roundtable weighs in on how Donald Trump’s rampant corruption will play out at the polls. Although conventional wisdom in Washington suggests that graft doesn’t move voters, Democrats have nonetheless spent more than three hundred million dollars on ads that portray the President’s self-enrichment as a tax on everyone else. They are joined by a former commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, Rebecca Slaughter, who discusses what, if anything, can be done about corruption in the federal government, and why criminal prosecution may not be the most effective tool to combat it. Slaughter argues that officials must find ways to make corruption costly for those who engage in it. And though few Americans expect the powerful to face consequences, Slaughter says, “the only way to change that impression . . . is to start making people pay.” Get Tickets to ⁠The Political Scene Live at The New Yorker Festival⁠ on October 24th Get Tickets to ⁠The Political Scene Live at Sith & I in Washington D.C.⁠ on November 18th This week’s reading: “The Dumocrats Are Coming for Trump, and All He Can Do Is Call Them Names,” by Susan B. Glasser “The Battle for the Post-Trump Right,” by Emma Green “The Battle to Pass a Billionaire Tax,” by Nicholas Lemann “In ‘Musk,’ Alex Gibney Punctures Elon’s Self-Mythology,” by Sheelah Kolhatkar “ICE Is Everywhere and Acting with Impunity,” by Jonathan Blitzer “Will Netanyahu Escape His Reckoning?,” by David Remnick The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The New Yorker staff writer Jonathan Blitzer joins Tyler Foggatt to talk about Donald Trump’s decision to delay the cancellation of Temporary Protected Status for Salvadoran immigrants. They discuss why the Administration, which has already terminated the T.P.S. designations of fourteen other countries, effectively opening up those communities to deportations, has yet to follow through on its promise to do the same for immigrants from El Salvador, and whether the decision was influenced by lobbyists from industries that rely on immigrant labor. They also discuss the tensions between the nativist wing of the Trump Administration and the pro-industry wing, and what Trump’s handling of T.P.S. reveals about how he makes decisions and exercises power in his second term. Does Trump’s unpredictability—and his susceptibility to being influenced even on his most deeply held beliefs—make his agenda more vulnerable to challenge? Recommended reading: “Why Trump Delayed Cancelling Legal Status for Salvadorans,” by Jonathan Blitzer “ICE Is Everywhere and Acting with Impunity,” by Jonathan Blitzer “The Quiet Unravelling of a Haitian Life in America,” by Ruby Cramer “The Great Delegalization,” by Dara Lind The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 2023, Evan Gershkovich was working as a young reporter in Moscow for the Wall Street Journal, when he was arrested by Russian authorities. He was eventually convicted on blatantly false charges of espionage and spent nearly five hundred days in imprisonment. Gershkovich recounts the experience in a new memoir, “This Cursed Beautiful Land,” and in an essay in The New Yorker. He spoke with David Remnick about life inside a Russian prison, the international prisoner swap that freed him, and why the difficult process of reacclimating to his former life complicated how he viewed his incarceration.  Further reading and listening:  “The Russian Prisoner Who Didn’t Want to Be Freed,” by Joshua Yaffa “Evan Gershkovich Is Finally Coming Home,” by Joshua Yaffa “The Unimaginable Horror of a Friend’s Arrest in Moscow,” by Joshua Yaffa This segment was recorded live at the Temple Emanu-El Streicker Centers, in New York City.   The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Washington Roundtable is joined by the Polish Foreign Minister, Radosław Sikorski, to discuss the war in Ukraine and Russia’s brazen tests of the NATO alliance, including drone incursions in Poland and a campaign of gray-zone tactics. “They are boiling the frog and watching what we will do,” Sikorski says. He weighs how much Europe can still count on the United States under President Trump, and whether the trust between America and its allies can be restored. The panel also reflects on how Poland pulled back from its own authoritarian slide, and what that history might say for Americans worried about the future of our democracy.  This week’s reading: “Pete Hegseth Just Declared Victory in the Wrong War,” by Susan B. Glasser “Why the War in Iran Is Likely to Heat Up Again,” by Isaac Chotiner “Why Trump Delayed Cancelling Legal Status for Salvadorans,” by Jonathan Blitzer “The President vs. the Press,” by Jelani Cobb The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The New Yorker staff writer Emma Green joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss the Senate race in Maine, where the Republican Susan Collins, who has served in the Senate for nearly thirty years, is facing off against the former state senator Troy Jackson. They discuss how Collins has leveraged her seniority—and her chairmanship of the Senate Appropriations Committee—to bring considerable federal funding to Maine, helping her fend off Democratic challengers in the purple state. They also explore Collins’s reputation as a moderate Republican willing to break with her party on high-profile votes, despite siding with President Donald Trump roughly ninety-five per cent of the time, and ask what the results of the Maine race may suggest about two competing visions of a senator’s job. Will Collins’s focus on Maine-specific projects and bringing federal money home win out over Jackson’s focus on national issues such as abolishing ICE, Medicare for All, and protecting national abortion rights? This week’s reading: “Susan Collins’s Maine Money Machine,” by Emma Green “Troy Jackson Is Still Surprised That He’s Running for Senate,” by Jesús Rodríguez The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ari Emanuel is the executive chairman of W.M.E., one of the biggest talent agencies in Hollywood. He has overseen the careers of Oprah Winfrey, Taylor Swift, Meghan Markle, Martin Scorsese, Dwayne (the Rock) Johnson, and Donald Trump. His entertainment machine now includes the W.W.E., the U.F.C., live theatres, ticketing operations, and more. In a new memoir, “Roll the Calls,” Emanuel charts his rise from working in the mailroom to global power. He talks with David Remnick about his disappointment with Donald Trump’s self-enrichment during his Presidency; his close relationship with Elon Musk, whom he calls an “incredible human being”; and doing business within “shades of gray” with the de-facto Saudi leader Mohammed bin Salman.   Further reading: “Ari Emanuel Takes on the World,” by Connie Bruck The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Washington Roundtable travels to Madison, Wisconsin, for a conversation about the politics of artificial intelligence before a live audience at the Cap Times Idea Fest. The group discusses the stakes of Xi Jinping’s visit to Washington, D.C.; the potential for coöperation between the U.S. and China on A.I., which the staff writer Evan Osnos likens to “private nuclear weapons”; and whether American policymakers can even agree amongst themselves on how to approach regulating the technology. “The executive branch is approaching this not as an existential-level threat to our society,” the staff writer Susan B. Glasser says, “but as a pot of gold that our wealthy business leaders, and presumably the politicians who support them, win if they get to the end of the race first.”   This week's reading: “Our A.I. Problem,” by Gideon Lewis-Kraus “Is A.I. Above the Law?,” by Jill Lepore “There Is No A.I. ‘Race,’” by Chang Che “What China’s Vibe-Coding Capital Can Tell Us About the A.I. Boom,” by Afra Wang The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The New Yorker staff writer Ruby Cramer joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss how the Make America Healthy Again movement is influencing debates within families over vaccines and medical care. They talk about the rise of vaccine skepticism, fuelled by Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and how measles cases have surged across the country, reaching their highest level in three decades. They also explore what happens when parents disagree over their children’s medical care, especially as concerns about parental rights and America’s worsening health, alongside growing distrust of the medical and pharmaceutical establishments, draw more people into the MAHA movement. This week’s reading: “The MAHA Custody Battle,” by Ruby Cramer “Is R.F.K., Jr., Winning or Losing?,” by Dhruv Khullar  “One Vaccine-Schedule Change That Actually Makes Sense,” by Rivka Galchen Tune in to The Political Scene wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Malcolm Gladwell, a longtime staff writer at The New Yorker, often uses ideas from the social sciences and epidemiology and applies them to surprising topics. But his new book tackles an issue that’s in the headlines every day. The book is called “The American Way of Killing,” and the subject is America’s unique association with gun violence. Death statistics, he says, fail to convey the scale of the problem because advances in medical care save countless lives that are nevertheless scarred by violence. Gladwell talks with David Remnick about how gun-control advocates have got the problem wrong, and why he thinks that a persistent dynamic of under-policing and over-incarcerating is at the root of America’s problem. “I can’t even utter the phrase ‘defund the police,’ ” Gladwell says, “without nearly blowing a gasket.” Further reading: “What We Get Wrong About Violent Crime,” by Malcolm Gladwell “Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Snowden, and the Modern Whistle-Blower,” by Malcolm Gladwell  “Thresholds of Violence,” by Malcolm Gladwell The Political Scene draws on the reporting and analysis found in The New Yorker for lively conversations about the big questions in American politics. Join the magazine’s writers and editors as they put into context the latest news—about elections, the economy, the White House, the Supreme Court, and much more. New episodes are available three times a week.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Washington Roundtable will be back next week. In the meantime, we would like to introduce “The Journey,” an audio investigation hosted by our colleague Ava Kofman. Throughout five episodes, it unravels the mystery of how Guojun Xuan and Silvia Zhang, a wealthy Los Angeles couple, obtained dozens of children through nearly as many surrogates—and exposes a scandal that threatens to undermine the entire surrogacy industry. In Episode 1, “Gifts,” a woman in Texas agrees to carry a child for the couple. She thinks she’s helping a family in need. Then she becomes a whistle-blower. In the Dark is an acclaimed investigative-journalism podcast that launched in 2016. Its third season won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for audio. To keep listening to “The Journey,” search for In the Dark wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices