David A. Graham

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Legal opinions tend to be dry, wordy, and intentionally vague. One issued by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel earlier this month is none of these.
“You have asked whether the Presidential Records Act of 1978 (‘PRA’ or ‘Act’) is constitutional.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
In an earlier, somewhat more innocent era of Donald Trump’s social-media posting, one could still chuckle darkly at his 2017 declaration that his approach “is not Presidential – it’s MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Critics have used many phrases to describe Donald Trump’s presidency, some of them unprintable. Scholars and journalists have debated whether Trump’s approach is “authoritarian,” “white supremacist,” or “fascist.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
A popular joke in the 1850s concerned a man who, upon being convicted for the murder of his parents, throws himself at the judge’s feet and begs for mercy on a poor orphan.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
To national audiences, the news that a North Carolina state senator had apparently lost a Republican primary race by two—yes, two—votes seemed like one of those quirky election stories that come around every year, such as when the mayor of Boca Raton, Florida, recently won by five votes.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Mike Pence should have been a warning to J. D. Vance about the inevitable abasement in store once you join a ticket with Donald Trump.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Readers’ faith in publications and writers relies on a belief that the information provided is true and accurate to the best of the writer’s knowledge. When I get something wrong, I owe it to you to correct myself. Today, I have that unpleasant task.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
No one could accuse Representative Andy Ogles of using dog whistles. The Tennessee Republican prefers a bullhorn.
“Muslims don’t belong in American society,” Ogles wrote on X on Monday. “Pluralism is a lie.”
The statement’s open bigotry is jarring.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Partisan gerrymandering—the practice of drawing districts in a way that is designed to aid one party and hurt the other—is one of the more pernicious phenomena in American politics today. It’s fundamentally antidemocratic because it’s designed to circumvent or at least dampen the will of voters.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Any legislation titled with a backronym is automatically suspect, and the SAVE America Act—that’s Safeguard American Voter Eligibility—is no exception.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Stephen Colbert’s Late Show ends in May, and he’s in almost open warfare with his soon-to-be ex-bosses at CBS. Last night, he had planned to broadcast an interview with James Talarico, a member of the Texas state House who is running in a heated Democratic primary for United States Senate.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
“I have nothing to hide. Absolutely nothing,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told a Senate committee yesterday. Perhaps that’s true—but given his recent history, don’t bet on it.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Last night, during Super Bowl halftime, I watched a mustachioed entertainer put on a show that celebrated working-class values, the pleasures of a good party, and the virtues of marriage, with a side serving of grievance against elites.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
The CIA World Factbook occupies a special place in the memories of elder Millennials like me. It was an enormous compendium of essential facts about every country around the world, carefully collected from across the federal government.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
With nine months to go until the midterm elections, President Trump’s campaign to subvert them is escalating.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
The attack on Representative Ilhan Omar on Tuesday was horrifying but depressingly predictable. Not only has the country seen a recent spree of political violence, but Omar, a Democrat from Minnesota, has also been a frequent target of death threats.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Destruction is easier than construction. If Donald Trump’s decades as a real-estate developer didn’t teach him that, his time as president might.
In October, the administration bulldozed the East Wing of the White House in order to build a ballroom he wants to put on the site.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Perhaps the most disturbing part of the Trump administration’s immigration operation in Minnesota is not just that agents of the state are killing peacefully protesting citizens on the streets.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Donald Trump retains the ability to shock; the day he loses that, he will, like the biblical Samson—another man notable for his coiffure—lose his power entirely.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
The most notable, and perhaps most effective, ad of the 2024 presidential campaign featured footage of the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris, voicing her support for gender-affirming treatment for inmates in federal prisons. “Kamala is for they/them.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
After an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Good in Minneapolis last week, forensic examinations of videos of the incident emerged within hours.

In the summer of 1968, three years into the Grateful Dead’s existence, the band fired singer and rhythm guitarist Bob Weir. Jerry Garcia, the band’s other guitarist and its reluctant leader, and bassist Phil Lesh had decided that Weir and keyboardist Ron “Pigpen” McKernan were dragging the band down musically. Weir was just 20 years old, the youngest member of the group and the least technically accomplished.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Until recently, Donald Trump was consistent about this: The time for the United States to police the world, enforcing laws and norms, was over. “We are going to take care of this country first before we worry about everybody else in the world,” he told The New York Times in 2016.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
When a federal immigration agent shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis today, the details were fresh but the story was familiar.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
One indicator of a polity’s health is whether a citizen can be punished merely for telling the truth about the law. The signs for American democracy are not good.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
A year ago, no one knew for sure whether Project 2025 would prove to be influential or if it would fall by the wayside, like so many plans in President Donald Trump’s first term. Today, it stands as the single most successful policy initiative of the entire Trump era.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
This past Friday was the legal deadline for releasing files related to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and the Justice Department blew right through it.
In an interview Friday morning, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche acknowledged that not everything would be ready by the deadline.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
When President Donald Trump visited George Washington’s Mount Vernon in 2018, he reportedly showed little interest in the estate or in the first president. But Trump did have a critique of his predecessor. “If he was smart, he would’ve put his name on it,” he reportedly said.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Last week, the Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado made a daring escape from her home country to Norway, where she was honored as winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize.