Today's Liberal News

The President’s Pattern of Impatience

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During Donald Trump’s first stint as president, the political scientist Daniel Drezner maintained a very long thread on the site formerly known as Twitter.

Trump’s Campaign to Scare Off Foreign Students

During last year’s presidential campaign, Donald Trump endorsed a novel idea: Foreign students who graduated from college in the United States would automatically get a green card, instead of having to scramble for a new visa or leave the country entirely. “They go back to India; they go back to China,” he told the tech-plutocrat hosts of the All-In Podcast in June.

A Reality Check for Tech Oligarchs

Technologists currently wield a level of political influence that was recently considered unthinkable. While Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency slashes public services, Jeff Bezos takes celebrities to space on Blue Origin and the CEOs of AI companies speak openly of radically transforming society. As a result, there has never been a better moment to understand the ideas that animate these leaders’ particular vision of the future.

The People Who Clean the Ears of Lincoln (And Other Statues)

Bettmann / Getty
National Parks Service worker James Hudson uses a cloth-wrapped pole to clean the ear of the statue at the Lincoln Memorial in 1987.Gary Hershorn / Getty
Maintenance workers clean a statue in Central Park, in New York City, in 2016.Anton Vaganov / Reuters
A municipal worker scrubs a statue of the Soviet state founder Vladimir Lenin in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in 2023.

J. D. Vance’s Bargain With the Devil

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On this episode of The David Frum Show, David opens with a Memorial Day message about corruption and extortion in the Trump White House, including revelations about meme-coin pay-to-play schemes and foreign-financed golf courses.
Then David is joined by his Atlantic colleague George Packer to discuss Packer’s new profile of Vice President J. D. Vance.

“Mt. Everest of Corruption”: Crypto Investors Buy Access to President; Trump Expands Bitcoin Holdings

We speak with Robert Weissman of Public Citizen about Donald Trump’s various conflicts of interest after Trump hosted a private dinner at his Virginia golf club for the 220 top buyers of his $TRUMP cryptocurrency. The Trump family has also announced it is expanding its holdings in cryptocurrencies, with the Trump tech startup set to raise $2.5 billion to invest in bitcoin. “There’s millions of losers for every few winners in the crypto game.

“Corporate Criminal”: Nadia Milleron, Whose Daughter Died in 737 Crash, Slams New DOJ-Boeing Deal

The Trump administration has reached a deal with the aerospace giant Boeing that will allow the company to pay $1.1 billion to avoid criminal prosecution for two deadly crashes of the company’s 737 MAX jet in 2018 and 2019, which together killed 346 people. Under the non-prosecution agreement with the Justice Department, Boeing would pay fines and fund safety improvements while providing an additional $445 million for crash victims’ families, among other measures.

“I Am a Political Prisoner”: Immigrant Rights Activist Jeanette Vizguerra Speaks from ICE Jail

We speak with the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa after she got extraordinary access to an ICE detention center in Colorado, where she interviewed the immigrant rights activist Jeanette Vizguerra. The undocumented mother of four was arrested by federal agents in Denver in March after she successfully fought multiple deportation efforts since 2009, including when she took sanctuary in a Denver church with her children in 2017.