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 U.S. Delta Force commandos slipped into Venezuelan airspace over the weekend, they did so in secrecy.
This weekend’s attack on Venezuela produced plenty of indelible images. The one burned into my brain was shared by President Donald Trump on Truth Social. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is sitting in front of a laptop at a makeshift command center in Mar-a-Lago. He’s monitoring the raid with a grave expression on his face, eyes intently focused on something out of frame.
At least the debut of the “America-loving” newscast was an apt metaphor for America right now.
The Atlantic contributor and renowned foreign-policy scholar Robert Kagan will discus the Trump administration’s attack on Venezuela with the Atlantic staff writer Vivian Salama. In this virtual event just for subscribers, Kagan and Salama will explore the political fallout of the ousting and capture of Nicolás Maduro, the United States’ complicated history of regime changes, and how the Trump administration’s actions in Venezuela can serve as a warning for other world leaders.
The president’s remarks come at a tenuous time, as many lawmakers are holding out hope for a compromise bill to extend lapsed Obamacare subsidies.
Nicolás Maduro wasn’t due to arrive at his arraignment yesterday in downtown Manhattan until noon, but a large crowd had already formed outside the federal courthouse by 9 a.m. Actually, two crowds. One had come to tell Donald Trump to keep his hands off Venezuela. The other, which seemed largely Venezuelan, had come to celebrate.
Maduro was, until Saturday, a widely hated ruler. His last election campaign consisted of threatening his people with a “bloodbath” if he lost.
Pilot program will test how far patients and regulators are willing to trust AI in medicine.
Barbieland author Tarpley Hitt tells us all about the checkered past of the world’s most famous doll.
Ventures launched by the Trump family since Donald Trump’s reelection have generated at least $4 billion in proceeds and paper wealth for the Trump family. With investments across sectors like real estate, hospitality, media, cryptocurrency and more, the Trumps are “increasingly integrating their business empire” into the wider U.S. economy, says David Uberti, who has been reporting on the family’s self-enrichment for The Wall Street Journal.
The share prices of U.S. oil companies surged following the Trump administration’s attack on Venezuela and abduction of its president, Nicolás Maduro. In public statements, Trump has been clear about his desire to reassert U.S. corporate control over Venezuela’s nationalized oil industry. Now with Trump’s show of force over Venezuela’s political sovereignty, many investors see the potential for a similar overpowering of the socialist country’s economic independence.
The share prices of U.S. oil companies surged following the Trump administration’s attack on Venezuela and abduction of its president, Nicolás Maduro. In public statements, Trump has been clear about his desire to reassert U.S. corporate control over Venezuela’s nationalized oil industry. Now with Trump’s show of force over Venezuela’s political sovereignty, many investors see the potential for a similar overpowering of the socialist country’s economic independence.
Zeteo’s Mehdi Hasan outlines Donald Trump’s “Donroe Doctrine,” a throwback foreign policy exemplified by the Trump administration’s shocking intervention in Venezuela. With his claims of U.S. sovereignty over nations in the Western Hemisphere, “Trump’s basically saying, ‘Well, this is ours, and China, Russia can have their spheres of influence.’ And it is very 19th-century-esque. ’Let’s divide up the world between the powers.’” This orientation is a major shift from U.
2025 was an interesting year for US stock markets and global dealmaking.
Rating the spiciness and truthiness of the hottest takes we heard in 2025.
Mary Childs learned about how places like ALIMA and Givewell are moving forward now that USAID is done.
Trump Media & Technology Group has merged with a nuclear fusion company TAE Technologies.
In moving to reduce marijuana regulation, the president has defied the party’s old guard.
Most Americans likely will not benefit immediately from efforts to lower prescription prices. Administration officials expect effects to spread as markets are reshaped.
Even state governments that want to help can’t completely cover rising insurance premiums.
Montana and California will receive near equal amounts in 2026, despite their massive size disparity.
Outward’s hosts sit down with the host and co-creator of When We All Get to Heaven.
The neighborhood changes, the church moves, people forget and remember “the AIDS years,” but AIDS isn’t over.
The AIDS cocktail opens new possibilities. And MCC San Francisco tries to use the experience of AIDS to make bigger social change.
The church’s minister gets sick and everyone knows it.
The church’s “it couple” faces AIDS, caregiving, and loss as part of a pair, part of families, and part of a community.
The vice president fine-tunes Trump’s economic message, but he’s only got so much wiggle room.
Voters who backed Donald Trump in 2024 and swung to Democrats in this year’s Virginia and New Jersey elections did so over economic concerns, according to focus groups conducted by a Democratic pollster and obtained by POLITICO.
In races across the country, Democrats focused on promises to make life more affordable — even as they offered contrasting approaches.
The White House plans to make affordability a key selling point for Republicans across the board as the 2026 midterm elections come into focus.
