The Daily

The sabotage in September of the Nord Stream pipelines carrying Russian gas to Europe has become one of the central mysteries of the war in Ukraine, prompting months of finger-pointing and guesswork. Now, new intelligence reporting has provided the first significant known lead about who was responsible. Guest: Julian E. Barnes , a national security correspondent for The New York Times. Background...

As the race to be the Republican Party’s presidential candidate gets underway, one figure has emerged as a particularly powerful rival to Donald J. Trump. That person, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, has broken away from the pack by turning his state into a laboratory for a post-Trump version of conservatism. Guest: Patricia Mazzei , the Miami bureau chief for The New York Times. Background reading:...

On Feb. 3, a nearly two-mile long freight train carrying hazardous materials derailed near East Palestine, Ohio, a town of about 4,700 people. The railroad company and local officials decided to do a chemical burn to neutralize the cargo, but as a giant plume of black smoke settled over the town, residents’ anger about the handling of the accident has intensified. Guest: Emily Cochrane , a nationa...

Today, we’re taking some time out of our regularly scheduled programming to share the first episode of “The Coldest Case in Laramie.” In the new series from The Times and Serial, Kim Barker, a Times investigative reporter, digs into the 1985 murder of Shelli Wiley, a young woman who was a few years older than Kim when they both lived in Laramie, Wyoming.  The long-unsolved case took a turn in 2016...

As Russian troops pushed into Ukraine, children who were fleeing newly occupied territories were swept up. Many became part of a Russian effort to portray itself as a charitable savior.  The children were placed in Russian families and paraded on television. The Times interviewed one child who was taken from Ukraine, a girl named Anya, who said she ached to return. Guest: Emma Bubola , a reporter...

In August, President Biden announced a loan cancellation plan that would erase an astonishing $400 billion in student debt — one of the most ambitious and expensive executive actions ever. Now, in a far-reaching case, the Supreme Court will decide whether the president is authorized to take such a big step. Guest: Adam Liptak , a Supreme Court correspondent for The New York Times. Background readi...

In 2000, the F.D.A. approved the medication abortion drug mifepristone. Now a federal judge in Texas is set to rule on a case filed by anti-abortion groups urging the agency to revoke its approval of mifepristone and the other main drug used for medication abortion in the United States. Abortion via medication has become increasingly common and now accounts for more than half of the nation’s abort...

The 7.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Feb. 6 left more than 50,000 people dead. The sight of rescuers combing the rubble has prompted questions about why so many buildings seemed so inadequate to resist the shaking earth. In Turkey, the government has turned the focus onto builders and property developers, accusing them of chasing profit over safety. But the reality is far m...

After the 2020 election, wild theories ran rampant on the right of an election stolen from Donald Trump through a coordinated conspiracy. The news channel Fox News became one of the loudest voices amplifying these false claims into millions of U.S. households. Now, a defamation lawsuit by Dominion, a voting machine maker that was cast as a villain in these conspiracy theories, seeks to hold the me...

In February, the first lawsuit against Tesla for a crash involving its driver-assistance system, Autopilot, will go to trial. The slew of trials set to follow will be a costly fight that the company’s chief executive, Elon Musk, has vowed to take on in court. When Tesla released its Autopilot feature in October 2015, Musk touted the feature as “probably better” than a human driver. The reality, ho...

The war has already done untold damage. By some estimates, tens of thousands have died, and the country has sustained tens of billions of dollars’ worth of damage that has left cities flattened. But Ukraine has also largely stopped the offensives of its much larger and better-armed neighbor and has regained some captured land. On the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion, these Ukrainians reflect...

Since 1996, the modern internet has been defined by a sweeping law that prevents tech companies such as Facebook and Google from being held responsible for the content posted on their sites. This week, the Supreme Court heard arguments in a case that could take that legal immunity away. Guest: Adam Liptak , who covers the Supreme Court for The New York Times. Background reading:  The decision on w...

In a major shift that would modify laws set half a decade ago, states and cities around the United States are moving to legalize psychedelics for use as a medical treatment. The sudden change of heart has a lot to do with who is asking for the substances. Guest: Andrew Jacobs , a health and science reporter for The New York Times. Background reading:  Lawmakers find it hard to “just say no” to com...

The great supply chain disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic scrambled the shipping system across the Pacific. Although mostly over, the turmoil has led to alterations in the way the global economy functions. One such change can be seen in Mexico, where companies from China are increasingly setting up shop. Guest: Peter S. Goodman , a global economics correspondent for The New York Times....

Times tech columnist Kevin Roose stopped by The Daily twice this week to chronicle the debut of Bing’s new chatbot — and the creepy things that transpired. Today, we’re bringing you the latest episode of Kevin’s podcast, Hard Fork. Kevin, along with his co-host Casey Newton, expand the discussion about why Microsoft’s A.I. search tool appears more powerful — and more unsettling — than they initial...

Microsoft recently released a new version of its search engine Bing that is powered by artificial intelligence software from OpenAI, the maker of the popular chatbot ChatGPT. On Valentine’s Day, after a meal with his wife, Kevin Roose, a New York Times technology columnist, had a two-hour conversation with the chatbot. The chatbot, which revealed that it identified as Sydney, told Kevin that it wa...

When a 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit Syria and Turkey last week, it killed thousands and created a crisis within a crisis. International aid began pouring into Turkey, but northwestern Syria, which was also hard-hit, received only a trickle. It was a bitter blow for Syrians, whose lives had already been uprooted by years of civil war, mass displacement and death. Today, we hear from some Syrians an...

Microsoft recently released a new version of Bing, its search engine that has long been kind of a punchline in the tech world. The company billed this Bing — which is powered by artificial intelligence software from OpenAI, the maker of the popular chatbot ChatGPT — as a reinvention of how billions of people search the internet. How does that claim hold up? Guest: Kevin Roose , a technology column...

Last week, after the Air Force shot down a Chinese surveillance balloon, examination of its wreckage revealed that it could not only take images, but also scoop up radio and cellphone communications.  The balloon, the U.S. military said, was part of a bigger global program by China to collect information about military operations. Since then the U.S. has shot down three other objects from the skie...

Amid growing threats from rivals like China, the United States military is determined to invest in new forms of defense and abandon those that no longer meet its needs. On that list: a combat ship rife with flaws. But getting rid of the ship has proved unexpectedly difficult. Guest: Eric Lipton , an investigative reporter for The New York Times. Background reading:  After years of crippling proble...

Menopausal hormone therapy was once the most commonly prescribed treatment in the United States. In the late 1990s, some 15 million women a year were receiving a prescription for it. But in 2002, a single study, its design imperfect, found links between hormone therapy and elevated health risks for women of all ages. Panic set in; in one year, the number of prescriptions plummeted. Hormone therapy...

This weekend, one of the most watched sporting events of the year, the Super Bowl, will draw an estimated $16 billion in bets from Americans, more than double last year’s total. The booming trade is a sign of how gambling has gone from illegal to legal very quickly in many states — and hints at the enormous risks posed by the change. Guest: Kenneth P. Vogel , an investigative correspondent for The...

For the past decade, San Francisco has worked hard to turn its downtown into a vibrant hub, providing a model that other cities in the United States looked to emulate. In the wake of the pandemic, however, many buildings and offices in the center of the city have remained empty. What went wrong? Guest: Conor Dougherty , an economics reporter at The New York Times and author of “Golden Gates: The H...

This episode contains descriptions of violence.  The death of Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, at the hands of officers in Memphis last month has intensified calls for fundamental reform in policing. Those calls were echoed yesterday by President Biden, who hosted Mr. Nichols’s parents at the State of the Union address. Today, we hear about a Times investigation into the special team of offi...

On Monday, a giant 7.8-magnitude earthquake and an aftershock almost as big shook the earth in southern Turkey. The quakes sent ripples through neighboring countries, but the area along the Syrian-Turkish border was hit particularly hard. Thousands of people have been killed, and dozens of cities have been gutted. We hear from witnesses on the ground about what happened when the devastating tremor...