Today, Explained

President Biden finally wants to put the Keystone XL pipeline to bed. But if the last 12 years of environmental fights are any indication, it won’t be easy. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vox’s German Lopez explains why he feels optimistic about the end of the pandemic even though 500,000 Americans have died, the virus is mutating, and it’s going to take a long time to vaccinate the world. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Andrew Cuomo and Gavin Newsom were hailed for their leadership early on in the pandemic. Now, the former is mired in scandal and the latter is facing a recall campaign. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What’s taking so long? What’s happening with those $1,400 checks? Are the Democrats betraying the people who voted for them? Vox’s Li Zhou and Andrew Prokop explain. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Australia just reined in Google. Dozens of other countries want in on the action. The latest season of Land of the Giants explains how two grad students turned a search engine into what might be the most powerful company in history. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

First it was brutal winter weather, power outages followed, and then came a poorly timed trip to Cancun. Texas Public Radio’s Joey Palacios explains what comes next. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Author Nicole Hemmer explains how Limbaugh helped pave the way for Fox News, OAN, and Newsmax. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Biden says he wants to undo his predecessor’s immigration policies, so why are some of them still in effect? The El Paso Times’s Lauren Villagran and the New Yorker’s Sarah Stillman explain. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Democrats made a strong case against Donald Trump. Republicans are being punished for supporting it. Vox’s Zack Beauchamp explains. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The movement to liberate Britney Spears from her conservatorship may not succeed, but it’s revealing a lot about how we treat young women. Vox’s Constance Grady explains. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sen. Mitt Romney wants to throw money at parents, Andrew Yang-style. President Biden is into it, too. Vox’s Dylan Matthews explains. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Poorer countries have received less than 1 percent of the Covid-19 vaccines distributed around the world. Vox’s Julia Belluz explains what the WHO is calling a “catastrophic moral failure.” Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A quarter-century after it was signed, Section 230, the law that made the modern internet, has done the impossible: united Democrats and Republicans. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vox’s Andrew Prokop previews the historic second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump. Law professor Alan Rozenshtein explains what the Justice Department can and cannot do to prosecute insurrectionists. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Senate voted on more than 40 pieces of legislation overnight. Vox’s Li Zhou explains what the “vote-a-rama” means for President Biden’s agenda. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ten years ago, a Tunisian fruit vendor set himself on fire and set off a revolution across the Middle East and North Africa. The Independent’s Borzou Daragahi says the Arab Spring never ended. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vox’s Aaron Rupar explains why Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has likened a fellow Republican’s views to cancer. And New York magazine’s Olivia Nuzzi explores what lawmakers peddling conspiracy theories means for the future of the GOP. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Some would say the military has always been in control of Myanmar. On Monday morning, they made it official once again. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After the 1977 murder of a young Latino man, the Houston Police Department created a team of five young Latino officers to solve homicides in their community. True crime meets forgotten history in the Vox Media Podcast Network’s Chicano Squad. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

And whether or not any of it will last beyond his presidency. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vox’s Emily Stewart explains how GameStop’s stock jumped by 1,700 percent this month. Bloomberg’s Matt Levine ponders the purpose of the stock market. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Sen. Tammy Duckworth wants the military to do a better job of rooting out extremism in its ranks. A military investigator explains how to solve a decades-old problem. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

One year after our first episode on the novel coronavirus, Vox’s Julia Belluz explains what we got right, what we got wrong, and what comes next. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Marianne Williamson was applauded as well as ridiculed on the presidential debate stage when she warned of the “dark psychic forces of collectivized hatred.” Now, just a few weeks after a lethal insurrection, a historic second impeachment, and the inauguration of President Joe Biden, she talks about the possibility of unity. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. V...

Kamala Harris has already broken barriers, but ahead lies the rare task of leading a polarized and evenly divided Senate. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices