KQED's Forum

Scratch at a problem for San Francisco, and you’ll find an issue that underlies almost all of them: the city’s intractable housing crisis. A new documentary “Fault Lines,” on Apple TV follows three storylines connected to the lack of housing. There is a homeless family’s attempts to get into a permanent home, a Sunset neighborhood’s fight over an affordable housing project and the ugly competing c...

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. named multiple vaccine skeptics to the federal Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices last week, after purging the original members of the panel. The move comes after HHS released a report on children’s health questioning the safety of vaccines, while also taking aim at processed food and environmental toxins. We’ll take stock of Kenn...

After months of sparring over tariffs, the Trump Administration says it has reached a deal with China on  trade negotiations, but many businesses and consumers are still feeling uncertain about the economy. The deal imposes 55% tariffs on most Chinese imports, down from President Trump’s earlier 145% tariffs that would have made it prohibitively expensive for many U.S. businesses to import goods f...

We’re joined in studio for a live performance by the Jahari Stampley Family Trio. Stampley, an award-winning jazz pianist who is known for melding genres like funk, gospel and rock, calls his forthcoming album “What A Time” a sonic reflection of “the quiet stillness of late-night thoughts, the joy of a spontaneous jam, the fire of resistance, and the calm of resolution.” We talk to Stampley about...

As a food writer and cook himself, John Birdsall often wondered whether there was such a thing as “queer food.” Was it rainbow cupcakes? Quiche? Unicorn frappucinos? In his new book, “What is Queer Food?: How We Served a Revolution” Birdsall examines the complex story of how, through times of fear and persecution, queer people used food to express joy and build community. Guests: John Birdsall, au...

Ostensibly to quell anti-ICE protests, President Trump this week mobilized 700 Marines and another 2,000 National Guard troops to Los Angeles. That’s on top of the 2,000 troops he sent over the weekend. The Atlantic’s David Graham calls the deployment a “gesture of authoritarianism.” We’ll talk to Graham and former Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary Juliette Kayyem about Trump’s i...

In the days since President Trump sent the National Guard and Marines to quell protests in Los Angeles, demonstrations against ICE raids have been held across the Bay Area and nationwide. This weekend’s “No Kings” protests, timed to the day of President Trump’s military parade, are expected to draw large crowds across the country. We take this moment to look back at times when protests have been s...

The federal “Take It Down Act,” signed into law last month, has been hailed as a major step in protecting victims of revenge porn and deepfakes. It passed both chambers of Congress nearly unanimously, but First Amendment watchers have concerns. We take a closer look at the new statute, along with new California laws that also criminalize sexually explicit deepfakes. And we’ll hear how you can prot...

The San Francisco Parks Alliance has shut down after revelations that it misspent at least $3.8 million. The organization raised money for the city’s parks and open spaces as well as serving as an umbrella organization for about 80 community groups that managed public parks and projects. Now the Parks Alliance has gone broke and many of those organizations are left stranded with their cash reserve...

Old jeans. Worn shirts. Scraps from flour sacks and homemade dresses. Nothing is too humble for a quilt. In BAMPFA’s new exhibit “Routed West: Twentieth-Century African American Quilts in California,” quilts tell the story of resilience, family, and cultural continuity. The exhibit highlights the quiltmaking skills that many migrants brought with them in the Second Great Migration from 1940-1970—a...

The South Bay in San Diego County is the site of one of the nation’s worst environmental disasters. Fifty million gallons of untreated sewage and industrial chemicals flow daily into the Tijuana River and out of Imperial Beach. New research connects the waste to worsening air quality, which has been linked with headaches, skin infections and gastrointestinal problems in the local population. We’ll...

National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles on Sunday as part of the Trump administration’s response to clashes between federal immigration officials and protesters following ICE raids of local businesses. Governor Gavin Newsom opposed the deployment, posting on social media Sunday that “Trump is trying to manufacture a crisis in LA County — deploying troops not for order, but to create chaos.” W...

California has been a leader in rooftop solar adoption for years thanks to incentives and compensation programs. But  policies from utilities and state lawmakers are removing incentives and making it more expensive for residents to have  solar on their homes. Supporters of the changes say the new policies will reduce everyone’s electric bills, but solar advocates say cutting back on rooftop solar...

The prevailing narrative about Apple in China over the last two decades is that the Cupertino company took advantage of low wages and weak labor laws to ship out close to half a billion devices per year. Journalist Patrick McGee says that narrative isn’t wrong, but it misses “the biggest piece of the puzzle: that Beijing allowed Apple’s activities so that China could exploit Apple and become a tec...

Oakland based art-pop band Tune-Yards is widely loved for their complex and funky rhythms, layers of sound, thrillingly dynamic vocals, and thought provoking lyrics. The duo, Merrill Garbus and Nate Brenner, have just released a new album, “Better Dreaming,” praised by critics as highly danceable and jubilant while, as always, grappling with the state of the world. Merrill Garbus joins us in the s...

NPR’s Rhaina Cohen has taken a close look at friend-powered parenting, joining shared households to see how neighbor-and-friend alliances can break the isolation of modern parenthood. We’ll talk about the challenges of communal living and what parents gain—emotionally, practically, even financially—when they raise their kids with their friends. Cohen’s recent piece for the Atlantic is “A Grand Exp...

When the first AIDS LifeCycle ride rolled down the California coastline in 1994, AIDS was the leading cause of death for people aged 25 to 44. Today, HIV is no longer a death sentence and can be treated, though not cured. This weekend, the ride, which has raised $300 million for research, crosses the finish line for the last time. We take this moment to look back on the strides made in AIDS/HIV re...

“We’re in a protein craze, and it’s hard to ignore,” writes New York Times health reporter Alice Callahan. Social media feeds are inundated with claims about protein – encouraging protein-maxxing diets that contain many times the federal recommendations, and pushing supplements, artificial protein sources and lots of red meat. We’ll talk with Callahan and nutritionists about how to evaluate your o...

Celebrated nature writer Robert Macfarlane has written about mountains, trails, and the old ways of humans on Earth. His new book lays out its premise in the title: “Is a River Alive?” He seeks answers to the question in a cloud forest in Ecuador, a dying ecosystem in Chennai, and a powerful river in Canada. We talk to Macfarlane about what rights nature should have and we hear from you. Do you fe...

For decades, multi-level marketing (or MLM) companies like Amway and Mary Kay have made the promise that people could become their own bosses, earn extra income and work flexible hours under the umbrella of a globally recognized brand. But in reality, the success rates for people working in multi-level marketing “are closer to those of gamblers in a casino.” That’s according to Bridget Read, autho...

When new apartment and office buildings are built, Bay Area cities often require developers to include retail space on the ground floor. The goal s to create vibrant neighborhoods by encouraging foot traffic and what urban planners call street “activation.” And yet, many of these spaces are vacant all over the region from downtown San Francisco to Concord. We’ll talk about the challenges of fillin...

Journalists Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s new book, “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again” has generated massive coverage – and pushback – since its release in May. Some Democrats say it’s not time to focus on the past, amid the turmoil of the current administration. But Tapper and Thompson say that, “journalism about Biden does not excuse...

President Trump’s  budget bill rolls back clean energy initiatives, reduces Medicaid benefits, alters student loan rules, and extends tax cuts to the wealthiest, among other initiatives. It passed in the House by a bare margin, but Republican senator Ron Johnson has called the bill “divorced from reality,” indicating that it may face headwinds in the Senate. We talk with reporters about what’s in...

We remember George Floyd, five years after his murder by a Minneapolis police officer. In the days and months after Floyd’s death, millions of Americans took to the streets to protest racism and police violence, ushering in a new era of racial reckoning. Robert Samuels, co-author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography “His Name is George Floyd,” wonders however if “the backlash feels more endurin...

New York has the pizza slice, Philly has its cheesesteak, and Chicago its hot dog. In the Bay Area, our iconic and passionately argued-over staple has long been the Mission-style burrito. Its origins are obscure, but one thing agreed on is that those enormous, foil-wrapped burritos are a culinary anchor that were perfected in San Francisco decades ago. But, just because it’s a classic doesn’t mean...