The Daily

Like a lot of people who get into professional wrestling, Donovan Danhausen had a vision of a different version of himself. Ten years ago, at age 21, he was living in Detroit, working as a nursing assistant at a hospital, watching a lot of “Adult Swim” and accumulating a collection of horror- and comedy-themed tattoos. At the suggestion of a friend, he took a 12-week training course at the House o...

A few days ago, the Biden administration released a report warning that a warming planet posed severe economic challenges for the United States, which would require the federal government to reassess its spending priorities and how it influenced behavior. White House reporter Jim Tankersley explains why getting the government to encourage the right decisions will be so difficult. Guest: Jim Tanker...

A.O. Scott started as a film critic at The New York Times in January of 2000. Next month he will move to the Book Review as a critic at large. After 23 years as a film critic, Mr. Scott discusses why he is done with the movies, and what his decision reveals about the new realities of American cinema. Guest: A.O. Scott , a longtime film critic for The New York Times. Background reading:  A.O. Scott...

Barney Frank was one of the people most responsible for overhauling financial regulation after the 2008 economic crisis. After retiring from Congress, he supported a change to his own law that would benefit midsize banks, and joined the board of such a bank.  Last week, that bank failed. David Enrich called Mr. Frank and asked him to explain. Guest: David Enrich , the business investigations edito...

As Xi Jinping, China’s leader, meets with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Moscow this week, Chinese officials have been presenting his trip as a mission of peace. But American and European officials are watching for something else altogether — whether Mr. Xi will add fuel to the full-scale war that Mr. Putin began more than a year ago. Edward Wong explains what Mr. Xi is really up to, and...

TikTok, the app known for short videos of lip syncing, dancing and bread baking, is one of the most popular platforms in the country, used by one out of every three Americans. In recent weeks, the Biden administration has threatened to ban it over concerns that it poses a threat to national security. Guest: Sapna Maheshwari , a business reporter for The New York Times. Background reading:  TikTok’...

As an American, Sam Anderson knows what it feels like to arrive at a theme park. “The totalizing consumerist embrace,” he writes. “The blunt-force, world-warping, escapist delight.” He has known theme parks with entrances like “international borders” and ticket prices like “mortgage payments.” Mr. Anderson has been to Disney World, which he describes as “an alternate reality that basically occupie...

In the past week, as spooked customers frantically withdrew $42 billion from Silicon Valley Bank, the U.S. government stepped in to craft a rescue operation for the failed lender. But efforts to contain the crisis have met resistance, and the fallout of the collapse has already spread to other regional banks, whose stocks have plummeted. Guest: Emily Flitter , a finance correspondent for The New Y...

This episode contains strong language Millions of people have taken to the streets in France to protest a government effort to raise the retirement age to 64, from 62, bringing the country more in line with its European neighbors. Today, as Parliament holds a key vote on the proposal, we look into why the issue has hit such a nerve in French society. Guest: Roger Cohen , the Paris bureau chief for...

Three years after the start of Covid, the central mystery of the pandemic — how exactly it began — remains unsolved. But recently, the debate about the source of the coronavirus has re-emerged, this time in Congress. The Energy Department has concluded, with “low confidence,” that an accidental laboratory leak in China was most likely the origin, but politics are making it harder to find definitiv...

With federal regulators planning to take over the collapsed Silicon Valley Bank, a 40-year-old institution based in California, nearly $175 billion in customer deposits will be placed under the authorities’ control. The lender’s demise is the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history and the largest since the financial crisis in 2008. The debacle raised concerns that other banks could face probl...

The principle behind E.S.G. is that investors should look beyond just whether a company can make a profit and take into account other factors, such as its environmental impact and action on social issues. But critics of that investment strategy, mostly Republicans, say that Wall Street has taken a sharp left turn, attacking what they term “woke capitalism.” Guest: David Gelles , a climate correspo...

After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February last year, Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany told Parliament that the attack was a Zeitenwende — a historic “turning point” for Europe and Germany. The risk of a large land war in Europe had previously been considered far-fetched, but recent years of Russian aggression have inspired fear in Germany and a 100-billion-euro fund to bolster its...

Almost immediately after taking power in December, Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition in Isreal proposed a highly contentious overhaul of the Supreme Court. The court has long been seen as a crucial check and lone backstop on the government, and the plan has divided Israeli society, kindling fears of political violence and even civil war. Guest: Patrick Kingsley , the Jerusalem bureau chief...

Slaughterhouses, construction sites, factories. A Times investigation has found that migrant children have been thrust into jobs in some of the most demanding workplaces in the United States. How did this crisis in child labor develop? And now that it has been exposed, what is being done to tackle the problem? Guest: Hannah Dreier , an investigative reporter for The New York Times. Background read...

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...