What Next | Daily News and Analysis - The Award for Messiest Oscar Contender Goes To…

As Donald Trump’s campaign of trans panic and anti-Latin American sentiment buoyed him back to the White House, Emilia Pérez looked like a film to meet the moment. Then audiences started actually seeing it and...yikes.


Guest: Michael Schulman, staff writer at The New Yorker and author of Oscar Wars: A History of Hollywood in Gold, Sweat, and Tears.


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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme and Rob Gunther.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - Trump’s South Africa Fixation

Among his recent executive orders, Donald Trump moved to halt aid to South Africa over a land law and extended political asylum to South Africa’s white Afrikaner population.


Where does Trump’s seemingly spotty understanding of South Africa come from? How could having close advisors who grew up in apartheid-era South Africa, like Elon Musk, influence him?


Guest: Chris McGreal, writer for The Guardian US who reported from South Africa during the end of apartheid.


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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Rob Gunther, and Ethan Oberman.

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Slate Books - Death, Sex & Money | After Sobriety, Chasing Goosebumps Instead of Highs

When the poet and writer Kaveh Akbar likes something, he really likes it. As a high school student, he got hooked on poetry. In college, it was alcohol. This week, Kaveh talks to Anna Sale about the factors that led to his sobriety, and he explains exactly how he manages a life that’s full of healthy, wonderful obsessions as well as problematic ones.  

Kaveh’s critically acclaimed novel Martyr! is now available in paperback. You can read about his temporary fixation on collecting basketball cards in GQ. 

Podcast production by Cameron Drews.

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And if you’re new to the show, welcome. We’re so glad you’re here. Find us and follow us on Instagram and you can find Anna’s newsletter at annasale.substack.com. Our new email address, where you can reach us with voice memos, pep talks, questions, critiques, is deathsexmoney@slate.com.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - The GOP Can’t Quit “Stop the Steal”

As Donald Trump has demonstrated, losing an election is no reason to admit you lost an election. In fact, in North Carolina, the Republican challenger, who lost a race for the state’s Supreme Court, is testing a bold new strategy of disqualifying ballots until he gets the result he wants. And if he succeeds, it could start a trend.


Guest: Mark Joseph Stern, Slate senior writer covering courts and the law. 



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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, Ethan Oberman, and Rob Gunther.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - Lessons From Hungary

Donald Trump has a lot of similarities—and something of a bromance—with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. And those who wish to resist Trump’s Orbán-like, right-wing strongman tendencies could learn something from the resistance in Hungary. 


Guest: Gábor Scheiring, former member of the Hungarian parliament and assistant professor of comparative politics at Georgetown University Qatar.


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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme and Rob Gunther.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - TBD | Why Trump’s Data Purge is a Digital Book Burning

Using Github, you can watch as government websites are brought into compliance with Donald Trump’s executive orders. Out goes the word “equity;” in comes “fair.” And health and science data, once publicly available, disappears.


Guest: Jason Koebler, cofounder of 404 Media.


Jeremy Prokop, data science advisor in the Midwest


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Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick | Law, justice, and the courts - Trying To Undo A Coup, In The Courts

DOGE is running wild in the District of Columbia. Chaos reigns supreme. Trump 2.0 has been frightening and it’s all been happening so fast. But there are lots of people fighting back, as they try to slow the damage. And the courts are exactly where the pushback has been most fierce. One of the teams of people leading the charge includes former Judge Nancy Gertner, one of the many legal professionals suing the Trump administration. Judge Gertner's case is about the list of rank and file FBI agents threatened with retribution and the public disclosure of their names, because they did their jobs and prosecuted January 6th cases. Gertner is involved with a slew of cases from the State Democracy Defenders Fund. She talks with host Dahlia Lithwick about the many wins against the administration in court this past week, and whether they matter. Next, Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern joins Dahlia to update us on the DOGE litigation and the Birthright Citizenship cases.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - TBD Bonus: The Discourse | Why is Elon Musk Cheating at Video Games?

Elon Musk is supposed to be running several companies and a new government department—so why is he also spending money to pretend to be good at video games?


Guest: Drew Harwell, tech reporter for the Washington Post.


This episode is member-exclusive. Listen to it now by subscribing to Slate Plus. By joining, not only will you unlock exclusive episodes of What Next TBD—you’ll also access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the What Next show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - TBD | Is Elon Musk Unstoppable?

You can’t doubt the enthusiasm of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. You can question the legality of some of their early moves. 


Guest: Makena Kelly, senior writer at WIRED


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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Patrick Fort, and Cheyna Roth.

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What Next | Daily News and Analysis - Guantanamo Bay’s Comeback Is a Warning

Last week, Donald Trump announced that Guantanamo Bay would be used to house the “worst criminal illegal aliens” and claimed that it would be drastically scaled up to hold as many as 30,000 people. In addition to its infamous role in the War on Terror, it’s the latest use of Gitmo as an immigration deterrent—and legal grey zone.


Guest: Andrea Pitzer, author of One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps



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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme and Rob Gunther.

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