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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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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Why did the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which gives money to humanitarian causes around the world and accounts for roughly half of one percent of the federal budget, end up in DOGE’s crosshairs? And is its abrupt closure legal?  

Guests: Franco Ordoñez, White House Correspondent for NPR. Fred Kaplan, Slate’s war stories correspondent.

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

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America hadn’t had a major commercial airline crash since 2009 until the mid-air collision over the Potomac. Is this a sign of a larger problem that will require government intervention—and will Congress prioritize safety over convenience for their constituents and themselves?  

You can read Dan’s 2023 article, “Everyone Seems to Agree a Major Plane Crash is Coming. Why?” on Slate.

Guest: Dan Kois, writer at Slate and author of five books.

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

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Trump and his allies in the House’s flurry of anti-trans legislation and executive orders will soon run into both the law and the reality that our institutions like the military really rely on trans people.

Guests:

Major Alivia Stehlik, Director of Holistic Health and Fitness for the 101st Airborne Division.

Kate Sosin, LGBTQ+ reporter at The 19th.

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

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The artificial intelligence industry was thrown for a loop when the Chinese start-up DeepSeek rolled out a product that was more energy efficient, cheaper to produce, and open source. Where did DeepSeek come from, and are Silicon Valley and Washington right to be panicking? 

Guest: Zeyi Yang, senior writer at WIRED.

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

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Did the Chinese artificial intelligence start-up Deepseek just blow up the A.I. world as we know it? Or is it just a cheap knock-off?

Guest: Lizzie O’Leary, host of the Slate podcast What Next TBD.

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—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.

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

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Tapped by Trump for the role of health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. presents himself as someone willing to say what other politicians won’t. But during his Senate confirmation hearings, both Democrats and Republicans questioned his previous statements about vaccines—and questioned whether he even knows what the job he’s trying to get entails. But his nomination signals that maybe it isn’t about vaccines - it’s about wanting to blow up the whole healthcare establishment. 

Guest: Dan Diamond, White House correspondent for The Washington Post

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

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Tulsi Gabbard’s political career is truly singular: once a young progressive Democrat on the rise, then a gadfly taking surprise meetings with Bashar al-Assad, now she’s Donald Trump’s nominee to head up National Intelligence. Along the way, Gabbard has given almost everyone a reason not to vote for her.

Guest: Elaine Godfrey, staff writer covering national politics for The Atlantic.

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

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Trump’s Office of Management and Budget sent a memo directing federal agencies to “temporarily pause all activities related to … disbursement of all Federal financial assistance,” which threw everything from Meals on Wheels to the rebuilding of a Rhode Island bridge into a state of confusion. 

What seems clear is that Congress has already stipulated how this money should be spent—and the president doesn’t have the power to change that.

For more on the legal mess that’ll follow this news, head over to the Amicus feed. Dahlia Lithwick just dropped an emergency episode.

Guest: Karen Tumulty, political columnist for The Washington Post.

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

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