Radio Atlantic
The Atlantic has long been known as an ideas-driven magazine. Now we’re bringing that same ethos to audio. Like the magazine, the show will “road test” the big ideas that both drive the news and shape our culture. Through conversations—and sometimes sharp debates—with the most insightful thinkers and writers on topics of the day, Radio Atlantic will complicate overly simplistic views. It will cut through the noise with clarifying, personal narratives. It will, hopefully, help listeners make up their own mind about certain ideas. The national conversation right now can be chaotic, reckless, and stuck. Radio Atlantic aims to bring some order to our thinking—and encourage listeners to be purposeful about how they unstick their mind.
Episodes
December 18, 2025 • 28 mins
More than a decade after its peak, the Islamic State has changed, but it isn’t defeated. This past weekend, the jihadist group reemerged in connection with two disparate acts of violence thousands of miles apart.
Two U.S. soldiers and a civilian interpreter were killed in Syria by a man the Pentagon says is affiliated with ISIS. A day later, at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, two men opened fire at a Hanukkah celebration, killi...
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December 11, 2025 • 39 mins
A young Chicago couple—one is an undocumented immigrant from Poland, and the other is a U.S. citizen—face a choice: stay in the place they’ve called home—or give up on the place that doesn’t seem to want them anymore.
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December 4, 2025 • 30 mins
Australia is about to become the first country in the world to ban kids under 16 from having social-media accounts. Other countries have attempted partial restrictions, but Australia’s Online Safety Amendment is the first real ban, and it comes with heavy fines for social-media companies that fail to comply. In this episode, we hear from the woman in charge of enforcing the policy, the teens who will be affected by it starting next...
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November 27, 2025 • 33 mins
In Alison Roman’s newest cookbook, “Something From Nothing,” her pantry is her primary inspiration. In this live conversation, we talk with Roman about her family Thanksgiving, why she makes her own baby food, and why simple really is better. We also discuss food trends, and what life is like for her as a solo creator. Then, we put the cookbook’s philosophy of simplicity to the test with an onstage game in which Alison must choose ...
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November 20, 2025 • 40 mins
When the Trump administration promised a mass deportation campaign they initially relied on Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Disappointed with ICE’s pace and tactics, the White House turned to the Border Patrol for more sweeping, military-style enforcement. Commander-at-large Gregory Bovino has brought his green-uniformed agents (and his film crew) to Los Angeles, Chicago, now North Carolina, and perhaps soon New York City.
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November 13, 2025 • 27 mins
The money keeps coming. Global spending on artificial intelligence is projected to hit $375 billion this year. In 2026, the figure is supposed to approach half a trillion dollars.
The sums invested already are so staggering that the United States is beginning to look like an “Nvidia-state,” where the tech boom is fueling a great majority of economic growth. But lately, tech watchers have started to ask the obvious question: Is thi...
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November 6, 2025 • 27 mins
Go ahead, Democrats. Enjoy your victory parties. But after that, brace yourselves, because Republicans may not be playing by the same rules a year from now. Since President Donald Trump took office for his second term—indeed, since his loss in 2020—he has shown his willingness to subvert the rules of free and fair elections. In various ways, he’s used his power to intimidate potential opponents, Democratic donors, and even voters w...
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October 30, 2025 • 24 mins
So far, the U.S. has blown up 14 boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific, killing at least 57 people. In the two months since the strikes began, the administration has consistently offered the same explanation: The U.S. has a fentanyl overdose problem, and these boats are a source of that drug. The federal government has stuck to that line despite the Drug Enforcement Administration and Department of Homeland Security saying most of...
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October 23, 2025 • 34 mins
In Kathryn Bigelow’s new movie, A House of Dynamite, the clock is ticking. The film’s fictional president of the United States has less than 20 minutes and very little information to decide whether or not to retaliate against a nuclear missile, launched at the United States, from an unknown source. As with Bigelow’s other war movies, the story is disturbingly plausible. During the Cold War, the likely scenario was a war with the So...
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October 16, 2025 • 35 mins
This week, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments about the last remaining section of the Voting Rights Act, a civil rights law designed to ensure that states could not get in the way of nonwhite citizens voting.
We talk to Stacey Abrams, voting rights activist and former candidate for Georgia governor, and Atlantic staff writer Vann Newkirk about the case and a world without the Voting Rights Act.
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October 9, 2025 • 28 mins
The Riyadh Comedy Festival in Saudi Arabia concludes this week, but the outrage (from comedians who didn’t go) and self-justification (from comedians who did) continues. The festival is one small piece of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s grand vision to remake the kingdom for the 21st century and simultaneously draw global attention away from human-rights violations like the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
In this epi...
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October 2, 2025 • 40 mins
President Donald Trump is using the Department of Justice to try to punish his political enemies. How much can the president bend the DOJ, an institution built on norms and ethics, to his will before it breaks? In this episode, we talk to the Atlantic staff writer Quinta Jurecic, who covers legal issues, and Benjamin Wittes, editor in chief of Lawfare, about who the Trump administration might target next, what legal strategies migh...
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September 25, 2025 • 41 mins
Hanna Rosin sits down with Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters to ask him about a purity test for teachers and a nearly scandalous incident that happened days before the interview. And two Oklahoma high-school teachers take very different paths.
This is the second episode of a two-part series from Radio Atlantic. (This episode has been updated from a previously published version to include additional news.)
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September 21, 2025 • 41 mins
A live conversation about authoritarian forces in America with Anne Applebaum, an Atlantic staff writer, and Garry Kasparov, the former world chess champion and a lifelong democracy activist.
Speaking about the upcoming midterms, Kasparov says: “If Democrats do not retake the House, 2028 will be a formality.”
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September 18, 2025 • 21 mins
Yesterday, Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show was suspended indefinitely. It’s a shocking moment for free speech, given the order in which events unfolded. Earlier that day, FCC Chair Brendan Carr had suggested on a conservative podcast that ABC and its affiliates consider taking steps against Kimmel, saying, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
As it so happened, the late-night legend David Letterman was scheduled to speak ...
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September 18, 2025 • 44 mins
American public education is changing. And, in many ways, Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters is at the center of it, trying to push for Bibles in schools, new curriculum standards that include dozens of references to Christianity, and an ideology test for teachers coming from “places like California and New York.”
One Oklahoma teacher finds herself at direct odds with Walters and the Department of Education. And a pair of ...
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September 11, 2025 • 32 mins
He was, after all, the eldest boy. The family drama that inspired HBO’s Succession ended this week with a settlement that ensures Rupert Murdoch’s conservative media conglomerate will pass to his oldest and most conservative son, Lachlan.
The Atlantic staff writer McKay Coppins wrote about the Murdoch succession saga for The Atlantic’s April cover story, “Growing Up Murdoch.” He joins Radio Atlantic to share insights from his mont...
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September 4, 2025 • 29 mins
As Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. works to dismantle the national vaccine infrastructure, states have started going their own way. Governors in California, Washington State, and Oregon said they intend to coordinate on vaccine policies. Florida’s surgeon general went in the opposite direction, announcing a plan to end all state vaccine mandates, which he compared to “slavery.” We talk to the Atlantic scie...
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August 28, 2025 • 35 mins
President Donald Trump recently deployed the National Guard to Washington, D.C., and has talked about federalizing the Guard in other cities across the country. In this episode of Radio Atlantic we talk to Atlantic staff writers Quinta Jurecic and Nick Miroff about which legal barriers might hinder Trump from using the military this way, how he might try to push past the courts, and what role immigration enforcement is playing in t...
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August 21, 2025 • 33 mins
There was so much symbolism in President Donald Trump’s two most recent international summits—in Alaska last week with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and then at the White House this week with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. In this episode, we talk with Anne Applebaum, who has been studying Ukraine and Russia for decades and understands their leaders’ underlying motivations. And we speak with politics and national-secur...
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