8.21.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the reading of The New York Times for Thursday,
August twenty first, twenty twenty five. As a reminder, Radio
I is a reading service intended for people who are
blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult to
read printed material. Your reader for today is Scott Johnson.

(00:20):
We'll begin today's reading with the Merriam Webster Word of
the day, and today's word is validate. Validate. To validate
something is to show that it is real or correct.
Validate can also mean to state or show that something
is legal or official, to put a mark on something,

(00:41):
to show that it has been checked and is official
or accepted, and to show that someone's feelings, opinions, et
cetera are fair and reasonable, as in the company's claims
about its latest product, are yet to be validated. You
can get discounted parts by having your parking garage ticket

(01:02):
validated at the museum's ticket desk, or the decline in
sales only validated our concerns about the menu changes. Today's
front page headlines from the national print edition of The
New York Times moves by Israel risk imperiling hope for peace,
Hardliner influence settlement approved for West Bank as assault on

(01:26):
Gaza looms, Democrats see profound loss in registration, bleeding voters
across red and blue states. Lining up to be a
one stop shop for streaming forty percent jump in viewers
who get services via solo provider. Trump shrinks student access

(01:47):
from overseas. Ireland's last leprechaun whisperer hunts his own pot
of gold and after battle to get to the top,
why did she paramount? We'll begin with a story headlined
with moves on West Bank and Gaza City, Israel defies

(02:09):
global outcry. It's by Laura Jakes, who frequently writes about
the war in Gaza. Israel on Wednesday approved new settlements
in the West Bank, had announced that it was moving
ahead with plans to take over Gaza City, bucking international
criticism and defying growing support for the creation of an

(02:30):
independent Palestinian state. The moves raised questions about whether a
new ceasefire proposal, which officials have said is similar to
terms that Israel previously endorsed, could move forward. Experts said
the two moves suggested Prime Minister Benjamin Yahoo was bending
to the ideologies of extremists in his coalition in order

(02:53):
to remain in power, even at the cost of isolating
Israel internationally. Idea of a Palestinian state is being erased
from the table. Bazalosmotrich, a hard line finance minister, declared
after the government approved a settlement project of three thousand,
four hundred housing units in the heart of the occupied

(03:16):
West Bank. Every town, every neighborhood, every housing unit is
another nail in the coffin of this dangerous idea, mister
Smotridge said on Wednesday. At the same time, the Israeli
military said it was advancing plans to take over Gaza City,
with troops already on the city's outskirts and tents being

(03:37):
moved into southern Gaza for displaced people. An additional sixty
thousand reservists would be told to report for duty in September.
While troops have already obtained operational control over seventy five
percent of the Gaza Strip, the military said in statements,
the United Nations has put that number closer to ninety percent.

(04:00):
The military has begun the next phase of the war,
said Brigadier General Fi Defrin, the Israeli military's chief spokesman.
The looming assault aims to prevent Hamas, which led the
deadly October seventh, twenty twenty three onslaught on southern Israel
that started the war, from regrouping and planning future attacks.

(04:22):
An Israeli military official who requested anonymity in line with
military protocol, told journalists at a briefing on Wednesday about
twelve hundred people were killed and around two hundred fifty
others kidnapped during the twenty twenty three assault. After nearly
two years of Israel's retaliatory war against Hamas, the Gaza

(04:43):
Strip has been largely leveled and parts of it have
been brought to the brink of famine. More than sixty
thousand Palestinians have been killed, according to the Gazen Health Ministry,
which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians. For mister
nett Yahoo, it doesn't matter if these steps, the war
in Gaza and the quasi annexation in the West Bank,

(05:06):
would damage Israel's relations with the Arab world, said Michael Milstein,
an Israeli analyst and former military intelligence officer. He said
both developments also showed that mister Netanyahu believes he can
continue to depend on American support even as Arab and
European nations sharply condemn Israel's actions. World leaders quickly condemned

(05:30):
the announcements on Gaza City. The military offensive in Gaza
that Israel is preparing can only lead to disaster for
both peoples and risks, plunging the entire region into a
cycle of permanent war. President Emmanuel Macron of France said
on social media. France is among a growing number of

(05:51):
countries that, frustrated with Israel's war in Gaza, have declared
in recent months that they will recognize a Palestinian state
at the Annual You and General Assembly in September. While
the United States has for years endorsed a so called
two state solution, it has blocked recent efforts to recognize
full Palestinian statehood under current conditions. Prospects for a functional

(06:17):
Palestinian state have been dim for years, and its boundaries
have never been clear. Mister net Yahoo has not publicly
shared his position on the new ceasefire proposal, which Hamas
has accepted and was announced this week by Katari and
Egyptian mediators, but a statement that his office released on
Wednesday night seemed to signal that the military operation was

(06:40):
soon to begin mister Smotrich has led a pressure campaign
by hardliners who have threatened to quit mister Nettyaho's coalition
and potentially bring down his government if the proposed cease
fire deal was pursued or it struck. A minister in
mister Netyahu's government and a member of the far right
Religious Zionism party, warned the Prime Minister in a radio

(07:05):
interview about accepting a deal that did not defeat Hamas
and put in his words or her words rather the
value of returning the hostages above the national interest. This
will push the country into a horrible abyss, Miss Strock
told Army Radio. So it is very possible that we

(07:25):
will say we will not be prepared to lend our
hand to the government. The new proposal has been described
as a partial deal that would not immediately release all
hostages and would postpone discussions about ending the war, including
the issue of disarming Hamas. As many as twenty hostages
are still believed to be alive, according to the Israeli authorities.

(07:49):
The bodies of thirty others, they say, are also being
held in Gaza. Many Israelis fear that Hamas will kill
the remaining hostages if the military operation goes forward. The
Israeli official who briefed journalists on Wednesday described the military
operation as gradual, precise, and targeted, saying it would extend

(08:10):
into areas of Gaza City where Israeli soldiers had not
previously been during the war. The city and its surrounding
neighbourhoods remain a stronghold for Hamas fighters and the militant's government,
the official said. Two other Israeli officials said the operation
would unfold in parts. First, troops would encircle Gaza City

(08:33):
while allowing the population to move south, passing through checkpoints
to prevent Palestinian militants from escaping. Then the troops would
move in with force. The officials spoke on condition of
anonymity to discuss operational details. Ahmed Salek, forty five, said
Israeli troops were sending remote controlled vehicles packed with explosives

(08:56):
to blow up buildings blocked by block in the Zeitoun
neighborhood near where he lives in Gaza City. I hear
the big explosions all the time. They're getting close, said
mister Salek, adding that he would try to stay in
his home for as long as possible. If he is
forced to leave, mister Salek said he would head west

(09:16):
to a beachfront where he previously lived in a tent
while waiting for the violence to ebb Although worried that
Israeli forces will close escape routes to the west, mister
Salek said he will not move to southern Gaza as
Israel is demanding of displaced residents. There are no services
there at all, but most importantly, there is no room

(09:38):
left for newcomers in the south. He said, I know
no one there and have no more money to pay
for that trip. As the international community has focused on
the devastating war in Gaza, the Israeli government has barreled
ahead with settlement construction in the West Bank. The project
that was given a final approval on Wednesday, known as

(10:01):
East One or E one, was delayed for more than
two decades. While the United States had pressured Israel to
reject settlement expansion, the Trump administration has been far less
critical of settlements than most of the international community, which
generally considers them to be illegal and obstacles to Israeli

(10:22):
Palestinian peace. About five hundred thousand Israeli settlers and about
three million Palestinians live in the West Bank. The Israeli
authorities have advanced plans for more than twenty thousand housing
units as of late July, already the highest tally in years,
according to Peace Now and Israeli Settlement watchdog. That has

(10:44):
been accomplished by a campaign of brazen attacks by Jewish
streamists on Palestinian communities. On Wednesday, Jordan's Foreign Minister Aman
Safadi cited a completely inhumane reality that the Israeli aggression
has created in Gaza. His words, he also accused Israel
of taking quote illegal measures that continue to undermine the

(11:09):
two state solution and kill all prospects for peace in
the region quote. The Israeli military officials said the new
operation will also expand humanitarian aid in southern Gaza, where
displaced people are being told to move. That will include
opening new aid distribution sites, ensuring there is no fighting

(11:30):
near them, and opening new routes for trucks to safely
bring in more supplies. We'll move now to a story
headlined Trump's tactics mean many international students won't make it
to campus. It's by Anamara horticulists. Many Iranians are not

(11:51):
going to American universities this fall. Students from Afghanistan are
having trouble getting to campus. Even students from China and
in India, the top two centers of international students to
the United States, have been flumixed by a maze of
new obstacles the Trump administration has set up to slow
or deter people entering the country from abroad. Between the

(12:15):
federal government's heightened vetting of student visas and President Trump's
travel band, the number of international students newly enrolled in
American universities seems certain to drop by a lot. There
were about a million international students studying in the United
States a year ago, according to figures published by the

(12:35):
State Department. Data on international student enrollment is not expected
to be released until the fall, but higher education is
already feeling the pain and deeply worried about the fallout.
Many schools have seen the number of international students grow
in recent years, but a survey of over five hundred

(12:57):
colleges and universities by the International The Institute of International Education,
a nonprofit which works with governments and others to promote
international education, found that thirty five percent of the schools
experienced a dip in applications from abroad last spring, the
most since the pandemic in China and India. There have

(13:20):
been few visa appointments available for students in recent months,
and sometimes none at all. According to the Association of
International Educators also known as NAFSA, a professional professional organization,
if visa problems persist, new international student enrollment in American
colleges could drop by thirty to forty percent overall this fall,

(13:45):
a loss of one hundred fifty thousand students, according to
the group's analysis. Some students have given up on enrolling
in US schools entirely out of anxiety over the political
environment in the United States. Others are staying away because
they worry that even if they were able to gain entry,

(14:05):
they would effectively be trapped, unable to do things that
other students can, like apply for internships or travel home
over the holidays to see their families. International students make
up a significant portion of enrollment at elite universities like Columbia,
but also at public institutions like Purdue. At Arizona State University,

(14:28):
one of the ten universities that enroll the most international students,
the number beginning their studies. This fall, fourteen thousand, six
hundred in AWE is down by about five hundred from
last fall, a spokesman said, mostly because of visa delays.
Many international students pay full tuition and are a revenue

(14:48):
source that schools have come to rely on, including to
help underwrite financial aid for other students. It's part of
the business model. Wendy Wolford, vice provost for internationals Affairs
at Cornell University, said the biggest loss from the drop
in international enrollment is talent. They're literally some of the

(15:08):
best in the world, she said. Doctor Wolford said she
was also worried about the lost opportunity for domestic students
to be exposed to students from different cultures and for
international students to spread goodwill toward the United States when
they return home. The Trump administration began focusing on international

(15:29):
students last spring, taking a number of steps to target
students who were already in the country and to increase
vetting of those who wanted to enroll. While President Trump
said that he welcomed international students, he argued that some
of them posed security risks and may be involved in
academic espionage. He also said foreign students were taking up

(15:54):
coveted slots at universities that could instead go to American citizens.
We have people who want to go to Harvard and
other schools, they can't get in because we have foreign
students there, mister Trump said. But I want to make
sure that the foreign students are people that can love
our country. In one of his first moves, one of

(16:16):
its first moves, rather, the Trump administration threatened to deport
more than one thousand, eight hundred international students studying in
the United States. In many cases, the reasons were opaque.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that international students
who were a part of campus protests over the war

(16:37):
in Gaza in particular, were not welcome. We gave you
a visa to come and study and get a degree,
he said last spring, not to become a social activist
that tears up our university campuses. Several groups have gone
to court to challenge what they call an ideological deportation policy.

(16:58):
Vina Dubal, General Oral Council for the American Universe Association
of University Professors, says the administration is violating the constitutional
rights of non citizens and citizens alike in choosing to
deport people based on views that are protected by the
First Amendment. Jamil Jaffer, executive director of the Night First

(17:21):
Amendment Institute at Columbia University, has argued that the crackdown
is undemocratic. This practice is one that we'd ordinarily associate
with the most repressive political regimes, he has said. After
an outcry, many of the students targeted for deportation were reinstated,

(17:41):
but overall this year, State Department officials said they had
revoked more than six thousand student visas on grounds of
supporting terrorism, overstaying visas, and breaking the law, a number
first reported by Fox News, and the State Department suspended
new student visa appointments between May twenty seventh and June eighteenth,

(18:03):
a time of year that is ordinarily the peak season.
When the government began issuing student visas again in late June,
it was with a proviso that consulates would scrutinize applicants
social media more rigorously. That has made the process much slower,
and students who have yet to clear the interview process

(18:24):
may be in danger of missing the start of fall classes,
or may even have to postpone enrollment by a semester
or more. There does appear to be a heightened review
of student visa applications, said Miss Dubal, adding their social
media are being reviewed for expression of pro Palestinian sentiment
or critiques of Trump's foreign policy positions. Mister Trump signed

(18:48):
a proclamation in late May barring foreign students from entering
the United States to attend Harvard, citing security concerns, but
a judge has blocked the order from taking effect. In June,
mister Trump signed another proclamation fully or partially restricting the
entry of people from nineteen countries, including Afghanistan, Haiti, Iran, Yemen, Cuba, Laos,

(19:13):
and Venezuela, and to increase scrutiny to people from other
countries to make sure that the people quote do not
intend to harm Americans or our national interests unquote. Although
the proclamation did not target students in particular, many students
have been caught up in the travel restrictions. Because of

(19:35):
the travel ban, it's just not possible to get student
visas from certain countries, said Dan Berger, an immigration lawyer
in Northampton, mass A lot of Afghan women have been
offered full scholarships in the US and can't get visas.
Asked about delays, a State Department spokesperson said that the
department had made its vetting of visa applicants more effective

(19:57):
and more efficient, but in every case, we will take
the time necessary to ensure an applicant is eligible for
the visa sought and does not pose a risk to
the safety and security of the United States, the spokesperson said. Nushin,
an Iranian student who was admitted to the University of
South Carolina to study for a doctorate in chemical engineering,

(20:21):
was caught up in the travel band. She had a
visa interview in September twenty twenty four and was to
start her studies in the spring of twenty twenty five,
but she has yet to hear whether her visa will
be approved. She is now helping to organize a lobbying
campaign to end the visa delays, and says that a

(20:41):
chat group on Telegram suggests that there are hundreds of
other Iranian students in similar situations. Nushin, who asked for
her last name not to be disclosed for fear that
it would affect her visa prospects, said she chose the
United States as the place to study because she believed
that it offered the best higher education in the world. Now,

(21:05):
she believes she is being punished because of assumptions about
her political beliefs, though as a scholar, she argues she
is separate from politics. Michael Crowe, the president of Arizona
State University, said he met with an American diplomatic official
in India a few months ago to discuss the visa
problem and was told the state department was doing the

(21:27):
best it could. The uncertainty about getting a US visa
is prompting some students to look elsewhere. Doctor Wolford of
Cornell said universities were already seeing European students diverting to
European universities and Asian students to Asian universities. Our international

(21:48):
students had always been very secure in the knowledge that
they understood the rules of the game, and last year
the rules of the game changed dramatically, she said. Many
American universities now have campuses abroad and have tried to
accommodate international students at those campuses until they can get
US visas. Cornell, for instance, gave students the option to

(22:13):
start the fall twenty twenty five semester at Partner campuses
in Edinburgh, Hong Kong or Seoul. We didn't have many
students take us up, Doctor Wolfrid said. Students were hoping
they would either get their applications through and come to us,
or they decided to go someplace else. Iranian students, including

(22:34):
some admitted to Cornell, have banded together to try to
attract attention to their plight. The group is highly educated,
said Poia, a civil engineering student who asked that his
surname not be used to protect his visa chances. He
was admitted to a doctoral program at the University of
Texas at Austin. He said. His research project, to investigate

(22:56):
how polymeric geocels can be used to reach enforced roadway foundations,
is financed by the Texas Department of Transportation. His request
for a visa has been stuck in administrative processing for
fourteen months, he said. In the meantime, he has been
collaborating with colleagues remotely to keep the project from slowing down.

(23:20):
Students like him, he argued, are not a threat to
US society now. A story headlined what Russia is doing
to grab Ukrainian land while it still can. It's by
Kim Barker. And Michael Schwartz. Kim Barker reported from near Pokrovsk, Ukraine,

(23:41):
Michael Schwartz from New York. On a map, the gains
hardly seem noticeable, measured in hundreds of yards, not hundreds
of miles, But as President Trump presses Ukraine and Russia
to make a deal to end their war, President Vladimir V.
Putin of Russia is pushing to capture as much land
as possible along a front line that stretches about seven

(24:05):
hundred fifty miles, almost the distance from Chicago to New York.
As ever growing swarms of surveillance drones make any movement
on the battlefield dangerous, the Russians are sending in small
groups of soldiers on foot who are harder to detect.
They effectively sneak past the Ukrainian troops, regroup, and then attack,

(24:28):
repeating this cycle as they inch forward. These groups gained
some territory earlier this month, especially in the crucial eastern
Donetsk region near the embattled city of Pokrovsk. Larger formations
of Russian troops also outflanked some Ukrainian defenses with drones
and sheer numbers, raising fears that the front line could

(24:49):
start to crumble as the most concerted effort at peace
talks in three years gets under way. Ukrainian forces have
largely pushed the Russians back from their recent gains and
stabilized the front line after moving in reinforcements, according to
interviews and battlefield maps. The fighting, however, remains intense. General

(25:14):
Alexandr Skirsky, Ukraine's top military commander, sat on Wednesday that
Russian troops were stepping up their offensive actions in the
north of Donyatsk while continuing to push toward Pokrovsk. Given
that political negotiations and deals are starting to emerge, Putin
is trying to use the short amount of time left

(25:36):
to grab as much territory as he can, said Colonel
Dmitro Pallisa, commander of Ukraine's thirty third Mechanized Brigade. His
team recently moved to an area near Pokrovsk, which Russian
troops have been trying to capture for more than a year.
On Sunday, he sat on a dark blue Pleuther couch

(25:57):
inside a dugout near the fighting. Bombs could be heard
in the distance. The makeshift room, built of plywood and netting,
smelled like soil. He doesn't care how many Russian soldiers
die or how much equipment is lost. Colonel Pelis has
said of mister Putin, what matters to him now is
to seize as much of the Donyetsk region as possible. This,

(26:21):
in term, could have a negative consequence for us, because
it would force us to enter any negotiations from a
weaker position. It has been a long time since this
was a fast moving war. Russia gained much of the
territory it now holds in twenty fourteen, when it seized
the Crimean Peninsula and then fomented the proxy war that

(26:43):
followed in eastern Ukraine, and in the early months after
launching its full scale invasion in February of twenty twenty two.
Russia's control over Ukrainian territory has been close to twenty
percent for the past year, but recently Ukrainian defenses along
a front line running through the east and south of

(27:03):
the country have at times flagged. Russian troops captured twice
as much territory in May after starting their Spring offensive
than they had the month before, While the Ukrainian military
has stemmed significant territorial losses, the most battle hardened brigades
are exhausted after being used to plug holes and engage

(27:27):
in the most serious fighting wherever it exists. The Azof
Brigade was recently moved to the Pokrovsk area, along with
brigades like the thirty third and the fifty ninth. Many
soldiers have been fighting since twenty twenty two, some since
twenty fourteen. Despite a draft of all men from the
age of twenty five to sixty, despite flashy billboard campaigns

(27:50):
featuring soldiers riding giant cats, the Ukrainian Army is having
difficulty recruiting new soldiers. Last month, Ukraine even adopted a
law allowing citizens over sixty to voluntarily enlist. To understand
what is happening in the war, look no farther than Donyetsk,

(28:10):
a focal point both on the battlefield and in peace negotiations.
Mister Putin exists in that Donyetsk, which makes up the
core of a historical area known as the Donbas, belongs
rightfully in Russia. At his meeting with mister Trump in
Alaska on Friday, mister Putin seemingly convinced the American president

(28:32):
that Ukraine needed to give up the entire Dnbas region
to Russia to achieve peace, but Russia controls only about
three quarters of Donyetsk. In the Ukrainian controlled area of
western Donyetsk, roughly the size of Delaware, fighting is fierce.
The small groups of soldiers that Russia is using, numbering two,

(28:54):
three or four, have exploited gaps in the Ukrainian frontline
near the town of Dobropilia. This is the area. It
is this area rather where drones and missiles are now
pounding villages on a regular basis, destroying post offices and schools.

(29:14):
It is where Russia has been unable to turn small
gains on the battlefield into actual breakthroughs despite suffering huge losses.
And it is where mister Putin and mister Trump want
Ukrainian soldiers to walk away after an eleven year fight
in exchange for a peace deal. The battlefield map maintained

(29:36):
by Deep State, a Ukrainian group with ties to the military,
shows Russian incursions growing in early August about twelve miles
northeast of Pokrovsk, with small fingers of troops making gains
to the west and the north. This area has little
strategic significance but definite opportunity. By August eleventh, a Monday,

(29:59):
the Russians had rushed about eight point five miles north
in two long incursions that resembled rabbit eers east of Dograpilia,
the map showed, and then on August fifteenth, last Friday,
the map showed the Ukrainian troops severing the rabbit ears
from the rest of Russian forces, effectively trapping the Russians

(30:20):
who were there. Their goal is to rush forward as
far as possible, stop and hold a line. Colonel Polisa
said they simply charged a head and settled in place.
There wasn't any deep strategic meaning behind it. At least
twenty one Russians had surrendered in the previous three days,
he said. Those who don't we destroyed. He added. Vitali Pisetsky,

(30:44):
the chief sergeant of the ninety third Mechanized Brigade, said
his brigades units were operating in two directions, including between Kramatorsk,
one of the two major cities in Tunetsk, and Dogroupilia,
where the enemy has managed to infiltrate deep inside our
defensive lines. That's a quote, he said. The unit had

(31:05):
stormed and cleared small settlements. This is the tactic. They
are now using infiltration that succeeded just beyond the limits
of our area of responsibility, Sergeant Piasetsky said. He said
mechanized assaults had become rare because of the large number
of drones in the air that can detect the movement

(31:26):
of armored vehicles, trucks and motorcycles. It's a creeping offensive,
he explained. His forces have discovered and eliminated many of
the small groups of Russian troops, but some of these
groups do get through, Sergeant Piosetsky said. A soldier from
the first corp Azov of the Ukrainian National Guard stationed

(31:48):
at the front near Dogropilia, played down the seriousness of
the recent Russian incursion, But the soldier, who spoke on
the condition of anonymity because he was not author to
talk to the media, said Russian offensive actions had increased
after the most recent flurry if peace talks ended. Both

(32:09):
Sergeant Piyasetski and Sergeant Alexander Karpyuk of the Inquisition Unmanned
Systems Battalion and the fifty ninth Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade
reiterated a frequent complaint from the front line that the
Ukrainian Army does not have enough personnel, not enough drones.
Ukraine also does not have the technology to stop specialized

(32:33):
Russian drone units that attack supply roots. Sergeant Karpiak said
the main current defense is to set up netting shields
along roads and on vehicles. The Russian units have inflicted
a toll on Ukraine's drones. The large Ukrainian attack drone,
known to the Russians as Baba Yaga, named for a

(32:54):
Slavic folklore witch who lived in a hut that stood
on chicken legs, used to make an average of seventy
flights before being shot down. Now it can barely make ten.
Sergeant Karpiak said, we need to admit that these units
are working. Sergeant Karpiak said of the Russians, all these

(33:14):
new drone units are a new threat to us. We'll
switch now to a story headlined Come one, Come all,
buy your TV subscriptions here. It's by John Coblin. Millions
of Americans are gravitating toward a new way to subscribe
to streaming services. Antech, media and cable companies are lining

(33:39):
up to take advantage. Facing a chaotic maze of apps
payments and passwords. People are increasingly signing up from multiple
streaming services through a single provider. Amazon, by far the
leader in this growing trend, urges users of its Prime
Video service to sign up for and watch Hbomax, Paramount

(34:01):
Plus and other services through its app. Apple, Roku, and
YouTube encourage the same as do cable providers like Comcast.
The number of new subscriptions purchased through one of these
third party apps has jumped forty percent over the past
two years. According to research from Antenna, a subscription research firm,

(34:25):
nearly thirty percent of all new subscriptions are bought this way.
Signing up directly, like through a company website, still remains
the most popular way to get a new streaming subscription,
but the sudden popularity of signing up through a third
party signals the emergence of a new kind of cable bundle,
a development that media executives have predicted for many years

(34:48):
but had not yet become much of a reality. The
shift could help reshape the consumer experience. Viewers can go
on one platform and find a single interface which shows
and movies that are available on a wide array of
services or channels. It also has set off a fight
between media tech and cable companies to try to be

(35:11):
the dominant, one stop shop. You could almost call this
the next chapter of the streaming wars, said Jonathan Carson,
the chief executive of Antenna. The winners of that battle
will effectively become the equivalent of what the cable providers
were for the linear era, he said. Consumers have complained

(35:31):
for years that the streaming era requires them to hopscotch
from one app to the next to get a sense
of what to watch. Amazon said seventy seven percent of
its viewers wanted their streaming apps consolidated into one place,
according to customer research the company did in twenty twenty three.
That finding gave Amazon more conviction to pursue this strategy further,

(35:56):
said Albert Chang, the head of Prime Video in the
United States. For media companies, the development has major trade offs.
Making their streaming service available at a third party retailer
helps deframe millions of dollars in marketing and technological costs.
Most of the companies have labored to make their streaming

(36:16):
services profitable in part because of those costs, but platforms
like Amazon take a big cut of the subscription revenue.
Often thirty to fifty percent, along with a piece of
the advertising revenue. This route also cuts off the direct
relationship between a media company and a subscriber. For some companies,

(36:38):
particularly Netflix, which has by far the most subscribers with
about three hundred million globally, that has been reason enough
to mostly avoid selling subscriptions through third parties. Netflix already
operates as a go to destination for entertainment thanks to
the breadth and variety of our slate and superior product experience,

(37:00):
the company told investors last year. Disney, likewise, has largely
been sitting on the sidelines for more niche services. However,
the popularity of signing up through a platform has been
a boon. Specialty streaming services like crunchy roll and BritBox
have eagerly signed up, which helps drive subscriptions and awareness

(37:23):
to brands that are not well known. And then there
are players with considerably bigger budgets that are joining the fray.
After years of selling only directly, Apple TV Plus joined
Prime Video's channel's environment late last year. The number of
new subscriptions to Apple TV has grown since then, with

(37:45):
Prime Video already responsible for twenty nine percent of new
sign ups according to Antenna, it promotes a lot more
subscription trial and activity and discovery in a way the
app store environments don't. Mister and said. YouTube started its
channel business only a few years ago under the name

(38:06):
YouTube Primetime Channels, and the company already is a huge
believer in this business, said Jen Chun, the head of
Sports and Studio Partnerships at YouTube. What we have heard
over and over again from folks is that they don't
like having a lot of different apps to click in
and out of. She said. It is messy on their screen.

(38:28):
It is challenging. There's a certain level of inertia that
people have, particularly in living rooms. Folks really just want
to turn on the screen and watch. Roku's president of
Subscriptions and Partnerships, Gil Fuchsburg, said its channel business had
grown considerably over the past year. He called it the
fastest growing part of our subscriptions business, but the market

(38:52):
leader is by far Amazon Prime Video. Amazon Prime users
have signed up for forty six million streaming subscriptions via
its channel business, significantly more than Roku or YouTube. According
to the Antenna data. The company has had the benefit
of doing it for a long time. It started a

(39:13):
decade ago, but it was only in the last few
years that executives there and elsewhere began to realize its power.
In twenty twenty one, HBO Max no longer made itself
available on Amazon Prime Video. Overnight, HBO Max lost five
point one million subscribers, according to Antenna Data, But eight

(39:37):
months after those subscribers left, fewer than five hundred thousand
of them had elected to resubscribe to HBO Max, according
to the data. When HBO Max returned to Prime Video
in late twenty twenty two, more than three million of
them signed up within three months, according to Antenna. I
think it became very apparent how we were contributed to

(40:00):
the overall streaming marketplace with HBO coming off and back on,
said mister Cheng, the Prime Video executive. That's when you
kind of go, oh, yeah, we actually do make a difference,
mister Cheng said. Prime Video drove new subscriptions that would
have been difficult for our partners to get on their own.

(40:22):
It has been mister Chang's job to persuade would be
partners to think of Prime Video as a helpful aggregator
of programming. There are a lot of people who prefer
to be in a place where they can consume all
of it in one place, he said. Mister Carson, the
Antenna chief executive, compared the changing attitudes to Nike's decision

(40:44):
a few years ago to pull out of retail shops
in favor of selling directly to the consumer. That strategy failed,
and Nike has begun selling its sneakers in stores again.
There are many people that are going to dsw de
Bai a pair of trainers, and if Nike's not on
the shelf, then Nike's not getting that sale, he said.

(41:05):
Mister Chang said he wanted consumers to start seeing Prime
Video more and more as a marketplace for streaming, arguing
that being a retailer is precisely what the company has
long been good at. Our job is we want to
be the best at selling stuff, he said. Now to
politics for a report headlined the Democratic Party faces a

(41:30):
voter registration crisis. It's by Shane Goldmacher with Jonah Smith.
Shane Goldmacher is a national political correspondent covering the rebuilding
efforts of the Democratic Party. Jonah Smith is a data
journalist focused on voter registration and election turnout data. The

(41:52):
Democratic Party is hemorrhaging voters long before they even go
to the polls. Of the thirty states that track voter
register by political party, Democrats lost ground to Republicans in
every single one between the twenty and twenty twenty four elections,
and often by a lot. That four year swing toward

(42:13):
the Republicans adds up to four point five million voters,
a deep political whole that could take years for Democrats
to climb out from the stampede away from the Democratic
Party is occurring in battleground states, the bluest states, and
the reddest states too, according to a new analysis of

(42:33):
voter registration data by The New York Times. The analysis
used voter registration data compiled by L two, a nonpartisan
data firm. Few measurements reflect the luster of a political
party's brand more clearly than the choice by voters to
identify with it, whether they register on a clipboard, in

(42:55):
a supermarket parking lot, as a department of motor vehicles,
or in the comfort of their own home. And fewer
and fewer Americans are choosing to be Democrats. In fact,
for the first time since twenty eighteen, more new voters
nationwide chose to be Republicans than Democrats last year. All told,

(43:17):
Democrats lost about two point one million registered voters between
the twenty twenty and twenty twenty four elections in the
thirty states along with Washington, d C that allow people
to register with a political party. In the remaining twenty states,
voters do not register with a political party. Republicans gained

(43:38):
two point four million. There are still more Democrats registered
nationwide than Republicans, partly because of big blue states like
California allow people to register by party, while red states
like Texas do not. But the trajectory is troublesome for Democrats,
and there are growing tensions over what to do about it.

(44:00):
Democrats went from nearly an eleven percentage point edge over
Republicans on election Day twenty twenty in those places with
partisan registration to just over a six percent edge in
twenty twenty four. That swing helps to explain President Trump's
success last year, when he won the popular vote for

(44:21):
the first time, swept the swing states, and roared back
to the White House. I don't want to say the
death cycle of the Democratic Party, but there seems to
be no end to this, said Michael Pruser, who tracks
voter registration closely. As the director of Data Science for
Decision Desk HQ an election analysis site, quote, there is

(44:44):
no silver lining or cavalry coming across the hill. This
is month after month, year after year, unquote. The Shifts
also previewed Democratic weaknesses. In twenty twenty four, the party
saw some of its steepen its declines in registration among
men and younger voters. The Times analysis found two constituencies

(45:07):
that swung sharply toward mister Trump. All four presidential battleground
states covered by the Times analysis, Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina,
and Pennsylvania showed significant Democratic erosion. In North Carolina, Republicans
erased roughly ninety five percent of the registration advantage that

(45:29):
Democrats held in the fall of twenty twenty according to
state records. As of this summer, in Nevada, Democrats suffered
the steepest percentage point plunge of any state but West
Virginia between twenty and twenty twenty four. The share of
voters choosing to register with either party went down after

(45:50):
the state adopted an automatic voter registration system, but the
Democratic decline allowed Republicans to briefly surpass Democrats earlier this year.
For many years, more and more voters have been registering
as independents or unaffiliated, sapping both parties roles. More recently, however,

(46:10):
that growth has come mostly at the expense of Democrats.
Top Democratic strategists say the party's nationwide registration decline is
a hidden and plain sight crisis that must be reversed
before the twenty twenty eight election. Consider this. In twenty eighteen,
Democrats accounted for thirty four percent of new voter registrations nationwide,

(46:35):
while Republicans were only twenty percent. Yet by twenty twenty four,
Republicans had overtaken Democrats among new registrants. In six years,
the GOP's share rose by nine percentage points, the Democratic
share dropped nearly eight points. The Times compiled registration data

(46:57):
from L two and compared it to state records across
the country to show the scope of the registration decline
for Democrats and interviewed more than two dozen party strategists
and officials involved in registration efforts. We fell asleep at
the switch, said Maria Cardona, a veteran party strategist and
longtime member of the Democratic National Committee. But Democrats are

(47:22):
divided and flummoxed over what to do. For years, the
left has relied on a sprawling network of nonprofits, through
which solicit donations from people whose identities they need not
disclose to register black, Latino, and younger voters. Though the
groups are technically non partisan, the underlying assumption has been

(47:46):
that most new voters registering would vote Democratic. Mister Trump
upended that calculation with the inroads he made with working class,
non white voters. You can't just register a young Latino
or a young black voter and assume that they're going
to know that it's Democrats that have the best policies.
Miss Cardona said, behind the scenes, a fierce fight is

(48:10):
underway over how Democrats should address their sagging voter registration
numbers and which groups should receive funding to do the work.
It's a battle with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake,
pitting partisans against philanthropists, and some of the Democratic Party's
most important constituencies against one another. Voter registration is an

(48:33):
important barometer of a state's political tilt, even if it
doesn't necessarily predict the outcome of the next election. Experts
sometimes call it a lagging indicator because people typically stop
voting with a party years before they formally register with
a new one. Kentucky and West Virginia, for example, each

(48:55):
flipped to a Republican registration advantage only in recent years,
though both states turned red in presidential contests long ago.
Tom Bonnyer, one of the Democratic Party's leading experts on
voter registration trends, spent much of twenty twenty four downplaying
the seriousness of his party's registration woes. He's now come around.

(49:18):
I was wrong, he said in an interview. Clearly, in retrospect,
we can say the Democratic Party had dug itself in
too deep a hole in the preceding four years for
the Harris campaign to dig itself out in the last
few months, added mister Bonnyer, referring to the twenty twenty
four bid by former Vice President Kamala Harris. He now

(49:40):
calls the registration figures a big flashing red alert. Grim
milestone's of Democratic decline have been piling up. Last summer,
Bucks County, a competitive Philadelphia suburb, tilted Republican in registration
for the first time since two thousand and seven, according
to state records. In the fall, mister Trump became the

(50:03):
first Republican presidential candidate to carry the county this century.
This spring, it was Miami Dade County in Florida where
the number of active Republican voters in the county zoomed
past Democrats just months after mister Trump became the first
Republican presidential candidate to carry the county in decades. As

(50:25):
recently as November twenty twenty, Democrats outnumbered Republicans there by
two hundred thousand. Statewide, one point two million voter swing
flipped Florida into the Republican column by registration. According to
The Times analysis of L two's data, North Carolina could

(50:45):
be the next battleground state to tip. State records show
the Democratic edge there is down to less than seventeen
thousand voters from nearly four hundred thousand four years ago,
and Pennsylvania may be on deck. Democrats held a registration
advantage of five hundred seventeen thousand, three hundred ten among

(51:07):
active voters there in November twenty twenty, according to state records,
but that edge dwindled to fifty three thousand, three hundred
three voters this summer. Much of that change is from
party switchers. From twenty twenty through July twenty twenty five,
nearly twice as many Pennsylvania Democrats switched to become Republicans

(51:29):
three hundred fourteen thousand as the other way around one
hundred sixty one thousand. State records show. Anyone who says
that these things are not concerning for Democrats is, in
my opinion, mostly lying, said Lakshya Jane, a Democratic analyst
and co founder of split Ticket, a non partisan election

(51:50):
analysis site, quote the act of being a registered Democrat
is still psychologically something. The act of switching is a
political state. The Democratic Party's diminished appeal to men and
younger voters was evident and partisan registration data long before
it became apparent to everyone in the twenty twenty four election.

(52:14):
Not so long ago, in twenty eighteen, Democrats had accounted
for sixty six percent of new voters under forty five
who registered with one of the two major parties. Yet
by twenty twenty four, the Democratic share had plunged to
forty eight percent. The Times analysis of l two's data found,

(52:36):
in other words, Republicans went from roughly one third of
newly registered voters under forty five to a majority in
the last six years. The story is even bleaker for
Democrats in some key states. In Nevada, which releases particularly
detailed data, Republicans added nearly twice as many voters under

(52:57):
thirty five to the roles as Democrats do it did
last year. State records show the shifts among male voters
tell a similar story. Nearly forty nine percent of men
newly registering with a major party chose the Democrats in
twenty twenty. In twenty twenty four, that figure was down
to roughly thirty nine percent. At the same time, the

(53:22):
Democratic edge among women registering to vote has shrunk. The
combination inverted a gender gap that in recent years had
heavily benefited Democrats. Few states offer registration data by race,
but those that do reflect the Democratic parties fading a
lure to Latino voters. According to The Times analysis of

(53:43):
the L two data in Florida, a slim fifty two
percent majority of new Latino registrants who chose one of
the two major parties had aligned with the Democrats in
twenty twenty. By last year, the share of new Latino
voters had collapsed to thirty three percent. Democrats fared only

(54:06):
slightly better in North Carolina. The party's share of Latino
registrants picking one of the two major parties declined from
seventy two percent in twenty twenty to fifty eight percent
last year. Within the small community of democratic data and
voter registration experts, a confidential memo circulated early last year

(54:27):
was explosive. Aaron Strauss, a data scientist who has spent
years studying how to elect Democrats, wrote that the old
way of registering voters, working through nonprofit groups to enroll
young people and people of color in general, rather than
explicitly seeking new Democrats, might actually backfire in twenty twenty four.

(54:48):
If we were to blindly register non voters and get
them on the rolls, we would be distinctly aiding Trump's
quest for a personal dictatorship, mister Strauss wrote in the memo,
which the Washington Post report it at the time. Mister
Strauss argued that the left needed to target its new
voters more surgically because mister Trump's support was growing among

(55:10):
traditional Democratic constituencies. Registering voters without regard to their political
beliefs remained cost effective for Democrats only with black voters,
with other democraphic groups. Explicitly partisan groups ought to make
explicitly partisan arguments in order to actually benefit Democratic campaigns.

(55:32):
It would be naive to call twenty twenty four anything
other than a reckoning on the Democratic brand, said Torri Gavido,
the president of Way to Win, a progressive donor network,
who argued that more spending on non partisan registration was misguided. Quote.
To solve a brand problem, you need people talking about

(55:54):
that brand, and that requires partisan dollars unquote. That would
be a huge shift, including for politically minded donors who
reap tax breaks from their gifts to some groups that
register voters on a non prop partisan basis and that
are considered charities. The donors would not get such tax

(56:16):
breaks if they gave two traditional packs. Registering voters is
a big business and an expensive endeavor. Every new sign
up costs thirty to eighty dollars. One official involved in
registering voters said the memo from mister Strauss, who declined
to comment, estimated that netting extra Democratic votes by registering

(56:37):
black voters cost five hundred and seventy five dollars per
vote in twenty twenty. This concludes the reading of the
new York Times for today. Your reader for today has
been Scott Johnson. If you have any questions, comments, or
suggestions concerning this program, please feel free to call us

(56:57):
at eight five nine four to two two six three
nine zero. Thank you for listening, and now please stay
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