Politics

United States International Human Rights Climate Change

Made in the USA

Pete Hegseth is the product of an essentially American ethos—which means we have no choice but to ask what to do with him, and what to do with ourselves.

June 11, 2026 issue

David W. Blight

Dreams of Our Nation

Historians must not cede the study of how Americans understand their cacophonous nation to advocates of “patriotic” history.

June 11, 2026 issue

Benjamin Nathans

Navalny’s Unfinished Work

In his posthumous memoir, Alexei Navalny’s utopian vision of “the Beautiful Russia of the Future” remains strangely detached from history.

June 11, 2026 issue

Jonathan Mingle

Our Climate’s Wild Card

Methane’s part in the climate crisis remains largely overlooked, even though it is responsible for 30 percent of all global warming to date, and despite the fact that it’s still possible to purge it from our skies.

June 11, 2026 issue

Quinn Slobodian

Damming the Big Ocean

Edward Fishman’s Chokepoints explains how the US came to rely on its economic arsenal, but stops short of a complete assessment of the unreliable tactic and its often devastating consequences.

June 11, 2026 issue

Ben Tarnoff

Whither the Nerd-Bully?

Bill Gates was the monopolistic father figure who Silicon Valley’s young founders rebelled against—and, in so rebelling, became.

May 28, 2026 issue

Christopher de Bellaigue

Iran’s New Winter

The US-Israeli war against Iran, far from encouraging a popular uprising, has strengthened the regime’s grip and set back the cause of Iranian freedom indefinitely.

May 28, 2026 issue

David Cole

The Second ‘Redemption’

The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais deals a fatal blow to the Voting Rights Act, using reasoning that Congress rejected more than forty years ago.

June 11, 2026 issue

David Cole on the Supreme Court

David Cole

Trump v. Trump

What happens when a president sues himself?

May 20, 2026

David Cole

The Second ‘Redemption’

The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais deals a fatal blow to the Voting Rights Act, using reasoning that Congress rejected more than forty years ago.

June 11, 2026 issue

David Cole

Born in the USA

For the Supreme Court to accept the Trump administration’s attempt to revoke birthright citizenship, it would have to repudiate the Constitution, its own precedents, and the long-standing position of all three branches of the US government.

April 23, 2026 issue

David Cole

The Lie of ‘Preventive’ War

Never has Donald Trump’s willful blindness to legal limits been more evident than in his decision to start a war with Iran.

March 6, 2026

On Iran

Christopher de Bellaigue

Iran’s New Winter

The US-Israeli war against Iran, far from encouraging a popular uprising, has strengthened the regime’s grip and set back the cause of Iranian freedom indefinitely.

May 28, 2026 issue

Anonymous

From the Rooftops of Tehran

We in Iran own our grief, mourning all by ourselves.

April 23, 2026 issue

Orly Noy

Longing for My Tehran

On the Israeli news, I watch as the country whose citizenship I hold devastates the one where I was born.

March 14, 2026

Neve Gordon

The Gaza Doctrine

Over the course of two years, Israeli forces systematically destroyed the Gaza Strip’s health system. Their attacks in Iran and Lebanon follow a disturbingly similar pattern.

March 22, 2026

Belligerent Boys Club

Ronald Steel

All About Henry

“Everyone reports to Kissinger, and only Kissinger reports to the President.”

September 19, 1974 issue

Joan Didion

Cheney: The Fatal Touch

“Here was a man with considerable practice in the reversal of his own errors. He was never a star. No one ever called him a natural.”

October 5, 2006 issue

Robert G. Kaiser

The Closed Mind of Mitch

‘The Cynic: The Political Education of Mitch McConnell’ by Alec MacGillis

November 10, 2016 issue

Fintan O’Toole

William Barr: Enabler in Chief

The attorney general exemplifies the growing influence of right-wing Catholicism under Trump.

November 5, 2020 issue

On Israel and Gaza

Adania Shibli

Dead Lands

Rather than letting ourselves tire of repeated stories, how might we allow them to inform us about something we couldn’t grasp otherwise?

June 17, 2026

Piper French

To Break the Siege

By sailing to Gaza, activists in the flotilla movement have long tried to pressure their own governments to honor international law.

May 31, 2026

Doha Kahlout, translated by Katharine Halls

Elegy for Rafah

For the tens of thousands of Gazans who need to leave the Strip but want the chance to come back home, life revolves around the Rafah crossing.

March 20, 2026

Madeleine Schwartz

Pieces of Gaza

An exhibition in Paris of archaeological treasures from Gaza served as a reminder of how much of the Strip’s history has been destroyed.

February 12, 2026

Ada Ferrer and Miriam Pensack

Broken Promises in Cuban Miami

Donald Trump has reversed the government’s longstanding benevolence toward Cuban asylum seekers, even as his administration exacerbates the crisis they fled.

July 23, 2026 issue

Tanvi Misra

The Unraveling of Afghan Asylum

Afghan asylum seekers fled a crisis the US had a direct role in fomenting—only to become targets in Trump’s immigration crackdown.

June 28, 2026

Mary Turfah

Safety Is When There’s No One Dying

Israel’s assault on Palestine and Lebanon has reconfigured how children understand the world.

June 24, 2026

Caroline Tracey

Putting the Lake to Work

State officials have long treated the Great Salt Lake as a resource to exploit, including through far-fetched engineering schemes. Now its future is on the line.

June 14, 2026

Nic Johnson

Planet UFC

Mixed martial arts have become the lingua franca of a strange new twenty-first-century formation: the nationalist international.

June 13, 2026

Fintan O’Toole

Cloudbusting in California

Steve Hilton’s journey from Downing Street guru to Trump-endorsed gubernatorial candidate suggests how thoroughly image-makers have hollowed out our democratic life.

June 9, 2026