Stephanie McCrummen is a national enterprise reporter at The Washington Post. “I do have to psych myself up. There’s always something awkward about it and that never goes away. … No matter how long I do this job, that part of it doesn’t get any easier. It’s always a bit awkward and you’re always sort of humbled when someone actually is willing to talk to you. Then it can be kind of thrilling, once you’re in it, once you’re actually in the conversation. ... But the moment a few seconds before that is still—to this day, it’s sort of an act of will.” Thanks to Mailchimp and Squarespace for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes: @mccrummenWaPo McCrummen on Longform McCrummen's Washington Post archive 08:00 "In Georgia, a Biden supporter realizes the power of her ballot" (Washington Post • Nov 2020) 12:00 "Miranda’s Rebellion" (Washington Post • Feb 2020) 28:00 "Judgment Days" (Washington Post • Jul 2018) 37:00 "Woman says Roy Moore initiated sexual encounter when she was 14, he was 32" (Washington Post • Nov 2017) 43:00 "A woman approached The Post with dramatic — and false — tale about Roy Moore. She appears to be part of undercover sting operation." (Shawn Boburg, Aaron C. Davis and Alice Crites • Washington Post • Nov 2017) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Olivia Nuzzi is the White House correspondent for New York.“I don’t think that, broadly speaking, this a group of redeemable people. … But I do think there is tremendous value, in this first draft of history, trying to understand why the fuck they are like this. … There is value in understanding why these people are like this because they are the reason why we are here in this situation. And I think it’s a [question] that historians will try to answer years from now. … I view my job as providing fodder for that.” Thanks to Mailchimp and SAIC for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes:   @Olivianuzzi Nuzzi on Longform Nuzzi's archive at New York 13:00 "The Final Gasp of Donald Trump’s Presidency" (New York • Nov 2020) 24:00 "Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus Want You to Know They’re Actually Friends" (New York • Feb 2017) 25:00 "My Private Oval Office Press Conference With Trump, Pence, Pompeo, and Kelly" (New York • Oct 2018) 25:00 "How John Kelly Failed to Tame the West Wing" (New York • Dec 2018) 25:00 "The Chaotic, Desperate, Last-Minute Trump 2020 Reboot" (New York • Aug 2020) 36:00 "The Mystifying Triumph of Hope Hicks, Donald Trump’s Right-Hand Woman" (GQ • Jun 2016) 39:00 "An Anonymous Republican on Power vs. Contempt for Trump" (New York • Oct 2020) 56:00 "Listen to Children Who’ve Just Been Separated From Their Parents at the Border" (Ginger Thompson • ProPublica • Jun 2018) 1:06:00 "Does Governor Andrew Cuomo Have His Nipples Pierced?" (New York • Apr 2020) 1:08:00 Nuzzi's archive at The Daily Beast 1:08:00 "The Entire Presidency Is a Superspreading Event" (New York • Oct 2020)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Reeves Wiedeman is a reporter at New York and the author of the new book Billion Dollar Loser. “You get inside these companies and … you assume everything is running based on models and numbers and then you get inside and it’s just people. And sometimes they have MBAs and sometimes they don’t. … At the end of the day, whether you’re running a media company or an office space company, it’s all people making these decisions and they often do very strange, contradictory, and ultimately unsuccessful things.” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes: @reeveswiedeman reeveswiedeman.net Wiedeman on Longform Wiedeman on Longform Podcast Wiedeman's archive at New York Magazine 01:00 "The Watcher" (New York • Nov 2018) 01:00 "What's Left of Condé Nast" (New York • Oct 2019) 01:00 "A Company Built on a Bluff" (New York • Jun 2018) 01:00 "The I in We" (New York • Jun 2019) 02:00 Billion Dollar Loser (Little Brown • 2020) 17:00 "Is Uber Evil, Or Just Doomed?" (New York • May 2017) 25:00 Cambridge Analytica coverage at The Guardian   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Latif Nasser co-hosts Radiolab. He also hosted The Other Latif and the Netflix documentary series Connected.“It’s so easy to hate everything and be cynical. There’s a kind of ease to that. It takes a lot more courage to go up in front of everybody and be like, This is awesome. I love this. That takes a lot of guts, I think.” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes:   @latifnasser 02:00 The Other Latif (WNYC Studios • 2020) 02:00 Connected (Netflix • 2020) 09:00 "Dust" from Connected (Netflix • 2020) 09:00 "Digits" from Connected (Netflix • 2020) 18:00 "A Clockwork Miracle" (Radiolab • 2012) 22:00 "Smile My Ass" (Radiolab • Oct 2015) 28:00 "The World’s Biggest Scavenger Hunt: A Guide To Finding Stories" (Transom • Nov 2018)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Barton Gellman is a staff writer for The Atlantic. and was previously a Pulitzer-winning reporter at The Washington Post. His latest book is Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden and the American Surveillance State and his latest essay is "The Election That Could Break America."“I have found that I have a talent for accidentally pissing people off. ... I’m interested most in accountability and the use and abuse of power. So naturally it’s going to annoy people sometimes. And sometimes they take it like grown-ups and sometimes less so.” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes: @bartongellman bartongellman.com Gellman on Longform Dark Mirror (Penguin Press • 2020) 10:00 Gellman's early Washington Post archive 37:00 Gellman's Time archive 39:00 Gellman's NSA stories at The Washington Post 57:00 "The Election That Could Break America" (The Atlantic • Nov 2020)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Latria Graham is a writer living in South Carolina. Her work has appeared in Outside, Garden & Gun, The Guardian, and The New York Times. Her latest essay is "Out There, Nobody Can Hear You Scream." “My goal as a person—not just as a writer—is to be the adult that I needed when I was younger. That’s why I go and talk to college classes. That’s why I write some of these vulnerable things, to let people that are struggling know that they’re not on their own. … I have to be unmerciful to myself, I think, in order to do it. I really do try to dissect myself and my mistakes. And just kind of say, Here’s the full deck of my life. Take from it what you need. But I’m not holding out on you.” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show Notes: @LatriaGraham latriagraham.com 10:00 Going Hungry (Kate M. Taylor • Anchor • 2008) 32:00 "The Dark Knight Unmasked" (SB Nation • Jan 2016) 37:00 "We're Here. You Just Don't See Us." (Outside • May 2018) 37:00 "Out There, Nobody Can Hear You Scream" (Outside • Sept 2020) 48:00 "How an E-Bike Got Me Riding Again After 20 Years" (Bicycling • Jul 2018) 1:03:00 "A Dream Uprooted" (Garden & Gun • Apr/May 2020) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nicholson Baker is the author of 18 books of fiction and nonfiction. He has written for The New Yorker, Harper’s, and many other publications. His latest book is Baseless: My Search for Secrets in the Ruins of the Freedom of Information Act. "In the end, I don’t care how famous you get, how widely read you are during your lifetime. You’re going to be forgotten. And you’re going to have five or six fans in the end. It’s going to be your grandchildren or your great-grandchildren are going to say, Oh, yeah, he was big. … So I think the key is, write what you actually care about. Because in the end, you’re only doing this for yourself. … So maybe do your best stuff for yourself and for the three, four, five people who know in the coming century that you ever existed. That’s all you need to do." Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes: @nicholsonbaker8 nicholsonbaker.com The Mezzanine (Grove Press • 1988) Baseless (Penguin Press • 2020) 10:00 Human Smoke (Simon & Schuster • 2009) 10:00 "Wrong Answer" (Harper's • Sept 2013) 11:00 Room Temperature (Grove Press • 2010) 11:00 U and I (Random House • 2000) 11:00 The Fermata(2000) 12:00 "The Projector" (New Yorker • Mar 1994) 12:00 The Size of Thoughts (Vintage Contemporaries • 1996) 13:00 "The Author vs. the Library" (New Yorker • Oct 1996) 19:00 Double Fold (Vintage • 2002) 30:00 Lab 257 (Michael Carroll • Willam Morrow Paperbacks • 2005) 33:00 Longform Podcast #192: Seymour Hersh 33:00 The Killing of Osama Bin Laden (Seymour Hersh • Verso • 2017) 33:00 Longform Podcast #321: Nicholas Schmidle 33:00 "Getting Bin Laden" (Nicholas Schmidle • New Yorker • Aug 2011) 46:00 Baker's New Yorker archive     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Elizabeth Weil covers California and the climate for ProPublica. She has written for The New York Times Magazine, California Sunday, and more.“As a journalist you’re endlessly asking people to tell you really personal, really vulnerable stuff about their lives. And I feel like you have to be willing to be in that conversation too—or really think about why you’re not willing.” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes:  @lizweil elizabethweil.net Weil on Longform 03:00 "Why He Kayaked Across the Atlantic at 70 (For the Third Time)" (New York Times Magazine • Mar 2018) 04:00 "What the Photos of Wildfires and Smoke Don’t Show You" (ProPublica • Sept 2020) 08:00 "The Climate Crisis Is Happening Right Now. Just Look at California’s Weekend." (ProPublica • Sept 2020) 13:00 "The Lost Boys of Sudan; The Long, Long, Long Road to Fargo" (Sara Corbett • New York Times Magazine • April 2001) 17:00 Off the Sidelines (Kirsten Gillibrand • Penguin Random House • 2015) 20:00 "In the Ashes of Ghost Ship" (New York Times Magazine • Dec 2018) 24:00 "Mary Cain Is Growing Up Fast" (New York Times Magazine • Mar 2015) 31:00 "Kamala Harris Takes Her Shot" (Atlantic • May 2019) 32:00 The Girl Who Smiled Beads (Clemantine Wamariya • Penguin Random House • 2019) 36:00 No Cheating, No Dying (Scribner • 2012) 36:00 They All Laughed at Christopher Columbus (Bantam • 2010) 39:00 "Married (Happily) With Issues" (New York Times Magazine • Dec 2009) 42:00 "Raising a Teenage Daughter" (California Sunday Magazine • Nov 2017)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jiayang Fan is a staff writer for The New Yorker. Her latest article is a "How My Mother and I Became Chinese Propaganda.""I think considering the unusual shape of our lives—the lives of my mother and I—from bare subsistence to one of the richest enclaves in America … it made me think about what the value of existence is. ... It made me wonder, What should a person be? And how should a person be? And being a writer has been a lifelong quest to answer those questions." Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes   @JiayangFan Fan on Longform Fan at The New Yorker 02:00 "How My Mother and I Became Chinese Propaganda" (New Yorker • Sept 2020) 09:00 "Hong Kong's Protest Movement and the Fight for the City's Soul" (New Yorker • Dec 2019) 40:00 "China's Selfie Obsession" (New Yorker • Dec 2017) 41:00 "China's Mistress-Dispellers" (New Yorker • June 2017) 43:00 "How E-Commerce is Transforming Rural China" (New Yorker • July 2018)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Claudia Rankine is a poet, essayist, and playwright. She is the author of the new book, Just Us: An American Conversation.“I began to wonder, why am I maintaining civility around things that are actually very important to me? This might be the only chance I get to stand up for myself. As Claudia. As a Black person. As a Black woman. As an American citizen. So what am I waiting for? What am I preserving when the thing I am supposedly preserving is also the thing that is on some level killing me?” Thanks to Mailchimp for sponsoring this week's episode. Show notes: Rankine on Longform Just Us: An American Conversation (Graywolf Press • 2020) Citizen: An American Lyric (Graywolf Press • 2014) 4:00 "The Meaning of Serena Williams" (New York Times Magazine • Aug 2015) 4:00 "I Wanted to Know What White Men Thought About Their Privilege. So I Asked." (New York Times Magazine • July 2019) 4:00 On Being: Claudia Rankine 43:00 "Black Newborns More Likely to Die When Looked After By White Doctors" (Rob Picheta • CNN • Aug 2020)   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices