The Nation Podcasts

On this episode of American Prestige, Derek speaks with Marie-Rose Tshite, a peacebuilding advocate and Ph.D. student in Political Science with a concentration in Feminist Comparative and International Politics at the University of Cincinnati, about M23 and the situation in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). They explore the group’s origins, its ties with the Rwandan government, other external actors, the recent seizure of Goma, minerals and the economic factors driving the conflict, the humanitarian situation, and more.Read Marie-Rose’s recent article on Congolese women's experiences during the Second Congolese War between 1998 and 2003, “Capturing Congolese Women’s Memories of War and Peacemaking”.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Running for president last year, Donald Trump disowned Project 2025, the laundry list of radical demands gathered together by right-wing think tanks. Trump claimed Project 2025 had no influence on him and was only being raised by Democrats as a political attack. But now Trump is in power, he’s enacting an agenda of dismantling the welfare state that is following Project 2025 in close detail, as my Nation colleague Chris Lehmann documented in a recent column. Chris and Jeet Heer talk about Trump’s mobilization of Christian nationalist ideologues in the service of a making the state subservient to big business. We also take up the remarkable supine Democratic Party response, and also possible sources of resistance in the courts, the federal government and, most crucially, from outraged public opinion mobilized into protest.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week: in Israel-Palestine, detainees were exchanged on Thursday (0:31), the IDF continues its operation in the West Bank (6:05), an update on the humanitarian situation in Gaza (7:40), and Trump proposes the idea of ethnically cleansing the Strip (10:34); in Lebanon, the IDF ignores its withdrawal deadline (15:02); in Syria, the political transition continues (17:00), the IDF remains in the country’s south (19:04), and negotiations with Russia are underway over its bases in Syria as well as the fate of Bashar al-Assad (20:32); the rollout of China’s DeepSeek AI roils tech stocks (23:00); the Sudanese army sees a string of military successes around Khartoum (25:24); in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the M23 military group takes Goma while advancing south (27:59); Putin comments on peace talks regarding Ukraine (32:43); Colombia and the US get into a spat regarding deportation flights (34:12); and in US news, arms sales hit a new record in 2024 (37:16), Donald Trump vows to build a migrant detention facility at Guantánamo (38:20), and some details on the effects of his foreign aid freeze (39:35).  Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this episode of Tech Won't Save Us, Paris Marx is joined by Chris Gilliard to discuss David Golumbia's final book Cyberlibertarianism and how right-wing politics shaped how we think about the internet.Chris Gilliard is co-director of the Critical Internet Studies Institute and author of the forthcoming book Luxury Surveillance, coming in 2026.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Our attention is limited. That makes it valuable, Chis Hayes says– not just to us, but to those who’d like to exploit it. Chris’s new book is The Sirens’ Call: How Attention Became the World's Most Endangered Resource; before he became host of “All in with Chris Hayes” on MSNBC, he was The Nation’s Washington Correspondent.Also: Your Minnesota Moment: officials in sanctuary cities and counties in Minnesota face threats from the Trump administration. Host Jon Wiener explains the threats to undocumented residents from Stephen Miller, and the response from Minnesota’s Attorney General Keith Ellison.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this episode of American Prestige, Lydia Walker, historian at Ohio State University, is back with Danny and Derek to conclude the conversation about her book States-in-Waiting: A Counternarrative of Global Decolonization. This time, the group explores post-colonial states following colonial borders, how business interests shaped things in states like Namibia, progressive capitalism, how the Cold War defined horizons of political possibility for nationalist actors, legitimacy as dictated by outside forces, and where decolonization stands in the modern day. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this week's American Prestige news roundup: in Gaza, the ceasefire takes effect (0:37), allowing a surge of humanitarian aid (3:51), the latter being partly facilitated by Hamas’s police force back in power (5:50). Meanwhile, an agreement on the second phase of the ceasefire remains to be seen (7:56); the IDF launches a new operation in the West Bank (14:38); negotiations between the government and SDF continue in Syria (17:11); Turkey hints at a possible thaw with the Kurdish PKK (20:13); Afghan refugees who’d already been granted asylum are stranded after Trump’s executive order (24:54); China brokers a new ceasefire in Myanmar (27:49); M23 makes a new advance in the Democratic Republic of Congo (29:31); Trump threatens myriad economic penalties against Russia if it doesn’t end the war in Ukraine (31:42); NATO’s defense spending might be on the rise (34:19); Colombia breaks off peace talks with the ELN (37:48); Mexico and Honduras react to Trump’s deportation plans (40:10); Oxfam releases a new report on the rise in inequality (42:44); and Donald Trump signed a flurry of executive orders only a few days into taking office (44:44).    Be sure to listen to our post-election special with Alexander Aviña on Trump’s plans regarding immigrants and deportations.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this episode of Tech Won't Save Us, Paris Marx is joined by Gaby Del Valle to discuss the inauguration of Donald Trump and what the tech oligarchy hopes to get from their relationship with him.Gaby Del Valle is a policy reporter at The Verge and is working on a book on ecofascism that will be released by Bloomsbury in 2027.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

How Trump ‘won’: In 2024, 244 million Americans were eligible to vote. 31.5% voted for Trump, 30.6 % voted for Harris, 38% did not vote. Trump won the same share of the eligible voters as he did four years ago (32%), But Harris’s share of eligible voters fell by 3.5 points compared to Biden. Why did 7 million Democratic voters stay home? Harold Meyerson has our analysis—he’s editor-at-large of The American Prospect.Also: now that Trump is preparing to round up and deport undocumented residents, we want to thank them for everything they’ve done to make America good. It’s a sentiment they don’t hear nearly enough--especially the “unaccompanied minors,” who have “shown more bravery in their young lives than anyone in Trump’s administration could ever dream of.” Gustavo Arellano will explain – he’s a columnist for the LA Times whose father came to the US in the 1960s in the trunk of a Chevy.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this conversation, Lydia Walker, an Assistant Professor of Global Military History at Ohio State University, dives into her book, States in Waiting. She challenges mainstream decolonization narratives and discusses the fascinating roles of non-state actors, such as Naga leader Angami Zapu Phizo and anti-apartheid activist Michael Scott. The discussion also touches on India's complex nationalist movements, the intricate dynamics of advocacy networks, and how grassroots efforts shaped the narrative of global decolonization.