Delegates hold “Mass Deportations Now” campaign signs during the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Wednesday, July 17, 2024. President-elect Donald Trump said he will use the military to carry out mass deportations — the centerpiece of his immigration agenda in his second term. He has not gone into detail about his plans, but legal experts have suggested he may be able to rely on a combination of federal laws to implement the deportations with the military’s help. The notion of the president deploying the military domestically may seem like a nightmare scenario, but it’s not implausible given his broad executive powers. On Monday, Trump responded to a post on his social media network Truth Social, claiming that he would “declare a national emergency and will use military assets” to carry out mass deportations, saying it was “TRUE!!!” It’s not immediately clear what he means by that: whether he intends for the military to enforce the nation’s immigration laws, for military funds to be redirected toward supporting mass deportations, or something else. A representative for his transition team did not respond to a request for comment. But Trump has a few avenues through which he could activate the military and its resources. Those include the Insurrection Act, which gives the president the power to deploy the military domestically; emergency powers, like redirecting funds to military construction projects; and other presidential powers like requesting national guard assistance in carrying out military missions. Immigration advocates are readying to challenge mass deportations. Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said Monday after Trump’s announcement that his organization is preparing for litigation. However, the law does give presidents significant leeway to use the military at their discretion, and courts have historically been wary of overstepping, though they may intervene if the civil liberties of immigrants are being violated. The United States has “a very permissive legal regime regarding how the president can use the military,” said Chris Mirasola, a professor at the University of Houston Law Center. Again, those powers aren’t absolute, however. “There are downstream implementation matters that I think are more susceptible to litigation,” Mirasola said. The Insurrection Act, briefly explained According to the New York Times, Trump is planning to invoke the Insurrection Act to bring in the military to carry out mass deportations. The law is a key exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits the use of the military to enforce federal law without the permission of Congress or the Constitution.  Only in rare instances have presidents invoked the Insurrection Act. President George H.W. Bush was the last one to do so amid the 1992 Los Angeles riots that broke out in response to the acquittal of police officers in the beating of Rodney King. President Dwight D. Eisenhower also notably used the Insurrection Act to facilitate the desegregation of schools in Little Rock, Arkansas. The provision of the Insurrection Act most likely to apply in Trump’s case is one that allows the president to unilaterally activate the military domestically to enforce federal law whenever they determine that “unlawful obstructions, combinations, or assemblages, or rebellion… make it impracticable [to do so] by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings.” Mirasola said Trump would have a “relatively easy time” making the case that cartels trafficking immigrants across the border constitute an “unlawful obstruction” to the enforcement of US immigration law. Trump has in some ways appeared to begin building his case for invoking the Insurrection Act through his rhetoric on the campaign trail this year by describing an “invasion of criminals” coming across the border. But Mirasola said it would be harder for Trump to argue that it is impracticable to enforce immigration laws through the “ordinary course of judicial proceedings.” That’s because presidents have done so for decades, and border crossings are no longer unusually high: They have sharply declined this year and are down even from certain points in the first Trump administration. However, the law gives the president “sole discretion, in most instances” to determine whether the criteria necessary to activate the military have been met, according to 2022 congressional testimony given by Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the liberty and national security program at the Brennan Center for Justice, and Joseph Nunn, the Center’s counsel in the national security program. Goitein and Nunn also argued that the “vague and broad criteria for invoking the Act, combined with the lack of any provision for judicial or congressional review, render it ripe for abuse.” At that point, their concern was that Trump could have used the Insurrection Act to interfere with the certification of the 2020 election results. The use case is now different, but the potential for overreach is the same. That is to say, while advocates may challenge Trump on whether the two key criteria for invoking the law have been met, the law gives presidents a wide berth — and the courts little power. “For all practical purposes, courts have been cut out of the process,” Goitein and Nunn write. The president’s emergency and other powers There are other potential authorities that Trump could invoke to surge military resources to his mass deportation plan. As Mirasola writes in Lawfare, Trump has a nonemergency power under federal law to request the assistance of state national guards in a federal military mission. Under the National Defense Authorization Act, that mission can be to assist US Customs and Border Protection in “ongoing efforts to secure the southern land border.” The law does not provide parameters limiting the kind of assistance that the military can provide, be that boots on the ground at the border or intelligence analysis support. Emergency powers could be helpful in creating the infrastructure needed for mass deportations. Stephen Miller, one of Trump’s key immigration advisers, told the New York Times in November 2023 that a second Trump administration would construct “vast holding facilities that would function as staging centers” for immigrants facing deportation. Mirasola writes that, to do so, Trump could invoke federal law allowing the secretary of defense to “undertake military construction projects … not otherwise authorized by law that are necessary to support” the armed forces in a national emergency.  If Trump declares a national emergency with respect to immigration, that law would essentially allow him to bypass the need for congressional approval to get the funds he needs to construct these holding facilities. He previously used the same law to try to get funding for his border wall during his first term. Whether he could do so was never settled.  Pro-immigration advocates challenged the use of that law to fund the border wall in Trump’s first term. Their years-long litigation over the border wall became moot when President Joe Biden took office, but they were not expected to win if the issue had come before the Supreme Court. Advocates could again mount a legal challenge, but they may only succeed in delaying the construction of the facilities. However, pro-immigration advocates might have a stronger case if they file lawsuits over the conditions in these yet-to-be built holding facilities and over potential violations of civil liberties for immigrants subject to mass deportations. Those might involve, for example, violations of their constitutional right to due process. That sort of challenge, over inhumane detention conditions previously seen in CBP facilities (including a lack of access to basic hygiene products and a lack of food, water, and basic medical care) was successfully made during the first Trump administration.  Immigrants might also file suits arguing their constitutional protections against unlawful searches were violated: Doris Meissner, senior fellow and director of the US Immigration Policy Program at the Migration Policy Institute, said mass deportations of the scale Trump is imagining would likely involve “violations of people’s civil rights, profiling, all of those kinds of harms that poor policing brings about.”  That will present a key test for the courts, Michael Waldman, president and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, said in a statement: “Will [the courts] use their power to enforce long-standing protections for individuals? Will they uphold the rule of law? Or will they bow to political pressure and allow the executive to expand its already ample power?”

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) speaks to reporters as she heads to a House Republican Caucus meeting on Capitol Hill on November 19, 2024, in Washington, DC. | Andrew Harnik/Getty Images Congress member-elect Sarah McBride became the first openly trans person ever elected to the House this November, marking a historic milestone for the body. Her arrival, however, is being met with a targeted — and anti-trans — attack by Republicans in Congress that rejects the existence of trans people. On Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson announced that he is barring trans women from women’s bathrooms in the Capitol, following a proposal from South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace (R) to do just that. “I want to make sure that no men are in women’s private spaces, and it’s not going to end here,” Mace told reporters on Tuesday. “This kind of thing should be banned.” When asked if the action was in response to McBride coming to Congress, Mace was clear, noting, “Yes and absolutely and then some.” Mace’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and Johnson’s office pointed to statements he’s made about his belief in treating everyone “with dignity.” The new rule is the latest extension of ugly attacks Republicans have levied on trans people during the recent campaign cycle and in the past few years. Dozens of states have introduced anti-trans bills that restrict children’s access to gender-affirming care, that limit athletes to playing on sports teams that match the sex they were assigned at birth, and that prevent trans women from using women’s bathrooms. All of these policies are based on — and advance — a rejection of the idea that trans women are women. As Vox’s Aja Romano has explained, Republicans have used their focus on this subject to rally their base against a “common enemy,” framing trans people as threats, including to other women’s safety in bathrooms. A 2018 UCLA study on the issue found no evidence that trans people using bathrooms that match their gender identity has increased safety risks, but that data has not changed GOP rhetoric. Instead, the GOP has kept investing in anti-trans attacks and channeling more harm toward trans individuals, who are already the disproportionate subjects of violence and who already experience high rates of self-harm. Now, House Republicans’ push highlights how central such ideas have become to the GOP agenda — and how open they are to singling out a colleague to prove a point. Capitol Hill’s new, anti-trans bathroom policy, briefly explained Because the speaker of the House has wide-ranging jurisdiction over facilities in the House, Johnson has significant say in imposing rules like the new bathroom regulation. In a press release he issued on Wednesday, Johnson said, “All single-sex facilities in the Capitol and House Office Buildings — such as restrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms — are reserved for individuals of that biological sex.” In practice, this means that trans women are not able to use women’s bathrooms. Johnson noted that each Congress member has a bathroom in their office, and there are also unisex bathrooms available in the Capitol that could theoretically serve as an alternative. “Women deserve women’s only spaces,” he said in a statement. In addition to discriminating against McBride, the rule poses serious practical obstacles: The Capitol complex is a massive set of buildings, and lawmakers are often dashing from the main chamber to committee meetings to other events. By depriving McBride of access to the women’s room, the policy is effectively asking her to run back to her office, which is located in a separate building, use the men’s restroom, or find a unisex bathroom. Limiting a member’s access to bathrooms simply makes their job much harder and more inconvenient. The Hill’s new bathroom rules are part of broader Republican anti-trans attacks McBride responded to Mace’s initial proposal in a post on X on Tuesday, calling it “a blatant attempt from far right-wing extremists to distract from the fact that they have no real solutions to what Americans are facing.” “We should be focused on bringing down the cost of housing, health care, and child care, not manufacturing culture wars,” she added. In a post on Wednesday, McBride reiterated this message and said that while she’ll abide by Johnson’s rule, she found this whole fight to be a diversion from other policy concerns. I’m not here to fight about bathrooms. I’m here to fight for Delawareans and to bring down costs facing families. pic.twitter.com/bCuv7pIZBY— Sarah McBride (@SarahEMcBride) November 20, 2024 Republicans have made anti-trans policy a focus on par with the sorts of economic concerns McBride highlighted. During the 2024 campaign, President-elect Donald Trump invested millions in ads criticizing Vice President Kamala Harris’s past support for funding gender-affirming care for incarcerated people. And it wasn’t just Trump: Republicans and their allies spent at least $215 million on anti-trans ads last cycle. Those ads appear to have resonated with some swing voters, and the GOP now seems further emboldened when it comes to going after trans people. Ahead of the election, as Vox’s Nicole Narea and Fabiola Cineas wrote, there was an explosion of anti-trans bills in state legislatures in 2023, with at least 19 states approving such laws. As Narea and Cineas explained, those bills were fueled in part by right-wing evangelical members of the Republican base (and by lawmaker attempts to pander to that faction). But more recent actions — from the election ads to Johnson’s new rule — show an attempt to take anti-trans policy into the mainstream. Overall, Republicans’ actions signal that they plan to double down on the anti-trans culture war in the years to come.

Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo in Wicked, a movie based on a musical based on a movie and a book. | Universal/Wicked Welcome to Know-It-All. In the age of intellectual property grabs, docudramas, and so very many sequels, it can be difficult to find a way into the complicated worlds we see on screen. In this series, Vox experts explain what you need to know to get into the latest hot release. Like a friendship between a popular blonde princess and a dour lime-skinned outcast, the story of Wicked is a bit more complicated than it looks.  Wicked is billed as the “true story” of Glinda the Good and the Wicked Witch of the West, the very famous, very what-you-see-is-what-you-get witches from The Wizard of Oz. It’s based on a well-loved, very catchy Broadway musical that’s been around for 20-plus years. It also stars pop queen Ariana Grande and powerhouse Cynthia Erivo, and the movie’s very expansive, very expensive marketing campaign seemed determined to forever alter the way we think about pink and green. Wicked is everywhere. Surely it can’t be that impenetrable!  But did you know that the Broadway musical was based on Gregory Maguire’s revisionist novels which were, in turn, inspired by L. Frank Baum’s beloved series of over a dozen books about Oz? And that a major plot in the novels involves sentient, talking animals that love sonnets and science? Or that Wicked is really a political thriller about corrupt government officials scapegoating a minority and creating an enemy of the state? Beneath the movie’s airy aesthetics and its bubblegum pop moments is a broiling, chaotic tale of power, greed, and discrimination. The more you know about Wicked, the weirder and weirder it gets.  With that in mind, I asked my colleague Constance Grady to help us navigate the world of Wicked and Oz. Grady has read Gregory Maguire’s original novel multiple times, the Baum novels as a child, seen the Broadway production, and like me, saw the movie this week. We discussed everything from anti-goat fascism, to Grande’s delicious performance, to what from the book didn’t make it into the adaptations. Here’s what you need to know about the movie musical of the moment.  Do I have this correct? Wicked is a movie musical adaptation of the Tony-winning Broadway show Wicked which is an adaptation of the novel Wicked which is a retelling of The Wizard of Oz.  You’re right, but there’s another adaptation layer in there. All those layers.  The whole thing starts with the L. Frank Baum children’s novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which he published in 1900. Baum’s book was so successful that it was almost immediately adapted into a Broadway musical of its own (now largely forgotten) and an entire franchise worth of sequels, 13 of which Baum wrote himself. Then in 1939 we got the most famous and, for most people, canonical version of the story: The Wizard of Oz, the Judy Garland film based on the Baum novel.  The first Wicked was Gregory Maguire’s novel, first published in 1995 as Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. Maguire’s gimmick was to take Margaret Hamilton’s cackling, green-skinned Wicked Witch of the West from the 1939 film — surely one of childhood’s scariest villains — and make her the beating heart of his novel. He renamed her Elphaba, a name suggested by the initials of L. Frank Baum. Wicked the musical came in 2003, with music from Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. It was a smash hit success when it came out, and it’s still running on Broadway now, 21 years later.  The musical was such a hit that Universal, which owns the rights, has had various versions of the film in development for a very long time now. Finally and at last, in 2021, Universal put director Jon M. Chu of Crazy Rich Asians on the task. Chu split the stage musical into two halves, with Wicked Part 1 to premiere in November 2024 and Wicked Part 2 set to come in 2025. And now here we are!  Do you have a favorite?  At different times, all of the Oz stories have been my favorites. I grew up on the 1939 movie like everyone else. When Dorothy opens the black-and-white door to her Kansas home and walks out into brilliant, Technicolor Oz? That’s what cinema was made for, baby!  When I was around 8 or 9 I came upon the L. Frank Baum novels, and I was tickled to find that they contained such an expansive and playful mythology. I gobbled up those books like candy. Then at around 11 years old, I read Wicked and was entranced by it: all that moral complexity, all the political intrigue, all those slippery, winding sentences.  When the musical came along, I immediately resented it for being a glitzier, simpler story than the book was — really boiled down to the complicated friendship between Elphaba and Glinda, set against the backdrop of the Wizard’s manipulations — but when I was 17 I saw it on Broadway and was overwhelmed by the sheer spectacle of it and the gleeful drive of the songs. When Elphaba started flying at the end of act one, I burst into tears.  To be fair to 17-year-old you, there is at least one person, if not 10 to 20 people bursting into tears at every performance when Elphaba defies gravity. It’s a spectacle. It’s monumental. It’s as important to Broadway as the chandelier coming down in Phantom of the Opera. God, it’s truly so good. For that moment, I even forgive Schwartz for writing the lyric “Nessa, Nessa, I’ve got something to confess-a.” Wicked is famously one of only six musicals I enjoy. And I feel like the movie sticks to the musical. How well do the musicals stick to the book?  The musical is very, very loosely based on Maguire’s book. What Gregory Maguire wanted to write was a really sophisticated allegorical exploration of the nature of evil itself and what might drive Elphaba to wickedness. As such, his Wicked is bleak, at times self-indulgently so. Maguire’s Elphaba is raised by missionaries in a Southern Gothic childhood right out of Flannery O’Connor. After she abandons both religion and schooling and is politically radicalized by the cause of Ozian Animal rights, she becomes a terrorist, complicit in multiple acts of violence against civilians. By the end, however much you might sympathize with Elphaba’s cause, you understand why people call her the wicked witch. Wicked: Part I (the official name of this movie) feels less like “wow, this lady is really wicked” and more like, “oh, she’s just misunderstood.” Maybe we haven’t gotten to the full terrorist part yet, but I can’t imagine Elphaba’s morality is ever going to be as ambiguous as the novel.   Absolutely. The Wicked of the stage show is a much sweeter and sillier version of the story. Schwartz and Holzman ditch as much of the religion and the politics as they possibly can to focus on the relationship between Elphaba and Glinda, the Good Witch of the North — or Galinda, as she originally calls herself.  Maguire imagined Glinda as Elphaba’s college roommate, and she’s key to Elphie’s college years, but he largely abandons her after Elphie drops out of school to go into politics. Schwartz and Holzman, however, make comic, superficial Glinda into the heart of the story. Perhaps in part to make room for the shift in focus, Elphaba’s misdeeds are significantly toned down, and as for Maguire’s dark, heartbreaking ending … let’s just say it gets, um, revised. The movie convinced me that Glinda is actually the splashier, better-written role. I’ve always envisioned Glinda as an SEC-coded mean girl — blonde, bubbly, a bit passive-aggressive rather than aggressive-aggressive. Grande gets us there, and seems to really understand what makes this character so surprisingly funny.  So buy or sell: Oscar nominee Ariana Grande? Oh man. I buy. This movie struggles a lot with its tone. It doesn’t know whether it wants to be as silly as the stage musical or as serious as the Maguire book, and as a result it ends up veering wildly around. The only element of this movie that never has this problem is Grande’s performance.  Grande nails it top to bottom. She makes spoiled, selfish Glinda so gleefully mean, so deliciously phony in all her virtue-signaling, that you want to laugh at her the way you would laugh at Regina George — and then she shows you Glinda’s tender, insecure heart, and you fall in love with her.  Grande has always had an uncanny knack for vocal mimicry, and here she pitches her speaking voice into something halfway between Judy Garland’s earnest Dorothy tones and the distinctive showbiz patter of Kristin Chenoweth, who originated the role of Glinda on Broadway. You wouldn’t think you could combine the two, but Grande does, and she makes it make sense. As for the singing — well, that kind of goes without saying, doesn’t it? She’s in phenomenal voice. Whatever happens with the Oscars race this year, I’ll know that Grande is the Academy Award nominee of my heart. Tonally, the movie goes from Legally Blonde to The Fugitive. The last 10 minutes are absolutely bonkers. What in the world? Yikes, right? For me, this tonal mismatch is the big flaw of the film, and I think it’s a byproduct of this very long and winding adaptation process.  When Schwartz and Holzman adapted Maguire’s Wicked, they stripped away as much of his rather baroque mythologizing as they could while still allowing the plot to make a modicum of sense. The vibe of this musical is generally: Why go on and on about the ontological differences between humans and animals if we could be singing fun bops about being popular? It doesn’t all have to be so serious all the time. In their version of the story, the Wizard’s plans are vague, but clearly evil, and Elphaba’s resistance to his regime is likewise vague, but clearly righteous. The Wizard’s main sin in the stage musical is that he is lying to his people to stoke up their fears and marshal support to his own side, because this musical hit Broadway in 2003, when George W. Bush was just about to invade Iraq. Other than that, we don’t know that much about why he’s so bad. We don’t really care, either. It all pretty much works if you just sit back in the theater and let the songs wash over you. Chu, however, takes Wicked very seriously indeed; so much so that he’s stretched out the musical’s 90-minute first act into a lugubrious two hours and 40 minutes, mostly by keeping the pacing slow and solemn. The side effect of moving so slowly, though, is that it puts a lot of pressure on the political subplot of this musical to not only make sense, but to be emotionally impactful. Unfortunately, all of the background that could make it work got left behind in Maguire’s novel.  Are we supposed to care this much about anti-animal fascism in the movie? Or the musical? Do the people who adapted Wicked care that much? Yeah, this is one of the big plotlines where the cracks in the adaptation show. It also makes for a kind of interesting timeline of how different authors have thought about Oz. One of the inconsistencies of L. Frank Baum’s Oz is that it’s a land where animals can talk and go on quests and be guests at dinner parties and so on — you’ll recall the Cowardly Lion — but also all the characters are constantly eating meat. It’s the kind of minor quirk in worldbuilding that a children’s book can skate right over, but it becomes weird and confusing in an adult novel. So when Maguire wrote Wicked, he imagined an Oz that distinguished between Animals, who are talking and intelligent beings who wear clothes and hold jobs and can be invited to dinner parties, and animals in lowercase, who are non-sentient and can be killed or treated as chattel. In Maguire’s Oz, the Wizard consolidates his power in part by making the Animals into a scapegoat race.  Emphasis, quite literally, on “goat.”  Over the course of the novel, we see them go from full citizens to living under restrictions to slaves who are occasionally cooked and eaten. Elphaba is radicalized into terrorism when her favorite college professor, the Goat and Animal rights agitator Doctor Dillamond, is assassinated by the government.  When Schwartz and Holzman got their hands on the story, they were transforming it once again into a children’s tale, so they didn’t particularly have time for this piece of worldbuilding. They ditched the distinction between Animal and animal, so that Doctor Dillamond becomes a guy in a silly goat costume who exists to nudge Elphaba into realizing that the Wizard might not have her best interests at heart. It would be a stretch to think that the stage musical really wants the audience to care about animals in general or Doctor Dillamond in particular. Chu, characteristically, seems to want to give the animal plotline more gravitas. He makes Dillamond an eerily photorealistic CGI goat who appears in one of Elphaba’s visions shivering and cringing in a cage, in a dark foretelling of the Wizard’s eventual goals. Under Chu’s solemn and slightly heavy-handed touch, you can feel how important the animal rights plotline is to Elphaba’s character arc. But the part of Maguire’s novel that made you care about the animals, and about Elphaba’s commitment to their freedom, was jettisoned long ago. It’s an uneasy balance. This contradiction is part of why, I think, Grande’s Glinda feels so much like a breath of fresh air whenever she appears on screen. The part of this story that Schwartz and Holzman cared about was Glinda and Elphaba, so that’s the part of the story architecture that remains rock solid. No matter what happens, you can’t not root for their friendship. Are we going to get more of that in Wicked: Part II? Are people going to want to see the second half of this musical if it’s all about authoritarianism?  I am very curious to see how Chu handles Wicked: Part II, because the second act of Wicked is famously much worse than the first half. All the iconic songs are over by then (although personally, I quite like “No Good Deed”), the storytelling gets bogged down in mythology that never becomes either clear or interesting, and Glinda and Elphaba spend most of the act in separate places, effectively depriving the show of its strongest dynamic for long stretches of stage time. In the stage show, you’re generally invested enough in the characters on the strength of the first half to sit through the second half with minimal complaints, but for that act two to hold its own for a full movie? Tricky! As for the anti-animal fascism, though, we can all breathe easy. As originally staged, Wicked’s act two focuses on the animal rights plotline for exactly as long as it takes to hook Elphaba up with her iconic flying monkeys and not a single second longer. We’ll see if Chu keeps it that way.

An oil pump jack on the Great Plains, southeastern Wyoming. | Marli Miller/UCG/Universal Images Group/Getty Images During his campaign, President-elect Donald Trump had a pointed tagline for his energy policy: “Drill, baby, drill.” That statement is emblematic of where Trump is poised to focus his efforts in a second term: He’s pledged US “energy dominance” and everything from “new pipelines” to “new refiners” that amp up fossil fuel production.  This approach marks a stark shift from the Biden administration’s and puts the US’s emphasis more heavily on producing oil and gas than on attempting a transition to clean energy sources. In addition to touting the need to boost fossil fuels, Trump has disparaged subsidies for clean energy investments and called for “terminat[ing]” the funds that were allocated for those subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act. His stance ignores the role that burning fossil fuels has played in climate change and could cause considerable harm to US efforts to address the issue.  Several of his nominations are indicative of these goals. He’s chosen oil industry executive Chris Wright — a fracking evangelist — to head up the Department of Energy. He’s named North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum — who connected Trump to oil executive donors during the campaign — as the lead for the Interior Department and as an “energy czar.” He’s also tapped former Rep. Lee Zeldin — who’s emphasized his commitment to deregulation — as his chief of the Environmental Protection Agency.  There’s only so much the administration can control, however. Although Trump can take notable steps to try to increase fossil fuel production, actual upticks in oil and gas extraction will depend heavily on the private sector and the economics of the industry.  Still, while Trump faces some constraints, he has significant policy levers he can pull to encourage production of fossil fuels. Wright, Burgum, and Zeldin have also signaled they’re prepared to execute on the president-elect’s vision, including changes to drilling on public lands and speedier permitting for oil and gas projects.  “President Trump and his energy team — Mr. Burgum, Mr. Wright, Mr. Zeldin — can go to considerable lengths to make expanded production attractive and relatively easy,” Barry Rabe, a University of Michigan environmental policy professor, told Vox.  How Trump could increase fossil fuel production Trump has two key avenues he can utilize to boost fossil fuel production. One, he can open up more public lands and waters for exploration, development, and extraction. Two, he can ease the regulatory processes that govern fossil fuel work. Trump could offer more oil and gas leases on public lands As President, Trump will oversee the Interior Department, which includes the Bureau of Land Management as well as the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, both of which manage a substantial fraction of the country’s public lands and waters. He’ll also oversee the Agriculture Department, which contains the Forest Service, another body that has oversight of some public lands.  The Bureaus of Land Management and Ocean Energy Management, as well as the Forest Service, are the three main entities that issue oil and gas leases on public spaces. These leases effectively allow fossil fuel companies to rent parcels of public land from the federal government so they can extract resources from these areas. Once land is designated as available for lease, leases are typically auctioned off to the highest bidder. Those bureaus, and the Forest Service, have major discretion to determine if more leases can be issued and where. But the president can issue an executive order instructing them to prioritize the subject: Trump could call on agencies to make identifying suitable public lands a top agenda item, for example.  “If you have an administration that says we want everything that could be leased to be leased, there’s a lot of discretion to be able to do that,” says Stan Meiburg, the executive director of the Center for Environment and Sustainability at Wake Forest University.  Trump’s first term, during which he also made moves to expand the acreage of public lands available for oil and gas drilling, is likely a sign of what’s to come. Per a study from Science, he mounted one of the largest reductions in protected public lands in history, rolling back the acreage of Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument to allow for additional oil and gas exploration in these places. Data from the Bureau of Land Management shows that there was an increase in total acres offered for oil and gas leases during Trump’s first term compared to President Barack Obama’s second term and Biden’s current term.  Though Trump could again expand the number of leases available, it’s important to note that won’t necessarily translate to more production. Leases are subject to environmental rules. That means new leases could well be challenged in court for potential violations of the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, or other federal laws.  Another factor could limit production too: corporate interest. Companies may not be interested in these new leases since many of the parcels might not be home to fossil fuels. And businesses could also lease the land but fail to utilize it.  The White House could make expanding production easier for the private sector The second avenue Trump could pursue is rolling back regulations to make fossil fuel production easier and faster for the private sector. Much of this will involve undoing policies the Biden administration put in place — like the pause on permits for liquefied natural gas exports — and expediting federal approvals for oil- and gas-related projects.  Trump could use the executive branch’s authority to rescind certain proposals. For other rules, the White House could need Congress’s help. By utilizing what’s known as the Congressional Review Act, Congress has the ability to roll back rules that agencies have recently put in place. In other cases, it might need to pass new legislation: The EPA has just begun imposing a methane fee on oil and gas companies, and because that fee was included in the Inflation Reduction Act, it would need an act of Congress to undo. Under it, these businesses must curb their methane emissions or suffer a financial penalty.  Repealing policies like the methane fee and the natural gas export permit pause would curb the restrictions oil and gas companies currently face, creating more opportunities to export products abroad and making fossil fuel production less costly.  Another area where both the administration and Congress have power to ease regulation is on the issue of permitting reform. Currently, any oil and gas project — such as building a new pipeline — must go through many layers of approval by federal agencies like the EPA. (Many clean energy infrastructure projects also need to go through this process.) For these projects, companies have to obtain a hefty number of permits, slowing their ability to execute on these plans.  The Biden administration managed to outstrip the pace at which the Trump administration issued permits for drilling on public lands. Under Trump, federal agencies could try to further streamline such approvals, says Mark Squillace, a University of Colorado-Boulder Law School professor and former staffer at the Interior Department. “We certainly could see some efforts to pull back on environmental standards, to make it easier to permit different kinds of facilities,” Squillace told Vox.  Trump could also take executive action to direct agencies to cut as many unnecessary steps as possible and to simplify their processes. More expansive permitting reforms, like policies that put firm limits on the time needed for legal challenges and federal approvals of a project, would need the backing of Congress, however, and have had bipartisan support in the past. The combination of loosening restrictions currently placed on oil and gas companies and making new projects easier to pursue all tie back to Trump’s pledge to “slash the red tape” on the industry.  As is the case with expanding access to public lands, it’s not clear that these policy changes will result in more fossil fuel production since much of that will depend on how private companies respond. Trump can make production a little easier, but the market for fossil fuels is also a factor During the Biden administration, the US produced more oil and gas than any country in the world. Companies’ incentives to increase production will depend on whether they think it’s financially sound for them. As more countries — including the US — have invested in clean energy sources, there is more competition in the market, which could factor in to whether businesses see it as a smart move to dial up their fossil fuel output if given the chance. “As we watch a movement toward more solar and wind development, there is less demand for the oil and gas products that we’ve been producing,” says Squillace.  Though the administration has stressed that it’s all-in on fossil fuels, it’s not evident that it can turn away from clean energy investments to the degree that Trump has urged. Defunding the subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act, for instance, would prompt legal challenges, short of an actual repeal by Congress.  The administration could well take some contradictory stances, too. Although Trump has long denigrated energy sources like offshore wind and subsidies for electric vehicles, his allies include Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who’s the head of an EV company. Musk is among the tech leaders who’ve attained notable influence in the administration and who also has deep ties with the government due to his role leading SpaceX.  All of this means that, ultimately, even though Trump will have the power to try making good on this campaign pledge, it may not work out the way he promised. 

Donald Trump with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on October 23, 2024, in Duluth, Georgia. | Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images There is not one contradiction at the heart of the incoming Trump administration’s political project. There are two. The first centers on economic policy — or, more fundamentally, the role of government itself. One camp, exemplified by Elon Musk and traditional big business, sees Trumpism as a celebration of individual greatness and unfettered capitalism. The second camp, including economic nationalists and RFK Jr.’s crunchy hippy types, believes Trumpism has a mandate to try to transform American society, including by attacking the practices of large corporations that do not fit their nationalist vision. The second centers on foreign policy — or, more fundamentally, the purpose of America in the world. One camp, exemplified by Secretary of State pick Marco Rubio, sees the United States as the world’s rightful leader, one that has not only a right but an obligation to assert its will across the globe. Another camp, exemplified by Secretary of Defense pick Pete Hegseth, sees the United States as a more ordinary country whose interests are served by being less involved in other countries’ issues like the Ukraine war, but being more violently involved when core American interests are at stake. Of course, there are areas of overlap between these groups. Both sides of the role-of-government divide believe that America will be well-served by a mass deportation campaign; both sides of the foreign policy divide support aggressively confronting China and waging a global war on jihadist groups like ISIS. Yet these overlaps are limited and partial points of convergence between deeply divided ideological currents. The real connective tissue between the various Trump 2.0 factions is disdain for the cultural left and the “deep state” in Washington. The anti-left culture war has become, more or less, the central ideological principle of the modern Republican Party. On the campaign trail, it’s easy for Trump’s diverse set of allies to join together based on this shared animosity. But when governing, the administration will be forced to make choices in areas where its leaders disagree at a fundamental level, leading not only to internal conflict but potentially even policy chaos. The Trump coalition’s contradictions, explained Every administration has its internal disagreements. Typically, however, those disputes take place within a relatively narrow band: The political party they hail from is mostly clear on what it stands for and why. The Biden administration, for example, has generally agreed on a more redistributionist economic policy, even if certain policy issues, like how large the post-Covid stimulus should be, were subjects of major internal debate. The Trump-dominated GOP, by contrast, is ideologically adrift. Its nominal ideology is Trumpism, but Trumpism has little in the way of a defined ideological core. Its core tenets, total personal fealty to Trump and a generalized illiberal nationalism, are flexible, admitting of a wide band of different policy visions on a host of different issues. In the first Trump administration, the main fight was over just how much deference Trumpist impulses deserved. You had Trump in the Oval Office, but he was surrounded by establishment figures like Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and chief of staff John Kelly, who saw their job as curbing his worst impulses. In the second Trump administration, the situation will be very different. The Mattis and Kelly types have either been purged from the party or forced to bend the knee. The question now is not whether Trumpism is leading the party, but what Trumpism actually stands for.  One way to think about the divides on this question is which part of the classic “make America great again” slogan the various camps emphasize: America or greatness. When it comes to domestic policy, the “greatness” side includes folks like Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and traditional Republican business elites. They see the attack on “the deep state” as, in part, a war on government red tape that stands in the way of progress, innovation, and the entrepreneurial spirit. Trump, for them, is proof that one man can change the world if left to his own devices. They aim to unleash similar spirits across the country and, non-coincidentally, advance their own business interests in the process.  The “America” camp, by contrast, is more inclined to emphasize collective solutions to America’s collective problems. The chief advocates of mass deportations and across-the-board tariffs, like Steven Miller and Peter Navarro, are almost by definition not free marketeers. JD Vance aims to rebuild America along more conservative Christian lines, including by curbing the power of secular big business when he believes it threatens the organic unity of American society properly conceived. RFK Jr. and the “make American healthy again” movement see the war on government not as a campaign to shrink government per se, but rather to redirect its energies toward the problems they think really matter (vaccines, fluoridated water, and other such crank health concerns). The foreign policy divide falls along similar lines. People like Rubio and national security adviser pick Michael Waltz fall on the “greatness” side. They believe that the United States is destined to lead the world and ought to work to ensure that it remains safely atop the global power hierarchy. Challengers to the existing American-led order like Russia and especially China must be aggressively confronted, and hostile dictatorships like Iran must be brought in line by force if necessary. The American continents must be dominated, Monroe-doctrine style, advocating a far more aggressive policy toward Latin American leftist dictatorships like Venezuela and Cuba (as Rubio did in Trump’s first term). The other camp, including Hegseth and director of national intelligence pick Tulsi Gabbard, espouses a kind of narrower nationalism. Though they believe in American military strength, they care far less about aggressively protecting the existing political order. If Russia wishes to seize part of Ukraine, they suggest, that’s not really an American concern. The United States should instead be preoccupied with killing its enemies, advancing its narrowly construed interests, and protecting its border — up to and including launching a war in Mexico to battle drug cartels and human traffickers. I don’t mean to say that these camps are fundamentally opposed. They are part of the same administration and share many of their boss’s core insights and enemies. They all agree to “make America great again” as a slogan but disagree on which parts of it to emphasize. In practice, this might lead to a whole host of predictable and significant conflicts inside the administration. When RFK Jr. moves to put new regulatory barriers in the way of pharmaceutical research, will Big Pharma and biotech executive Vivek Ramaswamy try to stop him? When billionaires suggest financing the extension of Trump tax cuts by cutting the social safety net, will Christian populist JD Vance stand up for the meek? When Marco Rubio pushes for regime change in Venezuela, will alleged anti-imperialist Tulsi Gabbard try to make him back off? None of these conflicts are hypothetical. Each is eminently predictable based on what the personalities involved have done in the past and promise to do in the future. If left unresolved, they threaten to create a kind of policy incoherence, with different aspects of the US government working at direct odds with each other, depending on who they answer to.  If and when Trump steps in to resolve them, will he do so consistently? Will he say one thing publicly and do another privately, as so often happened in his first term? Or will the resolution so consistently favor one group over another that we can finally start saying Trumpism has a little more meat on its ideological bones? There is only one honest answer: We don’t know. But we can be sure the stakes are high for the Republican Party, the country, and most likely the entire world. This story was adapted from the On the Right newsletter. New editions drop every Wednesday. Sign up here.

Donald Trump visits the Economic Club of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois, last month. Some business leaders worry his economic plans will fuel inflation. | Christopher Dilts/Bloomberg via Getty Images Long before he officially pursued the presidency, Donald Trump railed against US trade deals. In interviews dating back to the 1980s, he told journalists that deals that benefited Asian and Middle Eastern trading partners consistently “ripped off” the US.  Over decades, that charge may have turned into a winning election strategy. As a first-term president and in his 2024 campaign, Trump argued that a lopsided global trading system is not only responsible for a deficit between the US and China, but also behind a decline in American manufacturing and jobs.  Now, Trump has made a second-term promise to raise tariffs — the taxes on imported goods that must be paid when they enter the US — even higher on China and other countries, while resurrecting those jobs.  This story was first featured in the Today, Explained newsletter Understand the world with a daily explainer plus the most compelling stories of the day. Sign up here. But footwear, apparel, and auto-part companies say they expect to pass the cost of such tariffs on to American consumers. Yale University’s Budget Lab projects that Trump’s proposed tariffs would cost the average American household up to $7,600 a year with initial price hikes as high as 5 percent. Those higher costs could potentially backfire on the president-elect’s campaign promise to make inflation “vanish completely.” Trump’s trade strategy is one that Greg Ip, chief economics commentator at the Wall Street Journal, says is a major departure from almost 80 years of US policy. In a conversation with Noel King, co-host of the Today, Explained podcast, Ip described how it might play out and have massive implications for the global economy.  Below is an excerpt of their conversation, edited for length and clarity. There’s much more in the full podcast, so listen to Today, Explained wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Pandora. Noel King Trade is a reality of economic life these days. What is Trump’s theory on it and how does it differ from his predecessors?  Greg Ip In the United States, since the 1940s at least, there’s been a bipartisan consensus that more trade is good. And this came from a bipartisan view that this made our workers more productive, because they had bigger markets to sell into. It benefited our consumers because they got cheaper goods and a greater variety of goods. And it was also good for the US geopolitically because it helped us increase our economic bonds to countries that thought the same way we did, politically.  Trump comes along and he argues: This entire regime has been much more to the advantage of other countries than it has been to the United States. Countries like Japan and then Germany and now China have taken advantage of the United States’s fixation on free trade to increase their trade surplus with the US, sell us lots of manufactured goods, and not buy very much from the United States. So his entire mission, from his first term, and now into this one, is to reverse that relationship and, he hopes, force those countries to buy more from the US, and Americans to buy more from each other instead of from importers. That’s the theory, anyway.  Noel King Donald Trump had a chance to do all of this from 2016 to 2020 when he was in office. What did he do?  Greg Ip He did raise tariffs, for example, in a series of rounds of tariff increases. He imposed tariffs on a wide range of products from China. And this was pursuant to a long-running case that complained that China was just systematically unfair to the United States, stealing our technology and putting up barriers to US exports to China. Then he imposed a variety of more bespoke tariffs on particular products. Noel King So at the end of that first term … had Donald Trump gotten what he wanted? Had his plan worked?  Greg Ip If the test of Donald Trump’s trade policy was a smaller trade deficit, then no, he didn’t really achieve what he wanted. The trade deficit when he left office was larger in dollar terms than when he entered office.  Did some manufacturing jobs come back? Possibly. But there also appear to have been some costs. There were industries that had to pay more for their inputs because of tariffs, and they lost sales and possibly jobs. And some of our trading partners retaliated.  Our trade deficit with China did begin to shrink. At the same time, though, you saw our trade deficit with Mexico and Vietnam grow. And what that told us is that some businesses responded to Trump’s tariffs not necessarily by bringing production back to the United States, but by moving it to another country — out of China, into Vietnam, into Mexico — that were not quite as affected by the tariffs.  Noel King What are Donald Trump’s plans for a second term?  Greg Ip He wants to, number one, come down even harder on China. Instead of just putting tariffs on about half of China’s imports, he’s talked about a tariff on all Chinese imports of as much as 60 percent. And instead of sparing traditional US allies, he wants to impose an across-the-board tariff on everybody, of say, 10 to 20 percent.  But there’s a very big caveat to this, which is that we don’t really know if Trump will end up doing exactly what he’s talked about.  We know that Trump likes tariffs, but we also know that Trump likes to make deals. So, as in his first term, we might see that the threat of tariffs is primarily a leverage instrument — you know, a negotiating chip — in which he goes to countries that he thinks treat the United States unfairly and says, “Here are some things we want you to do differently. And if you do as we ask, then we won’t hit you with the tariffs that I’ve talked about.” Noel King How close can Donald Trump come to really and truly changing the way the world does trade? Greg Ip It’s possible that Trump presses ahead with exactly what he said, raises tariffs on everybody, and then all those countries retaliate. They export less to us, we export less to them, trade shrinks, and everybody is worse off. There’s another possibility here, which is that a lot of folks in the United States and in other countries say, “You know, he’s right. The trading system was fundamentally good, but it went off the rails at some point. We need to get together. We need to remake that thing.” So I think another possibility is that we end up a few years from now with a different trading system, and perhaps a more realistic view of how China, above all — but some other countries, [too] — have not been playing by the rules. But I think, as we learned from his first term, one thing with Donald Trump — you can be sure of this — is that you should expect the unexpected.

Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth speaks at a news conference in February in support of IVF access. | Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images Since the fall of Roe v. Wade, Democratic lawmakers and reproductive rights advocates have maintained a clear strategy: Win a more progressive Democratic trifecta in 2024, eliminate the Senate filibuster, and pass comprehensive federal protections. When reporters asked about contingency plans — particularly given polls suggesting full Democratic control was unlikely — such questions were dismissed, cast as premature or defeatist.  Now, with Donald Trump’s return to power and Republicans set to control Congress, that strategy is drawing fresh questions. The GOP has signaled some openness to compromise: While campaigning, Trump said he supported abortion exceptions in cases of “rape, incest, and protecting the life of the mother,” and he promised to mandate insurance coverage for in vitro fertilization (IVF). Several Republican lawmakers have backed their own fertility treatment bills. Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) backed a Democratic-led IVF measure and speaks openly about his family’s consideration of the procedure. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) has pushed legislation to expand over-the-counter contraception. But reproductive rights organizations are doubtful. “We are not willing to compromise when it comes to our ability to make decisions about our bodies, lives and future,” Gretchen Borchelt, of the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), said on a press call the day after the election. “What is the compromise that would provide relief for Amber Nicole Thurman’s family who’s grieving her every single day?” added NWLC’s president Fatima Goss Graves, referring to a patient who died from sepsis after being denied care. Vox asked six major advocacy groups if they would consider pushing for new federal protections under a Republican-led Congress, be it for IVF, birth control or abortion. Most avoided giving a direct answer, instead directing the conversation to Republican accountability and the harm caused by abortion bans. The stance reflects a deeper calculation: that accepting anything less than people deserve — meaning access to the full spectrum of reproductive health care for any reason — would legitimize restrictions and undermine the broader fight for bodily autonomy. When asked about pursuing partial protections versus holding out for more Democrats, groups choose waiting.  “We are really looking at this from a defensive position,” said Ryan Stitzlein, the vice president of political and government relations at Reproductive Freedom for All, the group formerly known as NARAL. “We read Project 2025, we are very familiar with the folks in leadership on the Republican side … and are preparing for them to levy attacks on reproductive freedom at all levels of government on the administrative side.”  Polling suggests there may be political opportunities Despite the Biden era’s surprising bipartisan deals on thorny issues from gun control to climate change, there were never similar attempts to forge bipartisan compromise on reproductive rights. When a small group of Republican and Democratic senators introduced legislation in 2022 to codify elements of Roe, abortion rights groups quickly rejected the idea, arguing in part that it did not go far enough. Even on issues like IVF and birth control, where Republican support seemed possible and anti-abortion groups held less sway, there were no serious efforts to find common ground.  To be sure, while many Republicans have sought to reassure voters that they support IVF, their voting record thus far tells a different story. Many of those same lawmakers co-sponsored the Life at Conception Act, which could severely restrict fertility treatments by granting legal personhood from the moment of conception. Republicans have largely voted against Democratic IVF legislation, while claiming they’d support narrower fertility treatment bills and criticizing Democrats for not being open to working on amendments. Still, polling suggests potential political opportunities. About 80 percent of voters say protecting contraception access is “deeply important” to them, and 72 percent of Republican voters had a favorable view of birth control. IVF is even more popular: 86 percent of Americans think it should be legal, including 78 percent of self-identified “pro-life advocates” and 83 percent of evangelical Christians. Americans’ support for abortion rights has intensified since the fall of Roe, and this reality shaped some Republicans’ rhetoric on the campaign trail. Newly elected Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Dave McCormick ran on a platform of fighting restrictions on fertility treatments and proposing a $15,000 tax credit for IVF. Some policy strategists have suggested that, regardless of Republican sincerity, Democrats and abortion rights groups might benefit from pushing votes on new IVF and birth control bills, even if they offer limited protections or codify certain provisions that advocates oppose. Such moves could either win new concrete protections or expose Republican resistance. But Democratic leadership and abortion rights groups for now seem uninterested in this approach, preferring to maintain pressure for comprehensively restoring rights.  “We haven’t seen a genuine effort from Republicans that they engage in this conversation,” Stitzlein said. “We’ve seen them propose bills to try to save face in response to Dobbs and the Alabama IVF ruling.” Should Democrats keep their red line on abortion exceptions? The political math around abortion exceptions would seem straightforward. Trump ostensibly supports them. Most Americans, including many Republicans, believe abortion should be legal in cases of rape, incest, and threats to the parent’s life. And women are being demonstrably harmed by the lack of workable exceptions in state bans today. One recent study estimated that more than 3 million women in the US will experience a pregnancy from rape in their lifetime. Yet when asked whether they would consider seeking federal protections for abortion exceptions during Republican control as a harm reduction measure, established advocacy groups showed no interest, pointing to patients like Kate Cox and Amanda Zurawski who almost lost their lives or fertility despite state bans with exceptions. “As we are seeing across the country, exceptions often don’t work in practice, so people should not take comfort in those or rely on them,” Rachana Desai Martin, chief government and external relations officer at the Center for Reproductive Rights, told Vox. This position stems from a core belief: that any engagement with exceptions would validate the broader framework of restrictions. Some doctors on the ground in states with restrictive bans have bemoaned the lack of support they’ve received for carving out exceptions. “I worry that reproductive rights advocates may be digging into untenable positions and failing to listen to those affected most by the current reality,” wrote one maternal-fetal medicine physician in Tennessee.  On the question of codifying emergency medical protections, Planned Parenthood Action Fund stressed in an email that, “narrow health exceptions or those that focus only on emergencies are a disservice to patients and their health care providers because every pregnancy is unique.”  The position is particularly notable given these same groups’ strong defense of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) at the Supreme Court this year. The groups argued that EMTALA — which requires hospitals to provide “stabilizing treatment,” including emergency abortion care — represents a crucial federal protection for women in medical crises. Yet when asked about codifying the Biden administration’s interpretation of EMTALA or similar protections through legislation, the groups demurred. Internationally, exceptions have served as imperfect stepping stones to broader rights. Colombia’s journey from total ban to full decriminalization began with three abortion exceptions in 2006 — for health risks, fatal fetal conditions, and rape. Over 16 years, advocates used these flawed measures to help build public support and legal precedent for expanding access, ultimately leading to decriminalizing the procedure up to 24 weeks in 2022. India and Spain followed similar trajectories. India’s 1971 Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act initially permitted abortion only for specific circumstances like health risks and rape. Advocates used this limited framework to gradually build broader rights — first emphasizing public health arguments around unsafe abortions, then expanding to gender equality concerns. This incremental approach led to significant expansions in 2021 and 2022, including extended gestational limits and broader access for unmarried women. Spain’s path from its restrictive 1985 law to its 2010 legalization up to 14 weeks followed a similar pattern, with advocates particularly leveraging Spain’s mental health exception to create de facto broad access. These tensions — between principle and pragmatism, between long-term strategy and immediate needs — have taken on new urgency as patients in the US encounter the limitations of state-level abortion exceptions. In Louisiana, which has exceptions for protecting life, health, and fatal fetal conditions, almost no legal abortions have been reported since its ban took effect. Doctors say ambiguous laws and criminal penalties make them unwilling to test the rules.  But rather than pursue clearer federal standards around exceptions, advocacy groups are betting on abortion rights becoming more prominent as restrictions continue.  “Americans will continue waking up to stories of women who died preventable deaths because they were denied access to essential health care and voters will continue to see these bans wreak havoc on their families and communities,” declared a post-election strategy memo from Emily’s List, National Women’s Law Center Action Fund, Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and Reproductive Freedom for All. “With anti-abortion politicians in power, abortion rights will only grow in salience for voters in elections to come.” Working with Republicans on even limited protections could also undercut the narrative of GOP extremism — a message advocacy groups see as crucial for winning in 2026 and 2028. A high-stakes political bet Despite abortion rights proving less galvanizing in the most recent election than Democrats had hoped, reproductive rights groups are betting that voter attitudes will shift as restrictions continue. Currently, 28 million women, plus more trans and nonbinary people of reproductive age, live in states with abortion bans. “We have no interest in shrinking our vision,” Kimberly Inez McGuire, executive director of Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity, said, “but the politicians who will soon govern a majority pro-abortion country would do well to expand theirs.” In an interview with Vox, Democratic Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota said she will work with anyone in Congress who wants to collaborate in good-faith to protect abortion rights, but stressed that as Democrats move into the minority, “the onus will be on Republicans” to come to the table and negotiate with them in a serious way. Asked about potential deal-breakers, Smith declined to discuss specific provisions in the abstract, saying she would wait to see complete proposals. Smith’s view captured the movement’s current predicament: “We have been saying for several years after Dobbs that the way to protect people’s access to abortion is to win elections for people who are willing to protect those rights. And that didn’t happen, so there is no magic solution here.”

If the popular song is to be believed, there’s no place like home for the holidays.  But getting there is going to cost you. Americans plan to spend an average of $2,330 on holiday travel this year, according to NerdWallet’s 2024 Holiday Spending Report. Factor in another $900 on gifts, per the report, and hundreds more on all the usual living expenses and you’ve got a hefty credit card bill come January 1. You would think that it’d be easy to opt out of unnecessary and pricey holiday travel, but sometimes external pressures and expectations can make it hard to say no. Parents may look forward to spending uninterrupted time with their adult children and grandchildren during this time of year. If you’re coupled, that doubles the coordination: Pairs might weigh whose hometown to visit.  “We, as a culture, put so much emphasis on the holidays being the most important time — even though I don’t believe that’s true — that families get together,” says licensed marriage and family therapist Nicolle Osequeda. “[People] feel really obligated to meet the needs of their family … and moreover, not to disappoint them.” As much as you’d like to make the grandparents happy and get out of town for the holidays, sometimes your budget just won’t allow it. If you’re nervous about how to approach negotiations with your partner or break the news to your family, therapists offer some guidance on what to say and how to compromise.  Set your holiday priorities Beyond just setting a budget, Osequeda suggests first getting clarity on what an ideal holiday looks like for you. During a time of year when people are often making decisions out of obligation, ask yourself what’s actually important to you this holiday season. Maybe it’s paying down debt or saving for a major purchase. Everyone’s reasons will be a little different.  By focusing on what’s important to you, you can determine what you can afford. It’s not worth going into debt because you want to do it all this holiday season. “If there’s a reality that there’s three things you want to do and you can only afford to do two … just closing your eyes and putting things on credit cards is going to create bigger problems down the line,” says Matt Lundquist, founder and clinical director of Tribeca Therapy. “Those conversations go better when everybody is willing to put their cards on the table and say, ‘This is what I want, this is why it’s important to me.’” Getting clear on what you want helps you advocate for yourself when making plans with your partner, too. You may choose to prioritize some form of travel, but aren’t able to accommodate visiting both you and your partner’s families. Again, discuss your holiday goals and let your significant other know how your proposed plans align with that goal. If it’s been years since your partner’s been home, you might decide to visit them for Thanksgiving and then invite your family over for a New Year’s Eve party. “Those conversations go better when everybody is willing to put their cards on the table and say, ‘This is what I want, this is why it’s important to me,’” Lundquist says, “rather than the situation where we’re guessing what the other person wants and having to navigate reading between the lines.”  Break the news as soon as possible — and be direct Many people have a tendency to delay sharing news that might be potentially upsetting, Lundquist says. But don’t string your family along. As soon as you’ve determined you can’t make it, let your loved ones know so they can deal with their disappointment or offer a compromise, Lundquist says. Then, tell your family in a “kind but clear way,” Osequeda says, why you can’t make it — but avoid over-explaining. You owe your loved ones an explanation, but you don’t need to justify your choices, she says. The more justification you proffer, the more “people start to poke holes in your argument,” Osequeda says, and may try to convince you to spend beyond your budget.  If you’re unsure of how to tell your family, Osequeda suggests: “This is hard for me, but I’ve decided not to come home for the holidays this year because of the expenses involved. I understand if you’re disappointed. However, right now I really need to focus on [staying on top of my bills/not being stressed out over finances/not putting more money on my credit card/getting gifts for the kids]. Are there ways that we can still connect during the holidays that don’t include me traveling?” You might get some blowback from family members offering unsolicited criticism on what you choose to spend money on. (Which is none of their business anyway.) Remember that you’re making this choice based on your budget and financial needs, Lundquist says, and sometimes you’re going to make decisions that upset others. “I can’t get myself into debt to avoid you being upset,” he says, “And I also don’t want to organize our relationship in a way where those are the terms.” But be open to compromise Of course, your family might be entirely understanding and want to find a way to see you. It’s worth trying to find a happy medium, Osequeda says. If you have young kids and schlepping the whole family across the country is out of the question, you could ask your parents to travel to you if they’re able. Some families may offer to split the cost of travel with you.  Get as creative as you want: Meeting somewhere in the middle, making a plan to visit during a cheaper time of year, promising to save up so you can come next year. Maybe these bigger asks are out of the question. You could make a smaller compromise and suggest FaceTiming the family during dinner or when the kids open presents. If you’ve determined that your holiday wouldn’t be complete if you weren’t at home, there are also other ways to make it work. For the cheapest flights, you might consider departing on the holiday itself and returning home during the week after the holidays. Try to carry on your luggage instead of checking a bag to save on fees. Driving will generally be cheaper than flying for shorter trips, but be sure to factor in extra travel time for holiday traffic. But if you’re traveling across the country, your time and money is better spent on flying. Other ways to lower the cost of holiday travel, according to NerdWallet, are to use miles or points for flights and hotels and to book rideshares to and from the airport in advance. Regardless of where you spend the holidays, you should still find time to get together with people you care about, whether it’s a local Friendsgiving or neighborhood potluck.  “If you are unable to make it to your family because of financial reasons,” Osequeda says, “it doesn’t mean that you have to sit home alone miserably.”

Vox reader Jen Hawse asks: Why do hotels pump in very strongly smelling perfume into their lobbies and sometimes their guest rooms? What we think of as a “nice” hotel often comes down to a certain je ne sais quoi. Sure, it has all the amenities — a luxe restaurant and bar on the premises, hotel room beds with soft Egyptian cotton sheets, perhaps a decadent spa — but beyond all that, it should have an ineffable ambience that’s both welcoming and sensual, cozy and yet exotic. Scent can be what helps clinch this vibe. You might have noticed an alluring aroma wafting through the air as you enter a hotel lobby, or even a hotel room; this is likely a custom fragrance that hotels diffuse into the air. While some use mass-market scents available to consumers, many use their own signature scent developed by a master perfumer. Scent marketing, as the practice is called, isn’t just limited to the hospitality scene, but pervades the retail sector. Just think of the thick miasma of cologne that used to radiate from every Abercrombie & Fitch store. It’s (usually) a more subtle marketing tool than a giant light-up billboard, calling back to happy memories and altering your mood so you feel more satisfied in a space — which, in turn, can nudge you to stay there longer, spend more money, book a room again, and recommend the experience to someone else. Some companies are even spritzing smells in the office to make the return-to-office more pleasant. In so many of the places we spend time in, an appeal is being made to your nose. What’s the psychology behind scent marketing? Scent marketing has been around for decades, with Las Vegas casinos being some of the earliest pioneers to use it. In the 1990s and early 2000s, though, its purpose wasn’t just to invite a pleasant aroma to an otherwise neutral space — it was to counteract a lingering, distasteful odor. “There was a while there where most resorts were drawn to environmental scenting because they wanted to do something about the cigarette smoke,” Jim Reding, CEO of the environmental scenting company Aroma Retail, says.  Sign up for the Explain It to Me newsletter The newsletter is part of Vox’s Explain It to Me. Each week, we tackle a question from our audience and deliver a digestible explainer from one of our journalists. Have a question you want us to answer? Ask us here. A growing number of companies outside hospitality are developing ambient scents for their retail spaces, says Caroline Fabrigas, CEO of Scent Marketing Inc. Recently, Fabrigas’s firm helped create a custom scent for Wayfair’s new Chicago store that smells like linen and fresh-cut grass.  In food and drink establishments, focusing on smell makes immediate sense: You smell pizza, you think of pizza, you crave pizza. Starbucks works hard to keep its coffee aroma from being sullied by food and other smells in its stores — employees aren’t even allowed to wear fragrances. For other spaces, the basic theory is that a distinctive smell becomes something customers immediately associate with a brand — our sense of smell is connected to the part of the brain related to memory, like a certain laundry detergent taking you straight back to being wrapped up in blankets when you were home sick from school. Using an ambient scent can cement brand recognition, and improve how well customers remember aspects of a product or service. A nice smell also puts you in a good mood. A 2021 study by researchers from the Barcelona School of Tourism, Hospitality, and Gastronomy conducted a trial in a four-star hotel by comparing guest experiences in rooms scented with lavender and rooms without any scent; guests who stayed in scented rooms appeared to show higher happiness levels when in the room than those in the neutral room. Studies have also shown that a scented environment can make customers stay longer in a restaurant (while underestimating the length of their visit), thus spending more money — time flies when you’re enjoying yourself. An experiment an automaker conducted in the early ’90s even tried to determine if spraying certain scents on salespeople would make them more likely to be perceived as trustworthy, though it’s unclear what the outcome of this trial was.  How do hotels decide on a “signature scent”? Hotels and resorts spend a lot of time matching up their brand image to a signature scent, especially today. (Although it might be very similar to a popular fragrance.) One of the trends in hotel design right now is to play up how distinct a space feels. “Everything has become hyper-local now,” says Lori Mukoyama, a global leader of hospitality practice at the architecture and design firm Gensler. “Gone are the days where we’re stamping out the same brand, exactly the same, in 50 different cities across the world.” Having a tailor-made scent is key to building the feel of a personalized hotel lobby, according to Mukoyama. “I totally feel like it’s a logo in the air,” says Fabrigas, whose company develops ambient scents for businesses. “It’s a backdrop against which all else plays.”  For some brands, having one signature scent isn’t enough. The now-closed Mirage hotel in Las Vegas, for example, used two separate fragrances for two separate spaces. In the lobby, it used a buttery coconut vanilla scent, Reding says, to evoke a tropical theme that matched the giant aquarium behind the front desk. “It gives us a feeling of warmth and safety,” he says. But then the casino used something more energizing — a “tropical cocoa mango” — to give it a party-feel that might encourage exciting risk-taking rather than relaxation. One reason why environmental scenting is so commonplace in hotels is that it’s a place where the perception of cleanliness is sacrosanct. Reding says hotels often tell him they want something that smells fresh and clean, but tend to eschew anything that might remind people of cleaning products. It goes back to how we associate smells with certain contexts — a whiff of lemony Pine Sol is going to make you think of a bathroom, or a mop, rather than the luxurious, crisp cleanliness that hotels strive for. For some, hotel fragrances are an olfactory delight they want to recreate in their own homes. Several online retailers sell hotel and resort scents for consumers — or at least, an approximation of their bespoke scent — and Reding says this is the bulk of his business today. But not everyone is a fan of scent marketing. What’s a good or bad smell is highly subjective, and people with sensitive noses in particular might bemoan not being able to escape a headache-inducing fragrance. “That’s what really makes it tricky — that you’re diffusing in public spaces without the public’s consent,” Reding says. This story was featured in the Explain It to Me newsletter. Sign up here. For more from Explain It to Me, check out the podcast. New episodes drop every Wednesday.

Did you donate to charity in the past, but no longer do so?  If the answer is yes, you’re not alone. For the second year in a row, the philanthropy research foundation Giving USA reported that fewer Americans are donating to nonprofits than they used to, and the total amount of giving is declining once inflation is taken into account. Some in the philanthropy world are calling it a “generosity crisis” — fewer than half of American households now give cash to charity. Twenty million fewer households donated in 2016 than in 2000. And the money that is being given is increasingly coming from a small number of super-wealthy people. The only surprising thing about these findings, to me, though, is that anyone would be surprised. Why aren’t people donating to nonprofits? One big, and rather intuitive, reason why fewer people are donating money to registered nonprofits these days is the general state of the economy. The number of donors started sharply declining right around the tail end of the Great Recession in 2010. Of households that stopped donating money to nonprofits between 2000 and 2016, most earned less than $50,000 per year. Young people are also less likely to donate to registered charities than older people. The relationship between age and willingness to give away money makes sense — the younger you are, the fewer years you’ve had to earn money.  The Vox guide to giving The holiday season is giving season. This year, Vox is exploring every element of charitable giving — from making the case for donating 10 percent of your income, to recommending specific charities for specific causes, to explaining what you can do to make a difference beyond donations. You can find all of our giving guide stories here. But the age gap has grown over the past few years. In part, this can be explained by high costs of living, student loan debt, and inflation. “Younger donors simply don’t have money right now,” said Rasheeda Childress, a senior editor at The Chronicle of Philanthropy. But we can’t blame the economy for everything. The decline in organized religion might be the biggest factor in the decline in charitable giving.  Religious institutions are major hubs of philanthropy — highly religious adults volunteer nearly twice as much as other adults in the US, and roughly half of them volunteer through a religious organization. A report by the Do Good Institute, which conducts philanthropy research at the University of Maryland, found that people who belong to community groups, religious or otherwise, are more likely than others to volunteer and donate money.  It’s not that religion necessarily makes people more charitable. Community does — specifically, community where charitable giving is centered and expected. But as participation in organized religion declines, so does giving. Beyond religion, people seem to be losing faith in institutions — the government, the media, and nongovernmental organizations like nonprofits.  Nonprofits are one of the most trusted institutions in the US, but only about half of Americans have faith in them. Political polarization may be partially to blame — organizations that are colored by partisan values, like religious organizations and civil rights groups, are less trusted than nonprofits focused on more bipartisan issues like wildlife conservation.  For Nonprofit Quarterly, Ruth McCambridge speculated that, as the gap between rich and poor gets wider, people are more likely to view nonprofits as “compliant handmaidens to an unjust system.” It’s not that people are less generous, it’s because they don’t trust organizations that cater to the rich donors they depend on, McCambridge added. At the same time, a survey of over 2,100 adults in the US found that, of those who stopped giving to charity over the past five years, 47 percent said that they chose to stop donating because they believed wealthier households should be pulling more weight. Historically, reaching out to small-dollar donors has not been an effective use of time for nonprofits, even though many nonprofits — particularly those in less affluent communities — depend on recurring small donations to stay afloat. Why pour energy into persuading 10,000 people to donate $10 each, when you could get all $100,000 from one wealthy donor? “It’s almost becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy,” Childress said. By catering to the wealthy, nonprofits are “going after where the money is right now, but they’re not growing where the money is going to be.” The charitable tax deduction system was literally designed to benefit the rich. If you don’t earn a lot of money, claiming charitable donations doesn’t make much sense, especially after former President Trump’s tax cuts in 2017 reduced the need to itemize deductions. A totally reasonable reaction might be, “Who cares? Rich people have money to spare. Let them pay for everything!” But if we let rich people dominate philanthropy, we give them the power to shape how nonprofits operate. “You don’t want to be beholden to anyone,” said Phil Buchanan, president of the Center for Effective Philanthropy and author of Giving Done Right. If an organization that ought to be grounded in generosity and community is visibly propped up by a handful of billionaires and corporations, it’s not a great look.  If donors are not immersed in the community an organization is trying to serve, they’re less likely to understand what that community really needs. And centering the wealthy certainly doesn’t convince already-suspicious young middle-class adults to get involved. How can we measure generosity if the IRS doesn’t know about it? The Generosity Commission, a nonpartisan team led by The Giving Institute and Giving USA Foundation, has spent years trying to figure out where all the non-wealthy donors have gone. “There’s certainly a monetary giving crisis,” Childress said. But “if you look at the data, people are being generous” — just not in ways that we’re familiar with. In other words, the apparent “generosity crisis” may not be a crisis of generosity at all.  Measuring generosity is a bit like measuring “happiness” or “loneliness” — weird. Trying to nail down a feeling with statistics requires quantifying something that can’t really be quantified. Inevitably, the final score will be an imperfect reflection of the feeling, heavily skewed by what’s possible to measure. Today, measuring cash donations to registered charities is relatively simple. These gifts are reported to the IRS, leaving behind a paper trail that can be tracked by organizations like Giving USA. A 2020 study conducted by the Stanford Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society found that people in the US give in ways that extend far beyond tax-exempt donations to nonprofits. These forms of giving are harder to trace, though. When I gift a guitar to my neighbor who wants to teach his kid to play, for example, there’s no official record of that transaction — just a couple Facebook comments and a face-to-face conversation. The IRS can’t trace it, so in the eyes of Giving USA, it never happened. Mutual aid — or the reciprocal exchange of resources within a community — has existed worldwide for thousands of years. But it entered the spotlight in the US during the pandemic through community fridges, child care collectives, and healthcare funds.  For a population that increasingly distrusts political institutions and craves human connection, mutual aid can feel more impactful than donating to a nonprofit — whether it really is or not. A survey conducted by GivingTuesday, the organization behind the post-Thanksgiving global day of giving, found that 76 percent of respondents between 18 and 34 prefer to give directly to individuals in need, and not nonprofits — only 46 percent of those over 50 agreed. Donations raised through crowdfunding also grew 33.7 percent in 2022, with 6,455,080 crowdfunding campaigns launched across the world that year. The crowdfunding market is projected to grow to as much as $300 billion by 2030. But while a GoFundMe donation counts as “generous” in my book, Giving USA can’t track it — so, we have a “generosity crisis.” But we know that humans, for the most part, are generous. In 2022, the Charities Aid Foundation found that 4.2 billion people — 72 percent of the world’s adult population — gave money, time, or service to someone they didn’t know that year. Over the past several years, the Generosity Commission has been working to “tell the full story” of generosity, so nonprofits can better understand how people want to make their communities better. In a report published in September, the Generosity Commission identified several possible explanations for declines in volunteering and donations, including the Great Recession, declining religiosity, and delays in traditional adult milestones like marriage, home ownership, and parenthood — but they note that further research is necessary. So, what should we do?  To be clear: nonprofits do a lot of good, both in the US and abroad. Especially in smaller, less affluent communities, they absolutely depend on normal, not-super-rich donors like me — and we’re not pulling our weight. One could argue that, because I am, temporarily, a member of the richest 1 percent of the world’s population, I am morally obligated to donate a portion of my income to charity. At least in theory, if I schedule recurring donations to highly effective charities, I could save a number of lives in nations where my money will stretch much farther than it can in the US.  But such effective philanthropy has always been the exception — in fact, giving to international causes actually declined by 1.6 percent after inflation in 2023. The vast majority of charitable giving in the US is domestic. Most donors aren’t paying for malaria-preventing bed nets overseas — they’re mainly donating to Ivy League schools and religious organizations. Just this week, Michael Bloomberg donated $1 billion dollars to Johns Hopkins University to pay for med students’ tuition.  If I were in med school, I’d be thrilled — student debt sucks. But med students, especially from prestigious schools like the No. 2 ranked Hopkins, generally go on to make loads of money. Helping them out is less effective than, say, sending $1 billion dollars to directly help flood survivors in Kenya.  Personally, I don’t currently donate a portion of my income to registered nonprofits, highly effective or otherwise. I’m still earning back the savings I drained as a freelance journalist (after spending six years on a grad student stipend). Michael Bloomberg didn’t pay for my Ivy League education, and with tens of thousands of dollars in undergraduate student loan debt hanging over my head, I laugh every time I receive, and promptly delete, a fundraising text from my alma mater. But I do give. I regularly support Kickstarter campaigns, gift household items to my neighbors, and donate to a mutual aid fund supporting sex workers in my community. That makes me like other “zillennials” in my cohort, who tend to direct their money toward more informal charities than traditional nonprofits. That may not necessarily count in the IRS’s statistics, but I don’t think it’s fair to call us ungenerous. Given the current state of democracy writ large, it makes perfect sense to me that so many of us value direct, tangible impact over indirect measurements of “effectiveness.” Informal community-centered giving can feel more impactful, even if it doesn’t score as high on a utilitarian scale. And what giving within your community can do — whether in the form of cash, time, or stuff — is build connection at a moment when we need it more than ever. Middle-class people aren’t unwilling to give. They just seem to be giving differently, and philanthropic organizations are still figuring out how to measure charitable giving beyond tax-deductible donations to 501(c)(3) nonprofits. Whether channeled through money or not, people perform acts of kindness all the time. Hopefully, the philanthropy sector will start to see them. A version of this story originally appeared in the Future Perfect newsletter. Sign up here! Update, November 20: This story was originally published on July 10 and has been updated to include details about the Generosity Commission’s September 2024 report.

A person holds a self-painted picture with an inscription referring to the short-range missile of the same name at a rally for Ukraine’s Independence Day in August in Cologne, Germany. | Thomas Banniyer/picture alliance via Getty Images Nearly three years into Russia’s full-scale invasion into Ukraine, the Biden administration gave Ukraine the green light to strike deeper into Russia using US-supplied longer-range missiles. The Ukrainian military quickly put that permission to use: On Tuesday, it attacked a weapons depot about 70 miles from Ukraine’s border.  The US and NATO allies have hesitated to provide sophisticated weapons like the Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) that Ukraine used in that attack, fearing Russian retaliation against NATO sites — or even nuclear escalation.   Raising that specter on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a new version of the country’s nuclear doctrine, which would theoretically make it easier for Russia to use nuclear weapons in this conflict. The new doctrine specifically allows for a nuclear strike in response to a strike with conventional weapons — like the longer-range missiles Ukraine now has permission to use — if those attacks involved the “participation or support of a nuclear power,” likely referring to the US and other NATO countries.  Throughout the war, Russian leaders have threatened to use the country’s nuclear weapons in the conflict if they believed they were necessary. That has led Ukraine’s allies to be cautious about the amount of aid they’ve offered, and has led to limits on what Ukrainian troops can do with those weapons. Ukraine’s new ability to use longer range missiles to strike Russian territory — and Putin’s confirmation of new nuclear rules — have again raised the question: Could Russia’s war in Ukraine escalate into a nuclear conflict? Throughout the war, experts have downplayed Russia’s appetite for nuclear conflict. But the rapid escalation of the conflict in recent weeks, and particularly Russia’s new nuclear doctrine, could mean that possibility is closer than before.  What are the chances that Ukraine’s new missile capabilities lead to nuclear escalation? Since the beginning of Russia’s invasion into Ukraine, Putin and other officials have made statements, both explicit and oblique, that Russia might be pressed to use nuclear weapons. Most experts agree that the risk of Russia using such weapons is low, but it’s not negligible.  A previous version of the doctrine Russia updated on Tuesday said the country would tap into its nuclear arsenal only under four circumstances: receiving credible data of a ballistic missile attack; nuclear or other WMD attack against Russia or its allies; attacks on Russian nuclear infrastructure; or conventional weapons attacks that threaten “the very existence” of the Russian state. Under the new doctrine, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov  indicated attacks like Ukraine’s on Tuesday could trigger a nuclear response. That change shouldn’t be taken as a response to Ukraine’s strike, however, Samuel Charap, distinguished chair in Russia and Eurasia policy and senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation, told Vox. The new doctrine “has been in the works for a long time,” Charap said. “The timing may be tied to the attack of decision, but the substance has been brewing for a while.” Putin and other officials have not, it seems, made major preparations to actually use nuclear weapons. However as the war continues, Putin and his officials’ threats have become clearer and have involved actually demonstrating nuclear capacity. As recently as July, Russia and Belarus held joint military exercises that demonstrated Russia’s tactical nuclear capabilities. Initially, the US and NATO responded to Russia’s threats with caution, denying Ukraine weapons or placing restrictions on their use. But over the past three years, as little has come of Putin’s threats of nuclear war and of war with NATO, Western countries have given Ukraine access to increasingly sophisticated weapons systems.  Besides the risk of nuclear war, Ukraine’s allies have had to balance concerns that they might be more directly drawn into the conflict. Though Ukraine is not a member of the NATO military alliance, Putin has previously warned that permission to use longer-range missiles (like those used Tuesday) inside Russia would be considered a NATO attack on Russia. US officials speaking to the Associated Press said they had anticipated a response from Russia, but that Russian officials’ warnings were viewed as inflammatory rhetoric, and would not provoke any change in US action. That suggests the US does not believe there’s much danger in Russia using its nuclear capabilities in the near term. Russia “never explicitly, on the official level, warned that they would use nuclear weapons in response to X, Y, or Z,” Charap said. “The only explicit red line that they’ve ever drawn was on the use of long range, US [or] Western weapons to strike into Russia that has now been crossed. So I can imagine people will expect their response, and it will not just be with words.”  After 1,000 days of the war, the conflict appears to be approaching an impasse. There’s no clear path to decisive victory for either side. Each side is deploying new tactics to try to gain an advantage: Ukraine with longer range missiles; Russia with recruits from North Korea. And now, Russia and the US seem to be simply responding to each others’ escalations: Russia put North Korean troops on the battlefield, the US responded by authorizing the use of longer range missiles, and Russia released its new nuclear posture. That sort of behavior is both reckless and dangerous, Charap said. “You are in a spiral that is the definition of a tit-for-tat dynamic, where your actions are driven not by your goals, but by countering what the other guy is doing,” Charap said. “That only goes in one direction — continuing to up the ante. The spiral dynamic just continues until somebody gets out of control or somebody decides to stop it.” 

Social media personalities A.J., Big Justice, and the Rizzler on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on October 28, 2024. | Todd Owyoung/NBC One of my colleagues has a theory: If you know the Rizzler, you might not have been surprised that Kamala Harris lost this month’s presidential election. If the name Big Justice doesn’t sound familiar, the results from the election may have been a total shock. Back in March, a Florida-based father-and-son duo named A.J. and Big Justice posted a TikTok expressing their enthusiasm for Costco Wholesale and its food court items. The pair — as well as their extended universe of relatives and non-relatives, like the Rizzler — have since become viral sensations, cementing their internet celebrity status with an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. “The Costco Guys, the Rizzler, and this whole kind of straight-bro-coded mediaverse is a stand-in for how siloed media consumption on the left has gotten,” says senior politics reporter Christian Paz. As a result, Paz suggests, some progressives may have “missed a bit of the political evolution the country was going through.” It asks the question: Does the rise of the Costco Guys — who are in no way explicitly political — help explain a cultural landscape shaped by straight bros that presaged a Trump win? Or is their presence on the internet something more innocuous, a throwback to the early days of YouTube when regular people would go viral and get airtime on Ellen? The answers are a little complicated.  A history of the Costco Guys cinematic universe  While they officially became viral sensations back in March, the Costco Guys’ celebrity has been years in the making. Originally from New Jersey, the family’s patriarch, Andrew Befumo (a.k.a A.J.), was a professional wrestler who went by “the American Powerchild Eric Justice” before he retired and went into mortgage lending. About a decade ago, he started a family YouTube channel, featuring his wife Erika, his daughter Ashley, and his son Eric (a.k.a. Big Justice), called All Befumo’d Up. The channel featured the sort of mundane if heartwarming content you might see on a slice-of-life reality show, like cooking meals, attending an Avengers screening, and singing Christmas songs.  Since 2022, Befumo has mostly been making videos on TikTok (@a.j.befumo) with Eric — who he nicknamed Big Justice after his wrestling persona — with occasional appearances from Ashley and Erika, “The Mother of Big Justice.” Early videos show the father and son attending baseball games and reviewing local restaurants using their food review scale known as the “boom meter.” Delicious foods get a “boom!” Underwhelming or flat-out gross foods get a “doom!” — which is rare. They also recorded themselves running regular errands, like going to retail chains, with an unusual amount of enthusiasm. However, it’s that level of excitement in depicting the suburban, middle-class experience that’s part of their draw. While many famous vloggers are filming tropical vacations and helicopter rides, the Costco Guys treat a trip to Party City like a special occasion.  @a.j.befumo We’re Costco Guys‼️ #costco #father #son #family #bigjustice #boom ♬ original sound – A.J. & Big Justice These videos raked up hundreds of thousands of views and earned them some sponsorship deals. However, it wasn’t until this past spring that their affinity for Costco would give them a ticket to internet stardom. On March 1, they posted their own version of the viral “We’re X, of course we Y” trend about their love for the wholesale chain. “We’re Costco guys,” says Big Justice at the beginning of the video. “Of course we go shopping while eating a chicken bake.”  By July, they released a Beastie Boys-esque theme song, featuring Erika and Ashley, called “We Bring the Boom” that now has 14.4 million views. Since then, they’ve incorporated Costco and their extremely limited food court menu into much of their content, having guests rate the store’s “double chunk chocolate cookie” and come with them on shopping trips. They’ve released several remixes of “We Bring the Boom,” including a Christmas edition most recently. Ashley and Erika also emerged from the background of A.J. and Big Justice’s videos, creating their own page in October, @ashleyandmamajustice, where they mostly rank and review desserts.  Despite how normal these guys seem, viewers still feel like they’re watching something off-kilter and idiosyncratic. They have a wide-eyed, unflinching gaze — almost like they’re being held hostage and forced to read off a teleprompter — when staring into the camera. While you could argue that their zeal is earnest, their mannerisms are unnatural and stilted. The rap songs are inarguably cringe.  @a.j.befumo Jingle BOOM! ??#christmas #song #dance #father #son #mother #daughter #family #fun #bigjustice #boom @ItzTheRizzler @Sallyslices @Cody Chows @H00PIFY @The Makeshift Project @Cousin Angelo @Joe Felix @Real Santa Claus @Highland Bros @jerseyyjoe ♬ original sound – A.J. & Big Justice In the months since their initial virality, the “Costco boys” label has extended beyond the Befumo family to include some of their most frequent collaborators. Most notable among them is the Rizzler (a.k.a Christian Joseph), a kid influencer whose father began posting videos of him on TikTok in 2020. His father dubbed him the Rizzler, based on the slang term “rizz” that’s short for charisma. He’s since popularized the “rizz face,” a half-serious-half-smirking look similar to the alt-right meme/pose known as the “Chad face” or more broadly the “Gen Z Lip Sync Face.” A.J. said in an interview that a TikTok of the Rizzler joking around while wearing an ill-fitting Black Panther costume led him to contact the Rizzler’s father about collaborating. Other frequent guest stars include cousin Angelo, who may or may not actually be related to the Befumo family, and a TikTok dancer named Jersey Joe who posts videos dancing to Jersey Club music.  Do the Costco Guys really belong to the “bro internet”? Since their rise to prominence, the Costco Guys have earned a questionable reputation on social media as alleged Trump supporters if not avatars for an increasingly MAGA-fied internet. The evidence is mostly superficial. They live in Florida. They spend much of their time in the big-box stores closely identified with the suburban American experience. Their logos and merch prominently feature the American flag.  “There’s a lot of stuff about their content that is seemingly Republican-coded,” says EJ Dickson, senior culture writer at The Cut. “The main one is that they’re part of a demographic of white men in a state that overwhelmingly voted for Trump. The other aspect is the American flag imagery — very early on in their career. Actually, when A.J. was working in the mortgage industry, he was making content in front of an American flag.”  Other examples are more eyebrow-raising.  Their fanbase — at least based on their account’s commenters — leans heavily white and male; comments on one Costco Guys’ livestream featured rows upon rows of the N-word in all-caps. Logan Paul knows about them.  Unlike Paul, though, the Befumo family has largely — and intentionally — avoided politics in their journey to fame. In an interview with internet reporter Taylor Lorenz, A.J. said that they’ve been approached by presidential candidates to collaborate but that political content was “not in their wheelhouse.”  Possible political affiliations aside, Dickson, who profiled A.J. and Big Justice for Rolling Stone in July, doesn’t think this accounts for all of their popularity.  “I do think people genuinely enjoy seeing this guy and his kid just being goofy and making this incredibly silly content together,” says Dickson. “A lot of people think their content is charming in its way.”  She also argues that their videos may be more subversive than progressives online give them credit for: a father and son spending an immense amount of time together, showing each other affection and bonding over food. She compares them to bona fide right-wing personality Andrew Tate, who “built his brand in the thrall of his domineering and withholding father.”  The fact that A.J. is monetizing time with his family has not gone without criticism. A behind-the-scenes video of A.J. sternly directing Big Justice in a video made the rounds in August and reinforced the assumption by some that he’s a stage dad. Still, the image of fatherhood he promotes is adoring and hands-on.  “Even though [A.J.] performs masculinity with the way he looks and the workouts, he’s kind of doing the opposite by virtue of just clowning around on camera and spending a lot of time with his kid,” says Dickson. Regardless, the Costco Guys do ultimately exist in a lineage of influencers and celebrities that draw straight, white, right-leaning male fans. Several moments this year have shown, from the conservative appropriation of Sydney Sweeney to the overnight success of Hawk Tuah Girl, that it’s not totally up to public figures to decide who they appeal to.

The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 promotes conservative and right-wing policies aimed at reshaping the US government. | Kent Nishimura/Getty Images President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly distanced himself from Project 2025, a 900-page opus of conservative policy recommendations published by the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank. But he has nominated two of the document’s co-authors to Cabinet-level positions, and many others served in his first administration, which suggests the document may be a window into what the next four years could bring.  On Monday, Trump nominated Brendan Carr, who wrote Project 2025’s chapter on the Federal Communications Commission, to head the agency. He has also appointed Tom Homan, a Heritage Foundation fellow named as a contributor to Project 2025, as his so-called “border czar.”  Eighteen of the 40 co-authors and editors of the report served in the first Trump administration. Among them are Ken Cuccinelli, former acting deputy secretary of Homeland Security; Christopher Miller, former acting Defense secretary; and Russell T. Vought, former director of the Office of Management and Budget. Vought is reportedly being considered for another top post in the coming administration.  During the 2024 campaign, Democrats sought to tie Trump to Project 2025 — a policy agenda they decried as “dangerous” and “shockingly radical” — framing it as a blueprint for his second term that is much more detailed than the GOP’s 28-page platform. The document focuses on proposals to expand presidential power, gut the federal bureaucracy, enact the priorities of the religious right, deregulate, and more.  Trump at one point claimed to have “no idea who is behind it” and denied any connection with it when asked about it at the September presidential debate: “I have nothing to do with Project 2025. I haven’t read it. I don’t want to read it purposely. I’m not going to read it.” However, since Trump’s reelection, some of his allies have suggested that the document was always intended to be the playbook for his second term. Trump’s nominations of Carr and Homan seem to support that idea. Neither will require additional Senate confirmation to take on their roles; through them, they will be in a position to advocate for Project 2025’s ideas on communications and immigration.   Here’s what we know about Carr and Homan and the ideas relevant to their posts outlined in Project 2025.  Brendan Carr Carr, a pick approved by Trump’s billionaire backer Elon Musk, currently serves as the senior Republican on the FCC and was previously its general counsel. Now, he is set to take the helm, steering the commission toward a hardline stance against Big Tech and what he describes in Project 2025 as its “attempts to drive diverse political viewpoints from the digital town square.”  Among his key proposals in Project 2025 is ending legal immunities for internet platforms hosting user-generated content under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. That would require stricter content moderation on the part of these platforms or cutbacks to the degree to which users can contribute content, fundamentally changing the way people interact online.  At the same time, he wrote in Project 2025 that he wants to ensure that “Internet companies no longer have carte blanche to censor protected speech.” That echoes some of Trump’s other Cabinet picks who are seeking to crack down on “wokeness” in their respective agencies.  Carr also supports efforts to block TikTok in the US, identifying it, along with the Chinese smartphone producer Huawei, as a national security threat. He claims in Project 2025 that TikTok is part of a Chinese “foreign influence campaign by determining the news and information that the app feeds to millions of Americans.” However, there are reasons to believe that a TikTok ban would, as Vox previously reported, have “serious consequences for online expression,” which include shutting down what has proved a hub for activism. Carr may have some difficulty enacting his agenda initially, however. The commission will have a 3-2 Democratic majority until next June when Trump will be able to nominate a new member.  Tom Homan Homan isn’t named as an author of a particular chapter of Project 2025 but as an overall contributor — and some of his stated hardline views on immigration and the border are reflected in the report. He started out as a Border Patrol agent in the 1980s and worked his way up through the immigration agencies, becoming the head of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s removal operations arm under former President Barack Obama. There, he presided over the most immigrants ever deported in a single year, exceeding 400,000. Under Trump, Homan served as acting director of ICE but was never confirmed to the position permanently by the Senate. Homan’s new role as “border czar” appears to involve far-reaching responsibilities. Those include overseeing the implementation of Trump’s mass deportations policy — the centerpiece of the former president’s immigration agenda.  That means Homan’s responsibilities will likely intersect with many of the numerous immigration priorities outlined in Project 2025. Here is a non-exhaustive list of what’s included: Expanding the use of a legal authority known as “expedited removal” to quickly deport immigrants who crossed the border without authorization. Deporting immigrants even in currently protected, sensitive zones like churches. Ending large-scale parole programs that the Biden administration has relied upon as a deportation shield for individuals from certain countries, including Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.  Ending programs like the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which has protected hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who came to the US as children from deportation. Creating a new legal authority akin to the Title 42 policy, which was implemented by Trump and maintained by Biden to rapidly expel immigrants arriving on the US southern border on the dubious public health grounds of stopping the spread of Covid-19.  Homan has yet to indicate whether he or Trump fully endorses these policies. But unlike Trump, who claims to have never read Project 2025, Homan put his name to the document, and could draw from it in his new role. 

A teenage boy is vaccinated against smallpox in New York in March 1938. | Harry Chamberlain/FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Measles, mumps, and polio are supposed to be diseases of the past. In the early to mid-20th century, scientists developed vaccines that effectively eliminated the risk of anyone getting sick or dying from illnesses that had killed millions over millennia of human history. Vaccines, alongside sanitized water and antibiotics, have marked the epoch of modern medicine. The US was at the cutting edge of eliminating these diseases, which helped propel life expectancy and economic growth in the postwar era. Montana native Maurice Hilleman, the so-called father of modern vaccines, developed flu shots, hepatitis shots, and the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine in the 1950s and ’60s, which became virtually universally adopted among Americans. !function(){"use strict";window.addEventListener("message",(function(a){if(void 0!==a.data["datawrapper-height"]){var e=document.querySelectorAll("iframe");for(var t in a.data["datawrapper-height"])for(var r=0;r

President-elect Donald Trump looks on during the UFC 309 event at Madison Square Garden on November 16, 2024, in New York City. | Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC It’s been two weeks since the presidential election and there has been no shortage of autopsies. If anything surprised me about the outcome, it’s not that Donald Trump won, but how he did it. The president-elect won all seven swing states and the popular vote, and seemed to gain ground with basically every demographic except college-educated women. That is a political reckoning for the Democratic Party. All we can definitively say at this point is that there are many reasons for this electoral defeat and we just don’t know enough right now to parse it out in a satisfying way. But that doesn’t mean that we have no idea what happened. What is fairly clear is that the roughly 76 million people who voted for Trump were saying “no” to something — or, to be more precise, they were saying “no” to lots of things. And I am genuinely interested in understanding what — apart from the Biden administration — so many people were rejecting, and what lessons we might be able to draw from that. So in the aftermath of the election, I invited Vox’s own Zack Beauchamp on The Gray Area to talk about what we know and what it could mean for our political future. Beauchamp writes a newsletter for Vox called On the Right, which is all about the evolving nature of conservatism and the various ideas and movements driving it. He’s also the author of a recent book called The Reactionary Spirit. We discuss the competing accounts of this election, the differences between conservative and reactionary parties, as well as some of the broader trends in democratic societies across the world. As always, there’s much more in the full podcast, so listen and follow The Gray Area on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever you find podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Sean Illing Now that we’ve all had a little time to process it, what do you make of the election results? Zack Beauchamp I would say we should separate out two different things. One is our analysis of what’s happening, and the other is how we feel about what happened. Analytically, I think it’s still pretty early to have any really strong conclusions, but I will say that most of what people are saying as a result of that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. If you notice, there’s a one-to-one correlation between someone’s very detailed account of what happened in the election and their own priors about how politics works. You mentioned that Trump gained ground with basically every group, right? Well, that only happens, this kind of uniform swing, when there’s some big structural factor at play. The candidates that make sense to explain a shift from 2020 to 2024 are inflation, right? That’s new and has been politically potent everywhere, and historically, in the US it matters. And anti-incumbent sentiment, which is a worldwide fact and true in democracies around the world. But Harris’s biggest losses were in blue states, and that suggests that something is going on beyond messaging. Something else is happening. Sean Illing Let’s set aside the election for a minute, though we’re going to keep coming back to it. When someone asks you what is American conservatism in 2024, what is your answer? Zack Beauchamp It’s not conservatism. What we call the conservative movement today is not what the conservative movement historically has been in the United States. It’s a species of reactionary politics. The distinction rests in the party’s fundamental attitude towards democracy and democratic institutions.  The old Republican Party, for all of its faults, played by the political rules. It had faith in the idea that elections determine the winner, and that when elections happen, you accept the verdict of the people and you adjust based on that regardless of whether or not you like the policy preferences.  Reactionary parties are different from conservatism. They both share an orientation towards believing that certain ways in which society is arranged — certain setups, institutions, even hierarchies — are good and necessary. There’s value in the way that things are. What differs between the two of them is that conservative parties don’t see potential social change as an indictment of democracy. That is to say, even if a democracy or an election produces an outcome that they don’t like, that threatens to transform wholesale certain elements of the social order, a conservative would not throw out the political order as a consequence of that. Reactionaries are willing to do that. My view is, at the core of the Trump movement, which I want to distinguish from every Trump supporter because they’re not the same, but the people who have given Donald Trump an iron grip on the Republican Party, that base of hardcore support, are animated primarily by reactionary politics, by a sense that things have gone too far in a socially liberal and culturally liberal, and even in some cases economically liberal direction, and they want things to go back to partially a past that never existed, but also a past that did exist where there was a little bit more order and structure in terms of who was in charge and what the rules were. Sean Illing What Trumpism seems to be, increasingly, is a rejection of the ruling elites, a rejection of the professional managerial class, which is more about class and culture than race and the preservation of traditional hierarchies. So how do you make sense of that? Zack Beauchamp When we talk about what Trumpism is, we need to specify what we’re talking about. And I don’t think [that means] looking at a general election and saying that every person who voted for Trump is necessarily a Trumpist. If somebody was considering voting for Harris or maybe voted for Democrats down ballot, it might not make sense to think of their behavior through a purely ideological lens, because they may not even have firm ideological beliefs. Many swing voters, if you look at the way they talk about politics, it’s sort of jumbled. Again, I’m not saying that they are bad for having jumbled views, but this is just a fact about people who don’t pay attention to politics very much. If you look at Trump’s core supporters though, the story of racial and social grievance, anger about immigration, a sense of alienation from the United States after Obama really personalized the changing social order — all of that is remarkably consistent among the people who will turn out to vote for Trump in a Republican primary. It’s been true over and over again. The evidence is overwhelmingly strong. This is their core motivation in Trump politics and in being engaged in this movement. And nothing about this election result changes that.  What that part of the story does is help us understand why Trump has gained control over one of our two major political parties, why it is that he crushed traditional Republicans who were unwilling to give those voters what they wanted in such clear terms, and those voters had become a majority of the Republican Party internally. And more than that, it’s why the bulk of Republicans rejected the 2020 election when previously they had believed elections were legitimate. It’s why so many people were willing to swallow the idea that Obama wasn’t born in the United States. So that’s one category of explanation, but then we’re talking about shifts in coalitions between different elections, and here the analysis becomes a lot trickier because we’re not talking about what makes up the core of an ideological movement, because all of those voters are baked into voting for Trump no matter what. I mean, you have 46 or 47 percent of the electorate that’s not going to change their mind no matter what on both sides. Maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but not much. So you end up having these voters in the middle, and what causes someone to change their votes between elections is not the same thing as what engages really highly motivated, highly ideological voters who make up a political movement. They’re swing voters, right? They’re not Trumpists in the clear sense just because they voted for Trump once. So collapsing that distinction leads to analytic mistakes.  Sean Illing I continue to have a hard time parsing out all the forces that are combining to scramble our politics. There’s so much alienation. It’s a very lonely society. Our democracy doesn’t feel very participatory for lots of people, so there’s not enough investment in it. I think social media, media fragmentation more generally, the collapse of consensus reality — it’s all been very destabilizing. And I’m just going to keep saying that I think millions of people have never experienced real political disorder, so they take liberal democracy for granted and frankly don’t take politics very seriously. They’re entertained by Trump. They think he’s funny, and maybe he’ll make eggs a little cheaper and also drive annoying coastal elites insane and that’s kind of it for plenty of people. Zack Beauchamp Yeah, I think that’s true for a lot of people. Especially that point about taking liberal democracy for granted. When you live in a political order for a long period of time, you start to take it as a baseline. This is the way that things are. It’s not that you can’t even envision fundamental change — it’s that you don’t even have the vocabulary necessary or the sense of perspective necessary to believe that you should be envisioning radical change. It just doesn’t enter into your daily life. If you look at interviews with swing voters and the way that they talk about politics or when you talk to them yourselves, the sense that you get is not that these people are like, “I want to burn American democracy to the ground.” It’s that they’ve got a choice between two candidates, like they do every election, and they pick the one who represents whatever their grievances are at this moment in time or whatever their anger or frustration or even hopes and dreams are at this moment in time. Lots of different things go into for a voter that changes their mind election to election, what speaks to that. And the stuff about who Trump really is and what he really stands for, the system-threatening part of it, just doesn’t even register because it seems too remote to feel real. Sean Illing I don’t think Trump is really committed to anything. I have always felt that his political genius consists in making himself into an avatar onto which people can project whatever they need to project and he’s so well-equipped to be this kind of vehicle. I genuinely do not think he cares about anything other than himself. I mean, if the man had to choose between preserving liberal democracy for another century or building a beautiful new golf course in Saudi Arabia, is there any doubt he’d build the fucking golf course? Zack Beauchamp No, but I think that that’s a mistake. Because it’s not that he doesn’t have a commitment to democracy in the sense that he’s not attached to it. He doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like the idea that he can’t do whatever he wants when he gets power. He gets very angry when people say, “You can’t do that,” or, “That’s illegal.” And he openly admires leaders in other countries who have either always been authoritarians, like Xi Jinping in China, or who have torn down their own democracies like Putin [in Russia] or Viktor Orbán in Hungary. He thinks that they’re strong and that it’s great that they get to do stuff like that. This is not an ideological commitment to authoritarianism, either. It’s not like Trump has a sincere belief that authoritarian systems work better or deliver better in some kind of meaningful sense. It’s a gut level “I like that. I want to be like that.” It’s when he said in those comments that were recently reported, “I want generals like Hitler’s generals,” it’s not like he was saying, “I want generals who will follow my orders to exterminate the Jews.” He’s saying, “I want people who listen to me and do the things that I say, whatever those things are, however crazy they might seem.” In that sense, he has a gut-level authoritarianism, and it’s reactionary in the sense that he very clearly hates a lot of the social change that has happened.  Sean Illing Do you think our institutions will continue to hold?  Zack Beauchamp Yeah. I mean, I don’t think there’s any reason to expect that elections will be formally abolished by 2028 in the way that some wild-eyed commentators in social media have suggested. I think there is a moderate chance that the fairness of our elections will be severely undermined by then. And I think there is a very high chance that some of the core institutions of American democracy will be damaged in ways that have significant long-term consequences.  Put differently, I don’t think this election itself is the end of American democracy. I do think it is the beginning of the greatest test American democracy has seen since the Civil War of its resilience, and the outcome of that test is not determined and there is a range of probabilities, ranging from truly catastrophic to merely somewhat bad. Sean Illing What makes this to you a more significant test than the first Trump administration? Zack Beauchamp It’s the degree to which they have clear and cogent plans about what they want to do, and the anti-democratic nature of those plans. Coming into office last time, Trump didn’t have a vendetta against large chunks of the government. He didn’t believe an election had been stolen from him and that needed to be rectified. At the very least, he thinks it is a public blemish that needs to be shown to be false to many people, because if many people believe that he won, then that’s good enough. It doesn’t matter if he actually did. What matters, to put it differently, is Donald Trump’s honor, and the honor of Donald Trump must be avenged at all costs, and the insult of 2020 must be erased from the history books. That’s the kind of thing that he cares about. The degree and scope of the planning that has gone into this and the willingness to take a hammer to different institutions and the specificity of the plans for doing so is not normal. To name just one example from Project 2025, they want to prosecute the former Pennsylvania secretary of state who presided over the 2020 elections using the [Ku Klux] Klan Act, which was passed to fight the first Klan. It’s basically alleging that by trying to help people fix improperly filed mail-in ballots in 2020, this Pennsylvania secretary of state was rigging the election, trying to undermine everyone else’s fair exercise of their votes in a way akin to the Klan intimidating Black voters in the 1860s by threatening to lynch them.  When I speak to legal experts about this, they’re like, “No credible prosecutor I know would bring such a charge.” It’s a real abuse of power and anti-democratic in many ways because it’s trying to wield federal power to prevent local authorities from administering elections properly and helping people vote. So in order to try to even begin an investigation on this front, let alone actually prosecute, what you need to do is fire the people who would do that kind of job, which would typically be in the Justice Department Civil Rights Division role, so the Election Crimes Unit and the Criminal Division, fire those people who work on these cases, bring in attorneys who are willing to do what you say, even though it’s ludicrous on the basis of a traditional read of the law, and then initiate an investigation, try to get charges spun up, and then get them to a judge like Aileen Cannon, who’s presiding over Trump’s documents case and has clearly shown herself to not really care about what’s going on, but rather just to interpret the law in whatever way is most favorable to Trump. All of that stuff, and this is just one specific example, illustrates the ways in which doing what Trump and his allies have outlined as part of their revenge campaign requires attacking very fundamental components of American democracy: the building blocks, like the rule of law, like a nonpartisan civil service that treats all citizens equally, like a judiciary that’s designed with interpreting the law as best as it can, rather than delivering policy outlines, you need all of those things in order to act on already offered promises in what is widely understood to be the planning document for the Trump administration. Sean Illing As hard as it is to believe, there’s a shelf life to Trump’s political career and there are people who think our situation will be drastically better the day he leaves. I’m not so sure about that. Are you? Zack Beauchamp Well, I agree with you in brief, but to build on what you’re saying, let’s say Trump dies in office. Then you get President JD Vance, who shares some very similar ideological commitments to the people who want to tear down American democracy. So there’s that. There’s the fact that Trumpist politics have paid off in two presidential elections for Republicans, and I just can’t imagine being a Republican strategist right now and saying what we need to do is go back to 2012. Because even if all you care about is narrowly winning elections, then you’re going to try to be Trump rather than the pre-Trump GOP. There will be a lot of people trying to take up the mantle of Trump’s successor in the Republican Party, and that means doing a lot of the same things that he did. Sean Illing But can they do that effectively? Can anyone else do what Trump has done?  Zack Beauchamp I’m very skeptical of that. If you look comparatively at authoritarian parties that work inside democracies, many of them are led by singular charismatic figures. Not all, but many of the successful ones. There’s this saying in Indian politics that Narendra Modi is the man who has a 56-inch chest. And it’s not literally true, but it’s one of many things that isn’t about him that his supporters say when you talk to them. This sort of mythologizing and grandiose comments stem from Modi’s outsized personality and his ability to connect as a figure with supporters of his party and with a lot of ordinary Indians who might not have supported his party in the past. And I think Trump is much the same way. And that appeal, first of all, is not fixed. Modi, while he won reelection this year, his party took a major hit. They lost their parliamentary majority, and of course Trump lost in 2020. But second is, what happens when he’s gone? We know that this is a huge problem for authoritarian parties in authoritarian countries. They’re often nasty fights over what happens after the big man dies. That seems equally true in authoritarian factions inside democracies, because part of what makes them authoritarian is that they put one guy in charge, and it’s not clear who’s next unless you have something like a monarchy where the rules of succession are clear. But even then, who doesn’t know about nasty fights inside monarchies over who is the true heir to the throne? It’s just a fact of life when you’re not having things settled through a normal democratic procedure. So I just don’t know what’s going to happen after Trump is gone. I can guess, and I think a lot will depend on how his administration manages American public opinion. Not only did Trump end his presidency historically unpopular, but even now, he’s unpopular. There’s a lot of people who really don’t like him, and many of the swing voters could be turned off by things that happened during his presidency, especially if it’s as disruptive as it seems like it might be to ordinary people’s lives. Listen to the rest of the conversation and be sure to follow The Gray Area on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever you listen to podcasts. 

People pose for photos after they’re sworn in as new US citizens. | Al Seib/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images Ending birthright citizenship has been on President-elect Donald Trump’s wishlist for years, and he’s pledged to kill it once and for all in his next term. But ending it may not be as easy as he’s promised.  Under a longstanding interpretation of the Constitution and federal law, children born in the US automatically become American citizens, even if their parents are undocumented. Trump, however, has promised that, “On day one of my new term in office, I will sign an executive order making clear to federal agencies that under the correct interpretation of the law, going forward, the children of illegal immigrants will not receive automatic US citizenship.” Specifically, that executive order would mandate that at least one parent must be a US citizen or green card holder for their child to qualify for automatic citizenship. Federal agencies would be directed to deny passports, Social Security numbers, and public benefits to children with two undocumented parents.  The executive order would almost certainly be challenged in court. Though it’s impossible to say what the Supreme Court may ultimately decide, history and precedent isn’t on Trump’s side.  “I think that birthright citizenship is such a bedrock principle of American law that of all the things on the Trump agenda, this is the one least likely to be successful,” said Hiroshi Motomura, a professor at UCLA School of Law. Trump has framed the policy as a solution to “birth tourism” — when pregnant people travel to the US to give birth in order to secure US citizenship for their child — and a means of removing a pull factor for unauthorized immigration, which has sharply declined at the southern border in 2024. The policy also reflects Trump’s longtime efforts to assert a particular vision of what it means to be American in an era when the US’s white population is declining in numbers. In his first term, he reportedly eschewed immigration from “shithole countries,” referring to Haiti and African countries. And he has more recently claimed that immigrants are “poisoning the blood” of the country.  It’s not clear how many people could be impacted by the policy. However, about 5.5 million American citizen children currently live in mixed-status households, some of them with two undocumented parents, which would have made them ineligible for automatic US citizenship under Trump’s proposed policy. That suggests that the affected population of future children born in the US could be large. What the law says The prevailing belief among legal experts is that ending birthright citizenship would require a constitutional amendment, that there is not enough support in Congress to pass one, and that Trump’s proposed executive order would not hold up in court.   “President Trump cannot do this,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean at Berkeley Law school. “President Trump cannot change the Constitution by executive order.” He said that ending birthright citizenship by executive order contravenes the 14th Amendment, which was adopted after the Civil War to ensure that formerly enslaved people would be considered US citizens.  The 14th Amendment states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”  Chemerinsky said that this has “always been understood to mean that all born in the United States (or naturalized as citizens) are United States citizens,” in addition to any individuals under US jurisdiction abroad, such as children born to US military personnel in foreign countries. The phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” was intended to exclude only Native Americans born on tribal land as well as children of enemy occupiers and foreign diplomats.  The Supreme Court’s 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark “makes clear that those born in the United States are citizens,” Chemerinsky added. That case concerned a child born in California to Chinese immigrants who were lawful permanent residents of the US. At the time, no Chinese citizens were allowed to become naturalized US citizens under the Chinese Exclusion Acts. The court ruled that the child was a US citizen because he was born in the US, even though his parents were noncitizens.  Can Trump ban birthright citizenship anyway? Right-wing immigration hawks have argued that the “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” clause ought to be interpreted differently to exclude children of unauthorized immigrants from the benefits of automatic citizenship. The clause, they argue, was meant to exclude anyone who had any loyalties to a foreign power, including citizens of other countries.  But even some of Trump’s allies — including Mark Krikorian, director of the Center for Immigration Studies, an anti-immigrant think tank — appear to acknowledge that he would face an uphill battle in court to realize his plan.  “I think it would be immediately challenged in the courts, and I think that the challenge would have all of the history and the origins of the statute behind it,” Motomura said. “I can’t predict what any court will actually do, but I think the historical record is so clear.” Still, if Trump succeeds in enacting his executive order, its impact would be far-reaching. Birthright citizenship has served as an “engine of integration” for immigrant populations in the US, and ending it would also undermine America’s cultural identity as an “inclusive immigrant society,” Motomura said, adding that it would hit people of Mexican and Central American origin the hardest. “That aspect can’t be ignored,” Motomura said. “It’s the resurrection of the use of US citizenship rules with a real racial impact, and I think an intentional racial impact.”

Giving to charity is great, not just for the recipients but for the givers, too. But it can be intimidating to know how to pick the best charity when there are thousands of worthy causes to choose from, and especially when so many are suffering around the world. Yet that suffering makes it all the more clear why giving, and why doing our best to give effectively, is so important. There’s a lot of need out there, and it matters not just whether we give, but how. Effective giving can translate into more lives saved and more lives improved. Even among charities that target the poorest people in developing countries — where charities can typically be most impactful because a dollar goes much further — the most effective charities produce a whopping 100 times more benefit than average charities, according to expert estimates. So this holiday season, we thought it might be helpful to update our annual guide to giving. Think of this as not only a rundown of charity recommendations, but also a broader guide to thinking about how to give. Here are a few simple tips for end-of-year giving that can help. 1) Check in with charity recommenders It’s of course possible to research charity options yourself, but you can save some time by outsourcing that labor to a careful, methodologically rigorous charity recommender like GiveWell. Charity Navigator has started following in GiveWell’s footsteps by evaluating charities based on their ability to do the most good at the lowest cost; GiveWell has a longer track record, but Charity Navigator’s impact scores are worth consulting, too. GiveWell, which functions somewhat like a grantmaker, currently lists four top charities. Its recommendation, if you find it hard to choose among the four, is to donate to the Top Charities Fund, which goes directly to those top charities based on GiveWell’s assessment of where the money is most helpful given the different groups’ funding needs. The top charities are: Malaria Consortium, which helps distribute preventive antimalarial medication to children (a program known as “seasonal malaria chemoprevention”) Against Malaria Foundation, which buys and distributes insecticidal bed nets, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa but also in Papua New Guinea Helen Keller Intl, which provides technical assistance to, advocates for, and funds vitamin A supplementation programs in sub-Saharan Africa, which reduce child mortality New Incentives, which increases uptake of routine immunizations by offering small cash incentives to families in Nigeria when they get their children vaccinated GiveWell chose those charities based on how much good each additional donation would do, not necessarily how good the groups are overall; in other words, these are organizations that can put new funding to use, rather than sitting on it. Other charities do great work, too, but if they’re already decently funded, they might not do the most good with your extra dollar. The Vox guide to giving The holiday season is giving season. This year, Vox is exploring every element of charitable giving — from making the case for donating 10 percent of your income, to recommending specific charities for specific causes, to explaining what you can do to make a difference beyond donations. You can find all of our giving guide stories here. GiveWell also supports novel interventions, but through its All Grants Fund, not its Top Charities Fund. That can mean giving an organization a grant to run a study in order to find out whether a hypothetical future program is feasible, like a January 2023 grant to a group in Rwanda to run a randomized evaluation of its program training farmers to grow trees for timber. It can also mean funding time-sensitive programs, like the rollout of a new malaria vaccine. Toward the end of 2021, GiveWell found itself in the position of having more funding available than extremely cost-effective opportunities to spend it on. So it made the (somewhat controversial) announcement that it would roll $110 million in funds into 2022, instead of distributing those funds to charities right away, in hopes of finding more high-impact opportunities later. The gambit paid off: Whereas in 2021 GiveWell had found $450 million worth of cost-effective opportunities, it was more like $900 million in 2022 — meaning the size of the pool roughly doubled. Instead of having too much money and too few great causes to spend it on, GiveWell had too many great causes and too little funding to support them all. Specifically, it found itself around $300 million short. “There’s this gap, and so we want to raise more, because there’s impact just being left on the table,” Elie Hassenfeld, GiveWell’s CEO, previously told Vox. It’s worth noting that GiveWell takes disconfirming research seriously. In 2017, it recommended Evidence Action’s No Lean Season, which offered no-interest loans to farmers in Bangladesh during the “lean season” between planting rice and harvesting it; the loans are conditional on a family member temporarily moving to a city or other area for short-term work. But a subsequent randomized evaluation found that the program didn’t actually spur people to migrate or increase their incomes, and GiveWell and Evidence Action then agreed that it should no longer be a top charity. Evidence Action stopped soliciting funds for it and later shut it down — an unusually scrupulous move for a charity. (Disclosure: Dylan has been donating to GiveWell since 2010. Because he writes about philanthropy frequently, outsourcing his giving to GiveWell prevents him from donating directly to specific top charities that he may cover in the future, not unlike investing in index funds to avoid conflicts of interest when writing about particular companies. GiveWell is also an advertiser on Vox podcasts.) 2) Pick charities with research-based strategies GiveWell’s recommendations rely heavily on both evaluations done by charitable organizations and existing research literature on the kind of intervention the charities are trying to conduct. For example, research from the Poverty Action Lab at MIT suggests that giving away insecticidal bed nets — as the Against Malaria Foundation does — is vastly more effective than charging even small amounts for them. Meanwhile, hundreds of studies have found largely positive effects for the kind of cash transfers that GiveDirectly, one of GiveWell’s grantees, distributes (even if cash has its limits). 3) If you want to maximize your donation’s impact, give to poorer countries It’s really hard to adequately express how much richer developed nations like the US are than developing ones like Kenya, Uganda, and other countries targeted by GiveWell’s most effective charities. The US still has extreme poverty, in the living-on-$2-a-day sense, but it’s comparatively pretty rare and hard to target effectively. The poorest Americans also have access to health care and education systems that, while obviously inferior compared to those enjoyed by rich Americans, are still superior to those of developing countries. Giving to charities domestically is a commendable thing to do, and many people feel it’s right to give first to the communities they live in. But if you want to get the most bang for your buck in terms of saving lives, reducing illness, or improving overall well-being, you’re going to want to give to the places with the greatest need and where your additional dollar will do the most good. That means outside the US. Years ago, GiveWell actually looked into a number of US charities, like the Nurse-Family Partnership program for infants, the KIPP chain of charter schools, and the HOPE job-training program. It found that all were highly effective, but were also far more cost-intensive than the best foreign charities. KIPP and the Nurse-Family Partnership cost more than $10,000 per child served, while a vaccination program like New Incentives in Nigeria costs around $17 per child served. The Covid-19 pandemic has also taxed health systems in low-income countries, putting pressure on programs designed to fend off other diseases like malaria. Donations to anti-malaria, (non-Covid) vaccination, and vitamin A supplementation programs like the ones recommended by GiveWell can help cushion that blow. 4) If you do give locally, you can still consider impact Although this guide is mostly meant to offer suggestions if you don’t have existing philanthropic interests and are curious for the most efficient ways to help, many people already do have specific causes: They want to give to their own communities, or to causes they’re passionate about for personal reasons (like curing a disease that killed a loved one, for instance). And they often want to use charity as a way to connect with broader trends in the news — by, say, donating to help refugees coming from Ukraine, Sudan, Gaza, and elsewhere. It is, of course, admirable to give to your own community and personal causes, and a lot has happened in recent years to make it easier to find effective ways to give domestically. The group Charity Navigator acquired a nonprofit called ImpactMatters in 2020 and began incorporating its estimates of the bang for the buck provided by charities in several different sectors. So you can specify that your goal is, say, to provide a night of shelter for a person experiencing homelessness, and Charity Navigator will provide you with a menu of nonprofits and their cost per night of housing. The Nazareth Housing shelter in New York City, for instance, is estimated to provide nightly shelter at less than 200 percent of fair market rent, which is Charity Navigator’s benchmark for reasonable spending on shelter. 5) Saving lives isn’t everything If you care mainly about reducing early mortality and giving people more years to live, then you should give all your donations to the Malaria Consortium, Helen Keller Intl, or the Against Malaria Foundation. Malaria is a frequently fatal disease, and cost-effective interventions to reduce malaria infection are a great way to save lives. Similarly, vitamin A supplementation, like Helen Keller does, is an effective way of reducing child mortality, as is vaccination (as promoted by New Incentives). But extending life isn’t the only thing that matters; improving quality of life matters, too. It’s extremely hard to weigh these interests against each other: Is it better to make a donation that can save one child’s life, or, with the same amount of money, to lift multiple families out of extreme poverty? There’s no one right answer to that question. How you answer it depends on your philosophical assumptions. “Philosophical factors can radically alter the cost-effectiveness of life-extending interventions,” writes the Happier Lives Institute, a research center that aims to find evidence-based ways to improve well-being worldwide, in a new report. To show this, the researchers crunched the numbers to compare the cost-effectiveness of three different charities in terms of how much they boost subjective well-being. Two were life-improving charities: GiveDirectly, which gives cash to poor people in countries like Kenya and Uganda to spend as they see fit, and StrongMinds, which treats depression in African women using group psychotherapy. The third charity, the Against Malaria Foundation, is mainly life-saving. Their findings? “On the assumptions most favorable to extending lives, AMF is about 30 percent more cost-effective than StrongMinds. On the assumptions least favorable to extending lives, StrongMinds is around 12 times more cost-effective than AMF.” So when you’re making your donations, it’s worth thinking not only about quantity of life, but also about quality of life. GiveWell asked recipients themselves how they weigh each of these, and you can read about the results here. 6) Maybe just give money directly to poor people For years, one of our primary charities has been GiveDirectly, which gives unconditional cash transfers. (Sigal donated to them in 2022, 2023, and 2024.) We’ve given to them partly because there’s a large body of research on the benefits of cash transfers, which we find quite compelling. But we’ve donated to GiveDirectly mostly because we didn’t trust ourselves to know what the world’s poorest people need most. We’ve been profoundly lucky to never experience the kind of extreme poverty that billions of people worldwide have to endure. We have no idea what we would spend a cash transfer from GiveDirectly on if we were living on less than $2 a day in Uganda. Would we buy a bednet? Maybe! Or maybe we’d buy an iron roof. Or school tuition for loved ones. Or cattle. But you know who does have a good sense of the needs of poor people in Uganda? Poor people in Uganda. They have a very good idea of what they need. Do they sometimes misjudge their spending priorities? Certainly; as do all of us. And bednets appear to be underpurchased relative to the actual need for them. But generally, you should only give something other than cash if you are confident you know the recipients’ needs better than they do. We weren’t confident of that, so we gave cash. As the World Bank’s Jishnu Das once put it, “‘Does giving cash work well?’ is a well-defined question only if you are willing to say that ‘well’ is something that WE, the donors, want to define for families whom we have never met and whose living circumstances we have probably never spent a day, let alone a lifetime, in.” If you’re not willing to say that, then you should strongly consider giving cash. 7) Don’t give to big charities … You’ll notice that all of the charities GiveWell recommends are reasonably small, and some big names are absent. That’s not an accident. In general, charity effectiveness evaluators are skeptical of large relief organizations, for a number of reasons. Large organizations tend to be less transparent about where their money goes and also likelier to direct money to disaster relief efforts, which are usually less cost-effective, in general, than public health programs. “Overall, our impression is that your donation to these organizations is very hard to trace, but will likely supplement an agenda of extremely diverse programming, driven largely by governments and other very large funders,” wrote GiveWell co-founder Holden Karnofsky in a 2011 blog post. Our colleague Kelsey Piper has explained that by the time a disaster has struck, it’s mostly too late to improve disaster relief work. The quality of the immediate response, which includes search-and-rescue and emergency medicine, is determined by choices before the disaster occurs. Investments in improving those capabilities are most effective either before a crisis or well after, during the recovery phase.  8) … But maybe consider meta-charities A different option is giving to groups like GiveWell, Innovations for Poverty Action, The Life You Can Save, and Giving What We Can that evaluate development approaches and charities, and encourage effective giving. Suppose that every dollar given to Giving What We Can — which encourages people to pledge to donate at least 10 percent of their income until retirement — results in $1.20 in donations to the Against Malaria Foundation. If that’s the case, then you should give to Giving What We Can until the marginal effect on donations to Against Malaria hits $1 or lower. “If they can turn a dollar of donations into substantially more than a dollar of increased donations to effective charities, isn’t that the best use of my money?” asks Jeff Kaufman, a software developer who, with his wife Julia Wise, gives about half his income to effective charities and meta-charities. 9) Consider giving to animals Alternatively, you could consider giving to non-humans. Animal charities, especially those engaged in corporate pressure campaigns to better the treatment of farm animals, chickens in particular, can be effective in improving animal welfare. The charity evaluations in this area are much younger and less methodologically rigorous than GiveWell’s, but Animal Charity Evaluators has named four animal groups that may be effective causes for donations: Sign up for the Meat/Less newsletter course Want to eat less meat but don’t know where to start? Sign up for Vox’s Meat/Less newsletter course. We’ll send you five emails — one per week — full of practical tips and food for thought to incorporate more plant-based food into your diet. Faunalytics is a research organization that provides reports on animal-related issues like corporate commitments to animal welfare improvements, public opinion regarding farmed animals, issues around animal testing in science, and animals kept as pets, etc. The Humane League specializes in corporate campaigns to improve farm standards. It has achieved big victories in eliminating the culling of baby chicks and getting food service companies like Kroger and Sodexo to only use cage-free eggs, and is now pushing for better standards for chickens raised for their meat. The Good Food Institute works to reduce the impact of animal agriculture by supporting the development of plant-based and cell-cultured alternatives to animal products. Wild Animal Initiative studies the lived experience of animals in the wild and researches ways to ease their suffering, which may be intense and widespread. 10) Give what you can (though if you can spare it, pledging to give 10 percent of your income would be fantastic) One of the hardest problems in philanthropy is deciding how much to donate. There are some people who argue the correct answer, unless you’re near the end of your life, is nothing. You should, in this view, not give to charity during your career, and instead save and invest your money, increasing it as much as possible over time. That way you can give more when you die than you would have if giving continuously over the course of your life. Another approach is to “earn to give”: take a high-paying job, typically in finance or tech, and give away a huge share of your earnings, like 40 to 50 percent. But frankly it’s not the best option for most people, especially if the “earn to give” job is in a morally dubious field. And there are a lot of amazing jobs — in scientific research, in the private sector, in direct charity or nonprofit or government employment — where the typical person can do more good through their work than they could by solely using their career as a mechanism through which to generate donation money. So we suggest a more moderate course: You can sign the Giving What We Can pledge, which commits members to donating 10 percent of their annual income to highly effective charities, or take a Trial Pledge, which commits members to donating a percentage of their choice — at least 1 percent — to such charities. Ten percent is a totally reasonable number, comparable to alms in many religions, that requires relatively minimal sacrifice. (Here’s an interview with Toby Ord, who started that pledge.) But even if 10 percent is too much for you, don’t despair. Giving 5 percent or 1 percent is better than giving 0 percent. Perhaps the most important thing is to just get into the groove of donating, to make it a habit. We use direct deposit on our paychecks to make the most of our charitable contributions, just so it’s extremely automatic and hard for us to avoid doing. Going from not giving to giving a little, regularly, is a huge positive step. Update, November 19, 2024: This story, originally published in 2020 and updated in 2021, 2022, and 2023, has been updated throughout for 2024.