Slate News

In this Money Talks: Felix Salmon is joined by journalist Mariana van Zeller, who has spent years reporting on black and gray markets around the world and has a new podcast, The Hidden Third, that delves into these powerful underground economies. They’ll get into what Mariana has seen embedded with criminal operators, from the surprisingly mundane to the darker side of working outside the system.

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Podcast production by Jessamine Molli and Cheyna Roth.

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An activist and former political director for Bernie Sander’s presidential campaign shocked the field by winning a primary for a special congressional election. Now the favorite to win the solidly blue district, she’s actually excited to work with congressional moderates—and to keep pushing them.

Guest: Analilia Mejía, Democratic nominee for New Jersey's 11th congressional district special election

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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, and Rob Gunther.
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Youth sports have grown into a $40-billion dollar per year industry, where eager parents shell out for private coaches, off-season practice, and travel leagues, in the hopes of giving their child a competitive edge.

Guest: Anna North, senior correspondent at Vox. She writes Kids Today, a newsletter about kids.

Want more What Next? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and across all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen.

Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, and Rob Gunther.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Olympics are touted as a moment for the world to come together and celebrate sport and achievement and check their politics at the door—yeah right.

Guest: Justin Peters, Slate correspondent currently covering the 2026 Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics and author of The Idealist: Aaron Swartz and the Rise of Free Culture on the Internet.

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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, and Rob Gunther.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The machinery to enable Stephen Miller’s darkest deportation dreams is both tangible and legal. In this week’s show, Dahlia Lithwick explores the statutory and regulatory foundations of the Trump administration’s expanding network of detention camps, plus the historical background of the vast warehouse system they are using to imprison tens of thousands of migrants. First, she speaks with Linus Chan, who represents Minnesotans detained by ICE, he teaches law at the University of Minnesota School of Law. Chan describes how the most basic right of habeas corpus has been whittled away by the courts to a filament when it comes to immigration law, allowing the federal government to weaponize brutal detention against ordinary Americans.
Next, Dahlia is in conversation with Andrea Pitzer, about her chilling and urgent new piece, Building the camps: The warehouseification of detention and initial thoughts on stopping it. It is essential reading (and listening!) in light of the billion dollar detention camp system being built in warehouses near you in cities around the nation.
If you want to check if your town is on the list, Andrea recommends checking out Project Salt Box.

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