The New Yorker staff writer Isaac Chotiner joins Tyler Foggatt to reflect on several of the most notable interviews that he conducted in 2025. They discuss competing theories about the origins of political violence over the past year, how to understand Donald Trump’s approach to power in his second term, and the challenges of covering an Administration that rarely appears to be driven by a coherent ideological framework. They also revisit two high-profile interviews: one with the former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, about her decision to leave the Democratic Party, and another with the legal scholar Cass Sunstein, on the limits of big-tent politics and his curious friendship with Henry Kissinger.
This week’s reading:
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