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Radio Atlantic

The Atlantic

The Atlantic has long been known as an ideas-driven magazine. Now we’re bringing that same ethos to audio. Like the magazine, the show will “road test” the big ideas that both drive the news and shape our culture. Through conversations—and sometimes sharp debates—with the most insightful thinkers and writers on topics of the day, Radio Atlantic will complicate overly simplistic views. It will cut through the noise with clarifying, personal narratives. It will, hopefully, help listeners make up their own mind about certain ideas.

The national conversation right now can be chaotic, reckless, and stuck. Radio Atlantic aims to bring some order to our thinking—and encourage listeners to be purposeful about how they unstick their mind.

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  • 46 episodes
  • a few times a week
  • Avg 30 min
  • English

Episodes 46

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  • #207
    August 24 · 30 min

    Where Do America’s Colleges Go From Here?

    This back-to-school season, higher education finds itself at a crossroads. Amid rising costs, pressures from the Trump administration over admissions and ideological diversity, and AI, a debate is raging about what college is actually for. Radio Atlantic host Adam Harris speaks with Jack Stripling of The Chronicle of Higher Education about new challenges that colleges and universities are facing from the Department of Education, and what purpose higher education serves in the Trump era. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #206
    August 20 · 24 min

    Secrets of a Jeopardy Champion

    What does it take to win Jeopardy? Drew Goins—an Atlantic staff writer, a Jeopardy champion, and the creator of The Atlantic’s new trivia game, Rabbithole—shares his secrets on winning at Jeopardy and cultivating a very particular brand of curiosity. - - - Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #205
    August 17 · 38 min

    The Trump Administration Wanted Her Expertise, Just Not Her

    In 2013, Julia Curlee became the first CIA officer to transition openly and keep serving the agency.She felt more effective at her job living as the person she always believed she was—and years ago she wrote about her experience under a pseudonym in The Atlantic. Her performance proved her effectiveness: She became the daily intelligence briefer for Vice President Pence during the first Trump administration and a director on the National Security Council in both the Biden administration and the second Trump term. Less than 70 days after the president returned to office in 2025, Julia was fired from the White House without explanation. She returned to the CIA and, over time, began to feel a lack of support at the agency in an administration that was openly hostile to transgender people. Julia left her dream job with the federal government earlier this year. This week on Radio Atlantic, she is telling her full story for the first time. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #203
    August 10 · 18 min

    Never Trump, Still a Republican

    Radio Atlantic host Adam Harris speaks with former Republican U.S. Senator and former U.S. Ambassador Jeff Flake about his recent endorsement of Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff in the Georgia Senate race and why character in politics still matters. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #202
    August 6 · 29 min

    The Death of Romance

    We’ve entered the era of the great romance slump. Fewer people are moving in together and getting married, and a shrinking number of young adults say they have experience in a committed relationship—all this despite people saying that they want to find love. So why aren’t they getting it? The Atlantic’s staff writer Faith Hill explains what’s driving the romance decline and reports on life inside the slump. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #201
    August 3 · 24 min

    What ‘America First’ Means for Global Health

    Ebola is ravaging the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in what may soon become the worst outbreak of the disease ever recorded. This particularly deadly strain is spreading amid a weakened global-health infrastructure, including the Trump administration’s cuts to USAID. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #200
    July 30 · 39 min

    The Town That Wants a Data Center Next Door

    Opposition to data-center construction is the bipartisan issue of the moment—70 percent of Americans are against construction in their communities. Recently, New York passed the country’s first statewide data-center-construction moratorium. Maine was supposed to have been the first. For this week’s episode of Radio Atlantic, the reporter Ethan Brooks traveled to Maine to understand why one tiny town killed what would have been America’s first data-center moratorium. - - - Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #199
    July 27 · 25 min

    Can a Progressive Win a Purple State?

    Nationwide attention and endorsements are flooding into Michigan as voters get ready to pick their Senate candidates Aug. 4. Why is everybody from President Trump to Bernie Sanders so interested? The path to win the Senate runs straight through this purple state, and that has Democrats battling over whether the progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed or the more centrist U.S. Representative Haley Stevens is the right candidate to put forward. Host Adam Harris talks to Atlantic writer Russell Berman about why Michigan matters and what the outcome of this race could mean for the future of the Democratic Party and the Senate at large. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #198
    July 23 · 30 min

    Is the Age of Reading Over?

    Rose Horowitch on her cover story and what happens when a society becomes “postliterate”

  • #197
    July 20 · 23 min

    What We Know About the Recent ICE Killings

    The fatal shootings of two men in Texas and Maine by immigration officers have put the Department of Homeland Security back under renewed scrutiny. Host Hanna Rosin is joined by Atlantic staff writer Nick Miroff to discuss the recent killings and what role traffic stops played in them. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #196
    July 16 · 49 min

    The Election Deniers Are in Charge Now

    Today’s episode is a dispatch from Georgia, where election skeptics run elections. Lately, the president has gone into an election frenzy, trying to spread the idea that elections are rife with fraud. He seems to be laying the groundwork for the argument that if Republicans lose the midterms, it can be only because someone cheated. The place to truly advance the idea that elections can’t be trusted, however, is in the states, where officials have authority over the building blocks of elections. We travel to Georgia, a once-red state quickly turning purple, where election skeptics are not just inside the building; they have taken over several floors, settled in, and put their feet up on the table, and now they are trying to change all of the locks. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #195
    July 13 · 24 min

    The War Trump Can't Control

    Though President Trump has said he would not enter any “forever wars,” America seems to find itself headed toward one. With the latest cease-fire “over,” is there a way out of the conflict with Iran? Host Adam Harris is joined by Tom Nichols and Nancy Youssef, who cover the military and diplomacy for The Atlantic, to discuss the conflict that is beginning to feel more like a permanent condition. --- Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at theAtlantic.com/listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #194
    July 9 · 35 min

    Another Fatal ICE Shooting

    This week saw the first fatal ICE shooting since Minnesota. In Houston, an ICE officer shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo. It’s been six months since the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and the federal government hasn’t properly investigated either one. And it has stood in the way of state agents trying to find out what happened—failing, for example, to give state investigators access to Good’s car. The face of this federal response is Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general who is facing a Senate confirmation hearing next week. For a system that assumes the federal government keeps state and local law enforcement from committing civil-rights abuses, what happens when the roles are reversed? How far can states such as Minnesota go? The Atlantic’s staff writer Quinta Jurecic discusses the Good and Pretti investigations, how Blanche has warped the Justice Department, and how state prosecutors and federal judges are pushing back. - - - Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #193
    July 6 · 28 min

    The Black Patriots Pushing for a Better American Future

    The military has historically been a powerful force for integration in America—even as its top ranks have been slow to reflect the racial makeup of the country. Host Adam Harris speaks with the Atlantic staff writer Clint Smith, who wrote in the July issue of the magazine about what it means that the gradual, visible racial progress in the military is being degraded as Black officers are pushed out. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #191
    June 29 · 20 min

    Trump’s Battle for Washington

    The drama around the algal bloom in the Reflecting Pool may seem like a shallow issue. But it’s part of a much broader pattern as President Trump tries to “beautify” Washington, D.C., and cement his legacy. Host Adam Harris talks to the Atlantic staff writer David Graham about Trump’s attempts to remake the city physically, culturally, and politically. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

  • #190
    June 25 · 34 min

    How the World Cup Explains the World

    In his classic book How Soccer Explains the World, the Atlantic staff writer Franklin Foer theorized that the sport was a mirror of the world, particularly in its shift from tribalism to interdependence. More than two decades after the book came out, the world is different in many ways, but he says the title still holds true. Foer joins to discuss the World Cup. Who he’s excited to watch. How the global game has changed over the years. And how this year’s World Cup offers global audiences a gentler form of nationalism—one that we may not be used to lately, and may indeed learn from. - - - Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Showing 21–40 of 46 episodes