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Post Reports is the daily podcast from The Washington Post. Unparalleled reporting. Expert insight. Clear analysis. Everything you’ve come to expect from the newsroom of The Post, for your ears. Martine Powers and Elahe Izadi are your hosts, asking the questions you didn’t know you wanted answered. Published weekdays around 5 p.m. Eastern time.
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President Biden’s new plan to cancel some student loan debt will impact millions of Americans. On today’s “Post Reports,” we learn how this program works, what it means for the economy and why some people are unhappy with this approach.
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Millions of Americans rely on the federal government to cover the cost of college. Soaring tuition costs, higher enrollment and changes to the federal lending system have all contributed to the $1.6 trillion in outstanding federal student debt.
This week, President Biden announced a plan to cancel up to $10,000 in federal student loan debt for many borrowers, and up to $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients.
National higher education reporter Danielle Douglas-Gabriel provides a walkthrough of who qualifies for the plan and the arguments for and against this massive debt forgiveness.
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In the last days of the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, a suicide bomber set off a blast at Kabul airport. It killed an estimated 170 Afghans and more than a dozen U.S. troops. Today, one year after the withdrawal, Pentagon reporter Dan Lamothe takes a closer look at the days leading up to that devastating blast and what happened in its aftermath.
From a Marine in a scout-sniper team, to the top military commander who planned and directed the operation, today’s episode shares the stories of the U.S. service members who lived through the violent evacuation process. Some of these never-before-heard accounts offer a different and more nuanced picture than the story the U.S. government tells.
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On today’s “Post Reports,” how a car bombing in Moscow has become a flash point in the war in Ukraine, and what it could signal is coming next.
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On Saturday, Daria Dugina, the daughter of a far-right Russian nationalist, died in a car bombing in a Moscow suburb. Russia’s domestic security agency, the FSB, accused Ukraine of organizing the attack, which many think was intended for Dugina’s father, Alexander Dugin. Ukraine denied any involvement.
The killing has already created a new flash point, as Putin’s ally calls for “more than revenge” for his daughter’s killing and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warns of a possible escalation in Russian attacks ahead of Ukraine’s independence day.
Reporter Mary Ilyushina explains what this bombing could mean for the future of the war in Ukraine.
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Today on “Post Reports,” the changing relationship between former president Donald Trump and media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and what it could mean for the future of American politics.
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Rupert Murdoch has swayed global politics through his media empire for decades. His relationship with former president Donald Trump was regarded as one of his strongest alliances, with Trump dominating the conservative media outlets Murdoch owns. But as media reporter Sarah Ellison explains, Trump and the Murdochs were aligned for mutual benefit – and that dynamic could be changing.
Correction: A previous version of this podcast mistakenly referred to 21st Century Fox instead of Fox Corporation. The Murdochs sold most of 21st Century Fox to Disney, and rebranded the assets they retained as Fox Corporation.
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Congresswoman Liz Cheney’s crushing defeat in Wyoming’s Republican primary on Tuesday. Plus, Alaska experiments with a new way to vote.
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Rep. Liz Cheney’s loss on Tuesday night wasn’t really a surprise — not even to her. As vice chair of the congressional committee investigating Jan. 6, she’s carved a new reputation as a voice of anti-Trumpism within the Republican party. But her constituents have rejected it. Politics reporter Amber Phillips explains what Cheney’s future could look like from here.
And two years ago, Alaska adopted a new way of voting that seems to be gaining steam in other places across the country: ranking candidates. Experts say ranked-choice voting boosts the chances for candidates with a wider appeal. Phillips breaks down what this experimentation with a new voting system could mean.
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Today on “Post Reports,” why school districts across the country are facing a critical teacher shortage this fall. Plus, we meet some of the covid “super-dodgers.”
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As back-to-school season gets into full swing, many schools across the United States are still scrambling to hire teachers.Education reporter Hannah Natanson has been speaking with educators and administrators about why we’ve run out of people who are willing to teach and what this will mean for students.
Then, meet the “super-dodgers” – the people who have never gotten covid-19. After an overwhelming response when she looked for sources, reporter Ellen McCarthy spoke to several people who have impressively avoided the coronavirus – or so they thought.
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Billionaire Peter Thiel was one of Facebook’s first investors. Now, more than a decade later, Thiel is investing in a slate of right-wing candidates in the midterms. Reporter Elizabeth Dwoskin explains Thiel’s rise.
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Elizabeth Dwoskin reports on how Peter Thiel went from Facebook investor to an architect of the new American right.
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Today on Post Reports, why the FBI searched former president Donald Trump’s Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, and what they’re looking for.
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On Monday, former president Donald Trump announced that his Palm Beach, Fla., home had been searched by the FBI. No former president has ever faced a search by federal investigators like this.
This is the next step in an investigation of whether Trump took classified documents with him when he left the White House. The National Archives retrieved 15 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago earlier this year.
Matt Zapotosky, an editor at The Post who formerly covered the Justice Department, explains what federal agents were looking for and the complex calculations behind the FBI’s search.
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What’s to blame for a summer of flight disruptions. And the legacy of pioneering “Star Trek” actress Nichelle Nichols.
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This summer has been filled with air travel issues: canceled flights, lost baggage, long lines. There’s been a lot of finger-pointing from airlines, at weather issues and short-staffed air traffic controllers, but federal data suggests the airlines themselves are to blame for many of the disruptions. Transportation correspondent Lori Aratani explains why airlines are still struggling to handle the demand for travel, and how to plan ahead when traveling.
Nichelle Nichols, the actress best known for her role as Lt. Uhura in “Star Trek,” died last weekend at 89. David Betancourt discusses the road she paved for Black women in entertainment and the impact she had on the entire science fiction genre.
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The killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the world’s most wanted terrorist, leaves al-Qaeda in a leadership crisis. But the drone strike ordered by President Biden also highlights new tensions with the Taliban one year after the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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Ayman al-Zawahiri’s safe house in Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, was targeted by a drone strike Saturday after months of planning, officials said Monday. And Zawahiri had been a U.S. target for more than two decades: He oversaw the 9/11 attacks alongside al-Qaeda’s founder, Osama bin Laden.
“This is a victory for the president, no doubt,” national security reporter Shane Harris says on today’s episode of Post Reports. “But beneath that victory is the fact that the world's most wanted terrorist moved right into the capital city of the country that [Biden] ordered troops to leave last year.”
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Today on “Post Reports,” we talk to tech columnist Geoffrey A. Fowler about how apps are spying on our kids — and what we can do to stop it.
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Geoff has been looking at tech from a consumer perspective in his series We the Users, and he says apps are spying on our kids at a scale that should shock you.
More than two-thirds of the 1,000 most popular iPhone apps likely to be used by children collect and send their personal information out to the advertising industry, according to a major new study shared with Geoff by fraud and compliance software company Pixalate. On Android, 79 percent of popular kids apps do the same.
On today’s show, Geoff tells us who the biggest offenders are, and what parents can do to protect their kids’ privacy online.
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