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But HOW Might A.I. Kill Us All? Sep 18, 2026

Show notes

Why did the “Hugging Face Incident” scare A.I. researchers so much? And if they are so confident artificial intelligence needs to be slowed down, why aren’t they slowing it down?

Guest: Nate Soares, President of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, co-author of “If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies”

Want more What Next TBD? 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 Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Who's Interfering in the Election Now Sep 17, 2026

Show notes

Those concerned that the Trump administration will interfere with the upcoming midterm elections can breathe a little easier this week, as the Supreme Court threw out their plan to have the Post Office muck up mail-in voting. But are we out of the woods yet?

Guest: Ari Berman, Mother Jones' national voting rights correspondent.

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 Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

JD Vance Enters the Mommy Wars Sep 16, 2026

Show notes

Childcare is expensive and who wouldn’t want to spend more time with their kids? Giving parents money to stay home, on its face, would seem to make sense. But a proposal from the Trump administration isn’t enough to help most stay-at-home parents—and it comes with some glaring downsides.

Guests:

Dr. Jessica Calarco, Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of four books including Holding It Together: How Women Became America’s Safety Net.

Lauren Brody, founder of The Fifth Trimester movement, advocate with Chamber of Mothers, and author of The Fifth Trimester: The Working Mom’s Guide to Style, Sanity and Big Success After Baby.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is Trump Losing His Touch? Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

The GOP just held a midterm convention that was centered around the one thing their base seems to really like: Donald Trump.

The only problem is that pretty much everyone outside the GOP is blaming Trump for rising inflation, a foreign war, and a stagnating economy—and, oh yeah, Trump won’t be on the ballot.

Guest: Greg Sargent, host of “The Daily Blast” podcast and a staff writer at The New Republic.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How Ivanka Trump Sparked a Revolution in Albania Sep 14, 2026

Show notes

There are thousands of people protesting the Trump family every day—but they aren’t Americans, and they aren’t protesting Donald.

Guest: Imogen West-Knights, Slate contributing writer based in London.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A.I-pocalypse Now? Sep 11, 2026

Show notes

After OpenAI agents hacked a rival company this summer, the word from Silicon Valley was “That’s it! They’re almost ready to kill us all!” But…are they? Really?

Guest: Paul Ford, co-founder of the AI start-up Aboard, technology writer.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The 9/11 Panopticon Sep 10, 2026

Show notes

America didn’t start down the path to a president who is unaccountable to even the Constitution under Trump. He’s the culmination of a change that dates back to September 11, 2001.

Guest: Ben Wizner, Deputy Legal Director and Director, Center for Democracy

ACLU

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Did ICE Drive Him to His Death? Sep 09, 2026

Show notes

Thousands of immigrants who were in America legally were suddenly rendered unemployable and subject to deportation after the Supreme Court ruled that the Department of Homeland Security could end temporary protected status. The effect on Springfield, Ohio’s Haitian community has been devastating.

Guest: Carl Ruby, senior pastor at Central Christian Church in Springfield, Ohio.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dems Can Beat MAGA. Here’s How. Sep 08, 2026

Show notes

The stage is set for the president’s party to take a real shellacking in this year’s midterm elections—that is, if the Democrats can put together a compelling pitch. What might that look like?

Guest: Sarah Longwell, author of “How to Eat an Elephant,” political consultant and publisher of The Bulwark.

Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Question Everything: The Sunscreen Paradox Sep 07, 2026

Show notes

While the What Next team enjoys the holiday, hear this episode from our friends at Question Everything. Mary will be back in the feed with a new episode of What Next tomorrow.

In June, disgraced former Florida Congressman turned right-wing One America News Network anchor Matt Gaetz peddled a novel and dangerous conspiracy to his audience: that using sunscreen causes skin cancer. Gaetz’s guest was Nicholas Hulscher, a prominent voice in the COVID anti-vaccination movement and co-author of one of the most prolific medical disinformation newsletters in America. Within days, this false claim had reached millions of viewers and dozens of countries – and was popping up in the comments of innocuous mommy blogger videos about applying suntan lotion to kids.

NewsGuard health editor John Gregory explains how Hulscher’s false claim metastasized throughout the internet, and how he sold it to the world by twisting the surprising findings of a legitimate scientific study.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.