Joe Biden has had a remarkable reversal of fortune this summer. He signed three bi-partisan bills, and the Inflation Reduction Act, a multi-billion-dollar combination of climate and healthcare legislation, was surprisingly revived and passed by Congress. That was accompanied by a drop in gas prices and a slowdown in inflation. Suddenly it seems like the Democrats could hold onto the Senate, and even the House, in the upcoming midterms. But, according to the Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore, these successes do not make Biden the equivalent of Franklin Delano Roosevelt or Lyndon Baines Johnson, as some—the President among them—have suggested. Lepore speaks with the guest host Evan Osnos about this turning point in the Biden Administration, and about the inextricability of a President and their historical moment. The two also discuss the looming question of whether the Justice Department should prosecute Donald Trump, whether over the hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago or the insurrection. Of January 6th, Lepore says: “the crime is much more dire than Watergate, which just looks goofy and low rent compared to this.”
Related - Episodes
On June 23, 2023, tanks rolled into Moscow and into the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, and troops surrounded military and government buildings. They were fighters from the Wagner Group, a private battalion. The group’s leader is Yevgeny Prigozhin, who…
The Washington Roundtable: Susan B. Glasser, Jane Mayer, and Evan Osnos discuss whether the debate will affect the outcome of the November election. The historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, who is the author of “An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History…
Ten months after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, access to abortion is once again before the United States Supreme Court, in a case that targets not only abortion medication but also the Food and Drug Administration. Last week, Judge…
