The New Yorker
Open Secret
When a prosecutor began chasing an accused serial rapist, she unravelled a scandal. The evidence was in plain sight. So why were the police refusing to investigate Sean Williams? Ronan Farrow reports on why the prosecutor lost her job and how police let one of America’s most prolific predators get away.
Today’s Mix
Don’t Believe Trump’s Promises About Protecting the Social Safety Net
The Social Security Administration is shuttering offices, and the Republicans’ own math suggests that they are planning big cuts to Medicaid and SNAP.
We’re Still Not Done with Jesus
Scholars debate whether the Gospel stories preserve ancient memories or are just Greek literature in disguise. But there’s a reason they won’t stay dead and buried.
The E.P.A. vs. the Environment
With the help of the agency, the Trump Administration is doing everything it can to make emissions grow again.
Is March Madness All Luck?
As a Purdue Boilermakers fan, I’ve experienced plenty of heartbreak during the N.C.A.A. tournament. Was it a matter of skill, or of chance?
The Deaths—and Lives—of Two Sons
The truth is that however I choose to express myself will not live up to the weight of these facts: Vincent died, and then James died.
The Lede
A daily column on what you need to know.
Trump’s Vivisection of the Department of Education
The President cannot legally shut down a government agency, but his Administration could make it essentially impossible for the D.O.E. to function.
Inside Trump and Musk’s Takeover of NASA
So far, the agency has been spared the sweeping cuts that DOGE has unleashed on other federal agencies. Is that about to change?
Donald Trump, Producer-in-Chief
What does it mean to have a President who views his time in office as the biggest, bestest Andrew Lloyd Webber theatrical ever?
Trump Nears Open Defiance of the Courts
The Justice Department claims to be complying with a federal judge’s orders while provoking a constitutional crisis.
The Guerrilla Librarians Resisting Trump’s Data Purge
Can digital archivists save the country’s files from DOGE?
Killing the Military’s Consumer Watchdog
A unit inside the C.F.P.B. protects servicemembers and veterans from financial scams. The Trump Administration has tried to stop it.
Your A.I. Lover Will Change You
A future where many humans are in love with bots may not be far off. Should we regard them as training grounds for healthy relationships or as nihilistic traps?
The Critics
Disney’s “Snow White” Remake Whistles But Doesn’t Work
Loathed even before its release, the latest live-action version of an animated classic embodies many of the cynical moves of the remake racket.
For Elias Williams, the Hip-Hop Beat Machine Carries the Soul of Community
In “Straight Loops, Light & Soul,” a project evoking Roy DeCarava’s Harlem jazz pictures and the music of J Dilla, Williams captures the underground beat-maker scene of New York City.
The Resurrection of a Lost Yiddish Novel
At the end of the twentieth century, Chaim Grade preserved the memory of a Jewish tradition besieged by the forces of modernity.
The Hitchcockian Wonders of “Misericordia”
Alain Guiraudie’s intimate thriller, about sex and death in a rustic village, bends classic tropes into modern forms.
“Purpose” on Broadway and “Vanya” Downtown
Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s latest offers another family battle royale, and Andrew Scott dazzles in a one-man tour de force.
Pedro Lemebel, a Radical Voice for Calamitous Times
Lemebel’s writing was entirely focussed on those living on the farthest margins of society—people escaping the norms and seen as different.
The Best Books We Read This Week
A stark critique of America’s schools that anchors our current educational system in eighteenth-century ideas about race and intelligence; a sly novel that captures a culture of exquisite taste, tender sensitivities, and gnawing discontent; and more.
Our Columnists
What Gavin Newsom’s Embarrassing Podcast Suggests About the Democratic Party
There’s a new strategy of disavowal emerging among some progressive politicians—and it is destined to fail.
Why “Constitutional Crisis” Fails to Capture Trump’s Attack on the Rule of Law
The Administration’s defiance of Congress and the judiciary has both flouted and made use of the country’s legal system.
The Flawed Heart of “Adolescence”
The creators of the British miniseries think of the contemporary English boy as a fragile creature, abandoned by society.
Helen, Help Me: Should I Be Cooking with Ostrich Eggs?
Our food critic answers a reader’s question about alternatives to the beleaguered chicken egg.
Is Gossip Good for Us?
Kelsey McKinney, a podcast host and a champion of gossip, is out to change the practice’s bad reputation.
Ideas
Could We Store Our Data in DNA?
Billions of years ago, evolution stumbled upon DNA as a storage medium. Some scientists believe it might allow us to keep everything, forever.
The Silencing of Russian Art
Vladimir Putin views his country’s cultural sphere like any other sector: a subordinate dominion, which should submit to the state’s needs and interests. What’s been lost?
How an American Radical Reinvented Back-Yard Gardening
Ruth Stout didn’t plow, dig, water, or weed—and now her “no-work” method is everywhere. But her secrets went beyond the garden plot.
What Do We Buy Into When We Buy a Home?
Homeownership, long a cherished American ideal, has become the subject of black comedies, midlife-crisis novels, and unintentionally dystopic reality TV.
The Game Designer Playing Through His Own Psyche
Davey Wreden found acclaim in his twenties, with the Stanley Parable and the Beginner’s Guide. His new game, Wanderstop, grapples with the depression that followed.
From the Anniversary Issue
Gary, Indiana, and the Long Shadow of U.S. Steel
Can a company town that’s been called “the most miserable city in America” remake itself?
Fifty Weird Years of “Saturday Night Live”
“SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night” delves into cast auditions, “More Cowbell,” and a fateful season in which Lorne Michaels almost lost the show with new experiments.
The Long Flight to Teach an Endangered Ibis Species to Migrate
Our devastation of nature is so extreme that reversing even a small part of it requires painstaking, quixotic efforts.
The Nuns Trying to Save the Women on Texas’s Death Row
Sisters from a convent outside Waco have repeatedly visited the prisoners—and even made them affiliates of their order. The story of a powerful spiritual alliance.
High-School Band Contests Turn Marching Into a Sport—and an Art
Band kids today don’t just parade up and down the field playing fight songs. They flow across it in shifting tableaux, with elaborate themes and spandex-clad dancers.
Lost and Found: A Newly Discovered Poem by Robert Frost
“Nothing New,” which the American poet wrote in 1918, is published for the first time in The New Yorker’s Anniversary Issue.
Silent Spring
Rachel Carson’s groundbreaking work of environmental writing, published in 1962, opens with a description of an idyllic town, rich in wildlife and resources, harmoniously synched with the seasons. Then, one spring, something changes. What follows is her enduring investigation of what is behind a wave of maladies—the pesticide DDT and other chemicals. She reasoned that “If we are going to live so intimately with these chemicals—eating and drinking them, taking them into the very marrow of our bones—we had better know something about their power.”
Puzzles & Games
Take a break and play.
In Case You Missed It
But I loved him.
Basically.
And he fielded most of our expenses.
It’ll be an adventure, Craig said.Continue reading »
The Talk of the Town
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