Blog

This summer marks 80 years since the end of World War II when Allied forces liberated Nazi-occupied Europe, and also began to discover the horrific scale of the Holocaust.

An estimated six million Jews were systematically murdered by the Nazi regime.

With the passage of time, there are fewer and fewer survivors who can tell the stories of what they witnessed and endured.

Once fringe ideas of Holocaust denial are spreading. Multiple members of President Donald Trump’s administration have expressed support for Nazi sympathizers and people who promote antisemitism.

The stories of those who lived through the Holocaust are in danger of being forgotten. And there’s a race against time to record as many as possible.

In this episode, the story of a Jewish man who survived Buchenwald and an American soldier, who helped liberate the concentration camp.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

The massive tax and spending bill central to President Trump’s agenda is one step closer to reality.

After weeks of negotiations and 49 consecutive votes that started Monday morning, the senate approved President Trump’s signature domestic policy bill around lunch time Tuesday. It now goes back to the House of Representatives where Republican Speaker Mike Johnson will have to reconcile the senate changes with his members’ competing priorities.

Michael Ricci has had a long career in republican politics, including working as Speaker Paul Ryan’s communications director and Speaker John Boehner’s Chief Speech writer. We talked with him about the stakes, and the bill’s prospects in the House.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

The massive budget bill that Senate Republicans are debating pays for some of its tax cuts by slashing hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid spending. The latest report from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates nearly 12 million people will lose health insurance if the Senate version of the bill becomes law.

Trump insists the cuts come from eliminating waste, fraud and abuse. Democrats have said they break Trump’s promise not to touch Medicaid — and over the weekend, Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina agreed. “What do I tell 663,000 people in two years or three years when President Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there anymore?”

We asked Sarah Jane Tribble, the chief rural correspondent for KFF Health News, what the cuts will mean for rural residents of states like North Carolina — and the hospitals that serve them.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

A number of Supreme Court decisions handed down this term have expanded the power of the president while limiting the power of the courts.

How has this term changed the relationship of the judicial and the executive branches?

NPR’s Scott Detrow speaks with Greg Stohr from Bloomberg about what we’ve learned about the makeup and direction of the court from this year’s rulings.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

Although President Trump launched air strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, the administration has chosen a different path when dealing with Kim Jong Un, the leader of nuclear-armed North Korea.

For our Reporter’s Notebook series, host Scott Detrow speaks with NPR correspondent Anthony Kuhn about covering Trump and Kim’s past negotiations and the difficulties of reporting on North Korea.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

Three different federal judges have issued nationwide blocks to President Trump’s executive order to deny U.S. citizenship to some babies born to immigrants in the U.S.

These court orders are called universal injunctions.

But when the case reached the Supreme Court, the administration didn’t focus on the constitutional right to birthright citizenship.

Instead, government lawyers put most of their energy into arguing that universal injunctions themselves are unconstitutional.

And on Friday, in a 6-3 decision on ideological lines, the Supreme Court agreed — limiting the power of lower courts and lifting a key restraint on the Trump administration.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has spent years spreading doubt about the safety of vaccines and linking them to autism.

Dozens of studies have debunked the theory, but it has nevertheless persisted for years. Part of the reason why may be that autism diagnoses have soared over the last few decades.

Dr. Allen Frances is psychiatrist who led the task force that created the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which expanded the definition of Autism. Frances says that expanded definition played a role in the increase.

Rates of autism have exploded in recent decades. Could the clinical definition of autism itself be partly to blame?

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

Tens of millions of people across the US are currently under a heat advisory. And the extreme heat isn’t just affecting people.

You may have seen videos online of the heat causing asphalt roads to buckle. It is impacting rail travel too. Amtrak has been running some trains more slowly, as have the public transit systems of Washington and Philadelphia.

Mikhail Chester, an engineering professor at Arizona State University, talks through the intersection of extreme heat and transportation.

And NPR’s Julia Simon shares advice on how people can keep themselves cool.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

Three years ago, the Supreme Court ended the constitutional right to an abortion in the United States.

As the legal landscape shifted, the medical landscape of reproductive care was faced with a serious question. Where would people turn for abortions?

Abby Wendle, from NPR’s Embedded podcast team, has been reporting on self-managed abortions, and how the medical community’s views on it have changed in recent years.

The podcast has just released a new series about the history of self-managed abortion called The Network. It was produced with Futuro Media.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy

On Monday, Iran struck back against the United States, firing missiles at a U.S. base in Qatar. The retaliatory strikes come two days after the U.S. attacked nuclear sites in Iran.

In a twist, President Trump thanked Iran on social media for giving advance notice of the attacks, “which made it possible for no lives to be lost, and nobody to be injured.”

Host Mary Louise Kelly speaks with NPR correspondents Aya Batrawy, who is on the ground in Dubai, and Pentagon correspondent Tom Bowman, reporting from Washington.

Editor’s note: This conversation was recorded prior to President Trump announcing that Iran and Israel have agreed to a ceasefire.

For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NPR Privacy Policy