PODCAST · news
Letters from an American
by HCR
Heather Cox Richardson's narrated newsletter about the history behind today's politics.
Episodes
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Making Voices Count
October 16, 2026Chaos reigns in the Trump administration with the resignation of new pick for WH press secretary after 5 days. Trump has walked back from braodcasting the execution of Nidal Hasan, The debilitation of Ukraine’s military defenses by SpaceX has led a bipartisan group of senators to...
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Corruption as a Driving Force
October 15, 2026The idea that when a democratic system is taken over by a single party it quickly becomes corrupt describes what is happening in Trump’s orbit, In the last few days, multiple examples of corruption have emerged, Kimberly Guilfoyle was forced to resign from her post after allegedly...
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Taking Authoritarianism Out For a Spin
October 14, 2026Ukraine’s military relies on two satellite systems related to Elon Musk’s SpaceX, and last night SpaceX restricted speed limits, debilitating Ukraine’s drones even as Russian forces launched strikes against the country’s infrastructure, President Zelensky noted that Russia’s…
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Desperate for Distraction
October 13, 2026The attacks on James Talarico were likely an attempt to get ahead of another damaging story about Ken Paxton, The Wall Street Journal reported that Paxton spent New Year’s Eve in Dubai partying along with two fugitives from US Justice, While the administration claims to be…
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Radicalism
October 12, 2026Billionaire Elon Musk has put at least $366 million into trying to elect Republicans in the midterm elections, Republicans are publishing material accusing Democrats of being radicals, But it is the right that is radical, attempting to consolidate power in the hands of a few, The...
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How Much Longer?
October 10, 2026Trump is openly backing Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, Trump blamed President Zelensky for prolonging the war waged by Russia, Trump has issued a warning to Zelensky, The US previously stood against Russia’s invasions of Ukraine, In 1991 Russia agreed to secure Ukraine’s...
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Smash and Grab
October 9, 2026Kimberly Guilfoyle, Trump's ambassador to Greece, was revealed to have asked Eric Deters, who wanted help from the administration with tax and legal issues, for money to pay her credit card bill, The grifting and corruption of Trump’s family and associates continued with news that…
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Why We Remember the Great Chicago Fire
October 8, 2026On October 8, 1871, the Peshtigo Fire burned through the Midwest, and claimed between 1,500 and 2,000 lives, The Peshtigo Fire was the deadliest wildfire in US history, The Great Chicago Fire happened the same day, but was smaller and less deadly, Yet the Great Chicago Fire is the...
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I Can Do Whatever I Want
October 7, 2026On October 7, 2016, the story of the Access Hollywood tape broke, in which Trump told tv host Billy Bush about his approach to women, Five years later on October 7, 2021, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s draft report on its investigation into Trump's attempt to use the Department…
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Panic
October 6, 2026Trump’s social media posts suggest he is panicking, Trump is blaming Ukraine for driving up oil prices, He is incensed about reports that people aren’t turning out for his rallies, He accuses the New York Times of doctoring a picture of Trump National Doral where he will hold the…
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Undermining the Post-WWII Order
October 5, 2026The US Southern Command struck another small boat in the Caribbean, bringing the number of strikes to more than 70, The administration has not made its justification for the strikes public, although there was a DOJ memo, US District Judge Engelmayer has demanded that it be shown to...
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A Flood of Corruption Stories
October 4, 2026Saying he will make a payment to seniors, and also pay all Americans if Republicans win in the midterms, Trump is openly talking about using taxpayer money to buy votes, Trump is increasingly worried about Democrats winning control of Congress in the upcoming elections, Democratic...
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Power to the People
October 3, 2026The Power to the People festival on October 3rd, organized by Tom Morello, had a legendary line-up of musicians, Attendees could find ways to get involved in government and a portion of the proceeds went to VoteRiders, a nonpartisan organization working to overcome barriers to...
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A Seismic Political Change
October 2, 2026Trump held a campaign rally in Mobile, Alabama today, Mobile is where his MAGA rallies really took off in August 2015 when more than 30,000 people showed up, In 2015, Trump tapped into the anger of people who felt they had been dispossessed, Trump promised to bring back jobs and…
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An Immediate Calamity
October 1, 2026The Trump administration is defying Congress, taking funds appropriated for specific purposes and redirecting them, Some of those funds were used to pay for the ads boosting Trump before the midterms, The destruction of the fundamental separation of powers at the heart of our...
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Withdrawal from Iraq
September 30, 2026After more than two decades, the deaths of countless Iraqi civilians and more than 4,500 US troops, the wounding of more than 30,000 US military personnel, and a cost of more than $2.8 trillion, the US has pulled out the last of its forces from Erbil Air Base in northern Iraq, A...
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A Scene before the Senate Judiciary Committee
September 29, 2026At a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee Jack Smith was questioned about the case charging Trump with using fraud and deceit to overturn the 2020 election results, The courts have interpreted the language in the Constitution that protects speech in Congress broadly,...
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Headaches for Republican Lawmakers
September 28, 2026Trump posted a video ad on television with the words “Paid for by the U.S. Government,” The backlash was immediate, Social media users and lawyers alike asked why the US government was paying for a poilitical ad, The government paying for Trump’s vanity ads while at the same…
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Bad News Plagues the Administration
September 26, 2026Last night, the White House would not allow reporters from CNN on Air Force One as part of the press pool, With bad news plaguing the administration, Trump has reasons for wanting to control the press, A key prosecutor in the case of the Broadview Six resigned, in a scathing...
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National Lobster Day
September 25, 2026September 25 is Dolly Parton Day and also National Lobster Day, National Lobster Day honors the cultural and economic history of the lobster industry, Lobsters have been vital to Maine’s coastal communities, but were once scorned as poor man’s food, It was fish that were central...
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A Hard Sell
Early today, US District Judge Timothy Kelly granted the request of media outlets to stop Trump’s order banning members of their organizations from the White House, Kelly ordered the credentials of 78 journalists restored immediately but the White House continued to deny White House access to...
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Pay-To-Play
September 23, 2026When Trump returned to the White House in 2025, he fired the investigators in the anti-corruption group of the FBI who were investigating Sen. Susan Collins for engaging in a pay-to-play scheme, He largely stopped investigating public corruption, The Gilded Age was known for...
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Defiance
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A Direct Assault
September 21, 2026On September 18th, Trump announced he was banning CNN, MS NOW, and Politico from the White House, Trump invoked “national security,” again, as the explanation for the ban, CNN, MS NOW, and Politico have sued Trump, his communications director, the Secret Service director, and…
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NATO 3.0
September 20, 2026Thousands gathered outside the JFK Center on Friday evening, in protest of Trump’s takeover of the building and his threat to shut it down or even demolish it, Trump is protecting his Triumphal Arch project by announcing that it will be essential for “national security,”…
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Bacon’s Rebellion
September 19, 2026350 years ago, on September 19, 1676, Nathaniel Bacon and his followers burned Jamestown - the capital of the Virginia Colony, Virginia lawmakers would respond by making sure poor men would not again make common cause by passing laws to divide them along racial lines, A year...
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The Media Begins to Turn Against Trump
September 18, 2026Diesel has hit its highest recorded average price, An advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader said Iran would not reopen the Strait of Hormuz until Trump and Netanyahu are removed from power, The economic pain of this moment appears to be turning the media against Trump, Trump…
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The Supreme Law of the Land
September 17, 2026In 1776, Benjamin Franklin helped draft the Declaration of Independence and in 1787, he urged his colleagues at the Constitutional Convention to rally behind the new plan of government they had written, The framers of the new constitution hoped it would fix the problems of the...
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Trump Isn’t Taking the News Well
September 16, 2026A US District Judge refused to perist the Kennedy Center board to return Trump’s name to the building’s facade, The board promptly appealed, and voted to close the venue for two years, Rep. Joyce Beatty of Florida, an ex-officio member of the board, confroted Trump, Panic is...
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Letters from an American
September 15, 2026Seven years ago, I wrote a Facebook post that was the start of Letters from an American, I wrote about how things at the White House looked to me, I wrote that a dictator was on the rise, using the power of his office to amass power, The patterns I saw seven years ago are…
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Attempting to Establish an Authoritarian Government
September 14, 2026News broke about a Russian oligarch spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on Donald Trump Jr.’s wedding, The inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security released a report detailing violations of standards at the now-closed detention camp in the Florida…
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Asking the U.S. Government to Regulate AI
September 13, 2026Dario Amodel, the CEO of Anthropic expressed concern that AI models are advancing faster than engineers can understand them, He warned that a swarm of programs could take over the internet and called for AI companies to establish safety standards and limit their rate of…
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The Writing is Already on the Wall
September 12, 2026Judge J. Michael Luttig published a warning about how Republicans could refuse to seat elected Democrats after the midterm elections, Speaker Mike Johnson has the power to replace the current House clerk with a MAGA loyalist who will refuse to list Democrats on the roll of those...
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The Twenty-fifth Anniversary of 9/11
Yesterday, Trump’s midterm convention had its second night, The audience was sparse, but Trump got the loyalty he demanded from the crowd that showed up, He promised, again, to pay all adult US citizens $5,000 if the Republicans hold control of the House and the Senate, Meanwhile, along with the...
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A Chokepoint for World Trade
September 10, 2026Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi militants have taken control of an area near the Bab el-Mandeb strait, With the Strait of Hormuz largely closed, the Bab el-Mandeb has become very important for global shipping, The Iran-backed Houthis have been in a struggle against the Saudi...
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Self-inflicted Problems
September 9, 2026At a White House event marking the anniversary of 9/11, Trump told a story about being at the site of the World Trade Center that day, but fact checkers and Trump’s nephew dispute his account, Canada’s retaliatory tariffs on US-made goods went into effect on September 8, The US…
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Hell-bent
September 8, 2026Germany’s far right AfD party won 43.8% of the vote in the small state of Saxony0Anhalt, formerly part of the Soviet dominated East Germany, Right wing leaders across Europe celebrated the outcome, Elon Musk, a supporter of AfD, was the largest donor to any political committee in...
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Trump’s Frantic Pace
September 7, 2026Trump has been posting on social media at a frantic pace, He is posting AI images of himself as a superhero, as various historic figures, as a mapmaker, and a stock trader. He apparently believes that trolling the country is a good way to keep attention focused on himself rather...
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In a Nutshell
September 5, 2026The Trump administration had a busy Friday, US District Judge Talwani blocked Trump’s illegal and unconstitutional plan to use the US Postal Service to screen mail-in voters, A day after Interior Secretary Burgum announced that work was starting on Trump’s arch, US District Court...
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Labor Day
September 4, 2026On September 5, 1882, workers in New York City celebrated the first Labor Day holiday, Their goal was to emphasize the importance of workers in the industrializing economy, Twenty years after the Civil War, government had swung toward men of capital, and working men worried they...
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What Will the Midterms Bring?
September 3, 2026Election analyst Charlie Cook is warning Republicans to brace themselves for the midterms, The Trump administration is trying to implement a new gatekeeper role for the US Postal Service, violating the Constitution which gives control of elections to the states, The court that...
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Nothing You Can Do Can Stop Us
September 2, 2026Some pundits interpreted Trump’s 2024 win as a permanent political realignment, Others disagreed, seeing the swing toward Trump as due to anti-incumbent feelings, Republicans set out to redistrict states to guarantee control of Congress after the 2026 midterm election, The...
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A Betrayal of Our Constitution
September 1, 2026The US Supreme Court allowed Trump to continue to build his ballroom, Chief Justice Roberts wrote that the project is likely unlawful, but the project will likely be completed before that question is resolved, Trump’s behavior is a logical outcome of the theory of the “unitary...
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Military Leadership is Concerned
August 31, 2026Military leaders are warning Defense Secretary Hegseth that continuing large scale operations in Iran is unsustainable and dangerous, Trump’s insistence on having the option to launch major attacks has forced more than 50,000 troops to be kept on alert for months, The chief of…
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Truth Telling
August 30, 2026In America's founding myth about George Washington and the cherry tree, the message was that truth telling is important in a leader, Trump’s administration was supposed to notify US District Court Judge Reyes before taking down trees on the grounds of the East Potomac Golf Links, a...
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The Right to Run for Office
August 29, 2026Republican lawmakers are attempting to restrict the ability of naturalized and dual citizens to run for office, At least five Republican members of Congress want to prohibit them from holding federal judgeships, Cabinet posts, and ambassadorships as well, Americans have struggled...
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The Need to Defend the Vote
August 28, 2026On August 28, 1963, Reverend Dr Martin Luther King spoke at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, His speech was about race, but also about economics, John Lewis also spoke, calling for peaceful demonstrations and the vote, In 1964, voters gave Democrats a strong majority…
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The Stench of Corruption
August 27, 2026RFK appears to have lied about the purpose of his Samoa trip, Information on his testimony and conduct could lead to hearings, and could prove embarrassing to the Trump administration, The war on Iran has created a financial crisis that is affecting the Navy, There is speculation...
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Dolly
August 26, 2026On August 25, buildings across the country were lit up in pink at 9:25, Dolly Parton was a musical prodigy encouraged by her mother, She began singing on local radio and tv shows before she was 10, and at the Grand Ole Opry when she was 13, Musicians recognized her talent as a...
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Performative Nonsense
August 25, 2026Trump is floating the idea of renaming Lake Ontario. Canadian officials will impose tariffs of up to 50% on US products on September 8, Scott Bessent’s threat to strangle Iran’s economy isn’t faring well, China is taking advantage of the desperation those threats suggest, The Iran...
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Heather Cox Richardson's narrated newsletter about the history behind today's politics.
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