Bulwark Takes

<div> <p>Jasmine poses Triad readers’ questions to JVL: How can we stop Trump's slush fund? Will AI discourse dominate the 2028 campaign? Why does Trump keep turning down Iran's proposals to end the war? What is the true definition of populism? All that and more (like whether JVL thinks his best friend, Sarah Longwell, should run for Senate in Pennsylvania) in this week’s mailbag.</p><p>Paid members of the Bulwark can get the full episode on Apple Podcasts, YouTube or Substack.</p></div>

<div>Van Lathan joined Tim Miller at the Los Angeles live show to break down the SCOTUS VRA ruling and what it really means for the Deep South—including a conversation with his 88-year-old grandmother who thought the civil rights battle was already won. Plus: Van's gym run-in with Theo Von, whether MAGA can be deprogrammed, and why he's not the one to do it (but Tim might be).</div>

<div><p>Ebola is back. Hantavirus is spreading. So Sonny Bunch and Jonathan Cohn revisited three pandemic "classics"—And the Band Played On, Contagion, and Outbreak—to see which one we're actually living in.</p></div>

<div>Before the DNC released its unfinished autopsy report on May 21, The Bulwark published an exclusive behind-the-scenes article with an accounting of what happened inside the Biden and Harris presidential campaigns in 2024. It was written by Rob Flaherty who served as deputy campaign manager. Flaherty had been interviewed for the autopsy and, before anything was released from the DNC, felt it was critical to pull back the curtain on his view that Democrats ran a campaign built for a world that no longer exists. From his descriptions of a political brand failure, what happened during negotiations with Joe Rogan and the breakdowns he says happened around social media, it is a more complete "autopsy" than what was ultimately released. To bring Flaherty's piece to you as quickly as possible, we've used computer-generated narration with an intro by The Bulwark's Sam Stein.</div>

<div> <p>Catherine Rampell welcomes former DHS official Doug Rand to take on Trump’s purposely chaotic new green card policy, why legal immigrants and Silicon Valley are panicking, and how the administration may be using confusion and fear to push people out of the country.</p><p>Listen to Doug Rand's podcast, 'The Melting Pod' — <a href="https://meltingpod.org/">https://meltingpod.org/</a></p></div>