The Atlantic
June 2026
Photos of the Week: Stone Roofs, Football Fans, Soapbox Racers
Inside the Trump Administration’s ‘Freedom Trucks’
On an afternoon last month at an American Legion parking lot in Bel Air, Maryland, locals—many sporting the Stars and Stripes in cap, tee, and even Croc form—waited for a glimpse of the past with an eagerness history teachers could only dream of
This authentic Wells Fargo shotgun represents the grit and danger of the American frontier.”
I think we should be giving it the same weight that they would have given, which is not that much,
I feel very, very strongly that if young Americans are going to be taught to hate America, they’re not going to want to enlist in the military. They’re not going to want to defend America. They will propagate anti-American ideas that will lead to the weakening of our country and our society,
A country that doesn’t understand its roots, it’s like a nation with amnesia. It’s a person who doesn’t know himself.”
The Chaotic President
A loud confrontation with members of his own party followed by sneering remarks about some of the nation’s oldest allies
I make no apologies for standing up to the president,
We had a really great meeting,
Bill McRaven: Americans Deserve Answers
Abraham Lincoln relieved McClellan that November for his failure to be aggressive on the battlefield
What the Prairieland Prosecutions Reveal About Trump’s America
Last July, a group of activists staged what they called a “noise demonstration” at ICE’s Prairieland Detention Facility, near Dallas
The True Believers at the Great MAGA Fair
Is President Trump my favorite person in the world?”
I haven’t heard of crime in our neighborhood in a really long time,
A lot of people don’t like it, but he is doing exactly what he said he was going to do,
One Metaphor to End Them All
Our pool is bigger than skyscrapers,
The Final Message of ‘The Bear’
EVERY SECOND COUNTS hangs on the wall of Chef Carmen (played by Jeremy Allen White) and Chef Sydney’s (Ayo Edebiri) restaurant kitchen, inscribed on a plaque rescued from a different restaurant whose own time ran out
Fucking kid’s gonna end up abandoned and alone, just like he was,
It says we’re out of time, chef,
Make it easy for him to say yes. Don’t use too many words. Have no fear. Don’t be scared by his blue eyes.”
How the World Cup Explains the World
Venture capital and oil money have poured into clubs all around the world
Europe Cannot Cope With This Heat
A summer escape to Paris, at least in the American mind, evokes a certain set of images: quiet strolls along the canals, long hours in bookstores and museums, a pleasant park bench, a glass of wine
The thing I’ve learned about Paris is the city is completely capable of handling winter and rain; it cannot handle any sort of summer at all,
I should have bought more, but we never had this,
I don’t know about you, but I refuse to hand down to my son a country where the only refuge is the basement, and the only survival strategy is fending for oneself,
This is truly extraordinary, unprecedented weather happening in places that are simply not designed to cope with this kind of heat,
We’d expect records to be broken, yes, but we wouldn’t expect them to be smashed to smithereens,
I throw a bunch of ice cubes in my kids’ water bottle, and I’m like, ‘Let’s go to school. We have five days left,’
I was so tired at that point. I’m not old, and I don’t have any health issue, but I cannot stand the heat,
AI Can’t Fix the Student-Motivation Problem
I think our biggest lever is really investing in the human systems,
It’s cognitively effortful and not experienced as fun. How do we get kids to want to do that?”
Alan Greenspan Was ‘Not Quite God’
The Federal Reserve, which he led from 1987 until 2006, issued an encomium in characteristically modest and understated Fedspeak
Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself especially, are in a state of shocked disbelief,
The Federal Reserve, consistent with its responsibilities as the Nation’s central bank, affirmed today its readiness to serve as a source of liquidity to support the economic and financial system.”
I would engage in some form of syntax destruction,
Trump Is Making the 250th Small
The United States was once a dead country, everyone was laughing at us, we’re the hottest country in the world, and so on
Trump’s Other Paint Job
Before he botched the Reflecting Pool, the president wanted the border wall black
If it’s white, it’s not hot,
If they don’t paint it, bad things are happening,
I built the same wall that the Border Patrol asked me to build,
The negative optics behind trying to make the wall too hot to touch were a detractor for us,
The Whiplash of Trump’s Iran Capitulation
Almost everything in the Trump administration seems like an implausible pitch for a television show, containing so many oddball plot devices and weird twists that even the most creative showrunner would veto most of them
I mean, they have to have some,... Missiles, they hurt a little location, but they don’t blow up the planet.”
Trump’s No-Limits Presidency
What have you learned about not just the exercise of power but the limits on your power as a result of the conflict?”
I haven’t learned that lesson yet,
Why did no one tell me ranch sauce is like crack?”
Do you see any checks on your power on the world stage? Is there anything that could stop you if you wanted to?”... Yeah, there is one thing,
Trump Has a Bill Pulte Problem
The Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence shall act for, and exercise the powers of” the DNI when that position is vacant, as it is now
I’d like to see it smaller. I think there are a lot of people in there that shouldn’t be there,
He’s a very smart guy, and he may find out some things about the rigged elections,
Don’t Overestimate the Pink Tide
All of us are a little frustrated with the Democratic Party. But you don’t blow it up. That’s what MAGA has done.”
New York’s Warning for Democratic Leaders
It’s time for Leader Jeffries to recognize the left as a part of the bigger Democratic coalition and start building with it, not around it,
The Democrat Party Officially Belongs to the Socialists.”
Every House Democrat, in safe and competitive districts alike, will now answer to the radicals calling the shots,
The Reflecting Pool Water’s Fine
ABC News is tougher on Trump about algae in the reflecting pool than they were on Biden about his disastrous exit from Afghanistan that cost American soldiers’ lives,
Legacy media would rather report on algae than anything that actually matters to the American people,
At the right time, you’ll see it. You’ll see it in court,
They took some form of knife or blade, and put a 250 foot long gash into the beautiful facade of what took so much work, competence, and money to build and complete,
Somebody said they might have put fertilizer. They did something to create the algae,
Burnham Is Britain’s Last Chance Before Farage
If, as expected, he replaces Keir Starmer as Britain’s prime minister, he will not just be taking up an office that has chewed through six occupants in merely 10 years
I think people can see that that form of politics—a more divisive, polarized politics—does not bring growth at the end of the day. It creates division, it creates argument, it creates discord. Greater Manchester has been built on completely the opposite,
Labour politics has helped build this place into the growth story it is today,
Greater Manchester has become more and more functional as the country has become dysfunctional. But why has the country become more dysfunctional? I will put that directly at Reform’s door—the promises they made running up to the Brexit referendum and since just haven’t been borne out whatsoever,
War and Consequences
The deal might even allow Iran to monetize its geographic position at the Strait of Hormuz by levying fees or tolls
The AI Super PACs Trying to Influence the Midterms
The elections will be a test for the industry’s ability to translate money into political power
Another Top General Is Out at the Pentagon
As the head of Army forces in Europe and Africa, he has helped bolster Ukraine in its fight to repel the Russian invasion
America Desperately Needs More Sterile Screwworms
But screwworms, which grow into flies as adults, had jumped the cordon and infested a large swatch of Mexico by last year
When everybody in an area is doing that, you can keep the numbers low in the environment. But all it takes is one neighbor, as a source, that is not,
I’ve had people ask, ‘My parents told me about how they had to manage this in the ’60s,
It was a lot of work to make these strains, and I thought they were good,