Elon Musk

An oral history project to document the stories of federal workforce cuts is open to all feds and contractors — even DOGE and Musk.

The Reagan administration offers a cautionary tale about cost-cutting zeal crashing up against the reality of how government works.

Donald Trump is showing us what an unaccountable class of corporate decision-makers looks like—and it looks like a lot of fear, and a terrible loss of freedom.

A long and ugly history.

Public education is meant to be a great equalizer. That’s why Trump wants to do undo it.

As a child in postings around the world, the author witnessed the agency’s complex relationship with American empire—and with autocrats everywhere.

Plutocrats, anarchists, and what Henry James grasped about the romance of revolution.

The Trump administration’s attacks on DEI are aimed at reversing the civil rights movement.

The first time a president withheld funds for something approved by Congress, it led to the Impoundment Control Act. We’ll soon find out if that law has teeth.

Presidents can't shutter an agency Congress created by statute. Only Congress has this power.

Musk and Trump are capitalizing on decades of confusion and broken promises to lay waste to a crucial agency.

In a new book, Jeffrey Toobin makes a convincing case that Ford’s pardon of President Nixon set the stage for unchecked presidential power.

Deferring to power and authority leads inevitably to autocracy.

Trump is freezing the United States’ foreign aid agency, which grew from our relief efforts over the world’s wars and crises.

Theodore Roosevelt started a version of DOGE too, but it failed to achieve much.

Americans love games of chance, but history shows they're a poor substitute for a robust investment in public goods.

Those who draw a line from today to that infamous historical moment when democracy slid into authoritarianism are missing a key difference.

Eight years into the fascism debate, few skeptics seem to be willing to admit that they were wrong.

We took a closer look at how Americans’ views and experiences have evolved on a variety of topics over the last 20 years.

It’s important to understand why some workers might be motivated to weather scorn, rejection and even violence from their peers.