Diane Rehm: On My Mind

WAMU 88.5

Diane Rehm’s weekly podcast features newsmakers, writers, artists and thinkers on the issues she cares about most: what’s going on in Washington, ideas that inform, and the latest on living well as we live longer.

6hr 38min

Thumbnail for "What to expect from a second Trump presidency".

Donald Trump won a decisive electoral victory Tuesday. With a GOP majority in the Senate and possibly in the House, political scientist Norman Ornstein looks ahead at how Trump could transform our government.

November 7, 202446min 44sec44.88 MB

Thumbnail for "Trump, Social Security and the future of retirement in America".

During the campaign Donald Trump promised not to touch Social Security benefits. But his policies could lead to deep cuts. Economist Teresa Ghilarducci explains why.

December 5, 202445min 44sec43.92 MB

Thumbnail for "A conversation with folk legend Joan Baez".

For decades legendary folk singer Joan Baez wrote poems on scraps of paper, tucked away in old notebooks. Now 83, she's sharing them in her first poetry collection, "When You See My Mother, Ask Her to Dance." Baez joined Diane for her August 2024 book club event.

November 27, 202447min 19sec45.44 MB

Thumbnail for "How RFK could change public health in America".

Vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been tapped to run the Department of Health and Human Services. Dr. Celine Gounder of KFF Health News on the impact RFK could have on public health in America.

November 21, 202432min 54sec31.59 MB

Thumbnail for "Trump’s immigration crackdown. How far will he go?".

Promises of mass deportation took center stage in Donald Trump's campaign. So what will that actually look like when he takes office? The Washington Post's Nick Miroff on the coming immigration crackdown.

November 14, 202435min 34sec34.16 MB

Thumbnail for "What does it really mean to call Trump a "fascist"?".

Donald Trump has been called a "fascist" by historians, his former White House staff and now Kamala Harris. Fascism expert Jason Stanley joins Diane to talk about what that term means and why voters should care.

October 31, 202438min 1sec36.51 MB

Thumbnail for "How secure is the 2024 election?".

Donald Trump has laid the groundwork to challenge the election if he loses. Legal expert Rick Hasen says lessons learned from 2020 could help secure the vote in 2024.

October 24, 202437min 34sec36.06 MB

Thumbnail for "Kamala Harris makes a push to energize Black voters. Will it work?".

Weakening support among Black voters prompts a last-minute push by the Harris campaign. So, what's her message? And is it too late? Diane talks to New York Times reporter Maya King.

October 17, 202434min 59sec33.59 MB

Thumbnail for "Thirty years after the Violence Against Women Act".

It has been 30 years since Congress passed the Violence Against Women Act. And yet one in three women will experience abuse in their lifetime. Journalist Rachel Louise Snyder talks about progress made — and work to be done -- to end domestic violence.

October 10, 202437min 4sec35.59 MB

Thumbnail for "Dr. Francis Collins on faith, science and healing our divisions".

Former NIH director Francis Collins talks about his new book, "The Road to Wisdom: On Truth, Science, Faith, and Trust."

October 3, 202442min 18sec40.61 MB

What to expect from a second Trump presidency

November 7, 202446min 44sec

During the run up to the election, Donald Trump made big promises about immigration, about the economy, about remaking the bureaucracy of the United States government.

And now it seems he will get a chance to follow through on those promises.

“This is a much broader rejection than a rejection of Biden and by extension Harris,” says Norman Ornstein, emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. “It is a rejection of a larger sense of who has been running the country, all the elites.”

Few know the workings of the U.S. government as well as Ornstein and though he says “the elites” (himself included) have much to learn from the extent of Trump’s victory, he warns that people might not understand what they have gotten themselves into.

“For a lot of Americans who think that you can get rid of the bureaucracy, get rid of government and all will be fine," he say Ornstein, "they’re going to discover what it does in terms of disruption to their daily lives.”

Ornstein joins Diane to make sense of what we saw on Tuesday – and what a Trump second term will look like.