Throughline

NPR

Throughline is a time machine. Each episode, we travel beyond the headlines to answer the question, "How did we get here?" We use sound and stories to bring history to life and put you into the middle of it. From ancient civilizations to forgotten figures, we take you directly to the moments that shaped our world. Throughline is hosted by Peabody Award-winning journalists Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei.Subscribe to Throughline+. You'll be supporting the history-reframing, perspective-shifting, time-warping stories you can't get enough of - and you'll unlock access bonus episodes and sponsor-free listening. Learn more at plus.npr.org/throughline

  • 51 minutes 43 seconds
    The Tax Collector
    Gangsters, banksters, and politicians. Today on the show, how the hunt for Al Capone helped turn the IRS into one of the U.S. government's most powerful tools — and most effective weapons.

    To access bonus episodes and listen to Throughline sponsor-free, subscribe to Throughline+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/throughline.

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    15 May 2025, 7:00 am
  • 51 minutes 48 seconds
    California's 'Bum Blockade'
    The story of the Los Angeles police chief who, faced with one of the largest internal migrations in American history, tried to close California's borders to stop it.

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    8 May 2025, 7:00 am
  • 50 minutes 38 seconds
    Motherhood
    Baby bonuses, childless cat ladies: the rhetoric around motherhood is politically charged right now. And the fantasy of an ideal mother remains powerful, even as real-life parents struggle to reconcile its demands. Today on the show, three myths of motherhood, and the people who have fought to break them down. This episode originally ran in 2023 as The Labor of Love.

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    1 May 2025, 7:00 am
  • 49 minutes 31 seconds
    The Deadly Story of the U.S. Civil Service
    When James Garfield won the Presidency in 1880, Charles Guiteau got ready to accept his new government job. No one had actually offered him a job – but he'd campaigned for Garfield, so he assumed he'd be rewarded. That was the spoils system, and it was how the government worked.

    But President Garfield didn't hire him. Guiteau was furious. And on July 2, 1881, he followed Garfield to a Washington D.C. train station and shot him.

    Today on the show: how an assassination meant to restore the spoils system instead led to its end, and birthed the modern federal workforce.


    An earlier version of this episode incorrectly said that Abram Garfield fought a fire with his brothers. In fact, he fought the fire with his neighbors.

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    24 April 2025, 7:00 am
  • 49 minutes 2 seconds
    The Alien Enemies Act
    In March 2025, President Trump issued an executive order invoking a centuries-old law: the Alien Enemies Act. The Act allows a president to detain or deport citizens of foreign adversaries to the United States, but only in the case of a "declared war" or "invasion." Now, the Trump administration and the courts are locked in a battle over whether the president's use of the Act, under which people have already been deported, is legal. Today on the show: where the Alien Enemies Act came from, how presidents have used it before, and what that tells us about what's to come.

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    17 April 2025, 7:00 am
  • 49 minutes 1 second
    When Things Fall Apart
    Climate disaster, political unrest, random violence: Western society can often feel like what the filmmaker Werner Herzog calls "a thin layer of ice on top of an ocean of chaos and darkness." But is that actually true — or the way it has to be? Today on the show, what really happens when things fall apart. This episode originally published in 2023.

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    10 April 2025, 7:00 am
  • 49 minutes 41 seconds
    Get Rich Quick: The American Lottery
    Want to get rich quick? You're not alone. Right now, Americans spend over $100 billion, yes billion, every year on lottery tickets. Today on the show, in collaboration with Scratch and Win from WGBH, how the mafia, Sputnik, medical equipment, and the electoral college led to American's obsession with playing the numbers.

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    3 April 2025, 7:00 am
  • 48 minutes 36 seconds
    We the People: The Right to Remain Silent
    The Fifth Amendment. You have the right to remain silent when you're being questioned in police custody, thanks to the Fifth's protection against self-incrimination. But most people end up talking to police anyway. Why? Today on Throughline's We the People: the Fifth Amendment, the right to remain silent, and how hard it can be to use it.

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    27 March 2025, 7:00 am
  • 48 minutes 47 seconds
    Sesame Street
    Big Bird, politics, and the ABCs: how a television show made to represent New York City neighborhoods like Harlem and the Bronx became beloved by families around a divided country. This episode originally ran in 2022 as "Getting to Sesame Street."

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    20 March 2025, 7:00 am
  • 51 minutes 1 second
    Winter is Coming
    Dinosaurs, Carl Sagan, and nuclear war. There was a moment in the not-so-distant past when we learned what drove the dinosaurs extinct — and that discovery, made during the Cold War, may have helped save humans from the same fate. In this episode, we'll take a journey from prehistoric times to the nuclear age and explore how humans contend with fears of the end.

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    13 March 2025, 7:00 am
  • 47 minutes 46 seconds
    We the People: Succession of Power
    The 25th amendment. A few years before JFK was shot, an idealistic young lawyer set out on a mission to convince people something essential was missing from the Constitution: clear instructions for what should happen if a U.S. president was no longer able to serve. On this episode of our ongoing series We the People, the story behind one of the last amendments to the Constitution, and the man who got it done.

    Correction: In a previous version of this episode we incorrectly said that John F. Kennedy was the youngest president in US history. Kennedy at 43 was the youngest person to be elected president but Theodore Roosevelt, who took office at age 42 after William McKinley was assassinated, was the youngest person to serve as US president.

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    6 March 2025, 8:00 am
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