President Donald Trump has vowed to tackle immigration on “day one,” and that includes promising to close the southern border and begin mass deportations almost immediately. So who better to discuss the plausibility of those imminent plans than the man who led immigration policy at the Department of Homeland Security for the past four years, former Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas? 

Kara sits down for an exit interview with Mayorkas to talk about the backlash he faced, from both sides of the aisle, during a term plagued by “Biden’s Border Crisis”; whether he feels responsible for Trump’s election victory; his assessment of the threats posed by foreign and domestic extremists; his thoughts on calls to break up the mammoth DHS; and what he makes of his tapped successor, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem. Plus: why he thinks banning TikTok an imperative, if ultimately thankless, game of national security whack-a-mole.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram @onwithkaraswisher

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They’re incredible pieces of technology, they’re unbelievably useful, and we feel lost without them. Nonetheless, smartphones have become the bane of our existence. So Graham Dugoni started Yondr with a surprisingly simple and analog solution to their ubiquity: locking pouches that force cell phone users to put away their device while still keeping their phones on them. Now, they’re used everywhere from comedy shows, to concerts, courtrooms, and weddings.

After the success of Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation, more and more states and school districts are instituting cell-phone bans — and, oftentimes, Yondr is the first company they turn to when they need help. Kara and Graham talk about the push to ban phones from schools, the company’s success, and his philosophical take on smartphones, social media and technology.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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Transgender kids and adults have become a political punching bag for conservatives — but Laverne Cox is stepping into the ring. Kara talks with the transgender activist, Emmy award-winning producer and four-time Emmy-nominated actor, known for her groundbreaking role as Sophia Burset in Orange is The New Black, about the Trump campaign’s $200+ million spend on anti-trans ads during the election (and the Harris campaign’s lack of response); why Meta’s decision to no longer monitor hate speech could lead to more gender violence, and not just against trans kids; and how to stay resilient in the fight for civil and human rights (including packing a go bag).

Plus: Laverne and Kara bust myths in a speed round about gender-affirming care, which is being targeted by laws across the country, and talk about her upcoming Prime Video comedy series Clean Slate.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher.

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Senator Amy Klobuchar has been legislating on Capitol Hill for 18 years. She recently won reelection and is now the number three Democrat in the Senate. And even though Big Tech has blocked her attempts at reform, at every turn, she is determined to keep pushing forward bills on everything from antitrust to privacy, competition, kids' safety and revenge porn. 

Kara and Klobuchar talk about Trump’s nominations, January 6th and the upcoming inauguration (Klocuchar was one of four members of Congress who counted the electoral votes and she’s the chair of the Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies), her attempts to work across the aisle, and of course, tech and antitrust legislation.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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After MAGA rioters attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021, many people thought Donald Trump's days as a political force were over. A notable exception was Maggie Haberman – senior political correspondent for the New York Times, political analyst for CNN, and author of Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America. Four years later, as the country prepares for President-elect Trump's second inauguration this month, Kara talks to Haberman about initial actions he'll likely take on immigration, tariffs and TikTok; which of his controversial cabinet picks could pass muster in Congress; and whether tech billionaire Elon Musk will have an all-access pass to the West Wing. Plus: how seriously she takes the administration's threats to retaliate against Trump's political enemies, Special Counsel Jack Smith, and journalists like herself.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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We’re kicking off the year with a deep-dive into AI ethics and safety with three AI experts: Dr. Rumman Chowdhury, the CEO and co-founder of Humane Intelligence and the first person to be appointed U.S. Science Envoy for Artificial Intelligence; Mark Dredze, a professor of computer science at Johns Hopkins University who’s done extensive research on bias in LLMs; and Gillian Hadfield, an economist and legal scholar turned-AI researcher at Johns Hopkins University.

The panel answers questions like: is it possible to create unbiased AI? What are the worst fears and greatest hopes for AI development under Trump 2.0? What sort of legal framework will be necessary to regulate autonomous AI agents? And is the hype around AI leading to stagnation in other fields of innovation?

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher.

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Samantha Bee is a comedian, author and former late-night host who hosts the podcast Choice Words with Samantha Bee and co-hosts The Daily Beast Podcast with Joanna Coles. Her weekly late-night comedy series, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee was nominated for over 70 awards — and she has personally been nominated for 18 Emmy awards and won for both writing and executive producing. 

Full Frontal was explicitly, and hilariously, political and left-leaning so it’s a bit surprising that Bee has declared herself Democrat-celibate, (at least for now). Samantha explains her new approach to politics and dishes on her biggest regret in this CNN pilot titled “Off Script” with Kara, Audie Cornish, CNN correspondent and host of The Assignment, and Van Lathan, co-host of The Ringer’s Higher Learning podcast.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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Happy Holidays! We have a special episode from our friend Adam Grant and the folks at the TED Audio Collective.

Sarah Silverman is a comedian, actor, and writer who doesn’t shy away from saying what she thinks. In this episode of ReThinking with Adam Grant, Sarah shares stories from her bold, distinctive career that has taken her from Saturday Night Live and Seinfeld to Broadway, late-night TV, plays and Disney animated movies. Adam and Sarah also discuss defusing anger, finding courage, and forging connections when we don’t see eye-to-eye. 

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Which subpar books actually warrant writing a bad review? Do best sellers usually live up to the hype? And how does our relationship with technology affect the publishing industry? Kara sits down with two of her favorite book critics, Dwight Garner of The New York Times and Becca Rothfeld of The Washington Post, to discuss the best and worst books of 2024. 

The trio debates standout books and notable disappointments, the craft of book reviewing, and the best way to experience a great book. They also explore the importance of best-seller lists, how concerned we should be over the rising tide of book censorship, and which books from 2024 could end up becoming forever classics.

Books mentioned includes (listed alphabetically):

• What Are Children For? On Ambivalence and Choice, Anastasia Berg & Rachel Wiseman
• Boswell’s London Journal 1762-1763
• Believe Nothing Until it is Officially Denied: Claud Cockburn and the Invention of Guerrilla Journalism, Patrick Cockburn
• D'Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths
• Carson McCullers: A Life, Mary V. Dearborn
• You Dreamed of Empires, Álvaro Enrigue
• James, Percival Everett
• When the Clock Broke, John Ganz
• The Upstairs Delicatessen, Dwight Garner
• Small Rain, Garth Greenwell
• Lesser Ruins, Mark Haber
• Alphabetical Diaries, Sheila Heti
• A Few Words in Defense of Our Country: The Biography of Randy Newman, Robert Hilburn
• Splinters, Leslie Jamison
• Howl's Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
• Creation Lake, Rachel Kushner
• Liars, Sarah Manguso
• We Who Wrestle With God, Jordan B. Peterson
• Intermezzo, Sally Rooney
• The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World, Christine Rosen
• Things Are Too Small, Essays in Praise of Excess, Becca Rothfeld
• Knife, Salman Rushdie
• I Heard Her Call My Name, Lucy Sante
• The Rebel’s Clinic, Adam Schatz
• The Politics of Cultural Despair, Fritz Stern
• Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher 

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Kara sits down for a live interview with Yann LeCun, an “early AI prophet” and the brains behind the largest open-source large language model in the world. The two discuss the potential dangers that come with open-source models, the massive amounts of money pouring into AI research, and the pros and cons of AI regulation. They also dive into LeCun’s surprisingly spicy social media feeds — unlike a lot of tech employees who toe the HR line, Yann isn’t afraid to say what he thinks of Elon Musk or President-elect Donald Trump.

This interview was recorded live at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center in Washington, DC as part of their Discovery Series.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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RFK Jr. was on the Hill, on Monday, working to persuade senators he’s capable of running the  Department of Health and Human Services and its almost $2 trillion budget. Ever since the news his lawyer has petitioned the federal government to revoke the approval of a polio vaccine broke, that job has gotten a little harder — but it doesn’t mean he won’t get confirmed. And so could a number of other highly unorthodox candidates that Trump plans to nominate for key positions in the HHS. Kara talks to an expert panel to make sense of it all and find these nominations could means for America’s public health policy. 

Her guests are: Dr. Zeke Emanuel, Dr. Celine Gounder, and Donald McNeil Jr. 

Dr. Emanuel has written and edited 15 books and over 300 scientific articles. He was Chief of the Department of Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health, one of the architects of the Affordable Care Act and he teaches at the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Celine Gounder is an internist, infectious disease specialist, and epidemiologist, a CBS News Medical Contributor and Editor-at-Large for Public Health at KFF Health News, and she teaches at New York University.

Donald McNeil wrote for the New York Times from 1976 to 2021, where he was a health and science reporter and the lead reporter the COVID beat. He won the prestigious John Chancellor Award in 2020 and was on the New York Times team that won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2021. You can find his latest work on Medium.

Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher

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