A partisan election board in Georgia has been trying to change the rules around voting and election certification. It's giving 2020. In the first episode of our battleground state series, we go to Georgia to learn how election guardrails will protect the vote.

Country music is cool again!!!!! Billboard's Melinda Newman explains.

Conservatives have started claiming hot girls as a culture war victory. Vox's Constance Grady explains why.

Educators and politicians across the nation are banning cellphones in classrooms. Today, Explained’s Miles Bryan visits a school in Philadelphia to find out how kids feel about it.

The Federal Reserve is set to make its first interest rate cut since the pandemic ended. Marketplace's Kimberly Adams explains how the move could impact the US economy and politics.

No, Haitian immigrants aren’t eating anyone’s pets. USA Today-Ohio’s Erin Glynn and the Verge’s Gaby Del Valle explain why Republicans are talking about it anyway.

This week Apple announced its first AI iPhone with features that will make it even easier to edit your photos. But manipulating reality worries photojournalists like Fred Ritchin, who says these advancements pose a lot of ethical questions.

Once the world's largest corporation, the now-struggling US Steel wants to sell itself to Japan's Nippon Steel. The United Steelworkers oppose the deal, and President Biden is backing the union. The Washington Post's David Lynch explains how the steel giant's future became an election-year issue.

A conservative and a liberal wrangle over how the Harris-Trump debate should have gone.

One of the most significant parts of Pope Francis’s Asia tour might be a country he isn’t visiting: China, home to 10 million Catholics, with whom the Vatican has long dreamed of strengthening ties.

The arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov by French authorities is part of a broader shift away from the free speech absolutism long championed by Big Tech. The Washington Post’s Will Oremus explains.

Vox’s Benji Jones takes us diving in a coral reef to learn how scientists are trying to save them.

American sanctions can destroy a country’s economy. The unintended consequences are massive in places like Venezuela and Syria. Jeff Stein of the Washington Post explains why the US is so committed to a mistake.

Donald Trump hasn’t yet figured out how to run a disciplined campaign against Kamala Harris. In the meantime, he’s leaning into the weird.

The story of Army specialist Austin Valley highlights a crisis the US military can’t seem to solve: More service members die by suicide than in combat. A veteran psychologist told Congress what to do about it, and today he tells us.

For the first time, a woman is playing on the US wheelchair rugby team at the Paralympics. It’s a sign of progress in the complicated arena of co-ed sports.

The two are on the brink of starting a regional war. An analyst and a negotiator say without a ceasefire in Gaza, the Middle East could spin out of control.

A meme of a Minion being crucified went viral on TikTok in a very unusual way. Today, Explained’s Laura Bullard investigated and connected the dots all the way to the 2024 election.

Vox’s Adam Clark Estes explains why that might be a good thing.

Bloomberg’s Loren Grush explains how two astronauts got stuck on the International Space Station and astronaut Cady Coleman tells us why she is jealous of them.

Noel closes out her week in Chicago with a recap of Kamala Harris’s speech. Political strategist Mike Podhorzer looks ahead.

Around 50,000 migrants have poured into Chicago in the last two years. Some Chicagoans are furious. We talk to residents, clergy, and migrants on Chicago's South Side about an issue that may be Kamala Harris's biggest liability.

The Democrats call Black women the "backbone" of their party. We ask three Black women delegates in Chicago about making history, Gaza, and Black men voting for Trump.

The last two Democratic presidents took distinct approaches toward leading their party and the nation. New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait explains why he thinks Kamala Harris should embrace Barack Obama’s style of governance over Joe Biden’s.

When Chicago hosted the Democratic National Convention in 1968, it descended into riots in the street and chaos on the floor. Historian Rick Perlstein talks about whether 2024 risks a repeat.