Welcome to Wired's Uncanny Valley.

I'm Wired's global editorial director, Katie Drummond.

Today on the show, why Elon Musk wants the government shutdown

and the state of measles in the United States.

I'm joined today by Wired Senior Editor Leah Figer.

Welcome back to Uncanny Valley, Leah.

Thank you so much for having me.

Love to be back.

Now, Leah, you are back for a very good reason,

which is that earlier today, you and your team broke a fascinating and a very consequential

story about the looming government shutdown and why Elon Musk has actually

wanted this shutdown to happen. Give us the latest. Walk us through this reporting.

There is a possible government shutdown that could occur as soon as Friday. Basically,

Republicans right now in Congress are trying to force through a continuing resolution, a CR, that would extend government funding.

It wouldn't extend it forever. It would extend it to September. But, you know, buying Congress and Republicans and Trump a little bit more time.

Trump has been giving some very full-throated encouragement to his party, I should say, to vote for the CR and to avoid a shutdown.

Our reporting ran in direct contrast to that, that Trump's arguably chief lieutenant right now and collaborator, Elon Musk,

has actually been expressing a pretty serious desire for a government shutdown, even as Trump has

been saying that he does not want one. Not only does Musk want a government shutdown, an aim

that obviously, as I just said, runs totally contrary to Trump, but it's partially because it would

make it a lot easier to eliminate the jobs of hundreds of thousands of federal workers,

essentially achieving what would be a permanent shutdown.

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