Democracy Now! Audio

Part 2 of Democracy Now!'s conversation with Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory. She was recently sanctioned by the Trump administration, shortly after publishing a report on corporations supporting what she calls Israel's “economy of genocide.”

Transcribed - Published: 11 July 2025

Full interview with U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk in Geneva, Switzerland.

Transcribed - Published: 11 July 2025

Headlines for July 11, 2025; Ex-NOAA Official on TX Flood: Trump Breaking “Disaster Response Chain” as Climate Crisis Escalates; Judge Blocks Trump Birthright Citizenship Order; DOJ Caught Lying About Men Sent to El Salvador; U.N. Human Rights Chief Slams Trump’s Anti-Immigrant Policies, “Militarized Response” to Protests

Transcribed - Published: 11 July 2025

Headlines for July 10, 2025; From Agents on Horseback in L.A. to a Chicago Arts Festival, Latino Communities Mobilize Against ICE; “Apocalypse in the Tropics”: Brazilian Filmmaker on Evangelicals, Bolsonaro & Trump’s Tariff Threat; “Economy of Genocide”: U.S. Sanctions U.N. Expert Who Reports on Corporate Profits from Israel’s Gaza War

Transcribed - Published: 10 July 2025

Headlines for July 09, 2025; “Netanyahu Is the Problem”: Sanders’s Former Adviser Matt Duss on Why Gaza Ceasefire Remains Elusive; “Vladimir Putin Is Not Interested in a Peace Deal”: Matt Duss on Trump’s Stalled Ukraine Diplomacy; “Ideological Deportation”: AAUP v. Rubio Trial Challenges Trump Crackdown on Pro-Palestine Students; Philadelphia Strike Ends: Race & Inequality at Center of Municipal Workers’ Fight for a Fair Wage

Transcribed - Published: 9 July 2025

Headlines for July 08, 2025; Hold GOP Accountable: Youngest Dem. Congresswoman on Medicaid, Climate Cuts & Her Visit to ICE Jail; “Freedom to Choose”?: Peter Beinart Slams Trump-Netanyahu Plan for Ethnic Cleansing of Gaza; Peter Beinart on Zohran Mamdani & Why Democratic Voters Are Increasingly Skeptical of Israel; What Is the Trump Doctrine? John Bellamy Foster on U.S. Foreign Policy & the “New MAGA Imperialism”

Transcribed - Published: 8 July 2025

Headlines for July 07, 2025; Texas Flood Kills 82+, Including 28 Kids, Amid Drought, Trump Cuts to Weather Service, NOAA & FEMA; “Most Massive Transfer of Wealth Upward in American History”: John Nichols on Trump’s Budget Law; “Frontal Assault” on Climate Justice: Rolling Stone’s Antonia Juhasz on Trump’s Budget Law; “Completely Illegal”: Dr. Feroze Sidhwa on Israel’s “Outrageous” Attacks on Gaza Hospitals & Staff

Transcribed - Published: 7 July 2025

“What to the Slave Is the 4th of July?”: James Earl Jones Reads Frederick Douglass’s Historic Speech; “Empire of AI”: Karen Hao on How AI Is Threatening Democracy & Creating a New Colonial World; Journalist Karen Hao on Sam Altman, OpenAI & the “Quasi-Religious” Push for Artificial Intelligence

Transcribed - Published: 4 July 2025

Headlines for July 03, 2025; EXCLUSIVE: Mahmoud Khalil, Palestinian Activist Jailed by ICE for 104 Days, in First Live Interview; GOP Budget Bill Slashes Medicaid for Millions, Cuts Taxes for the Rich, Funds ICE at Historic Levels

Transcribed - Published: 3 July 2025

Headlines for July 02, 2025; “Not a Done Deal”: After Senate Passes “Big, Ugly Bill,” Progressives Fight to Stop It in the House; GOP Budget Bill Would Make ICE “Largest Federal Law Enforcement Agency in the History of the Nation”; “Alligator Alcatraz”: Florida Activists Resist Everglades Migrant Jail as ICE Deaths Rise in U.S.; “Arrest Now, Ask Questions Later”: Why Did L.A. ICE Agents Arrest and Jail U.S. Citizen Andrea Velez?

Transcribed - Published: 2 July 2025

Headlines for July 01, 2025; “Worst Thing I’ve Ever Seen”: U.S. Surgeon Describes Mass Starvation, Injury and Death in Gaza; “Trying to Find Food Is a Death Sentence”: Palestinian Writer Muhammad Shehada on Gaza Aid Massacres; “Ethnic Cleansing”: U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, on Israel’s War in Gaza; “Damaging and Deadly” Heat Domes Nearly Tripled, from Europe to the U.S.: Climatologist Michael Mann

Transcribed - Published: 1 July 2025

Headlines for June 30, 2025; To Fund Tax Cuts for the Rich, GOP Budget Bill Would “Take a Sledgehammer” to Healthcare for Millions; SCOTUS Clears Way for Trump Agenda, from Limits to Birthright Citizenship to LGBTQ Books in Schools; Freedom for Western Sahara: Sahrawis Demand End of Moroccan Occupation at U.N. Human Rights Council

Transcribed - Published: 30 June 2025

Journalist Rebecca Grant, who writes about reproductive rights, outlines the alternative healthcare methods that many are forced to turn to in the face of dangerous and increasingly draconian abortion restrictions.

Published: 27 June 2025

The Brooklyn-based Sikh American musician Sonny Singh joins us in our Democracy Now! studio to perform and talk about his remarkable music. Singh gained fame as a member of Red Baraat and now records as solo artist.

Transcribed - Published: 27 June 2025

Headlines for June 27, 2025; Open the Floodgates: SCOTUS Says South Carolina Can Defund Planned Parenthood. Will Other States Follow?; Kidnapped to Salvadoran Mega-Prison: Andry Hernández Romero’s Family on 100+ Days of Disappearance; Rep. Pramila Jayapal: Trump Is Attacking “Every Part of the Legal Immigration System”; Bill Moyers Dies at 91: PBS Icon on Corruption of Corporate Media and Power of Public Broadcasting

Transcribed - Published: 27 June 2025

Headlines for June 26, 2025; “The Economy Is Rigged”: Robert Reich on Zohran Mamdani, The Democratic Party, Inequality, and Trump; “A Clown Show”: RFK Jr. Fires CDC Panel & Stacks It with Anti-Vaxxers, Cuts Funding for Int’l Vaccines; “Buy More U.S. Weapons”: “Daddy” Trump Pushes Military-Industrial Complex on NATO Countries

Transcribed - Published: 26 June 2025

Headlines for June 25, 2025; “We Fight for Working People with No Apology”: Zohran Mamdani Beats Cuomo in NYC Mayoral Primary; “One Mass Casualty After Another”: U.S. Doctor in Gaza on Ongoing Israeli Massacres at Aid Sites; “Imperial Decline”: NATO Nations Boost War Spending at Trump’s Urging as He Defends Iran Bombing; “Inhumane”: Marine Veteran Calls for ICE to Release His Father After Video of Brutal Arrest Goes Viral

Transcribed - Published: 25 June 2025

Headlines for June 24, 2025; F-Bombs and Real Bombs: Trita Parsi on Shaky Iran Ceasefire & Trump’s Anger at Netanyahu; NYC Mayoral Primary Day: Zohran Mamdani on Building a Movement & Campaigning for an Affordable City; How Ranked-Choice Voting Could Decide NYC’s Mayoral Election: John Tarleton on Cuomo vs. Progressives; “Blatantly Unconstitutional”: Rep. Ro Khanna Decries U.S. Strikes on Iran Without Congressional Approval

Transcribed - Published: 24 June 2025

Headlines for June 23, 2025; Report from Tehran: Iranians View U.S. Strikes on Key Nuclear Sites as “Act of War”; Stop the War on Iran: 1,000+ Sign Petition Saying Iran War Deflects Attention from Gaza Genocide; Ex-Israeli Peace Negotiator Slams U.S. Bombing of Iran, Says Israel Seeks Chaos in Middle East; Mahmoud Khalil Is Free: Follow His Journey from ICE Jail to Newark Airport to Gates of Columbia University

Transcribed - Published: 23 June 2025

Columbia University graduate, Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil reunited with his wife and met his newborn son after being released from over 100 days in ICE detention. After flying from Louisiana to New Jersey, Khalil told reporters, “If they threaten me with detention, even if they would kill me, I would still speak up for Palestine.”

Transcribed - Published: 21 June 2025

Columbia University graduate, Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil reunited with his wife and met his newborn son after being released from over 100 days in ICE detention. After flying from Louisiana to New Jersey, Khalil told reporters, “If they threaten me with detention, even if they would kill me, I would still speak up for Palestine.”

Transcribed - Published: 21 June 2025

Headlines for June 20, 2025; Another Iraq? Military Expert Warns U.S. Has No Real Plan If It joins Israel’s War on Iran; “Harming Young People”: Chase Strangio on SCOTUS Trans Heathcare Ban & End of LGBTQ Suicide Hotline; I Was Detained, Deported from L.A. Airport for My Reporting on Gaza Campus Protests: Australian Writer; “More Choices and More Power”: How the Ranked-Choice Ballot Is Changing NYC Elections

Transcribed - Published: 20 June 2025

Juneteenth Special: Historian Clint Smith on Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America; Rhiannon Giddens on Pulitzer-Winning Opera “Omar” About Enslaved Muslim Scholar Omar ibn Said; “Another Wasted Life”: Rhiannon Giddens on How Death of Kalief Browder Inspired New Song

Transcribed - Published: 19 June 2025

Headlines for June 18, 2025; Tehran Professor Reports from Iran State TV Building Bombed by Israel as Trump Threatens Khamenei; “A Moment of Immense Danger”: U.S. Inches Toward Direct Involvement in Israel’s War with Iran; Mosab Abu Toha: As Attention Shifts to Iran, Israel Ramps Up Killings, Starvation & Annexation in Gaza; “What Authoritarians Do”: NYC Comptroller Brad Lander Speaks Out After ICE Arrests Him in Courthouse

Transcribed - Published: 18 June 2025

We look at how ranked-choice voting works and what it could mean for New Yorkers heading to the polls in the primaries for local elections this Tuesday, with early voting already underway.

Transcribed - Published: 18 June 2025

Headlines for June 17, 2025; Preemptive Strike or Act of War? Israel Attacked Iran Amid Sinking Global Support for Assault on Gaza; “We Loved Her”: MN AG Keith Ellison Mourns His Friend Melissa Hortman, Slams Republican Rhetoric; Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister on U.S. Embargo, Trump’s Deportations, Israel’s War on Iran & Gaza

Transcribed - Published: 17 June 2025

Headlines for June 16, 2025; Israel & Iran at War: Trump Is “Only World Leader Who Can Stop the Cycle of Escalation”; No Kings: Millions Across U.S. Protest Trump’s Power Grab, Overshadowing His Military Parade; “An Outstanding Leader”: Minnesota Mourns Assassinated Lawmaker Melissa Hortman as Suspect Is Arrested

Transcribed - Published: 16 June 2025

Watch Part 2 of our interview with Patricia Torres Ray, former Minnesota state senator and former colleague of Melissa Hortman and John Hoffman.

Transcribed - Published: 16 June 2025

Headlines for June 13, 2025; Israel Attacks Iran, Killing Top Military Leaders, Scientists; Hits Nuke Sites in Expanding Conflict; “We Are in the Midst of the Creation of a Police State”: Rep. Ilhan Omar on Trump’s Authoritarianism; “Millions of Lives at Risk”: USAID Cuts Lead to Global Rise in Death, Hunger, Poverty and Disease

Transcribed - Published: 13 June 2025

Headlines for June 12, 2025; Ex-U.S. Diplomat Joins March to Gaza, Says Biden Official Matthew Miller Has “Blood on His Hands”; Block the Bombs: Rep. Delia Ramirez Pushes Bill to Halt U.S. Weapons Sales to Israel over Gaza; “The Beginning of Fascism”: Rep. Delia Ramirez Says Trump’s Immigrant Crackdown Is Crushing Democracy; The U.S. Accepts “Fruits of Migrant Labor” But Not Immigrants’ Humanity: Day Laborer Organizer in L.A.

Transcribed - Published: 12 June 2025

Headlines for June 11, 2025; “No Kings”: 1,800+ Rallies Planned as Trump Threatens “Very Heavy Force” on Army Parade Protesters; From Travel Ban to Troops in Streets, Advocates Blast Trump’s Targeting of Immigrant Communities; “They Kidnapped Us”: Deported Gaza Flotilla Activist Describes Israeli Interception in Int’l Waters

Transcribed - Published: 11 June 2025

Headlines for June 10, 2025; Chaos & Cruelty: Trump Deploys Thousands of Soldiers to Put Down Anti-ICE Protests in Los Angeles; California AG Bonta Sues Trump for Deploying Troops, Warns President Is Trying to Provoke Violence; Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s Lawyer: Trump Admin’s Trafficking Charges Must Be Viewed with “Suspicion”; “A Show of Human Solidarity”: Ex-U.S. Diplomat to Join Global March to Gaza to Break Israel’s Siege

Transcribed - Published: 10 June 2025

Headlines for June 09, 2025; L.A. Under Siege: Trump Sends in National Guard as Protests Continue over Militarized ICE Raids; “Absolutely Unprecedented”: Trump Deploys National Guard to L.A. & Hegseth Threatens to Send in Marines; “Kidnapped in Int’l Waters”: Israel Intercepts Gaza-Bound Aid Ship, Detains Greta Thunberg & Others

Transcribed - Published: 9 June 2025

Headlines for June 06, 2025; Musk vs. Trump? Quinn Slobodian on the Risks of Billionaire Rule; Trump Budget Bill Would Lead to 51,000 More Deaths Each Year, as Health Experts Urge Medicare for All; “Completely Unwarranted”: Newark Mayor Ras Baraka Sues Trump Officials over His Arrest at ICE Jail; High Seas Update from Aid Ship Sailing to Gaza: Activists Vow to “Win Through Solidarity”; Fired over Gaza? Dr. Rupa Marya Sues UCSF, Says She Was Targeted for Speaking Up for Palestine

Transcribed - Published: 6 June 2025

As For Venida, For Kalief premieres this weekend at the Tribeca Film Festival, we speak with Kalief Browder’s older brother and the film’s director on the 10th anniversary of Kalief’s death.

Transcribed - Published: 6 June 2025

Headlines for June 05, 2025; Trump Revives Travel Ban, Bars Citizens of 12 Nations in Move Decried as “Devastating”; Mahmoud Khalil, Trapped in “Immigration Gulag” for Nearly 3 Months, Challenges Deportation Efforts; As U.S. Vetoes U.N. Gaza Ceasefire Resolution, Kathy Kelly & Veterans Enter 3rd Week of Hunger Strike; “The Shame of Israeli Medicine”: How Israeli Doctors Turned on Palestinian Colleagues & Patients; “How to Survive the Broligarchy”: Carole Cadwalladr on Tech Titans & Rising U.S. Authoritarianism

Transcribed - Published: 5 June 2025

We continue our conversation with investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr about the rise of unregulated tech behemoths like OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT that has been embroiled in scandals surrounding its generation of easily disseminated false information, and Palantir, the secretive data-mining company that now heavily contracts with the U.S. government to provide mass surveillance and data collection services.

Transcribed - Published: 5 June 2025

We continue our conversation with investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr about the rise of unregulated tech behemoths like OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT that has been embroiled in scandals surrounding its generation of easily disseminated false information, and Palantir, the secretive data-mining company that now heavily contracts with the U.S. government to provide mass surveillance and data collection services.

Transcribed - Published: 5 June 2025

Headlines for June 04, 2025; “Death Traps”: U.S.-Israeli Aid Scheme Paused in Gaza After 100+ Palestinians Killed While Waiting for Food; Greta Thunberg Speaks from Aid Ship Heading to Gaza Despite Israeli Threats: It’s My Moral Obligation; “Empire of AI”: Karen Hao on How AI Is Threatening Democracy & Creating a New Colonial World

Transcribed - Published: 4 June 2025

Extended interview with Karen Hao, author of Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI. The book documents the rise of OpenAI and how the AI industry is leading to a new form of colonialism.

Transcribed - Published: 4 June 2025

Headlines for June 03, 2025; “Panic, Terror, Chaos, Trauma”: SCOTUS Ruling Lets Trump Strip Protections for 500K+ Immigrants; ICE Raids on Restaurants, Farmworkers, Students Spark Community Resistance Across Country; “Detention Facilitates Deportation”: Trump’s Budget Bill Would Massively Increase ICE Jail Capacity; Palantir: Peter Thiel’s Data-Mining Firm Helps DOGE Build Master Database to Surveil, Track Immigrants

Transcribed - Published: 3 June 2025

Headlines for June 02, 2025; Ex-Israeli Negotiator Daniel Levy: Netanyahu Wants “Permanent War” in Gaza, Not a New Ceasefire; British Surgeon in Gaza Reports on Rafah Massacre as Dozens of Palestinians Killed Waiting for Aid; Gaza Aid Worker: Israel’s New Shadowy Humanitarian Aid Scheme Is “Tool to Increase Suffering”; Harvard Commencement Speakers: Despite Crackdown, “Students Will Keep Speaking Up” for Palestine

Transcribed - Published: 2 June 2025

Headlines for May 30, 2025; “Worse Than McCarthyism”: Historian Ellen Schrecker on Trump’s War Against Universities & Students; As Courts Battle Trump on Tariffs, Will Right-Wing Supreme Court Rescue the President’s Trade Agenda?; Trump’s Abuse of Pardons Undermines Entire Justice System: Reagan Official Bruce Fein

Transcribed - Published: 30 May 2025

Headlines for May 29, 2025; Fear, Repression & Brain Drain: U.S. Campuses Reeling as Trump Freezes, Revokes Student Visas; Mosquito Protocol: Ex-Israeli Soldier on Army’s Systematic Use of Palestinians as Human Shields; Jeremy Scahill: Shadowy Israeli-U.S. Aid Plan Is Weapon in “Netanyahu’s War of Annihilation” in Gaza

Transcribed - Published: 29 May 2025

Headlines for May 28, 2025; “I Am a Political Prisoner”: Immigrant Rights Activist Jeanette Vizguerra Speaks from ICE Jail; “Corporate Criminal”: Nadia Milleron, Whose Daughter Died in 737 Crash, Slams New DOJ-Boeing Deal; “Mt. Everest of Corruption”: Crypto Investors Buy Access to President; Trump Expands Bitcoin Holdings

Transcribed - Published: 28 May 2025

Headlines for May 27, 2025; Israel Bombs Home of Gaza Pediatrician, Killing 9 of Her 10 Kids, in Latest Attack on Health Workers; Trump vs. Academic Freedom: President Escalates Attacks on Harvard & International Students; Georgia Abortion Ban Forces Family to Keep Pregnant, Brain-Dead Woman on Life Support; “Unconscionable & Deliberate”: GOP Budget Defunds Planned Parenthood Amid Maternal Health Crisis

Transcribed - Published: 27 May 2025

“Sinners”: Director Ryan Coogler on His Latest Hit, Delta Blues, His Mississippi Roots & Vampires; The Injustice of Justice: Keith LaMar Speaks from Ohio Death Row as Movement Grows to Save His Life; “I’m Innocent”: Keith LaMar Speaks Live from Death Row About His Case, Conditions & Pending Execution

Published: 26 May 2025

Headlines for May 23, 2025; “Theft from On High”: Trump’s Budget Bill Guts Medicaid, Medicare & More to Pay for Tax Cuts; Mahmoud Khalil: Jailed Activist Testifies Before Immigration Judge and Holds His Child for First Time; “I Can’t Breathe”: Five Years After George Floyd’s Murder, Trump Admin Rolls Back Police Oversight; “King of the North”: New Book Examines MLK’s Fight Against Police Brutality & Racism Outside Dixie

Transcribed - Published: 23 May 2025

Historian Jeanne Theoharis joins us for an in-depth discussion about her new book, King of the North: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Life of Struggle Outside the South, a major reexamination of his experiences and activism confronting police brutality, alongside his wife Coretta Scott King.

Transcribed - Published: 23 May 2025

Headlines for May 22, 2025; “Nothing Can Justify It”: Journalist Gideon Levy Reacts to Killing of Israeli Embassy Staffers in D.C.; “The Worst It’s Ever Been”: U.K. Surgeon in Gaza Warns Kids Are Bearing Brunt as Israel Widens Assault; U.K. MP Jeremy Corbyn & EU MP Lynn Boylan on Europe Pressuring Israel to Halt Atrocities in Gaza; Trump Repeats “White Genocide” Falsehoods in Meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa

Transcribed - Published: 22 May 2025