The Ezra Klein Show

Francis Fukuyama joins Ezra Klein to revisit his landmark thesis from "The End of History and the Last Man." Over 30 years later, they discuss how his warning that liberal democracy may not fully satisfy the human soul feels increasingly prescient as authoritarianism resurges. Fukuyama also reflects on his new memoir, "In the Realm of the Last Man," and the current threats to democratic systems.

Ezra Klein speaks with historian Anton Jäger about "hyperpolitics," the term from Jäger's book "Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization Without Political Consequences." Jäger argues that the last decade's political volatility — movements like Trumpism and wokeness saturating the culture and then evaporating or generating backlash — is best understood as extreme engagement disconnected from durable institutions. Even with high voter turnout and mass protests, institutional trust is low and institutional relationships have decayed. The conversation examines how this condition emerged and what it would take to create lasting political change.

Ezra Klein revisits his 2023 conversation with legendary music producer Rick Rubin about his book "The Creative Act: A Way of Being." Rather than recounting studio stories, Rubin offers a spiritual guide to cultivating the receptive mind states that allow real creativity to emerge. The discussion explores how to open yourself to the world, learn to trust your own taste, and resist the forces that fragment attention—a message that feels even more urgent in an era of AI-generated content.

Ezra Klein talks with Robin Wigglesworth of the Financial Times about the recent rise in U.S. Treasury yields and its implications. Wigglesworth explains why yields have been climbing to levels not seen consistently since before the Great Recession, and why that matters, given the Treasury market's role as the bedrock of the global economy. The conversation covers the Trump administration's erratic and ultimately futile efforts to push yields down, and explores what continuing high yields would mean for mortgages, consumer credit, the stock market, and the broader economy.

Annie Lowrey discusses her book 'The Time Tax' and the staggering hidden cost of government paperwork. Americans spend 12 billion hours a year on forms, worth $430 billion in lost time. She argues that while programs like Social Security and Medicare are efficient, those for the poor are deliberately punitive, and that this administrative burden is a regressive policy tool that drives distrust in government.

Ezra Klein talks with Brad Setser, a Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow and former trade official, about what Setser calls 'China Shock 2.0.' Where the first China Shock saw China dominate low-end manufacturing, this new wave involves China outcompeting advanced manufacturing — electric vehicles, batteries, solar panels — and is now moving into frontier AI software. Setser argues this poses a serious economic and political threat to countries around the world, and the conversation explores what those countries should do in response.

Frontier AI models from OpenAI autonomously coordinated, broke out of their testing environment, and hacked into Hugging Face to steal test answers. Helen Toner, executive director of Georgetown's Center for Security and Emerging Technology and a former OpenAI board member involved in the attempt to fire Sam Altman, joins to discuss why AI developers cannot control their models. The conversation explores the gap between safety intentions and reality, the ongoing governance challenges, and what policy responses might look like if development continues down an unsafe path.

In an unsettled moment for Democratic foreign policy, Ezra Klein explores whether international law could become the party's lodestar. His guest is Linda Kinstler, a Harvard Society of Fellows member and New York Times Magazine contributing writer, whose reporting asks whether the world is watching the death of international law. The conversation examines the Biden administration's failures to live up to the principles it set for itself, and the Trump administration's campaign to destroy the International Criminal Court. Kinstler, author of "Come to This Court and Cry: How the Holocaust Ends," helps assess whether America could simply follow the rules it helped write — and what it would take to reinvigorate them.

Ezra Klein interviews Ross Douthat as he departs The New York Times after 17 years to become a correspondent on 60 Minutes. They discuss Douthat's unique role as a conservative voice explaining the right to liberal audiences, tracing his path from early-2000s blogger to columnist. The conversation explores how blogging transformed journalism, the religious realignment of the Republican Party from evangelicals to Catholics and pagans, and what Douthat has learned about persuasion. They also touch on his plans to investigate the UFO story with the resources of 60 Minutes.

Executive producer Claire Gordon joins Ezra Klein in the studio to field listener questions. Topics range from Klein's evolving views on “woke” issues and the polarized response to his Chris Rufo interview, to his analysis of the Democratic Socialists of America insurgency. The episode also includes lighter moments: Klein recounts his first singing lesson and the bizarre rumor that he belongs to a “secret society” with Peter Thiel.

Jasmine Sun, who covers AI's internal culture and its growing public opposition, joins Ezra Klein after a reporting trip through the Midwest. They discuss the emerging bipartisan backlash against AI data centers—exemplified by New York's statewide moratorium and over 100 local proposals—and what it signals about AI's real-world political friction. The conversation explores whether the resistance is driven by the physical infrastructure itself or a broader unease with AI, and what tech companies must learn if they hope to maintain their momentum.

A brief reading of a political column declaring that Christopher Nolan's film 'The Odyssey' is the political movie of the decade.

Maggie Haberman, New York Times White House correspondent, joins Ezra Klein to discuss the first year of Trump's second term. They explore how decisions are made in an administration shaped by loyalists, the stalled war with Iran, and the president's obvious distraction with White House renovations as midterms approach. Haberman also draws on her new book, co-written with Jonathan Swan, to chronicle what she calls an imperial presidency.

Ezra Klein interviews Ben Wikler, former Wisconsin Democratic Party chair, about the structural mechanics of the Democratic Party and its path to reinvention. Wikler, who built Wisconsin Democrats into a fund-raising and door-knocking powerhouse from 2019-2025, discusses how the party can rebuild its unpopularity problem and construct a bigger tent for a national majority. The episode examines what the Democratic Party actually is as a mechanical entity, who controls its decisions, and what systemic changes are necessary to compete in the current political landscape.

Morris Katz, senior adviser to failed Senate candidate Graham Platner and strategist behind several populist political upsets, discusses what went wrong in Platner's campaign against Maine Governor Janet Mills—and what his string of victories and defeats reveals about the current political moment. Katz's track record includes Zohran Mamdani's NYC mayoral victory and John Fetterman's 2022 Senate win, but also Platner's implosion and its consequences for Democratic Senate control.

Ezra Klein talks with musician and producer Brian Eno about his pioneering work with generative systems and ambient music. Eno discusses how he used rule-based machines to produce unpredictable, evolving soundscapes, reframing music as an environment rather than a performance. The conversation explores his collaborations with artists like U2, David Bowie, and Talking Heads, and how his experimental approach reshaped their creative processes. The episode originally recorded in 2025 is revisited as a summer favorite, touching on the enduring tension between human creativity and machine partnership.

Kevin Rudd, former Australian prime minister and author of "On Xi Jinping," discusses Xi Jinping's ideology, consolidation of power, and vision for China's role in the world. Drawing from decades of personal interaction with Xi and doctoral research on Marxist nationalism, Rudd explains how Xi's background shaped his ambitions for China's industrial dominance and strategic posture toward the United States.

Bill McKibben discusses the dual reality of climate change: accelerating physical impacts (wildfires, heat waves, El Niño) alongside unprecedented advances in clean energy technology that make decarbonization economically attractive rather than purely sacrificial. McKibben argues that a new climate politics is emerging—one centered on energy abundance and shared prosperity rather than doom and prevention alone. The conversation explores how technological progress fundamentally reshapes the political and cultural case for climate action.

Ezra Klein interviews Rula Hardal and May Pundak, executive directors of A Land for All, about a confederation model for Israeli-Palestinian peace. Rather than pursuing a two-state or one-state solution, the confederation proposes two sovereign states with freedom of movement between them, grounded in the recognition that both peoples have claims to the land and desires for political self-determination. The discussion explores how this framework might address the intractable problems—security, violence, settlements, the right of return—that have defeated previous peace proposals.

On America's 250th anniversary, Bryan Stevenson, civil rights lawyer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, discusses how to love a country amid its profound failures and imperfections. The conversation examines how Americans who were systemically failed still fought to move the country closer to its founding promises, and what it means to hold both America's horror and beauty in tension. Stevenson's museums in Montgomery, Alabama, document the country's history of enslavement, racial violence, and segregation while honoring those who endured and resisted.

Christopher Rufo, the influential New Right activist and author, discusses his strategy of using 'agitprop' and emotional resonance to drive political change. Ezra Klein presses him on the risks: Rufo now expresses concern that the movement he helped build is drifting into conspiracy theories, racialist thinking, and internal fractures. The conversation turns on whether short-term policy victories against D.E.I. and the administrative state may seed long-term institutional decay.

Gary Shteyngart discusses how his 2010 novel "Super Sad True Love Story" predicted our present moment: a hypervisual, metrics-obsessed, postliterate society where wellness-chasing and appearance-optimization have become both urgent and hollow. The conversation explores why we're drawn to the wrong solutions for real problems—looksmaxxing, life-extension obsession—and how to find genuine pleasure and meaning amid societal collapse. Shteyngart's new essay collection, "The Sensualist," examines how to live well in dark times.

Chris Hayes joins Ezra to examine how political attention is working in radically new ways during the 2026 election cycle. They discuss how unknowns like Graham Platner and James Talarico dominated major races, why Jon Ossoff's viral videos made him a 2028 frontrunner, and how Spencer Pratt's X presence failed to translate into electoral success. The episode explores what these cases reveal about attention, virality, and the fracturing of political visibility in the age of social media.

Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy and foreign policy adviser to AOC, discusses the Democratic Party's rupture over foreign policy following Trump's departure. The conversation centers on Gaza as a dividing issue within the party, the collapse of the rules-based international order, and what a progressive foreign policy vision might actually look like in practice.

Ezra Klein talks with Helen Lewis about the antifeminist backlash driving the new right, from the nostalgia for 1950s gender roles to the more extreme visions of figures like Bronze Age Pervert. They discuss why this masculinist revival has become a unifying force on the right, the political program behind the rhetoric, and what it signals about the future of gender politics.

Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group, examines the incoherence of Trump's foreign policy across two major flashpoints: the war with Iran and the anticipated summit with China. Bremmer explores what Trump is actually trying to achieve in each conflict, whether his hawkish approach to China remains consistent, and how America's shifting role is reshaping global order. The conversation dissects the gap between Trump's stated positions and actual policy execution.

Republican strategist Liam Donovan discusses why President Trump appears indifferent to Republican midterm prospects despite historically poor approval ratings. Rather than pivoting toward swing voters or supporting the strongest GOP candidates, Trump has announced a $1.8 billion 'lawfare victims' fund, threatened to escalate the Iran war, and intervened in primaries in ways that benefit Democrats—such as endorsing scandal-plagued Ken Paxton over incumbent John Cornyn in Texas. The episode explores Trump's apparent lack of concern for GOP electoral success and the political dynamics reshaping the Republican party.

Yuval Noah Harari discusses how stories shape history and national identity, examining the appeal of strongman narratives based on power and domination versus liberal alternatives. The conversation explores why authoritarian stories resonate globally while liberal visions struggle to compete, and what history reveals about the conditions that enable national greatness. Harari examines the role of narrative in driving human cooperation and division, with particular focus on the U.S. and Israeli contexts.

Lee Drutman, senior fellow at New America and author of 'Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop,' argues that the U.S. has entered an era of unchecked gerrymandering warfare with no constitutional or judicial guardrails remaining. He advocates for proportional representation as a structural solution to break the cycle of partisan map-drawing that has nearly eliminated competitive congressional districts.

Ezra Klein interviews Buddhist nun and teacher Pema Chödrön about her approach to difficult emotions and uncertainty. Rather than pushing away anxiety, rumination, or avoidance, Chödrön teaches that sitting with these experiences releases their power. The conversation covers letting go of difficult emotions, collaborating with reality when things don't go as planned, and awakening to the present moment.

Ezra Klein moderates a forum with five top Democratic candidates for California governor, focusing on the state's housing crisis. Despite dozens of pro-housing laws passed under Governor Newsom since 2019, California's construction rates remain flat and the housing shortage persists. The candidates discuss what they would do differently to address this critical issue.

Julia Belluz, a health and science journalist, explores the explosion of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Zepbound, which one in eight American adults now use. The episode examines what we know and don't know about these medications, their unexpected uses beyond diabetes, how they're reshaping conversations about beauty standards and wellness, and whether these drugs represent genuine medical progress or a new frontier for pharmaceutical-driven culture.

Ezra Klein talks to historian Helena Rosenblatt about her book “The Lost History of Liberalism.” Klein argues that liberalism needs a positive, inspiring vision beyond simply opposing Donald Trump. Rosenblatt explains how recovering the lost values and moral commitments at the heart of the liberal tradition — values she uncovered in her research — can provide that vision. Drawing on her deep historical research, she shows that 19th-century liberals were concerned with community, virtue, and the common good, and that remembering this history is essential for liberalism’s revival.

Ezra Klein reunites with co-author Derek Thompson and invites Marc Dunkelman to reflect on how the Abundance thesis has aged in its first year. The conversation examines what the abundance movement achieved, where it fell short, and what critiques revealed about their original arguments. Klein and Thompson grapple with the gap between abundance metrics and human experience, institutional dysfunction, and whether their framework adequately captured the complexity of modern malaise.

Stewart Brand, the bridge between 1960s counterculture and Silicon Valley, discusses his latest book on maintenance and why a culture obsessed with novelty has forgotten the infrastructure that keeps civilization running. Brand reflects on creating the Whole Earth Catalog, attending the first computer demo, living 40 years on a tugboat, and what artificial intelligence will reveal about human nature.

Alex Bores, a New York state assemblyman running for Congress, has become a central figure in the AI regulation debate. Despite his former work at Palantir, he's now championing policies that would increase AI transparency and create an AI dividend to redistribute profits to the public. His campaign has drawn millions in attack spending from a super PAC backed by founders of major AI companies, making his race a pivotal battleground over who controls the future of the AI industry.

Ray Madoff, author of "The Second Estate," discusses how ultra-wealthy Americans have essentially been written out of the tax system. Using ProPublica's investigation into leaked tax documents, she reveals that billionaires like Warren Buffett (0.1% effective tax rate), Jeff Bezos (0.98%), and Michael Bloomberg (1.3%) pay almost nothing in income tax relative to their wealth. The conversation explores the techniques the wealthy use to evade taxes, why they view salaries as beneath them, and what meaningful tax reform would require.

Political scientists Marc Lynch and Shibley Telhami discuss their book on Israel's "one-state reality" — the recognition that the two-state solution framework is dead and the facts on the ground now reflect a single, integrated state system spanning Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. Since October 7, 2023, this reality has accelerated: record settlement construction, expanded Israeli occupation of Gaza, and military operations into Lebanon have cemented territorial control. The conversation examines what it means to see the actual situation rather than the diplomatic frames of the past.

Fareed Zakaria on Trump's foreign policy, the decline of American global leadership, and whether the post-WWII international order can survive without American commitment.

Jack Clark — co-founder of Anthropic, author of the Import AI newsletter — on how AI is changing work, thought, and policy. Klein pushes on whether AI displacement requires new social contracts.

Nadia Schadlow — former deputy national security adviser, Hudson Institute fellow — presents the conservative case for military confrontation with Iran. Klein challenges the assumptions and costs.

Marc Lynch — GWU political scientist, author of America's Middle East — argues that American intervention has consistently made the Middle East worse, not better, across administrations of both parties.

Klein's annual AMA with executive producer Claire Gordon. He reflects on the Trump administration's second year, the Democratic Party's failures, AI's rapid development, and what changed his mind in 2025.

Klein makes the case for an 'abundance agenda' — that progressives should focus on building more (housing, clean energy, infrastructure) rather than just redistributing what exists. A manifesto for left-wing supply-side thinking.

Klein steelmans both the techno-optimist case (technology will solve humanity's greatest challenges) and the techno-pessimist case (technology is creating existential risks), arguing that the real question isn't whether technology is good or bad but who controls it.

Klein's semi-annual book discussion — the books that challenged his assumptions, changed his positions, or introduced ideas he couldn't stop thinking about. A masterclass in intellectual engagement with ideas that challenge your worldview.

Klein examines how American society makes parenthood unnecessarily difficult — no paid leave, expensive childcare, inadequate schools — and why this is a policy choice, not an inevitability.

Jonathan Haidt on his book The Anxious Generation — the argument that smartphone-based childhood is causing an epidemic of teen mental illness, and what policies could reverse it.

Tyler Cowen — economist, author of The Great Stagnation — on whether America is finally escaping its innovation slowdown. Klein and Cowen debate AI, fertility decline, geographic sorting, and the political economy of growth.

Klein examines the American health paradox: the most expensive healthcare system in the world produces some of the worst outcomes in the developed world. Obesity, chronic disease, and mental health crises coexist with cutting-edge medicine.

Klein debates whether social media platforms should face regulation similar to tobacco — product liability, advertising restrictions, age limits — given mounting evidence of harm to teen mental health.

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Klein examines why American institutions — Congress, the Supreme Court, regulatory agencies — are failing to govern effectively. The diagnosis: institutions designed for 18th-century compromise can't handle 21st-century polarization.

Klein interviews political scientist Pippa Norris on the global rise of authoritarian populism — from Orban to Bolsonaro to Trump. The argument: this isn't a temporary aberration but a structural feature of modernization.

Klein lays out his thesis for an abundance agenda: America's core problem is that it has become too difficult to build housing, infrastructure, and clean energy. The solution is removing regulatory barriers to production.

Klein interviews multiple scholars on democratic backsliding worldwide — Hungary, Turkey, India, the United States. The consensus: democracies don't die through coups anymore; they're slowly hollowed out from within.

Klein examines why K-12 education outcomes have stagnated despite decades of reform and dramatically increased spending. The diagnosis: education policy focuses on inputs (money, standards, tests) rather than the relationship between teacher and student.

Klein argues that both parties benefit from immigration dysfunction: Republicans campaign on border chaos, Democrats campaign on humanitarian crises. Neither has an incentive to solve a problem that serves their political interests.

Fareed Zakaria discusses his book Age of Revolutions, arguing that periods of rapid change produce both progress and backlash. Covers how technological, economic, and social revolutions create the conditions for populism.

Klein explores the 'meaning crisis' — rising rates of loneliness, purposelessness, and existential anxiety in wealthy societies. A conversation about why material abundance hasn't produced psychological flourishing.

Klein examines why America incarcerates more people than any country on earth — 2 million people, 5x the global average — and whether mass incarceration actually makes anyone safer.

Klein dives into the American housing crisis — why costs have skyrocketed, why building is so difficult, and what policies could actually increase supply. The case that housing is the most important policy issue most people ignore.

Klein examines the attention crisis — how technology companies have systematically captured and degraded human attention for profit, and what individuals and societies can do about it.

Klein explores the psychological and political barriers to climate action. The technology exists. The economics work. The science is settled. So why can't we act? The answer lies in psychology, politics, and temporal discounting.

U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy declared loneliness a public health epidemic. Klein explores the data: loneliness increases mortality risk as much as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, and Americans are more isolated than ever.

Klein examines why Americans trust institutions less than at any point in polling history — and whether distrust is rational. The answer: institutions have often earned their distrust, but the alternative (trusting nothing) is worse.