Talk to your kids about ICE
One of the most difficult things about following the story of the Trump administration's mass deportations has been seeing, hearing, and reading about the many children who are being swept up by ICE and Border Patrol, undoubtedly traumatized by the experience. The federal agencies have raided schools, daycares, and hospitals. They've separated children from their families, sent them to faraway places, housed them in detention centers with horrible conditions, and even used them as bait to entrap their parents.
Among the horrors is that kids are seeing this happen all around them, to their friends, family members, and neighbors. If you're a parent or a caretaker, you can't just pretend it isn't happening. Kids are afraid, and our job as adults is not to lie or sugarcoat the story for them. It's to help them understand what's happening and to protect them from real danger, without making them feel worse. I was so grateful for Anna North's conversation with experts offering tips on the best ways to do those things. Unfortunately, it's an extremely useful, practical guide for helping children through a harrowing time.
One of America's best foreign aid programs is back from the dead
Much was made last year of the Trump administration's cuts to USAID. It may have been a trivial part of America's total budget, but people all over the world relied on those funds to survive. (On Friday, Reuters reported that some of the slashed millions are now paying for the security detail assigned to the architect of the cuts, OMB director Russell Vought.) Among the cuts' casualties was USAID's most rigorous and creative division: a shop known as Development Innovation Ventures, or DIV. Sara Herschander describes DIV as "a cutting-edge clearinghouse for finding out what works and what doesn't work in foreign aid." "It was one of the only programs in the world laser-focused not only on saving people's lives now, but also on learning how to save many more lives in the future," she writes.
Its loss was a blow to the people it was trying to help and those trying to help them. But now, a year after Peak DOGE, DIV is back, thanks to backing from private philanthropy that includes a $45 million grant from Coefficient Giving. DIV's former leaders are back in charge, too. Unlike most entities that only fund existing projects, what makes DIV special is that it focuses on promising new projects and pressure tests them to see how effective, or not, they are in alleviating global problems. The new fund has only a fraction of its resources under the federal umbrella, but it's something — and it's a foundation for coming back into government support under a future administration.
France's extremely talented and extremely controversial ice dancers, explained
Villains are some of the most fascinating characters that the Olympics always produces — and the Milan Games have been no exception. The French ice dancing pair Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron are one of the most troubling versions of this archetype we've seen in some time.
First, it must be said: They are amazing at their event. They won gold on Wednesday — but their win sparked an uproar. The duo had some issues in their final skate, but nevertheless, edged out the American pair that took silver after what appeared to be a near-flawless performance. And spectators pointed to one French judge as the culprit of the injustice; the judge gave his compatriots a suspiciously high score and the Americans a suspiciously low one, a discrepancy that meant the difference between gold and silver.
But Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron were already controversial — for much darker reasons. Fournier Beaudry's former dance partner was accused of rape, and Fournier Beaudry publicly defended him after the accusations. His career essentially ended after the charges, and she replaced him with Cizeron — who had faced allegations of emotional abuse and mistreatment by his former ice dancing partner. The full backstory is worth reading about in Alex Abad-Santos' explainer. Keep following Alex's work for more on the Games.
Trump's biggest war is one he almost never talks about
Something that has surprised many onetime Trump supporters has been the military adventurism of his presidency. He's bombed Iran, captured the president of Venezuela after bombing many alleged drug boats off its coast, and threatened a hostile takeover of Greenland. But the most extensive bombing campaign of his second term has been far from any of those places and received far less press coverage: His biggest war this term, Josh Keating reports, is in Somalia.
As the president has escalated his racist rhetoric against Somali Americans at home, he's also overseen a massive escalation of airstrikes on the East African country. "In 2025, the US carried out 125 airstrikes and one ground raid in Somalia, compared to 51 operations during Joe Biden's whole presidency. Already, in 2026, the US has carried out 28 operations, more than any full year under a non-Trump president," Josh writes. Hundreds of people have been killed in these strikes. So why is he doing it? There are several factors, including a genuine fear of Somalia as a new nexus of terrorism and a powerful war-on-terror machine that's simply on autopilot. Josh's piece explains how all this, along with Trump's growing personal hostility toward the country, have produced a deadly campaign that hasn't received enough of the world's attention.
