On this episode of Start Making Sense, Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan, talks about refusing to submit to the president, and Adam Hochschild explains Woodrow Wilson’s attacks on his critics.
President Donald Trump speaks to reporters after signing a proclamation in the Oval Office at the White House on April 17, 2025, in Washington, DC.(Win McNamee / Getty Images)
JD Vance said it most clearly: For the Trump people, “The universities are the enemy.” That’s why Trump is cutting billions of federal funding and making impossible demands that threaten dozens of universities. But universities have begun to resist. Michael Roth comments—he’s the president of Wesleyan, and was the first university president to speak out against Trump’s attacks.
Also on this episode: Trump is not the worst president when it comes to constitutional rights and civil liberties; Woodrow Wilson was worse. Adam Hochschild explains why—starting with his jailing thousands of people whose only crime was speaking out against the president. Adam’s most recent book is American Midnight: The Great War, A Violent Peace, and Democracy’s Forgotten Crisis.
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
Zorhan Mamdani takes office in four weeks as the first socialist mayor of New York City. How should we understand the constraints he faces, without accepting those constraints? Bhaskar Sunkara has our analysis; he’s president of The Nation and author of ‘The Socialist Manifesto.’
Plus: Sports Talk on The Nation podcast! Of course Thanksgiving was a big weekend for football on TV – a weekend where millions of viewers got to see a festival of brain injuries — concussions after receiving blows to the head. Dave Zirin will comment – he's the long-time sports editor of The Nation and host of the Edge of Sports podcast.
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Jon WienerTwitterJon Wiener is a contributing editor of The Nation and co-author (with Mike Davis) of Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties.