The World and Everything in It: October 27, 2026

Editor's note: The following text is a transcript of a podcast story. To listen to the story, click on the arrow beneath the headline above.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning!

Washington state voters decide next week whether boys belong in girls’ sports. But young athletes there have already voted with their feet.

STAUDT: They showed the rest of us what happens when girls stand together

NICK EICHER, HOST: Also today: Lula hangs on in Brazil. And in Venezuela, an exiled reformer returns. But will that bring stability?

Later, an elite runner, still competing after 40.

HALL: I've gotten to model to my kids through running so many things that I want to instill in them.

And WORLD Commentator Daniel Suhr on a new cycle of political payback.

MAST: It’s Tuesday, October 27th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Good morning!

MAST: Up next, Kent Covington with today’s news.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: US campaign update » Election Day is now just one week away.

Analysts believe Democrats are still in a strong position to claim a majority in the House, while control of the Senate could go either way.

With that in mind, Vice President JD Vance campaigned Monday for a Republican senator in Topeka, Kansas.

VANCE:  Whenever Roger Marshall is given a choice between the lobbyists and between the people of Kansas, I have seen it, he fights for Kansas every single time.

The latest polls suggest that race is a dead heat, as Marshall looks to fend off Democrat Adam Hamilton.

President Trump today will rally in Texas on behalf of Republican Ken Paxton in another tight contest.

Meanwhile, Former President Barack Obama is stumping for Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in Georgia tomorrow.

Israel elections update » Meantime, Israelis are heading to the polls. WORLD Reporter Travis Kircher is on the ground in Jerusalem and talked to voters about the choices they face.

SOUND: Rally music

TRAVIS KIRCHER: Thousands of supporters turned out for a rally Sunday night in Tel Aviv for Yashar Party leader and prime minister candidate Gadi Eisenkot.

SOUND: Eisenkot speaking

Eisenkot told supporters that the current government of incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has failed to adequately deal with the terror group Hamas and is tarnishing Israel's image around the world.

Netanyahu is Israel's longest-serving prime minister, and Eisenkot supporter Isaac Sabag told me he thinks it's time for a change.

SABAG: After 20 years, Bibi has been prime minister. It’s enough. It doesn’t matter if it’s or right or it’s more left. It’s enough. We need to bring a new leader with a new idea…

But Netanyahu is touting the endorsement of President Trump, who described him as an outstanding wartime leader. Over the weekend Netanyahu cast doubt on Eisenkot's ability to deal with the threat posed by Iran without mentioning him by name.

On Sunday, the prime minister posted an AI-generated image of a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv.

He also took aim at Eisenkot’s limited English proficiency, reposted statements from a political commentator insisting that Israel could not afford a candidate who couldn’t have a phone call with President Trump or withstand the pressure of a TV interview.

Reporting for WORLD, I'm Travis Kircher in Jerusalem.

Four Corners region floods » Floodwaters are receding across much of the Four Corners region, but the San Juan River still threatens communities downstream this morning.

The region surrounds the meeting point of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah.

Hydrologist Paul Miller is with the Colorado Basin River Forecast Center:

MILLER: We are seeing roads washed out. We are seeing, uh, places that have not seen water for quite some time be inundated. Um, we are seeing places that have historically not been inundated, inundated with water.

Days of heavy rain flooded homes and forced rescues.

In Bluff, Utah, officials lifted an evacuation order Monday. But some properties remained flooded, and officials warn that sewage may have contaminated parts of the San Juan River.

MILLER: I would urge people that even if water looks to be shallow or low-lying or not moving swiftly to exercise extreme caution and stay away

Forecasters expect mostly dry weather through Thursday. But another storm could arrive next weekend, and with the ground already soaked, even modest rainfall could send streams rising again.

Anthropic files for IPO » It could be the biggest initial public offering in the history of Wall Street, when AI company Anthropic goes public. It filed paperwork Monday to do just that. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin has more.

KRISTEN FLAVIN: Anthropic is the company behind the Claude chatbot and other AI tools. Reports suggest it could raise as much as $100 billion dollars. That would exceed the record that SpaceX just set when it went public in June.

Anthropic has not confirmed that figure.

Reports say trading could begin next month. Revenue is growing fast, though the company is still losing money overall.

At the same time CEO Dario Amodei has called for slowing down AI development to give safety measures time to catch up.

Last month, he joined President Trump and other tech leaders at the White House to sign voluntary safety commitments. Those include outside reviews of safeguards against hacking and biological threats.

The agreement does not require companies to slow development.

For WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin.

Walter Koenig obit » Actor Walter Koenig has died. He was best known for playing Ensign Pavel Chekov on “Star Trek.”

CLIP (Star Trek):  Captain, the alien ship has changed course and speed, moving directly toward us at warp eight

“Star Trek” had a three-year run on television, beginning in 1966 but gained a massive following and lived on in syndication. Koenig also appeared in seven Star Trek movies and wrote a book about the series.

He also acted in the sci-fi series “Babylon 5” and ventured into computer games.

His agent says he passed away at his home in Los Angeles. Walter Koenig was 90 years old.

I'm Kent Covington.

Still ahead, voters in Washington state are set to decide if boys should be allowed to compete in girls sports. Plus, Brasil’s left-wing president Lula wins reelection.

This is The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s The World and Everything in It from WORLD Radio, celebrating 15 years. Today is Tuesday, the 27th of October.

Thanks for making us part of your morning routine. Good morning. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Up first:

SOUND: Crowd chanting Maria, Maria!

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado welcomed home this week.

She left the country in an undercover operation late last year, in order to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.

Machado returns to a country run by Delcy Rodríguez, who took over after US forces captured longtime dictator Nicolás Maduro in January. Rodríguez was Maduro’s V-P and now has the backing of the Trump administration.

Does Machado’s return signal more political change ahead?

MAST: Joining us now is Brian Fonseca. He's Vice Provost for Defense and National Security Research at Florida International University. His expertise is in Venezuela's military and security apparatus, including its role in regime stability and repression. Brian, good morning.

BRIAN FONSECA, GUEST: Hey, good morning. Thanks for having me.

MAST: Sure thing. Brian, I know you've been following the story. What did you think when you first heard the news of her return?

FONSECA: Well, I mean, I, there's a couple of things. I mean, first, I thought I mean this is largely symbolic. You know, there's, there's no real signs of major institutional changes in Venezuela right now. In other words, the regime that was in place before Maduro was was taken out of power in January still persists today. Delcy Rodriguez and Dios Estado Cabello and some of the other, you know, important figures of the regime are still very much in power and in place.

Again, the U.S. has has talked and and argued that you know there was a process towards democratization that was going to start with stabilization first, right? and then beyond stabilization, it was reconciliation and then sort of transition to democracy. And so I think it you know, not long after Maria Corina Machado landed, or it was announced rather, Secretary Rubio came out with a pretty bullish statement about, you know, the evolution of political transformation in Venezuela, which I thought was was insightful and may have made more sense of of her her visit to Venezuela.

MAST: I want to talk a little bit more about what this might mean for Washington's strategy in Venezuela. Of course, Machado gave President Trump her framed Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year. But he has focused very much on working with Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, said the country isn't ready for Machado to take control. So what where do you think stand with Washington? They're very bound up in what's going on in Venezuela right now.

FONSECA: I think what's, what's really interesting is when, when, when President Trump stood before the nation after Maduro was, was, was ousted by what was arguably, you know, one of the the the most you know successful in complex military operations, I think Rubio called it enhanced law enforcement, supported by military operations, in January of this year, he said that the United States was gonna run the country. I think what he was referring to is they were going to establish a political leverage by controlling much of the Venezuelan economy.

Oil right now is probably the most important element to the Venezuelan economy. And if the United States can control the checkbook when it relates to Venezuela's most important economic tool, then the then Washington would be able to influence political outcomes in Venezuela. And I think that's what this progression has been all about.

Maria Corina Machado and the opposition are pushing for political outcomes, which is a transition back to democracy. And so again, I don't know if the timing was intentional. It doesn't sound like from Rubio's tweet that this is something that was you know, done in in in sort of opposition to to the US government, US interest. the timing could be be interesting. But I think this is part of the natural progression where the United States wanted to stabilize Venezuela, and work on reconstruction and then transition back to democracy.

MAST: Yeah, I want to ask about that. You've been watching this. So I assume there were sort of indicators that you were looking for that might imply stability. So Machado comes back. It seems to be a surprise. Were those indicators in place or is this a chicken and egg sort of thing where instead of stability and then return, her return pushes towards stability?

FONSECA: Yeah, I mean, again, I I think there there has been a degree of stability. There's been rumors about elections being called for as early as next summer or the summer of 2028. but something has to predate that, right? And so I wouldn't be surprised if an announcement of elections comes out in the next couple of weeks, right?

And so I think again, while it's symbolic at this stage, it does symbolize that that space is is opening. Or else Maria Corina Machado wouldn't be in the country or she would have been arrested as soon as she landed. Now we want to see about her movement and and what she does in country to give us a little bit more understanding of the space in Venezuela. Does she have the latitude to move? Is she looking at mobilizing populations?

MAST: What else needs to happen though? I my understanding is that there are systemic undergirdings that do not bode well for Machado to lead, even if she has the public support. So what else needs to change on those fronts in order to have elections and then have successful rule post election?

FONSECA: That's a great question because the the the whole reason why I think Washington didn't immediately put the opposition back in power when Maduro was ousted and they had seemingly, you know, a heavy hand in in shaping the immediate outcomes was because I think there's this there still is a deep distrust between, you know, organizations like the Venezuelan military and Venezuelan intelligence and security services and the opposition. There's a deep distrust there.

And there was a concern, and I think it was a legitimate concern, that if the opposition were to come in power and look for retribution and look for revenge and and look to hold people accountable, that the country could spiral into some deeper civil conflict because the institutions that have the guns and the power are the ones that distrust the opposition to begin with.

And so you know what's interesting about Venezuela is Venezuela does have a historical memory of democracy. When Chavez came in and was elected in ninety nine, I mean there was a slow deterioration of democratic norms and process. He spent you know just over a decade eroding democratic institutions. And when Maduro took over, he accelerated that. And so I think what you have now is a lot of hollowed out democratic institutions that have been, you know, purged with loyalists by the regime and and and a lot of that has to be gutted out.

I think there's gonna be trade offs that have to happen between the opposition and the regime in order to begin plotting out a, you know, sort of an enduring path back to what what would be a hallmark of democratic society, which is elections, at the at the presidential level, that you know, both sides would convince the rest of the world that they'll be free and fair and that, you know, the the spoils will go to the victor and they will preside over the country going forward. I mean, I think that's all sort of in question, but I think it begins with institutional strengths and the institutions need to be recalibrated to embrace that transition back to democracy.

MAST: All right. Brian Fonseca is vice provost for defense and national security research at Florida International University. Brian, thank you so much.

FONSECA: Thank you.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It:

A disputed presidential election in Brazil.

Brazilian equity markets took a tumble yesterday after leftist incumbent President Lula pulled off a surprise re-election.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Investors had bet heavily on conservative Flavio Bolsonaro winning. Bolsonaro is challenging the result, pointing to a highly unusual court order that extended voting hours and triggered last-minute chaos.

But did it affect the outcome?

WORLD’s Emma Freire reports.

GUARDIAN NEWS, LUIZ INÁCIO LULA DA SILVA: (Portuguese) But I wanted to thank the Brazilian people for their generosity they have shown me for a long time.

EMMA FREIRE: Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, usually known as simply Lula, thanked his supporters after Sunday’s victory gave him a fourth term as president.

MEIDASTOUCH: STREET CELEBRATIONS

He defeated Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro. His father is serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest after Brazil’s Supreme Court convicted him of plotting a coup after his election defeat in 2022.

Lula’s victory was unusual. Brazil has a 2-round election system. Bolsonaro won the first round on October 4. Since Brazil returned to democracy in the 1980s, no presidential candidate had lost the first round and then won the second.

Bolsonaro is challenging the result. Because just as polls were closing, a Supreme Court justice ordered voting extended nationwide by two hours, from 5 to 7 pm.

Gabriel de Arruda Castro teaches international relations at Cedarville University.

CASTRO: Brazil does have an electoral court, so that's usually where those issues have to be addressed.

Both campaigns asked the electoral court for more time in some areas. Lula’s campaign cited problems with public transportation. Bolsonaro’s pointed to heavy rain. But Lula’s campaign also went to Brazil’s Supreme Court.

CASTRO: And there the case was in a lottery system distributed to Lula's former personal lawyer, who is now a Supreme Court justice.

The order applied nationwide, but some polling stations had already closed.

CASTRO: Many parts of the country they were not able to actually extend the voting hours until 7 p.m. because they were already closed by the time they got the decision.

Castro says those extra 2 hours didn’t change the outcome.

CASTRO: Everything is electronic in elections in Brazil, it's not a paper ballot. We know exactly how many votes came after 5 p.m. So it was not a lot, so it was it would not have made a difference. Lula had a major victory.

Analyses by Folha and BBC News counted fewer than 35,000 votes coming in after 5pm–not enough to threaten Lula’s winning margin of more than 4 million. Whether the justices had the authority to extend voting is a separate question.

Lula’s campaign rolled out a familiar playbook, relvying on votes from Brazil’s more impoverished Northeast region. His previous administrations directed welfare subsidies to that area.

CASTRO: He targeted those low income voters more aggressively with new promises of expansion of those welfare programs.

Castro says Lula also warned voters about what a Bolsonaro presidency could mean for those benefits.

CASTRO: And Lula also did a good job, telling voters in general that his opponent would privatize the public healthcare system, would reduce welfare benefits, which is not something Flavio Bolsonaro was actually talking about.

Guilherme Casaroes, an associate professor at Florida International University, says Lula also made a clever change in campaign tactics after the first round.

CASAROES: After trailing the first round to Flavio Bolsonaro, his campaign took a U-turn. He and his supporters embarked in a social media blitz. Hundreds of 1000s of people took to the streets, and Lula successfully conveyed a message to undecided voters that his rival was a dangerous option for Brazil's future.

Castro says domestically, Lula will keep doubling down on welfare programs. And on foreign policy:

CASTRO: The Brazil Lula has in mind is more aligned with the BRICS, with China, and even Russia than with the U.S., especially now with Trump in the White House.

Casaroes thinks Lula has an uphill battle. He must face Bolsonaro’s election challenge and then there’s his legislative agenda. Right-wing candidates won control of Brazil’s Congress on October 4th.

CASAROES: Upon taking office, another major challenge for Lula will be to work with a conservative majority Congress, which is already given signals that it will not make Lula's life easy in the fourth term.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Emma Freire.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Up next: Boys in girls’ sports. Voters in Washington state face that question on Election Day next week. And some female athletes too young to vote are taking a stand of their own—on the cross-country course.

WORLD’s Ray Hacke reports.

RAY HACKE: Logan Mihailoff began the season on the boys’ jayvee team at Camas High. But after finishing 76th in Camas’ first race, Mihailoff switched to the girls’ varsity team – and found virtually instant success. He’s beat out hundreds of girls to stand on the podium in multiple races since.

SOUND: [RACE AMBI]

Girls on his team have walked off the course in protest. Three team captains from Camas, including reigning league champion Kate Westfall, also quit.

Hundreds of fans have shown up to Mihailoff’s races wearing caps and T-shirts bearing some version of the message, “Save Girls’ Sports.” Mihailoff’s second-place finish at the district meet helped Camas capture the championship – but plenty of people in attendance weren’t happy about it.

EMILY SADLOWSKI: The first time that she did step off, she was proving a point that her goal for this year was trying to make podium …

That’s Emily Sadlowski talking about her daughter, Charlie Garrett. The Skyview High runner led Mihailoff most of the race before fading to third. She had refused to run against him in an earlier race.

SADLOWSKI: And if Kate Westfall was running today, she would have got first or second with Sophie Rogers, Logan would have got third and my daughter wouldn’t have been on the podium.

At the district meet, supporters of Washington’s Initiative 638 rallied to encourage voters ahead of next week’s election. The measure would ban boys in grades K through 12 from competing against girls in interscholastic sports.

Frances Staudt plays basketball near Olympia.

AUDIO FRANCIS STAUDT: These girls in Camas did something powerful. They showed the rest of us what happens when girls stand together. It’s easy to point a finger at one girl. It’s easy to call one girl names. And it’s easy to silence one voice.

Staudt sat out the final game of her sophomore year after her complaints about an 18-year-old boy’s presence on the court – and in her locker room -- fell on deaf ears. She also found herself in trouble for “misgendering” the young man – she’d called him a “man” to his face.

Staudt says it’s unfortunate that female runners have had to bow out of races to protest a boy’s presence among them. However, she also praised the girls from Camas High for making the stand that they did.

STAUDT: But what happens when that voice becomes 10? What happens when 10 becomes 100? And what happens when girls all across Washington say, ‘Enough is enough?’ (CHEERING) I’ll tell you what happens: They can’t ignore us anymore.

Washington isn’t the only state with a pro-girls’ sports initiative on the ballot: Colorado has one, too. Both are blue states that have traditionally been friendly to LGBT rights. But if one poll released in mid-October is any indication, Washington’s measure has a decent chance of passing: The poll indicated that 56 percent of 7,500 likely Washington voters would vote ‘yes’ on 638, while only 24 percent would vote ‘no.’

Staudt will still only be 17 on November 3rd. That means she and other girls won’t be old enough to vote on Initiative 638. So they’re thus calling on eligible voters in Washington to do what they can’t.

STAUDT: Most of the girls who are being affected and having this impact go onto them are not able to vote. A lot of these girls are high schoolers and middle school girls, elementary school, so we are not able to vote ourselves. That’s why we need the adults to listen to us and hear the truth and hear that we are crying out for help, asking for them to protect us.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Ray Hacke in Camas, Washington.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Police in Charlotte, North Carolina, pulled over two men for a rather unusual traffic violation.

They were riding down the street on a loveseat.

Not a pickup truck. Not a trailer.

They had balanced the sofa between two side-by-side electric scooters. And off they went.

Charlotte police said they appreciated the creativity, but reminded the men that safety comes first—no matter what you're driving.

And the officers used the word “driving” rather loosely.

No word on where the men were headed.

But apparently, they wanted to get there without leaving the comfort of their own living room.

File it under, seemed like a good idea at the time.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Today is Tuesday, October 27th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: longevity in an elite sport.

Sara Hall has been a recognized name in running since she was in high school in the late '90s. She has won national titles and records across distances up to the marathon.

MAST: Yet her story has been as much about persevering through failure as it has been success. She has a memoir titled For the Love of the Grind, and that love has been fueled by her Christian faith, her relationship with her husband Ryan, and the four daughters they adopted from Ethiopia.

I recently sat down with Hall to discuss how motherhood, aging, and letting go of ego changed her relationship with the sport. I asked her about aging and wisdom, how she realized when she had reached a point of being mature—in her faith and in her running.

HALL: Yeah, I mean, I don't think I've arrived at any in any means right now. I try to still see myself as a beginner and just have that mindset with things. I think, yeah, that I think there's always just greater levels with God, which is exciting, you know. And I think my faith has evolved in different ways. And I think that I embrace mystery more now. And I think running too, you know, I improved kind of linearly in the marathon for a long time. And now, you know, you get to 43 years old, your body doesn't necessarily do what you want it to do all the time. But running can look differently. And it's like there's always these other areas of the sport like trail running and stuff that I haven't even yet explored. So it's like I feel like that’ll just be kind of like your faith, like just continuing to explore and, and, and just see different levels and different areas.

MAST: Sure, sure. I want to talk a little bit about the other great journey that you've been on, which is motherhood. You wrote that you always wanted to adopt, and for more than a decade now, you've been Mom to four sisters, and you actually got faster at running, even though you were older. And I know you had some fears about being “washed up,” in your words. So, how did becoming a mother affect your approach to and your attitude about running?

HALL: Yeah, it definitely changed things. You know, when you're a professional athlete, your life very much revolves around yourself and your whole day, everything you eat, sleep, drink, and there's definitely a self-centeredness to it that is kind of understandable. And then all of a sudden you have four kids with very unique needs. Your life is no longer your own, right? And it's like a mental load you can't really ever turn off. And being a mom and my kids, you know, they came from trauma. They didn't know any English. They'd never been to school. So like there were just so many things I was thinking about all the time. Juggling, trying to show up well for them, but also show up well for myself. And you know, I kind of assumed I would have to retire, but it turned out that like I was like, I'm just gonna keep trying. Like I really love this still. And I'm really thankful I did. I think there's just been so many ways it's made my running have more meaning. I've gotten to just model to my kids through running so many things that I want to instill in them. They saw me fail, they saw me go through long injury cycles where I didn't know if I would ever get out of them and like show up every day, like put in the work, keep faith, to then come out of those injury cycles to place the highest I ever have at an Olympic trials at age 40 in conditions that didn't favor me, you know, and like against kind of all odds. And so yeah, without that, I mean I wouldn't have gotten to show them any of those things. And so it was tough for sure. It still is tough. But I wouldn't have it any other way for sure.

MAST: I wanted to ask about Atlanta in 2020, you stepped out of the race early, and it was at your husband's urging because you both knew you had these longer term goals, and that you know leaving this one behind would allow you to potentially accomplish things later. Just briefly, how do you get to that point where you go, “You know what? This is not. This is not the day, but we're going to keep going because there may be another day if we call this one, you know, a wash for today.” How do you get there?

HALL: It's tough. Yeah. It's, it's definitely tough. I definitely don't like to drop out if I physically can finish. But I've learned that, yeah, sometimes that is the right decision because, you know, it, it takes a lot to come back from marathons that you're really having to drag yourself through the last. Like that can do a lot of damage on your body. It limits your opportunities later. At in that time in Atlanta, you know, I was gonna focus on the Olympic track trials.

And it would really be upsetting to drop out. And so I think I'm really trying to figure out how to do this without ego, you know. I think as you get older, you go through different stages of ego development as you age, you know. And I think in your 20s you're very much in the ego building phase and stuff. And I think in your 40s you realize how much of elite sport and stuff is tied to your your ego. And I think as long as you can let go of that and and make the right decision for what is the right decision, you know, and like what your gut feeling is without caring what anyone else thinks, I think is the main thing.

MAST: Right, right. Sara Hall is a professional runner who has been nationally ranked for almost three decades, and she's the author of the book For the Love of the Grind. Sara, thank you so much for being with us.

HALL: Thank you so much.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Election Day is exactly one week away today. Democrats are loving the look of the polls and preparing for the possibility of taking control of Congress.

And they’re already talking about investigations that would follow.

WORLD commentator Daniel Suhr wonders when the lawfare tit-for-tat will end—if ever.

DANIEL SUHR: It was the most memorable chant of every Trump rally in 2016:

AUDIO — TRUMP RALLY: “Lock her up! Lock her up!”

The her, of course, was Hillary Clinton. The alleged crime was mishandling classified documents.

But when Trump came into office, a remarkable thing happened. His Department of Justice never pressed charges. He didn’t lock her up.

Things took a different turn during the Biden administration. District attorneys in Manhattan and Fulton County Georgia went after Trump. The FBI searched Mar-a-Lago for classified documents.

There were other controversies. An FBI memo about traditional Catholics. FACE Act prosecutions of pro-lifers.

After Trump won a second term, his administration pursued investigations and prosecutions of political opponents.

I fear this cycle of revenge and recrimination is going to get worse before it gets better.

Consider what Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin said recently at the University of Chicago. She was asked what Democrats should do if they win control of Congress.

SLOTKIN: But you can’t just make that your whole personality. Right, so you have to pick signature cases, and you have to go after people and projects that are just super egregious.

She went on to say Democrats should target people around Trump who, in her words, enabled him. And when the interviewer returned to that subject, she spelled out what she hoped to accomplish.

SLOTKIN: I want young people coming out of school to say, ’Should I go work for the Trump administration?’ That sounds fun. I might get an opportunity. I want them to be like, ’Lord, that might be buying myself a ton of problems that I don’t want, and so let me avoid participating in that.’ I want that deterrence message sent.

Slotkin now says she meant only people who break the law. But that’s not what she said at the University of Chicago. You just heard that. She wanted young people to worry about the consequences of working for Trump. That was the point of her warning.

And now Democrats are discussing investigations of major corporations that worked with this administration.

“Democrats Are Coming for the CEOs,” The Wall Street Journal warned in an editorial yesterday. The Washington Post reports that executives are already preparing for a reckoning if Democrats win control of Congress.

There may be reasons to investigate. Examples include the awarding of government contracts, the granting of exemptions from tariffs, and any kind of political favoritism. The congressional prerogative is oversight. I get that.

But it’s not illegal for a young staffer to accept a White House job or a CEO to deal with the sitting president.

Yes, this is politics, not beanbag, to quote the old saw. And, yes, Caesar’s wife must be above reproach, to invoke another aphorism.

But we have to reject Soviet-style tactics: You show me the man, I’ll find the crime.

The Constitution wisely bans bills of attainder like that. Democrats need to heed that wisdom now.

For WORLD, I’m Daniel Suhr.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Tomorrow: It’s Washington Wednesday with Hunter Baker.

And, you’ll meet the translators using stick figures and original text to create a new English Bible.

That and more tomorrow.

I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

This is episode 3517 of The World and Everything in It, from WORLD Radio.

WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Bible says,

When they are diminished and brought low through oppression, evil, and sorrow, he pours contempt on princes and makes them wander in trackless wastes; but he raises up the needy out of affliction and makes their families like flocks.

The upright see it and are glad, and all wickedness shuts its mouth.

Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things; let them consider the steadfast love of the LORD.

Verses 39-43 of Psalm 107.

Go now in grace and peace.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.