Chris Hayes interviews Michael Lewis about his book The Fifth Risk, using the Trump transition and early administration to explore what federal agencies and civil servants actually do and why their work is largely invisible until it breaks. They frame government as a system for managing low-probability, high-impact risks—from nuclear security and weather forecasting to consumer protection—and discuss how neglect, ideological sabotage, and conflicted appointees can quietly raise those dangers while the public mostly experiences bureaucracy as frustrating “red tape.” The conversation also argues that the absence of immediate catastrophe can normalize incompetence, even as long-horizon threats like climate change demand precisely the kind of expert, mission-driven governance being undermined.

The episode traces how Mitch McConnell navigated Donald Trump’s rise in 2016, publicly condemning Trump’s rhetoric at times while ultimately choosing to support him as the path to conservative policy wins, especially on the Supreme Court. It explores how McConnell’s priorities—winning elections, maintaining Republican power, and reshaping the judiciary—led him to align with Trump through controversies like Charlottesville, the 2019 government shutdown, and Trump’s emergency declaration for border wall funding. A central theme is McConnell’s long-term strategy of using Senate procedure to confirm large numbers of young conservative federal judges, and the tension between his self-image as an institutionalist and his willingness to bend or change norms to achieve durable results.

Juli Briskman, a Virginia cyclist photographed giving President Donald Trump’s motorcade the middle finger in 2017, was fired from her job at government contractor Akima after informing them she was in the image amid media attention and threats. She sued, arguing wrongful termination and First Amendment violations, but the case was dismissed and later settled through a severance agreement. The incident pushed her into political activism, including work on Jennifer Wexton’s 2018 congressional campaign, and she later ran for the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors. Briskman defeated the incumbent Republican by nearly nine points to win a seat representing a district that includes Trump National Golf Course, as Democrats celebrated broader statewide gains in Virginia.

The CDC is dispatching experts to Samoa at the government’s request as a measles outbreak has sickened 2,437 people and killed 32, mostly young children, with cases still rising and nearly half occurring in children under 5. The agency will help with case tracking and vaccination efforts in a country where immunization rates are among the world’s lowest, weakened by distrust after two infants died from a nursing error during vaccine preparation and amplified by anti-vaccine activism. Samoa has imposed strict measures including school closures and limits on children’s gatherings while accelerating a mandatory vaccination campaign, but health experts say the response came late and the outbreak has not yet peaked. The crisis reflects broader regional and global resurgence of measles, with spr...

In late 2019 Samoa faced a catastrophic measles outbreak that led the government to impose a two-day national lockdown, ban non-essential movement, and deploy vaccination teams to homes marked with red cloths, eventually making immunisation compulsory. With thousands of cases and a death toll rising into the dozens, mostly among children under five, the country’s limited hospital capacity and shortages of intensive care resources intensified the trauma for families. The article describes widespread grief and the strain on local services despite international medical support, while highlighting how delays in vaccination and the spread of anti-vaccine misinformation worsened the crisis. It also situates Samoa within a global resurgence of measles and notes the arrest of a prominent vaccine o...