The most important stories for you to know today
in Burbank, Hannah Dasher brings honky-tonk vibes to Hollywood, new exhibits at CAAM and more of the best things to do this week.. It was clever, witty, tight and very au courant.
So how pleased was I to learn that just over a year later, this little-show-that-could is getting a full staging at the Colony Theatre in Burbank. Nico Juber’s musical follows the daily life of a millennial mom who’s trying to keep up in this emoji-laden world. The California African American Museum has eight current exhibits now open, so you can go again and again this summer and never fail to learn something new .
The latest show to open there is, which looks at the New Orleans-born artist’s chronicling of Black life in America from the late 1960s through the present.before I ended up in an endless scroll through her addictive TikTok feed that blends Southern cooking and country music. She brings her signature honk- tonk sound to a free live performance at Desert 5 Spot.
, but apparently that’s all you need to know now that the real-life Anaheim Ducks are progressing through the Stanley Cup playoffs —include experimental ambient artist Ana Roxanne at Sid The Cat Auditorium and YouTube star-turned-rapper DDG at the Roxy, both on Monday. On Tuesday, Paramore’s Hayley Williams kicks off her solo run at the Wiltern, RAYE plays the first of two nights at the Greek Theatre and indie-pop heroes the New Pornographers play the Teragram.
Wednesday, Mika relaxes and takes it easy at the Orpheum; Canadian singer-songwriter Katie Tupper is at the Echoplex; and electronica legends the Prodigy restart their fire with the first of two nights at the Novo. Thursday, you can see Nottingham post-punks Sleaford Mods at the Fonda; Rozzi at LAX ; UB40 at the Pacific Amphitheatre; or the triumphant Indigo Girls, who are soldiering on despite singer Emily Saliers’ health issues, at the Bellwether.
Lorde will also play the first of her two-night stint at the Forum. Jazz Fest in New Orleans is over, but really, who can get enough? Rap and hip-hop pioneer Rakim headlines, supported by the legendary New Orleans brass band the Soul Rebels, for two more unforgettable nights at the Blue Note.. It was clever, witty, tight and very au courant.
And so how pleased was I to learn that just over a year later, this little-show-that-could is getting a full staging at the Colony Theatre in Burbank. Nico Juber’s musical follows the daily life of a millennial mom who’s trying to keep up in this emoji-laden world. It’s good fun for anyone who can’t get off their phone, which, let’s admit, is all of us.
Climbers and wannabe climbers, head to indoor rock climbing gym Sender One for a special AAPI month event with the Asian Climbing Collective and FilipinUp. Celebrate Asian culture and community through climbing, plus local vendors, music, mock competitions and a raffle. , received a recent rave from The New York Times. She’ll be on hand for a discussion and book signing with the Italian American cultural group, the Garibaldina Society, at their club, moderated by L.A.
Times food writer Jenn Harris. Of course, there will be snacks, drinks and sauce. The California African American Museum is always a great place to spend an afternoon, but with eight current exhibits now open, you can go again and again this summer and never fail to learn something new .
The latest show to open there is, which looks at the New Orleans-born artist’s chronicling of Black life in America from the late 1960s through the present, with a focus on “retentions” — African traditions that show up across American culture. The Birch exhibit joins ongoing shows, including).
The free-to-enter event includes bites inspired by his work, cocktails and a chance to purchase a tote bag that the artist will sign and illustrate on the spot for a one-of-a-kind keepsake.before I ended up in an endless scroll of her addictive TikTok feed that blends Southern cooking and country music. She brings her signature honky-tonk sound to a free live performance at Desert 5 Spot, timed with the release of her first cookbook titled — I am not making this up —Potential young voters get information at an outreach event at Cal State Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California, ahead of the 2024 US presidential elections.
Californians can’t cast a ballot until they turn 18, but for the last decade 16- and 17-year-olds have been able to pre-register to vote and be automatically added to the rolls on their 18th birthday. However, LAist reviewed state data and found that participation in the program cratered during the COVID-19 pandemic and has yet to recover.cast a ballot compared to 62% of overall turnout. Romero said this deficit has been consistent over time.
Research shows that pre-registration is associated withThe number of pre-registered teens peaked in January 2020 at 163,000 — then fell to a record low, about 113,000, in February 2021. About 119,000 California 16- and 17-year-olds are pre-registered to vote as of April 3, per theCalifornians can’t cast a ballot until they turn 18, but for the past decade 16- and 17-year-olds have been able to pre-register to vote and be automatically added to the rolls on their 18th birthday.
“Teens get to get a head start on the access to voting,” said Daphné Rottenberg, a 17-year-old Venice High School student who pre-registered last year. “I think that it's a very important thing for younger people to learn about their rights, their voting rights and ultimately their ability to decide what policies and politicians become their leaders.
” Nearly 1.5 million students have pre-registered since the program started in 2016 and more than 1.1 million became eligible voters, according to a spokesperson for the California Secretary of State. However, LAist reviewed state data and found that participation in the program cratered during the COVID-19 pandemic and has yet to recover.
A nonprofit that promotes youth voting found California’s pre-registration totals represent “California is not doing a good job implementing pre-registration,” said Laura Brill, who lives in Los Angeles and is the founder and CEO of.
“It's a very nice law that lets you do it, but it has not been widely adopted by high schools. ” The unrealized promise of the program is to jumpstart the civic lives of young voters, who’ve been historically underrepresented at the polls.
“The process of signing up creates conversations, dialogue that can educate young people and hopefully encourage them ,” said Mindy Romero, director of theat USC. “If they vote at 18, they're much more likely to continue to vote through the life course. But you've got to get them when they're young.
”Rottenberg, who describes herself as “pretty involved in the political scene,” didn’t know about pre-registration until she connected with The Civics Project through a teacher to hold a voter registration drive at her school.
“Every youth vote is valuable and important, but the numbers should be higher,” Romero said. “It's really on our society and we shouldn't be blaming young people for that. ” “I think young people really struggle with particularly coming of age in this polarized environment,” Romero said.
“They feel really disconnected from the political process. They care about the world and issues, but they don't see necessarily how voting is an actionable step on what they care about. ” It's a very important thing for younger people to learn about their rights, their voting rights, and ultimately their ability to decide what policies and politicians become their leaders.
“We somewhere along the line disconnected the notion of high schools and K through 12 schools as like, bedrocks of teaching democracy and democratic practice,” said Joel Snyder, a social studies teacher at a charter school in the Florence-Firestone neighborhood. “I think a lot of that nationally is a real fear of folks looking or feeling like they're being partisan.
” Even Snyder, who's been a teacher for more than two decades, paused during our interview to consider whether to share that as part of his class, students register to vote. California 16-year-olds became eligible for pre-registration in fall 2016.likely they are to become life-long participants in democracy,” Jackson wrote.
Not currently serving a state and federal prison term for a felony conviction or found mentally incompetent to vote by a courtto your county elections office— this option does not require a California-issued driver’s license or identification card number I'm looking forward to when I can vote, to being able to actually get closer to those things, to not just tell other people why they're important, but I can actually do something. The number of pre-registered teens peaked in January 2020 at 163,000 — then fell to a record low, about 113,000, in February 2021.
Romero hasn’t analyzed the program’s outcomes, but offered a “likely” set of factors contributing to the stagnating participation.
“You can't just offer it and then expect a high sign-up rate,” Romero said. “There needs to be conversations around why it's important, what the nuts and bolts of registration are, what the nuts and bolts are of voting so kids feel confident. ”for AB 2724, a 2024 bill that would have required schools to provide students information about pre-registration before the end of their junior year, Newsom wrote he was concerned about creating another school mandate.
“Schools already have the ability to fulfill the requirements of this bill without creating a new mandate,” Newsom said. “Civics in schools is under-taught, right, and under-resourced, and teachers are burdened, they have lots of different competing requirements,” Romero said. “So you have to be really committed to wanna talk to young people about this.
”Brill, with The Civics Center, said there are other changes that could help make it easier for teens to pre-register, including removing the requirement to have a driver’s license to sign up online. AboutHer organization holds trainings and created a toolkit for students and educators to host voter registration drives at their schools. Brill said more than 100 are planned for this spring, including at Venice High School.
“It really bothers me when people think that they're not being heard and so they completely disengage,” said Sage Smith, who is organizing the drive with several other students, including Rottenberg. “Instead of tuning everything out, I, we are able to bring people in so that they actually get involved. ” Smith said more than 300 of her peers pre-registered to vote during last year’s drive, which targeted seniors.
“There's an idea that, you know, younger people are uninvolved, but when they're presented with the information, everyone cared, everyone was quick to sign up,” Smith said. Despite this, the 1994 World Cup — the first held in the U.S. — took a surprising turn.
Game after game, the Rose Bowl and stadiums across the country were filled to capacity, packed not only with tourists and die-hard fans but also with soccer novices who came out of curiosity and because tickets were relatively affordable, according to soccer historians. Soccer's momentum in the U.S. has only been growing since then, fueled by the launch of Major League Soccer and the success of the U.S. Women's National Team. The World Cup returns to the U.S. in June.
This time, the games in L.A. — eight total — will be played at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood. On a scorching afternoon in Chicago, some 63,000 spectators — including then-President Bill Clinton and Oprah Winfrey — were packed like sardines at Soldier Field to watch Germany vs. Bolivia. Their cheers and boos, as loud as thunder.
Today, it's easy to imagine a World Cup game drawing such American fanfare. But back then, it was a much different story.
"It was a big question as to how the U.S. would embrace it. Would people come to the games?
" Mike Sorber, who played for the U.S. Men's National Team in 1994, told NPR. Despite this, the 1994 World Cup — the first held in the U.S. — took a surprising turn. Game after game, stadiums were filled to capacity, packed not only with tourists and die-hard fans but also with soccer novices who came out of curiosity and because tickets were relatively affordable, according to soccer historians.
" I think all the naysayers were surprised," said Sorber, who is currently an assistant coach for Major League Soccer's New York Red Bulls. "The atmosphere was electric. It was like a big party.
" Soccer's momentum in the U.S. has only been growing since then, fueled by the launch of Major League Soccer and the success of the U.S. Women's National Team. When the World Cup returns to the U.S. in June, it will be greeted by aHow exactly did a sport that struggled to gain traction for decades go on to break the World Cup's record for largest attendance and win over Americans' hearts?
To answer that, NPR spoke to Sorber, along with soccer journalists and fans, about the breakthrough World Cup. How far back the soccer tradition in the U.S. goes depends on whom you ask and where they're from.
Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis and pockets of New York, New Jersey and New England all have deep soccer roots — often brought by European immigrants in the 19th century, according to Brian D. Bunk, who teaches the history of sports at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. As a result, the sport was largely associated with working-class and immigrant communities, Bunk added. Some also dismissed soccer over the perception that it lacked the physicality of sports like American football.
Colombian soccer fans wave their country's flag during the "Chicago Welcomes the World Cup" parade on June 15, 1994.
"The argument that was often made against soccer is that it was an inferior form of football," Bunk said. There were brief bursts of excitement for the sport in the late 20th century — such as when legendary Brazilian player Pelé came to play in the U.S. in the late 1970s — but they never lasted long. By the 1980s, the future of soccer in the U.S. looked bleak.
The North American Soccer League, which began in 1968, folded after the 1984 season.
" Let's face it: You need to have the product in front of you to see what the heck this is all about," said Michael Lewis, who has covered soccer for five decades. He's the editor of Front Row Soccer, a website that follows the soccer scene in New York and New Jersey. FIFA also saw an opportunity.
Soccer's global governing body viewed the U.S."as the last and largest uncracked market for its sport," Pete Davies, who has written extensively about sports, toldWhat the U.S. lacked in soccer prowess, it made up for with its ability to put on a massive sporting event — and a fun one at that.
" We have the sporting infrastructure — the stadiums — we have the hotels, the restaurants, the transportation systems," said Bunk, of the University of Massachusetts. "And so all of that stuff meant that the World Cup could go very smoothly. " Americans also proved they were up for a good time — and World Cup fans knew how to bring the party. Drums, whistles, trumpets, singing, dancing and face paint were the hallmarks of a World Cup game.
A Mexican fan, his face painted with Mexico's national colors, cheers in the stands at the Citrus Bowl stadium in Orlando, Fla. , on June 24, 1994, prior to the start of the World Cup match between Mexico and Ireland. A soccer fan supporting Argentina plays a drum at the World Cup match between Argentina and Nigeria at Foxboro Stadium in Massachusetts in June 1994.
That's what Kevin Tallec Marston, a research fellow at the International Centre for Sports Studies in Switzerland, remembers most vividly from the Belgium vs. Saudi Arabia match in Washington, D.C. , which he attended as a teenager.
"It was not the kind of fandom that Americans would associate with going to an NBA game, going to an NFL game," he said. "Seeing these people from all around the world with their own cultures, their own chants, their own songs, their own instruments.
" "It created this sort of mythical element of what it was to watch the World Cup," said Tallec Marston, who, along with Front Row Soccer's Lewis, is a board member of the Society for American Soccer History. But perhaps what electrified Americans most was the strong performance of the U.S. Men's National Team. It started with a hard-fought 1-1 tie with Switzerland, followed by a stunning 2-1 upset over powerhouse Colombia.
That match was the first World Cup win for the U.S. men's team since 1950. The team's victory was witnessed by more than Sorber, a midfielder in the starting lineup, said he had played for large crowds before, but never for an audience so enthralled by the U.S. team.
It was"euphoria," he said.
" All of a sudden, it really opened the eyes to the whole United States … that wow, this is what the future of soccer could be. " . "It sort of lit a fire under people," he said. "I would think some Americans became soccer fans that day.
" The U.S. team went on to lose to Romania 1-0 and then to Brazil 1-0. Although the U.S. didn't win, Sorber said, the support and energy from American fans during those matches felt like a victory.
" You had a huge turnout," he said. "So again, that was a big moment in U.S. soccer history … to reestablish soccer, to build that foundation and get more awareness for the U.S. national team. "In total, over 3.5 million people attended the 1994 World Cup — the largest attendance in FIFA history to this day. Despite its success, soccer's American fanbase didn't grow overnight.
Two years later, the professional Major League Soccer launched. Around that time, FIFA's World Cup video game franchise helped introduce soccer to an even broader audience. All the while, the U.S. Women's National Team emerged as a dominating force and accelerated the rise of women's soccer globally. Brandi Chastain celebrates after kicking the winning penalty kick at the 1999 women's World Cup final against China on July 10, 1999.
, added fire to the nation's passion for the sport. MLS, which began with 10 teams, has since expanded to 30 clubs. Together, these moments helped transform the soccer landscape in the United States. The 2022 World Cup in Qatar drew an average of 4.7 million American viewers per game, according toWhen it comes to America's favorite sports, soccer now ranks third, surpassing baseball, according to Ampere Analysis, a data firm focused on entertainment industries.
Davis, who is now the director of legacy programs for the North Texas FIFA World Cup Organizing Committee, said it's validating to see the sport he has loved and played since childhood resonate with more people at home.
"I did have some faith that it was going to grow," he said. "But I would be lying if I said I thought we'd be here in 2026, seeing how big it's become. "Although this isn't the first time that the U.S. has hosted the World Cup, the upcoming tournament is expected to be vastly different.
"One of the key aspects of the '94 World Cup was taking football to the new horizon," said Tallec Marston, who co-wroteHosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico, this year's competition will introduce more teams and matches than ever before. It will also return to a far more diverse United States. In 1994, aboutTwo men walk past a mural of a soccer player in Guadalajara, Mexico, on April 29.
Mexico will co-host the biggest World Cup in history, along with the United States and Canada, from June 11 to July 19.
"You're going to have a representation of countries and nations that we will have never seen before. And so that will be very exciting to see," Tallec Marston said. The current U.S. Men's National Team has far more experience on the World Cup stage compared with the 1994 team. Since then, the team has qualified for every World Cup except one, in 2018.
There'sThe controversies leading up to the games are also quite different. In 1994, the uncertainty was whether many Americans would attend the matches. This year, the question is whether they will be able to afford to — with dynamic pricing The tournament will also take place during a politically volatile period in the United States.
The ongoing war with Iran has led to questions about whether the Iranian team will participate.as to how many tourists will feel comfortable traveling to the United States. The administration is also requiring a bond offrom 50 countries that it deemed as having immigration risk factors, such as high overstay rates and screening and vetting deficiencies.
Five nations that qualified for the World Cup —, about his experience covering eight men's World Cups, expects that"there'll be magic, but there'll be headaches too.
" " I think the games themselves should be exciting and fun," he said. However, putting the problems to rest, Lewis added, will be"easier said than done.
"If you're enjoying this article, you'll love our daily newsletter, The LA Report. Each weekday, catch up on the 5 most pressing stories to start your morning in 3 minutes or less. President Donald Trump is now communicating with the public sometimes dozens of times a day on a social media platform that he himself created, and most Americans never see most of those posts.
During his first presidential campaign, Trump's constant stream of seemingly unvetted tweets was a sideshow that quickly became inescapable — the boasts, insults, and lies at times hijacked news cycles. Once he was elected, they presented a new frontier in American politics: a real-time view into a president's mind.
Ten years, one Twitter ejection, one Twitter return, and a move to Truth Social later, Trump's posts still make news — like when he announces a war or tries to pick a fight with the pope — but for many have become the background noise of American politics.for a picture of exactly what, in the aggregate, the president of the United States is thinking about and saying to the world at all hours.
On March 1, the day after U.S. forces bombed Iran and began a war that's now more than nine weeks long, President Donald Trump posted 30 times on Truth Social.an update on the war . Mid-afternoon, he posted a string of Trump-friendly news coverage, including ain the presidential race.
Shortly thereafter, in the span of five minutes, he posted 10 times, all of them lists ofmarked as being from an Instagram user called @truthaboutfluoride, purporting to show San Francisco as a run-down city filled with poverty. During his first presidential campaign, Trump's constant stream of seemingly unvetted tweets was a sideshow that quickly became inescapable — the boasts, insults, and lies at times hijacked news cycles.
Once he was elected, they presented a new frontier in American politics: a real-time view into a president's mind. Ten years, one Twitter ejection, one Twitter return, and a move to Truth Social later, Trump's posts still make news — like when he announces a war or tries to pick a fight with the pope — but for many have become the background noise of American politics.
The president of the United States is now communicating with the public sometimes dozens of times a day on a social media platform that he himself created, and most Americans never see most of those posts. Of course, most of those posts are not individually newsworthy.
But looking at them together provides a picture of exactly what, in the aggregate, the president of the United States is thinking about and saying to the world at all hours. To try to grasp that, NPR analyzed the first four months of Trump's Truth Social posts this year.
What emerged is a portrait of an extremely online president with scattered focus — who, even while he dealt with fallout from his policies such as war in Iran and immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, was also busy insulting his critics, posting pictures of his proposed ballroom, and continuing to insist on the lie that he won the 2020 election. The president also has unorthodox posting habits that illustrate that, even as arguably the most powerful person on earth, he remains focused on how he is seen..
We then classified each post based on its topic and the type of post it was . Trump posted 2,249 times in the first four months of 2026, an average of just under 19 posts per day. The most common topic Trump posted about – at about 14% of his posts – was 2026 elections.
These posts — more than 300 of them — consist largely of either candidate endorsements or posts touting a Trump-backed candidate's win. However, Trump at times did not give a simple endorsement, instead adding attacks on an endorsee's opponents.
For example, in endorsing Republican candidates for the Indiana state Senate, the posts became paragraph-long screeds as TrumpThe next most common topics after elections were Iran and the economy . He also posted dozens of times about alleged fraud in Minnesota's safety net programs, the SAVE Act, and his belief that the justice system was weaponized against him.
To the degree that his posts measure what he's thinking about, the president's social media feed suggests he is as preoccupied — or even more so — with his personal projects and vendettas than he is with pressing policy matters. President Trump posted about the 2020 election 71 times in the first four months of 2026, more than he posted even about tariffs .
Those 2020 election posts all promoted the lie that via massive voter fraud or other malfeasance, Joe Biden stole that election. Trump posted 68 times about his various Washington, D.C. , building projects, including his White House ballroom and a proposed massive arch across the Potomac near Arlington National Cemetery.
That's slightly more than he posted about Venezuela, more than he posted about the SAVE Act he's promoting, and more than he posted about protesters and federal agents in Minneapolis, including federal agents killing two U.S. citizens. He posted more than six times as often about his various legal grievances than he did about healthcare policy . Also notable are the topics that get little attention.
While tariffs and the war in Iran do affect, for example, the farm economy, Trump posted just four times specifically about American farming during the first four months of the year — less than half as many times as he posted about his anger at comedian Bill Maher. As for the top types of posts, the largest category – at just under one-quarter of his posts – are social media reshares.
These take several formats — some are screenshots of posts from X, and others are videos reposted from other social media sites, such as TikTok. Near the end of his first term, the videos Trump posted were largely from Fox News or other right-leaning news outlets, or they were videos produced by the White House. Now, there's an endless array of TikTok and Instagram videos and memes the president can repost, many of them from amateurs or generated by AI.
Some have been outright offensive, as when he posted a racist video that depicted former President Obama and Michelle Obama as apes. The White House initially defended the video, with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt telling reporters,"Please stop the fake outrage.
" Trump later said he hadn't seen the full video, telling reporters,"I looked at the beginning of it. It was fine.
" He did not apologize, and the post was later deleted.that baselessly proposed that Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz was involved in the 2025 killing of Minnesota Democratic State Rep. Melissa Hortman. Occasionally, those videos have nothing to do with current events, or even Trump, but are the kind of inane posts littering many people's Facebook feeds.
Around 11 p.m. one night in February,a TikTok video of a person's pet corgi reacting to a can of Reddi-wip. A minute later, he reposted that video along with aThis posting-then-reposting pattern is one of the more notable oddities of the president's Truth Social posts.
It appears to be a makeshift way of reposting things from X. The president regularly grabs, for example, a video someone else has posted on X, posts it without attribution on Truth Social, then immediately quote-posts his own post along with a screenshot of the original X post. Some of these reposts are about current events, but they cover many other topics as well – they include a variety of amateur-made videos praising Trump, attacking his enemies, and concurring with his false claim that he in fact won the 2020 election.
In recent months, Trump has reposted aThe pattern of snagging content from X highlights two important facts about Truth Social. One is that X appears to dwarf it in size. The Center for Campaign Innovation, a right-leaning political strategy organization, provided NPR with polling from around the 2024 election, finding that only 6% of people used Truth Social for news on even a weekly basis.
That's compared to 30% who used X. Trump may therefore go to X to get material because there are just more users there, and especially more big names like politicians, news organizations, and MAGA influencers. Secondly, Truth Social's smaller size means it serves a different purpose for Trump than Twitter ever did, before Trump was kicked off of the platform after the January 6 riot. "I think really the best way to understand it is this is where you get your marching orders if you're MAGA," said Eric James Wilson, a Republican strategist and executive director of the Center for Campaign Innovation.
"And too, it is direct communication from him, in the way that maybe a statement, an administration policy or a press release would have to go through multiple layers of, if not revisions, certainly approvals. " Leavitt told NPR in a statement that Truth Social is"the most powerful and popular social media platform in the world because it serves as President Trump's authentic voice.
", he is"generally obligated to make any social media post on TruthSocial and may not make the same post on another social media site for 6 hours. " This gives the site"limited time to benefit from" his postings. NPR emailed Truth Social's press team to check if this agreement is still in effect, but the email bounced back. It's not entirely clear how many of the posts on the president's Truth Social account come directly from him.
Leavitt also told NPR that some posts are made by staffers.
"President Trump posts at all hours because he is constantly working, but sometimes these posts are also published by staff who are simply catching up on the many articles and reading materials President Trump approves the day prior," she said in another statement. One of the most telling indicators of what's on Trump's mind can be found in the news articles he posts — more than 1 in 5 of the president's social media posts in the first four months of this year were news articles, op-eds, and videos.
Those news pieces almost uniformly praise the president or promote administration-friendly storylines, including persecuting his perceived enemies. On March 29, in a span of six minutes, his account posted 10 news pieces about criminal referrals against New York Attorney General Letitia James, who prosecuted Trump in a civil business fraud case. A substantial number of the news stories Trump's account posts are not current.
At least 1 in 4 of the news stories posted were more than 10 days old at the time he posted them . In some cases, such as the article about Lady Gaga's father, the news pieces were months old. At other times, he posted several older articles in rapid succession about the same event.
On March 16, TrumpLeavitt told NPR in a statement:"The President is extraordinarily well read, and he likes to share stories or content that he finds interesting on his account.
"In the first four months of the year, President Trump made 98 posts we classified as"announcements" — which we defined as the president purporting to give the public new information. These covered a range of topics — there was the video announcing the U.S. had bombed Iran. There was the announcement of a new DHS secretary nominee — Markwayne Mullin. There were announcements about disaster aid to states affected by a massive winter storm.
There were notifications of upcoming interviews or press conferences. Not all of these announcement posts turned out to be accurate, however, as with anHe also made 29 posts we classified as"threats.
" These range from the specific to the vague . The president hasn't followed through on all of these threats with concrete action. Altogether, that's 127 of Trump's most newsmaking posts — around one per day. Those posts have introduced an unprecedented unpredictability into presidential policymaking.
His tariff policy posts, for example, have created widespread uncertainty in the business world. This can make life in a Trump White House particularly difficult, especially in the realm of foreign policy. John Bolton, who served as National Security Advisor in Trump's first term, tells a story about Trump's chaotic posts.
"My deputy was there when was shown — this is in 2019 — overhead pictures of a failed Iranian missile launch," Bolton says. "And he said to the intelligence briefer, can I keep this picture? And she said, 'Well, yes, but it's very sensitive, Mr. President.
' He said, 'Okay. ' And about 20 minutes after they left, he tweeted the picture out with some of the markings still on the picture. ", the photo was revealed to be classified. Experts told NPR that tweeting the picture potentially helped America's adversaries, including Iran and Russia, because it revealed U.S. satellite capabilities.
Since his time in the first Trump administration, Bolton has been willing to sharply criticize the president. In October, the Trump Department of Justice obtained indictments against Bolton on 18 charges alleging that he unlawfully retained and transmitted classified documents. Bolton pleaded not guilty. Bolton sees Trump tweeting the picture as part of a larger pattern: to attempt maximum bluster and in the process reveal more than he intends to.
Trump's recent posts about the war in Iran are another example.
"The very ferocity of his tweets or the outrage you can hear just tell the Iranians 'If we just stay, if we just be patient a little while longer, he's just going to flip right out entirely, and he wants out. So we're going to drag it out and get every concession we can from him,'" Bolton said.
"I don't understand why he can't see that. " Pundits have theorized that with his threatening posts about Iran, President Trump is practicing the"madman theory" of foreign relations. H.R. Haldeman, who served as chief of staff to President Nixonthat Nixon's strategy was to make the U.S.S.
R. and the government in North Vietnam think that the fervently anticommunist president was willing to go to even extreme lengths, such as dropping a nuclear bomb, to end the Vietnam War.
"Nixon had credibility. He was strongly anti-communist," Bolton said, adding that communist adversaries might have thought,"Good God, that guy is crazy enough that he would drop a nuclear weapon.
"To some degree, the president's posting can be seen as an extension of his communications strategy of simply communicating a lot. Trump regularly does lengthy press gaggles in the Oval Office, and he also has the unprecedented habit of fielding calls directly from reporters who have his phone number.
However, with posts, unlike interviews, the president is not having a conversation. Rather than being prompted by a reporter, the president in his posts seemingly reveals what is on his mind at any given time. On April 2, the day he announced that Pam Bondi would be leaving her post as attorney general, President Trump was also thinking about Bruce Springsteen.
He insulted the singer in two posts shared at Indeed, the president's insults and tirades have become so commonplace that they at times don't get much notice. Some of these posts go on at length. On April 9, he wrote a more thanthat insulted a series of right-wing commentators but also veered into the topics of Iran, election results, media outlets he dislikes, and his approval rating.
This kind of naked fury from the president of the United States toward his perceived opponents might once have made headlines. NPR also analyzed the length of Trump's posts this year through the end of April. He wrote 93 posts of 1,500 characters or more in that time period, accounting for around 4% of all his posts.
About half of those are endorsements, in which the president praises his chosen candidates and at times rails against the opponent . Many of these endorsements appear to be variations on boilerplate language as Trump endorses a string of candidates in a short timeframe. Trump had more of those ultra-long posts in April than in any other month. And if you take out endorsements, it's even more stark.
In April, Trump posted 22 extra-long posts about things other than endorsements — slamming Supreme Court justices, repeatedly promoting his ballroom, and railing against particular media outlets. That's twice as many such posts, or more, as he had in any other month. To the degree, then, that the length of his posts correlates to Trump's anger, or perhaps enthusiasm, April was a particularly enthusiastic month for the president.
The president's Truth Social account primarily gets wide attention when the president either makes an announcement or writes something particularly coarse or offensive. That was the case on Easter morning this year, at around 8:00 a.m., when President Trump threatened Iran.
"Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the F*****' Strait, you crazy bastards, or you'll be living in Hell - JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah," he wrote.
— along with an obscenity and a tongue-in-cheek praise to Allah, all on one of Christianity's holiest days, together were stunning choices for a president whose core supporters are white evangelical Christians. In a recent NPR focus group of Georgia swing voters — people who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 and Trump in 2024 — no one reacted positively to that post. Participants were identified by their first names as a condition of their participation.
One voter named Joe said that posts like that one inspire fear.
"It's not presidential. They're supposed to be doing diplomatic negotiations. You know, he's the agent of chaos when it comes to this kind of thing. It just – it scares me," he said.
"He's a loose cannon, in my opinion, when it comes to this kind of stuff. "A series of earthquakes has struck the Imperial Valley city of Brawley. The blue circle represents the largest to date: a 4.7 magnitude that struck early Sunday morning. At least 40 quakes have struck in the last 24 hours, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
No injuries or significant damage have been reported. The jolts are concentrated around the Brawley Fault Zone, an area connecting the Imperial and San Andreas faults known for frequent earthquake swarms. A swarm of earthquakes has hit the Imperial Valley city of Brawley, the most significant ranging in magnitude from 2 to 4.7 — with scores more registering at lower magnitudes.over the past day.
At least 40 quakes strong enough to make the 2.0 and higher magnitude list are among those.was issued for the 4.7 magnitude quake. The early warning system alerts nearby residents to prepare, warning that strong shaking will start imminently.
"It felt all right. We were having a good day," Dave Ramirez, who works at a local truck stop, told LAist.
" Nothing really crazy. "City leaders at Brawley, a city about 115 miles east of San Diego, say in a statement that they continue"closely monitoring ongoing earthquake activity and aftershocks affecting the region. "The jolts are concentrated around the Brawley Fault Zone, an area known for frequent earthquake swarms connecting the Imperial and San Andreas faults. Lucy Jones, a seismologist with Caltech, said the phenomenon is not unusual for the region because of its geological makeup.
"Instead of having one big fault, there's a lot of small crossing faults," Jones said. "Probably hundreds of times we've seen swarms like this. "Even at magnitude 4.7, Jones doesn't believe the swarm will set off the San Andreas. "Aftershocks don't have to be on the same fault, but it has to be close enough that the stress change that produced the first earthquake can make it there," Jones said.
"And how much it can make it there depends on the length of the fault. It's something that's true for all earthquakes.
"You’re at Union Station when the big one hits. The next two minutes are terrifying. By the time you make your way outside, the Los Angeles you know is gone. In Episode One, you experience what the first hours after a massive earthquake could be like..
We don't know when, but we know it'll be at least 44 times stronger than Northridge and 11 times stronger than the Ridgecrest quakes in 2019. To help you get prepared, we've compiled a handy reading list
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