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American Enterprise Institute

The American Enterprise Institute is a public policy think tank dedicated to defending human dignity, expanding human potential, and building a freer and safer world. The work of our scholars and staff advances ideas rooted in our belief in democracy, free enterprise, American strength and global leadership, solidarity with those at the periphery of our society, and a pluralistic, entrepreneurial culture.

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Series

Not Dead Yet, 37 episodesThe Report Card with Nat Malkus, 57 episodesWhat the Hell Is Going On, 339 episodes

Recent Episodes

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Is Going on in Iran and Ukraine? Brian Kilmeade Talks Foreign Policy and His New Book.

In this episode, we are joined by Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade to discuss the themes of his new book, Uniting the States: Six Crucial Moments That Forged the American Miracle. We explore pivotal events that have shaped American history and national identity. Our discussion connects stories of the American founding to modern foreign policy lessons and unity today. How does modern patriotism look compared to the spirit of our Founding Fathers? Is America the place it once was? And do we still have the spirit to lead the world? Speaker, best-selling author, TV and radio personality Brian Kilmeade currently serves as co-host of Fox News Channel's FOX & Friends and as host of Kilmeade and Friends. Prior to joining in 1997, Kilmeade has worked at NEWSPORT TV, the independent station WLIG-TV in New York, KHSL-TV in Ontario, CA, The Jim Brown Show on XTRA-AM, and Channel One. Kilmeade is the author of several New York Times bestselling books, including "Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates", "Andrew Jackson and the Miracle of New Orleans" and "George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring That Saved The American Revolution.” Brian Kilmeade received a B.A. from Long Island University. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen, with guest BKBrian Kilmeade

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Joni Eareckson Tada

Joni Eareckson Tada joins the guys to talk about a lifetime of faith, suffering, service, and choosing to find joy. How do you build the habit of gratitude? How can we better welcome families living with disabilities? How can we be anti-fragile and compassionate? Why is it important to serve our neighbors even when we’re going through the thick of it ourselves? Plus, Ben and Chris are bad painters and completely out of excuses to complain.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Is Europe on Fire? With Dr. Dominic Green.

In this episode, Dr. Dominic Green joins us from the United Kingdom to discuss mounting protests and violence raging across Europe. It’s been a tumultuous month in France in particular, with Paris and other cities engulfed in fire fueled by radical groups. We examine the broader implications of this upheaval for democratic values and societal norms. Is Europe a distant issue, or a precursor to what the United States might face? Dr. Dominic Green is a columnist for The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Examiner, The Critic and the Jewish Chronicle. He edited the US edition of The Spectator and is the author of five books, including The Double Life of Dr. Lopez: Spies, Shakespeare and the Plot to Poison Elizabeth I, Three Empires on the Nile: The Victorian Jihad, 1869-1899, and The Religious Revolution: The Birth of Modern Spirituality, 1848-1898. He is a regular contributor to The New York Post, The New Criterion, First Things, and The Daily Telegraph. He has taught Writing and History at Brandeis, and Politics at Boston College, and is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, the Royal Society of Arts, the Center for American Culture & Ideas and the FPRI’s Center for the Study of America and the West. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

The Report Card with Nat Malkus
The Report Card with Nat Malkus

American Adolescence in 2026 (with Daniel A. Cox)

On The Report Card, we talk a lot about schools, but in this episode we do something a little different and talk about one of the populations schools serve: adolescents. How are technologies such as social media, AI, and location tracking affecting teenagers? What are gender relations like among high school students? And how do teens today think about family, religion, politics, and America? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions and more with Dan Cox. Daniel A. Cox is the director of the Survey Center on American Life at the American Enterprise Institute. He is also the author of a recent report, A Digital Divide in American Adolescence: Gender, Class, and the New Teenage Experience, and a new book, Generation Uncoupled: America’s New Gender Divide and the Crisis of Human Connection. This episode was produced by Elli Lucas.

Hosted by Nat Malkus

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Francis Collins

The guys are joined by the scientist who led the Human Genome Project and, more recently, the Director of the National Institutes of Health. Epistemological humility is key to public policy and science; the laboratory is a cathedral; the future of medicine looks wildly different thanks to unique gene-based treatments; and there's COVID blame to go around. Come for the faith and science, stick around for the pandemic conversation. Don't miss the journalist correcting the historian on Martin Luther.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Is China Spying Through LinkedIn? With Luke Jacobus.

We are joined by Luke Jacobus, one of AEI’s own, to highlight how China’s spies leverage the LinkedIn networking platform to recruit Americans to pass them sensitive knowledge. MSS agents use artificial intelligence to impersonate consultants and pay U.S. clearance holders for national security information. How effective is this recruitment method? What are potential countermeasures? To what extent do private corporations shoulder the blame? Listen in on the risks that face Americans face online every day. Luke Jacobus is a research associate at the Coalition Defense of Taiwan project, a partnership between the American Enterprise Institute and the Institute for the Study of War. His research focuses on the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) politics, the People’s Liberation Army, and the PRC’s overseas influence and espionage activities. Luke is a graduate of the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss), where he majored in Chinese and International Studies, and speaks Mandarin Chinese.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Emma Camp

Can you live the good life without taking risks? Emma Camp of the Wall Street Journal joins the guys to talk about Gen Z, risk aversion, getting married young, and the importance of a good cocktail party — and the obligation to extend hospitality more more broadly. When did everything get wrapped in therapy speak? How has lifestyle creep blown expectations out of proportion? How do you build the habit of being social? Could a few good house parties save America?

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH: Will AI End Humanity? Chris Miller Explains.

In this episode, we are joined by Chris Miller for a clear-minded and sobering discussion of the future of AI. The geopolitical competition between the United States and China in the field of artificial intelligence is the arms race of the 21st century, yet in this case, the product is self-improving. Some warn it could end humanity, while others refute these claims as exaggerations. So, what is the answer? Is the opportunity greater than the risk? What are the Chinese up to? Can they beat us? We discuss the risks, opportunities, and implications of proper regulation. Chris Miller is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and an associate professor at Tufts University. His latest book Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology (Scribner, 2022) is a New York Times bestseller. In addition to Chip War, Dr.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

The Report Card with Nat Malkus
The Report Card with Nat Malkus

Private Tutoring Centers—A Bigger Deal than You Think (with Joshua Goodman)

Kumon, Sylvan Learning, Mathnasium, and Huntington Learning Center—these private tutoring chains are familiar names, but they have received little attention from education researchers. According to recent research co-authored by Josh Goodman, however, this is an oversight. Not only has the number of private tutoring centers tripled since the late 1990s, but private tutoring centers also might have a surprisingly large effect on district achievement trends. To find out more, on this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Josh Goodman. Nat and Josh discuss what instruction looks like at private tutoring centers, which families send their children to private tutoring centers most often, whether tutoring might explain why East Asian countries do better on international assessments, why the number of private tutoring centers peaked in 2015, whether private tutoring centers might be insulating high-achieving students from downward achievement trends, what American schools can learn from private tutoring centers, whether giving families vouchers for private tutoring centers would have been an effective method for fighting pandemic learning loss, why big tutoring chains often outperform other tutoring centers, and why private tutoring centers might be a more cost-effective way to raise student achievement than most other interventions. Joshua Goodman is a professor of education and economics at Boston University and the co-author of Kumon Up: Private Tutoring Centers and Student Achievement and Kumon In: The Recent, Rapid Rise of Private Tutoring Centers. This episode was produced by Elli Lucas.

Hosted by Nat Malkus

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Bill Burns

The former head of the CIA joins the guys and things get wonky. The (mostly) unredacted conversation covers everything: Russia, China, college basketball, AI, spy novels, and what it takes to become an intelligence officer. What does the former top spy remember most about his time as a hostage at the Farm’s Special Operations Training Course?

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH: Jason Miyares on Five Easy Ways to Wreck a State.

Jason Miyares, former attorney general for the state of Virginia, joins us to discuss Virginia’s hard political shift leftward — skyrocketing taxes, sanctuary cities — and the impact of these policies on its eight million citizens. We weigh rising crime rates, extreme constitutional amendments, and the end of purple Virginia. What the hell are the consequences of this governance? How the hell is this going to impact American citizens? Jason S. Miyares served as the 48th Attorney General of the Commonwealth of Virginia from 2022 to 2026, becoming the first Latino-American — and specifically the first Cuban-American— elected to statewide office in Virginia. As the Commonwealth’s chief legal officer, he led the Office of the Attorney General and represented the interests of more than eight million Virginians. He received a Bachelor of Business Administration from James Madison University and his J.D. from the College of William & Mary School of Law. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

September 2026

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Ed and Carmen Policy

Chris is doing journalism, so Ben talks football. Another father-son football episode with Ed and Carmen Policy. Can you build a common culture for front office white-collar workers and on-field warriors? How has a salary cap made the NFL more competitive, and can baseball learn anything from it? Did high school failure help create the 49ers dynasty? Gambling’s a big problem, but after the Supreme Court’s ruling, what’s the path forward? Why is Youngstown, OH the epicenter of football? Ben Sasse's WSJ piece on how playing football builds character: https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/america-needs-its-boys-to-play-football-5b9673de?st=Qmuz3H&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Is Going on with Trump at the United Nations? Brett Schaefer Explains.

In honor of NYC’s least favorite week, we are joined by Brett D. Schaefer to analyze the ongoing United Nations General Assembly meeting. How the hell is this institution serving American interests? Together with Brett, we discuss the President’s address, weird US shenanigans, the threats to American interests posed by international governance, and the importance of U.S. oversight. The United Nations needs significant reform, but how the hell can the White House make that happen? Brett D. Schaefer is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he focuses on multilateral treaties, peacekeeping, and the United Nations and international organizations. Before joining AEI, Mr. Schaefer was the Jay Kingham Senior Research Fellow in International Regulatory Affairs at the Heritage Foundation, a member of the United Nations Committee on Contributions and an expert on the UN Task Force for the United States Institute of Peace. His work has been published in Fox News, The Hill, National Review, and National Security Journal, CNN, and CNBC, and more. Read Brett and Dany’s project on corrupt OCHA funding here. Read Brett’s reaction to Trump’s UN speech here. Read Brett’s United Nations Organizations Assessment Project here. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

The Report Card with Nat Malkus
The Report Card with Nat Malkus

Implementing AI (with Philip Oreopoulos)

Proponents of education technology have often made big promises about its potential to transform schooling, but so far, ed tech has failed to live up to its promise. Will AI also fail to deliver, or will it finally be the education technology that breaks through? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus and Philip Oreopoulos discuss this question and more. Nat and Philip discuss how to make sure ed tech actually gets used, whether schools need dedicated ed-tech staff, the educational benefits of using AI for language instruction, the logistical challenges of using AI for math instruction, how much upside there is for AI tutoring, how AI can affect the amount of time students spend on material, and what teachers should know about effective ed-tech implementation. Philip Oreopoulos is a professor of economics at the University of Toronto and the author of several recent papers on AI and education technology that examine the importance of implementation. This episode was produced by Elli Lucas. Show Notes: One Click Away: AI Tutoring with Khanmigo in a Two-Year School Experiment Making AI Tutoring Productive: Evidence from a Mastery-Based Math Practice Experiment How In-School Supervised Ed-Tech Support Produces Massive Learning Gains: A Khan Academy Field Experiment in India

Hosted by Nat Malkus

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Katherine Boyle

First return guest, Katherine Boyle, joins the guys to pick up where they left off. How can technology strengthen families? Why do boys need risks? How can women combine work and motherhood? Don’t we all need some suffering? Come for the deep questions, stick around for the autonomous boats, rebuilt shipyards, and American builders.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Are We Doing To Replenish Our Weapons Stockpiles? Anduril’s Chris Brose Explains.

What the hell is happening with U.S. defense technology? Chris Brose, the President and Chief Strategy Officer of defense tech firm Anduril joins us to talk about how private defense companies are innovating and revolutionizing American national security, America’s lousy defense acquisition habits, and what we can learn from Ukraine and the war with Iran. The traditional US defense industrial base is slowly cranking out exquisite and outdated weapons. If things don’t change, we risk losing a war to China. We discuss the crucial shift towards technological advancement, what the Pentagon and Congress must do, and what this means long term for the safety and security of the American people. Chris Brose is President and Chief Strategy Officer of Anduril Industries, a venture-backed defense technology company. He is the author of The Kill Chain: Defending America in the Future of High-Tech Warfare (2020) and formerly a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. From 2014-2018, he was the staff director of the Senate Armed Services Committee supporting then Chairman John McCain. From 2009-2014, Mr. Brose served as senior policy advisor to Senator John McCain, and from 2008-2009, he was senior editor of Foreign Policy. From 2005-2008, he served as policy advisor and chief speechwriter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and began his career in government as a speechwriter for Secretary of State Colin Powell from 2004-2005. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Andy Crouch

Technology, idolatry, time, and habits. Andy Crouch joins the gang to talk about technology, work without rest, and rest. How radical is an hour a day, a day a week, and a week a year? How does rest make us better at work? Is anybody a digital native? Golf, magic, acorn (not cogs) metaphors. It’s a wild ride.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Live! Remembering 9/11 25 Years Later with Stephen Hadley and J.D. Crouch.

On the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we hosted a live recording of the podcast, What the Hell Is Going On?, featuring former National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and former Deputy National Security Adviser J. D. Crouch II. Both Mr. Hadley and Dr. Crouch were serving in the Bush administration on that terrible day. Together, we discuss the attacks, the global war on terror, the state of America’s fight against Islamist extremism, and the United States’ safety and security one quarter century on. Stephen Hadley is a principal of Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC, an international strategic consulting firm founded with Condoleezza Rice, Robert Gates, and Anja Manuel. He is an executive vice chair of the board of directors of the Atlantic Council and is also the former board chair of the United States Institute of Peace, where he continues to serve on the Board of Directors. J. D. Crouch II is managing director for global strategy at Gallagher Insurance. A longtime national security and foreign policy leader, Dr. Crouch has served as deputy national security adviser to President George W. Bush, assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, and US ambassador to Romania. He later served as president and CEO of the United Service Organizations. At Gallagher, he focuses on the geopolitical forces shaping global business, risk, and strategic decision-making. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

The Report Card with Nat Malkus
The Report Card with Nat Malkus

Should We Close the US Department of Education?

According to many in the Trump administration, closing the US Department of Education would increase efficiency, reduce bureaucracy, and give states more control over education. But according to opponents of the move, closing the Department would create a bureaucratic web that would be confusing for states to navigate, weaken civil rights enforcement, and do little to raise student achievement. Once abstract, these debates are now anything but. Since his second term began, President Trump has signed an executive order directing the Department to begin shutting itself down, the Department has cut about half of its staff, and the Department has announced several interagency agreements to shift certain federal programs to other agencies. Against this backdrop, on this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus and four experts discuss and debate whether we should close the US Department of Education. Note: This episode is adapted from the most recent installment of the American Enterprise Institute’s Education Policy Debate Series, which was held at AEI on September 2.

Hosted by Nat Malkus

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Yuval Levin

World renowned for his beauty and his above-average thoughtfulness, Yuval Levin joins the guys. Why does he describe his work as gratitude for America? Why can’t you script a career path? Why do we overcomplicate questions of virtue? Is it true that Ben once sheared a sheep with Yuval in western Nebraska? All this and so much more.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt, with guest Yuval Levin

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Is Happening With Midterms? With Josh Kraushaar.

In our back-to-school episode, we welcome the return to D.C. by diving straight into the upcoming midterm elections. Who the hell is running? What the hell do they believe in? Where the hell are the particularly crucial races? Between the Iran War, heightening antisemitism, the increasingly popular DSA, and a possible AI bubble, American voters have no shortage of issues to weigh at the polls. We are pleased to host Josh for a discussion on what November might bring, and its implications for broader American policy in the future. Josh Kraushaar is the editor-in-chief of Jewish Insider and is a political analyst for Fox News Radio. With a track record of identifying election trends before they become conventional wisdom, Kraushaar is one of Washington’s leading political analysts. Josh will soon be publishing a weekly column analyzing the latest political developments for JI and is also the author of Axios’ weekly Sunday Sneak Peek newsletter, which focuses on the big-picture forces driving American politics. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

Not Dead Yet
Not Dead Yet

Gordon Gee

Ok, they’ll bite. What’s a university? Ben and Chris are joined by legendary university president E. Gordon Gee. Public trust is in collapse, the core curriculum looks like a Cheesecake Factory menu, the math doesn’t add up, and college football looks a heckuva lot like professional football. The guys cover it all. Boy do Stirewalt and Gee love West Virginia.

Hosted by BSBen Sasse and CSChris Stirewalt

August 2026

What the Hell Is Going On
What the Hell Is Going On

WTH Should I Read This Summer? ‘Subversion and Seduction’ by Audrye Wong.

What the hell is Beijing doing to seduce Washington? Join us for the last in our summer book series for a discussion with Dr. Audrye Wong for a conversation about her new book, Subversion and Seduction: China’s Economic Statecraft. How the hell has Beijing gained influence inside the United States? What the hell are their carrots and sticks? We debrief the state of China’s seduction campaign and Audrye’s policy suggestions to counter Beijing. Audrye Wong is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where her work focuses on China’s foreign policy, economic statecraft, propaganda and disinformation campaigns, and foreign influence operations. Previously, Dr. Wong was a professor at the University of Southern California and postdoctoral fellow at the Grand Strategy, Security, and Statecraft joint program of the Harvard Kennedy School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Security Studies Program. She has also held affiliations with Harvard’s Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, the Wilson Center, the Brookings Institution, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is fluent in Mandarin. Dr. Wong holds a PhD, MA and AB from Princeton. Read the transcript here. Subscribe to our Substack here.

Hosted by Danielle Pletka and Marc Thiessen

The Report Card with Nat Malkus
The Report Card with Nat Malkus

How Schools Should Approach Mental Health (with Carolyn D. Gorman)

Many schools today offer mental health programming, but according to Carolyn Gorman, a lot of school mental health programming is not only wasteful and ineffective but also directionally misguided: School mental health programming often targets students who don’t need help, pathologizes ordinary emotions, and fails to adequately help students with the most severe mental health problems. On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Carolyn Gorman about school-based mental health. Nat and Carolyn discuss whether and why student mental health has gotten worse, what we do and don’t know about school-based mental health programming, what K–12 schools should do when it comes to mental health, whether the mental health landscape in higher education is similar to the mental health landscape in K–12 schools, and how schools can promote student mental health through ordinary routines and orderly school environments. Carolyn D. Gorman is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, where her research examines how policy changes in the U.S. impact individuals with mental illness. This episode was produced by Elli Lucas. Show Notes: School-Based Mental Health Initiatives Challenges and Considerations for Policymakers The Tradition and Limits of Campus Mental Health Congress Is Treating Schools like Mental-Health Clinics It’s Time For Schools To Get Out Of The Mental Health Business

Hosted by Nat Malkus

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