Pam Bondi was never going to survive in Trump’s DOJ. Her mishandling of high-profile cases made her exit inevitable, writes Tom Rogan 👇

San Francisco Democrats thought they had an Israel equilibrium. This race suggests otherwise, writes William Liang 👇 buff.ly/vYaEBfw

Social media is awash with teenagers spending hundreds of dollars mimicking adult beauty routines — if companies can erode self-esteem at a young age, then they can ensure a lifelong dependency on their products | Kristina Murkett

The case for social media bans rests on the argument advanced by Jonathan Haidt that social media is driving a worldwide deterioration in adolescent mental health. It is a compelling story but that doesn’t make it true. | Olympia Campbell unherd.com/2026/04/the-case-against-social-media-bans/

‘Often mocked in their former pomp, the books pages used to be the only point of contact between literary culture and the ordinary reader’ | Cosmo Adair

The decline of literacy is much invoked these days – most influentially by James Marriott, who predicts a rapid social decline as societies stop reading. But what if it wasn't as simple as that? | Thomas Peermohamed Lambert unherd.com/2026/04/we-have-always-been-postliterate/

‘There are reasonable questions to ask of Britain’s policing standards and whether some forms of street disorder are simply allowed to run rampant’ | Chris Bayliss

The antiquity of nations was of no interest to Walker Connor: he understood that the perception of ethnic kinship is a social fact rather than a biological one, in which ‘the myth of a common and exclusive descent can overcome a battery of contrary fact’ | Aris Roussinos unherd.com/2026/04/why-...

By distancing themselves from Trump, European leaders are making a mistake | Wolfgang Münchau

Will America still have libraries in 50 years' time? Trump’s book-free presidential library may be the future | Nicholas Boys Smith

For years, rural Red America has prided itself on its moral integrity — clearly, nobody told Bryon Noem | Sohrab Ahmari

‘In a country often devoid of meritocracy, the sport is bossed by elderly men with no vision’ | Tobias Jones

‘If we have any hope of protecting gay kids, then a therapist must have the right to interrogate a child’s claim that he or she was born in the wrong body’ | Ben Appel

If Israel is hoping to defeat Hezbollah, and then deal with a neutered-but-coherent Lebanese state, they may have underestimated just how much the country has fragmented. | Jacob Russell unherd.com/2026/04/will...

Some Democrats on the Hill have been blaming the failure of the Biden era on the administration’s physical haggardness. They point to a well of unsexiness for voters’ indifference towards the party. | Poppy Sowerby unherd.com/2026/04/make...

‘Men who already have the chiselled face can now inject dead people’s fat into their chests and shoulders to build useless but shapely muscles’ | Oliver Bateman unherd.com/newsroom/ris...

With Britain now confined to a spectator role as the rules-based order burns, a new political posture is gaining popularity in the more intellectual corners of the Labour Party: ‘Anglo-Gaullism’. Jonny Ball explains why that posture is wrong. unherd.com/2026/04/what-the-anglo-gaullists-get-wrong/

It's been 12 years since the publication of the Jay Report. Why has it taken so long for the state to ask questions that could prevent further scandals? Joan Smith👇 buff.ly/vW6YxED

Mamdani finds himself caught between activists and the Trump administration. Don’t be surprised if his LGBTQIA+ agenda remains largely symbolic, writes Joseph Figliolia 👇 unherd.com/2026/03/the-...

‘The Overton window around acceptable metaphysical belief has shifted — sharply’ | Katherine Dee

‘A pact between Starmer and Polanski would let the best-placed Left-wing candidate have a free run at Reform, maximising their vote’ | John Oxley

Kanye West's new album could mark the beginning of another rehabilitation — should he be forgiven? | Samuel Rubinstein unherd.com/newsroom/is-...

‘Labour's introduction of yet more social engineering schemes looks a lot like Nero fiddling while Rome burns’ | Niall Gooch

The midterms may not hinge on swing voters. They may hinge on whether MAHA shows up, writes Emily Jashinsky 👇

If the Iran war is still raging come the middle of next month, oil prices could reach $200 a barrel. Are Western economies prepared? | John Rapley unherd.com/newsroom/ful...

‘Netanyahu is willing to keep escalating in the belief that whatever follows, however chaotic, will be in Israel’s interest’ | Tom Rogan

It is not clear what, exactly, the point is of the UAE's hyperactive foreign policy: besides a lust for gold and glory. | Brad Pearce unherd.com/2026/03/the-...

Rupert Murdoch didn’t just win the 1986 Wapping dispute against his striking printworkers. He helped re-write the political map of the UK. | Robert Khan and Tom Salinsky unherd.com/2026/03/how-murdoch-rewrote-the-rules-of-power/

Does Sadiq Khan understand the role of the Church of England? | Mary Harrington unherd.com/newsroom/sad...

Perhaps the single most important lesson of the First World War, then, is that you cannot base your entire strategy on a single roll of a dice. | Wolfgang Münchau on Trump's war in Iran unherd.com/2026/03/trumps-gamble-with-the-wests-future/

‘Official gaslighting of once-unthought-of measures as “routine” merely hardens suspicions of a lack of political nerve to address the underlying issues’ | Dominic Adler

‘Sandberg’s crusade is exemplar elitist feminism — a class-based luxury belief that treats professional work as the only legitimate female path’ | Carolyn D. Gorman unherd.com/newsroom/she...

Hungary’s two main parties are exchanging accusations of espionage, treason and fraud ahead of elections next month. Don’t expect either side to calmly accept the result | William Nattrass unherd.com/newsroom/hun...

Labour insiders are predicting a ‘bloodbath’ at the May elections. The only way for the party to save itself is to replace Keir Starmer | Peter Franklin unherd.com/newsroom/lab...

The Houthis’ entry into the Iran war could spell disaster for the world economy | Malcom Kyeyune

'To believe in euthanasia and assisted dying while not being a moral nihilist requires believing in three contradictory ideas before breakfast' | Yuan Yi Zhu unherd.com/newsroom/noe...

England is set to charge foreign tourists for entry to national museums. But we should all be paying | Ben Lewis unherd.com/newsroom/bri...

Putin can recast public dissatisfaction with a peace deal into a narrative of relief | Bethany Elliott

'When the joke lands on their side of the aisle, Right-wingers can be every bit as brittle, censorious, and melodramatic as the Left' | Ryan Zickgraf unherd.com/newsroom/dru...

‘A key difference between Europe and Britain is that on the continent, privacy principles and a deep wariness of state surveillance still energise the Left’ | Chris Bayliss

'The programme is going far too slowly, and thus risks becoming a textbook example of “broken Britain”' | Nicholas Boys Smith

Given its sheer size and human scale, India may be on its way to becoming the largest single non-hostile casualty of the war in West Asia. | Kapil Komireddi unherd.com/2026/03/how-...

Barrow is the quintessentially left-behind former boomtown, lying at the end of the Furness Peninsula — ‘Britain’s longest cul-de-sac’ — at the entrance to Morecambe Bay. | Christopher de Bellaigue

Trump has extended his deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz. Does Tehran have the upper hand in negotiations? | Jennifer Kavanagh

How can women seeking late-term abortions for healthy babies both be disempowered, traumatised wrecks, but also clear-sighted rational actors whose decisions society should respect? | Kathleen Stock on the limits of bodily autonomy. unherd.com/2026/03/the-...

'The Crown Prosecution Service continues to mislead about something as fundamental as the sex of men accused of serious crimes' | Joan Smith

The Left sees Bill Maher as a sell-out, the Right sees him as a useful idiot. And Donald Trump sees him as a last resort, writes Emily Jashinsky 👇 buff.ly/Cvx7bHt

Anti-Trump sentiment may not be enough for Democrats in the midterms later this year | Michael Baharaeen unherd.com/newsroom/don...

Cuddihy’s mode of analysis is a kind of ham-fisted determinism. Any thought which has ever been had by a Jew is by nature a Jewish thought, produced solely by its thinker’s Jewishness. | Samuel Rubinstein

Harsher restrictions on social media risk expanding state control at home | Stella O'Malley