Victoria Monét

On the campaign trail, President-elect Donald Trump spoke of the burden grocery prices were placing on Americans and promised to help bring relief to more households. It’s a vow that may have helped him get elected, but experts say his proposed tariffs could exacerbate the problem. High prices—and the economy more broadly— were top of mind for most Americans at the ballot box.

This article is part of The D. C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox. Not one year ago, Rep. Nancy Mace took her seat in the committee meeting room and peppered a friendly witness with questions she already knew the answers to. “Does the color of your skin matter when you are in the trenches, when you are in combat?” the Republican lawmaker asked a Space Force commanding officer who was fired after publicly claiming Marxist ideologies were widespread in the military.

Most Americans consider access to medical care a necessity, not a luxury. Yet, in rural regions, such access has become increasingly sparse. Between 2010 and 2021, the American Hospital Association reported that there were 136 rural hospital closures around the country. This year, nearly one-third of the remaining rural hospitals could shutter their doors and services.

When Ellie Shoja goes for a walk, she slips on her headphones and starts talking—but there’s no other voice ricocheting through the speakers. It’s merely a convenient way to disguise the fact that she’s engrossed in a conversation with herself. “As far back as I can remember, I’ve talked to myself,” says Shoja, 43, who lives in Los Angeles.

It’s not easy to lose track of Lake Erie. It’s harder still to lose track of two and a half Lake Eries, but that’s more or less what happened back in 2015, when the Earth lost 290 cubic miles (1,200 cubic km) of freshwater, or 250% of Lake Erie’s volume.

(NEW YORK) — New York prosecutors oppose any effort to dismiss President-elect Donald Trump’s hush money conviction, but they expressed some openness Tuesday to delaying sentencing until after his impending second term. In a court filing Tuesday, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said Trump’s forthcoming presidency isn’t grounds for dropping a case that was already tried.