You can’t understand the modern Republican Party without understanding the complete collapse of trust in mainstream institutions that has taken place among its voters over the last half-century. Pew found that only 35 percent of Republicans trust national news and 61 percent think public schools are having a negative effect on the country. Many of the issues animating the modern right — from fights over school curriculums and learning loss to media bias and Covid vaccines — are connected to this deep distrust. In Katharine Ham’s view, America’s institutions have “earned” her party’s rampant distrust. So this is a conversation that explores Katharine Ham’s critique in order to understand the distrust at the heart of the Republican Party.

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Persons: Pew, “, Ezra Klein, Mary Katharine Ham, Katharine Ham’s Organizations: Republican Party, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google, CNN, Fox News, ABC