Curated playlist

People associated with the 2020 United States presidential election

Hillary ClintonAround 1961, a girl from the Chicago suburbs wrote a letter to NASA. Hillary Rodham, later known as Hillary Clinton, wanted to know what she could do to become an astronaut. The reply was blunt. Women were not being accepted into the…
Barack ObamaObama rejected a plan to bomb a compound in Pakistan and sent Navy SEALs instead. The 2011 raid killed Osama bin Laden.
Chuck SchumerBob Dole once joked that the most dangerous place in Washington was between Charles Schumer and a television camera. Schumer, a Democrat from Brooklyn, has been a United States senator from New York since 1999. Along the way he has led his…
Nancy PelosiOn the 4th of January 2007, Nancy Pelosi defeated Republican John Boehner of Ohio by 233 votes to 202 in the election for speaker of the House. Standing in the chamber afterward, she declared, "today, we have broken the marble ceiling."…
Ted CruzTed Cruz, the junior senator from Texas, once held the Senate floor for 21 hours and filled part of that time by reading Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss. He has served in the Senate since 2013. A Harvard law professor, Alan Dershowitz,…
Bernie SandersBernie Sanders delivered a speech in the United States Senate on the 10th of December 2010 that lasted 8 hours and 34 minutes. His target was a tax bill that would extend the Bush-era rates, which he argued favored the wealthiest…
Jill BidenJill Biden shared a cubicle with another teacher at Northern Virginia Community College while her husband was vice president of the United States. She persuaded the Secret Service agents who accompanied her to dress as plainly as possible.…
Mitch McConnellMitch McConnell won his first Senate race in 1984 by 3,437 votes out of more than 1.2 million cast, a margin of just over 0.4 percent. He was the only Republican Senate challenger to win that year, even though Ronald Reagan carried the…
Derek ChauvinDerek Michael Chauvin joined the Minneapolis Police Department in 2001, and on the 25th of May 2020 he became one of the most scrutinized defendants in the world. That day he was among four officers who arrested George Floyd, a 46-year-old…
Charlie KirkCharlie Kirk, then a senior at Wheeling High School in Illinois, once organized a boycott of the cafeteria's cookies to protest a price increase. Charles James Kirk grew into an American political activist, entrepreneur, and media…
Savannah GuthrieSavannah Guthrie's first television job nearly ended before it began. She started in October 1993 at KTVM, the NBC affiliate in Butte, Montana. On her 10th day at the station, management closed the local news operation. Today she is a main…
Melania TrumpMelania Trump holds a set of firsts that no earlier first lady of the United States shares. She is the first naturalized citizen to hold the title. She is also the first first lady whose native language is not English. Other names mark…
Jesse JacksonJesse Louis Jackson Sr. died on the 17th of February 2026, after a public life that ran across the pulpit, the picket line and the campaign trail. In November 1987, The New York Times told its readers that most analysts gave him little…
Marjorie Taylor GreeneMarjorie Taylor Greene walked onto the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives on her first day in office wearing a face mask that read “Trump Won.” Donald Trump had lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden. The mask told…
Donald Trump Jr.Donald John Trump Jr. was born on the 31st of December 1977 in Manhattan. He is the eldest child of Ivana and Donald Trump, who would later serve as the 45th and 47th president of the United States. When he was twelve, his parents divorced…
Stephen MillerStephen Miller holds a senior White House post that no voter chose and no Senate vote approved. He is an unelected advisor, and his positions do not require confirmation. Since 2025 he has served Donald Trump as deputy chief of staff for…
Tulsi GabbardTulsi Gabbard, an American politician and Army officer, faced the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the 30th of January 2025 and turned a hostile question into a punchline. Her critics, she said, implied she was loyal to something…