What do Democratic Socialists want?

0:00Support for Here and Now Anytime comes from MathWorks, creator of MATLAB and Simulink software, to design and develop engineered systems, accelerating the pace of discovery in engineering and science. Learn more at mathworks.com. WBUR Podcasts, Boston. Among Democrats, Democratic Socialism has a higher approval than Democratizing Congress, and just Donald Trump's general approval ratings are quite low. The Democratic Socialists of America are riding high on a string of primary wins. How far can the left go?

0:50It's Tuesday, July 7th, and this is Here and Now, Anytime from NPR and WBUR. I'm Chris Bentley. Today on the show, a look at the impact of higher temperatures on our air quality as wildfires burn in the West. Air pollution contributes to more deaths in the United States than breast and prostate cancer combined. Also, with AI companies left largely to self-police, third-party auditors say they're backsliding on safeguards against doomsday scenarios. The choice before us is not between faith in AI or fear of it. It is between governing by design and drifting by default. But first, it has been a banner year for the Democratic Socialists of America.

1:40Their candidates have won congressional primaries recently in New York, Colorado, and Pennsylvania. Now the group, and the Democratic Party that has spent millions fighting to defeat them in those elections, are wondering how far the movement can go. The highest profile DSA member in elected office is probably New York Mayor Zoran Mamdani. And while Senator Bernie Sanders is not a member, his campaigns for president calling himself a democratic socialist, helped bring the term into the national political conversation. Megan Romer is national co-chair of the Democratic Socialists of America. She told Indira Lakshman on what the group stands for.

2:20We believe in a system of economics and politics that puts the working class in charge of their own basic needs, right? So it means that we get to decide together as the people whose labor creates all wealth, how the world we live in looks. All right. Well, President Trump used part of his July 4th speech to say that the U.S. is facing an internal threat from communist candidates. It's an apparent reference to the rise of progressives. There's a concern that DSA candidates could end up handing elections to the GOP if people see them as too far left. What do you say to that? My assessment is that voters from really across the political spectrum are extremely frustrated that they have so little power in in the sort of management of their lives and their communities.

3:17They are tired of wages stagnating while prices go up. They're tired of us sending money to fight countless wars overseas while there are schools and roads crumble. And I think that message resonates with a lot of people, both sort of across the political spectrum, but also it's really activating a base of people who are who have these progressive values who have felt really checked out of politics. Well, it's been more than a decade since Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who caucuses with progressive Democrats, gained a national following for his democratic socialist ideas. But there are newer DSA candidates like Daria Lisa Avila Chevalier, who just won a democratic primary for Congress in New York City and looks likely to be elected to Congress.

4:06She has praised communism and even defended Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a response to Western bullying. So what do you say to voters who say, sure, I'm a progressive, but I'm not a communist? Yeah, DSA is a big tent left movement. And so we have people coming from all strains, all historical strains of leftist thought. But I think what we come together on is the collective platform and the policies that our candidates end up running on. And those policies are really resonating with voters. All right. Let's talk about Israel because the DSA has called for an end to Israel's occupation of Arab lands and has described the war in Gaza as genocide.

4:46Your group's candidates have been called anti-Semitic for allegedly blurring the line between criticizing Israel's current government and questioning Israel's right to exist. What do you say to that? And how do you overcome concerns from people who are supportive of Israel's right to exist? obviously we are not uh in favor of anything even brushing up against anti-semitism but we believe that yes israel is an apartheid state and um saying that point blank to voters is is resonating with them because they see us funding this war that is killing children and journalists and doctors in palestine um and they don't want to pay for that and they don't want to support it Let me ask whether DSA candidates and their policies, you know, they have succeeded in New York City tremendously.

5:43We've got the mayor Zoran Mamdani there who does identify with the Democratic Socialists. In general, are people from the movement seen as too far left to win outside of liberal cities like New York or Berkeley, California or Cambridge, Massachusetts? Well, we're seeing victories across the country. People are tired of kind of being told what to do by the consultant class. They want to have some power and some dignity and some ability to make changes in their own communities. And, you know, among Democrats, Democratic Socialism has a higher approval than Democrats in Congress. And just Donald Trump's general approval ratings are quite low.

6:24Megan Romer is co-chair of the Democratic Socialists of America. Thank you so much for speaking with us. Thanks so much.

6:37Stay with Here and Now anytime as the 2026 election season heats up. We'll have more primary results, conversations with candidates and voters, and big picture stories about what it all means for the issues that matter to you. Click that follow button in the NPR app or wherever you're listening to this podcast. And if you're already following the show, give us a good review so new people can find us too. It really helps. Thanks. Coming up next, extreme heat has swept much of the U.S. and Europe in recent weeks. Heat is dangerous on its own, but it can also exacerbate bad air quality and set the stage for ferocious wildfires.

7:18What can you do to protect yourself from hazardous air? More on that in just a minute.

7:32Do you ever check the air quality index before you go outside in the summer? It's a must if you've got asthma or other conditions. But even if you don't, you might want to, especially on very hot days. Intense heat and sunlight can magnify the effects of smoke and everyday pollutants like car exhaust and industrial emissions. Sometimes you don't need an app with the air quality index to know something's off. You can see a smoky haze. Yesterday, Denver had the most polluted air in the U.S., and among the worst in the world, thanks to the dozens of wildfires burning in Colorado and other western states.

8:13And as you might have noticed last weekend, fireworks are not great for local air quality either. Washington, D.C.'s air quality was way down after the America 250 pyrotechnics this weekend? That has dissipated, but the Trump administration's regulatory rollbacks might have a longer-term effect, says Dr. Mary Rice of Harvard's Center for Climate Health and the Global Environment. She told Indira Lakshmanan, it's true, pollution can actually be worse in the summer. Well, when fossil fuels are burned by vehicles, power plants, industry, they emit particles and gases. And some of those gases undergo chemical reactions in the atmosphere that are enhanced when it's hot and sunny outside.

8:59So one important and harmful pollutant that's higher in the summertime is ground-level ozone. And we know that ground-level ozone is particularly bad in Californian cities and especially in Los Angeles. But tell us about the impact of air pollution on our bodies, particularly in kids. Decades of epidemiologic, clinical animal laboratory studies have shown that tiny particles and gases, including ozone, are inhaled into the lung where gas exchange takes place. And there they trigger inflammation and oxidative stress. And those biological effects don't stay in the lung. They extend into the bloodstream.

9:36They affect the immune system, blood vessels, the heart, the brain, and other organs in the body. And kids, because their organs are still developing, are especially susceptible to the health effects of air pollution, and they can have long-term health consequences. So let us understand the scope of this problem. What number of Americans are affected annually by air pollution, and how do you see it playing out? You're a professor of medicine at Harvard, too. How does it play out in the real world in cases you see? Breathing in air pollution can trigger asthma attacks in people of all ages, heart attacks, strokes, and it increases the risk of death in older adults.

10:16And over time, breathing air pollution increases the risk of chronic diseases. To compare it to a health outcome I think we can relate to, air pollution contributes to more deaths in the United States than breast and prostate cancer combined, 80 ,000 premature deaths per year. Wow. Yes. Well, let me ask you, has the Trump administration's loosening of environmental regulations measurably worsened our air quality? Well, there have been a number of policies and initiatives recently that increase or sustain fossil fuel pollution and put health at risk. One example, several aging coal-fired power plants that were scheduled to shut down for economic reasons have been ordered to remain open.

10:58And we know coal combustion, amidst deadly fine particle pollutions of mercury and other pollutants, is especially harmful to children's brains. It's a neurotoxin. Given that we're now in a situation where some of these air quality controls have been reduced, how can we be protecting ourselves or making our surroundings safer in terms of air quality? First, check the Air Quality Index. It's available on airnow.gov and on most smartphone weather apps. Knowing when air quality is poor can help you make informed decisions about your outdoor activities. When air quality is unhealthy and air quality index over 100, I would recommend spending time indoors and keeping windows closed.

11:41And for kids with asthma and adults with chronic heart or lung disease, I would be even more cautious and limit outdoor activity with an AQI above 50. Another measure that people can do in their own homes is to purchase an air purifier. And when you go to purchase one, look for one that says HEPA. Those are high-efficiency air purifiers that remove particles. They reduce particles effectively by more than 50 % on average. And if you need to go outside during a really poor air quality event, like a wildfire smoke event, a well-fitted N95 respirator is very effective in reducing particle exposure.

12:20All right, before I let you go, Mary, is there a chance to turn this around? Many of the harms of air pollution are preventable. We know that when emissions of pollutants are reduced, people get healthier surprisingly quickly. And I'm inspired by examples that we've seen in the past. As far back as 1996, during the Atlanta Olympics, there was a traffic congestion policy that cut traffic temporarily by 28 percent. And child asthma visits went down by more than 40 percent and then went back up again. Many examples of coal-fired power plants shutting down or coal processing plants closing down and almost immediate health benefits for the lungs, for cardiovascular, for mortality and life expectancy.

13:11So in other words, as long as we're able to put the right regulations in, clean up the air and the environment, then actually we can recover public health quite quickly. Yes, I think we can get there. And there's a valuable analogy with cigarettes. Once it became clear that secondhand tobacco smoke was harming the health of people who breathed it, it was local action that drove very rapid change to smoke-free schools and workplaces around the country. We now have equally strong evidence that combustion-related pollution harms health. And as energy demand continues to grow, we really have an opportunity at this moment to meet those needs with cleaner sources of power and to provide healthier air for kids and really people of all ages.

13:53That's Dr. Mary Rice. She's a pulmonologist and she leads Harvard Center for Climate Health and the Global Environment. Mary, thanks so much for coming in. Thank you so much for having me.

14:10We've got one more story for you on today's show. Coming up, the leading AI companies have quietly backed away from some safety protocols, according to a new third-party review. There's little interest in Congress or the Trump administration to regulate the industry, so tech companies are largely left to self-police. But a growing number of states and third-party auditors are stepping in to fill the gap. Indira has more on that in just a minute.

14:46A new report out today finds that none of the leading artificial intelligence companies earned more than a C-plus in a third-party safety review. Anthropic, OpenAI, Google DeepMind, and Meta have quietly weakened their commitments to safety, according to the Future of Life Institute, a nonprofit group that looks at how to reduce risks from technologies like AI. Ina Fried is chief technology correspondent for Axios, and she joins us now to explain more. Welcome back, Ina. Hi, Indira. So we spoke yesterday about how Anthropics' most advanced AI models are back online after the Trump administration ordered them to plug security holes that made them vulnerable to hackers.

15:28You're reporting today on troubling findings in this new report card on AI safety. So explain to us what did they find and what are the safety risks? So the big issue here is that safety commitments are getting weaker even as these models are getting more powerful. when you'd want the opposite to be happening. You would want us to be making progress on safety and the commitments, if anything, to grow. And this is a real worry here, that it was easy to say we'll stop shipping models when we hit a certain point when we were far away from that point. But now, as we get closer to artificial general intelligence or just really powerful AI, what we've seen is some of the companies slightly change their wording, but in meaningful ways.

16:14Hmm. All right. Well, does this mean that they're now vulnerable to hackers? I mean, what kind of safety risks are we talking about? Or these nightmare scenarios we hear about AI getting out of control and, you know, basically taking over the humans? What kind of safety risks? Yeah, this is closer to the latter. So we're dealing with more existential risks here, which can be the machines taking over. But there's other issues here. One that the report deals a lot with is the risks of tying AI to warfare. And a bunch of these companies early on said, we won't work with militaries. We don't want our technology used for weaponry.

16:52And many of the leading labs have reversed that policy. Many are working with the US government and providing their technology for use in military applications. So that's another risk is that we get into autonomous warfare where it's AI systems that are making the call and minimal human oversight over what's happening, which is something that the UN Secretary General cautioned about in addition to several other things this week. Yeah, that is very scary. All right, well, yesterday, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed into law new regulations on AI that may be the strongest in the nation. The law requires major AI developers to undergo independent audits of their safety plans.

17:33How significant is that, and will other states follow suit? It is significant. You know, I think the fact that there's any rules is a good thing. Not any rules, but some rules where there haven't been. This is a bill that the AI companies belatedly came around to support. I think there was worry in the beginning. And in general, the AI companies say, we want regulation. And then anytime any significant regulation comes up, they tend to be opposed to it. Anthropics a little bit more pro-legislation. But this is one that they all got behind. And I think it is a sensible measure, and I think there are a bunch of sensible things that could be done that would help make the world more safe when it comes to powerful AI.

18:15You mentioned that this week the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, called for better governance of AI in a speech. Let's listen. Used well and shared widely, AI could compress decades of development into years. It could become the great equalizer of the 21st century, but no future builds itself. And so the choice before us is not between faith in AI or fear of it. It is between governing by design and drifting by default. All right, Ina, this reminds me of the battle a decade ago when policymakers were wringing their hands over mis - and disinformation spreading like wildfire on social media and affecting elections.

19:06Combating that proved really hard, and so did regulating social media. So does the UN or some other global body have a realistic plan to regulate AI and limit the risks of the machines taking over? I think there are good plans and good suggestions from the AI companies. I think, I mean, from the UN and other bodies, the question is whether the global AI companies, especially the Chinese, will actually agree to this. I think there is a need. There is a clearly articulated vision for what could be global governance, but we don't really have anything like that in place. All right, Ina, quickly, an outgoing White House tech advisor says that Donald Trump has no interest in burdensome, onerous, bureaucratic red tape.

19:54If the federal government won't regulate AI safety, how much of an impact could state laws even make? Well, state laws can have a big impact so long as the federal government doesn't preempt them, because if California or Illinois or another big state does something, it tends to become the default nationwide and even globally. It's not the answer to everything, but state regulation can be meaningful. Thank you so much. That's Ina Freed, Chief Technology Correspondent for Axios. Thanks, Indira. Lots more coverage of AI at hereandnow.org, including what it means for regulations on the industry and national security now that Anthropik's powerful fable and mythos models are back on the market.

20:42You can find that and a lot more at hereatnow.org. But that'll do it for the show today. Here and Now Anytime comes from NPR and WBUR Boston. Today's stories were produced by Lynn Menagon and Thomas Danielian. Our editors were Todd Munt, Mikaela Rodriguez, Michael Scotto, and Kat Welch. Technical direction from Matt Reed and James Trout. Our theme music is by Mike Moschetto, Max Liebman, and me, Chris Bentley. Our digital producers are Allison Hagan and Grace Griffin. And Here and Now's executive producer is Alan Price. Thanks for listening. We'll be back with you tomorrow.