Writer, Editor
Senior Associate Editor at The Atlantic, author of "Busting Cactus Smugglers in the American West."
PROFILE
Weston Phippen
FROM Weston Phippen
Press Play with Madeleine Brand
Who Are The Cactus Thieves Cactus experts say there are about 2,000 different types of cacti living today. Many of them are out here in the deserts of the West, but they’re in danger. According to a study published last year in the journal “Nature Plants,” almost one third of them are threatened with extinction. They’re threatened by humans taking their habitat, and livestock trampling them. The biggest reason so many cacti are disappearing, however, is a simpler one: theft. People are stealing rare breeds and selling them. There are laws against it, but they’re tough to enforce across hundreds of thousands of square miles of the desert West. We take a look inside the cactus smuggling trade.
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Bookworm
Claudio Magris: Blameless In Claudio Magris' Blameless, a museum of the implements of war and destruction is created to inspire peace. But this conversation is not just about war and peace.
The Business
In 'Speechless,' Scott Silveri combines comedy, family & disability Scott Silveri has written and produced sitcoms for more than 20 years. In all that time, he never encountered a TV family that looked anything like the one he grew up in -- with a mom, a dad...and a brother with cerebral palsy. He changed that with his show Speechless on ABC. Silveri tells us about looking to his own past for stories, and why he was determined to make a family comedy and not just a "disability show."
Press Play with Madeleine Brand
Why did Jared Kushner want a back channel with Russians? News broke Friday that President Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor, Jared Kushner, tried setting up a back channel between the Trump transition team and the Russian government. What are the consequences for Kushner, President Trump, and the investigation into Russian meddling?