The Powers That Be: Daily

ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne, who broke last week’s big news about the LA Lakers, joins John to walk through how the $12.5 billion deal came together practically overnight. The two dig into the NBA’s exploding franchise valuations, what kind of owner Iger is likely to be, why LeBron James really left for Philly, and the murky, slow-moving investigation into the Clippers and Kawhi Leonard.

Malique Morris joins Peter to unpack J.Crew’s preppy renaissance—buoyed by buzzy campaigns with Bad Bunny and Jasmine Tookes—and why all that reclaimed cool may not be showing up on the balance sheet. Then they dig into Vette, Condé Nast’s ambitious new affiliate-marketing venture, and debate whether shoppers will really flock to influencer-run storefronts over the retailers they already know.

Julia Ioffe joins Peter to discuss how Trump’s cascading misadventures in the Middle East are hanging over the midterms—driving up gas prices, scrambling party politics on Iran and Gaza, and fueling more insurgent challengers than ever. Then they turn to the president’s renewed tariff threats, and how Israel could become the defining litmus test issue of 2028.

Ian Krietzberg joins Peter to unpack the backlash against Flock, the fast-growing surveillance-camera startup whose automated license plate readers are popping up (and being torn down) across the country. Then the pair examine how Democratic operatives are mining opt-in ChatGPT and Gemini transcripts to craft ads for voters who’ve tuned politics out.

Marianna Sotomayor joins Peter from her home state of Florida to unpack today’s primaries, beginning with Ron DeSantis—still polling above Trump, yet oddly absent from the race to replace him. Then they survey the down-ballot field, from a Senate seat Democrats have all but conceded to House primaries crowded with carpetbaggers.