150 episodes

Notes from America with Kai Wright is a show about the unfinished business of our history, and its grip on our future.

Notes from America with Kai Wright WNYC Studios

    • News
    • 4.3 • 1.5K Ratings

Notes from America with Kai Wright is a show about the unfinished business of our history, and its grip on our future.

    Voter Vibe Check: Democratic Voters Are Torn Over Biden’s Gaza Policy

    Voter Vibe Check: Democratic Voters Are Torn Over Biden’s Gaza Policy

    A movement is emerging among registered Democrats across the U.S. In Minnesota and Michigan, collectively, more than 150,000 voters chose “uncommitted” rather than selecting Joe Biden on their primary election ballots. Protest voting is a trend on the rise  with many in the Democratic party expressing their frustration at U.S. policy as the war in Gaza enters its sixth month. 

    Host Kai Wright asks voters who would likely have supported Biden’s campaign, but are now conflicted because of the violence in Gaza, what they will do to engage politically? In this episode, Kai also speaks with Rima Meroueh, director of the National Network for Arab American Communities and a volunteer with Michigan's “Uncommitted” campaign, about how the campaign came to be and what her organization is hearing from voters about the future of political organizing around the war in Gaza.

    Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

    Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET., and listeners to the broadcast and podcast are invited to join the conversation at 844-745-TALK(8255). Podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

    • 50 min
    Kai Wright Presents Blindspot Episode 5: What If I Could Have Grown Old With My Brother?

    Kai Wright Presents Blindspot Episode 5: What If I Could Have Grown Old With My Brother?

    In 1985, doctors at a methadone clinic in the South Bronx made the harrowing discovery: 50 percent of their patients had HIV. Three years later, in the same neighborhood, a pair of epidemiologists estimated that as many as one in five young men were positive for the disease. Those numbers made the South Bronx one of most critical hotspots for HIV in the country.

    Joyce Rivera was born and raised in the South Bronx. She watched as heroin flooded into her neighborhood followed by HIV. When Rivera’s brother died in 1987, she decided to do something. Working with a heroin dealer and a local priest, she defied the law and set up an illegal needle exchange in an attempt to prevent the transmission of HIV among injection drug users. And she largely succeeded. But what if this country had treated drug addiction like a public health issue instead of a criminal problem?

    Listen to more episodes and subscribe to Blindspot here.

    Blindspot is a co-production of The HISTORY® Channel and WNYC Studios, in collaboration with The Nation Magazine.

    Tell us what you think. Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here. We’re also on Instagram and X (Twitter) @noteswithkai.

    • 40 min
    How Actor Danielle Brooks 'Already Won' Before The Oscars

    How Actor Danielle Brooks 'Already Won' Before The Oscars

    Danielle Brooks, nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress following her masterful portrayal of Sofia in the 2023 remake of “The Color Purple,” discusses her journey to the Oscars with host Kai Wright.

    Brooks was the sole representative at the 96th Academy Awards from last year’s film adaptation. The first time novelist Alice Walker’s story met the silver screen, directed by Steven Spielberg, it earned 11 Academy Award nominations but notably took home no gold. “The Color Purple” later evolved into a musical, premiering on Broadway in 2005. Brooks stepped into the role of the brazen and spirited Sofia for the 2015 revival of that show, all while playing Tasha “Taystee” Jefferson in the Netflix series “Orange is The New Black.” 

    Brooks talks about her rise to fame, overcoming impostor syndrome in Hollywood and her next film project, which is quite a departure from projects she’s taken on before.

    Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

    Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET., and listeners to the broadcast and podcast are invited to join the conversation at 844-745-TALK(8255). Podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

    • 50 min
    Kai Wright Presents Blindspot Episode 4: Respectability Politics and the AIDS Crisis

    Kai Wright Presents Blindspot Episode 4: Respectability Politics and the AIDS Crisis

    By 1986, almost 40 percent of people diagnosed with AIDS in the United States were either Black or Latino. As the full contours of the crisis became apparent, a group of Black gay men began to organize in cities across the country, demanding attention and support for the people dying in their midst. This effort required them to confront big, important institutions in both the medical establishment and the government — and it meant they had to stare down racism in the broader LGBTQ+ community. But perhaps their most pressing and consequential challenge was the most difficult to name: the rejection of their own community.

    As men, women and children within the Black community began falling ill, essential institutions — the family, the church, civil rights groups — which had long stood powerfully against the most brutal injustices, remained silent or, worse, turned away. Why? What made so many shrink back at such a powerful moment of need? And what would it take to get them to step up?

    In this episode, we meet some of the people who pushed their families, ministers and politicians to reckon with the crisis in their midst. We hear the words of a writer and poet, still echoing powerfully through the decades, demanding that he and his dying friends be both seen and heard; and we spend time with a woman who picked up their call, ultimately founding one of the country’s first AIDS ministries. And we meet a legendary figure, Dr. Beny Primm, who, in spite of some of his own biases and blindspots, transformed into one of the era’s leading medical advocates for Black people with HIV and AIDs. Along the way, we learn how one community was able to change — and we ask, what might have been different if that change had come sooner?

    This episode contains a brief mention of suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts, there’s help available. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is open 24 hours a day by calling or texting 988. There’s also a live chat option on their website.

    Blindspot is a co-production of The HISTORY® Channel and WNYC Studios, in collaboration with The Nation Magazine.

    Listen to more episodes and subscribe to Blindspot here.

    Tell us what you think. Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here. We’re also on Instagram and X (Twitter) @noteswithkai.

    • 49 min
    Are we really having a 'migrant crisis?' Depends who you ask.

    Are we really having a 'migrant crisis?' Depends who you ask.

    Both President Biden and Donald Trump took campaign trips to Texas to visit the U.S. border in recent days. These simultaneous visits happened shortly after several polls found that immigration remains a top issue for voters. But the political discourse can often erase the lived experiences and realities of migrants throughout the country. 

    In this episode, local reporters in some of the country’s major migration hotspots join host Kai Wright for a discussion on what migration looks like in their respective cities. We learn how migrants are navigating their first initial entry into the U.S. in the city of El Paso, and later, how they are coping with trying to get work, find shelter and integrate into America — all while still awaiting proper work authorizations — in Chicago and New York.



    Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

    Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET., and listeners to the broadcast and podcast are invited to join the conversation at 844-745-TALK(8255). Podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

    • 49 min
    We Could End AIDS. So Why Are People Still Dying?

    We Could End AIDS. So Why Are People Still Dying?

    Host Kai Wright started his career covering the impact of HIV and AIDS on communities in America. A new project brings that experience full circle. Kai hosts the latest season of the Blindspot podcast, “The Plague In The Shadows,” which introduces listeners to people who were affected in the early years of the HIV and AIDS epidemics. 

    Decades later, AIDS is still with us and its status as an epidemic remains accurate. In this episode, we learn why that is from two women whose careers have centered around this disease in different ways. Journalist Linda Villarosa is the author of “Under the Skin: The Hidden Toll of Racism on American Lives and on the Health of Our Nation;” and June Gipson, Ph.D. is the director of the organization My Brother’s Keeper, which works on both HIV prevention and access to treatment in Mississippi. They discuss the medical achievements in the field of HIV and AIDS treatment, as well as the barriers to eradication. Plus, listeners from across the country weigh in with their own stories and we hear from one of the people you meet in the Blindspot podcast, Victor Reyes, who was born with HIV in Harlem in 1989. 

    To hear more of Blindspot: The Plague In The Shadows, listen and subscribe here.

    Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at notes@wnyc.org. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET., and listeners to the broadcast and podcast are invited to join the conversation at 844-745-TALK(8255). Podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

    • 49 min

Customer Reviews

4.3 out of 5
1.5K Ratings

1.5K Ratings

sfgrrderoc ,

Wonderful insights

Kai Wright does an excellent job of making complex issues understandable, and sometimes discusses topics which I wouldn't think interesting at first glance, but he makes them interesting, relevant and valuable to my understanding of what it means to be American. Bravo.

softMints88 ,

Capitalize Barbie

Isn’t it interesting how racism transcends from generation to generation. It was thought in 1955 white america fear would go away by 1970, lol. Even today stil we can’t rationalize whether a doll named Barbie should be represented as an American institution or the decentralization of the government.

JCASEA ,

“Woke” origins?

please don't advertise an episode until it’s available (heard on political scene, the new yorker 1/15/24). sounds interesting but not there….

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