Shows / KQED's Forum
KQED's Forum
Forum tells remarkable and true stories about who we are and where we live. In the first hour, Alexis Madrigal convenes the diverse voices of the Bay Area, before turning to Mina Kim for the second hour to chronicle and center Californians’ experience. In an increasingly divided world, Mina and Alexis host conversations that inform, challenge and unify listeners with big ideas and different viewpoints. Want to call/submit your comments during our live Forum program Mon-Fri, 9am-11am? We'd love…
Episodes
- KQED's Forum
California's Primary is June 2. Do You Know What's on Your Ballot?
You may be among the nearly two million voters who have already cast their votes for California’s primary election next week. But if you’re procrastinating…
- KQED's Forum
Ahead of America’s 250th, a ‘Declaration of Interdependence'
The United States turns 250 this summer, but for many Americans feeling burned out by partisan politics it may feel hard to imagine wanting to celebrate. We…
- KQED's Forum
Facing Headwinds, Bay Area Museums Adapt
Great museums can drive tourism, and the Bay Area has no shortage of world class institutions. But museums everywhere are facing rising costs, declining…
- KQED's Forum
Forum from the Archives: What Does It Take to Be a ‘Good Woman’?
“All my life I have tried to be a good woman,” writes Savala Nolan. Being “good” meant not rocking the boat. It meant following the rules and fitting herself…
- KQED's Forum
Forum From The Archives: When The World Expects Hate, A Palestinian and An Israeli Choose Peace
Aziz Abu Sarah, who is Palestinian, and Maoz Inon, who is Israeli, have both lost family to the conflict in the Middle East. They are also both peacebuilders…
- KQED's Forum
Inside Trump's Pardon Economy
Presidents have traditionally waited until their final months in office to give clemency, but just over a year into his second term, President Trump has issued…
- KQED's Forum
This Year’s College Grads Have A Tricky Road Ahead
The college graduates in the Class of 2026 have not had an easy path. Part of their high school years were spent in Covid lockdown. And now, they are…
- KQED's Forum
Still Undecided in California Governor's Primary? Here's Where the Race Stands
As the June 2nd primary approaches, many California voters remain undecided about their pick for California’s next governor. This year’s race is especially…
- KQED's Forum
Bay Area Director Yoav Potash on the Enduring Weight of the Holocaust in Poland
The award-winning documentary by Bay Area director Yoav Potash, “Among Neighbors,” sheds light on the history of antisemitism in Poland, where both during and…
- KQED's Forum
How San Diego is Responding After Mosque Shooting
Two teenage gunmen killed three people, and later themselves, in an attack Monday at the Islamic Center of San Diego, the city’s largest mosque. Authorities…
- KQED's Forum
DACA’s Future Uncertain as Delays Disrupt Lives, Raise Fears of Deportation
Since it was created back in 2012, DACA has allowed unauthorized immigrants who arrived in the US during childhood to go to school and work without fear of…
- KQED's Forum
What Hantavirus Teaches Us About the State of Outbreak Response
The recent hantavirus outbreak, which killed three people and sickened close to a dozen more, is largely under control, with many passengers now quarantining…
- KQED's Forum
The Child of Revolutionaries, Running From the FBI
Even as a young child, Zayd Ayers Dohrn knew that the FBI was after his family. His parents Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers had been living as fugitives for…
- KQED's Forum
A Family Divided By Cuba’s Revolution
On May 13th, Cuba ran out of oil, crippling public services for nearly 10 million people. It’s a result of a months-long oil blockade initiated by the Trump…
- KQED's Forum
Can the Federal Reserve Retain Its Independence in the Trump Era?
The Federal Reserve Board begins this week with a new chair, Trump appointee Kevin Warsh. The Fed is a nonpartisan government body tasked with setting interest…
- KQED's Forum
How to Get Better at Accepting – Even Appreciating – Uncertainty
Though our lives are filled with uncertainty, we’re less tolerant of it than ever, says journalist Simone Stolzoff, author of the new book “How to Not Know…
- KQED's Forum
La Doña Presents Her New Album, 'Corrientes' Live in Studio
Singer, songwriter and San Francisco native Cecilia Peña-Govea – better known as La Doña – joins us in studio with her band for a special live performance on…
- KQED's Forum
A 'Monster' El Niño Is Brewing in the Pacific
An El Niño is starting to form in the tropical Pacific Ocean, and some forecasters say it could be a “monster,” the most powerful in 150 years. The weather…
- KQED's Forum
How Plastic Took Over the World – And How Big Oil is Betting on It
As the world moves away from fossil fuels, oil and gas companies are betting on plastic to keep profits rolling in. In her new book, “Plastic Inc.,”…
- KQED's Forum
The Hidden World of Forced Arbitration
Forced arbitration clauses are buried in everything from product warranties to bank loans to employment contracts, often requiring consumers and workers to…
- KQED's Forum
Republicans Are Winning the Redistricting War
Both Democrats and Republicans have turned to redistricting to improve their chances in this fall’s midterm elections. But a recent court case striking down a…
- KQED's Forum
The `Blood Populism’ Driving Political Violence in America
A 2025 study found political violence is shifting from a primarily right-wing phenomenon to one now more common on the left (fueled partly by a significant…
- KQED's Forum
Project Homekey Is CA’s Ambitious Plan to House Homeless People. Is it Working?
California launched Project Homekey after the pandemic to quickly create new housing and get homeless people off the streets. Over the last few years the state…
- KQED's Forum
U.S.-Iran Ceasefire Tested as Tensions Rise in Persian Gulf
Tensions remain high in the Persian Gulf as the U.S. and Iran exchanged fire late last week, calling into question whether an already fragile ceasefire still…
- KQED's Forum
Mac Barnett on How Kids Can Teach Us to Be Better Readers
Mac Barnett is a bestselling children’s book author and, since last year, the National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. He has a new small book out…
- KQED's Forum
How Did You Find Your Life’s Work?
How can we find and start our life’s work? That’s the question Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Jodi Kantor tried to answer for Columbia University’s seniors…
- KQED's Forum
Tracy Clark-Flory’s “My Mother’s Daughter” Tells the Story of Finding Her Long-Lost Sister
When she was 16, journalist Tracy Clark-Flory found out that she had a long-lost sister. Her mother shared that as a teenager, she had given up a child for…
- KQED's Forum
We're Living Online. Our Bodies Are Paying the Price
We’re spending too much time sitting behind screens. First we’re at our desks for eight, maybe ten hours. Then, all too often, we get home and plop onto the…
- KQED's Forum
Low-Income Adults with Disabilities Stand to Lose SSI Benefits Under Proposed Trump Administration Rule
A proposed rule change for obtaining Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits could reduce or eliminate income for some 400,000 adults with Down syndrome…
- KQED's Forum
Could a ‘Plastic Detox’ Help With Health and Fertility?
The new Netflix documentary “The Plastic Detox” follows six couples struggling with unexplained infertility, asking them to cut plastic from their lives to see…
- KQED's Forum
What Did Mapping The Genome Get Us?
Pioneering geneticist J. Craig Venter, who revolutionized biology with his role in sequencing the human genome, died last week in San Diego. In this hour, we…
- KQED's Forum
When Will Alternative Meats Go Mainstream?
Humans eat more than 550 metric tons of meat and seafood a year — a number that’s steadily climbing, and expected to do so until at least 2050. At the same…
- KQED's Forum
Mary Cain Was A Running Prodigy, Until Abuse Derailed Her Career
As a teenager Mary Cain was a running phenom. At 17, she ran the 800 in under two minutes, and broke numerous national high school records. She went pro that…
- KQED's Forum
What Animal Caregiving Reveals About Us
A blue whale mother that fasts for months while her calf puts on close to 250 pounds a day. A male hamster who acts as a midwife while his partner gives birth…
- KQED's Forum
Court Battle Over Abortion Access Returns to Center Stage
After a federal appeals court on Friday blocked mail-order access to the abortion pill mifepristone, the Supreme Court stepped in to pause the ruling…
- KQED's Forum
It’s Not Personal: When Rejection Gets Political
We all know the stinging pain of rejection: the exclusion from a high-school in-group or the all-too-common experience of applying for a job and receiving an…
- KQED's Forum
Stage Diving into Sonoma County’s Early Punk Scene
When punk rock thrashed through the Bay Area in the 70s and 80s, there were some venues that became iconic hubs, like Mabuhay Gardens in San Francisco and…
- KQED's Forum
Scammers Pretended To Be Forum's Mina Kim. Here's Why
In the last month, about a dozen authors wrote to Forum saying they’d been messaged by a fraudster claiming to be Mina Kim. In exchange for a “small fee,”…
- KQED's Forum
Trump’s War in Iran Nears Critical Deadline
When President Trump sent troops into Iran, he did so without a green light from Congress. Now he faces a deadline on May 1 to either end the war in Iran or…
- KQED's Forum
Roundup: The Controversial Weedkiller Sprayed Throughout California Forests
The Supreme Court this week heard a case about Roundup, a weedkiller widely used in agriculture — and that tens of thousands claim has caused their cancer. Now…
- KQED's Forum
When Your Devices Fritz And Your Digital Life Is Lost. What Next?
What happens when your hard drive gets fried and every photo documenting your kid’s life, or that novel you didn’t back up, or that cache of old emails…
- KQED's Forum
Have We Learned How to Talk About GLP1s?
An estimated one in eight Americans has now tried a GLP-1 medication like Ozempic or WeGovy: to lose weight, manage diabetes or experiment with anecdotal…
- KQED's Forum
How ‘Muskism’ is Reshaping America
Everyone has an opinion about Elon Musk, who has carved out a uniquely powerful place for himself in the worlds of auto-making, space launch, social media and…
- KQED's Forum
Tucker Carlson’s Reversal on Trump Raises Questions for MAGA
Tucker Carlson, the right wing pundit and onetime Donald Trump diehard, now says he regrets supporting the President. Carlson apologized on his show for…
- KQED's Forum
How Can We Better Care for Foster Youth?
The death of a San Jose toddler in foster care has Santa Clara’s child welfare system scrambling to respond and politicians asking what went wrong. Six percent…
- KQED's Forum
What an Accent Can – and Can’t – Say About You
Everyone has an accent, even people who don’t think they do. That’s according to linguist Valerie Fridland, who studies the way American accents have been…
- KQED's Forum
Remembering Classical Music Icon Michael Tilson Thomas
We’ll remember legendary conductor, composer, educator and San Francisco icon Michael Tilson Thomas who died on Wednesday. He served 25 years as music director…
- KQED's Forum
When The World Expects Hate, A Palestinian and An Israeli Choose Peace
Aziz Abu Sarah, who is Palestinian, and Maoz Inon, who is Israeli, have both lost family to the conflict in the Middle East. They are also both peacebuilders…
- KQED's Forum
Why Do Certain Songs and Bands Go Viral?
Some fans of the indie-rock band Geese have been feeling betrayed after learning that TikToks that looked like they were made by fans were actually created by…
- KQED's Forum
M Gessen Reckons with Familial Crime and Punishment
“The Idiot,” a new podcast from Serial and New York Times opinion columnist M. Gessen, shares the story of Gessen’s own cousin, Allen, who went to prison for…
- KQED's Forum
The Psychological Toll of Trump’s Immigration Policies on Bay Area Latinos
The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration has many people feeling self-conscious about speaking Spanish in public or being recognized as Latino. Last…
- KQED's Forum
Anthropic’s New AI Mythos Is a Cybersecurity Game-Changer
The San Francisco AI firm Anthropic has developed a new model that it says is too powerful to be released to the public. Called Mythos, Anthropic says it’s in…
- KQED's Forum
Paying for Graduate School Is Going To Get Harder
Going to graduate school has never been cheap. But sweeping new changes to the federal loan system – which will now have caps on how much you can borrow – may…
- KQED's Forum
Rethinking Healing: Insights from Survivors of Extreme Trauma
Psychiatrist Suzan Song has for decades worked with people who have experienced extreme traumas, like being trafficked or recruited as child soldiers. She says…
- KQED's Forum
CA Prepares for Early Wildfire Season Amidst Slashing of US Forest Service
California’s record-setting heatwave in March caused snow to melt and vegetation to dry out earlier than normal this year. Those conditions could provide lots…
- KQED's Forum
Celebrating the Players That Made Women's Basketball
The 2026 WNBA season tips off next month. It’s expected to see historic viewership and attendance, after last season’s record-breaking run as the most-watched…
- KQED's Forum
Bass Legend Melvin Gibbs Shows Us 'How Black Music Took Over the World'
Grammy-nominated bassist and composer Melvin Gibbs contends that all music genres popular in the U.S. — pop, country, rock, dance, hip-hop and Latin — “either…
- KQED's Forum
Viktor Orbán’s Defeat, and the Limits of MAGA Populism
After almost two decades as Prime Minister, Hungarian autocrat Viktor Orbán was defeated by Péter Magyar, leader of the center-right Tisza party. In the final…
- KQED's Forum
What Will it Take to End the War in Iran?
An American naval blockade of Iranian ports entered its third day as the U.S. tries to open up ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, President Trump…
- KQED's Forum
Examining the Fallout From Eric Swalwell’s Sexual Misconduct Allegations
Facing sexual misconduct allegations from at least five women, including one former staffer, Bay Area Democrat Eric Swalwell resigned from Congress, where he…