The New York Times

Three married couples recently filed into a federal building in San Diego for green card interviews that they believed would secure their future together in the U.S. Half of each pair was American. It was supposed to be a celebratory milestone, the final step in the process to obtain U.S. permanent residency. Instead, as each interview with an immigration officer wrapped up, federal agents swooped in, handcuffed the foreign spouse and took him or her away. The couples and their lawyers said they had followed the required steps to secure permanent residency. In San Diego alone, immigration lawyers in the region estimate that several dozen foreign-born spouses have been detained since mid-November, one immigration lawyer said. At the link in our bio, read more about how some green card interviews are ending with the spouses of U.S. citizens in handcuffs. Photos by @arianadrehsler

Since Jennifer Capasso, a 42-year-old transgender woman, was diagnosed with metastatic rectal cancer, her life had become a succession of treatments and surgeries. It frustrated her that she was unconscious at the most crucial moments — as each cancerous mass was removed. She decided to record her next surgery at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. “I wanted to know what’s going on,” she recounted. She started recording before the anesthesia hit. “Knowledge is power.” On the recording, the health care workers express opinions about transgender identity. “Not that it’s not right, but — ” one person can be heard saying. “I don’t get any of it,” another says. One person suggests updating Capasso’s medical file. “Yeah, it needs to say ‘male,’” the person says. The hospital has denied discriminating against Capasso and suggested that her “secret” recording invaded the privacy of its health care workers. Capasso said that long before she made the recording, she had experienced discriminatory treatment at the hospital. Listen to some of Capasso’s recordings and read more of her story at the link in our bio. Photo by @sarahblesener

President Trump appeared to be fighting sleep on Tuesday during a cabinet meeting at the White House, closing his eyes and at times seeming to nod off, after he criticized media coverage about him facing the realities of aging in office. Asked whether the president fell asleep, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in a statement that he was “listening attentively and running the entire” meeting. It was the second time in less than a month that Trump, who is 79, appeared to doze off in public. During an Oval Office event on Nov. 6, the president’s eyes grew heavy and closed for several seconds. Read more at the link in our bio.

In every realm of Dijon’s multi-hyphenate career, this has been the breakout year for the buzzy producer and musician. In addition to a memorable feature on the indie-folk musician Bon Iver’s LP “Sable, Fable” (and a small role in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Oscar contender “One Battle After Another”), he is a writer and producer on Justin Bieber’s nimble pair of “Swag” albums; those contributions earned Dijon his first two Grammy nominations, including a nod for producer of the year, non-classical. This weekend, he’ll make his debut as the musical guest on “Saturday Night Live.” Onstage in Brooklyn, though, a relatively reticent @dijondijon_ let his songs speak for themselves. His most personalized bit of crowd work was a well-chosen sample: He came onstage to the audio of Jalen Brunson hitting the game-winning three-pointer that propelled the Knicks to the second round of the 2025 NBA playoffs. That’s one way to get a New York crowd hyped. At the link in our bio, read more about the studio maestro stepping into the spotlight. Photos by @poupayphoto

President Trump formally pardoned former President Juan Orlando Hernández of Honduras on Monday. Hernández was accused of flooding the U.S. with cocaine and had been sentenced to 45 years in prison. Authorities had characterized it as “one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world.” Trump pledged to issue the pardon last week after Hernández sent him a four-page letter addressing Trump as “your Excellency,” and casting himself as a victim of “political persecution” by the Biden-Harris administration and comparing his fate to that of the American president. Read more at the link in our bio.

Costco has sued the Trump administration for a refund of the tariffs it has paid on imported goods, should the Supreme Court rule them illegal. The retail giant has become one of the largest companies to challenge President Trump’s sweeping levies in court. The complaint argues that Trump misused a 1977 law in his move to implement tariffs on products from more than 100 countries. The lawsuit also asserts that Congress, not the president, has the authority to set tariffs, and that Trump exceeded the authority granted to him by the law, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA. Read more about the lawsuit at the link in our bio. Photo by @instadickie

Leo XIV, the first pope from the U.S., concluded his first international trip as pontiff on Tuesday, which began in Turkey and ended in Lebanon. His visit to a region divided by religious differences was closely scrutinized for signs of where he stands on sensitive geopolitical issues. In the biggest diplomatic test of his papacy, Leo looked to build bridges with Muslim leaders and Orthodox Christian patriarchs. At the link in our bio, read more about the pope’s trip. Photos by @diego.ibarra.sanchez, pool photo by Yara Nardi and Ozan Kose/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

In Ukraine, army recruitment ads are impossible to miss. Constant Méheut, a New York Times reporter in Kyiv, describes how those ads have evolved to reflect the country’s shifting moods after four years of war with Russia. Read more about Ukraine’s recruitment efforts at the link in our bio. Video by Constant Méheut, Nikolay Nikolov and James Surdam/The New York Times

More than half a million Jamaicans’ jobs depend on tourism — which accounts for nearly a third of the economy — in the Caribbean country that, in October, was battered by its first Category 5 hurricane. Authorities announced that Jamaica would be back in business for visitors by Dec. 15, which the government considers the start of the winter travel season, an ambitious goal that many hotels said they would not meet. About 40 to 50% of the country’s hotels suffered at least some damage, but even some that were largely spared have had to grapple with workers who lost their homes and are now displaced. At the link in our bio, read about the rush to reopen as much of Jamaica as possible after the devastating hurricane. Visuals by @erinschaff

Here they are — the 10 Best Books of 2025, selected by the staff of The New York Times Book Review. Every year, we spend months debating the most exceptional books until we arrive at our list of the standout fiction and nonfiction. Tap the link in our bio to see the full list and learn more about why each title is a best book of 2025. In the article, you’ll also be able to track and make shareable reading lists of how many of this year’s 10 Best Books you’ve read — or want to read.

A group of kids in eastern Marin County, California, was playing with an e-bike on a warm Saturday night in 2023. Amelia Stafford, who was 15 at the time, got on the bike behind someone and rode up and down the street, Coral Billisi, Amelia’s best friend, recalled. Coral said it was such a short ride that wearing a helmet didn’t occur to anyone. When the bike toppled over, “our immediate reaction was that we all started laughing — we just thought it was so funny,” she says. “Like, Ha ha, they’re so stupid, they can’t even ride bikes.” Then they saw the blood on the pavement around Amelia’s head. Before the crash, Marin County officials had needed hard numbers to effect a change in public policy. But then, said John Maa, a chief trauma surgeon who was on call that Saturday night, Amelia crashed, and everything changed: “It was like a light switch.” At the link in our bio, read the full @nytmag story about the accident, its toll on Amelia and how it finally led to reform. Photo by @balazsgardi

The actor Rose Byrne (@fullyrosebyrne) and the writer Sheila Heti share an aptitude for pathos and humor, which they often blend or juxtapose for effect. Byrne’s latest film role is Linda, a mother on the brink in “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You” (2025), though even in this harrowing portrait of anxiety, there are moments when she makes you laugh. Last year saw the publication of Heti’s “Alphabetical Diaries,” which is composed of sentences taken from a decade’s worth of her journals, and she’s currently attempting to make a book out of exchanges she and others had with a chatbot. Byrne and Heti met for the first time on a video call in late October for T’s Admiration Society series, during which they discussed creating characters and questioning motherhood. Tap the link in our bio to read the full conversation. Written by Kate Guadagnino (@k_guad). Photo by @heathersten.