The Sunday Read: ‘What Alice Munro Knew’

Last week, when Paramount, the parent company of CBS News, announced a $16 million settlement with President Trump over editing of a segment of “60 Minutes,” many of the network’s journalists were furious. The deal also raised questions about the independence of CBS’s journalism, and how much news organizations could be cowed by threats from the president going forward. David Enrich, an investigations editor at The Times, takes us inside the settlement, and Lowell Bergman, a former CBS producer and investigative journalist at The Times, reminds us that the network has been in a similar situation before and discusses why this time may be different. First, Edgar Sandoval, who is on the ground in Texas, explains what is happening in the wake of the flooding.

When the Modern Love podcast asked listeners how location sharing is affecting their relationships, the responses they got were all over the map. Some people love this technology. Some hate it. But either way, it has changed something fundamental about how we demonstrate our love and how we set boundaries around relationships. In this episode, the Modern Love team shares a few of their favorite listener responses. Then, host Anna Martin talks with Arlon Jay Staggs, a Modern Love essayist who has wrestled deeply with whether to share his location. At first, location sharing wasn’t a big deal for Staggs and his mother. He took a lot of long drives, and it made sense for her to keep tabs on him. But when he realized his mother was watching his little blue dot too closely, and it was causing her stress when she needed peace of mind, Staggs decided the sharing had to stop. He just couldn’t figure out how to tell her. And when tragedy struck his family, the stakes of his decision to share or not share became a lot higher. Today’s episode was inspired by the essay “Every Move I Make, She’ll Be Watching Me.” For more Modern Love, search for the show wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Wednesday.

Secretary general Mark Rutte has only good things to say about the mercurial U.S. leader and his impact on the world stage.

After months of debate, weeks of tense negotiations and 24 hours of Republican arm-twisting, President Trump has muscled his giant domestic-policy bill through both chambers of Congress. It’s a major legislative victory for the president that paves the way for much of his second-term agenda, and it will have profound impacts across the country. The Times journalists Tony Romm, Andrew Duehren and Margot Sanger-Katz discuss what the legislation changes, and those whose lives it will change the most.

After a eight-week trial whose every turn has grabbed headlines, a jury found Sean Combs, the music mogul known as Diddy, not guilty of the most serious charges against him. Ben Sisario, who has been covering the trial, explains why the prosecution’s case fell short, and Jodi Kantor, an investigative reporter at The Times, discusses what the verdict may tell us about how prosecutors and juries see sexual abuse cases.