The Slatest for Jan. 12: We’re Getting a Preview of Trump’s Chaotic Legal Strategy, and It Doesn’t Bode Well for Jack Smith

Trump’s New York fraud trial is giving us a preview of the legal strategy he’ll probably deploy in all of the criminal trials he’s facing over the coming year—and it’s not pretty, Robert Katzberg writes. It seems like Trump’s going to do everything he can to improperly impact jurors and cause a mistrial. Katzberg examines where this strategy could lead, and what it could mean for Jack Smith’s federal election interference case.

Plus, in case you missed it: Jeremy Stahl wrote about how Trump’s legal arguments are getting increasingly embarrassing.

The U.S. launched an attack against targets in Yemen, after months of Houthi fighters attacking ships in the Red Sea. Fred Kaplan examines the possibility that we’re on the brink of an expanding conflict in the Middle East, and one possible way a broader war could be avoided.

Plus: Thousands of women have been widowed in Gaza, and they’re fighting for their families’ lives. Over at our sister publication, Foreign Policy, Neha Wadekar and Ruwaida Amer tell some of their stories.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis faced a sharp, surprising rebuke from a conservative appeals court on Wednesday. Mark Joseph Stern explains what happened.

It’s honestly impressive how messed up the 2024 primaries are—even by America’s standards. States are going rogue, and we’d be in real trouble if the winners weren’t a foregone conclusion. On What Next, Mary Harris spoke with Ari Berman about how voting in this country is about to get really weird.

Elon Musk is apparently realizing he should have bought TikTok. How can you tell? Well, unfortunately for us, he’s making Twitter into a terrible version of TikTok. Alex Kirshner breaks down how we got here, and how none of it had to happen this way.

“Not many things about immigration policy are clear except for the fact that it seems to have broken people’s brains,” Pedro Gerson writes. And when it comes to this issue, Democrats are falling into an old trap all over again.

An iPhone fell 16,000 feet and somehow its screen didn’t break. How? Part of the answer is that phone screens have gotten more durable, Anna Gibbs writes—and part of it is basic physics. She breaks down the science for us.

Plus, in case you missed it: Luke Winkie wrote about why the Alaska Airlines loose bolts incident is so much more horrifying than other stories of things going wrong on planes.

And What Next: TBD took a look at Boeing’s larger problems.

True Detective: Night Country isn’t a return to form. It’s something much better. Laura Miller explains how the new season overhauls everything the series was known for.

But which sedimentary rock is that metamorphic rock derived from, hmm? You can test your knowledge of rocks—and much more—with our daily quiz!

We hope your holiday weekend … rocks! (All right, all right, we’ll see ourselves out!)

Thanks so much for reading, and we’ll see you on Tuesday.