Business
Why workers still swelter, weeks after new heat standards took effect for indoor worksites
Alexia Rangel recalled sweating as she rang up customer orders at a Taco Bell in Alhambra during an early August heat wave. The air conditioning wasn’t working, she and fellow workers said, and heat radiated from the grills in the kitchen.
She remembers feeling dizzy a few hours into her shift, then her vision shifting to black and white. The color drained from her face, she said, and her lips turned purple.
“I nearly, almost passed out,” recounted Rangel, 20.
Despite new state regulations requiring workplaces to cool indoor climates when they reach unsafe levels, the temperature in the restaurant’s kitchen that day registered 104 degrees, according to a hand-held thermometer that Rangel said a co-worker showed her. Workers would include a photo of the temperature reading in a complaint filed with state regulators.
After years of delays, California’s new rule regulating heat in indoor workplaces took effect in late July. The rule, adopted by the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, lays out heat illness prevention measures for indoor workplaces. It requires employers to provide easy access to clean drinking water and cooling areas, and to monitor workers for signs of heat illness whenever work site temperatures reach or exceed 82 degrees.
If temperatures climb to 87 degrees, or employees are required to work near hot equipment, employers must cool the work site or rotate workers out of hot environments. Workers are to be allowed an unlimited number of cool-down breaks to protect themselves from overheating.
Under California’s new indoor heat standards, employers are required to provide easy access to clean drinking water and cooling areas.
(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)
But more than four weeks after the regulations took effect, interviews with workers and union leaders indicate compliance varies by industry and workplace. Some workers interviewed by The Times said they continue to swelter. Many weren’t aware of the new rules.
The places where heat safety measures were in effect tended to be union shops where regulations had been written into existing contracts, or in industries such as demolition and hazardous materials removal where such precautions have become ingrained in workplace culture.
While employers have a legal responsibility to implement the new measures, advocates stressed that labor groups and community organizations will need to work with the state to raise awareness of the regulations and ensure employees have the information they need to push for changes. A major challenge will be supporting workers who fear retaliation, labor experts said.
“The timeline should be as soon as possible, because heat was killing workers yesterday,” said Renee Guerrero Deleon, an organizer at the Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health.
Some occupational health experts worry that Cal/OSHA won’t be up to the task of promoting and enforcing the new standards. The agency is confronting a severe staffing shortage that is hampering its ability to conduct workplace inspections. Cal/OSHA is already under fire for failing to aggressively enforce heat regulations for outdoor laborers, raising questions about its ability to ensure compliance with nearly 200,000 indoor sites.
Cal/OSHA spokesperson Peter Melton said in an emailed statement that the agency has begun “extensive campaigns on social media.” It will continue to ramp up inspections and work to increase hiring, Melton said.
The state estimates the heat standards will apply to about 1.4 million workers. The job sites expected to be most affected include industrial warehouses, commercial laundries, manufacturing facilities and restaurant kitchens.
Employers who fail to comply could face Cal/OSHA inspections and penalties of up to $15,873 per violation; penalties rise for deliberate or repeat violations.
At the Taco Bell in Alhambra where Rangel works, employees initially weren’t aware of the heat standards. Still, they were so concerned about conditions that, days after Rangel nearly fainted, workers held a one-day strike in front of the restaurant. They learned of the new rules while filing a complaint with Cal/OSHA.
Taco Bell Corp. did not respond to specific questions about its compliance with the heat law, but issued a more general statement saying it prioritizes the health and safety of employees. “In this case, the franchise owner and operator of this location took swift action to address the issue,” the company said.
Rangel said the restaurant, indeed, has felt cooler in recent days, adding: “It took for someone to almost pass out for them to do all this stuff, like fix the A/Cs.”
Ana Solis is a dishwasher with Flying Food Group, a catering company that services airlines. She says the heat emanating from dishwashing machines can be suffocating.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
Ana Solis, 65, is among the workers who said they hadn’t heard about the new regulations until interviewed by The Times.
Solis is a dishwasher with Flying Food Group, a catering company that services airlines. Her work area in Inglewood has air conditioning, but she said that the system isn’t powerful enough to cool a room filled with steamy dishwashing machines.
She said the high heat sometimes leaves her struggling to breathe and with red, irritated skin that she treats at home with creams. Solis said workers at the site are allowed to go to an air-conditioned cafeteria for 10-minute breaks and lunch, but that she sometimes needs additional breaks, escaping to a cool hallway to catch her breath.
“We don’t have the right to a cool-down break,” she said, unaware the new regulations provide that right. “But sometimes I take it, because the heat makes me feel like I’m suffocating.”
Flying Food representatives did not respond to questions from The Times regarding how the company is complying with the heat standards.
Margot Alvarez, an employee with Braun Linen, a commercial laundry company, was among the workers The Times interviewed who said they were unaware of the state’s new indoor heat regulations.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Margot Alvarez, who sorts soiled bedding and other materials from convalescent homes and medical facilities at Braun Linen, a commercial laundry in Paramount, was also unaware of the regulations.
Hot steam wafts from a large washing machine as she works in a vinyl gown and gloves. She said the heat generated by sanitizing appliances makes the room feel at least 10 degrees hotter than the outdoor temperature.
After Alvarez raised concerns, she said, management installed a fan by her work station. But she said the fan mainly blows hot air in her direction. Twice in recent weeks, Alvarez said, she grew lightheaded and vomited in the restroom.
Scott Cornwell, owner of Braun Linen, declined to comment on specific concerns Alvarez raised. He said his company works closely with the union that represents its workers, and has installed fans and air conditioning. He said workers have access to cooling areas and water.
“We are in compliance,” Cornwell said.
Bertha Servin, 58, works at Mission Linen Supply in Chino, an industrial laundry where workers sanitize and iron linens, uniforms and bedding for nearby hospitals.
“The big industrial machines, the big dryers, the ironers, everything is hot,” Servin said.
But because of long-standing provisions built into their union contract, Servin said, she and her colleagues have access to fans and cooling machines, and workers come together to make requests, such as asking the company to repair a broken ice maker. The contract also requires the company to provide annual training sessions, where workers are told to be attentive to their bodies in the heat and to feel free to go to the lunch room for a cool-down break.
“If you don’t feel good, you have to report immediately to a supervisor,” she said.
For demolition and construction workers laboring on sizzling roofs or handling hazardous materials in humid plastic enclosures, heat has long been a serious threat. Several workers who specialize in asbestos, lead and mold removal said efforts to safeguard against heat illness predate the state standards. Instead, the industry serves as an example of what protocols can look like once they are ingrained in workplace culture.
Often, buildings undergoing construction have the power shut off, which means there is no air conditioning. On some sites, workers wear respirators and protective body suits as they extract hazardous materials. They often are slinging sledgehammers and crowbars “in a sauna-like environment,” said Fabian Plascencia, of the Northern District Council of Laborers Local 67.
Each morning, PARC Environmental, a hazardous services company based in Fresno, convenes a meeting to discuss the dangers presented by that day’s job site, and review a worksheet that outlines safety protocols, including heat illness prevention, said foreman Rodolfo Nunes.
“The company has always been really strict on heat, since we are from the Central Valley. Our guys need to stay hydrated at all times,” said Nunes, 35.
For demolition and construction workers laboring on sizzling roofs or handling hazardous materials in humid plastic enclosures, heat has long been a serious threat.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
Nunes frequently works in triple-digit conditions. “Oh man, it gets overwhelming,” he said, adding that he’s finally developed a habit of drinking water before he’s thirsty.
“It’s adapting, just getting used to routines,” Nunes said. “When you’re new, you don’t know the first symptoms, like dry mouth. The small things that are going to take you to dehydration.”
Eco Bay, a Bay Area company that does hazardous materials remediation, convened supervisors for a meeting earlier this summer to discuss the new indoor heat rule.
Workers had already been trained to hydrate and take breaks, and to check in with each other for symptoms of heat illness using a buddy system, said Juan Carlos Moreno, 51, a supervisor at Eco Bay. The main changes communicated at the training involved monitoring temperatures throughout the job site and emphasizing to workers that there are no break limits in the heat.
Michelle Moreno, Eco Bay’s safety director, said the company now places thermometers in different areas of the job site and checks them throughout the day to ensure the temperature is under the 82-degree threshold.
During a months-long project inside a poorly ventilated building in the Sacramento area last year, Eco Bay provided workers with respirators that had built-in cooling systems, called a “powered air-purifying respirator.” Moreno said the company’s owner was a laborer himself before he started the company, and so he takes safety seriously and is “more than willing to spend money on it.”
“It comes down to companies having the right culture,” Moreno said, “and making sure people in charge are trained properly to recognize hazards and how to put controls in place, and also training workers so that they know how to recognize warning signs and to speak up if they aren’t feeling well.”
This article is part of The Times’ equity reporting initiative, funded by the James Irvine Foundation, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to address California’s economic divide.
The Na’vi won the battle of the box office this weekend, as “Avatar: Fire and Ash” hauled in a hefty $88 million in the U.S. and Canada during its opening weekend.
The third installment of the Disney-owned 20th Century Studios’ “Avatar” franchise brought in an estimated total of $345 million globally, with about $257 million of that coming from international audiences. The movie reportedly has a budget of at least $350 million.
Box office analysts had expected a big international response to the most recent film, particularly since its predecessor “Avatar: The Way of Water” had strong showings in markets like Germany, France and China.
In China, the film opened to an estimated $57.6 million, marking the second highest 2025 opening for a U.S. film in the country since Disney’s “Zootopia 2” a few weeks ago. (That film went on to gross more than $271.7 million in China on its way to a global box office total of $1.1 billion.)
The strong response in China is another sign that certain movies can still do well in the country, which was once seen as a key force multiplier for big blockbusters and animated family films but has in recent years cooled to American movies due to geopolitics and the rise of its domestic film industry.
Angel Studio’s animated biblical tale “David” came in second at the box office this weekend, with an estimated domestic gross of $22 million. Lionsgate thriller “The Housemaid,” Paramount Animation and Nickelodeon Movies’ “The Spongebob Movie: Search for Squarepants” and “Zootopia 2” rounded out the top five.
The weekend’s haul likely comes as a relief to theater owners, who have weathered a roller coaster year.
After a difficult first three months, the spring brought hits like “A Minecraft Movie” and “Sinners” before the summer ended mostly flat. A sleepy fall brought panic to the exhibition business until closer to the Thanksgiving holiday, when “Wicked: For Good” and “Zootopia 2” drew in audiences.
Dear Liz: When I retired, I had a small 401(k) with about $12,000 in it. Instead of rolling that money into an IRA, I took a distribution and paid taxes on it. I had no immediate need for the remaining funds, so eventually I opened a new IRA account and deposited the money.
I now realize I should have put it in a Roth IRA so I wouldn’t face double taxation on the money. This is the stupidest thing I’ve done in recent memory. Is there any legal mechanism I can use to get that money out and into a Roth without paying taxes the second time?
Answer: You made a mistake, but probably not the one you think.
You can’t contribute to an IRA — or a Roth IRA, for that matter — if you don’t have earned income. So if you’ve fully retired, you should contact your IRA administrator and let them know you need to withdraw your “excess contribution” as well as any earnings the contribution has made.
If you contributed this year, you have until your tax filing deadline — typically April 15, 2026 — to remove the funds without penalty. If you contributed in a previous year, you’ll typically face a 6% excise tax for each year the money remained in your account.
Now, a warning about financial mistakes: They tend to become more common as we age. That can be incredibly unsettling, especially to do-it-yourselfers used to handling finances competently on their own. Retirement is a good time to start implementing some guardrails to protect ourselves and our money.
Hiring a tax pro would be a good first step. Anything to do with a retirement fund should be run past this pro first to make sure you’re following the tax rules.
Dear Liz: In response to a reader who asked about creating a will, you suggested options for low-cost online resources. That is great! But, I would encourage you to remind readers to designate beneficiaries on accounts and assets where that option is available.
While they should still have a will, many readers may not know that they can add beneficiaries to brokerage, checking, and savings accounts (in addition to IRA and retirement accounts) so that their assets will pass directly to the designated beneficiaries and not have to go through probate with the extra hassle, time and expense.
For those without a trust, designating beneficiaries may be the easiest way to pass on many of their assets. In California (and some other states), even houses may pass without probate with a transfer-on-death deed. Many readers may not know about the option to add beneficiaries, and you would do your readers a service by educating them about it.
Answer: Anyone adding beneficiaries to accounts needs to be aware of some major potential drawbacks.
A big one involves settling the estate. If all available funds are transferred directly to beneficiaries, the person settling the estate may not have enough cash to do their job.
Beneficiary designations can also result in unintentionally unequal distributions if there’s more than one heir, and complications if the beneficiaries die first or aren’t changed appropriately as life circumstances change.
That’s not to say that beneficiary designations are the wrong choice, but they’re certainly not a one-size-fits-all option.
Dear Liz: Your recent column about advanced directives said that people could get a free version at PrepareForYourCare.org. I found there is a charge. Is this for all online directives?
Answer: Prepare is a free site supported by donations, grants and licensing agreements. If you were asked to pay, you either clicked the donate button or weren’t on the correct site.
Liz Weston, Certified Financial Planner, is a personal finance columnist. Questions may be sent to her at 3940 Laurel Canyon, No. 238, Studio City, CA 91604, or by using the “Contact” form at asklizweston.com.
To understand how Mr. Trump has achieved this omnipresence, The New York Times reviewed the first 329 days of his second term, finding at least one instance each day when he attracted the public’s attention to himself and his actions.
The review encompassed more than 250 media appearances, more than 320 official appearances, and more than 5,000 Truth Social posts or reposts. The analysis shows that while Mr. Trump has lagged his predecessors in his number of official appearances, he has pursued a raft of innovative methods to force himself into the public consciousness on a daily, and sometimes even hourly, basis.
The battery of activity started from the moment he was inaugurated, when he traveled from the Capitol Building to the Capital One Arena to publicly sign a flurry of executive orders.
Since then, he has stayed in the public eye in part by doing things no president has ever done. High-stakes Oval Office meetings, like his negotiations with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, are held on-camera and broadcast live on global news networks. His Q.-and-A. sessions with reporters frequently last an hour or more.
He regularly airs his opinions – on social media, in discursive asides at rallies – about idiosyncratic subjects that range widely across the zeitgeist, from Sydney Sweeney’s sexy denim ads to the redesigned logo of the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain to the mysterious fate of the aviator Amelia Earhart, who vanished over the Pacific Ocean in 1937.
And his engagement with the news media has soared well beyond the start of his first administration.
Through Dec. 14, Mr. Trump took reporters’ questions on 449 occasions, compared with 223 during the same period of his first term. On average, Mr. Trump has interacted with journalists roughly twice a day, doubling his rate from 2017, according to Martha Joynt Kumar, a Towson University political scientist who tracks presidential press interactions. Mr. Trump limits which news outlets can ask questions at small events, but in sheer volume, he is the most media-accessible modern president, and far outpaces his predecessor, Joseph R. Biden Jr.
“Reporters will be in my office asking me for the president’s reaction to a breaking news story,” Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in an interview. “And I’ll just say to them, ‘I don’t know, why don’t you ask him yourself in 30 minutes?’”
President Trump’s media appearances have soared this year, more than doubling both the Biden administration’s and those of his own first term.
Finding the Cameras
Many of his public moments go viral online, like his diatribe about restoring the name of the Washington Redskins, or the A.I.-generated video meme he posted of himself dribbling a soccer ball with Cristiano Ronaldo in the Oval Office. They take on a life of their own, rippling across social media and dissected and amplified by influencers and mass media platforms alike.
The result is a president whose not-so-inner monologue is injected into our daily lives in myriad ways, when we are watching TV on the weekends or idly scrolling the web – a Greek chorus for our national narrative.
“He’s the most ubiquitous president ever,” said Douglas Brinkley, the presidential historian.
The media strategy aligns with his political strategy.
Dating back to his years as an outspoken real estate developer and reality TV star, Mr. Trump has relished being unavoidable for comment. But at age 79, he has been outdoing his younger self. And there is a logic to his logorrhea.
Mr. Trump’s allies often speak of the political benefits of flooding the zone: pursuing so many policies, ideas, and dramatic restructurings of the normal ways of governance as to overwhelm the system. “All pedal, no brake,” as Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s one-time adviser, has called it.
“We joke internally that he is our ultimate director of communications,” Ms. Leavitt said. “He has incredible media instincts, and he is the final decision maker on all policy, and he has been in a ‘flood the zone,’ ‘do as much as possible’ mindset since he walked into the Oval Office on Jan. 20.”
All presidents benefit from the awesome news-making powers of the office, with its agenda-setting influence over a dedicated global press corps. But Mr. Trump has outstripped his predecessors in whipsawing the public’s attention onto matters small and large – and limiting the level of scrutiny that any one shocking remark or policy proposal receives.
“People can really only focus on a handful of things a day,” said Bill Burton, a deputy White House press secretary under former President Barack Obama. “This attention flood is working for Trump because he is able to do an extraordinary amount of executive actions and very little of it can get attention.”
Or as Mr. Brinkley put it: “He plays to win the day, every day, around the clock.”
His commentary takes on a life of its own.
One of Mr. Trump’s political assets is his instinct for virality.
With a natural feel for the web, Mr. Trump has a knack for amplifying wacky memes and pop culture curios that can drive days of online discourse. Sometimes, coverage of his offhand remarks or late-night social media posts can crowd out the more significant, norm-shattering changes he is making to American governance.
Late one Friday night in May, the president posted an obviously A.I.-generated image of himself as the pope. It struck a nerve.
Mr. Trump had already courted controversy days earlier, after the death of Pope Francis on April 21.
“I’d like to be pope,” the president told reporters who asked about who should become the next pontiff. “That would be my number one choice.”
The comment disturbed some Catholics, who said the notion was crude and insensitive. That reaction seemed only to prompt Mr. Trump to double down, posting the A.I.-generated image to his Truth Social account days later. By the weekend it had become a cultural phenomenon, mocked on “Saturday Night Live” and called out by experts as an example of misleading A.I. content.
After Mr. Trump posts the A.I. image …
May 2
Trump posts A.I. image of himself as Pope
There is nothing clever or funny about this image, Mr. President. We just buried our beloved Pope Francis and the cardinals are about to enter a solemn conclave to elect a new successor of St. Peter. Do not mock us.
May 3
NYS Catholic Conference says “do not mock us”
May 3
“Saturday Night Live” covers fake image
May 3 Vatican asked about image, declines to comment
May 4
Cardinal Joseph Tobin of New Jersey criticizes image as “not good”
May 4
JD Vance defends Trump on X, calling it a joke … some Catholics were outraged, prompting a news cycle focused on the controversy …
5
Says “the Catholics loved it”
… before Mr. Trump suggested he had nothing to do with it.
Mr. Trump, who is not Catholic, had plenty of defenders, too. They said his commentary and the A.I. image were simply jokes, part of the president’s unique comedic style.
“As a general rule, I’m fine with people telling jokes and not fine with people starting stupid wars that kill thousands of my countrymen,” Vice President JD Vance, who is Catholic, wrote on X.
In his quest for attention, the president is often aided by a cottage industry of right-wing influencers and activists who are primed to syndicate, reinforce and defend whatever content he pushes out each day. For this conservative media ecosystem, Mr. Trump’s messaging and commentary are the raw fuel that drives clicks, shares and views.
On June 7, the president’s visit to a raucous U.F.C. fight – complete with a “Trump dance” entrance into the arena – generated an immediate spike in online interest, including about 50,000 posts on X. Five days later, when he promoted a “Trump gold card” visa, his announcement led to roughly 30,000 posts on X.
A barrage that distracts from bad news.
One pattern in Mr. Trump’s behavior: When his administration is faced with bad news, he launches a fusillade of distraction.
This can take the form of outlandish, out-of-left-field claims about political opponents. Or he might weigh in on a pop culture subject far afield from Washington politics – from the ratings of late-night hosts like Seth Meyers to the physical appearance of a megastar like Taylor Swift.
The events of July 2025 offer a case in point.
As the Jeffrey Epstein files returned to the news – along with speculation that Mr. Trump might appear in them – the president embarked on a breathtaking series of tangents. Mr. Trump claimed without evidence that former President Bill Clinton had bankrolled an effort by senior intelligence officials to frame him for a crime, mused about stripping the actress Rosie O’Donnell of her U.S. citizenship, and accused the singer Beyoncé of accepting millions of dollars to endorse his erstwhile rival, former Vice President Kamala Harris.
July 8
F.B.I. publishes memo about Epstein files On July 8, the F.B.I. said it would not declassify more Epstein files.
10
Claimed intelligence officials tried to frame him
10
Pushed to defund NPR and PBS
10 Directed ICE to arrest protesters
12
Threatened Rosie O’Donnell’s citizenship
15
Claimed Adam Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud Over the following days, Mr. Trump seemed to lash out in every direction.
On July 18, the Justice Department filed a request to unseal grand jury testimony about Mr. Epstein, again raising questions about Mr. Trump’s involvement. The president promptly lobbed insults at late-night talk show hosts, dismissed the Epstein affair as “fake news” and shared fresh claims about a supposed Obama administration plot to undermine him after the 2016 election.
July 18
Request filed to unseal grand jury testimony
On July 18, the Department of Justice filed a request — later denied — to unseal grand jury testimony.
20
Criticized Washington Commanders name
21
Called the “Russia hoax” the “crime of the century”
22
Called Epstein controversy “fake news”
22
Criticized Kimmel and Fallon
24 Criticized Federal Reserve chairman
Over the following days, Mr. Trump bounced from topic to topic.
On July 25, The Wall Street Journal published a major scoop: The paper had unearthed a risqué birthday letter that Mr. Trump had apparently written to Mr. Epstein in 2003. Mr. Trump responded with his attack on Beyoncé and revived his threat to revoke the broadcast licenses of TV networks. Then he announced the imminent construction of an enormous gilded ballroom at the White House, at a cost of $200 million. (He has since revised the cost upward to $400 million.)
Asked if there was a deliberate strategy to distract from negative news, Ms. Leavitt noted that every administration seeks to minimize unhelpful headlines.
“Yes, there have been times in which we’ve tried to do that, but also often it just happens naturally, because the president is willing to weigh in on so many subjects,” she said. “Sometimes it’s really not deliberate. It’s just him speaking his mind on whatever news cycle or news story is brought to him in that moment.”
He has added tricks to his arsenal.
Mr. Trump’s devotion to Truth Social mirrors the hair-trigger Twitter habit of his first term; on one recent December evening, he posted 158 times between 9 p.m. and midnight. And he has continued to appear on Fox News with certain preferred hosts.
But this year, he has added to his media arsenal by appearing in many more public spaces that fall outside of a president’s typical itinerary.
Mr. Trump has stopped by a Washington Commanders N.F.L. game, popped up in the New York Yankees locker room, attended the Ryder Cup golf tournament and the men’s tennis final at the U.S. Open, sat ringside at numerous U.F.C. fights, and traveled to the Daytona 500. He is the first sitting president to attend a Super Bowl. When FIFA staged the Club World Cup final in New Jersey, Mr. Trump not only attended, but joined the winning team onstage for the trophy ceremony.
The net effect is a sense of inescapability, that no corner of American life remains Trump-free – which itself amounts to a potent expression of presidential authority and command. “His power, in part,” said Mr. Burton, the former Obama aide, “comes from the attention that people give him, or that he forces on them.”
Can it ever be too much?
In the fall of 2009, President Barack Obama appeared on David Letterman’s talk show, gave interviews to CNBC and Men’s Health magazine, and made the rounds of all five major network Sunday shows. Washington was abuzz about whether he was overexposed.
That debate sounds quaint today. But the question of whether a president can be too visible remains open.
“The public is being desensitized” to Mr. Trump’s omnipresence, argued Mr. Brinkley, the historian. “It starts becoming blather. The enemy for Trump isn’t Democrats; it’s the public being bored with the show.”
Ms. Leavitt said that if there was a risk to his ubiquity, “President Trump would not be president right now.” She added: “He is a businessman who speaks his mind and tells it like it is, and sometimes people don’t like that. But obviously the vast majority of our country does, or else he wouldn’t be in this office.”
During Mr. Trump’s first term, the public eventually tired of his frenzied pace. And in some ways, Mr. Trump appears to be slowing down physically as he approaches his 80th birthday in June (which he will celebrate in part by staging a nationally broadcast U.F.C. fight on the White House lawn). He has appeared to doze at some Oval Office meetings, and he is holding fewer formal public events than he did at this point in 2017.
Still, Mr. Trump and his team have embraced the everywhere-all-at-once nature of modern media. Average Americans, busy with work and family, do not tune in for daytime news conferences or Cabinet meetings. And 6:30 p.m. newscasts and local newspapers are no longer the primary vessels by which Americans learn about their commander-in-chief.
Instead, politics now suffuses our lives as a kind of ambient noise – via TikTok videos, social media posts, YouTube talk shows and family Facebook messages – never fully separate from our leisure pursuits. “Right now the game is attention, in terms of what’s culturally breaking through,” Mr. Burton said. “The fact that so much message exists is the point.”
Mr. Trump has both propelled this merging of culture and politics, and continues to strategically exploit it. In December, he became the first president to personally host the Kennedy Center Honors, comparing himself onstage to Johnny Carson and musing that he would do a better job than Jimmy Kimmel.
“This is the greatest evening in the history of the Kennedy Center,” Mr. Trump told the crowd. “Not even a contest. There has never been anything like it.”
His performance will air in prime time on CBS on Dec. 23.
Photo and video sources: Graham Dickie/The New York Times; Doug Mills/The New York Times; Roll Call Factba.se; PBS; Mauro Pimentel/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images; Kenny Holston/The New York Times; The New York Times; Annabelle Gordon/Reuters; Eric Lee/The New York Times; Fox; Cheriss May for The New York Times; Wilfredo Lee/Associated Press; Margo Martin, via Storyful; Mark Abramson for The New York Times; Global News; Al Drago/Getty Images; Fox News; Dave Sanders for The New York Times; Pete Marovich for The New York Times; Ted Shaffrey/Associated Press … Show all
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