David Firestone

New York

Deputy Editor at The New York Times Opinion

NYT editorial board and editor of the Point, our opinion blog. Was exec editor for digital at NBC News, and reporter and editor at The NYT (Brooklyn, ex-K.C.)

Articles

Trump's Cabinet Picks Won't Solve What Happened in New Orleans

Jan 2, 2025 | nytimes.com | David Firestone

Senate Republicans say the terrorist attack in New Orleans has increased the urgency to approve Donald Trump's choices for top national security positions. " Lives depend on it," said Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming. They're right that the attack sends an urgent message, but they don't see what the message is: The Senate needs to reject the political hacks Trump has selected and replace them with real professionals.
The Trumpian Attitude at the Heart of the Gaetz Report

Dec 23, 2024 | nytimes.com | David Firestone

There is so much repellently sleazy behavior documented in the House Ethics Committee report about Matt Gaetz that a reader has to stop every few pages to look away and focus on what still seems astounding: This is the man that Donald Trump wanted to be the attorney general of the United States, the highest-ranking law enforcement official in the land, the leader of the Department of Justice.
What Biden should do in his final days as president

Dec 10, 2024 | sltrib.com | David French |David Firestone |Nicholas Kristof |Binyamin Appelbaum

By David French, Opinion columnist I was in Kyiv in 2023, and I was there when the Russian missiles were coming in. I saw the courage of the Ukrainian people. I saw the lines of ambulances of casualties coming in from the front. I saw the damage and the destruction all around Kyiv from Russian aggression. There is a lot of concern that after Donald Trump is sworn in, he's essentially going to cut off Ukraine, and that he'll be cutting off Ukraine at a particularly dangerous time in the war.
Walz Failed to Expose Vance's Debate Masquerade

Oct 1, 2024 | nytimes.com | David Firestone

JD Vance has always had the ability to switch on and off the outrageousness, to sound reasonable, to paper over a bitter and hollow core with a velvet patter learned at Yale and in countless television appearances. That was the version of himself that Vance presented to a national audience at the debate Tuesday night, and it was a world away from how he sounds when campaigning in front of MAGA crowds on the trail.
Opinion | Vance’s Dominant Debate Performance Shows Why He’s Trump’s Running Mate

Oct 1, 2024 | flipboard.com | David Firestone

Ohio Sen. JD Vance expressed concern for "American citizens in Springfield whose lives have been devastated by Vice President Kamala Harris' open-border policies." He added that while he believes Walz wants to address the issue, he doesn't think Harris does.Oct. 2, 2024
The Supreme Court's Bump Stock Decision Will Kill People

Jun 14, 2024 | nytimes.com | David Firestone

There was nothing abstract about the 6-to-3 decision issued Friday morning by the Supreme Court to permit bump stocks to be used on semiautomatic rifles. It is one of the most astonishingly dangerous decisions ever issued by the court, and it will almost surely result in a loss of American lives in another mass shooting.
At Last, Washington Realizes the Obvious Truth About Marijuana

May 2, 2024 | nytimes.com | David Firestone

It caused a bit of a sensation in 2014 when the editorial board of The New York Times published a six-part series urging the federal government to stop banning marijuana. Readers responded with more than 15,000 comments, pro and con ( mostly pro). TV networks interviewed board members, and the big newspapers and magazines wrote articles about the series. There were cringe-worthy headlines about the editorial page going to pot. Twitter users fantasized about Times opinion writers getting stoned.
When a Governor Escapes Gunfire

Feb 15, 2024 | iverifyu.com | David Firestone

Feb. 15, 2024, 5:04 a.m. ETIf you hear a thunderclap don’t look for a lightning bolt, because the lightning comes before the thunder. Austan Goolsbee, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, used that metaphor on Wednesday when speaking to reporters at The New York Times to explain how he reacts to news about wages and prices. Wages are like thunder and prices are like lightning, Goolsbee said.
Governor defiance tries to usurp Washington’s role

Jan 3, 2024 | sanjuandailystar.com | David Firestone

By David FirestoneIn mid-December, just one day after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law a radical new immigration bill, immigrant rights groups challenged it in court as ridiculously unconstitutional. The groups felt they had no choice, but they did exactly what Texas was counting on, because the point of the law isn’t simply how outrageous it is; it’s about the fight it will cause.
Greg Abbott's Ridiculously Unconstitutional Immigration Fight

Jan 2, 2024 | rsn.org | David Firestone

In mid-December, just one day after Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas signed into law a radical new immigration bill, immigrant rights groups challenged it in court as ridiculously unconstitutional. The groups felt they had no choice, but they did exactly what Texas was counting on, because the point of the law isn’t simply how outrageous it is; it’s about the fight it will cause.