The Atlantic Daily: Biden’s Post-Trump Reset

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After four years of Donald Trump, President Biden is recalibrating America’s relationships abroad.  

Biden spent the weekend picking up the wreckage at the G7 summit, where “everywhere you looked … you could see the unresolved questions of the past few years” surface, Tom McTague writes from our London bureau.

Today, Biden faced Russia’s Vladimir Putin, a strongman for whom his predecessor had a strange affinity in a meeting that did not appear to meaningfully shift United States–Russia relations.

• Neither country has many options going forward. Putin has little to offer Biden, and Biden has little leverage over the Russian leader, Anna Nemtsova argues from Moscow.

• One news outlet is caught amid Trump, Biden, and Putin. Russia’s attacks on Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which is editorially independent but funded by the U.S. government, pose a test for Biden’s administration, Yasmeen Serhan explains.

One question, answered: Given what we know about the coronavirus variants circulating, will we need COVID-19 booster shots? If so, when?

Many experts think that boosters will eventually be necessary, but they don’t yet know when, our staff writer Katherine J. Wu reports:

Figuring out the best time to give a booster isn’t easy, because we have to account for two big variables at once: how long the immune system produces measurable protection against the virus, and how the virus itself is changing, including in ways that could evade immune protection. Both can be addressed by an additional shot of vaccine—either with the same key ingredients, to shore up existing protection that’s starting to ebb, or of a new vaccine recipe that addresses a variant the immune system doesn’t recognize.

If we’re just waiting for immune cells to forget the virus, that could take years. But if the virus changes really quickly in the meantime, that time line could be sped up. In a way, we’re waiting for our vaccines to falter, so that we can improve on their success.

Have questions about booster shots? Tell us.

Tonight’s Atlantic-approved activity:

Better Things is “consistently one of the best shows on TV,” our critic Sophie Gilbert argues. You can find it on FX or Hulu.

See more great TV offerings on our list of 25 half-hour shows to watch now.

A break from the news:

Kodak changed the way Americans saw themselves and their country. But it struggled to reinvent itself for the digital age.

Every weekday evening, our editors guide you through the biggest stories of the day, help you discover new ideas, and surprise you with moments of delight. Subscribe to get this delivered to your inbox.