Compared to his first term, Trump’s second administration has been marked by a relative lack of turnover in personnel. Beyond the departure of Elon Musk from the Department of Government Efficiency and the recent firings of homeland security chief Kristy Noem and attorney general Pam Bondi, the president’s inner circle has remained somewhat constant. But a more protracted fracture now surrounds Trump – the increasingly public split between interventionists and isolationists within his Maga movement. In the latter camp, no voice is louder than Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host-turned-podcaster. After being fired by the Murdoch family for his personal conduct and role in spreading misinformation about the 2020 election, Carlson established himself as a hugely popular new media upstart promoting a hardline Maga take. But as Trump’s foreign policy has become more adventurist, Carlson’s broadcasts to his approximately 20 million followers have increasingly espoused a virulent isolationist, anti-war and anti-Israel worldview. 

Then, a few weeks ago, following vociferous criticism of Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran, Carlson was officially cast out of the Maga movement by its leader. “Tucker has lost his way,” said Trump on ABC News. “Maga is America first and Tucker is none of those things.” Much of Trump’s ire stems from the fact that the joint US-Israel attack on Iran is both unpopular with many Americans and was undertaken without congressional approval. “Absolutely disgusting and evil,” was how Carlson characterised the war after the first bombs began falling on Tehran. In subsequent podcasts he has suggested that US actions reveal Israel’s stranglehold on Trump. Unsurprisingly, the war is deeply unpopular with Democrat-supporting Americans but Trump’s base initially supported the strikes. However, as the war drags on, affecting inflation even in the energy-secure US, Trump voters have begun to express disquiet. According to current polling, a majority of Americans do not support the campaign, believing that it has made their country less safe.

Carlson’s isolationism is nothing new. In the early 2000s he was one of the only right-wing media personalities to express reservations about the war in Iraq. More than two decades later, he possesses a level of influence that few could have imagined back then, allowing him to easily exploit public uncertainty to help push the White House to end the campaign in Iran – a war whose fuzzy aims make it ripe for quagmire status. In the short term this might answer the question, “What does Carlson want?” But there is now serious uncertainty over who might succeed Trump in 2028, leaving room for Maga disruptors such as Carlson to make the case for an alternative direction. Might he be making a play for the Oval Office himself? 

Such a move would have been considered highly improbable in the past. But the 2024 putsch that saw Kamala Harris oust Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination rewrote the rules of presidential succession, meaning that a social-media fuelled Carlson campaign cannot be discounted. Much depends on how long the war with Iran lasts and how deep its damage is to the US economy. If the US were to get mired in another costly and bloody Middle Eastern war, then Carlson would be able to claim that he has been on the right side of history twice. Styling himself as a prophet defending the American people’s isolationism and best interests, Carlson is likely to further inflame a president he once vocally championed. For now, he is not demanding that his many followers choose between the Maga establishment in Washington and its rebels across the country. But nothing is ever certain in Trump’s America – and no figure has yet shown the potential to threaten the president’s support quite like Carlson. 

Christopher Taylor is a New York-based journalist. For more opinion, analysis and insight, subscribe to Monocle today.

Further reading:
Want to make a restaurant succeed in Washington? Invite the MAGA crowd

Shortly after launching a military coup that overthrew the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi, its mastermind, General Min Aung Hlaing, promised that Myanmar would return to civilian rule within a year (writes Chris Cermak). Last week that transition finally ended with Min Aung Hlaing himself being appointed president, months after holding widely condemned sham parliamentary elections. 

Nevertheless, the fact that it took five years to reach this stage signals stiff public resistance to the junta’s efforts to consolidate power. “There was genuine shock on the part of the military, at just how strongly the public resisted the coup in 2021,” Ronan Lee, fellow at Loughborough University and author of Myanmar’s Rohingya Genocide: Identity, History and Hate Speech, told The Globalist. Moreover, Lee says that the new president can only lay claim to 50 per cent of the country’s territory, with the rest controlled by militant opposition groups. Whatever Min Aung Hlaing’s proclamations, the reality is that Myanmar’s civil war is at a stalemate. Lee adds that only renewed interest from the international community could tip the balance and resolve the deadlock. Despite myriad international crises drawing attention elsewhere, the people of Myanmar, who have resisted repeated military coups over the years, deserve to be heard.

Listen to the full conversation with Ronan Lee on ‘The Globalist’.

For decades, airline schedules and route plans have been built around predictable demand, including global sporting events, holidays and high-traffic business routes (writes Joseph Koh). But in 2026, Asian air carriers in particular are being forced to redraw both schedules and flight paths in response to K-pop touring cycles – mostly those of supergroup BTS – that are creating demand spikes powerful enough to rival peak seasons.

Germany, Japan, China, Hong Kong, the UK, the Philippines and Taiwan have emerged as the top markets driving this travel surge to South Korea. Searches for flights to the country have increased by more than 200 per cent, driven directly by the BTS tourism wave. The larger and more flexible fleet that came from the merger of Korean Air and Asiana Airlines is well positioned to capitalise on demand surges tied to major tours. It has been regularly adding temporary flights to Seoul from Tokyo, Manila and Los Angeles according to tour dates. Pricing dynamically and partnering with fan travel agencies has created a scalable model.

Thanks to K-pop’s heavily industrialised system, airlines can rely on these groups to produce albums and tour year after year. In an industry where consistency is currency, K-pop might just be the most reliable hit in the schedule.

Read more about how K-pop is shaping the airline industry here.