The Brief

My father’s side of the family spoke Mandarin, but my father did not. So, my sister and I never learned.

We spent a lifetime clumsily sounding out the 谢谢 and 再见 of our heritage language, while relatives smiled sympathetically. I always felt a little less Chinese American for it, always resented my dad a tiny bit for quashing what felt like a cornerstone of our identity.

But when anti-Asian hate crimes rose to an all time high in 2021, I chose to look more deeply at my family history – and realized how misguided my resentment was.

The process of interviewing my own relatives about our family history inspired “Inheriting,” co-created with Anjuli Sastry Krbechek and an entire team at LAist Studios. Set in California, this multi-part, narrative podcast about Asian American and Pacific Islander families explores how one event rippled through the generations that followed.

On “Inheriting,” the past is personal. Families are acknowledged and celebrated as actors in history. Our team wanted to know: What would happen if we talked about the past beyond facts and figures? What if history became a means for bridging intergenerational gaps, tending to our mental health, and processing the world we live in today?

Ultimately, we want “Inheriting” to inspire others to interview their own family members (however you define family), and to use our show and digital resource guide as a model for navigating conversations about the past.

"Inheriting" co-creator and senior producer Anjuli Sastry Krbechek interviews Reginald Jackson, a Compton resident, alongside Carol Kwang Park.

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Emily Kwong

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LAist

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Learning history to connect 

The past became personal to me when I stumbled upon a single date, 1943. That was the year the Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed, just as my grandmother, Hui Chen, was preparing to immigrate to the U.S. When I stitched these two timelines together – my family history and sociopolitical history – my perspective of my own family shifted.

I imagined the long shadow of that xenophobic law across my grandmother’s 17-year-old face, a Chinese college student fleeing war with Japan and determined to survive in New York City. I got curious about how languages and traditions die within families, and how historical and collective trauma shapes a family for generations.

"Inheriting" host Emily Kwong with her grandparents, Hui and Edgar Kwong.

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Courtesy Emily Kwong

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My first real attempt to answer those questions was in 2021, when I interviewed her son – my father, Christopher Kwong – for almost two hours for the NPR series "Where We Come From." He told me a story I had never heard before: about speaking Mandarin as a kid, his kindergarten teacher’s belief that bilingualism would hold him back academically (a now unproven idea), and his parents’ overnight decision to become an English-only household.

I pictured my five-year-old father in khaki shorts on summer vacation, doing vocabulary drills with my grandmother. He softly told me it was “a decision for (his) own emotional and social survival.” The more I learned about my father’s determination to adopt English, the more my resentment dissipated.

In that two-hour interview, I opened up to him too. I shared how disconnected I’d felt from our culture, our extended family, and why I decided to learn basic Mandarin as an adult. After we wrapped, the distance between us felt shorter. I asked him, “How does it feel to talk about all of this?”

“It’s very therapeutic,” he said. “For people who need to unburden themselves, I think it’s very necessary.”

Learning history to heal 

After that conversation with my father, I interviewed my Auntie Linda and Uncle Dick with my microphone and tucked those audio files somewhere safe. I began snapping pictures of sepia-toned family photographs and memorizing the names of those long gone.

Through these conversations, I’ve come to understand how war, racism, and assimilation have shaped our family, and how it runs down the family tree like an inkblot all the way to me.

I was a very depressed and anxious teenager. High-achieving, but unable to get out of bed for stretches of time. No one in my suburban Connecticut hometown had a family history like ours. Therapy and medication have been life-saving, but the real healing has come from talking to other Asian Americans. Other people’s stories have kept me alive. Stories were the proof I needed that life is flexible, and survivable.

A 2019 study from Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services (SAMHSA) found that Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders were the least likely of any racial or ethnic group to seek out mental health services. The barriers for affordable, culturally-competent care are numerous, but there is a generational change afoot.

The list of therapist directories, in-language conversation starters, and recognition of non-Western care practices is growing. Podcasts and new books devoted to intergenerational trauma are flourishing. Our show wants to be a part of that change.

Throughout production, our entire team learned so much from Sherry C. Wang, our consulting psychologist on the show, about the intersections between family history, community dialogue, and mental health. “Just talking about it is a big deal,” she’d constantly reassure me. On “Inheriting,” we explore intergenerational trauma most deeply in Episode 5 of the show, with Leah Bash. Both sides of her Japanese American family were incarcerated during World War II.

I want this show to find those that need it, perhaps a teenager in an all-white suburb like I once was, feeling lonely and disconnected from other people. And I want listeners to experience what it's like to bridge that gap, through intentional conversation, deep listening, and moments of real learning and sharing.

"Inheriting" is a co-production of LAist Studios and NPR. The team includes (from L to R), senior editor Sara Sarasohn, senior producer Anjuli Sastry Krbechek, producer Minju Park, executive producer Catherine Mailhouse, producer James Chow, host Emily Kwong, and LAist vice president of podcasts Shana Naomi Krochmal.

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Anjuli Sastry Krbechek

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LAist

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Learning history in solidarity 

Seven families participated in the first season of “Inheriting,” from Cambodia, Guam, Japan, India, Korea, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Vietnam. All of them processed a life-changing historical moment, across hours of conversation.

As the reporter facilitating those conversations, I was astonished how little I knew about other communities. In so many ways, this show is the history class I wish I took in college. By deconstructing the AAPI monolith, our team sought to tell a fuller story of these communities.

While making this show, I clung to Erika Lee’s The Making of Asian America and Renee Tajima-Peña’s 5-part PBS series Asian Americans. Social media has busted down doors in making learning more accessible. A growing list of states are requiring AAPI studies in their K-12 curriculum.

And yet, a growing number of states have restricted or banned teaching critical race theory. Last year, Florida banned an AP African American studies course, while approving an AAPI history bill for K-12 schools. This move prevents the next generation from understanding how different communities have historically affected one another.

“Inheriting” approaches history education differently, holding our stories alongside other immigrant and BIPOC groups. The first two episodes of the show focus on the 1992 Los Angeles Uprising for that reason, examining how decades of segregation, disinvestment, and police brutality led up to that one week in April. It ends with a call by professor Carol Kwang Park to her students: “What are you going to do to stop it?”

Asian Americans are the fastest-growing group of eligible voters and the fastest growing racial and ethnic group in the United States. When I think about that fact, Carol’s question rings in my ears. What are we going to do with our expanding political power?

This is a show meant to spark conversation within families– a starting point for those who want to engage deeply with the past. That’s why we built a digital resource guide to accompany each episode, alongside lesson plans from the The Asian American Education Project for K-12 instructors and students.

Listen to 'Inheriting'

My father has been one of the biggest supporters of me making “Inheriting.” Every plot beat, every historical deep dive. But he’s nervous.

Over the phone, he said, “I gotta be honest with you Emily, I’m not sure if anyone will want to listen to this.”

I get his concern. The people in “Inheriting” are neither celebrities, nor power brokers. But they are all actors in history, and that is compelling in every sense.

All across the Asian and Pacific Islander diaspora are people who took heroic leaps to keep their families together – whose choices made a difference – fleeing war, occupation, and social upheaval. Our families have shaped social movements, as activists and artists, and done good where they could: in gas stations and courtrooms, behind barbed wire and bullhorns, on the farm and on the picket line.

That inheritance is ours for the taking, if we’re willing to go back and reclaim it.

New episodes of “Inheriting” come out every Thursday. Listeners can subscribe on the NPR app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever podcasts are available.

In a world increasingly concerned about serious risks from artificial intelligence, policymakers trying to mitigate those risks find themselves turning more and more to a new class of professionals: AI evaluators, who audit systems on behalf of the companies that create them.

California is at the forefront of embracing the evaluators — and of grappling with some of the problems they raise, including conflicts of interests and the difficulty of auditing general-purpose technology.

Gov. Gavin Newsom last month signed one law establishing standards for “independent verification organizations” that would employ the evaluators and another creating a registry of evaluators. He also assembled a group of experts, who are to report back in November to recommend whether to require evaluators to be embedded inside companies developing the most powerful AI systems and whether to set standards on what counts as an adequate AI audit.

The moves come amid an intensifying focus on evaluators within the AI ecosystem itself. More than 200 AI researchers and evaluators last month signed a letter in favor of standards for independent evaluators; signatories included a former OpenAI whistleblower and the head of the United Nations’ Independent International Scientific Panel.

When a new group focused on AI evaluation gathered United Nations officials in New York last month for its official launch, it chose a California state senator, Jerry McNerney of Stockton, to give the closing remarks. McNerney, a Democrat who authored the verification standards law, called on nations and advanced AI companies like Anthropic and Google to create standards committees — in part to help ensure AI evaluators can properly do their jobs.

“We can put these companies on notice,” McNerney said at the event, “that they're going to be evaluated by folks that understand the process, that understand the technology, and will be transparent and hold them accountable so that they create safe products, and they don't send out these things into the wild that can cause havoc with banking, with our infrastructure and so on.”

An international joint statement that calls for independent AI evaluations garnered support from nearly 30 countries, according to the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Evaluators are coming to the fore alongside serious AI incidents. This year, AI agents, while being tested for their ability to hack into computer systems, carried out a series of high-profile attacks against business and government websites. The CEOs of leading AI companies subsequently committed to evaluations of their models by independent third-party auditors. A former employee of one such company, Anthropic, added to mounting concerns when he posted online about the possibility AI models will kill all humans.

Even before those incidents, there’s been a growing consensus among lawmakers in the past few years that developers should test AI before release, said Assemblymember Rebbecca Bauer-Kahan, a Democrat from San Ramon. For example, last year, testing requirements were included in a bill to help prevent discriminatory AI decisions and legislation to stop AI from causing catastrophic events. The proposals built on calls for AI testing and monitoring stretching back the better part of a decade. Roughly three out of four Californians said this spring that the government should require testing of advanced AI models, according to a Carnegie Endowment California survey.

State Sen. Jerry McNerney gave closing remarks at the launch of a new group focused on AI evaluation with United Nations officials in New York last month. McNerney during a floor session at the state Capitol in Sacramento on Aug. 6, 2026.

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Not all the attention on AI evaluators has been positive.

Bauer-Kahan, who was behind both of the auditor bills Newsom signed, pointed out that independent evaluators sign contracts with the tech companies whose products they evaluate, and that can pose a conflict of interest.

“I’m hearing from evaluators, ‘We have to be careful, because we want them to let us back in,’” she said. “So what are you avoiding saying in order to continue to gain access and contracts?”

Caroline Siegel-Singh, at the D.C. think tank the Federation of American Scientists, agreed, saying AI audit regimes run the risk of repeating mistakes in the structure of the bond-rating business. Before the 2008 financial crisis, the sellers of bonds could effectively shop for the rating they wanted. Then came the crash. Siegel-Singh thinks companies and governments should pool money to pay evaluators instead of AI labs paying evaluators directly, an idea that AI lab Anthropic has also endorsed.

The AI researchers who recently signed the letter calling for industry standards for auditors share Bauer-Kahan and Siegel-Singh’s concern. They are urging advanced AI companies to rely on evaluators who maintain full editorial control and who meaningfully disclose and mitigate conflicts of interest. They also suggested companies give access to multiple evaluation groups, all receiving the same level of access as their own safety employees.

Another risk is that AI companies may test models as a performative exercise, Bauer-Kahan said — as a move to reassure the public, without a sincere determination to uncover problems. Strong legal requirements can prevent performative testing, she added.

But legal requirements raise their own problems, said Matt O’Shaughnessy, a former State Department and Congressional staffer now at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a digital rights advocacy group.

When an assessment is done simply to meet a legal requirement, organizations are more likely to do the minimum that they need to do in order to comply, he and his colleagues recently concluded in a set of AI evaluation guidelines for policymakers

“It can make it harder for assessors to get the buy-in they need to make deeper changes in companies,” O’Shaughnessy said.

Siegel-Singh said that evaluators should share the results of their work to allow other evaluators to judge its quality, thus encouraging more thorough review.

The guidelines from O’Shaughnessy and his colleagues warn that properly evaluating AI models requires a considerable range of skills, including experts in everything from privacy to mental health to cybersecurity to bias outputs and physical safety. On top of that, audits should also examine incentive structures inside AI companies in addition to the technology itself, the guidelines say.

The guidelines also warn that properly evaluating AI models requires a considerable range of skills, including experts in everything from privacy to mental health to cybersecurity to bias outputs and physical safety. On top of that, audits should also examine incentive structures inside AI companies in addition to the technology itself, the guidelines say.

In the future, as they refine their approach to AI evaluation, California officials may find themselves collaborating with international partners. The consulates or embassies of nations sometimes promote and coordinate their tech policies in Sacramento, and in 2024 California lawmakers sought to align regulation with the European Union in order to protect people from artificial intelligence. In August, California also synced implementation of laws requiring watermarks for AI-generated content with the European Union.

Bauer-Kahan said she supports the idea of working with more nations, in part because regulation in one jurisdiction paves the way for rules in another.

“I do think collaboration and finding ways to push the envelope together is helpful,” she said.

A coalition of mid-sized countries working together with California could pool their economic influence to convince the largest AI companies to follow the kind of safety guidelines laid out in the international joint statement calling for independent AI evaluations, said Canadian ambassador to the United Nations David Lametti.

Pasi Rajala, Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Finland, said California working together with small nations “can play a key role” in addressing fast-developing AI risks.

O’Shaughnessy said that an international framework for commercial AI system evaluation is going to be really hard to create without a domestic framework in the United States first.

The Frontier AI Act, a bill in Congress that would enshrine testing requirements into federal law, has bipartisan support in Congress from California Rep. Jay Olbernolte.

“I can imagine some of the things that California is doing influencing how Congress thinks about these issues and that becoming something bigger,” he said.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

During a rally Monday night in Nebraska, President Donald Trump was going through his usual insistence that gas prices are only temporarily high and worth it as part of his war on Iran.

Then he added a new wrinkle, floating the idea that Tehran could “take out” two major American cities.

“They could take out a city,” he said. "Let ‘em take out Los Angeles. Let ’em take out San Diego.”

He continued as the crowd laughed and cheered: “This is a very small price to pay, and it’s going to be over with very soon.”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who may run for president in 2028, answered on X, calling Trump “deranged and dangerous.”

L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, who is running for reelection against Councilmember Nithya Raman, called the president's statements dangerous in a social media post.

"The role of a president is to protect the country, not to actively threaten it and encourage attacks on American lives," she wrote.

Sam Diego Mayor Todd Gloria, in another post on X, said "San Diego is not collateral damage. We are not expendable. And we are never a 'small price to pay."

Trump has a history of denigrating U.S. cities, especially the largest ones that lean heavily Democratic. Los Angeles was among the cities where Trump deployed federal military personnel for what he said was a crackdown on crime, despite local authorities not wanting the troops.

At a recent North Carolina campaign rally, Trump said the state’s cities are “blood-soaked killing fields.” North Carolina’s violent crime rate ranks in the middle third of states, according to FBI statistics.

LAist staff contributed to this report.

It’s official: Skydance-owned Paramount has closed its $81 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery.

The companies completed the deal on Tuesday, ushering in a new Hollywood giant with the now shorter “Skydance” nametag. The merger brings two of America’s oldest moviemaking studios together. And HBO Max, titles ranging from “Harry Potter” to “Sinners” and even networks like CNN find themselves under the same roof as Paramount+, CBS and the likes of “Top Gun” and “The Godfather.”

All of them will come under the helm of billionaire David Ellison, and his new co-CEO Ynon Kreiz. That further concentrates power in an industry already run by just a handful of major players. Ellison’s Skydance bought out Paramount for $8 billion just last year, and set its sights on Warner — an even bigger fish — very soon after.

What followed erupted into a tumultuous, roughly year-long fight over Warner’s fate.

Skydance Corp. emerges from one of the biggest tie-ups ever in the media and entertainment industry. Including billions of dollars in debt, the Warner acquisition amounted to nearly $111 billion.

“Today is a historic day, not just for Skydance but for our entire industry," Ellison said in a statement Tuesday. "We couldn’t be more excited to get to work.”

Here’s a look at some of the key moments that got us here.

Netflix v. Paramount

The early days of Paramount's quest for Warner turned into a messy bidding war.

Months after disclosing it was open to selling parts or even all of its business, Warner initially struck a studio and streaming deal with Netflix back in December. But Skydance-owned Paramount, which claimed Warner management “never engaged meaningfully” with its previous proposals, soon launched a hostile counterbid aimed at taking over the entire company — including networks like CNN and Discovery.

The Hollywood giants spent much of early 2026 in a heated back-and-forth over who had a stronger offer on the table, with Warner leadership repeatedly backing Netflix as its preferred suitor. But Paramount eventually upped its offer to buy all of Warner for $31 per share, and Netflix opted to bow out of the race. Warner and Paramount inked a mutual merger agreement by late February.

The response from Hollywood

Hollywood was closely watching the fight over Warner's future. And from awards shows to online petitions, A-list celebrities and other creatives made their voices known.

In April, thousands of movie stars, writers, directors and other professionals announced their “unequivocal opposition” to the Paramount-Warner merger. The open letter — which was signed by long-outspoken critics of the deal like Jane Fonda and Mark Ruffalo, as well as Hollywood heavyweights from Denis Villeneuve to J.J. Abrams — warned of fewer jobs and “less choice for audiences in the United States and around the world.”

Meanwhile, some other stars lined up to back Paramount as Ellison reiterated his commitments to the movies. At CinemaCon this past spring, the company debuted a glossy mini movie about the studio directed by Jon M. Chu and narrated by Tom Cruise — who ended the spot atop the iconic Paramount water tower, with the words “the future is paramount and the future looks pretty great from here." Director James Cameron also doubled down on his support of Ellison.

The prospect of a new Warner owner also loomed over awards season this year, from #BlockTheMerger pins to more subtle nods in acceptance speeches. When accepting her Emmy last month, “Remarkably Bright Creatures” actor Sally Field — who also signed the open letter in opposition to the Paramount-Warner deal — stressed that “unique storytelling matters” and “we can’t let those voices be silenced, or compromised or merged.”

Many industry critics were also outspoken when Netflix's studio and streaming deal was on the table, with particular focus on the future of movies staying in theaters.

Trump and CNN

Trump has regularly attacked reporting he deems unfavorable at CNN (most recently attempting to bar the outlet from the White House altogether). And over the course of the Warner buyout, his administration wasn't afraid to chime in about hopes for a new owner.

In December — days after Paramount launched its hostile bid for Warner — the president said that CNN spread “poison and lies,” adding that “I think the people who have run CNN for the last long period of time are a disgrace" and "it’s imperative that CNN be sold.”

The White House took aim again at CNN in March, over the network's coverage of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran. At the time, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told reporters that “the sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better.”

Ellison has said editorial independence will be maintained at CNN, and under a since-finalized settlement with the states, the company also agreed to form a “News Editorial Independence Board." But critics point to turmoil already seen at CBS under Skydance ownership — and aren’t convinced this new body will move the needle much, because Ellison is set to have ample oversight over appointments. Outside this board, however, the combined company is retaining Mark Thompson as CNN’s editor-in-chief.

Trump has separately continued to criticize CBS coverage under Skydance ownership. Still, the president has held a long relationship with the billionaire Ellison family. Paramount's chief reportedly hosted a dinner in Washington in Trump’s honor back in April, on the same day Warner shareholders gave their greenlight for the merger. And in June, just two days after the U.S. Justice Department said it wouldn't intervene in the deal, Ellison attended an Ultimate Fighting Championship match on the White House lawn for Trump’s 80th birthday (streamed by Paramount+).

Gulf money

To help fund its Warner buyout, Paramount racked up billions of dollars in financial backing from three Gulf countries: Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. The Federal Communications Commission approved the company’s request for sizeable indirect ownership from those foreign investors.

Paramount previously disclosed it expected those funds to indirectly own nearly 50% of equity interests — but no voting rights — of what is now the larger Skydance. But the company asked for clearance of up to 100% to account for potential future investments, which the FCC granted, citing in part that access to more capital would strengthen the broadcast industry and was therefore “in the public interest.”

Critics — including FCC’s sole Democratic Commissioner, Anna Gomez — have called the move alarming and unprecedented. They argue that amount of money opens the door to behind-the-scenes influence.

The final antitrust fight

Paramount cleared antitrust hurdles for its Warner acquisition from regulators worldwide over the summer, including the Trump administration's Justice Department.

But in July, Democratic attorneys general from 12 states — led by California's Rob Bonta — sued to block the merger, alleging the combined company would “extinguish competition” and lead to fewer choices for consumers, particularly movie theatergoers and cable customers across the U.S.

The Writers Guild of America followed suit. And Paramount agreed to put its Warner buyout on ice well into next year so the challenges could head toward a larger antitrust trial.

Settlement agreements emerged in September. The states' terms, eventually approved by a judge, include pledges from the company to increase film production in the U.S. over the next five years, commit millions of dollars to a fund aimed at supporting workers displaced by the merger and again establish new editorial monitoring of CNN and CBS.

Settling these challenges marked a key hurdle ahead of closing the deal. Critics decried the deal as capitulating to corporate pressure and said the remedies were too weak.

Federal forecasters say this year the planet could see the strongest El Niño event on record. It's already being called "Super El Niño" and even "Godzilla El Niño." El Niño is a natural climate pattern that has far-reaching impacts across the planet, potentially affecting hundreds of millions of people.

Where those impacts happen can vary drastically from one El Niño to the next. Here are the basics of what this historic event could bring.

What is El Niño?

El Niño occurs every two to seven years. It develops when a vast amount of water in the eastern Pacific Ocean warms up around the equator. That water releases massive heat, redistributing warmth from the ocean to the atmosphere. That shifts weather patterns around the world.

The flip side of El Niño is a La Niña, which is marked by relatively cool water in the tropical Pacific around the equator. These events are responsible for some of the biggest weather variability the planet experiences.

El Niño is like dropping a rock in a pond, says Daniel Vimont, professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "Even though you're not where the rock hit, you still may feel the effects of those waves," he says. "El Niño is the same thing, except it's an enormous rock in our entire Earth's system, and we feel the response."

How strong is it?

Sure, "Godzilla El Niño" is catchy, but technically, NOAA forecasters say this year's El Niño will fall into the "very strong" category. It's measured by the temperature of the ocean in a particular region off South America. The warmer the water, the stronger the El Niño. When that water is more than 2 degrees Celsius warmer than average, it qualifies as a "very strong" El Niño.

The last strong events were in 2015-16, 1997-8 and 1982-83. El Niños typically peak in November and December, but already, this El Niño is the strongest ever measured for this time of year. NOAA forecasters expect it to last through early 2027.

What will the impacts be globally?

All that added heat in the atmosphere raises temperatures globally. El Niño years tend to be the hottest on record. Forecasters say this year may get close to taking the top spot, but it's very likely that temperature records could fall in 2027. The planet is already warmer due to climate change, because emissions from burning fossil fuels are trapping more heat in the atmosphere.

El Niño also shifts rainfall patterns globally, raising the chances for destructive flooding in some parts of the world. Other regions get drier, exacerbating droughts. Both impacts can be catastrophic to agriculture around the world. The United Nations World Food Programme estimates that El Niño could push at least 49 million more people into acute food insecurity by the end of 2027.

What will the impacts be in the U.S.?

In El Niño years, the southern U.S. tends to see more intense rainfall because the jet stream shifts to the south. That raises the risk of floods along rivers and in cities. Still, in the Southwest, more rain could alleviate drought and recharge underground aquifers.

"El Niño tends to juice up those storms so that you get more really strong rain events," says Martin Hoerling, meteorologist and adjunct lecturer at the University of Colorado Boulder. "So if you were running a deficit in your water supply, a big El Niño, especially like the one we're having, can really get you into recovery mode that otherwise might have taken you years."

The northern half of the country gets warmer and drier, something that could exacerbate the current drought in the Intermountain West. Some states experience mixed effects during El Niños, like California. The state saw historic flooding in the 1997-98 El Niño, but was drier than average during the 2015-16 one. Climate experts say the current El Niño is so strong, it's more likely California will experience extreme rain.

El Niños can also lead to fewer hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean, since it's more difficult for the storms to form. In the Pacific Ocean, hurricanes can get more frequent, fueled by warmer ocean water. Already this year, hurricanes have intensified rapidly in the Pacific, and Hawaii has had close calls with several hurricanes that brought destructive rain and wind.

Can we blame it all on El Niño?

Certain weather changes are common during El Niños, but there are no guarantees that extreme weather events this winter will match those predictions for every region.

"El Niño is like loading the dice," Vimont says. "While we're loading the dice for a certain type of response from El Niño, we still know that in any given year, there are still natural fluctuations that may mask that or cause the response to be slightly different than what we might expect."

In addition to that natural variability, weather events are also being affected by climate change. The most intense storms are already producing more rainfall in most of the U.S., since a warmer atmosphere can hold more water vapor. Heat waves and droughts are also getting more intense due to rising temperatures. Climate experts say El Niño and climate change impacts will both play out this winter, but while El Niño will fade, the effects of climate change will continue.
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