The Atlantic

The Atlantic, American journal of news, literature, and opinion that was founded in 1857 and is one of the oldest and most-respected magazines in the United States. Both a monthly magazine and a digital publication, it delivers both breaking news and long-form narratives, has won journalism’s most coveted awards, and in 2025 reported on a national security breach by the Trump administration that was dubbed “Signalgate.”

Storied past

The Atlantic Monthly was created by Moses Dresser Phillips and Francis H. Underwood in Boston, and the first issue was published in November 1857. The journal quickly became known for the quality of its fiction and general articles, contributed by a long line of distinguished editors and authors that includes James Russell Lowell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Oliver Wendell Holmes.

Its mission statement states three principles, excerpted here:

First: In Literature, to leave no province unrepresented, so that while each number will contain articles of an abstract and permanent value, it will also be found that the healthy appetite of the mind for entertainment in its various forms of Narrative, Wit, and Humor, will not go uncared for. 

Second: In the term Art they intend to include the whole domain of aesthetics, and hope gradually to make this critical department a true and fearless representative of Art

Third: In Politics, The Atlantic will be the organ of no party or clique, but will honestly endeavor to be the exponent of what its conductors believe to be the American idea.

In 1869 The Atlantic Monthly created a sensation when it published an article by Harriet Beecher Stowe about Lord Byron and his salacious personal life. Stowe intended the article to “arrest Byron’s influence upon the young”; instead, it fascinated young readers, whose outraged parents canceled 15,000 subscriptions.

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In the early 1920s The Atlantic Monthly expanded its coverage of political affairs, featuring articles by such figures as Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Booker T. Washington. The high quality of its literature—notably, serialized novels, including best sellers—and its literary criticism preserved the magazine’s reputation as a lively literary periodical with a moderate worldview.

Economic challenges

In the 1970s, increasing publication and mailing costs, far outstripping revenues from subscriptions and meagre advertising sales, nearly shut The Atlantic Monthly down. Mortimer Zuckerman bought the magazine in 1980, but, despite his efforts, the publication continued to struggle. In 1999 he sold it to David G. Bradley, owner of the National Journal Group. Bradley invested millions in The Atlantic Monthly and oversaw numerous changes. The number of issues dropped to 11 in 2001 and 10 in 2003. In 2004 the magazine’s masthead was changed to The Atlantic, which had previously been used in 1981–93. Three years later a similar change was made to its corporate name. In addition, the magazine moved its offices from Boston to Washington, D.C., in 2006. The relocation reflected The Atlantic’s increasing focus on politics.

Under Bradley’s stewardship, The Atlantic experienced strong growth, much of which came from its digital operations. In 2017 it was announced that the Emerson Collective was acquiring a majority stake in the publication; the organization, which largely focused on immigration and education reform, was founded and headed by Laurene Powell Jobs, a noted philanthropist and the widow of Steve Jobs.

Renewed relevance in a digital age

In 2015, Bradley named Jeffrey Goldberg as the magazine’s 15th editor in chief. Goldberg, a longtime journalist who joined The Atlantic in 2007, had previously reported for The New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post. Under Goldberg’s leadership, the magazine has won three Pulitzer Prizes, the first in the magazine’s history.

In 2024, Goldberg announced that the magazine would return to monthly publication, an unusual pivot to print in the digital age. It was exactly the low-tech, tactile allure of print that Goldberg believed Atlantic readers welcomed. “The greatness of print and especially a print magazine is that it sits still for you. It doesn’t beep and flash and demand that you do things. It’s there to be read and enjoyed. People still derive intellectual and aesthetic pleasure from print,” Goldberg told CNN.

Even as it honored its historic roots, the Atlantic continue to expands its staff and its digital presence, adding high profile journalists to cover politics, national defense, and health matters and reporting that it had more than 1 million subscribers. In March of 2025, Goldberg himself broke one of the biggest stories of the second Trump administration, revealing that he had inadvertently been added to a message group using the encrypted app Signal that included Vice Pres. J.D. Vance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, among others. The group was discussing impending U.S. airstrikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen. Goldberg said he initially thought the text chain was a hoax and only believed it was real once the strikes occurred. He initially published an article that characterized the discussions but left out specifics that could jeopardize national security. He immediately came under attack from the Trump administration who called him a liar. Several days later the Atlantic published a follow-up story that included screen-shots of the text exchange, which outlined the specifics that were discussed on the timing, aircraft, and weaponry to be used in the attack.

Goldberg has acknowledged that the scoop was not the result of great investigative reporting, but instead because of a miscue on Waltz’s part. “Next thing I know, I’m in this very strange chat group with the national security leadership of the United States,” he told the BBC. The controversy, which came to be known as “Signalgate,” raised questions about the manner in which sensitive intelligence is handled in the Trump administration.