Lewis is the author of Moneyball and The Big Short
Michael Lewis discussed his new book, Blockers, with Nosheen Iqbal in a November 2, 2026 episode of The Guardian’s Today in Focus podcast. Lewis, a journalist and the author of Moneyball and The Big Short, spoke about civil servants who stood up to Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
The Guardian’s episode title calls those civil servants “blockers” and describes them as people who stood up to Elon Musk’s Doge. The wording makes the federal employees central to the episode and identifies their resistance as the story’s main subject.
The Guardian also framed the discussion with a direct question: “What happens when Elon Musk and a bunch of tech bros try to rip up the US government?”
Blockers follows the civil servants at the center of that confrontation. According to The Guardian’s listing, Lewis’s new book tracks their story as Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, tried to dismantle the US government.
The resulting focus is on resistance from within government: federal employees standing up as DOGE pursued its effort to dismantle the government. Lewis’s book places the people confronting that effort at the center of the story.
Lewis’s role in the conversation was as the author of that account. The Guardian’s description identified him as the author of Moneyball and The Big Short and presented Blockers as his new book.
Iqbal spoke with Lewis about the people his book follows and the confrontation they faced. Their conversation tied Lewis’s earlier titles and new work to a single subject: civil servants confronting DOGE’s attempt to dismantle the US government.
The Guardian invited listeners to send comments and questions about the episode to [email protected].