He Quit the Bench to Raise the Alarm

In the wake of the conviction of former police officer Derek Chauvin in the murder of George Floyd, journalism professor Allissa Richardson joins Dahlia Lithwick to discuss what it is to bear witness while Black in America, and why the media needs to stop airing the videos. (This is the interview with Vanita Gupta that Dahlia mentions. In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern and Dahlia probe the duplicity at the high court in this week's shocking juvenile life without parole decision, why justices insisting they're best friends really isn't the answer to calls for court reform, and a look ahead to the biggest case so far this term that you probably haven't heard much about. Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

24 Apr 20211h 1min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Professor Ciara Torres-Spelliscy, a Brennan Center fellow and professor at Stetson University, to discuss how, when it comes to corporate influence over politics, money talks - but should it actually speak? From Georgia boycotts to campaign finance, and Mitch McConnell’s apparent new take on Citizens United.  In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern joins Dahlia to discuss Justice Clarence Thomas’ anti-big-tech energy, why progressives need to stop pressuring Justice Stephen Breyer to retire, the rising tide of anti-trans bills around the country, and Joe Biden’s Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States.   Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

10 Apr 202157min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Adam Cohen to talk about Supreme Inequality: The Supreme Court’s Fifty-Year Battle for a More Unjust America, and whether Merrick Garland should heed calls to reinvestigate Justice Brett Kavanaugh.  In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern on Cedar Point Nursery v Hassid, the big union case before the court this week, guns at the 9th Circuit, and Georgia’s vote-suppression legislation push.  Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

27 Mar 202154min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon to discuss voting rights, democratic reform, and what it will take to get the For the People Act through Congress. This conversation was recorded as part of this year’s SXSW. Slate Plus members have access to the whole interview.  Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

20 Mar 202111min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Jessica Ring Amunson, who argued Brnovich v DNC at the Supreme Court this month, to take us inside the arguments and the key questions, and also to look at the wider landscape for voting rights.  Then Dahlia’s joined by Jamal Greene who says Americans’ thinking about rights is all wrong, as they discuss his new book How Rights Went Wrong: Why Our Obsession With Rights Is Tearing America Apart. In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern joins Dahlia to thrash out the major issues of the week we couldn’t get to in the main show, including racism at Georgetown University Law Center, Chief Justice John Roberts’ lone dissent, and the last of the kraken election cases batted away from the high court.  Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

13 Mar 20211h 15min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, to try to unpack how the First Amendment has become the answer to everything and yet actually applies to so few of the speech issues we face.  In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern takes a look at Justice Clarence Thomas’ dissent this week that sounded a lot like an endorsement of the Big Lie of 2020: Just because there’s no evidence of voter fraud, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

27 Feb 202145min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by renowned communications researcher and campaign adviser Anat Shenker-Osorio to talk about the messaging of impeachment outside the lens of the law. Then, Bob Bauer, former White House counsel under President Barack Obama and senior adviser to the 2020 Biden campaign, joins Dahlia to discuss the significance of this impeachment as a legal matter, and the next steps needed when the trial ends (in acquittal).  In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern on the guessing-game that is the law of Covid and death-penalty protocols in late-night SCOTUS orders. Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

13 Feb 20211h 25min

Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Daniel Goldman, who spearheaded the first round of impeachment hearings in the House in December 2019 as the senior adviser and director of investigations for the U.S. House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. They examine what impeachment last time can teach us about impeachment this time, and why we’ve got to stop thinking like lawyers when it comes to the Senate trial. In our Slate Plus segment, Mark Joseph Stern joins Dahlia to discuss the attempted sub-coup at the Justice Department, the first Biden-era sightings of the long tail of Trump’s judicial appointments, and the conservative legal establishment’s choice to embrace Trumpists after Jan. 6.  Sign up for Slate Plus now to listen and support our show. Podcast production by Sara Burningham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

30 Jan 202154min