Harry talks at length with Leah Litman about her new book on the Supreme Court, “Lawless” The book is a funny but biting look at the Court’s recent cases in a series of hot-button areas, including voting rights, abortion, and money in politics. Litman (no relation!) contends that the Court is driven mainly by the sentiments and political views of the Republican Party. The two Litmans explore her general approach to analyzing the Court as well as cases in several of the areas of focus on the book. They move at the end to Leah’s ideas for constructing a better, more progressive Court and finish with thoughts about the prospect for the Court and country’s falling off the cliff during Trump rule.

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It's our monthly Contrarian episode, and it comes at a natural pivot point entering the second 100 days of Trump 2.0. Three of the core members of the Contrarian — Norm Eisen, Jen Rubin, and Steve Vladeck — join Harry to break down Trump's dismal record in the courts & plunging polls against his continuing flurry of executive orders unmoored from the law and the constitution. After careful focus on recent events, the group turns to a prediction of the themes that will dominate the coming 100 days

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In a very unusual one-on-one--make that one-on-two--Harry sits down with Penn law professor Kate Shaw and Pennsylvania congresswoman Mary Gay Scanlon to discuss the recent hearing in Congress at which Professor Shaw testified and Congresswoman Scanlon posed questions for the minority. The hearing was a tendentious and contrived set piece directed by Republican Congressman Jim Jordan with the clear goal of supporting the Trump administration's claim that federal judges such as Jeb Boasberg are improperly enjoining administration action. From their respective vantage points Professor Shaw and Congresswoman Scanlon explain the rules of the road about how to counter false claims about the constitution and the role of judges in it. Then with general discussion of ways in which the minority can be effective in the sharply constrained roles that the system forwards them.

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It was a week in which Trump’s power-mongering again achieved little but left the country and world in far worse shape. In a wide-ranging, insightful discussion, a great panel of Ted Lieu, Beto O’Rourke, & Tara Setmayer explain why & what’s to come. We begin with the gun-to-the-head offer to Ukraine and its implications for the U.S.’s global role. We move on to the Hegseth resignation watch & Trump’s abysmal record in the courts, ending w/ thoughts about what concerned citizens can be doing now.

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In this 1-on-1, Harry sits down with Congressman Dan Goldman, who previously worked on Trump’s first impeachment and before that was an AUSA in New York City. Goldman gives a sobering analysis of a series of stealth moves from the Trump Administration that are pulling us closer to authoritarian rule, including secret IRS-ICE data deals that shred privacy, economic sabotage through chaotic tariffs, and a GOP too scared to stop him. 

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The stage seems just about set for us to get the answer from the Supreme Court whether it will permit the judiciary to get rolled by an administration looking to use the label "foreign policy" to avoid all accountability. Elsewhere, the administration’s campaign to take control of large civil institutions hit a roadblock with a pushback from Harvard. Jon Alter, Susan Glasser, and Katie Phang join Harry to take stock of how far from the private precipice we are and our prospects for going over.

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Harry talks with Mark Tushnet, the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Emeritus at Harvard Law School, and one of the country’s leading constitutional scholars. After a brief discussion about his new book, “Who Am I To Judge,” the two dive in to the law and politics of the Trump administration assault on elite universities, in particular Harvard and Columbia. Tushnet explains why he thinks that the Administrations’ broad-gauged demands are unconstitutional on several grounds, including a somewhat underdeveloped principle in the law of fit between Government objection and proposed remedy, i.e. here that the administration is stating concerns about antisemitism to justify an extremely broad range of demanded changes. Tushnet describes the fervent opposition on campus and in the Harvard alumni community to the Administration’s demands, and lays out Harvard's overall strategic thinking in the short, medium, and long terms. The two then turn to the very different response from Columbia, including discussion of the Administration’s apparent consideration of a very novel approach to continuing supervision of the university under the model previous Departments of Justice have employed for corrupt police departments.

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It was a week in which Trump’s broad and malign influence on civil society took another giant step forward. He single-handedly brought the economy to the edge of a recession w/ erratic and ill-considered tariffs; commandeered several more large law firms; initiated criminal investigations of two former officials for daring to oppose his views; and issued an executive order on showerhead pressure. A fantastic panel of Jason Kander, Zoe Lofgren, and Charlie Sykes joins Harry to break it all down.

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Harry talks with Dr. Kavita Patel, professor of medicine at Stanford and a previous official overseeing public health in the Obama Administration. In the short tenure of Robert F Kennedy, Trump’s controversial head of HHS, we have seen several potential national and international health crises, involving measles, bird flu, and tuberculosis. Dr. Patel discusses all of them, and explains what a traditional federal government approach would be to each and the contrasting and frightening approach of Kennedy and the Trump Administration. The two end by discussing a potential parade of horribles to which Kennedy’s stewardship of the nation’s public health system could give rise

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Many federal agencies have new leadership that are hostile to the career personnel. For this special episode, we go inside the DOJ, or as close as we can, w/ the help of 2 of the country’s most respected reporters, Devlin Barrett and Evan Perez, and a recent DOJ exile, Stacey Young, who has an organization to help her erstwhile colleagues. We get a concrete sense of what life & work are like now; the day-to-day relationships b/t new guard and the old staff; & the state of mind of the workforce.

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