Grounded with Jon Tester & Maritsa Georgiou

It was a big weekend in Big Sandy, Montana. Jeff Ament, through his nonprofit Montana Pool Service, hosted the 16th annual Big Sandy Skate Jam + Pig Roast Saturday. It gave us the perfect reason to host our first joint episode from the Tester farm (and snag some MPS merch)!

A few days ago, our friend Dana DuBois connected us with Nick Paro, a disabled veteran and advocate who recently joined forces with Disability Community to craft a call to action based on a recent Department of Justice memo. It's raising serious concerns, but hasn’t been widely covered in mainstream media yet. The Arc published a great explainer.

The memo basically reinterprets the 1999 Supreme Court Olmstead decision that ruled disabled people can’t be forced to be institutionalized if they can get support and services in their communities. The ruling said the institutional segregation of people with disabilities and mental illness is a form of discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act. That decision has been the basis for requiring states to improve access for community-based services. People briefed on the situation told reporters with Bloomberg Law that White House adviser Stephen Miller was the driving force behind the DOJ memo.

The DOJ memo doesn’t change the law, but it does signal a shift. The National Alliance on Mental Illness says the language in the memo has the potential to promote a shift back toward institutionalization. It prompted Sen. Tammy Duckworth and other Senate Democrats to introduce a resolution that reaffirms the promise of Olmstead. It prompted Paro and his partners to publish their own call to action, saying this is an issue which will impact all of us. “Now is the time to speak — before they change the laws — and not after,” Paro’s group wrote.

As the Arc wrote, “this isn’t the end of Olmstead. It’s the start of a new fight to protect it.”

Stay tuned for more farm content from Big Sandy. If you want to learn more about MPS skatepark builds, make sure you check out Montana Grind and Paving the Way, two documentaries that feature Ament’s projects!

Oh so much to talk about with former RNC Chairman Michael Steele, who co-hosts the Weeknight on MSNOW. We discuss why Steele joined the GOP 50 years ago, his efforts to get the party back to its roots, and why he has no patience for Republican lawmakers (and pundits) speaking out against this administration only when it’s politically convenient.

“Right now our system is broken because of the infestation of stupid,” Steele said. “The infestation of people who don’t give a damn about public service and are more interested in their grift. How much I can make. How much I can churn the system up.How can I piss off my base enough to write me a check?”

Plus, Steele lays out why this upcoming election really is so critical, despite how many times we’ve heard that before.

Former DOJ pardon attorney Liz Oyer joins Grounded for the third time to discuss her new focus on Acting AG Todd Blanche's pending Senate confirmation. Hear why Liz thinks he's one of the most dangerous people in Washington right now, and what citizens can actually do to stop him. Plus, Oyer flags a potentially dangerous new policy change at the Bureau of Prisons and why she sees it as a tool to further weaponize the DOJ.

What does a secret, beautiful girlfriend in Canada have to do with the newly announced (and still unpublished) deal with Iran? Economist Justin Wolfers will tell you both stories smell off. He uses an "unraveling" argument from game theory and economic concepts to explain.


The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the country's oldest civil rights coalition, has put a lot of work into documenting the Trump administration’s efforts to turn back the clock on civil and human rights progress within the United States.

The organization’s president and CEO Maya Wiley joined Grounded for a wide-ranging conversation to discuss several interconnected threats to civil rights.

We discuss the Supreme Court's decision that led to the erosion of the Voting Rights Act, ICE detentions of people based on appearance and language rather than actual status, and threats to the nonprofit sector broadly. Wiley emphasizes that these attacks reach ordinary people, not just powerful figures — and that civil rights advocacy and voting are the tools citizens have to fight back.

Let’s be honest. There’s a lot to feel sad about in the world. There’s also a lot to stay hopeful about. 


JT’s travel schedule prevented us from locking in a guest for today, but we wanted to hop on and go over some of the big headlines. President Trump is still claiming a deal with Iran is just “days away” while fighting between Israel and Iran continues. We dissect parts of this weekend’s Meet the Press interview with Trump, during which he continuously defended J6 rioters, boasted about the “pay day” he delivered to farmers through $28 billion in taxpayer subsidies, and his interview-ending meltdown over “rigged elections.” Again.

We also spend some time talking about the emotional and impactful interview Scott Pelley had with the New York Times over the weekend about his firing from CBS News. We highly recommend watching or listening in its entirety.



“I’ve never worn the uniform,” Pelley said when responding to criticism from President Trump. “But I’ve been in combat for this country, in Afghanistan and Iraq, Kuwait. I’ve been shot at, spent nights in foxholes filling up with water in the desert. I’m not aware that the president of the United States has ever done any of those things for his country. Please correct me if I’m wrong. You become a journalist because you love the First Amendment. You become a journalist because you love the country. And while all the other descriptions that the president used about me might be applicable, not that one. [Tears up] There is no democracy without journalism. It can’t be done. That is why I am a journalist.”


We couldn’t have said it better, Scott.

At a time when all of us are drowning in tech, AFT President Randi Weingarten just rolled out an action plan to combat the use of screens in classrooms before third grade, which includes an emphasis on more hands-on learning.

“We are at a crossroads that will define the future of work and society,” Weingarten said. “Without proper oversight and strong guardrails, there will be real dangers to our safety, privacy, climate and the very fabric of society.”

Weingarten added that she is “not calling for a total ban on AI or a Chromebook bonfire,” but “what I am calling for,” she said, “is getting the balance right to harness the benefits of technology while mitigating the harms.”

How do we help kids learn and prepare in a world of AI without depriving them of curiosity, persistence and critical thinking? Plus, the new lawsuits aimed at overturning new rules that limit financial aid access under the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

We got an early start Tuesday dissecting all things legal with former federal prosecutor and national treasure Glenn Kirschner, who holds online community chats every night to discuss the pressing legal developments of the day.

“When you’re fighting for democracy, it’s not really a job. This is mission. You know, I got a lot of kids and grandkids and what are we going to leave them?” Kirschner said. “I just try to figure out like what is the most important legal development for people to understand? And that’s what I try to tackle.”

And there are so many to choose from. We hit on the $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund,” the great seashell caper, and the U.S. military’s boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific.

“When we suspect somebody is in international waters with drugs on the boat heading toward the United States, that’s why we have a Coast Guard,” Kirschner said. “We interdict them. We seize the evidence. We bring them into a court of law in the United States and we try to hold them accountable for any crimes they may have committed. We don’t murder them.”

We also discuss the war in Iran (which is deeply personal to Kirschner's family), the untapped power of contempt in the courts, and the accountability mission Kirschner calls a non-negotiable.

“This is a film about cryptocurrency. It’s pretty stupid.”

And as actor, author, and filmmaker Ben McKenzie will tell you, something that’s really stupid can also be really dangerous.

McKenzie joined Grounded to talk about Everyone is Lying to You for Money, his film that dives into the deceitful world of cryptocurrency. It all started during the COVID-19 pandemic when a friend started telling Ben about investing in Bitcoin.

McKenzie’s self-proclaimed obsession down the crypto rabbit hole ultimately led him to the U.S. Senate, where he testified before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs (and where McKenzie came face-to-face with another guy you might recognize).

We discuss the dangers of the unregulated system, the overlap between crypto and MAGA, and the crypto industry’s grasp on our political system.

“This is the poison fruit from Citizens United,” McKenzie said. “This is corporations and oligarchs having all the power and regular people not having much of any. And it’s really scary. I mean, they spent $240 million in 2024. It’s just a staggering amount of money. And they threatened to do that again in ‘26 and ‘28.”

“I often say that a vote is a kind of prayer for the world we desire for ourselves and for our children. And our prayers are stronger when we pray together.”

Wise words from Sen. Rev. Raphael Warnock, who joined Grounded Wednesday to discuss Tuesday primary results, the redistricting fight in the South, and why turnout is going to matter so much in the general election in November.

When it comes to the midterms, Warnock says he feels a lot better now than he did a year ago, but not quite as good as he did before the Supreme Court decision on Louisiana redistricting.

“It’s hard really to overstate how devastating and massive this decision, the Calais decision, will be on our electoral program,” Warnock said. “They have literally turned the clock all the way back. And we could literally look up and see a Congress in terms of racial makeup that looks more like the Congress of the 1950s. That is where we are.”

We touch on some policy, too—including private equity in housing and the warehouses the Dept. of Homeland Security bought up to turn into ICE detention centers. Plus, why Sen. Warnock says Jon Tester is the reason he’s in the Senate.