For the remaining prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba detention facility, “time becomes elastic,” in the words of filmmaker Alex Gibney. One long-time detainee, for instance, Abu Zubaydah, just had his petition to get information from the CIA about his torture and treatment denied by the Supreme Court. But Gibney, in his most recent documentary, “The Forever Prisoner,” does interview key figures in the saga. Political Theater recently discussed with Gibney his techniques and motivations for that project.

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In the last 50 years, only six first-term presidents have been graced with their party in the majority in the House and Senate, and those majorities come under a lot of pressure in midterm elections. That brings us to Joe Biden, one of the six. Nathan Gonzales, publisher of Inside Elections and Roll Call’s political analyst, joins Jason Dick to talk about whether State of the Union speeches, or anything for that matter, can change current political dynamics — as well as the overall state of play in the contests for the House and Senate.

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Rep. Jamie Raskin was already embroiled in a political struggle of titanic proportions when tragedy struck in late 2020: the death of his son, Tommy. Madeleine Carter’s documentary “Love and the Constitution” tells that story, one of personal tragedy against the backdrop of the future of the republic. Raskin and Carter discuss the film on the latest Political Theater podcast.

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This Super Bowl Sunday marks the conclusion of the one of the NFL’s mosts successful and entertaining seasons — and also one where its questionable business practices and work environment got amplified from the sports section to the halls of Congress. Jane Coaston, host of the New York Times podcast “The Argument” joins Political Theater to discuss the game she describes glowingly as beautiful, and a business that is infuriating.

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Voting rights is about as hot a topic as it gets in politics right now, with the debate centered around whether voting laws pushed by Republicans amount to discrimination of minorities. One thing FEC filings are showing, though, is that amid the debate, several high-profile minority candidates and lawmakers are raising a lot of money for their 2022 campaigns. CQ Roll Call Senior Writer Kate Ackley explains on the latest Political Theater.

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There has always been a risk to being a public figure, particularly a member of Congress. Beyond the violence of events like the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, members and their staff face threats all the time. CQ Roll Call’s own Jim Saksa reached out to every member of Congress to ask if they had received a death threat. The results were pretty shocking.

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The White House and Congress get a lot of attention for their proposals to change public law, but the Supreme Court is having an outsize effect on society with its decisions, from determining where women can get abortions, what kind of guns will be allowed in cities, how much money can be spent in politics and whether tens of millions of people will need to get a vaccine to protect public health. CQ Roll Call Legal Affairs correspondent Todd Ruger joins us on Political Theater to discuss.

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The current fight over voting rights will help determine how long the United States endures as a republic, says Timothy Snyder, a historian and author of “On Tyranny" and other books about why democratic republics rise and fall. He discusses that and the stresses on the current political system through the lens of history on this episode of Political Theater.

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For people just trying to do their jobs on Jan. 6, 2021, there wasn’t a lot of time to think. But bearing witness then and reflecting on it now are as important as ever during a time when the republic is so fragile. Three CQ Roll Call journalists look back on their coverage of the attack on the Capitol and what’s changed since then on Capitol Hill.

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It’s that time of the year, when podcasts like Political Theater do their years in review. It’s a helpful frame. But 2021 in retrospect looks a lot like 2020, an extension of something that started, but did not finish. The bitter politics of 2020 crashed into the new year with an assault on democracy on Jan. 6, and hasn't really let up. And the COVID-19 pandemic continues to define daily life. And there was much, much more. We look back at our most enlightening conversations of the year.

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