Politics with Amy Walter

By WNYC and PRX

News & Politics

What's Politics with Amy Walter about?

Every Friday, Amy Walter brings you the trends in politics long before the national media picks up on them.

Known as one of the smartest and most trusted journalists in Washington, D.C., Amy Walter is respected by politicians and pundits on all sides of the aisle. You may know Amy her from her work with Cook Political Report and the PBS NewsHour where she looks beyond the breaking news headlines for a deeper understanding of how Washington works, who's pulling the levers of power, and how it all impacts you.

Politics with Amy Walter is a co-production of PRI and WNYC Radio in collaboration WGBH.

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How President Biden Will Ta...

01.22.2021

Joe Biden takes the helm as the 46th president of the United States during an unprecedented crisis. The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 400,000 Americans, nearly 16 million remain unemployed, and the peaceful transfer of power was disrupted by ...

Politics with Amy Walter episodes:

01.22.2021 How President Biden Will Tackle the Economic Crisis Joe Biden takes the helm as the 46th president of the United States during an unprecedented crisis. The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 400,000 Americans, nearly 16 million remain unemployed, and the peaceful transfer of power was disrupted by ...
01.15.2021 What Happens to President Trump's Grip on the GOP Following Two Impeachments? President Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives just one week after encouraging his supporters to attack the U.S. Capitol and disrupt Congress as they tallied Joe Biden’s Electoral College win. He is the first president to be impeached ...
01.08.2021 How President Trump Attempted to Subvert Democracy This week, a violent mob of President Trump’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol. The insurrectionists were seeking to overturn the results of the general election during a joint session of Congress as members tallied the Electoral College votes. President Trump ...
12.25.2020 How American Democracy Became Vulnerable to the Threat of Populism Individual reactions to the coronavirus pandemic and the public health restrictions that have accompanied it have underscored how powerful negative partisanship can be in the formation of political opinions. In past crises, national shocks have urged partisans to put aside ...
12.21.2020 The Old South vs. The New South Since Georgia flipped blue for President-elect Joe Biden, the gulf between the Old South and the New South has come into focus. Come January, the state’s closely watched runoff elections will determine which party controls the U.S. Senate. In one ...
12.19.2020 Freshman Conversation: Representative-Elect Cliff Bentz, OR-2 Cliff Bentz was elected to represent Oregon's 2nd Congressional District this fall. He will fill the seat left open by retiring Congressman Greg Walden who served the district for more than 20 years. Oregon's 2nd encompasses a wide swath of ...
12.18.2020 What Happens to Immigration and DACA Under the Biden Administration? During the 2016 election, President Trump spent a considerable amount of time talking about immigration. On the campaign trail, he made racist comments about Mexicans and one of his first acts in office was to institute a Muslim ban. During ...
12.13.2020 Freshman Conversation: Representative-Elect Nicole Malliotakis, NY-11 Nicole Malliotakis is one of a record number of Republican women who were elected to Congress this fall. She defeated first-term Democratic Congressman Max Rose in New York’s 11th Congressional District, which includes Staten Island and parts of South Brooklyn. ...
12.12.2020 Making Sense of the Electoral College This week marked the so-called safe harbor deadline when states have certified their results for the U.S. presidential election. Typically, by the safe harbor deadline, election-related challenges at the state level are wrapped up. But, President Trump is continuing to ...
12.11.2020 How the Economic Downturn has Hurt Vulnerable Americans In the nine months that the coronavirus pandemic has ravaged the U.S., the most vulnerable Americans have struggled to keep up with monthly expenses. Eight million Americans have fallen into poverty since May and today there are 10 million fewer ...
12.05.2020 Freshman Conversation: Representative-Elect Ritchie Torres, NY-15 New York's 15th congressional district in the South Bronx has been called the poorest and bluest congressional district in America. Ritchie Torres, who served for seven years on the New York City Council announced his candidacy for the seat, left ...
12.05.2020 What to Expect of the Relationship Between Joe Biden and the Press? President Donald Trump spent his first term undermining the credibility of the media. His tweets, campaign events, and press conferences were tools he used to cast doubt on the legitimacy of reputable news organizations while promoting unfounded lies and conspiracy ...
12.04.2020 How the Media is Preparing to Cover the Biden Administration President Donald Trump spent his first term undermining the credibility of the media. His tweets, campaign events, and press conferences were tools he used to cast doubt on the legitimacy of reputable news organizations while promoting unfounded lies and conspiracy ...
11.27.2020 What Really Happened to the Middle Class? As around 70 percent of Americans consider themselves to be middle class, it’s no surprise that Democrat and Republican candidates spend a considerable amount of time on the campaign trail attempting to make themselves more appealing to this bloc of ...
11.20.2020 How a Biden White House will Approach Climate Change The priority for many Democratic voters in the most recent election cycle was removing President Donald Trump from the White House. This was clear after a crowded primary field coalesced around Joe Biden. But the world is a different place ...
11.20.2020 Freshman Conversation: Representative-Elect Ashley Hinson, IA-01 Republican Congresswoman-elect Ashley Hinson is one of a record-breaking number of Republican women who’ve been elected to Congress this year. Prior to becoming a congresswoman, she was a state representative and a news and television reporter. Hinson will replace Representative ...
11.13.2020 A Presidential Transition Delayed By refusing to concede, President Trump is not only disrupting the peaceful transfer of power, a cornerstone of American democracy, but he’s delaying the Biden administration access to pertinent information. The formal transition process we know today came to exist ...
11.07.2020 Joe Biden Wins Presidency All week, election results have trickled in from across the country. With just a few states outstanding, Vice President Joe Biden has surpassed the 270 threshold of electoral votes to win the race for the presidency. Maya King, politics reporter ...
11.06.2020 The Next President of the United States Not immediately knowing which candidate won the White House has long been a reality of a world changed by COVID-19. What campaigns, pundits, and pollsters failed to predict was the distance that would separate the results from the expectations. Tim ...
10.30.2020 Final Thoughts Before Election Day The ongoing campaign cycle was met by a number of twists that couldn’t have been predicted. A consequential presidential race, the pandemic, an economic downturn, and the killing of George Floyd by police. As the election cycle comes to an ...
10.23.2020 What Early Voting Patterns Tell Us About Wisconsin This week marked the second and final debate between Joe Biden and President Donald Trump. What has felt like a never-ending election cycle is taking place against the backdrop of a pandemic, an economic crisis, and a groundswell for racial ...
10.16.2020 Democrats Gain Edge in Quest to Overtake the Senate After the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on September 18th and nomination of Amy Coney Barrett just a week later on September 26th, there’s been a lot of speculation about the political implications of a Supreme Court ...
10.09.2020 What A Year This Week Has Been There are just over three weeks until Election Day and President Donald Trump is trailing Joe Biden in national polls by double digits. Sidelined with COVID-19 and unable to participate in traditional campaign events, the president has taken to Twitter, ...
10.02.2020 How the President's Coronavirus Diagnosis Alters the Race for the White House On Friday morning, President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump said they had tested positive for the coronavirus. More than seven million people in the United States have been infected with the coronavirus and more than 200,000 have died ...
09.27.2020 What's Next for Amy Coney Barrett's SCOTUS Nomination? On Saturday, President Trump nominated 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Amy Coney Barrett to fill Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's seat. If confirmed, conservative Judge Barrett would become the youngest member serving on the court. Senate Republicans will scramble ...
09.25.2020 A Look at the SCOTUS Nomination Fight The U.S. has observed a week of mourning since Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death, in addition to partisan warfare regarding her replacement. Senate Republicans have decided they will move to confirm President Trump's nominee ahead of the general ...
09.19.2020 How Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Death will Affect the Battle for the White House After serving 27 years on the Supreme Court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died on Friday from complications associated with metastatic pancreatic cancer. Justice Ginsburg was the second woman to be appointed to the highest court in the land. Early in ...
09.18.2020 Raising (Votes in) Arizona Arizona has been a reliably Republican state at the presidential level in every election since 1952 — except when Bill Clinton won in 1996. But a rapidly growing population has chipped away at the Republican advantage. In 2020, Arizona is ...
09.11.2020 How North Carolina's Electoral Process Is Unfolding While the bedrock of democracy is free and fair elections, the President has been sowing seeds of distrust throughout the course of the campaign. He's used his platform to spread conspiracy theories about the integrity of absentee ballots to his ...
09.04.2020 The Role of Political Disinformation in the Race for the White House Since May, protests have unfolded to denounce the way police interact with Black Americans. Most recently, the shooting of Jacob Blake, an unarmed father, has grabbed national headlines. Blake was shot in the back seven times by police in Kenosha, ...
08.28.2020 Whose Convention Resonated Best? Over the last two weeks, both the Republican and Democratic parties have proposed their visions for America and they could not be more different. President Trump used his primetime speech to convince those watching that he was still the outsider ...
08.21.2020 A Virtual Democratic Convention This week, Joe Biden officially became the Democratic nominee for president in the first-ever virtual convention. While there were no crowds, handshakes, or applause to demonstrate excitement, the new format allowed for Americans across the country to participate. Each night ...
08.14.2020 Processing a New Kind of Election Night The surge in absentee ballots because of the coronavirus could mean the outcome of the presidential race remains undetermined for weeks after the first Tuesday in November. Recently, The New York Times published a piece about what the media may ...
08.10.2020 Black Women Are Center Stage in 2020 This week, Cori Bush defeated longtime Democratic Congressman Lacy Clay, in the primary for Missouri’s First Congressional District. A safe Democratic seat, Bush is all but guaranteed to win in November when she will become the first Black woman elected ...
08.09.2020 In Pursuit of a Coronavirus Vaccine While many countries have curbed their total number of coronavirus cases, the U.S. has recorded more than four and a half million, and more than 160,000 deaths. Inadequate national leadership has caused one of the easiest and simplest solutions to ...
08.08.2020 Politics with Amy Walter: In Pursuit of a Coronavirus Vaccine While many countries have curbed their total number of coronavirus cases, the US has recorded more than four and a half million, and more than 160,000 deaths. Inadequate national leadership has caused one of the easiest and simplest solutions to ...
08.01.2020 The Path to November This week, President Trump renewed his commitment to questioning the integrity of our election system and the Senate left town on Thursday without reaching an agreement on a new stimulus bill, leaving millions of unemployed Americans in economic limbo. At ...
07.31.2020 Diagnosing Georgia's Primary Problems Perhaps, no state better embodies the polarization and partisanship with which we approach election administration than Georgia. After a messy primary in June with long lines and shuttered polling locations, election officials in the state have been working to improve ...
07.25.2020 An Unexpected Battle for the Senate Conventional wisdom had most people thinking that any gains that Democrats made in the Senate would be nominal. But, unexpected events over the last six months have turned a long-shot into the very real possibility that Democrats take control of ...
07.24.2020 Remembering John Lewis Last Friday, the world learned of the death of Congressman John Lewis. A civil rights icon and hero, John Lewis was known as the "conscience of the Congress," where he served for more than 30 years. In the week following ...
07.20.2020 A Look at the Next Stimulus Package It’s been four months since the U.S. economy shut down as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Since then, more than three million Americans have been infected by the virus and tens of millions have lost their jobs. In March, ...
07.17.2020 North Carolina, Up For Grabs With its 15 electoral votes, North Carolina is one of a handful of states truly up for grabs come November. Since 2008, no presidential candidate has carried the state by more than three points. The most recent polls show Vice ...
07.10.2020 How Cities Across the U.S. are Responding to Demands for Police Reform Lately, President Donald Trump’s speeches and tweets have become more pointed and divisive as he attempts to appeal to members of his base. There are four crucial months until election day and the president is spending them emphasizing racial divisions ...
07.03.2020 What it's Like To Start A Career During The Coronavirus Pandemic When the COVID-19 swept the U.S. in March, it was hard to fully understand how society would fundamentally change. Since then, more than 40 million Americans have filed for unemployment. As states grapple with the uncertainty that comes with reopening ...
06.26.2020 What a Surge in Absentee Ballots Means for November 2020 The uncertainty caused by COVID-19 has resulted in a record number of people requesting to vote-by-mail. While increased access to mail ballots will stem the spread of the disease, waiting for ballots to arrive will delay the final result. Kentucky ...
06.19.2020 Politics with Amy Walter: A National Reckoning In the weeks since George Floyd was killed by police officers in Minneapolis, we’ve been watching uprisings take place against police brutality. What many Americans have finally woken up to is what Black Americans have known for years: That it’s ...
06.12.2020 The Politics of "Defund the Police" Georgia’s Primary, George Floyd’s Funeral, and Congress’ Approach to Police Reform As the coronavirus pandemic has created uncertainty for the upcoming general election, many Americans are reconsidering how they’ll cast their ballots. This week, many primary voters in Georgia were ...
06.05.2020 The Tipping Point for the End of Systemic Racism in Policing How a Legacy of Racist Policies and Police Brutality Contributed to the Mass Disenfranchisement of Black People The death of George Floyd, an African American man, at the hands of police officers in Minneapolis has ignited protests and conversations surrounding ...
05.29.2020 The Future of the Democratic Party The Future of the Democratic Primary At the beginning of the Democratic nominating contests, the party faced a number of challenges. The field being crowded with candidates with such varied politics demonstrated that there were different visions for the future ...
05.22.2020 How Social Psychology Influences Political Behavior How Political Identities Have Become About What We Hate Instead of What We Love Individual reactions to the coronavirus pandemic and the public health restrictions that have accompanied it have underscored how powerful negative partisanship can be in the formation ...

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