Stress Test, from Mother Jones

On our first big impeachment podcast show, Mother Jones Washington D.C. Bureau Chief David Corn gives you the latest news direct from the hallway outside the House Intelligence Committee room on Capitol Hill, reacting to the partisan theatrics as they unfold on live television, while detailing the mounting case against Trump.

Then you’ll hear from editor and reporter Hayes Brown, the host of the new daily podcast from BuzzFeed and iHeartRadio, Impeachment Today. Brown will help you get to the bottom of one of the biggest emerging themes: the weaponization of conspiracy theories and misinformation to intimidate and incriminate witnesses. It can be mind-boggling to understand all the moving pieces and multitudinous cast members on this impeachment stage, but Hayes breaks it down with a big shot of energy, and lots of laughs. 

And finally: you know how everyone compares Trump to Richard Nixon? In fact, MoJo podcast favorite Tim Murphy returns to the studio to explain why the closest historical precedent to this Trump scandal is not Watergate, but the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson. 

Keep up-to-date with all things impeachment on our daily Impeachapalooza blog at MotherJones.com/impeachment. And here are some of the stories you heard during this episode:

Follow us on Twitter @MoJoPodcast.

Hong Kong resembles a war zone. Twenty-four weeks after millions demonstrated against a Chinese extradition bill, violent clashes between protesters and police are worse than ever. For this episode of the Mother Jones Podcast, host Jamilah King talks with Denise Ho, one of the most prominent leaders of the pro-democracy movement. Ho is an award-winning singer and songwriter who has been putting out hit albums since the late 1990s. But now, since becoming a political activist, her music has been banned in mainland China. Listen for a detailed analysis of what it’s like in Hong Kong today, Ho's opinions about the NBA Twitter dust up, and thoughts on the role of celebrity in this moment of political crisis. (And stay for a special performance, right at the end.)

Climate change is quickly becoming the defining issue of the 2020 presidential election. How the next American president confronts that threat will define where we live, what we eat, and how nations will survive. Despite the urgency, there hasn’t been a true forum for presidential candidates of both parties to thoughtfully discuss their plans to halt current climate. That changes Thursday night.⁠ The Weather Channel has teamed up with Climate Desk, a partnership of 18 media organizations working together on covering climate change (started by Mother Jones), to deliver an hour of climate conversations with nine candidates—five Democrats and three Republicans. It's called “2020: Race to Save the Planet,” and the special airs with limited commercial interruption Thursday, November 7 at 8 p.m. ET.⁠ 

On today's episode of the podcast, you'll get an exclusive preview from ⁠hurricane expert Dr. Rick Knabb from the Weather Channel, alongside Mother Jones's climate reporter Rebccea Leber, and you'll hear from candidates who visited communities on the frontlines of the current climate crisis: in the floodplains of Charleston, South Carolina; in South Bend, Indiana, and Dubuque, Iowa; as well as in Paradise, California, which was devastated by the Camp Fire almost exactly a year ago.  

We asked the top frontrunners to participate, and six Democrats and three Republicans said yes. We met with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) The Weather Channel interviewed Republican presidential hopefuls, too, including ex-Massachusetts governor William Weld, former Illinois Congressman Joe Walsh, and former South Carolina governor Mark Sanford.

Ronan Farrow’s reporting on Harvey Weinstein’s serial predatory behavior has earned a Pulitzer Prize. But in the months leading up to publication, a major news behemoth tried to kill the story. In Farrow’s latest book, "Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators", he tells the story of how NBC executives worked for months to try to kill the Weinstein story. Farrow unspools the remarkable tale with Mother Jones Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery at a live event in San Francisco earlier this month.

The US Marshals Service detains tens of thousands of people every day in jails across the United States, and thanks to President Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policies, that number is approaching historic highs. The Marshals are supposed to safeguard pre-trial detainees, but journalist Seth Freed Wessler's reporting reveals that America’s oldest law enforcement agency is suffering from a massive dereliction of duty—telling the story of widespread neglect, and deaths inside a system plagued by a lack of accountability. Seth teamed up with the award-winning radio producers behind NPR's Latino USA to produce this radio documentary based on his explosive reporting. For the full story for Mother Jones, reported in partnership with Type Investigations, visit http://www.motherjones.com/marshals.

President Donald Trump's sudden withdrawal of United States forces from Syria last week has pitted US allies against each other, liberated ISIS prisoners and terrorist detainees, strengthened the positions of Syria and Russia, and left the region in turmoil. Without US troops preventing Turkish forces from attacking the Kurds—who had been longtime US allies in the fight against ISIS in northern Syria—Turkey has swept into the region, with 160,000 civilians on the run, according to the United Nations. Now Turkey is bombing Kurdish territory and attacking Kurdish fighters and civilians. In 2018, Mother Jones reporter Shane Bauer traveled to Syria to document merica's involvement in one of the 21st century's bloodiest conflicts. He met the Kurds who Trump effectively gave Turkey permission to kill. On this week's episode of the Mother Jones podcast, Bauer talks to host Jamilah King about what it's like on the ground—and what's next. Also on the show, our sister podcast Bite has a new series about how climate change is affecting your food. Hosts Maddie Oatman and Kiera Butler give you the highlights from "Eating in Climate Chaos."

Naomi Klein is a veteran activist and environmentalist, and author of the new book, “On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal,” which argues that the dire urgency of the climate crisis is now a global five-alarm fire. Klein details the entrenched systems, social prejudices, and political patterns that have now fused into a singularly existential threat—and shows how those in power, on every level, have refused to act against impending peril. Klein joins Mother Jones editor-in-chief Clara Jeffery on stage for this special live (and lively) recording in Oakland, California.

Donald Trump’s massive debts—he owes hundreds of millions of dollars—are the subject of continuous congressional and journalistic scrutiny. But for years, one Trump loan has been particularly mystifying: a debt of more than $50 million that Trump claims he owes to one of his own companies. According to tax and financial experts, the loan, which Trump has never fully explained, might be part of a controversial tax avoidance scheme known as debt parking. Yet a Mother Jones investigation has uncovered information that raises questions about the very existence of this loan, presenting the possibility that this debt was concocted as a ploy to evade income taxes—a move that could constitute tax fraud. On today's show, host Jamilah King interviews Mother Jones investigative reporter Russ Choma about his dogged Trumpworld financial reporting, and the fresh questions it raises about Trump's debt.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Tuesday afternoon announced plans to launch formal impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump. In recent days, a growing number of Democrats have argued that Trump’s efforts to pressure Ukrainian leaders to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son could be grounds for removing the president from office. “This is a violation of his constitutional responsibility,” Pelosi said in televised remarks on Tuesday evening, accusing Trump of betraying his oath of office. “This is a violation of law." Washington DC bureau chief David Corn, and foreign influence and national security reporter Dan Friedman join host Jamilah King to discuss how a secret whistleblower complaint against Donald Trump rapidly transformed from a trickle of news into a full blown torrent that finally broke the dam.

For most of his life, Ibram X. Kendi admits he was a racist. He’s a black man, raised predominantly in black neighborhoods, and received an undergraduate degree from Florida A&M University, a historically black college. His upbringing was solidly middle class and Christian. He was not particularly focused on showing the world that black people could be twice as good as their white counterparts. Even so, he calls himself a racist. In his new book, "How to Be An Antiracist," author and professor Kendi combines searing autobiography with pointed analysis to show just how deeply racism is woven into our national—and global—fabric. He argues that the opposite of a racist isn’t someone who’s not racist, but instead an antiracist—someone who acknowledges how race has been constructed, and works actively against it. This week’s episode of the Mother Jones podcast features Kendi’s thoughts on antiracism, his writing process, and why this conversation is especially important in Trump’s America. Later in the show, we talk to Elizabeth Warren supporters at a big New York City rally about how they would convince Trump fans to switch their votes and back the Senator from Massachusetts in 2020.