On the latest episode of Nir & Rupar, our live weekly video show, David Nir of The Downballot and Aaron Rupar of Public Notice hold their noses as they dissect the politics of Donald Trump’s nightmarish “Big Beautiful Bill.” Aaron and David discuss: * Why passage of the bill is by no means assured, thanks to the competing demands of prickly Republican senators. * Why you shouldn’t buy any of the soft-focus encomiums to Elon Musk, whose reign was pure disaster (and may not even be over). * Wh...
May 30, 2025•45 min
On the latest episode of Nir & Rupar, our live weekly video show, David Nir of The Downballot and Aaron Rupar of Public Notice talk with Matt Gertz, senior fellow at Media Matters, the indispensable media watchdog organization. Matt sheds light on today’s right-wing media ecosystem, including: * How two dozen people with Fox News on their résumés now occupy senior posts in the Trump administration. * How the James Comey “86 47” story shows how quickly things now move from MAGA influencer to ...
May 16, 2025•42 min
I’m putting the Aaron Rupar Show on indefinite hiatus, and this brief episode explains some of the reasons why. Thank you for listening, and please subscribe to my Public Notice newsletter to follow my work. Cheers! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe
Sep 19, 2023•5 min
This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Melissa Hortman, speaker of the Minnesota House, reflecting on her two decades in the legislature, the state’s Democratic trifecta and this year’s historic legislative session , and much more. Speaker Hortman and I touched upon everything from lessons she took from losing her first two legislative campaigns in resounding fashion to Jesse Ventura's legacy to why Trumpism is such a bad fit for Minnesota Republicans. Get full access to Public Not...
Aug 31, 2023•51 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Ruth Ben-Ghiat, one of America’s foremost authoritarianism scholars and author of Strongmen and the Lucid Substack. We discuss the factors that contributed to Trump’s rise and MAGA’s parallels to other authoritarian movements, the bizarre GOP primary as a reflection of Trump’s personality cult, the current state of the global struggle been authoritarianism and democracy, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/su...
Aug 25, 2023•41 min
This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features lawyer and political commentator David Lurie. Topics include a premortem of the DeSantis campaign that David just wrote for Public Notice , the Trump indictments as well as the legal defenses and delaying tactics David expects from Trump's attorneys, why Hunter Biden is actually being treated unfairly by the DOJ, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe...
Aug 17, 2023•1 hr 1 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Justin Higgins, host of the Politics+Media 101 podcast , on his remarkable political biography and the insight it provides into today’s Trumpified GOP. Higgins is a former RNC staffer who did opposition research during the 2016 cycle, but was so turned off by the reality of President Trump that he became a Democrat and ended up working for the Democratic governor of Puerto Rico. We talk about what working for the RNC during Trump’s rise was li...
Aug 10, 2023•49 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Liz Dye, who needs no introduction for readers of this newsletter. Liz has done fantastic work here in recent weeks documenting Trump’s mounting legal problems and nonsensical defenses . Now, she joins my podcast to unpack Trump’s January 6-related indictment, including the specific laws he’s accused of breaking, important scenes from Jack Smith’s charging document, the identities and roles of his six co-conspirators, and much more. Get full a...
Aug 03, 2023•54 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features comedian Jay Black on his stand-up and the state of political comedy more broadly. Topics include how rising authoritarianism has made joking about politics more challenging, conservatives’ one joke and why Jay is so turned off by it, right-wingers’ difficulty to grasp what censorship is and isn’t, and much more. (“If you start screaming about your diarrhea at a Starbucks and they remove from the Starbucks, you’re not being censored.”) We had ...
Jul 27, 2023•53 min
This week's edition of the Aaron Rupar Show features Simon Rosenberg, author of the Hopium Chronicles and a longtime Democratic strategist, on the political state of play as we head toward 2024. We discuss the stakes of this election cycle and the importance of MAGA suffering a decisive defeat, Biden's strong record and why Simon isn’t especially worried about it not yet showing up in polling, how Trump's legal problems are an albatross for the whole Republican Party, and much more. Get full acc...
Jul 20, 2023•43 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features returning guest Juliet Jeske , author of the Decoding Fox News newsletter . We discuss Tucker Carlson’s fading star, Fox News’s new Tucker-free primetime lineup, Ray Epps, Hunter Biden, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe...
Jul 14, 2023•43 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Tim Mak, founder and author of The Counteroffensive , discussing what it’s like to do independent human interest journalism from a warzone. We talk about the Ukrainian counteroffensive and what we know about its early progress, how Kyiv residents handle near-nightly missile strikes, the challenges involved in traveling around Ukraine to report these days, what Ukrainians are thinking and saying about US politics, and much more (including, brie...
Jun 15, 2023•39 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features regular Public Notice contributor Noah Berlatsky on why he thinks it’s appropriate to describe Trumpism as a fascist movement, how families like his with trans kids are dealing with the GOP’s escalating attacks on the LGBT community , his disagreement with Cenk Uygur about what Biden’s lagging approval ratings mean for 2024, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe...
Jun 08, 2023•49 min
Public Notice is supported by readers and funded by paid subscribers. To help make this work sustainable, please consider becoming one. This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Nikki McCann Ramírez — politics reporter at Rolling Stone, longtime Fox News watcher for Media Matters, and friend of this newsletter — on how she's detoxing now that she’s no longer watching Tucker Carlson every night, her big picture view on the Trump/DeSantis race, right-wingers threatening to boycott (chec...
Jun 01, 2023•53 min
Public Notice is entirely supported by readers and funded by paid subscribers. To support our work, please consider becoming one. This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features returning guest Ron Filipkowski setting the table for the 2024 GOP primary. Hours before Ron DeSantis launched his campaign in sad fashion with a Twitter Space that quickly turned into a technical fiasco, Filipkowski and I discussed why kicking things off in that manner was a strange choice even under the best circu...
May 25, 2023•48 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features tech policy expert Adam Kovacevich , founder and CEO of the Chamber of Progress. We discuss artificial intelligence and how it could impact the 2024 elections, controversies swirling around TikTok, what Elon Musk gets wrong about content moderation, why Adam is a fan of self-driving cars, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe...
May 18, 2023•35 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features one of my favorite political scientists — Brian Klaas of University College London, who I interviewed for the very first edition of Public Notice . Klaas explains why grasping the distinction between “the land of normal politics” and “the land of authoritarian politics” is key to understanding Trump. We also discuss the similarities between the contemporary US and other teetering democracies, as well as what Democrats can do to fight back agai...
May 11, 2023•37 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features one of my favorite guests yet — Oliver Willis , the OG progressive blogger and author of the highly recommended Oliver Willis Explains Substack. We chop it up about how pro wrestling helps explain modern American politics, “old and busted Donald Trump” and his need for a fresh gimmick, why CNN’s Trump town hall is a desperation move that will likely backfire, Dark Brandon’s incredible babyface heat, and much more. Oliver is not only very insig...
May 04, 2023•50 min
This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features J. Patrick Coolican , editor in chief of the Minnesota Reformer , sharing his insights about Minnesota politics and the blizzard of progressive legislation the state’s new Democratic trifecta is currently shepherding into law. We also discuss the pitiful condition of the Minnesota GOP, which hasn’t won a statewide election in nearly 20 years, and why the party has such a hard time recruiting electable candidates. Did you know I began my career...
Apr 27, 2023•44 min
The April 19 episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Dan Froomkin, founder of Press Watch . We discussed Trump’s weaponized lying and how media outlets struggle to handle it, the shortcomings of fact checking as a genre of political journalism, why the press should focus more on “why” and less on "what,” reflexively negative Biden coverage, and much more. Audio of the conversation is available at the top of this post, or you can watch the footage below via my YouTube Page. (And please subscribe...
Apr 19, 2023•34 min
Episode 7 of the Aaron Rupar Show features Katherine Abughazaleh of Media Matters discussing her viral TikTok videos , Tucker Carlson’s new interview with Donald Trump , Fox News brain poison and what progressives can do to fight back, and much more. Kat is super insightful about all things Fox News, so I hope you enjoy! Check out the audio of our conversation at the top of the post, or watch the footage below. Next week's episode will feature Dan Froomkin of Press Watch . If you haven’t already...
Apr 12, 2023•42 min
Episode 6 of the Aaron Rupar Show features independent journalist and Public Notice contributor Thor Benson. Aaron and Thor talk about Thor’s personal interactions with Stormy Daniels and Elon Musk, work Thor has done about artificial intelligence and creeping authoritarianism , and a timely piece you’ll be able to read soon in this newsletter about how other countries have handled the prosecution of former political leaders. Listen to the audio at the top of this post, or watch the footage belo...
Apr 05, 2023•35 min
Episode 5 of the Aaron Rupar Show features Juliet Jeske, author of the Decoding Fox News newsletter, on what she’s learned during more than a year of immersion in Fox News, the network’s increasingly open embrace of anti-LGBT bigotry, why she thinks stupidity is the secret to The Five ’s success, Trump’s Waco rally, and much more. Listen to the audio above, or watch our conversation below via my YouTube page. Please subscribe to the Aaron Rupar Show wherever you get your podcasts, share the show...
Mar 28, 2023•52 min
Ep. 4 of the Aaron Rupar Show features lawyer David Lurie breaking down Trump's escalating legal problems, including an apparently looming indictment in for the Stormy Daniels hush payment, as well as why the legal and political defenses of Trump's conduct are a mess. Listen to the audio above, or watch the footage via my YouTube page below. If you haven’t already read my Monday Q&A with David about the Daniels case, be sure to check it out here . And today’s newsletter features a piece from Noa...
Mar 22, 2023•49 min
Aaron chats with Brian Tyler Cohen , host of "No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen," about the early stages of the Trump-DeSantis battle, the sorry state of the GOP, his big takeaways from Fox News’s texts and emails, what it was like to interview President Biden, and more. Listen above, or watch the footage via my YouTube page below. Check out all three episodes of the Aaron Rupar Show on the show's YouTube page or wherever you get your podcasts, and please leave a positive review on iTunes. New episo...
Mar 16, 2023•42 min
Episode 2 of the Aaron Rupar show is live! I talked with MSNBC columnist and “ The Daily Santos ” author Marisa Kabas about the seemingly infinite Santos scandals, how the changing environment of New York politics transformed him from unknown 2020 loser to a winner two years later, why Santos's constituents aren't necessarily placing all the blame for him on the GOP, and much more! Listen to the audio of our conversation above, and if you’d like to see the video, check it out below. Episode thre...
Mar 08, 2023•42 min
I launched a podcast and the first episode is live! The Aaron Rupar Show kicks off with a conversation with Ron Filipkowski about his work, the Republican primary, why he thinks DeSantis might be a tougher matchup for Biden than Trump, and much, much more. Listen to the audio of our conversation above, and if you’d like to see the video, check it out below. New episodes of my podcast will drop each week going forward. I hope you enjoy! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subs...
Mar 02, 2023•40 min
