When people shifted to working from home in 2020, many renovated their homes to add offices. Influencers showed viewers how to easily install vinyl flooring from stores around the U.S., and sales of such flooring surged. But what these influencers didn’t know is that much of the vinyl flooring sold in the U.S. is made with PVC or plastic produced with forced Uyghur labor. This week on Intercepted, Mara Hvistendahl, a senior reporter for The Intercept, breaks down the supply chain from the Chines...
Jun 29, 2022•55 min
Today we bring you a special episode in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade. First, The Intercept’s Washington Editor, Nausicaa Renner takes us to the protests in front of SCOTUS that formed after the radical decision to end the right to abortion. Then we turn to a livestream conversation The Intercept hosted on Friday discussing what can be done to minimize the impact on the most vulnerable people. The Intercept’s Natasha Lennard talks with professor Rachel Reb...
Jun 25, 2022•47 min
Last week, the House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, siege of the Capitol began public hearings to disclose its findings. During the hearings, the committee alleged that former President Donald Trump led and encouraged the attack on the Capitol in an effort to overturn the 2020 election results. This week on Intercepted, investigative reporter Trevor Aaronson is joined by Margot Williams, research editor for The Intercept, and Michael Loadenthal, founder and executive director of th...
Jun 15, 2022•50 min
Back in 2014, the FBI worked with an attorney-turned-informant to try to stop a meeting between journalist James Risen and a source. This week on Intercepted: Risen, national security correspondent for The Intercept, reveals how the FBI used his reporting to try to catch a person they secretly called "the second Snowden." Recordings of conversations between an FBI agent and the attorney expose the government's efforts to prevent Risen from obtaining documents that they feared could expose new de...
Jun 03, 2022•25 min
Two weeks ago, Politico obtained a leaked draft of the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the nearly 50-year-old ruling that acknowledged the constitutional right to abortion. Although this is the most egregious attack on reproductive rights, it only follows the anti-abortion momentum that has been building for years around the country. This week on Intercepted, Intercept investigative reporter Jordan Smith discusses the aggressive, irrational, and dangerous Supreme Court decision t...
May 18, 2022•56 min
Smartphone apps constantly harvest your location data. That information is shared with advertisers, typically without your knowledge or informed consent. There are no laws in the U.S. prohibiting the sale or resale of that private data. And companies like phone-tracking firm Anomaly Six exploit that. So do government agencies. This week on Intercepted, Intercept reporter Sam Biddle and Tech Inquiry’s Jack Poulson discuss their reporting on Anomaly Six and the company's pitch to a social media mo...
May 04, 2022•41 min
Murderville, Texas just ended its nine-episode season, casting significant doubt on whether a man on death row for the 1992 murder of a Houston grandmother is actually guilty. This week on Intercepted: Intercept Senior Editor Andrea Jones speaks with Jordan Smith and Liliana Segura, the reporters behind the investigative podcast, about what happened after the murder of 72-year-old Edna Franklin. Relying on a hunch from one of her grandsons, police had a suspect — and an arrest warrant — within 2...
Apr 20, 2022•52 min
Talks with Iran to revive the nuclear deal appear to be progressing, but in recent weeks, the United States’s designation of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, as a terror group has emerged as a major obstacle. The listing isn’t just about nuclear diplomacy: Countless Iranians who served in the IRGC are now labeled as terrorists — including hundreds of thousands who were conscripted without a choice. This week on Intercepted, senior news editor Ali Gharib and reporter Murtaza Hus...
Apr 06, 2022•23 min
This week, President Joe Biden is visiting European nations — including Poland — as the war in Ukraine rages on. This follows on the heels of Biden pledging to send $800 million worth of weapons to Ukraine, on top of an additional $13.8 billion approved by Congress. This week on Intercepted: associate editor Maia Hibbett discusses the details behind the U.S. support for Ukraine with investigative reporter Ken Klippenstein and associate reporter Sara Sirota. As Klippenstein and Sirota explain, th...
Mar 23, 2022•47 min
U.S.-trained officers have led seven coups and coup attempts in Africa over the last year and a half. This week on Intercepted: Investigative reporter Nick Turse details the U.S. involvement on the African continent. U.S.-trained officers have attempted coups in five West African countries alone: three times in Burkina Faso, three times in Mali, and once each in Guinea, Mauritania, and Gambia. Turse offers the stories behind the coups, details about clandestine training efforts, and a look at th...
Mar 09, 2022•27 min
Smoke-filled cells. Triple-digit temperatures. Chest-deep water. People trapped behind bars when climate disasters strike. This week on Intercepted: Ali Gharib, a senior editor, speaks to his colleagues, reporter Alleen Brown and senior research engineer Akil Harris, about the intersection of climate risks and mass incarceration. For more than a year, Brown and Harris analyzed climate risks to more than 6,500 carceral facilities throughout the U.S. join.theintercept.com/donate/now Hosted on Acas...
Feb 23, 2022•35 min
The number of people experiencing homelessness decreased by 8 percent between 2020 and 2021, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD suggests that the decrease could be attributed to Covid-19 pandemic relief efforts. However, many relief efforts have expired or will soon, from eviction moratoriums to expanded unemployment benefits. Meanwhile, the U.S. housing market has continued unabated, with rents rising and housing prices soaring. This week on Intercepted: Akel...
Feb 09, 2022•32 min
Murderville, an investigative podcast hosted by senior Intercept reporters Liliana Segura and Jordan Smith, examines the systemic failures that lead to wrongful convictions. Season Two takes Segura and Smith to the death penalty capital of the country, Harris County, Texas, where they investigate a disturbing crime, a startling confession, and a story that doesn’t add up. To follow the series, subscribe to Murderville at Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more at https://the...
Feb 01, 2022•35 min
Just how strong are the forces arrayed against police reform — and how far are they willing to go? In April 2019, Keith Humphrey was appointed police chief in Little Rock, Arkansas, a Southern city with a fraught history of racial division. Among the growing number of Black police chiefs, Humphrey came in with a mandate from the new mayor to implement reforms and curtail abuses. Almost as quickly as he set about to do that work, the city’s “old guard,” the police union, and even cops under Humph...
Jan 26, 2022•52 min
As 2022 begins, the world continues to see the effects of the climate crisis — from the severe drought in East Africa to the odd snowfall in British Columbia. But since December 5, a new film has been sounding the alarm. In Adam McKay’s “Don’t Look Up,” an allegory about the impending climate disaster, scientists discover an approaching comet that will destroy Earth. But the media, politicians, and elite in the U.S. fail at every opportunity to prevent the impending doom. The Intercept’s senior ...
Jan 12, 2022•45 min
On Tuesday, with 39 men remaining at Guantánamo Bay, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on closing the infamous military prison. This week on Intercepted: Intercept photo editor Elise Swain breaks down the horrifying story of one Yemeni man after being released from Guantánamo. After 20 years in arbitrary detention, former Guantánamo detainee Abdulqadir al Madhfari was released from a United Arab Emirates prison to his family’s care in Yemen. His freedom lasted less than a week. Suffe...
Dec 08, 2021•24 min
Over the past year, Intercepted has been bringing you more stories from the people behind The Intercept’s reporting. For Giving Tuesday, we’re asking you to contribute to The Intercept so that we can continue to provide hard-hitting investigative journalism. Your help allows us to report on abuses of power and serve as an independent source of news. Please visit theintercept.com/join. Thank you for listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....
Nov 30, 2021•4 min
Jurors in the trial of three men accused of killing Ahmaud Arbery began deliberations Tuesday. Last week, a jury acquitted Kyle Rittenhouse of all charges, including two counts of homicide. This week on Intercepted: We discuss the details of these two cases, how they differ, and the questions they raise about the normalization of violence in the U.S. On Friday, Rittenhouse, the teenager who killed two protesters and injured a third at a Black Lives Matter protest, was found not guilty on all cha...
Nov 24, 2021•41 min
Since January, there have been nearly 300 strikes throughout the U.S. This week on Intercepted: a look at the labor movement in 2021. Last week, tens of thousands of Kaiser Permanente health care workers announced that they will go on strike on November 15 if a collective bargaining agreement is not reached. If they take to the picket line, they will join hundreds of thousands of other workers nationwide who have used their labor power to demand better wages and working conditions in the afterma...
Nov 10, 2021•45 min
Last month, the Democratic-controlled House voted in favor of appropriating $768 billion for the 2022 defense budget. This week on Intercepted: Senior writer for The Intercept Jon Schwarz talks with Andrew Cockburn, Washington editor of Harper’s Magazine, longtime national security journalist, and author of “The Spoils of War: Power, Profit and the American War Machine.” Cockburn and Schwarz discuss the legacy of former Secretary of State Colin Powell and how private defense companies have histo...
Oct 27, 2021•42 min
As the national push to vaccinate people against Covid-19 continues, hundreds of thousands of hacked documents show how a group of doctors is explicitly pushing unproven and potentially dangerous alternatives on people hesitant to follow public health authorities’ recommendations to get vaccinated, wear a mask, and socially distance. This week on Intercepted: Nausicaa Renner, The Intercept’s Washington editor, and Micah Lee, director of information security for The Intercept, discuss how a netwo...
Oct 13, 2021•36 min
In late September, the World Health Organization announced that it had assembled a new team of scientists to revive its investigation into the origins of the virus that causes Covid-19. The new group will be tasked with examining whether the virus could have originated in a lab, months after its predecessor deemed the possibility too unlikely for serious consideration. This week on Intercepted: Intercept investigative reporters Sharon Lerner and Mara Hvistendahl join editor Maia Hibbett to discu...
Oct 06, 2021•41 min
More than 4,600 Haitian migrants were expelled by the U.S. government in little over a week. This week on Intercepted: Recent images of Border Patrol agents on horseback pushing back Haitians along the U.S.-Mexico border led to renewed anger at the United States’ immigration enforcement methods. Investigative reporter Ryan Devereaux explains how the U.S. immigration enforcement apparatus grew to the scale that it is today, stemming from the war on terror. Since the Department of Homeland Securit...
Sep 29, 2021•41 min
The war on terror has killed nearly 1 million people and cost more than $8 trillion, according to a report by Brown University’s Costs of War Project. This week on Intercepted: Journalists Murtaza Hussain and Rozina Ali break down how the 9/11 attacks reshaped U.S. foreign and domestic policies. In the last two decades, the U.S. launched two wars, leading to millions dead and wounded. There was also a rise in unmanned drones killing innocent civilians, the use of widespread domestic and internat...
Sep 15, 2021•38 min
The United States flew its last military flight out of Afghanistan, ending the 20-year war in the country — the longest in U.S. history. This week on Intercepted: Journalist Spencer Ackerman discusses his new book, "Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump." In 2001, the George W. Bush administration used the 9/11 attacks to launch the war on terror — an era that led to two massive wars, countless lives lost, mass domestic surveillance, the rounding up of immigra...
Sep 01, 2021•45 min
The Taliban have taken over Afghanistan, forcing the U.S.-backed Afghan government out. This week on Intercepted: Intercept reporter Murtaza Hussain guides us through how the two-decade-long U.S. War in Afghanistan has concluded. With the U.S. having suffered what appears to be a stunning defeat, national security editor for The Intercept Vanessa Gezari, who also reported from Afghanistan for years after the U.S. war began, breaks down the historical trajectory that led to this moment. In the we...
Aug 18, 2021•33 min
Leaked audio reveals how chemicals hazardous to human health and the environment are fast-tracked and approved at the Environmental Protection Agency. This week on Intercepted, investigative journalist Sharon Lerner reports on how the chemical industry pressures the EPA to approve chemicals and pesticides that are dangerous to public health. Lerner speaks with whistleblowers from the agency, scientists who say their research has been manipulated by EPA managers to downplay the dangers of chemica...
Aug 04, 2021•35 min
For more than six months, The Intercept’s Trevor Aaronson communicated with Russell Dennison, an American man who traveled to Syria and joined the Islamic State. This week on Intercepted: Aaronson, an investigative reporter, discusses American ISIS, the newest Audible Original podcast documentary from The Intercept and Topic Studios, in which he chronicles the story of Russell Dennison, one of the first American citizens to join ISIS and fight with the group in Syria. Almost daily, Dennison comm...
Jul 21, 2021•37 min
Water protectors are traveling in growing numbers to stand with the Anishinaabe-led movement to stop the construction of Line 3, a tar sands oil pipeline. This week on Intercepted: Intercept reporter Alleen Brown takes us to northern Minnesota, a flashpoint in the fight to halt the expansion of the fossil fuel industry as the climate crisis deepens. Direct actions and other protests against Line 3 are just heating up and more than 500 people have already been arrested or issued citations. Oppone...
Jul 07, 2021•42 min
Domestic workers — nannies, house cleaners, and care workers — are one of the fastest-growing labor groups in the U.S. They are also some of the most undervalued and least-protected workers, a factor further exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic. This week on Intercepted: Vanessa Bee and Murtaza Hussain interview Ai-jen Poo, co-founder and executive director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, about the impact of Covid-19 on these vulnerable yet essential workers. They also discuss how ...
Jun 23, 2021•35 min
