Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis admitted to having a personal relationship with Nathan Wade, the prosecutor she hired to handle the election interference case against Donald Trump. Meanwhile, the federal case against Trump is being delayed. And the Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments on Thursday deciding whether he can be left off the ballot in Colorado for his role in the January 6th insurrection. Police in the city of Dearborn, Michigan were on high alert this weekend after...
Feb 05, 2024•19 min
Welcome to What a Day’s How We Got Here, a new weekend series where Hysteria’s Erin Ryan and Offline’s Max Fisher pose a question about the week’s biggest headlines and comb through history to answer it. This week: why does it feel like the souther border is always in crisis? How does immigration enforcement distort our view of what’s actually happening? And what lessons about our fragile national identity can we learn from a discontinued California highway sign? Show Notes: What A Day – YouTube...
Feb 03, 2024•28 min
President Joe Biden issued an executive order imposing sanctions and visa bans on Israeli settlers who were accused of attacking Palestinians and Israeli peace activists in the West Bank. Meanwhile, the violence in Gaza continues. The Palestinian death toll has reportedly surpassed 27,000. More than 66,000 people have been wounded by Israel since Hamas’ attack killed 1,200 and took about 250 largely civilian hostages. Universal Music Group started pulling their music from TikTok Thursday morning...
Feb 02, 2024•23 min
The first official Democratic primary of 2024 taking place this Saturday in South Carolina. President Joe Biden has seen a decline in support among Black voters in early polls, so this early primary date is a chance for the Biden-Harris campaign to rally support in South Carolina and make a broad appeal to Black voters nationally. We’re joined by Jaime Harrison, Chair of the Democratic National Committee, to dig into the significance of South Carolina’s Democratic primary and how it plays into t...
Feb 01, 2024•21 min
Despite reported headway in the negotiations, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday rejected Hamas’ two primary demands for an extended temporary ceasefire and the release of the remaining hostages. Meanwhile, around a dozen Israeli troops disguised themselves as medics and civilians and stormed a hospital in the occupied West Bank, killing three Palestinian militants in the city of Jenin Tuesday morning. Tech CEOs of several social media platforms are on Capitol Hill today to tes...
Jan 31, 2024•21 min
A bipartisan immigration deal in Congress could be announced as soon as this week. The agreement would give the executive branch the legal authority to suspend asylum when migrant crossings surpass a certain threshold, among other things. That’s the part of the deal that President Biden referred to when he said late last week that he’d “shut down the border” if this new bill makes it into law. A new report by the Associated Press found that prison labor is connected to hundreds of millions of do...
Jan 30, 2024•23 min
The UN’s International Court of Justice ruled last Friday ordering Israel to prevent acts of genocide in Gaza, but stopped short of calling for a ceasefire. The court is weeks into a case that considers whether Israel is committing genocide. Republicans are, yet again, threatening the lives of trans people. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is trying to get healthcare providers in other states to give him the private medical records of youth who’ve received gender-affirming care. Meanwhile, Repu...
Jan 29, 2024•18 min
President Joe Biden will send CIA Director William Burns to help negotiate a new deal between Israel and Hamas to release hostages. Meanwhile, protests in the U.S. continued around America’s involvement in the war and whether we should officially call for a ceasefire. Universities in particular have been in the spotlight as the sites of many of these demonstrations. L.A. Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong appointed Terry Tang as interim executive editor, making her the first woman ever to be th...
Jan 26, 2024•23 min
New York City Mayor Eric Adams delivered his third State of the City address on Wednesday. Since just last spring, 170,000 migrants have arrived in New York City, tens of thousands of whom were sent by Texas Governor Greg Abbott. But in his speech, Mayor Adams fell short of providing any real plans to address the situation. We’re joined by Christine Quinn, former Speaker of the New York City Council and current head of shelter operator Win, to discuss what migrants need and what providers in the...
Jan 25, 2024•24 min
Former President Donald Trump won New Hampshire’s Republican primary on Tuesday and defeated former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley. Meanwhile, President Joe Biden won the Democratic primary as a write-in candidate. We’re joined by Colin Booth, Chief Political Correspondent for the Granite Post, to break down the results. President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris held their first joint campaign event of 2024 in Manassas, Virginia on Tuesday. And one clear takeaway from this event is that the ...
Jan 24, 2024•20 min
The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that the Biden administration has the authority to remove parts of a barbed wire barrier erected by Texas officials at the U.S.-Mexico border. The high court ruled for Biden in a 5-4 decision, with Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett siding with the three liberal justices. More than 300 L.A. Times journalists walked off their jobs last Friday for a one-day strike to protest potential layoffs. Then on Monday, a group of ten California lawmake...
Jan 23, 2024•23 min
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis officially exited from the 2024 presidential race and endorsed former President Donald Trump. He made the announcement in a video posted on X on Sunday, just two days before the New Hampshire primary. Because of his exit, all eyes will be Donald Trump and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in Tuesday’s primary. Democrats will also go out to vote, even though President Joe Biden will actually not be on the ballot this year. For more, we’re joined by Manny Espitia...
Jan 22, 2024•17 min
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis faces misconduct allegations after a co-defendant in Georgia’s election interference case against Trump claimed that Willis was in a “romantic relationship” with her special prosecutor. The presiding judge set a hearing for February 15th to focus on the allegations. The Justice Department released a scathing 575-page report Thursday about the 2022 elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. The report described the “significant failure” in the police’...
Jan 19, 2024•27 min
Israel and Hamas reached an agreement on Wednesday to get medicine delivered to hostages held in Gaza. In exchange, humanitarian aid and medication will be delivered to Palestinian civilians. And overnight on Tuesday into Wednesday, Israeli forces advanced on the area around the Al Nasser hospital complex in Khan Younis, a city in Southern Gaza. Over in Texas, a floating barrier in the Rio Grande will stay for now because an appeals court reversed an order for the state to remove it. Governor Gr...
Jan 18, 2024•20 min
President Biden invited Congressional leaders to the White House Wednesday for their first face-to-face talks in months about critical aid to Ukraine, immigration and border policy, and aid for Israel. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the World Economic Forum in Davos on Tuesday where he emphasized the need for more aid and called out Putin directly. In the Middle East, fears of an expanding war in the region have multiplied in recent days. The U.S. launched a new air...
Jan 17, 2024•20 min
The Iowa caucuses are officially over. Donald Trump won as expected with just over 50 percent of the vote, while Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis came in second and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley came in third. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy finished in fourth place, and suspended his campaign just minutes after the polls closed and then endorsed Trump. We’re joined by Eugene Scott, senior politics reporter for Axios, to break down the results and turnout in Iowa. And in headlines: Defense Secretary ...
Jan 16, 2024•17 min
The Iowa caucuses are here. Former President Donald Trump is in the lead, according to the most recent Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa poll. He has the backing of 48 percent of likely Republican caucus-goers. Former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley is in second place with 20 percent, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is in third place at 16 percent. Meanwhile, it is bitterly, bitterly cold in Iowa with a wind chill warning in place until after the caucus on Tuesday. And it’s not just Iowa – an...
Jan 15, 2024•26 min
The Iowa Caucuses are back! Trump is the clear favorite, but there’s a tense battle for second place that is all going to play out on Monday. We dive into what the caucuses even are, how they work, and what their role is in this year’s presidential election. Then, Crooked’s very own Tommy Vietor joins the show after being on the ground in Iowa himself. He walks us through what it was like sneaking into Republican campaign events, and what voters said. Show Notes: What A Day – YouTube – https://w...
Jan 12, 2024•19 min
Israel is accused of committing genocide in Gaza in a case before the International Court of Justice on Thursday. South Africa filed the claim, and it alleges that Israel violated international law by committing and failing to prevent genocidal acts against Palestinians in Gaza. Hunter Biden took a surprise trip to the Capitol Building on Wednesday to look Republicans in the eye as they advanced a resolution to hold him in contempt of Congress. And outside the Capitol, Hunter and his legal team ...
Jan 11, 2024•21 min
Donald Trump was back in court on Tuesday for the federal case against him for trying to overturn the 2020 election. This time, however, Trump tried to make the argument that he cannot be charged at all. Plus, Trump on Monday requested that a Maine judge put a pause on deciding whether he should appear on the state’s ballot for now. The Senate Judiciary Committee holds a hearing today about how artificial intelligence could impact journalism. One of the committee’s members – Sen. Amy Klobuchar –...
Jan 10, 2024•21 min
The Chair of Florida’s Republican Party of Florida, Christian Ziegler, was removed from his position on Monday after a closed-door meeting of party members in the state. It’s the latest development in the relatively small but very mighty scandal that also includes Ziegler’s wife, Bridget. Pope Francis called for surrogacy to be banned globally on Monday and described the practice as “despicable.” However, the Pope’s position on surrogacy doesn’t necessarily match up with some of his more progres...
Jan 09, 2024•21 min
The Federal Aviation Administration ordered the inspection of 171 Boeing 737 Max 9 planes after a panel blew out of an Alaska Airlines plane mid-flight on Friday. No serious injuries were immediately reported, but this isn’t the first time a Boeing plane raised passenger safety concerns. At least nine Palestinians including a young child were killed in the West Bank on Sunday. And on Saturday, the Israeli military said that the remaining Hamas fighters in northern Gaza were no longer “under an o...
Jan 08, 2024•17 min
ISIS claimed responsibility for the bombings in Iran that killed at least 84 people and injured 284 others on Wednesday. Plus, the United States launched a drone strike in Iraq’s capital of Baghdad on Thursday, killing a senior commander of an Iran-linked militia group and several others. New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced Thursday that he filed a lawsuit against 17 charter bus companies used by Texas Governor Greg Abbott to bus people seeking asylum at the border to New York. Adams is ask...
Jan 05, 2024•19 min
An appeals court ruled on Tuesday that doctors in Texas are not required to perform emergency abortion care as a necessary, stabilizing treatment to protect the health of the mother or pregnant person. In the opinion, Judge Kurt Engelhardt wrote the federal statute “does not mandate any specific type of medical treatment, let alone abortion.” A pair of bombs exploded in Iran on Wednesday and killed at least 95 people and injured over 200 others. The attack happened near the burial site of Iran’s...
Jan 04, 2024•17 min
Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday appealed the decision by Maine’s Secretary of State that bars him from the ballot due to his role in the January 6th insurrection. That comes after the Colorado Supreme Court last month removed Trump from the state’s ballot, which he is also likely to appeal soon. The deputy head of Hamas along with two other leaders of its armed wing were killed on Tuesday in Beirut, Lebanon by an Israeli strike. Meanwhile, the UN reports that half of Gaza’s 2.2 million ...
Jan 03, 2024•21 min
The Biden administration is pressuring Israel to scale back its war by the end of the year. And earlier this week, President Joe Biden warned that Israel’s “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza was whittling away international support. But it seems like the language shift hasn’t yet caused a meaningful development in the area. European Union leaders decided on Thursday to open EU membership negotiations with Ukraine. This has been a longtime goal of Ukrainian President Volodmyr Zelensky and is a boos...
Dec 15, 2023•25 min
The Supreme Court on Wednesday announced that it will hear a case challenging the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the commonly used abortion medication mifepristone. The justices also agreed to review the scope of an obstruction law that has been applied to hundreds of felony prosecutions of insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol on January 6th. Last week, the House passed a resolution that equated anti-Zionism with antisemitism. And on Wednesday, the House voted to pass a resolutio...
Dec 14, 2023•21 min
A group of ten current and formerly incarcerated people in Alabama filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday to allege inhumane conditions in the state’s prison system, and called it a “modern day form of slavery.” The lawsuit claims about 575 private companies and more than 100 public agencies have benefitted from incarcerated labor in Alabama in the past five years, and those benefits have amounted to an estimated $450 million annually. The latest Consumer Price Index showed that prices rose 3.1% in ...
Dec 13, 2023•26 min
The UN Climate Change Conference – known as COP28 – hit a major roadblock on Monday. There’s disagreement between countries because a potential deal stops short of a promise to phase out the use of fossil fuels. The Golden Globes nominees were announced on Monday, but this is the first time the award ceremony will be run without the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. The Association was dissolved, and a for-profit venture bought control over the awards. This year’s ceremony will be a case stud...
Dec 12, 2023•22 min
The Texas Supreme Court temporarily halted the abortion procedure for Kate Cox, a 31-year-old pregnant woman who was granted the country’s first court-ordered abortion last week since the fall of Roe. The justices said Cox's procedure is on pause while they review her restraining order, which is meant to protect her and her doctors from the state’s anti-abortion measures. Sickle cell disease is a painful condition that occurs more frequently in Black people, and last Friday the FDA approved two ...
Dec 11, 2023•20 min
