In June of 2023, Donald Trump was charged with 37 counts of alleged mishandling of classified documents, as well as obstruction of justice. Of those 37 counts, 31 are alleged violations of the Espionage Act. Now, since its passage after World War I, thousands of people have been investigated for violating the Espionage Act, including Julian Assange, Daniel Ellsberg, and Donald Trump. However, only two people have been executed for violating it during peacetime; Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. This e...
Aug 08, 2023•26 min•Transcript available on Metacast Every president generates millions of records in the course of leading the country: memos, emails, speeches, notes, tweets... There are rules for how those records should be treated, both as historical documents, and as public property, enshrined in the Presidential Records Act. What does the Act say, and what does it have to do with how former-President Donald Trump handled government documents after leaving office? We talk with Trudy Huskamp Peterson , who worked as an archivist for the Nation...
Aug 01, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast In June 2023, the Supreme Court determined that states do not have independent and exclusive authority when it comes to federal election rules. By the time they issued the majority opinion, it no longer mattered in the state that started it all. So what happened in Moore v Harper? What is (or was) the Independent State Legislature Theory, and what other powers did the court vest in itself in this opinion? Carolyn Shapiro , founder and co-director of Chicago-Kent's Institute on the Supreme Court ...
Jul 25, 2023•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Today is the first part in a series about the state of civic education in the US. In this episode, we gauge how we're doing civics-wise and then delve into the perpetually controversial history of history; have we ever agreed upon a narrative for our nation that we can teach students? Walking us through the past, present, and future of social studies and civic education are Danielle Allen , James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University, and Adam Laats , Historian and Professor o...
Jul 18, 2023•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast You probably associate the so-called "War on Drugs" with the Reagans. Or maybe, more correctly, with the Nixon administration. But the government's anti-drug policies started decades before that. And, as we discuss in this week's episode, those policies were often motivated by things other than public health and safety. Instead, they targeted - and continue to target - immigrants and communities of color. This episode digs into the history of America's War on Drugs, featuring guests Jason Ruiz a...
Jul 11, 2023•40 min•Transcript available on Metacast A law in Texas banning abortions after six weeks.The blocking of a majority-Black congressional district in Alabama. OSHA regulations requiring vaccinations or a negative COVID test result. All of these controversial issues were decided not through the tried-and-true method of a hearing in the Supreme Court, but rather through a system called "the shadow docket," orders from the court that are (often) unsigned, inscrutable, and handed down in the middle of the night. Professor Stephen Vladeck ta...
Jul 04, 2023•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Oral arguments at the Supreme Court are a window into the personalities, beliefs, and behavior of justices. They allow advocates to engage directly with the highest court in the land about how the law should work in practice. And over the last two decades, as country has become increasingly partisan, they've started to sound very different. We talk about how, why, and what's up with all the interrupting. Helping us break it down is Tonja Jacobi , professor of law and the Sam Nunn Chair of Ethics...
Jun 27, 2023•40 min•Transcript available on Metacast What does it really mean when we call someone a socialist, communist, or fascist? Where did these ideologies come from, and why do we have ideologies in the first place? Today we speak with Patrick McGovern, professor of political science at Buffalo State University , and Susan Kang, professor of political science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and host of Left On Red. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO DONATE AND GET YOURS! CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see al...
Jun 20, 2023•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast The 14th Amendment granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States. It also granted them equal protection under the laws and guaranteed due process of law. Those are considered its most important provisions today. That wasn't always the case, however. Why did it take so long for the Supreme Court to affirm these provisions of this significant Amendment, and what does that say about politics at the highest court in the land? Our guide to the 14th Amendment is Aziz Huq ...
Jun 12, 2023•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast Recently, news about Justice Clarence Thomas's decades-long friendship with a wealthy Republican megadonor, and the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of gifts and generosity he's received from that friendship, has led to increased scrutiny into whether Supreme Court justices are as unbiased and uninfluenced as they claim. It's also revealed how, unlike most other federal officials, we rely on the good faith of the justices to hold themselves accountable. Helping us untangle this is Tonja Ja...
Jun 06, 2023•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast The federal government has always had debt. How much is too much, and how do politicians exploit it? This episode originally dropped in August 2022, but since the subject is in the news, we've been getting lots of questions about it! SUPPORT OUR WORK - DONATE TO CIVICS 101 TODAY! Since our nation's founding, the federal government has borrowed money from other governments, private investors, and businesses in order to operate. Over the last century, the debt ceiling, a Congressional cap on how m...
May 30, 2023•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast What can we do with these invisible magnetic waves in the sky? Today we explore what we can say on the air. Are radio and television stations allowed to air their opinions in addition to the news? From 1949-1987 all broadcast media was beholden to the Fairness Doctrine; a law that enforced impartiality and civil discourse. So why did we have this law? How did it work? Why did it end? And finally, what are the arguments for and against bringing it back? Our guest is Larry Irving, who was counsel ...
May 23, 2023•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ryan Willard is the co-host of The Ten News, a news podcast created for 8-12 year-olds. He shared some of the ways his team frames complex and controversial topics so that they're appropriate and comprehensible to younger ears. You can hear their show wherever you get your podcasts, or at their website. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO DONATE AND GET YOURS! CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast, sign up for our newsletter, get fr...
May 19, 2023•10 min•Transcript available on Metacast While Black citizens fought for their civil and human rights in the Reconstruction era, state and federal governments alike passed law and policy pertaining to them. Courts ruled. Legislatures made law. These are the legal shifts that both supported the Black freedom struggle and actively worked against it. Our guides to the last part of our Reconstruction series are Gilbert Paul Carrasco , Kate Masur and Kidada Williams . Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO DONATE AND GET ...
May 16, 2023•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Reconstruction has long been taught as a lost cause narrative. The true story is one of great force. The great force of a powerful activist Black community that strived to establish a multiracial democracy and achieved great successes and political power. The great force of a violent white community that exploited, abused and murdered those of that Black community who would assert their civil and human rights. The great force of a federal government that was there and then wasn't. This episode i...
May 08, 2023•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Reconstruction Era, a period in American history at the end of and immediately following the Civil War, is one of the single-most important and instructive periods in American history. It has also, historically, been one of the least taught. Why is that, and what are we missing when we don't learn about it? A lot. In this, the first in a three-part series on Reconstruction, we speak to Mimi Eisen of the Zinn Education Project about Americas first Civil Rights Era and why most of us dont know...
May 02, 2023•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast What is defamation? Libel? Pre-trial discovery? Actual malice? Today we go into everything tied to the recently settled Dominion Voting Systems vs Fox News Network defamation lawsuit; including slander, libel, discovery, settlement, and the "whackadoodle email." Our guide through the world of defamation legalities is Jane Kirtley , Silha Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota. We talk about why these lies were p...
Apr 23, 2023•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast How free are we? Are some countries more free than we are? What does freedom even mean ? In this episode in our "US vs" series, we talk with the co-author of the Human Freedom Index , Ian Vasquez, about how we rank in our measure of liberty. Then we do a deep dive into Freedom of the Press with Jenifer Whitten-Woodring, co-author of the Historical Guide to World Media Freedom: A Country-by-Country Analysis . Here are some links to other episodes we've done that explore our ever-changing tally of...
Apr 18, 2023•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast A social media app with 150 million American users is under intense scrutiny by the U.S. government. The threat is "sell or be banned," but how and why can the government do that? What does this kind of business restriction look like? We talked to Steven Balla of George Washington University to get the low down on regulations and bans in the United States. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO DONATE AND GET YOURS! CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, don...
Apr 11, 2023•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast What are grand juries? Who gets picked for one? What does an indictment mean? What's next? Why does it seem like this process is taking so long?? Today we explain all the legal processes surrounding the recent indictment of former president Donald Trump, as well as what the Constitution has to say about all of this. With us is Albert "Buzz" Scherr, professor of Criminal Law and Justice at UNH Law. Sign up here for our newsletter, Extra Credit. It's fun, we promise. Want our new "Civics is my cup...
Apr 02, 2023•22 min•Transcript available on Metacast On this episode, you've been summoned to learn about jury duty. Do the reasons some people want to avoid jury duty have merit? How do you even get on a list to get summoned to begin with? What should you expect with you get summoned to serve? And should you embrace this particular opportunity to participate in the democratic process? (Spoiler alert: We really think you should!) Our guest is Sonali Chakravarti , professor of government at Wesleyan University and author of Radical Enfranchisement ...
Mar 28, 2023•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast If you've learned about things like Separation of Powers and Checks and Balances, you know the tried and true notion that Congress makes the laws, the executive branch enforces them, and the judicial branch interprets them. But would it surprise you to hear that's not how it goes most of the time? Today we explore who really writes the majority of legislation in the US, and how it got to be that way. We talk with Dan Cassino of Fairleigh Dickinson University, who breaks down that first step of t...
Mar 21, 2023•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast The idea that the more you have, the more youre expected to contribute in taxes, is a foundation of our income tax system. And there is one government agency that oversees it all: the Internal Revenue Service. However, the tax code itself, and the IRS, are subject to the will of politicians - who might have special interests of their own. We talk about how politics, wealth, and power influence how people file for their taxes in the first place, how some of the wealthiest Americans have the lowes...
Mar 14, 2023•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast For decades, one state has had the privilege of going first in the presidential primary process. But New Hampshires stranglehold on the way we pick presidents could be losing its grip. The Democratic Party changed its presidential nominating calendar to give voters of color more sway. But New Hampshire isnt backing down, setting up a major test of the stranglehold and its power. Today, we present that story from our colleagues in NHPR's newsroom, from the podcast "Stranglehold" Donate to support...
Mar 07, 2023•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast If you own land in the United States, do you own the air above it, too? Justine Paradis, Senior Producer at Outside/In from NHPR brings us the airy truth of property rights in air and space in this special collaboration. The answer will take us from Ancient Rome (as it occasionally does) to the United States courts, from a world when air travel was science fiction to the world where we know there are valuable resources on the moon... and we all want them. Guests for this episode are Colin Jerolm...
Feb 28, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode, we ask how the actions of various American financial institutions caused a global recession and destroyed the livelihoods and homeownership of millions of American people. Then we figure out what the federal government decided to do about it. This is the 2008 financial crisis as told by Amy Friend , Chief Counsel to the Senate Banking Committee as the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was written. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO ...
Feb 21, 2023•56 min•Transcript available on Metacast Most Americans need help to file our tax return each year - about 90% of people use technology like Turbo Tax, or hire a human tax preparer. Why does it feel like it takes degree in accounting, or the money to pay someone with a degree, or computer software, just to comply with the law? We talk about why our income tax system is the way it is: full of complexity, difficult to navigate, and extremely personal. It's a system where things like who you work for, what kind of resources you have, and ...
Feb 14, 2023•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Many Americans were taken by surprise when a whole new branch of the military - the U.S. Space Force - was launched during the Trump administration. But this branch of the military wasn't created on a whim, and its mission is more complicated than you might expect. On this episode, we unpack the history of the militarization of space, the creation of the Space Force, and ask the question: is it here to stay? Our guest is Dr. Wendy Whitman Cobb, Associate Professor of Strategy and Security Studie...
Feb 07, 2023•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Atlanta was the first city to erect public housing in the United States. It started with Techwood Homes, an all-white development that went up in 1936. Sixty years later it would be torn down, along with others of the now-neglected developments that were the promise of FDR's New Deal. Akira Drake Rodriguez leads us through the story of how residents of public housing in Atlanta worked with, against and despite housing policy in their city. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE T...
Jan 31, 2023•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast "Public housing" did not exist prior to the Great Depression. So it wasn't until Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal that the government had the chance to impose segregation at the highest level. The effects of segregation policy in housing continue to this day in the United States. Akira Drake Rodriguez and Richard Rothstein are our guides to how and why the government did it. Want our new "Civics is my cup of tea" mug? CLICK HERE TO DONATE AND GET YOURS! CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see a...
Jan 31, 2023•25 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
