Author: Slate Podcasts

Immigration judges walk into work everyday knowing that the system they operate in is broken. It has been for decades, through multiple administrations. So what’s the fix? The answer isn’t as radical as you might think.

Guest: Judge A. Ashley Tabaddor, immigration judge in Los Angeles and president of the National Association of Immigration Judges.

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The Trump administration wants to add a citizenship question to the U.S. Census, and the proposal has former Census directors up in arms. If the Supreme Court votes to allow the citizenship question, what could happen to the nation’s decennial headcount?

Guest: NPR correspondent Hansi Lo Wang. 

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin.

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For a long time, Brandon Flood kept his criminal history quiet: He worked in the Pennsylvania state government and didn’t want his former convictions to detract from his career success. But now, that history makes him uniquely suited for his new job as secretary of the state’s Board of Pardons. How did he go from submitting his own pardon application to, one year later, leading the body that helps make those clemency decisions?

Guest: Brandon Flood, secretary of the Pennsylvania Board of Pardons.

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You’ve heard the legal argument for starting impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump. Maybe you’ve heard the moral argument supporting impeachment. But what is the political case for impeachment? What could House impeachment proceedings possibly achieve, given that the Senate is controlled by the President’s party?

Guest: Jamelle Bouie, New York Times opinion columnist.

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin.

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What is Washington to do with a report that is damning, but doesn’t condemn? Slate’s legal team takes a look at the case made by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

Guests: Dahlia Lithwick, Jeremy Stahl, and Mark Joseph Stern.

Tell us what you think by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or sending an email to whatnext@slate.com. Follow us on Instagram for updates on the show.

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin.

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The new head of the Department of the Interior has close ties to industry and a penchant for relaxing environmental regulations. He’s also the subject of an ethics investigation. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt represents a new phase in the Trump administration: the shift from a cabinet of flashy, venal outsiders to savvy, ideological insiders.

Guest: Lance Williams, senior reporter for Reveal and the Center for Investigative Reporting. 

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin.

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How did a March speech by Rep. Ilhan Omar get shrunk down to a single phrase and turned into an attack on her character?

Guest: Aymann Ismail, Slate writer and host of the upcoming podcast, Man Up. 

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin.

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President Donald Trump has floated the idea of nominating former presidential candidate Herman Cain and conservative pundit Stephen Moore to policy seats on the Federal Reserve’s board. Would Cain and Moore alone swing interest rates? Probably not. But their appointments could erode non-partisan standards that make the Fed one of the most important economic institutions in the world.  

Guest: Jordan Weissmann, Slate’s senior business and economics correspondent.

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Last week’s Wisconsin Supreme Court race got ugly, fast. The Republican favorite, Judge Brian Hagedorn, eked out a win by about 6,000 votes. Our guest today says it’s hard to overstate the political fallout from this result. It could mean that conservatives dominate Wisconsin for years to come.

Guest: Mark Joseph Stern, covers the courts and the law for Slate.

Tell us what you think by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or sending an email to whatnext@slate.com. Follow us on Instagram for updates on the show.

Podcast production by Mary Wilson, Jayson De Leon, and Anna Martin

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