Opening Arguments

If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the appropriate T3BE posting. Or best of all, become a patron at patreon.com/law and play there! Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do! This content is CAN credentialed, whi...

OA1169 - We had our first live video QnA of the new era! It was so good that I really thought more folks should hear it. Thank you to all who attended and we look forward to the next one! If you'd prefer to watch it, it's available on YouTube .  

OA1168 - Did the Karen Read trial just become the most expensive drunk driving prosecution in US history? We then briefly discuss legal issues around the arrest by ICE of New York mayoral candidate Brad Landry, and Matt fills in the most important missing detail of a story which nearly the entire media got wrong this week. And in our main story: the Supreme Court has struck an expected but thoroug...

T3BE74 First an exciting announcement! We're bringing back the original Q&A format where everyone can hang out for the livestream, but patrons get the extra special opportunity to ask questions in advance! Be sure to join us on YouTube on Sunday, June 22nd , at 3pm Pacific/6pm Eastern ! If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that h...

OA1167 - Georgetown law student Mari Latibashvili is the co-founder of the GU Law Coalition for Justice, which recently made national headlines by organizing law students to refuse interviews and job offers from law firms which have given in to the Trump administration’s war on the legal profession. We discuss (among other things) this remarkably successful campaign, what life in law school has be...

OA1166 - We consider the legal realities behind this week's most important stories, from the unprecedented statutory justification for Trump sending troops into California to why a wrongfully-deported man’s return to the US is--bad, actually? Matt then serves up a digestif of a note en bas de page about one of the most audacious counterfeiters in French history and how they were brought down with...

T3BE73 If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky,  follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the appropriate T3BE posting. Or best of all, become a patron at patreon.com/law and play there! Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do! This content is CAN credentia...

OA1165 - Anna Chu is the Executive Director at We the Action, a nonprofit that recently collaborated with labor and democracy partners like the American Federation of Government Employees and Democracy Forward, to launch Rise Up: Federal Workers Legal Defense Network . This Network connects federal workers who are being illegally terminated to pro bono legal services to help them understand their...

OA1164 - After a brief conversation from the front lines about the chaotic state of US immigration enforcement as of June 2025, we examine three unusual recent 9-0 decisions authored by three of our favorite Supreme Court justices. Join us behind the headlines to learn why Matt agrees that stopping a lawsuit against gun manufacturers, potentially opening the door to dumbass “reverse discrimination...

T3BE72 If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the appropriate T3BE posting. Or best of all, become a patron at patreon.com/law and play there! Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do! This content is CAN credential...

OA1163 - No really. That's a real stat. It may actually be WORSE than that. So uh... how in the hell? Professor Valena Beety is here to break it down. She's done a ton of great work in this area, and has a new legal research paper, "Unfit": Gender, Ableism and Reproductive Wrongful Convictions by Valena Elizabeth Beety , which goes into this and much more! Content note: this episode does involve d...

OA1162 - It’s all good news from our favorite branch of government today! We review recent judicial wins in everything from illegal deportations to tariffs to the Trump administration’s wars on international students,  private law firms, and common-sense understandings of the expression “foreign policy.” Plus, Matt shares a footnote from the front lines of Trump’s mass deportation efforts to expla...

T3BE71 If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the appropriate T3BE posting. Or best of all, become a patron at patreon.com/law and play there! Check out the OA Linktree for all the places to go and things to do! This content is CAN credential...

OA1161 - Micah Herskind is an activist, Harvard law student, and most recently a co-editor of the essay collection No Cop City, No Cop World with Mariah Parker and Kamau Franklin. We welcome Micah on to discuss his experience with Atlanta’s Stop Cop City movement and the lessons which activists and advocates around the US can learn from it in these times of mass dissent in the face of American aut...

OA1160 - Sheryl Weikal is an Illinois trial lawyer with a name-your own-price practice representing marginalized people facing eviction, foreclosure, discrimination, and incarceration--which is all incredibly cool unto itself, but she also has a story like no one else you’ve heard. Sheryl won an incredible victory three years ago against the Illinois state bar for trans attorneys throughout the st...

T3BE70 - As is typical for Wednesdays these days, we've got some Lydia and Thomas nonsense to kick off the show, but Heather swiftly swoops in to save us from ourselves, reveal the answer to last week's T3BE69 (nice), and set up the question for T3BE70. If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with...

OA1159 - We are so pleased to have Temple Law Professor Rachel López on the show to discuss her work in shining light and digitally preserving court records related to the trials following the Guatemalan Civil War. Not only is the archiving of this material so important to those impacted by the government regime over the 30 year conflict, it also demonstrates early examples of transitional justice...

OA1158 - We start off with some patron questions about what to do when ICE comes to your neighborhood, the one thing that the world’s most annoying white libertarians got right, and how to best exercise the very few rights US citizens have coming back into the country. Then in our main story: This week the Supreme Court heard arguments over birthright citizenship--or did it? Matt explains how they...

After some Thomas-Lydia nonsense and updates, Heather gives us the answer to question 68, a fiendishly difficult real property one. Did you get the right answer? Then we get a new question 69! If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the approp...

OA1157 - Leah Litman is a co-host of Crooked Media’s  Strict Scrutiny podcast and professor at University of Michigan Law School, and most recently the author of Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes. We are pleased to welcome Professor Litman to discuss everything from what it’s like to teach American Constitutional law 2025 to what the Supr...

For this Rapid Response Friday, we answer patron questions on everything from how to examine a  warrant to why Donald Trump will never be sending anyone to Alcatraz. We also consider just how bad the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the administration’s ban on trans military service members actually is, how the single biggest financial corruption scandal in Presidential history is happening righ...

OA1155 - It's a bad news/good news show, but the good news is very good! But first, the fasch. First, a few more notes on the arrest of Judge Dugan. Then some terrible EOs. One attacking on sanctuary cities. In another, we get a look at what Trump wants to use his literal billion dollars of big law pledges for. And, you know, some other fascisms. Then the good news! The courts are putting a stop t...

T3BE68 - Professor Heather Varanini returns to spill the beans on how Thomas did for Question 67 before taking us down another Bar prompt. If you'd like to play along with T3BE, here's what to do: hop on Bluesky, follow Openargs , find the post that has this episode, and quote it with your answer! Or, go to our Subreddit and look for the appropriate t3BE posting. Or best of all, become a patron at...

OA1154 - Whatever the stage of fascism is where they start arresting judges for doing their jobs--well, we’re here. We review what we know about the in-court arrest of Milwaukie County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan last week. Matt then explains exactly what a “sanctuary” jurisdiction is (and isn’t) and how the Trump administration’s promises to aggressively investigate and prosecute state and local o...

OA1153 - It's good news Friday! Here are some stories about American fascists losing or otherwise showing their asses in court, including (among others): The Supreme Court comes through strong for immigrant justice at 1 AM on a Saturday morning Samuel Alito fails to properly interpret a book written at a fourth grade level after having his Easter ruined by immigrant justice DOJ accidentally files...