Slate News

The Supreme Court just completed its first term with new justice Amy Coney Barrett. With a conservative supermajority now seated, what does this term spell for the future of America’s legal landscape?  Guest: Mark Joseph Stern , reporter on courts and the law for Slate. If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate pod...

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.  Katherine Bell, Editor in Chief of Quartz, joins to talk about The Hudsucker Proxy . They discuss the heightened depiction of corporate culture, circles, and yet another female reporter character who sleeps with her source.  Email: slat...

From Slate Studios & ServiceNow, this episode of Let’s Workflow It features Deryck Mitchelson – one of the leaders taking on the greatest workflow challenge of our time – the effort to vaccinate millions of citizens from COVID-19. As Director of Information Security for NHS National Services Scotland, Deryck manages his nation’s contact tracing and vaccination systems, and shares his unique pe...

Critical Race Theory was created in the 1970s by a Harvard Professor seeking to describe the way racism is baked into the legal system. Half a century later, CRT is now the weapon of choice for right-wing pundits looking to silence conversations about race.  From an academic discipline to a conservative scare tactic, how did critical race theory become the dominant culture war in American politics...

A Supreme Court brain trust gathers for this year’s Amicus Breakfast Table. Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Melissa Murray , professor at NYU School of Law and co-host of the podcast Strict Scrutiny ; Jeffrey Fisher , Stanford Law School professor and co-director of Stanford’s Supreme Court Litigation clinic; Perry Grossman *, senior staff attorney at the New York Civil Liberties Union’s Voting Right...

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Stacy-Marie Ishmael discuss Robinhood’s FINRA fine, the use and longevity of concrete following the tragic collapse of a Miami condo building, and AirBnB’s secretive (and well-funded) violent crime cover-ups. In the Plus segment: Krispy Kreme.  Mentioned in the show: “ Airbnb Is Spending Millions of Dollars to Make Nightmares Go Away ,” by Olivia Carville “...

Last week, the U.S. government released a new report that attempts to categorize 144 verified sightings of unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAP. They could only definitively explain one of them.  The new report signals a shift in the way we think about UAP. As technology has advanced and evidence of these encounters has increased, the question has become more urgent: What exactly is happening in...

Last week, the U.S. government released a new report that attempts to categorize 144 verified sightings of unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAP. They could only definitively explain one of them.  The new report signals a shift in the way we think about UAP. As technology has advanced and evidence of these encounters has increased, the question has become more urgent: What exactly is happening in...

Emily Bazelon is joined by Ruth Marcus and Jamelle Bouie to discuss the infrastructure negotiations, alarming Supreme Court decisions and Bill Cosby’s release. Here are some notes and references from this week’s show: Catherine Rampell for The Washington Post: “ Three Things That Could Still Blow Up The Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal ” Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in A...

Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema has become a constant source of consternation for the left wing of the Democratic party. But early in her career, she was a vocal proponent of progressive ideals. How did she turn into one of the party’s staunchest defenders of bipartisan compromise?  Guest: Amanda Becker , Washington Correspondent for the 19th. If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for...

The Champlain Tower South building in Surfside Florida collapsed early last Thursday morning, seemingly out of the blue. But reporting shows that the condo board members were aware the building was structurally unsound for years. Right now the death toll stands at 12, with 149 people still unaccounted for. How did such a preventable tragedy take place? Guest: Daniel Rivero , reporter for WLRN in M...

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.  Shane Ferro, former economics journalist and current public defender, stops by to talk about how Magic Mike is a film about the gig economy and the precarity of freelance work in a post Great Recession world.  Email: slatemoney@slate.co...

Pop star Britney Spears spoke out in court last week about the conservatorship she’s been under for 13 years, shedding light on all the restrictions she’s lived under. In doing so, Spears opened up a world rarely-seen outside of courtrooms and the reality for an estimated 1.3 million people living under a court-ordered guardianship. Guest: Sara Luterman , freelance journalist covering disability p...

Last week, Las Vegas Raiders defensive end, Carl Nassib, came out in an Instagram post, making him the first openly gay active player in NFL histroy. The league immediately posted in in celebration of Nassib’s announcement. But given the NFL’s sorry history of standing by players on the vanguard, will the league really put its money where its mouth is this time?  Guest: LZ Granderson , LA Times op...

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Stacy-Marie Ishmael discuss the apparently abusive conservatorship of Britney Spears, the failures of COVAX and worldwide vaccine distribution, and Peter Thiel’s shocking Roth IRA.  In the Plus segment: Small businesses in the pandemic. Mentioned in the show: “ The Darker Story Just Outside the Lens of Framing Britney Spears ,” by Sara Luterman for the New...

For nearly two years, an unprecedented experiment has been taking place in the town of El Zonte in El Salvador. Funded by a mysterious donor, the town’s residents built a Bitcoin economy, using the cryptocurrency to purchase just about anything.  Now, El Slavador has passed a new law making it the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. Can they replicate El Zonte’s success at a national s...

For nearly two years, an unprecedented experiment has been taking place in the town of El Zonte in El Salvador. Funded by a mysterious donor, the town’s residents built a Bitcoin economy, using the cryptocurrency to purchase just about anything.  Now, El Slavador has passed a new law making it the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. Can they replicate El Zonte’s success at a national s...

Emily, John and David discuss the post-pandemic workforce, Tucker Carlson, and student wins at the Supreme Court. Here are some notes and references from this week’s show: Ben Smith for the New York Times: “ Tucker Carlson Calls Journalists ‘Animals.’ He’s Also Their Best Source. ” Slate: “ David Plotz and Tucker Carlson Debate Scott Brown, Health Care, and More ” Andrew Van Dam for the Washington...

COVID’s Delta variant is on the rise in the U.S. The data suggest we have room for optimism -- so why are we seeing dire messages from public health experts?  Guest: Dr. Monica Gandhi , infectious diseases and HIV doctor at UCSF/San Francisco General Hospital.  If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bon...

Senate Democrats tried to open up debate on sweeping voting rights legislation Tuesday but were stopped by a lack of support from their Republican counterparts. Would a more incremental approach have succeeded?  Guest: Rick Hasen , professor of law and political science at the University of California–Irvine School of Law and the author of Election Meltdown: Dirty Tricks, Distrust, and the Threat...

America has gone soft on monopolies. A small number of businesses control an ever-increasing market share with only muted protests from the Federal Trade Commission, the supposed antitrust watchdog of the U.S. government. But that all might be about to change with Lina Khan’s appointment as FTC chair. Guest: Matt Stoller , director of research at the American Economic Liberties Project and the aut...

Welcome to Slate Money Goes to the Movies, a miniseries in which Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and a different guest each week discuss popular business-themed movies.  Joanne Lipman, author and journalist, joins to talk about the 2005 film Thank You For Smoking. They discuss the terrible trope of female reporters sleeping with their sources, The Marlboro Man, and “moral flexibility.”  Email: slatemone...

Fears that an ultra-conservative faction would take control of the country’s largest organization of evangelicals did not come to fruition at the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting this year. But it was only a narrow loss, and, like conservatives around the country, the group remains sharply divided.  Guest: Bob Smietana , national reporter for Religion News Service.  If you enjoy this s...

This week, Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Stacy-Marie Ishmael discuss Lina Khan and tech antitrust, Anna Wiener ’s New Yorker piece on Silicon Valley , and the New York Times investigation into working at Amazon .  In the Plus segment: MacKenzie Scott gives again. Mentioned in the show: “ The Separation of Platforms and Commerce ,” by Lina M. Khan for the Columbia Law Review “ Does Tech Need a New...

Ever since police used a DNA platform called GEDmatch to crack the Golden State Killer case in 2018, police departments around the country have rushed to use genetic genealogy to crack their own cold cases. The result? Hundreds of violent cases solved.  So--why are some states passing new laws to limit this new technology? Guest: Nila Bala , senior staff attorney at the Policing Project at NYU Law...