The Back Room with Andy Ostroy

Paul Begala is a political commentator, professor of public policy, NY Times bestselling author, and political strategist. He is a commentator for CNN, and he’s been a frequent guest on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher. In the 1990’s he helped his friend John F. Kennedy, Jr. launch the political magazine George and wrote the “Capitol Hillbilly” column. He served in 1992 as a senior strategist for B...

Rep. Jason Crow represents Colorado’s 6th Congressional District and serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Armed Services Committee, on which he is the Ranking Democrat of the Intelligence and Special Operations Subcommittee. He’s a former Army Ranger and Bronze Star recipient who enlisted in the National Guard and worked construction to help pay his way thro...

George Hahn is a humorist, satirist, social media sensation, host of The Week podcast and reader of No Mercy/No Malice, both on Prof G Media, and host of The George Hahn Show podcast. George and I unpack Donald Trump's bizarre homoerotic behavior including his choice of YMCA as his theme song, his odd 2024 comments about golfer Arnold Palmer's penis, and his recent gushing over men's asses, hands,...

Norman Ornstein is an author, political scientist and emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. He’s a contributing editor and writer for The Atlantic, contributor to The Contrarian, and cohost of the podcast Words Matter. His many books include The New York Times bestseller, It's Even Worse Than It Looks written with Tom Mann, and the NYT and WAPO best-seller One Nation After Trump:...

Rob Bonta is Attorney General of the State of California. He previously spent more than eight years serving in the State Assembly. Prior to that he worked as a Deputy City Attorney for the City and County of San Francisco. He was sworn in on April 23, 2021, becoming the first person of Filipino descent to serve as California Attorney General. AG Bonta and I discuss Trump, the midterms, and the eff...

Alex Gibney is an award-winning filmmaker who's been called “the most important documentarian of our time” by Esquire Magazine. His work has been the recipient of an Academy Award, multiple Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award, several Peabody Awards, DuPont-Columbia Awards, Independent Spirit Awards, Writers Guild Awards, and more. He is also the recipient of the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the N...

Garlin Gilchrist is Michigan's Lt Governor and is running for Secretary of State to succeed Jocelyn Benson who's running for governor. Prior to serving as Lt Governor he worked at Microsoft as a software engineer. Join us for this important conversation about Michigan's efforts to protect the midterms, as well as Garlin's campaign for this critical position in the face of Donald Trump's assault on...

Frank Rich is a journalist, author, and television producer. A writer-at-large for New York magazine, he was previously chief drama critic and an OpEd columnist for the New York Times. He executive produced the long-running HBO series Succession, Veep as well as the limited series White House Plumbers and The Regime. He’s also EP’s the documentaries Six by Sondheim and Becoming Mike Nichols. His b...

Dana Bash is CNN's chief political correspondent, anchor of “Inside Politics with Dana Bash” and co-anchor of CNN’s“State of the Union”. She is based in Washington, D.C., where she plays a key role in CNN’s political coverage, conducting high profile interviews with politicians and candidates, and regularly serves as a moderator for the network’s political debate and town hall specials. In 2024, D...

Kerry Kennedy is a human rights lawyer, activist, New York Times-bestselling author, and daughter of Ethel Skakel Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. Kerry is the president of the Robert and Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center, the organization Ethel founded in 1968 to continue Robert’s unfinished work, and served as chair for the Amnesty International USA Leadership Council for more than a decade. Durin...

James Henson teaches in the Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the founder and executive director of the Texas Politics Project, a hub of research and public affairs work that provides non-partisan resources for understanding Texas government and politics. He co-founded the University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll, the longest running academic survey of Tex...

George Conway is an attorney, political activist, and legal and political commentator. He’s a founder of the Lincoln Project, and is a contributing writer to The Bulwark. He previously worked as a litigator for three decades at the law firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz in New York City. He recently ran for Congress in New York’s 12th District in Manhattan. George and I discuss all things...

Cait Conley is a fourth-generation Hudson Valley native and the daughter of a postal worker and a construction worker. She applied to West Point the day after 9/11 and went on to serve in the Army, first as a military police officer and then in special operations leadership, deploying six times and earning three Bronze Stars. She concluded her active-duty career as Director for Counterterrorism at...

Nikki Fried is the Chair of the Florida Democratic Party. She served as Florida’s 12th Commissioner of Agriculture and Consumer Services from 2019-2023. She is a lifelong Floridian, attorney and activist. Nikki and I discuss her state's key House, Senate and governor's races as well as the midterms overall and Democrats' chances of winning both the House and Senate. Got somethin' to say?! Email us...

Marc Levin is an award-winning, independent filmmaker. He has made over 50 films, including documentaries, TV series, dramatic feature films and episodic television. He’s won four Emmys and four duPont-Columbia Awards, among other prominent accolades. Highlights include his dramatic hit SLAM; the groundbreaking docuseries Brick City; several films for HBO including Gang War: Bangin’ in Little Rock...

Rick Wilson is co-founder and board member of The Lincoln Project. He’s a renowned political strategist, infamous award-winning ad-maker and podcast host, writer, speaker, and political commentator on MSNBC, CNN, ABC News, NPR, Real Time with Bill Maher, and various American and international news outlets. He’s a 30-year veteran of national Republican politics who got his start in the 1988 Preside...

S.E. is a nationally syndicated columnist, author, podcaster and TV commentator. She hosts Off the Cupp, a podcast which focuses on mental health, and which features interviews with celebrities and newsmakers. She is a columnist at the New York Daily News and has also been published in the New York Times, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, Washington Post and many other publications. She is currently a p...

Dr. Zaldy Tan is Professor, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and the Director of the Memory & Healthy Aging Program at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. His aging and dementia research has been covered by The New York Times, Time, CNN, The Wall Street Journal, NPR, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribute, Reuters, ABC News, and NBC News. He regularly speaks at major national and internatio...

Tara Setmayer is co-founder of the bipartisan superpac The Seneca Project. She’s a former GOP Communications Director on Capitol Hill and most recently served as a Senior Advisor for The Lincoln Project. She’s a political writer and commentator who’s appeared on MSNOW, CNN and other news outlets, The View, and Real Time with Bill Maher. Her writing has been featured on CNN.com, Bloomberg, The Dail...

Stephanie Grisham is the New York Times bestselling author of “I’ll Take Your Questions Now, What I Saw in the Trump White House.” During the Trump Administration she served as White House press secretary and director of communications for both the President and First Lady, Melania Trump. She is the only person in history who has held three senior roles at once, while representing both the east an...

Mark McKinnon is a political advisor, reform advocate, columnist, and television producer. He was the creator and co-host of Showtime's Emmy-nominated hit documentary series "The Circus”. He’s worked for many causes, companies, and candidates, including President George W. Bush, Senator John McCain, late Governor Ann Richards, and Bono. He was the chief media advisor for five winning presidential...

Jessica Tarlov is a liberal co-host of The Five on FOX News, the most watched show in cable news. In addition to co-hosting The Five, Jessica plays an integral role in special coverage for the network and is a fixture on election nights and for breaking news. She also co-hosts the podcast Raging Moderates with NYU Professor Scott Galloway and previously worked as a Democratic pollster and research...

Michelle Kinney is co-founder of The Mayday Network and a democratic strategist. Prior to that she was at The Seneca Project, which she co-founded. She previously served as the Creative Director at The Lincoln Project. She's also a photojournalist, previously served as Vice President of WestSide Democrats in NYC, and was publicly elected to the New York County Democratic Committee. Will the Postal...

Michael Steele is the co-anchor of MS NOW’s The Weeknight and previous co-host of The Weekend. Prior to joining MS NOW as a political analyst, he was elected Lt. Governor of Maryland in 2003 and served as Chairman of the Republican National Committee from 2009 to 2011. He was the first African-American to hold either office. Michael has appeared on Meet the Press, Face the Nation, Real Time with B...

ulie Roginsky is the co-founder of the Mayday Media Network on YouTube and the author of the Salty Politics newsletter on Substack. She has nearly three decades of public and private sector experience as an adviser on strategic communications, political strategy and public relations…working on behalf of corporate and political clients which include Fortune 500 companies, start-ups, non-profits and...