We're Lost

Adam Schiff and the impeachment managers wrapped up three days of tightly focused and at times stirring argument that with few exceptions seemed to full on deaf ears of Republican senators. Paul Fishman, Anne Milgram, Asha Rangappa, and Todd S. Purdum (calling in from the hearings) join Harry to discuss the legal strategies of both sides, Adam Schiff's momentous performance, the comportment of the Senators, and the legal and political maneuvers over calling John Bolton and others as witnesses.

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Will All Senators Now Stand

In a week in which the impeachment trial of President Trump commenced, there were ½ dozen other blockbuster stories, including the Parnas documents and interviews.  Natasha Bertrand, Matt Miller, and Joyce Vance join Harry to analyze a series of the biggest developments, including the Parnas materials, the ongoing battle over witnesses, the appointment of Starr and Dershowitz as Trump’s lawyers, and the investigation of James Comey for a three-year old leak.

Read the full episode transcript [LINK TO TRANSCRIPT HERE]

The Big Picture in Homeland Security: 2020 and Beyond

Three of the country’s premier experts in national security -- Frank Figliuzzi, Malcolm Nance, and Juliette Kayeem—in frank, unmediated discussion about the new threats to the nation heading into the 2020 election.  The Russian intervention in 2016 presents a sinister, existential hazard that calls for the same kind of paradigm shift in homeland security that the 2001 attacks required in intelligence.  And the Administration’s hostility to career professionals makes the threats that more keen.

Read the full episode transcript [LINK TO TRANSCRIPT HERE]

From Russia with Blood

The Feds cast a close focus on the scourge of Russian Organized Crime, which stepped into the gap left by the fall of the Soviet Union to play an illicit and controlling role in virtually every important in the country.  At the same time, it maintains remarkable ties with Putin’s government, which ultimately controls its actions, including ordering targeted killings of people all over the world who have fallen out of Putin’s favor; and it may have played a role in some of the Trump Organization’s business dealings over the last 15 years.  A panel of Russian OC specialists – David Hickton, the US Attorney who brought the first cybercrime case against Russian OC; Martha Boersch who brought and litigated the first important case in US courts involving Russian OC; and Heidi Blake, an investigative reporter whose new book provides an authoritative account on Putin’s use of OC to make war on the West, join Harry to plumb the depths of a singular threat to Western democracies.

Demagoguing the Border: The Trump Administration’s Treatment of Migrant Families

In an episode taped live in Washington DC and co-sponsored by the American Constitution Society and George Washington law School, Vanita Gupta, Leon Rodriguez, Lindsay Harris, and Andrea Senteno join Harry to describe and analyze the Trump Administration’s treatment of migrant families at the Southern border. The group traces the historical development of the issue and explains that, contrary to Administration rhetoric, virtually none of the tens of thousands of asylum seekers have histories of violent criminal conduct, and upwards of 95% of claimants with counsel appear for their hearings.  The panelists end with some potential solutions to a particularly vexing problem of law, policy, and politics. 

Trump Impeached: An Act of Constitutional Fidelity

Mary Gay Scanlon, Vice-Chair of the Judiciary Committee, joins Joyce Vance, Maya Wiley, and Harry Litman on the week in which the House of Representatives approved two articles of impeachment against President Trump, making him only the 3rd president impeached in U.S. history.  The congresswoman adds to the group’s analysis the account of how it felt on the floor of the House as the Articles moved toward passage, and the sentiments within the Democratic Caucus.  The Feds all analyze the possibility the impeachment could backfire, the Democratic strategy of holding back on the Articles to try to force the Senate to agree to witnesses, and the prospect of additional future investigations in the House post-impeachment.

"The Articles Are Agreed To"

The House Judiciary Committee voted out articles of impeachment against a President for the first time in a generation and only the fourth time in history, and sent to the floor a two-count case for impeachment that seems overwhelming in both the facts and the law.  But the vote was along strict partisan lines and all indications are that the Republicans in both Houses of Congress will hold near total ranks in support of the President, embracing a series of weak or diversionary arguments.  Feds Natasha Bertrand, Ron Klain, and Matt Miller join Harry to analyze the week and assess what happens next.  What short-, medium-, and long-term implications will the presumed impeachment/acquittal course of events have for Trump, the Republican Party, and the state of the Union?

What Will The Trial in the Senate Look Like?

Congressional and political experts Norm Ornstein, David Frum, and Elliot Williams join Harry to analyze the probable workings – from the broad strokes to the nitty gritty – of the expected upcoming impeachment trial in the Senate. Will Mitch McConnell control all aspects with an iron fist, and what if anything will make him part company from President Trump? Will it all be a strictly political affair or will broader considerations of country and Constitution hold some sway? And how many votes for conviction can we expect the Republicans?

Impeachment Academy

The impeachment process moves to the Judiciary Committee, beginning with a panel of scholars addressing constitutional standards for impeachment and applying those standards to the set of facts that the testimony in the Intelligence Committee established beyond reasonable doubt.  We engage the historic moment with a two-part episode featuring a remarkably high-powered group of commentators exploring the political and the constitutional considerations of the prospective impeachment.  First, David Frum, Jill Wine-Banks, Liz Holtzman, and Harry analyze and appraise the Democrats’ strategy, including serious consideration of whether opening with a panel of scholars is a blunder.  Next, we reissue portions of a previous episode in which Professor Larry Tribe, Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, Congress (and Judiciary Committee) member Jamie Raskin, and Harry undertake a deep dive into the meaning of the pivotal constitutional term “High Crimes and Misdemeanors.” 

The Impeachment Week That Was: If an avalanche of evidence falls in the Congress, can Republicans hear it?

It was one of the most dramatic and consequential weeks in the history of the Presidency, as the testimony of a series of witnesses before the House Intelligence Committee appeared to establish conclusively that President Trump had engaged in a corrupt and illegal course of conduct in his dealings with President Vlodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.  Yet at the end of this series of seismic hearings, it appeared that the House Republicans were prepared to continue to stand unanimously with the President.  Feds Matt Miller, Frank Figliuzzi, and Natasha Bertrand join Harry to assess where things stand and what if anything could force Congressional Republicans to acknowledge and come to grips with the President’s outrageous misconduct