Brian Lehrer: A Daily Politics Podcast

Democrats in the Senate are debating whether to allow the government to shut down when it runs out of funding later this month.On Today's Show:Zack Beauchamp, senior correspondent at Vox and the author of The Reactionary Spirit: How America's Most Insidious Political Tradition Swept the World (PublicAffairs, 2024), talks about what's at stake in the debate over whether to go along with the Republican plan to fund the government or withhold their votes in protest.

On today's show: Kelly Drane, research director at Giffords Law Center, Ned Parker, investigative reporter at Thomson Reuters, and McKay Coppins, staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of Romney: A Reckoning (Simon & Schuster, 2023), talk about guns and the state of political violence in America, after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at an event on a Utah college campus.

On Today's Show:Ben Casselman, chief economics correspondent for The New York Times, talks about the adjustments to hiring numbers showing 911,000 fewer jobs were created in the 12 months before March 2025, as listeners share their real-world job search stories.

After a string of losses in lower courts by the Trump administration, in an unsigned order on Monday, the Supreme Court lifted a restriction on ICE from conducting indiscriminate stops and raids in Los Angeles that have been decried as racial profiling. On Today's Show:Lindsay Nash, professor of law at Cardozo Law, co-director of the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic and co-director of the Center for Immigration Innovation, offers legal analysis of the ruling, and its implications for previously established protections against racial profiling.

Cristian Farias, legal journalist who writes for Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and other publications, and the host of The Bully’s Pulpit, a podcast of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, talks about the many legal issues the Trump administration is running into, related to sending the National Guard in to LA and DC, deportations and more. 

Recent developments on the world stage may be shifting the geopolitical calculations of the Israel-Hamas war. On Today's Show:Jane Arraf, international correspondent covering the Middle East for NPR, talks about the latest developments in Gaza as Israel clamps down on volunteer doctors and threatens more restrictions on humanitarian aid amid reports of famine.   

With the Epstein case and the possibility of other powerful abusers still at large, we look at the latest.On Today's Show:Jacob Shamsian, legal correspondent at Business Insider, talks about the latest developments in the Epstein saga as several survivors of Jeffrey Epstein urge Congress to act.

We look at how the media, including social media, is part of President Trump's approach to politics.On Today's Show:Ben Smith, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Semafor, and the author of Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race to Go Viral (Penguin Press, 2023), shares his analysis for how the president has come for civil servants, and what it might mean for the government bureaucracy in the future.

Congress is returning from its summer recess to a host of issues of national and international importance.On Today's Show:U.S. Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ) talks about his work in the Senate and the issues in New Jersey as congress returns to work, including his recent trip to Asia, deportations and immigrant detention, further rescission demands, and why he's supporting Zohran Mamdani.

On Today's Show:Nick Miroff, staff writer for The Atlantic who covers immigration and the Department of Homeland Security, talks about the changes at the immigration enforcement agency and how the $75 billion budget bump will be spent.

In an executive order on Monday, President Donald Trump directed each state’s National Guard to be prepared to respond to civil disturbancesOn Today's Show:Dan Lamothe, U.S. military and Pentagon reporter at The Washington Post, breaks down the latest news and what this might mean for cities like Chicago, Baltimore and New York City.

Between a meeting with South Korean leaders, further tariffs, and foreign investments, this week has seen several headlines regarding Trump's economic agenda. On Today's Show:Lydia DePillis, New York Times reporter covering the American economy and Shawn Donnan, Bloomberg News senior writer, talk about the latest economic and tariff news, including U.S. investment in Intel, other deals involving foreign investment in U.S. businesses, and the Federal Reserve.

The left is taking a variety of different, somewhat disjointed approaches to counter-messaging the Trump administration. On Today's Show:Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic and an author of the Atlantic Daily newsletter, talks about national politics, including Democratic messaging strategies, like California Gov. Newsom's efforts to 'troll' Trump on social media.

In July, the Justice Department (DOJ) announced it had issued subpoenas to medical providers that had provided gender-affirming care to minors. On today's show: Washington Post reporter Casey Parks discusses one of those subpoenas, which was newly made public, and what it means for transgender healthcare. 

As the Trump administration conducts a review of the content in the Smithsonian museums, the president wrote on social media earlier this week that the Smithsonian Institution was too focused on the horrors of slavery.On Today's Show:Douglas Brinkley, professor of history at Rice University, a CNN Presidential Historian, and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, talks about what could be lost if the administration is able to censor what is presented to museumgoers.