Podcast Summary: "Can the Supreme Court keep its secrets?"

Mixed Signals from Semafor Media
Host(s): Max Tani & Ben Smith
Guest: Jodi Kantor, Investigative Reporter, The New York Times
Date: November 21, 2025

Overview

This episode delves into the persistent secrecy of the United States Supreme Court, and whether shifting media dynamics are forcing it into a new era of transparency. Hosts Max Tani and Ben Smith are joined by Jodi Kantor, celebrated investigative journalist for The New York Times, who shares insights from her extensive recent reporting on the Supreme Court’s inner workings, its evolving public presence, the changing strategies of its justices, and the complex relationship between media coverage and institutional trust.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Supreme Court’s Tradition of Secrecy

• Secrecy as a Norm:
  • Kantor highlights that, while the Court claims transparency through oral arguments and public opinions, "the Supreme Court doesn't have visitor logs. The justice's papers belong to them and they are not released for a very long time... Everybody who works there takes a vow of silence." (C, 03:16)
  • Chief Justice's rare public comments are significant events: "For the chief justice to have said even something short is a big, big, big deal for him to wade in." (C, 04:20)

2. “Leaks” and Changing Media Landscape

• History of Supreme Court Reporting:

  • Kantor: “There is actually a pretty long tradition in journalism of trying to figure out what is going on inside the locked box of the Supreme Court... Bob Woodward has done it, Jeffrey Toobin has done it.” (C, 05:20)

• Is the Court Leaking More?

  • Despite recent high-profile leaks (like Dobbs), Kantor cautions against overstating a trend: “I don't know that we can say that... journalists for a long time have wanted to understand this institution.” (C, 05:20)
  • Perception of increased leaks comes from more ambitious, institution-focused journalism: “What I'm trying to do is establish an independent lens… Not just covering this decision or that decision, but answering fundamental questions about the institution and the Justices.” (C, 06:35)

3. Covering the Justices Themselves

• Unique Power and Accountability Structures:
  • Kantor discusses the Court's unusual job structure, lifelong terms, limited staff, and the singular accountability—or lack thereof—of justices: “They are the principals. They don't have the chief of staff and 20 assistants that a president or governor or even a senator has. It's really just them.” (C, 08:00)
• Reluctance to Scrutiny:
  • She observes, “Nobody likes being scrutinized. Nobody likes being written about.” (C, 09:13)
  • The “extraordinary” culture of reverence and obsequiousness toward justices, mixed with sharp, personal attacks, forms a "sick culture." (C, 09:26)

4. Generational Shifts & New Public Strategies

• Emerging Outward-Facing Justices:
  • Kantor explains that Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson are taking notably public-facing approaches, but with contrasting goals:
    • Barrett: Advocating trust and institutional integrity; “She’s clearly trying to promote trust in the Court…” (C, 11:26)
    • Jackson: Using dissent to express disillusionment, signaling to the public not to trust the current Court; “When she says that she is dissenting with disillusionment... don’t trust this Court.” (C, 11:26)
  • “Justice Jackson has really been willing to challenge the Court and the Justices publicly... with great thoughtfulness, broken a rule of the Supreme Court...” (C, 12:47)
• Effectiveness and Accessibility:
  • On whether these methods are effective: Legal language is dense; even the most populist opinions are hard to follow for the public. “I think that question of could a justice really have a kind of mainstream conversation with the American people and how would he or she do that is pretty interesting.” (C, 14:40)

5. Media’s Role: Undermining or Explaining Institutions?

• Journalism’s Impact:
  • Ben Smith challenges: “Do you worry that both the prevailing social media culture and specifically your work essentially do that? And undermine my trust in the institution.” (B, 15:31)
  • Kantor responds: Her investigations are “targeted,” focusing only on large, exceptional cases (Dobbs, immunity, Alito’s flags) where waiting decades for facts is inadequate: “Our attempts to find out what happened at the Court are pretty selective... I am not asking around about forthcoming opinions... I’m not going to spend my effort on it.” (C, 16:03)
• Privacy versus Secrecy:
  • Drawing on her Weinstein reporting, Kantor distinguishes between justified privacy and damaging secrecy: “I'm not trying to... strip the deliberative process of any confidentiality. I'm saying this institution is so important that we need a better way of understanding it.” (C, 17:54)

6. Gender, Power, and Perception on the Court

• Are Women Now the Most Interesting Justices?
  • Kantor is “drawn to making sure that women in public life are seen,” but resists declaring the female justices the “most interesting.” She’s focused on depth and accuracy rather than identity alone: “But I'm not going to shy away from writing about the men on the court.” (C, 20:47)

7. The Impact of the Dobbs Leak

• Profound Consequences:
  • Justice Thomas publicly compared the leak to “adultery”—a rare and severe rebuke that speaks volumes about the internal trust crisis. “He says this betrayal is tantamount to adultery, and you can never really look around this house the same way again.” (C, 22:02)

8. Balancing Exposure and Respect

• Interviewing Challenges:
  • Kantor reflects on her canceled Daily interview with Justice Barrett, suggesting the discomfort justices feel with extemporaneous formats: “There are a lot of opportunities to choose the wrong word. Right. I’m sure she wasn’t, that’s not necessarily the reason why she canceled, but it is interesting….” (A, 23:42)
  • Yet, “audio is also a very intimate and human Medium... there would have been some sort of fruitful meeting to hearing how she thinks, especially off the bench.” (C, 24:07)

9. Lessons from MeToo and Weinstein

• Legal Complexities and Media Dynamics:

  • On the Weinstein conviction reversal: “We knew that the appeal had a chance... the amount of stuff that Harvey Weinstein could be tried on was very small relative to the totality of the allegations…” (C, 25:37)
  • On prosecutorial boundaries: “There’s a sacred legal principle... you’re only on trial for the thing you’re on trial for. On the other hand, women in particular said... you have to have some sense of the totality to accurately read what happened.” (C, 27:15)

• From Bipartisan Consensus to Ideological Split:

  • Kavanaugh confirmation as the turning point: “That was the story that split everybody apart... There were major Republican political figures who fell. The Kavanaugh allegations really politicized everything.” (C, 28:37)

10. Is Factual Consensus Still Possible?

• Navigating Distrust:
  • Kantor maintains her commitment to bipartisan reporting but acknowledges the climate has worsened: “There are conservatives who see my work on the court as an attack... I can just tell you that that is not my motivation. The way I feel is that journalists scrutinize power.... I saw just from looking online, that a lot of conservatives discovered those stories in a frame of The New York Times is attacking Justice Alito and his wife. That was the first thing they read, not the facts.” (C, 30:47)
  • Ben Smith: “You once said something really smart to me, Ben... The question is whether we can go forward to something new that involves factual consensus. And I still think that's the right question. And my question is, like, is there a plan for saving the truth?” (C, 30:47/32:28)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Court Secrecy:
  “The justices have built something of a moat around themselves that says we control the lens through which you see us.”
  — Jodi Kantor (03:16)

• On New Outward-Facing Justices:
  "Justice Barrett and Justice Jackson have been... the two most outward facing Justices recently... but with different messages."
  — Jodi Kantor (11:26)

• On Being Scrutinized:
  “Nobody likes being scrutinized. Nobody likes being written about.”
  — Jodi Kantor (09:13)

• On Privacy vs. Secrecy:
  “There's a difference between privacy and secrecy. And we often confuse the two.”
  — Jodi Kantor (17:54)

• On the Dobbs Leak:
  “Justice Thomas publicly compared it to adultery... you can never really look around this house the same way again.”
  — Jodi Kantor (22:02)

• On Factual Consensus:
  “We’re not going to go back to some era where everybody read Time magazine and watched the network news together at night. The question is whether we can go forward to something new that involves factual consensus. And my question is, like, 'Is there a plan for saving the truth?'”
  — Jodi Kantor (30:47/32:28)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [03:16] – Kantor on the Supreme Court’s secretive practices
• [05:20] – History of reporting and “leaks” from the Court
• [09:13] – Resistance of Justices to scrutiny and the reverence-attacks paradox
• [11:26] – Justice Barrett vs. Justice Jackson: public communication strategies
• [12:47] – Kantor on efficacy and tradition-breaking dissent
• [14:40] – Challenges of connecting justices' messaging to a broad public
• [16:03] – Selectivity in investigative focus and public interest
• [17:54] – Distinguishing privacy and secrecy, referencing Weinstein reporting
• [22:02] – Justice Thomas’s reaction to the Dobbs leak
• [25:37] – The complexity and fallout of the Weinstein conviction
• [28:37] – The Kavanaugh hearing as a turning point in politicizing #MeToo
• [30:47] – Distrust in media/journalism and the possibility of fact-based consensus

Host Reflections & Closing Thoughts

• Ben Smith notes Kantor’s extraordinary methods and discipline, observing: “There’s a level of kind of discipline there that is part of why she is just such an incredibly successful journalist.” (B, 34:13)
• The hosts agree that the court’s “leakiness” is likely unprecedented, and that new reporting will push further transparency, even if slowly and unevenly.

Tone:
Respectful, thoughtful, and insider-oriented, with a balance of journalistic skepticism and genuine curiosity about both institutions and individuals.

This summary covers the full, substantive discussion and is structured for accessibility by listeners and non-listeners alike. Quotations include timestamps for reference.