It's Officially Bad Decision Season

Summary

Strict Scrutiny Podcast Episode Summary: "It's Officially Bad Decision Season"

Release Date: June 2, 2025 | Hosts: Leah Litman, Kate Shaw, Melissa Murray | Produced by Crooked Media

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1. Introduction and Setting the Stage (00:56 - 06:03)

In this episode, the hosts—Leah Litman, Kate Shaw, and Melissa Murray—welcome listeners to a live show recorded at the Capitol Turnaround in Washington D.C. They emphasize the importance of community and real-life engagement during these tumultuous times. Melissa encourages audience participation, setting an energetic tone for the episode.

2. DEI Update and Allegations Against Judd Stone (06:03 - 17:02)

Content Warning: The hosts begin with a serious discussion on allegations of workplace sexual misconduct within the Republican Party, specifically targeting Judd Stone, a prominent legal figure.

Leah Litman introduces Judd Stone's background, highlighting his roles as Texas Solicitor General, chief counsel to Senator Ted Cruz, and law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia. The conversation delves into Stone's involvement in defending Texas's restrictive laws, including SB8 and SB14, which targeted abortion access and transgender healthcare.

Notable Quote:

"As Emily just alluded to, and you all know, these are genuinely harrowing times to be living through."
— Kate Shaw [04:13]

The hosts discuss recent lawsuits filed against Stone, revealing disturbing allegations of Stone's inappropriate and offensive behavior in professional settings. The complaint details incidents where Stone allegedly made graphic sexual comments and fostered a hostile work environment, leading to his resignation from the Texas Attorney General's office.

Notable Quote:

"We can, we must fight back. Join Americans United for Separation of Church and State and their growing movement because church state separation protects us all."
— Melissa Murray [00:00] (Despite being part of a sponsorship message, it underscores the episode's theme of battling overreach.)

3. Supreme Court's NEPA Decision and Kavanaugh's Opinion (24:30 - 35:53)

The hosts transition to discussing a recent Supreme Court decision authored by Justice Brett Kavanaugh in 7 County Infrastructure Coalition vs. Eagle County, Colorado. The case centered on the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the requirement for environmental impact statements.

Leah and Kate criticize Kavanaugh's expansive interpretation of NEPA, arguing that his opinion undermines environmental protections and judicial deference to agencies. They highlight Kavanaugh's dismissive tone towards environmental concerns and his broader implications for infrastructure projects.

Notable Quote:

"NEPA is a procedural cross check, not a substantive roadblock. NEPA does not require the agency to weigh environmental consequences in any particular way."
— Justice Brett Kavanaugh [27:26]

The discussion points out that Kavanaugh's approach allows agencies significant discretion, potentially leading to reduced environmental oversight and increased litigation over infrastructure projects.

4. Fifth Circuit's Book Banning Ruling (36:16 - 38:21)

Leah and Kate examine a controversial decision by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, where Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan ruled against the right to access information in public libraries. The ruling declared that challenging book removals in libraries violates the Free Speech Clause, effectively banning individuals from contesting censorship.

Notable Quote:

"Plaintiffs cannot invoke a right to receive information to challenge a library's removal of books because that would establish a brave new right to receive information from the government in the form of taxpayer-funded library books."
— Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan [37:50]

The hosts express outrage over the decision, noting its departure from established precedents that protect against censorship and uphold the free exchange of ideas in public institutions.

5. Nomination of Emile Beauvais to the Third Circuit (41:12 - 43:29)

Kate Shaw discusses President Trump's nomination of Emile Beauvais to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Beauvais, a former Trump DOJ lawyer involved in high-profile cases, is scrutinized for his aggressive legal tactics against non-profits and media organizations.

Notable Quote:

"He is in the middle of one of the most notorious campaigns of retaliation against nonprofits in civil society right now."
— Norm Eisen [65:57]

The nomination is criticized as part of a broader pattern of appointing judges who are perceived as hostile to civil liberties and independent institutions.

6. Recent Supreme Court Cases on Tariffs and Deportations (45:53 - 48:28)

The episode covers two significant Supreme Court decisions:

• Trump's Taco Tariffs: Both the Court of International Trade and the District Court for D.C. deemed the tariffs illegal. However, the Federal Circuit issued an administrative stay on the Court of International Trade's decision, keeping the matter unresolved at the time of the podcast.

  Notable Quote:

  "The tariff decisions actually generated an absolutely delicious moment on social media wherein one Donald J. Trump... announced... Leonard Leo is, quote, a bad person and a real sleazebag who in his own way probably hates America."
  — Leah Litman [46:28]

• Deporations of Parolees: The Supreme Court paused a lower court ruling that blocked the deportation of roughly 500,000 Cuban, Venezuelan, Nicaraguan, and Haitian nationals who entered the U.S. lawfully. Justice Jackson dissented, highlighting the severe personal consequences of the decision.

  Notable Quote:

  "Justice Jackson... wrote that the court, quote, undervalues the devastating consequences of allowing the government to precipitously upend the lives and livelihoods..."
  — Leah Litman [47:21]

7. Discussion with Guest Ambassador Norm Eisen (51:34 - 65:57)

Ambassador Norm Eisen joins the podcast to discuss the ongoing litigation against the Trump administration. As a key figure in the Democracy Defenders Fund, Eisen outlines the extensive legal battles aimed at counteracting policies and actions deemed damaging to democracy and civil liberties.

Notable Quote:

"There are over 250 cases, over 170 orders stopping wrongdoing. We are involved in over 70 of those matters."
— Norm Eisen [51:49]

Eisen highlights significant cases, including a lawsuit against Elon Musk's involvement with government data mishandling and criminal prosecutions targeting federal judges for their roles in upholding integrity within the judiciary.

Notable Quote:

"We are representing at Democracy Defenders Fund, 140 federal and state judges who... filed a brief defending Judge Dugan."
— Norm Eisen [60:11]

He emphasizes the importance of legal accountability and the role of the judiciary in maintaining democratic principles.

8. Missouri's Abortion Laws and Recent Rulings (69:37 - 84:45)

Emily Amick recounts the battle over abortion rights in Missouri following the 2022 Supreme Court decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade.

Missouri voters successfully passed a ballot measure enshrining abortion access in the state constitution. However, subsequent lawsuits led to a trial judge ruling parts of the state's restrictive abortion laws unconstitutional. The Missouri Supreme Court then sided with the attorney general, overturning the trial judge's injunction and forcing providers to comply with the restrictive laws.

Notable Quote:

"Maybe it's about reversing our ability to access healthcare. And that's what we're seeing the Supreme Court do."
— Emily Amick [75:08]

The hosts critique the Missouri Supreme Court's decision as undermining voter-approved protections and reflect on the broader implications for democracy and reproductive rights.

9. "Who Said It?" Game: Alito vs. Atwood (77:36 - 91:06)

In a lighter segment, the hosts engage in a game where they present quotes and ask whether they were said by Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito or Margaret Atwood from The Handmaid's Tale. While intended for engagement, the game underscores the contrasting perspectives between legal authorities and dystopian literature.

Notable Quote:

"The champions of religious liberty, who go out as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves, can expect to find hearts that are open to their message."
— Samuel Alito [81:32]

Despite the grim topics discussed throughout the episode, this segment adds a moment of levity and showcases the hosts' dynamic interactions.

10. Closing Thoughts and Favorite Things (91:06 - 97:02)

The episode concludes with the hosts sharing their personal favorites from the week, including book recommendations, media pieces, and cultural observations. They emphasize the importance of staying informed, engaged, and supportive of progressive media outlets.

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Overall Themes:

• Judicial Overreach and Misconduct: Scrutiny of Supreme Court decisions and lower court rulings that undermine environmental protections, free speech, and reproductive rights.
• Political Appointments: Critique of judicial nominations that may exacerbate systemic issues within the legal framework.
• Democracy Under Threat: Highlighting attempts to roll back democratic principles through litigation and legislative actions.
• Accountability and Legal Resistance: Featuring efforts by legal professionals and organizations to counteract harmful policies and protect civil liberties.

Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• "NEPA is a procedural cross check, not a substantive roadblock."
  — Justice Brett Kavanaugh [27:26]

• "Plaintiffs cannot invoke a right to receive information to challenge a library's removal of books..."
  — Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan [37:50]

• "There are over 250 cases, over 170 orders stopping wrongdoing. We are involved in over 70 of those matters."
  — Norm Eisen [51:49]

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This episode of "Strict Scrutiny" provides a comprehensive and critical analysis of recent legal decisions impacting environmental policy, reproductive rights, and judicial integrity. Through in-depth discussions and expert guest insights, the hosts underscore the pressing need to defend democratic values and resist overreaches within the United States legal system.

Transcript

[Melissa Murray]

Strict Scrutiny is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. You don't destroy 250 years of secular democracy without gutting precedent, shattering norms, and dropping a few billion. The same people and groups that backed Project 2025 are part of a larger shadow network that's relentlessly pushing to impose a Christian nationalist agenda on our laws and lives. Church state separation is the bulwark blocking their agenda. One of the last bastions of church state separation is our public school system. So they're pushing vouchers everywhere. They're arguing for religious public schools. Yes, you heard that right. Religious public schools. At the Supreme Court in a case we've discussed on the podcast. If you're listening to us, you're seeing the writing on the wall. We can, we must fight back. Join Americans United for Separation of Church and State and their growing movement. Because church state separation protects us all. Learn more and get [e-mail] Crooked Mr.

[Kate Shaw]

Chief justice, may it please the court. It's an old joke, but when a.

[Leah Littman]

Man argues against two beautiful ladies like.

[Kate Shaw]

This, they're going to have the last word.

[Leah Littman]

She spoke not elegantly, but with unmistakable clarity. She said, I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks. Thank you so much for coming out for this special episode of Strict Scrutiny. Live from the Capitol Turnaround in Washington D.C. let me hear you make some noise. And ladies, I think it needs to be said, this is a very good looking audience for sure. Very good looking. New York City is going to be very jealous because you all right now look good. Like Qatari jet good.

[Emily Amick]

I don't know if that's a compliment, given that that was a fucking hand me down. But you know.

[Leah Littman]

You know what? You are too real sometimes. Y' all look like an emolument and I love, love, love it. Anyway, we are your hosts. I'm Melissa Murray.

[Kate Shaw]

I'm Kate Shaw.

[Emily Amick]

And I'm Leah Littman. As Melissa said, we are truly thrilled to be here. So thrilled we decided to break out a new summer drink to mark the occ. So, ladies, gentlemen, non binary listeners, may we present to you the big baller. So we tell you what's in it because we're so into transparency.

[Leah Littman]

It's ketamine.

[Emily Amick]

Melissa. The recipe is classified. So we are invoking the state secrets privilege since we hear you can just do that these days. But don't worry, this just means you're going to have to wait a little to hear what is in the recipe when you see it in a bathroom at Mar a Lago. Or wait to be accidentally added to one of our signal group chats, that will work too. But it still seemed like the perfect occasion to unveil this new summer drink to toast Elon Musk doging himself.

[Norm Eisen]

Cheers.

[Emily Amick]

Of course, by self Doge, we basically mean he quiet quit the federal government, but not really. And then he showed up to work the next day with a shiner. And according to the New York Times, there might have been some bladder damaging amounts of ketamine involved. Who is to say?

[Kate Shaw]

On a more serious note, we want to say we know we have some real, not Doge, but real federal government employees, public servants in the house. We know there are folks here from doj, from the nlrb, from the epa. Thank you to all of you for being here and for your genuine service to the public.

[Leah Littman]

And it wouldn't be a live show without some live guests. So we have some, some amazing guests joining us tonight. We are going to have Emily Amick, that is Emily in your phone, who's going to walk us through some of the latest developments in reproductive rights and the ongoing efforts to perpetrate some reproductive wrongs. We're talking about that. Also with us is Ambassador Norm Eisen, who's going to talk through some of the many lawsuits that he is spearheading to counteract this damaging administration that we are currently living through month four of the four year sentence.

[Kate Shaw]

But first, before we bring out our special guests, it is just us. And by just us, I mean the three of us, which is actually really rare. We are almost never in the same physical space, but also all of you. So these are, as Melissa just alluded to and you all know, genuinely harrowing times to be living through. And I got to say, I think being with your people, like in real life in the flesh is, to my mind, absolutely critical. So thank you for being here, seriously. And those of you listening at home, because as you know, this audio recording will be a podcast in your ears on Monday morning. Those of you listening at home, we have more live shows coming up, so please join us at one of those.

[Leah Littman]

Okay, first up, some breaking news. And I'm just gonna have to say it. When we said we were going to have a live show in Washington, D.C. the universe really pulled through for us. And by universe, I mean the planets, the stars and the asteroids.

[Kate Shaw]

Before we get into it, we actually feel compelled to offer a genuine content warning if there are children in the audience, either at this live show or at home. One word Earmuffs. Truly. For those of you listening with family, we are going to give you a few seconds to turn off or skip ahead or have your kids leave the room. We mean it. And for everyone else, just a caution. We're going to be discussing allegations of serious and profoundly disturbing workplace sexual misconduct.

[Emily Amick]

So with those caveats duly issued, let's proceed to the DEI of the Republican Party, which, as Melissa has told us, means the Dicks, ex husbands and imbeciles.

[Leah Littman]

All right, this latest DEI update concerns someone who we haven't talked about for a while. But if you are a longtime listener of the podcast, then you'll recall the solid days of 2022 when it seemed like we could not have an episode without mentioning Jud with two Ds. Stone. Judd with two D stones. Do you remember him? Do you remember? Yeah. Yeah. Now, if you're new to the pod, Judd with 2D stones is now 3D.

[Emily Amick]

Judd.

[Leah Littman]

Not just 2D, 3D's, maybe even triple XDS. Judd. Because there's a lot to unpack here, and I've got to warn you, you may actually need to process some of this with a trained and licensed therapist.

[Kate Shaw]

All right, a brief biographical sketch. Judd with two Ds. Stone is a former Texas Solicitor General, former chief counsel to Senator Ted Cruz, former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, and Judge Edith Jones of the Fifth Circuit. If Judge Jones sounds familiar, but you can't quite remember why, maybe it's because she is the judge who came for our friend Commander Professor Steve vladek at a FedSoc bonfire slash conference last year because of Steve's mean tweets about the federal judiciary, which she had printed out and brought in a manila folder like you do. That seemed pretty aggressive at the time, but in light of intervening developments, actually now seems downright quaint.

[Emily Amick]

So back to Judd with two Ds. Stone. Stone was Ken Paxton's Solicitor General and in that role defended some of Texas's cruelest policies. And he spearheaded some of its most insane litigation. So that included the litigation defending Texas's SB8, the bounty hunter law that shut down abortion access in Texas before the Supreme Court overruled Roe in Dobbs.

[Kate Shaw]

Stone also defended Texas's SB14, which was a law targeting health care for transgender individuals. He also led a lot of the litigation that Texas filed against the Biden administration, including challenging the Indian Child Welfare act and a case that claimed that the Biden administration was required to retain the first Trump administration's so called Remain in Mexico policy.

[Leah Littman]

Now, if that litany of litigation highlights didn't jog your memory. Don't worry. We have prepared a little montage of oral argument clips to give all of you a sense of the stunning, some might even say meteoric claims that Jud Stone has presented to the United States Supreme Court. So Melody, let's roll the tape.

[Justice Kagan]

So what would that injury be under.

[Norm Eisen]

SB8 if it's an injury?

[Justice Thomas]

In fact, one example could be akin to the injury suffered in the tort of outrage where an individual becomes aware of of a non compliant abortion and they suffer the sort of same extreme emotional harm.

[Emily Amick]

That is an exchange between Tootie, Jud Stone and Justice Thomas in the SBA challenge where Judd with Tootie's Stone is saying, of course anyone and everyone could bring a lawsuit against a person who had or performed an abortion because of the, quote, tort of outrage. Yeah, okay. He thought that was a thing. And now here is Judd with two Ds stone challenging the Indian Child welfare Act, answering some questions, comments Justice Kagan had for him.

[Justice Kagan]

General, I thought I'd just give you a chance to respond to a reaction I had to your brief. And the reaction was that there is an extraordinary amount of Texas's view of policy in your briefs.

[Justice Thomas]

Two parts, your honor. The first is I agree that those observations, those, those statements of Texas views have nothing to do with non delegate or non delegation, anti Commandeering or Article 1 challenges whatsoever. Those live or die on various legal principles that are not those.

[Justice Kagan]

They're just atmosphere.

[Justice Thomas]

They're in part atmosphere. Yes, your honor.

[Emily Amick]

Just going to say that Justice Kagan knew what the fuck she was talking about in her reference to the atmospher. Elena Kagan, welcome once again to the Cassandra Covet.

[Kate Shaw]

Okay, so I think that crash course gives our newbies a sense of Judd with two Ds stone. He is also one of the individuals who took a leave from government to serve as private counsel defending Texas attorney general Ken Paxton and Paxton's impeachment proceedings. And that is when some of the events that we are about to discuss occurred.

[Leah Littman]

A lawsuit was filed last week and it suggests that, that this timeline is cursed in a way that even we genuinely could not have foreseen. And it involves a man who is alleged to have an asteroid meteor fetish and who is aptly surnamed Stone.

[Emily Amick]

So an individual who worked as an executive assistant at Stone's private law firm filed this lawsuit. And we are mostly just going to read verbatim from the complaint because no editorializing is remotely necessary and we are only going to cover some of what is in this complaint. And you know how some things are nsfw. This is like NSFW times a billion.

[Kate Shaw]

All right, let's do it. According to the complaint, and this is actually just the warm up Jud Stone told the plaintiff when the firm was doing its impeachment work for Paxton, quote, in this firm, there are no rules. You can say whatever slurs you want. For the untutored, this is known as viewpoint diversity. And that does appear to have been.

[Leah Littman]

The practice, because according to the complaint, at Elunch county, conducted at a beer bar. That is a real thing, a beer bar. Stone and his law partner, quote, ordered four shots, one for each person at the table, and asked plaintiff to take a shot. After taking one sip, plaintiff stated, that is the most disgusting thing I have ever tasted. To which Jud Stone replied, I highly doubt that is the most disgusting thing that has ever been in your mouth. Exactly.

[Emily Amick]

He also allegedly called the plaintiff white trash because she wore turquoise earrings.

[Leah Littman]

Sir, how dare you. What you don't know is those earrings are not turquoise. They're not lapis. They're cerulean.

[Kate Shaw]

They definitely got that one.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah. So I purposefully wore a turquoise jacket today. Yeah. To stick it to Judd. With Tootie's Stone, I hope he is triggered as these men are so easily and that he experiences the kind of emotional distress Donald Trump apparently felt while watching 60 Minutes, aka the Tort of outrage.

[Leah Littman]

All right, there's more. According to the complaint, as the impeachment proceedings wrapped up, Stone and the other people at the firm, who had also previously been in the Texas AG office, planned to return to the AG's office. But the suit alleges that when the Texas AG's office was informed of these allegations, Stone and his law firm partner were offered the chance to either resign voluntarily or be fired. So think about that when you've lost Ken Paxton.

[Kate Shaw]

So they lost Ken Paxton and chose resignation. But according to the complaint, after Stone submitted his resignation letter, Brent Webster, the first assistant to the Texas Attorney General, wrote the following email.

[Emily Amick]

I, of course, was designated to read this portion. Quote, two women who worked with Stone over the summer asked to meet with me. A female employee, through many tears, told me stories of Judd discussing sexual things with her, specifically regarding a disturbing sexual fantasy Judd had about me being violently, anally raped by a cylindrical asteroid and in front of my wife and children. According to this employee, Judd publicly described this in excruciating detail over a long period of time to a group of Texas office of the Attorney General employees, Office of the governor, employees, federal judges and other non government employees at a table. The female employee conveyed she was so disgusted by the violent sexual nature of the discussion, she left the table to get away from. When she came back, people at the table harassed her, joking that she, quote, couldn't handle people talking about dicks.

[Leah Littman]

Talking about dicks or talking to dicks who's.

[Emily Amick]

They had all had some shots.

[Kate Shaw]

Yeah, yeah. Wrong proposition. I think there. So the complaint continues, quote, eventually Judd was confronted with these allegations and promptly admitted that all the allegations were true, but said it was okay because it was during their time at a private law firm.

[Emily Amick]

I slash. We will just start out by saying what the utter fuck.

[Kate Shaw]

I mean, that was and is my top line reaction to reading this complaint. On a more serious note, we obviously want to acknowledge the conduct the complaint describes is appalling, full stop. No one should be treated like that in a workplace, in even someone who willingly works for Ken Paxton. But having a co worker describe graphic rape fantasies about you is actually outrageous.

[Emily Amick]

And perhaps, perhaps it's a total coincidence that a guy with violent rape fantasies would be arguing in favor of unleashing private bounty hunters to terrorize women and their doctors or would be rearing to defend laws targeting transgender individuals. Actually, it's probably not a coincidence. These dudes are obsessed with genitalia and sex. And we also want to remind everyone that these are the people, their party, their ideological cohorts, who are screaming about how gay people shouldn't be allowed to marry because that's not natural and it will lead to polygamy. These are also the people who insist that drag queens can't participate in library story time because it will corrupt children. And according to this lawsuit, these same guys are sharing violent rape fantasies that they allegedly want children to witness with unnamed federal judges. Just let that sink in.

[Leah Littman]

Over the last couple of months, it is fair to say that we have gotten a glimpse into the mind of at least some members of the federal judiciary, and I gotta say, are the men's. Okay, there was that oral argument in Free Speech Speech Coalition versus Paxton, where Justice Alito made very clear that he is kind of a little obsessed with pornhub. So there was that.

[Kate Shaw]

Just the articles. Remember, Melinda?

[Emily Amick]

Just the articles.

[Leah Littman]

Just the articles. Just the articles. Correct. Correct. And then there was the oral argument in Mahmoud vs Taylor where justice Gorsuch made clear that he really can't tell the difference between a woman wearing a leather jacket and a sex woman worker. That seems actually low level compared to this.

[Emily Amick]

Pg, even. You know, we do have a lot of questions about the Judd with Tootie Stone story. Just to take one, who were the federal judges with whom Stone shared his asteroid rape fantasy? Our DMs are open if you have anything to share about this.

[Leah Littman]

Our signal chats are also open.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah.

[Kate Shaw]

I think we need a palate cleanser. Our list is probably. We need a bath palate cleanser. Agreed.

[Emily Amick]

I'm gonna take a drink.

[Kate Shaw]

Okay, take a drink. And for the rest of you, here as a palate cleanser is Justice Kagan asking for another chance to go after the then Texas Solicitor general in an exchange from one of the arguments concerning Texas's ability to challenge the Biden administration immigration policies. So here you go, General, do you.

[Justice Kagan]

Think that there's any immigration policy that you could not challenge under the way you view standing?

[Justice Thomas]

I think that's hard to discuss in the abstract.

[Justice Kagan]

I mean, every single immigration policy and then, you know, not to mention all the other policies in the world, that if a state comes in and says, I got a dollar's worth of costs that I can show you, we're just going to be in a situation where every administration is confronted by suits by states that can, you know, bring up a policy to a dead halt, to a dead stop by just showing a dollar's worth of costs.

[Justice Thomas]

Two points, your honor. The first is, and I can't speak for all states, Obviously, even though 37 of them are participating in this case and none have adopted the United States theory of standing, Texas has more than half of the southern states.

[Justice Kagan]

That's not responsive to my question. I'm saying that, like coming in and saying, you know, it seems to us that we have some costs associated with this, and we're not going to look at the benefits, and we're not going to look at the fact that, as Judge Sutton said, the fact that there are priorities, you know, that the person A will be. You know, will not be removed versus person B will. That. That doesn't particularly show that your net costs are even. That your. Your. Your gross costs are going to rise, let alone your net costs. And all of this speculation and all of this kind of like we think we kind of showed it is just not enough, given the backdrop of this case.

[Justice Thomas]

We don't think we showed it. Your honor, a trial court judge reviewable for clear error thinks that we showed it. And he based that on.

[Justice Kagan]

Can I. Can I say something about that? Can I. One more.

[Kate Shaw]

One more.

[Leah Littman]

Please, Chief, just one more shot at him, please. But, Elena, he's already dead.

[Emily Amick]

It's Never enough. I relate to that. So hard you gotta hammer those gnats.

[Melissa Murray]

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[Norm Eisen]

Hey, I'm journalist Sam Sanders.

[Saeed Jones]

I'm poet Saeed Jones.

[Zach Stafford]

And I'm producer Zach Stafford. And we are the hosts of a podcast called Vibe Check.

[Norm Eisen]

On Vibe Check, we talk about everything. News, culture and entertainment and how it all feels.

[Zach Stafford]

That's right. We talk about any and everything on our show, from real life issues like grief to music and movie critiques. And that barely scratches the surface.

[Saeed Jones]

Yes, indeed, and it doesn't stop there. We have got a lot to say, so join our group, chat, come to life, follow and listen to Vibe Check wherever you get your podcasts.

[Emily Amick]

And speaking of pests, what was the Supreme Court up to last week?

[Leah Littman]

Not a whole lot. But they did manage to soft launch Bad Decision season by releasing a single opinion. And it was a Justice Kavanaugh opinion. Which is how you know it's the start of Bad Decisions season. A Brett Kavanaugh opinion is basically like wearing white after Memorial Day.

[Kate Shaw]

All right? Happily, there were no bullet points in this writing, no dadaist poetry. It was an honest to God opinion with paragraphs and everything.

[Leah Littman]

You know what they call that?

[Sam Sanders]

Growth.

[Kate Shaw]

Growth I was gonna guess that. All right, that. However, growth is the only positive thing we will say about this particular Brett Kavanaugh.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah, it's what happens when you go to Yale. You think everything life writing Supreme Court opinions is pass fail. So you do the absolute least like walking off the stage at your own live show. Look, the real problem is we all know Brett Kavanaugh has just peaked intellectually and this is just all he has. So the case 7 County Infrastructure Coalition versus Eagle County Colorado is about the meaning of the National Environmental Policy act, or nepa, which generally requires agencies to provide an environmental impact statement that addresses a proposed project's impact on the environment.

[Leah Littman]

And here the Surface Transportation board approved an 88 mile railroad line that was going to be used to transport crude oil. Very environmentally friendly. And the D.C. circuit perhaps unsurprisingly, determined that the board's environmental impact statement was insufficient to satisfy the demands of nepa.

[Kate Shaw]

But last week, a unanimous Supreme Court concluded that the D.C. circuit was wrong.

[Emily Amick]

The real story here is that although the Republican appointees could have decided the case narrowly as the Democratic appointees preferred. Why do that when you can just go yolo? That's right. The court's YOLO Republicans decided to go real big on this one. Like asteroid size big, Big ball big.

[Kate Shaw]

The Democratic appointees favored a narrow ruling, although they agreed with the bottom line result. The ruling that they preferred would have said the board wasn't required to consider in this case the increase in upstream drilling or downstream refining because the board doesn't have jurisdiction. Right. Doesn't have authority to approve or disapprove either drilling or refining projects.

[Leah Littman]

And Justice Kavanaugh took that personally and decided instead to big ball his way through all of environmental law. His majority opinion said a whole lot of things. So let's recount some of them.

[Melissa Murray]

Yeah.

[Leah Littman]

Yeah, Okay.

[Kate Shaw]

I mean, basically the fact that NEPA is no big deal, it's a law, sure. But isn't it really like a law?

[Leah Littman]

Ish.

[Kate Shaw]

Not a law law. At a minimum, the statute is more of a vibe. So as he put it, and you know, he probably said, hold my beer while doing it, quote, NEPA is a procedural cross check, not a substantive roadblock. NEPA does not require the agency to weigh environmental consequences in any particular way. Rather, an agency may weigh environmental consequences as the agency reasonably sees fit under its governing statute and any relevant substantive environmental laws.

[Leah Littman]

He also took some substantive swipes at nepa, as you just heard. But more importantly, he took some real swipes at the prospect of judges judging so here's another quote. He wrote, quote, some courts have engaged in overly intrusive and unpredictable review in NEPA cases. Those rulings have slowed down or blocked many projects and in turn caused litigation averse agencies to take ever more time and to prepare ever longer environmental impact statements for future projects.

[Emily Amick]

Justice Kavanaugh accusing other judges of overly intrusive and unpredictable judicial review just belongs in the dictionary somewhere. So, not surprisingly, we have some thoughts. First, has Brett Kavanaugh been mainlining or chugging or whatever you do with Josh Hawley's book Manhood the Masculine Virtues America Needs? So in that book, Hawley goes through several male archetypes that he thinks men should follow. And one of those archetypes is the builder. As Hawley explains in the book, quote, the antidote to dependence is building.

[Leah Littman]

We've written a lot about Josh Hawley's manhood. And you know what? I'm gonna say that over. Say that over. We have written a law review article about Josh Hawley's book, the Masculine Virtues that America Needs. And I just want to say in that law review article, we talked about how obsessed the Republican justices are with these kind of manhood tropes. And, you know, this is classic Hawley, like Coach K being literally obsessed with the prospect of building something, anything. I mean, this is seriously an edifice complex. Think about it. Think about it. You got to read books for that one.

[Kate Shaw]

Well, I actually do think that Kavanaugh might have read at least one book in addition to Holly's Manhood. And let me read a quote.

[Emily Amick]

Was it a picture book?

[Kate Shaw]

It was, actually. Let me read an excerpt from another excerpt from the Kavanaugh opinion. And then I'll tell you what book I think he read in preparing it. So, quote, fewer projects. So this is, you know, under this expansive reading of nepa, fewer projects make it to the finish line, fewer projects make it to the starting line. That in turn means fewer and more expensive railroads, airports, wind turbines, transmission lines, dams. He loves lists. This guy loves lists. Housing developments, highways, bridges, subways, stadiums, arenas, data centers. That also means fewer jobs as new projects be become difficult to finance and build in a timely fashion. So first I just. Where is the law in this sentence?

[Zach Stafford]

Like who?

[Leah Littman]

Where's the law if you have a list.

[Kate Shaw]

Okay, that's true. But back to Leah's. Guess that it's a picture book. Do you remember those Richard Scarry children's books, like the Animals, Busy Town. So there's like, the Animals performing various municipal and private sector functions. I think those were his sources for this opinion.

[Emily Amick]

But in his zeal to build, Coach Kavanaugh seems to have forgotten some basic conservative talking points. So he writes that the D.C. circuit aired because it, quote, did not afford the board the substantial judicial deference required in NEPA cases. What's that? Deference to agencies. The Chevron doctrine would like a word, sir.

[Kate Shaw]

I love a crowd that responds like that to an invocation of the Chevron doctrine. Seriously, you guys are the best. And, you know, since you're interested, we'll drill down on this for a minute. I mean, she's so excited. Go Chevron.

[Leah Littman]

This was an optional part of the outline, but she's going there.

[Kate Shaw]

I am. I'm building. I'm expanding it in real time. No, I was just going to say, though there are some passages in the opinion that do appear to maybe somewhat limit Loper Bright. Of course, the opinion that overruled Chevron. You all know that. Or maybe it's just language that vindicates those that thought that Loper Bright did leave agencies room to exercise discretion. Discretion under some statutes. But it may be just that. That discretion can be exercised when the court thinks it should and only when the discretion is exercised to the court's liking. I actually think that's what this means. So Coach Kavanaugh does write that as a general matter, when an agency interprets a statute, review of the agency's interpretation is de novo.

[Sam Sanders]

Right?

[Kate Shaw]

That's what Loper Bright says. But he says when an agency exercises discretion granted by a statute review, judicial review is typically conducted under the deferential, arbitrary and capricious standard where the court asks not whether it agrees with the agency decision, but only whether the action was reasonable and reasonably explained.

[Emily Amick]

So, yeah, curious and curiouser. As we mentioned, this isn't the typical cav concurrence in the form of a majority opinion. It does contain full sentences. Perhaps he knew that May 31 is national speak Incomplete Sentences Day, so he wanted needed some practice at that. Still, the sentence level, writing in those complete sentences is quite painful. I'm just going to consider this tortured passage. Quote, A 1970 legislative ACORN has grown over the years into a judicial oak that has hindered infrastructure development.

[Kate Shaw]

I mean, we read these things, so you don't have to. And that, I think, is a service.

[Leah Littman]

Yeah, I just want to say it like we're all here among friends. Brett Kavanaugh might be the Dan Bongino of Pete Hexa.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah, especially the part where Dan Bongino goes on Fox News to cry slash whine about how life and government support service is just so hard giving all podcast hosts a bad name. But you know, it's not just Kavanaugh's mediocre writing, it's the mediocre thought. The opinion reminds me of the Court's order in the cases regarding multi member commissioners, which is to say the second the justices unleash their fed sock sauced theories on the world, be it the unitary executive or overruling Chevron, it's like they realize, oh shit, this law we just made up is not great. It's actually kind of unworkable and crazy. So then they have to announce a bunch of new made up exceptions to their new made up theories.

[Kate Shaw]

The separate writing from Justice Sotomayor, who concurred in the judgment and was joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson are like, so over these guys. So they indicated they would have again reached the same result, but just decided the case on much narrower grounds. They took some healthy swipes at the majority's apparent newfound love for agency deference, at least in some instances. And again, it seems for this court, and you can sort of read this between the lines of the concurrence, the only agency deference the majority can get behind is deference to an agency explaining why environmental considerations should not carry the day. So they write, quote, as the majority points out, agencies often are better equipped to assess or what facts are relevant to their own decision than a court is. And they chased that with a pointed citation to Justice Kagan's dissent in Loeb Bright.

[Emily Amick]

Love it.

[Leah Littman]

I cite myself.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah, the petty energy. I told you so. Live for it. Love it. You know, I think.

[Leah Littman]

Okay, can we. I can't. With the Kavanaugh opinion, can we go to a different bad decision?

[Emily Amick]

Oh, yeah, well, yeah, let's go to a different bad decision. Let's go to the place where it's always bad decision. The fifth Circuit. How did you guess?

[Leah Littman]

I did.

[Emily Amick]

How did you guess? Okay, so basically the fifth Circuit has learned fuck all from the Trump administration scuffle with the Library of Congress and has decided to fuck with some librarians. Stuart Kyle Duncan, who recently has been fairly overshadowed by his 5th Circuit colleagues, had quite the en banc opinion in which he concluded that reading is what? Not fundamental. With apologies to RuPaul's Drag Race.

[Leah Littman]

So to be very clear, the precise question in this case is whether someone may challenge a public library's removal of books as violating the Free State speech clause. And I'm going to give you one guess as to whether. Stuart Kyle Duncan and the 5th Circuit Broughs said that people actually have standing to challenge book banning. I'm going to need one word answers. Ready? 1, 2, 3. You are correct because you listen to this podcast and you know that the Fifth Circuit is America's worst circuit court. In inside. In this particular case, in this. Kyle Stuart Duncan. Stuart Kyle Duncan. What is his name? He says, quote, plaintiffs cannot invoke a right to receive information to challenge a library's removal of books because that would establish. Here's the reading part. A brave new right to receive information from the government in the form of taxpayer funded library books. He really thought he was doing something there. He really did. Really did.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah.

[Kate Shaw]

And I mean, just to be clear, this is not a new right. There are plenty of cases that allow individuals to challenge book bans and censorship, including specifically at libraries. But a full majority of the 5th Circuit decided to overrule decades of precedent to say there is no right to receive information at a public library. And then a different plurality said they thought that censorship at public libraries couldn't be challenged because libraries are a form of government speech and therefore the government can choose what to say by choosing what books to make available. Yeah. Extremely dangerous thinking.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah. And just take a second to compare this case and the reasoning with Mahmoud versus Taylor, where apparently you can challenge the availability of a book at a public school, but here you cannot challenge the removal of a book from a public library because as we all know, books are for bitches and reading is, what, not fundamental.

[Leah Littman]

Now, I know you're curious. What exactly were the books that were at issue in this case? So the books included Isabel Wilkerson's Cast as well as Susan Campbell Bertoletti's. They called themselves the kkk. Not really surprising, because obviously dei, Right. More surprising, though, was the exclusion of the classic children's book in the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak. And I'm honestly racking my brain as to why they found the Night Kitchen so objectionable.

[Kate Shaw]

Okay, so I'm weirdly, the children's book expert on stage, but there's like one picture of this kid falling out of the sky after baking cake for the world, and you see his butt in like a picture a kid. I'm sure that is why. Sure.

[Leah Littman]

Well, that tracks because the other books that were also banned that were on this list, in addition to the Night Kitchen, were books that really seemed to have a kind of butts and flatulence theme. So in addition to the Night Kitchen, Larry the Farting Leprechaun and Freddie the Farting Snowman also caught some strays here. Yeah, but hear me out. I do have to wonder whether any of the 5th Circuit judges who were in attendance at the aforementioned lunch were involved in the decision that prevented individuals from challenging the removal of the Buts and Farts books. Because if that were the case, seems highly coincidental. Very correlative.

[Melissa Murray]

Yeah.

[Kate Shaw]

So I don't know. But I am going to venture a guess that the Fifth Circuit would likely hold in circumstances where books are included as part of a school curriculum, as in Mahmoud vs Taylor. If we're talking about Pride Puppy, those are not government speech. And they can definitely be challenged by.

[Emily Amick]

Objecting parents because the Fed is different or really just because reasons and the gays is how that line would go. But. But don't let Stewart, Kyle Duncan and the 5th Circuit boys win. So I am going to officially declare this summer Hot Indie Bookstore Summer and encourage everyone to buy a book that would trigger your favorite 5th Circuit judge.

[Leah Littman]

Larry the Farting Leprechaun.

[Kate Shaw]

All right, moving right along. As if the courts of no appeal weren't bad enough already, last week the President announced his intention to nominate Emile Beauvais to the Third Circuit. I'm going to quote Matt Siegel on Blue sky paraphrasing Homer Simpson. You thought this was the worst federal judiciary of your life? It was only the worst federal judiciary of your life so far. I mean, it may be that Judd with 2D stones was unavailable. We cannot wait to see what Trump administration position that guy fails up to.

[Leah Littman]

Bovet is obviously very well known in Trump world. He is not only a leader in the current Trump doj, where he pressured federal prosecutors to drop federal charges against New York City's Mayor Eric Adams. That was a move that prompted a spate of resignations. But in addition to that, he was also one of the lawyers who represented the President, then a candidate as defense counsel in the Manhattan DA's hush money trial, where the former president, it should be noted, was convicted of 34 criminal charges. So again, in the spirit of failing up, Beauvais now may get a lifetime partner on the Third Circuit, the very same appellate court that launched the career of our favorite friend of the pod, Samuel A. Alito.

[Emily Amick]

It feels necessary to remind everyone once again that this seat was unoccupied during the Biden administration, and President Biden nominated Adil Manji to fill it. Manji would have been the first Muslim to serve on that court, and indeed any federal appellate court. Some members of the Senate took that personally, questioning Manji's representation of certain clients and his loyalty to the United States because Manji is Muslim and the Senate Democrats let them do it.

[Melissa Murray]

Strict scrutiny is brought to you by bookshop.org, look, we're law professors. We do love the books, but books are the best. I was talking with a good friend from growing up about how we want to spend our money and our time and what we want in our communities. And one of those things, independent bookstores, which help build community, help create better citizens, and they're just fun places to be around. And bookshop.org allows you to support independent bookstores while purchasing books online. When you purchase from bookshop.org, you're supporting more than 2,000 local independent bookstores across the country, ensuring they'll continue to foster culture, curiosity, and a love reading for generations to come. Whether you're searching for an incisive history that helps you make sense of this moment, a novel that sweeps you away, or the perfect gift for a loved one, bookshop.org has you covered. One of my favorite things about the Bookshop ads is being able to share some additional books that I've read as of late and I'm enjoying, so here goes. One is the Duke of Shadows by Meredith Duran. I've been looking for great historical romance. I've read all of Sarah MacLaine and Courtney Milan, and this book, Duke of Shadows, was incredible. I'm going to check out Duran's other books as well. I also reread parts of Claim of Privilege by Barry Siegel as I've been thinking about what's going on in the courts. That book is about a Supreme Court doctrine protecting government secrets that was actually built on a lie. So big. Bookshop.org has launched an ebook app so you can now support local independent bookstores even when you read digitally. Use code strict24 to get 10% off your next [e-mail] that's code [e-mail].

[Justice Kagan]

Hey.

[Norm Eisen]

I'm journalist Sam Sanders.

[Saeed Jones]

I'm poet Saeed Jones.

[Zach Stafford]

And I'm producer Zach Stafford. And we are the hosts of a podcast called Vibe Check.

[Norm Eisen]

On Vibe Check, we talk about everything. News, culture and entertainment and how it all feels.

[Zach Stafford]

That's right, we talk about any and everything on our show, from real life issues like grief to music and movie critiques. And that barely scratches the surface.

[Saeed Jones]

Yes, indeed. And it doesn't stop there. We have got a lot to say, so join our group, chat, come to life, follow and listen to Vibe Check wherever you get your podcasts.

[Leah Littman]

All right, Palate Cleanser thankfully it is not bad decision season everywhere. We got two recent decisions that invalidated for different reasons, the President's taco tariffs. A three judge panel of the Court of International Trade and the District Court for the District of the District of Columbia both concluded that the Trump tariffs were illegal, again for multiple different reasons. Because why? Just pick one. And they would have both blocked the enforcement of the tariffs.

[Kate Shaw]

But alas, because it is still bad decision season for appellate courts. The Federal Circuit issued an administrative stay pausing the Court of International Trades decision at least until June 9th. But the decision of D.C. the D.C. district Court hasn't been paused, at least at the time of this recording.

[Leah Littman]

And the tariff decisions actually generated an absolutely delicious moment on social media wherein one Donald J. Trump, who apparently listens to this pod in his spare time, just like Sam Alito, announced on social media that Leonard Leo is, quote, a bad person and a real sleazebag who in his own way probably hates America.

[Kate Shaw]

I, for one, mourn the end or the possible end of this once beautiful partnership. It really could not have happened to a nicer guy.

[Leah Littman]

All right. And on the topic of more bad appellate decisions, last Friday, the Supreme Court paused a lower court ruling that had blocked the Trump administration from deporting parolees. This withdraws protections against deportation for some 500,000 Cuban, Venezuelan, Nicaraguan and Haitian nationals who actually entered the country lawfully. Justice Jackson dissented from the court's order, writing that the court, quote, undervalues the devastating consequences of allowing the government to precipitously upend the lives and livelihoods of nearly half a million noncitizens while their legal claims are pending.

[Melissa Murray]

She also said that, quote, the court.

[Emily Amick]

Allows the government to do what it wants to do regardless, rendering constraints of law irrelevant and unleashing devastation in the process.

[Kate Shaw]

And we should say, while Jackson wrote, the rest of the court didn't. Right. There was zero in the court's order. There was zero reasoning that justices cannot bestir themselves to write even like a shitty two pages of justification for uprooting the lives of half a million people.

[Emily Amick]

It is galling and it's getting little coverage. But please, legacy and mainstream media, tell me more about the Supreme Court's standing up to the Trump administration on immigration. I get some version of the question, but isn't the Supreme Court actually good now? And don't you feel worried about criticizing the court? Whenever I talk about my book Lawless and I'm like, no, it's not good. See, for example, my book. That's my effort to cite myself, I Cite myself. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Norm Eisen]

Yeah.

[Emily Amick]

So since we're in D.C. i think we have some D.C. ish stuff.

[Kate Shaw]

Well, I think I get the sense there are a few lawyers in the house, and I think they're only lawyers in D.C. oh, no, we love you non lawyers just as much, but. Oh, see, look at that. Yes, all are welcome here. But for those of you who are lawyers and are members of the DC Bar. Can I hear from you? People here are members of the DC Bar.

[Leah Littman]

Guess what? DC Bar members, Brad Bondi, who is the brother of Attorney General. Say it with me, Pamela. Joe Bondi is running for election in the D.C. bar. And I just want to check, is Brad Bondi in the audience tonight? Okay. All right, we can continue.

[Melissa Murray]

Great.

[Emily Amick]

Okay. So, listeners, you'll probably recall in the last few years, as certain individuals who might be named Rudy Giuliani tried to avoid responsibility for their actions, one of the institutions that consistently held errant lawyers to account was bar associations, which can discipline and even move for the disbarment of lawyers who have violated their professional. Professional o.

[Kate Shaw]

So when we say all elections matter, we mean it. If you haven't yet voted in the D.C. bar election, get on it. Voting ends June 4th. All right, with the news duly covered, it is time to chat it up with some friends of the pod, old and new. And for our first segment, we are delighted to welcome to the stage friend of the show, Ambassador Norm Eisen. Norm, welcome. District Scrutiny. Norm, we are so excited to have you here. We are professionally obligated to keep up with the doings of all the lawsuits filed against the Trump administration. And even we find it difficult to stay atop the fire hose of litigation in response to the arson campaign that this administration represents. And as someone responsible, responsible for much of the litigation, as the fire captain, as we are tempted to call you, we want to take some time to kind of ask you about a few of the cases that you're involved with that maybe haven't gotten as much attention as they should. So first, how many times have you sued the Trump administration so far? And then tell us about one or two cases you want to highlight.

[Norm Eisen]

Leah, Kate, Melissa, thanks for having me. Hello, my fellow D.C. troublemakers. So many good troublemakers here. I mingled beforehand. I mingled.

[Emily Amick]

Of course you did.

[Norm Eisen]

That's why I buy the swag and the merch. I didn't take a free one. Back in the green room, we have been at the Democracy Defenders Fund, which is my organization that was born out of the defeat of the attempted coup of 2020. I took all the most battle hardened people and we now we're 40 litigators and communicators and we got ready for this eventuality. There are overall, we're part of a coalition. There's over 250 cases, over 170 orders stopping, wrong doing. We are involved in over 70 of those matters. That's a lot. I'm really tired. There were copious amounts of caffeine in the green room. So two cases that we have worked on just this week, really just in the past 72 hours that exemplify what's going on. Kate and I were talking before Doge and Dugan. It's like Dungeons and Dragons for litigators. Doge and Dugan. Doge we at the Democracy Defenders Fund started the Doge investigation as soon as it was announced. We did dozens of FOIA requests during the transition. I actually applied to be a member of the Doge.

[Kate Shaw]

Did you get an interview?

[Norm Eisen]

I did. No.

[Leah Littman]

The spokeswoman for the Shocking, shocking.

[Norm Eisen]

The spokeswoman for the Doge made the mistake of telling the New York Times we don't want him. He's a Democrat. Boom. Lawsuit number one. Only in the extremely litigious Beltway region does that line get such a vibrant reaction. So we brought the. It was actually the very first lawsuit of any kind against the Trump administration as soon as Donald Trump took his oath of office. By the way, did you notice that he didn't put his hand on a Bible this time around? I heard he left a scorch mark on the Lincoln Bible in the previous. So that was the first of a series of Doge lawsuits. And on Thursday we were in court with wonderful co counsel for a mini trial on one of the worst things Doge has done, which is paw over the data of tens of millions, hundreds of millions of Americans. This particular case concerned Doge's access to data in the Office of Personnel Management, which includes the data of people on this stage because it's every current or former federal government employee and every applicant to work for the federal government. And was a mini trial as one of the reporters called it. We put on a series of witnesses, cross examined the guy in charge from the OPM and he basically it was one of those Perry Mason moments that you so seldom get. He basically admitted that the handling of this data in those chaotic first days of Doge was not according to standards. And the judge suggested after the day long events that she probably was going to rule for us were now she strongly encouraged. Never a great sign when the judge tells the Government, you might want to think about settling this case. The government lawyers, they were not smart. And when they went to the elevator, they were overheard by one of the reporters. One of the government lawyers said, well, I think we lost in there. That appeared.

[Emily Amick]

These are the guys that have all our data. Right.

[Norm Eisen]

So we're going to get some. And I think it's important because there is so much grim news. But there's good news, too. And part of the good news is that this wave of litigation against Doge exposed that Elon Musk had used a chainsaw when he should have used a scalpel. And it helped make him the most hated oligarch in America. And it drove him out of Washington. He's gone. He's gone.

[Leah Littman]

Do you watch a lot of horror movies, Norm?

[Norm Eisen]

I cannot stand horror movies.

[Leah Littman]

Cause there's this trope in the horror movies that when you think the villain is dead.

[Norm Eisen]

Yeah.

[Leah Littman]

He still comes back.

[Norm Eisen]

Don't spoil my weekend, okay? Just at least let me enjoy his actions. This is what I do on Monday morning.

[Leah Littman]

This is what I do. I'm sorry.

[Norm Eisen]

He hates me, by the way. He's tweeted about me more than 30 times. So that's dosh. And there's many more. There's many more of those cases. And again, it's not just Democracy Defenders Fund. Wonderful other organizations who do this. So the other case where really extraordinary case is a criminal one. Democracy Defenders Fund is unusual because we both do the civil cases, but also work in the criminal arena. This was a brief that we filed, in some ways the most amazing brief brief that I've ever filed. And I've filed a lot of them in my 35 years. Just yesterday in the Judge Dugan criminal prosecution. Donald Trump's adventures in the civil courts have been such a fiasco. His first hundred days, he lost 96% of the cases in the month of April.

[Leah Littman]

96.

[Norm Eisen]

You can't do that by accident. You almost have to be determined to lose. They've been such a fiasco that he's turned to his criminal powers for the second hundred days. And we've seen a series of truly shocking. He's targeting Miles Taylor, who worked for him. His employees have attacked a sitting governor, Governor Evers. They're investigating Tish Dan James. I believe her crime is having two houses. Donald Trump cannot forgive that. But the two most serious of this series of criminal cases are the prosecution of a sitting member of the House of Representatives, Representative McIver, and of a judge in Wisconsin for doing nothing more than controlling her courtroom Judge Hannah Dugan. So we are representing at Democracy Defenders Fund, 140 federal and state judges who are. Who filed a brief yesterday defending Judge Dugan. You can applaud those judges. And that is not a normal thing for judges to retire judges to wade into a controversy like this. And because Kate and I talk about these things all the time, she'll appreciate this. The argument that we made in this brief was to flip The Trump v. U.S. immunity case and say, well, if he's immune, then shouldn't Judge Dugan be immune for doing her job?

[Leah Littman]

That's a sick burn, Norm.

[Emily Amick]

It's like an Oprah. It's like an Oprah immunity for you. You get immunity, you get immunity. You get immunity.

[Norm Eisen]

Everybody's immune.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah.

[Leah Littman]

Audience, I want you to look under your chairs right now. Yeah.

[Emily Amick]

So that's a lot of what is happening in the courts. On a recent episode, Melissa posed a profound question. What is a Congress? And where can I get one? Which prompts us to ask, there's one.

[Norm Eisen]

For sale just down the block.

[Emily Amick]

If you have a spare, hand me down Jet. You're looking to offload. That might be the going price. But, Norm, Melissa's question prompts us to ask you about this alleged first branch of government. So you might be aware that the House has passed a budget bill. Not gonna say its cursed alliterative name. Instead, I'll just use Big Ball's bill. And in that bill is a provision we've gotten a bunch of questions about. It's a provision that would prevent federal judges from enforcing contempt citations in any case in which there was no security given. So what does that mean? And what would it do?

[Norm Eisen]

Do get those earmuffs, kids? It's bullshit. It's just another, they got to scratch the itch on Donald Trump and they're just, you know, they're just flexing for Trump is what it would do. What this provision would do is there's an existing. I've had to deal with this in many of our cases. There's an existing rule, federal rule of civil procedure, that requires judges to consider a bond when they are entering injunctive relief. So this new provision would toughen that up a little bit by saying you cannot enforce contempt, which the Trump administration is nothing if not one continuous contempt roadshow. You cannot enforce contempt unless you have imposed a bond. But it doesn't provide. I probably shouldn't say this because the MAGA caucus in the Senate might be listening, but it doesn't give a dollar amount. So the. Like, I had a case where in my appointments Clause case, one of my many cases helped make Washington hot for Musk, the judge imposed a $500 bond. So that's not gonna. There's a huge body of case law under this rule that says, particularly in public interest cases where it would be crippling for obtaining relief, that you can impose a nominal bond. So it's like so much this Congress has done. It's the least productive Congress in history. Donald Trump, all of the energy is sucked up by his failed executive orders. That's what it is. But even if it makes it through the bird bath, the rule for budget bills, reconciliation, to get around 60 votes, which it won't, it doesn't mean a whole hell of a lot.

[Leah Littman]

Just a quick note for the audience. If. If you are interested in working to push back on this bill, our friends at Vote Save America have a table out in the lobby. You can talk with them after the show about how you can get involved in that effort. So that is outside. Yes, yes, Norm, I'm getting a text alert that there is a filing deadline at some D.C. court and you are needed right away. So I think you probably have to go.

[Norm Eisen]

It's the Jed Stone case I've got to file, but I have to tell you that. Can I tell you that slowly.

[Leah Littman]

Thank you. Spill the tea.

[Norm Eisen]

Okay.

[Emily Amick]

As long as you promise. It's like PG 13.

[Norm Eisen]

Is it all right? I won't mention any asteroids. No asteroids. Or other minerals. No minerals.

[Leah Littman]

Okay. You're being very specific about the mineral.

[Norm Eisen]

So Jud Stone is actually in the middle of one of the most notorious campaigns of retaliation against nonprofits in civil society right now. Because just this week, the D.C. circuit reprimanded and chastised the state of Texas, Paxton, for an purported investigation against the wonderful Media Matters organization, a very upstanding investigative media watchdog. Well, guess what? The same day that Judge Stone, after leaving the office based on these allegations in Texas, the same day that Paxton announced that investigation, Elon Musk coming full circle, Elon Musk hired Judge Stone to bring a lawsuit against Media Matters. So he's in the middle of that story, too. But the good news is, the good news is, my friend, the man who brought Fox to its knees on behalf of Dominion, Justin Nelson, has just been retained to Trump try that case. Judd Stone. Watch out. Thank you, guys.

[Kate Shaw]

Thank you so much.

[Melissa Murray]

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[Norm Eisen]

Hey, I'm journalist Sam Sanders.

[Zach Stafford]

I'm Poet Saeed Jones and I'm producer Zach Stafford and we are the hosts of a podcast called Vibe Check.

[Norm Eisen]

On Vibe Check, we talk about everything. News, culture and entertainment. And how it all feels.

[Zach Stafford]

That's right. We talk about any and everything on our show, from real life issues like grief to music and movie critiques and that barely scratches the surface.

[Saeed Jones]

Yes, indeed. And it doesn't stop there. We have got a lot to say, so join our group chat, come to life, follow and listen to vibe check wherever you get your podcasts.

[Leah Littman]

Whoa, that was bracing.

[Emily Amick]

We felt like we needed to end this episode with a big bang. Yes, that is a universe galaxy slash outer space joke. Sorry. So we are going to raise our big ballers and delightedly welcome to the stage our second guest of the evening, lawyer, best selling author and author of the terrific Emily in your phone. Subscribe Stack Emily Amick. All right, Emily, welcome back to Strict Scrutiny in the flesh. It's here.

[Sam Sanders]

Hi everybody.

[Leah Littman]

Hello, DC.

[Emily Amick]

So we thought we would start by talking to you about something that happened in Missouri last week, which we will provide a little bit of context for.

[Leah Littman]

Okay, so listeners, as you know all Too well, in 2022, the Supreme Court decided Dobbs vs Jackson, Women's Health Organization Organization, overturning Roe vs Wade and Planned Parenthood vs Casey and rescinding the constitutional right to an abortion. Thank you. That's exactly that. Is it. Don't worry, there's more booing to come. And the author of that decision was none other than not a friend of the pod, a frenemy of the pod, one Samuel A. Alito. Well, just as Justice Alito envisioned, many states moved immediately to severely restrict or eliminate access to abortion. But perhaps not as Justice Alito envisioned, in other states, the people actually mobilized to protect abortion access. And they did so by using this weird new invention called democracy.

[Emily Amick]

Justice Alito is like democracy don't nowhere ghosted that bitch.

[Leah Littman]

Anyway, so in Michigan and Ohio and in a number of other states, voters went to the ballot box and used methods of direct democracy to actually protect and enshrine greater protections for abortion access in their state constitutions.

[Kate Shaw]

And in last November's election, there were abortion related measures on the ballot. And actually in 10 states, notably, one of those measures which aimed to enshrine abortion access in the state constitution was on the ballot in ruby red Missouri. So, Emily, what was the outcome of that vote? Remind us.

[Leah Littman]

It passed.

[Sam Sanders]

Yeah, the people spoke.

[Leah Littman]

Are you saying conservative women in Missouri don't want to die in parking lots?

[Sam Sanders]

I mean, you'd be shocked to learn.

[Emily Amick]

Yes.

[Leah Littman]

Stunning.

[Sam Sanders]

Yeah.

[Emily Amick]

So on the heels of the ballot measure's success, Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit arguing that Missouri's many abortion restrictions were invalid And a trial judge ruled that the 2022 abortion ban and some, but not all of the state's other restrictive abortion laws violated the new state constitutional amendment and issued an injunction allowing providers to again begin performing the abortion procedure.

[Kate Shaw]

So very straightforward, right? The state constitution protects abortion and access to reproductive freedom. There are state laws that are fatally inconsistent with that new constitutional protection. The trial court did the only reasonable thing, which is to hold those existing state laws impermissible under the newly amended state constitution. But the Missouri attorney general did not allow that obviously correct result to stand and challenged those rulings. And last week, the Missouri Supreme Court sided with the attorney general.

[Leah Littman]

It's actually even worse than that because the Missouri state legislature actually had to pass a law that allowed the attorney general to challenge the court's initial preliminary injunction measure. So that hadn't happened. So they actually passed a law to make it easier to challenge the will of the people.

[Kate Shaw]

And he did. And what, Emily? Just like the Missouri Supreme Court last week, like, what the fuck happened? Like, what did the state Supreme Court do?

[Sam Sanders]

Yeah. So to pregame this event, I headed to pacer, as you do, as one does.

[Kate Shaw]

Most of the room did.

[Emily Amick]

One of our people. One of our people.

[Sam Sanders]

And it was like a really bad nightmare flashback to both law school and being an associate where the Supreme Court was like, there's a four part test and you only completed one part of the test. And I went back and I looked at the circuit court judge's opinion and I was like, I see all four tests here. I think one of the things that we are seeing taking a step backwards. We heard for many, many years that it's about states rights. And we just. Roe is bad because it should be up to the states. Women aren't people. Liberty. That doesn't count those women. But that was obviously always a lie, right? It was always just merely a step in the path towards making sure there's a national abortion ban and the trigger law that Missouri had set up that got knocked down, but they had all these specific regulations set up to make abortion functionally inaccessible. And that's really what we're talking about. And sometimes I'll be talking to young activists and I'll be like, when I was young, I remember 20, 30 years ago, we were trying to fight all of these different regulations. And it was so, so hard because no one would believe us. That was like, this is the path. It's not just about the width of the hallways. Right? Like, that is not really what this is about. It's not about the Licensing. It's not about the waiting periods. It's not about the texts of what you have to read. It's a much bigger plan about reversing our ability to access health care. And that's what we're seeing the Supreme Court do. And I was reading some of the statements made by Republican politicians in Missouri and one Republican member of the legislature said, well, I just don't think people knew what they were voting for.

[Emily Amick]

And such respect for their constituents.

[Sam Sanders]

What is democracy, am I right? And then the Republican Missouri attorney general said, you know, this is about safety for women and making sure Missouri is.

[Emily Amick]

The safest place, protecting them from their own votes.

[Sam Sanders]

Protecting them, yes.

[Emily Amick]

So I guess you already started getting to this. But what does this tell us about the actual appetite for democracy among certain constituencies?

[Leah Littman]

This is a leading question.

[Sam Sanders]

Yeah, let's say the appetite is full for democracy. They don't want it anymore. You know, I think that anti democratic sentiment is such an interesting thing because they like democracy only when it begets their interest. Interests. Right. Like they're very interested in getting votes for themselves. They're just uninterested in anyone who disagrees with them. And the things that they want are becoming representative of an increasingly narrower portion of the population and also likewise becoming increasingly draconian, increasingly authoritarian. Right. Like they're moving, it's getting another inch, an inch, an inch as we move forward. And you know, democracy, I think is. I saw a quote today. This is a little bit of a sidestep here. A little. I saw a little chart today about the difference the number of coal miners in America versus the number of WMATA employees. And there's like twice as many WMATA employees as there are coal miners in America. Right. And like a. We love our metro here. Fund the metro D.C. statehood.

[Kate Shaw]

Yeah.

[Leah Littman]

You know your people, Emily. You really do.

[Sam Sanders]

I didn't plan that, guys. But the reason they talk about these types of things is cause it's all optics and it's all fake.

[Kate Shaw]

Right.

[Sam Sanders]

Like it's. They're messaging to people about things that don't really exist. And I think when they're talking about women's safety and states rights and all of these things, they're messaging about things that don't exist. What they really want is to be dictators.

[Leah Littman]

They're putting the dick in dictator.

[Sam Sanders]

Indeed. Indeed. Emily, you seem up for anything in high school.

[Leah Littman]

Well, guess what, girl, School's in session. Ok, you want to play a little game?

[Sam Sanders]

Well, let's go.

[Leah Littman]

Let's begin.

[Sam Sanders]

Let's begin.

[Emily Amick]

Let the Games begin.

[Leah Littman]

We dreamed up. It wouldn't be a live show without a live game. So we dreamed up a really fantastic game for all of you, and we're gonna play it with Emily. And this game is called who Said It?

[Sam Sanders]

Oh, no.

[Leah Littman]

Samuel Alito. Oh, boo. Or Margaret Atwood. Actually, hard as fuck.

[Sam Sanders]

I'm gonna need help here from you guys.

[Kate Shaw]

You're gonna get it. Yes. Okay, so this is an interactive game, and this is how it's going to work. Emily, we are going to read you a quote. It is going to then be up on the screen. We're going to ask the audience to help you out and applaud if they think this is a quote from one Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. Or two. Margaret Atwood's classic 1985 novel, the novel predictive text, the Handmaid's Tale.

[Leah Littman]

This is the only time in the show where you're actually going to applaud for Samuel Alito.

[Kate Shaw]

All right, I am going to read the first one. Better never means better for everyone. It always means worse for some. Okay, clap if you think this was Alito. All right, some. Clap if you think this was Atwood and we have the audience's view. Emily, what is your answer?

[Sam Sanders]

Well, I thought it was Alito, but I believe in democracy, so I shall choose Handmaid's Tale.

[Kate Shaw]

And the answer is yes.

[Emily Amick]

See, this is why democracy is good.

[Sam Sanders]

This is why democracy works.

[Emily Amick]

Okay. Okay, next one.

[Leah Littman]

They're supposed to show respect because of the nature of our service. All right, audience, clap if you think that was Samuel A. Alito.

[Sam Sanders]

Yeah, I agree.

[Leah Littman]

Got some Alito stands here. Okay, clap if you think that was Margaret Atwood. No Canadians in the house. Okay. All right, Emily, what's your answer?

[Sam Sanders]

I think this is Alito about the flag incident.

[Leah Littman]

Wrong. It's so hard to tell with dystopian texts. Yes, it's so hard.

[Emily Amick]

Next one. I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes. But if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools. Okay, clap if you think this was Samuel Alito. Clap if you think this was Margaret Atwood.

[Sam Sanders]

Emily, I'm gonna go back to trusting democracy and go with Samuel Alito.

[Emily Amick]

You are correct. This is his dissent in Obergefell versus Hodges.

[Melissa Murray]

Yeah.

[Sam Sanders]

Boo.

[Melissa Murray]

Okay.

[Emily Amick]

So next question. The champions of religious liberty, who go out as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves, can expect to find hearts that are open to Their message. Okay, Clap if you think this was Alito. Clap if you think this was Margaret Atwood.

[Sam Sanders]

Emily, I still think it's Alito, but I'm gonna say Handmaid's Tale because I believe in democracy. The people led me wrong.

[Leah Littman]

Trust your gut. Trust your.

[Emily Amick]

This was Alito's 2022 Notre Dame religious Liberty Summit in Rome address.

[Leah Littman]

Okay, can we. Let's parse this for a minute. Like, we gave Brett Kavanaugh a lot of shit earlier for just poor literary references. When have serpents been wise? Isn't like, wouldn't an owl have been better?

[Emily Amick]

Look, the snake in the opening segment of the Reputation portion of the ERAS tour, that snake slapped.

[Leah Littman]

Okay, that was not the snake he's talking about.

[Melissa Murray]

Whatever.

[Leah Littman]

Whatever. I think this was a miss.

[Kate Shaw]

Yeah, duh.

[Leah Littman]

Duh.

[Sam Sanders]

Okay.

[Leah Littman]

All right. Okay. All right, I've got another one for you. Emily, you ready? You look weak. Okay, here we go. It's no excuse that what they did was illegal at the time. Their crimes are retroactive. They have committed atrocities and must be made into examples for the rest. Audience, clap if you think this was Sam Alito. Clap if you think this was Margaret Atwood. Like we said earlier, the worst federal judiciary so far. Emily, what's your choice?

[Sam Sanders]

I'll go with the Handmaid's Tale.

[Leah Littman]

You would be correct.

[Kate Shaw]

All right, next quote. One side or the other is going to win. There can be a way of living together peacefully, but it's difficult because there are differences on fundamental things that can't really be compromised. Do you think this was Sam Alito? And do you think this is Margaret Atwood?

[Leah Littman]

All right.

[Sam Sanders]

Samuel Alito.

[Kate Shaw]

Democracy aligns with. Yeah. The correct result. I mean, that's really a wild quote.

[Leah Littman]

That this was a secret recording.

[Kate Shaw]

Yeah, that's true.

[Leah Littman]

So it did sound more literary, like he was reading.

[Kate Shaw]

That's true. That's true.

[Leah Littman]

All right, this is the last one because this game is really grim. Okay. Okay, here's the last one. Maybe none of this is about control. Maybe it really isn't about who can own whom, who can do what to whom and get away with it, even as far as death. Maybe it's about who can do what to whom and be forgiven for it. Yeah. All right. Please clap if you think that was Sam Alito. Please clap if you think that was Margaret Atwood. Emily.

[Sam Sanders]

Melissa, your reading is just very cinematic, so I feel it is. It's leading the answer. But I will say the Handmaid's Tale.

[Leah Littman]

Correct.

[Emily Amick]

Wasn't that hard?

[Kate Shaw]

It was much harder than it should have.

[Leah Littman]

It was much harder. Maybe someone is reading on that court.

[Emily Amick]

Yeah, well. Or watching the TV series. Okay, so that was bleak. Maybe not as bleak as Joni Ernst telling us. We're all going to die, though, but up there and there, there aren't any prizes. So, Emily, thank you so much for joining us, but you're not going away just yet. So, listeners, again, Emily Substack. Is Emily in your phone? And she is going to stick around for our favorite things. So here's my list from this week. One, Taylor Swift's Instagram post and letter announcing she now owns her art. Two pieces on the Supreme Court's order on Humphrey's executor. I don't even know her. And those would be Kate Shaw's New York Times piece, why is this Supreme Court Handing Trump More Power? And Steve Laddock's piece at one First Living by the Ipsy Dixit. Okay. Also wanted to recommend Adam Serwer's fantastic piece the New Dark Age in the Atlantic and Michelle Goldberg's piece Elon Musk's Legacy is Disease, Starvation, and Death in the New York Times. So in the midst of these fawning exit interviews with Musk and profiles depicting him as this guy who sacrificed so much to be in government, I think Michelle Goldberg plainly and powerfully laid out the case why this guy should be saddled with the consequences of his actions for life. The piece quotes an associate professor of public health who estimates that the cuts Musk made to USAID have already led to 300,000 deaths, many of them children.

[Leah Littman]

Is it my turn now?

[Emily Amick]

Yeah.

[Leah Littman]

Okay. I think I drew the short end of the story in the order. Okay. So my favorite things this week, these shoes. These are by my friend Sarah Sklorondis, who's one of my mom friends in New York. And she makes amazing shoes. Check her out. These I love. And they're on sale, so bonus. Also awesome. This week I saw Cowboy Carter. And not only did I see Cowboy Carter, I saw Jay Z in the elevator bank. And not only did I see Jay Z in the elevator bank, when I told Kate she actually made a popular culture reference.

[Emily Amick]

Yes.

[Kate Shaw]

I told her there was a billion dollars in that elevator with her.

[Leah Littman]

And I was so dumbfounded that I was literally silent for two minutes and then I cried because our baby is growing up.

[Kate Shaw]

It's like my one reference of the year probably. It's graduation season.

[Leah Littman]

Kate is graduating from pop culture school. And I'm so proud.

[Kate Shaw]

You guys have taught me well.

[Leah Littman]

I'm also start. I just Started the new season of and just like that. And I love Nicole Ari Parker's Lisa Todd Wexley and her statement necklaces. You don't know what I'm talking about. Get on it. She is amazing. Get on that. Okay. And then I have an illicit confession to make. Okay. One of my favorite things this week, Small Voice, is that I have been listening on audible to Jake Tapper's book. I know.

[Emily Amick]

Hear her out.

[Leah Littman]

Just hear me out.

[Emily Amick]

I was just hear me out. When she initially shared this.

[Leah Littman]

I'm not reading the book. I'm listening to it. And it is ready by Jake Tapper himself. I'm just gonna say Jake Tapper is so bitchy and petty. And you can hear it in the inflections in his. I mean, like, it is super. The only way it could be bitchier is if it was read by Titus Burgess from the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. No, I know I'm not supposed to like it, and I feel it's a little bit like Corey Lewandowski and Maga Woman. You're not supposed to like it, but you're drawn to it anyway. And I am. I don't know what to say. And so I'm listening to it. And he's just so bitchy. And who even knew? Who even knew?

[Kate Shaw]

I'm still avoiding it, but same, same. I like this.

[Leah Littman]

I'm listening, so you don't have to. Perfect.

[Kate Shaw]

Thank you. All right, I'm just gonna name a couple. One A column in the Times last week. M. Gessens, beware. We are entering a new phase of the Trump era. I mean, the TLDR is like, outrage can be exhausting. It is really hard to sustain a very high level of outrage. But it is imperative to sustain that level of outrage because normalization is what they want and is wildly dangerous.

[Emily Amick]

So.

[Kate Shaw]

We are going to stay mad and you should, too. Okay, couple other things. Norm on his substack had a great piece last week how you help. How you all caps. You helped knock musk out of D.C. and out of politics. Some of the elaborating on some of the points he was making about the broad mobilization and also the litigation. And it actually being a really important result that we saw this last week that has, you know, a lot of participants in sort of getting to that place. And also another Musk must read is Megan Tuohy and Kristen Grimes New York Times piece on the campaign trail. Elon Musk juggled drugs and family drama. And it is like, as salacious as that is a title that's the headline and the piece delivers. And I also saw Cowboy Carter this week. I mean the concert, but also the outfits of all of the concert attendees. Oh my God, it was. Everyone was resplendent. And also in addition to the songs, the weird home video interludes.

[Leah Littman]

They're not weird.

[Kate Shaw]

They were home video interludes. Some were a little weird. All were delightful.

[Leah Littman]

None of them were weird.

[Kate Shaw]

Beyonce deserved a break. She was working really hard. But they included like unexpected cameos of like a blurred out Megyn Kelly. That was delightful and an improvement, honestly.

[Leah Littman]

Improvement.

[Kate Shaw]

So that was a thing I took in and really enjoyed this past week.

[Sam Sanders]

And Emily, I'll add into the pile on I enjoyed learning about the the side effects of ketamine on Elon Musk. You can go Google that yourself. In less erudite things, there's a new Nicole Kidman show in which she wears a cunty bob called Nine Perfect Strangers. It's doing terrible on Rotten Tomatoes. It's doing wonderful things for me. I'm like you guys, we have different stuff standards. I love it. So there's that. I have declared this summer jam Girl summer. And that means a number of different things. Most saliently it means buying the expensive preserves and that really fancy imported French butter, the bureau Bordier butter. Yeah. So a buy yourself the fancy butter and spread it on some good bread. But it also is more like a vibe, right? Like we're simmering, we're preserving, we're like enjoying ourselves, taking a little break. And then the last thing is, my bestie, Joe Piazza, her book is coming out in July. Everyone should read it. It's called Everyone is Lying to youo and it is a trad wife murder mystery. Everyone should pre order it. So you have the most perfect beach read for July.

[Leah Littman]

It's going to be read by Jake Tapper.

[Emily Amick]

It is.

[Sam Sanders]

It is. It is. It's gonna be so bitchy.

[Leah Littman]

All right, before we go, we have some housekeeping. So it costs $0 to subscribe to the Strict Scrutiny YouTube channel? That's right. It is fiscally responsible and constitutionally protected. You don't need Karlin Crow money to get inside court knowledge. Right wing channels are dominating political YouTube right now and their audiences hit subscribe faster than Alito hits publish on a shadow docket opinion. But the algorithm is basically like a swing justice. It goes wherever the numbers go. And more subscribers means more people hear progressive legal takes. So we're asking you to help support progressive media. Smash that subscribe button on the strict scrutiny YouTube channel. Like it's the Major Questions doctrine and you're the Roberts Court. Help us rebalance the media court and the court of public opinion. Because honestly, we don't need any more YouTube original Kavanaughs because the way things are going, our next Supreme Court justice will probably be some YouTube star.

[Emily Amick]

Okay, like us, we have. We have a list of thank yous. So thank you again to our guests, Norm Eisen and Emily Amick. We also want to extend a very special thanks to Sophie Eisenstadt, our tour manager. And we want to extend a very special thanks to our intern, the great Jordan Thomas, who helped us a ton with this episode, especially with a major lift on the Atwood or Alito game. And while we thank Jordan, we wanted to congratulate Jordan for graduating from Harvard Business School, where Jordan was one of the speakers. And in addition to graduating from Harvard, Jordan has one semester left to go before he graduates from Yale Law School. So Jordan is amazing. Please give a warm round of applause for Jordan Thomas. We also want to thank the wonderful Crystal Edge for opening the show. Crystal knows that reading is what fundamental and that the Supreme Court needs more than a little drag in their life or at least some dragging.

[Kate Shaw]

Thank you all for being a wonderful audience. We had much so such a great time. Wait, do you want to take a I do. Melissa really wants to take a selfie.

[Emily Amick]

With all of us.

[Kate Shaw]

Do you want to take a selfie with us?

[Leah Littman]

Strict Scrutiny is a crooked media production hosted and executive produced by Leah Lipman, me, Melissa Murray and Kate Shaw. Produced and edited by Melody Rowell. Michael Goldsmith is our associate producer. We get audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Our music is by Eddie Cooper. We get production support from Madeline Herringer, Katie Long and Ari Schwartz. Matt de Groat is our head head of production and we are thankful for our digital team, Ben Hethcote and Joe Matoski. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East. You can subscribe to Strict Scrutiny on YouTube to catch full episodes, find [e-mail] Strict Scrutiny podcast if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to Strict Scrutiny in your favorite podcast app so you never miss an episode. And if you want to help other people find the show, please rate and review us. It really helps.

[Norm Eisen]

Hey, I'm journalist Sam Sanders.

[Saeed Jones]

I'm Poet Saeed Jones.

[Zach Stafford]

And I'm producer Zach Stafford. And we are the hosts of a podcast called Vibecheck.

[Norm Eisen]

On Vibecheck, we talk about everything, news, culture and entertainment and how it all feels.

[Zach Stafford]

That's right. We talk about any and everything on our show, from real life issues like grief to music and movie critiques, and that barely scratches the surface.

[Saeed Jones]

Yes, indeed. And it doesn't stop there. We have got a lot to say, so join our group, chat, come to life, follow and listen to Vibe Check. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Kate Shaw]

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