Civics 101
How do landmark Supreme Court decisions affect our lives? What does the 2nd Amendment really say? Why does the Senate have so much power? Civics 101 is the podcast about how our democracy works…or is supposed to work, anyway.
Episodes
February 17, 2026 • 38 mins
About a week ago, host Hannah McCarthy stumbled on an article by an historian named Dr. Aaron Fountain Jr. What she read kind of blew her mind, so she decided to give him a call.
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February 10, 2026 • 31 mins
The rules about who could and could not come and live in the United States have changed many times over the last 250 years, but exactly when restrictions were first put on immigration might surprise you.
Today, walking us through the myriad qualitative and quantitative systems surrounding immigration policy is Muzaffar Chishti, Senior Fellow and Director of the Migration Policy Institute.
Here are some links to our episodes ...
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February 3, 2026 • 38 mins
We examine what the current presidential administration tells us about Immigration and Customs Enforcement and what the numbers, courts and history of the agency have to say.
For more information on the data referenced in this episode, you can check out this Politico fact check of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem's statements about ICE, this CATO Institute analysis, this CBS report, and this TRAC report and this Deportation Data Proje...
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January 30, 2026 • 33 mins
Introducing “Safe to Drink:” A New Hampshire town finds out its water has been contaminated by a chemical. The most basic question — whether the water is safe to drink — doesn’t have a clear answer. Nobody seems to know much about this so-called forever chemical, which is weird because… this has all happened before.
From the Document team at New Hampshire Public Radio, "Safe to Drink" is a four-part series about the water contamin...
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January 27, 2026 • 32 mins
In 1985, high school teacher Christa McAuliffe was selected to become the first private citizen to travel to space. After the Challenger explosion that killed her and 6 other astronauts, NASA scrapped its Teacher in Space Project; it was still too risky to send private citizens to space.
40 years later, things are looking very different.
Today, celebrities and billionaires are buying trips on commercial rockets. Private compan...
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January 20, 2026 • 27 mins
After its inception in 1823, the Monroe Doctrine was largely ignored. But after a while, different administrations saw the value in maintaining control over the western hemisphere. And notably, it is having a renaissance in the Trump presidency.
So what IS the Monroe Doctrine? How has it been interpreted in various presidencies? And, most importantly, is it legal under international law? Civics 101 regular Dan Cassino takes u...
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January 13, 2026 • 42 mins
On this episode, we’re talking about the history and evolution of United States’ refugee and asylum policy. We have been a country of exclusion for about as long as we’ve projected the image of a democratic refuge. We talk about what it actually takes to secure refugee or asylum status in the U.S. and how that gargantuan task has been made so much more difficult, if not impossible for some, under the second Trump Administration.
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January 5, 2026 • 21 mins
Sometimes, we just have to make a "101" episode of Civics 101. That is the case this week, in the wake of the arrest of Venezuela's sitting president by the United States. So, what's happening with Venezuela, Maduro, and the Trump administration's plan to "run" that country?
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To ...
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December 30, 2025 • 56 mins
This week Nick appears on The Middle, with Jeremy Hobson. The topic is civility in politics, and they're joined by former New Hampshire State Legislator Doug Teschner and Citizens Count Executive Director Anna Brown.
This episode was recorded live at the Bank of NH Stage in Concord, NH and features audience questions and comments.
Write to us at civics101@nhpr.org to tell us what you think: is there a political middle?
CLIC...
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December 23, 2025 • 26 mins
Today we answer this question from a listener, "Is Santa a criminal?"
We get to the bottom of the myriad actions of the jolly old elf, and whether he could reasonably be tried for civil and criminal violations, including but not limited to trespassing, breaking and entering, voyeurism, stalking, surveillance, burglary, tax evasion, bad labor practices, emotional distress, and (in one instance) involuntary manslaughter.
Taking us th...
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December 16, 2025 • 31 mins
Why does it take, in practice, 60 votes for a bill to pass in the Senate? Why doesn't it seem like anyone is up there talking for days anymore? And why do we even have it in the first place?
Today is all about the filibuster; from its benign origins to its use and misuse, the arguments for and against it, and what it would take to eliminate it entirely. Our guest is Molly Reynolds from the Brookings Institution.
To learn about the ...
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December 9, 2025 • 35 mins
The lottery generates over $70 billion in revenue each year. Today on Civics 101 we explore how we got here; from failed lotteries in the Revolutionary War to the Golden Octopus to the Numbers Game to a Mega Millions ticket from your neighborhood shop. Where does all of that money GO? And why are states so dependent on them in the first place?
Taking us on this madcap journey are two experts on the lottery in the US; Kevin Flynn (a...
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December 2, 2025 • 38 mins
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, once upon a time called food stamps, helps nearly 42 million Americans every month. While the 2025 government shutdown showed us what happens when SNAP dries up, we have yet to see the effects of major new legislative changes to the program.
So what, exactly, is SNAP? How does it work? Who gets it? Why do we have it to begin with, and what does it look like now? Our guide is Sara Bleic...
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November 25, 2025 • 27 mins
Today we talk about the myriad procedures involved in getting the Epstein Files Transparency Act passed in record time. How do discharge petitions work? What did HR 581 do exactly? How did it get through the Senate so quickly? And while we're at it, why did it take a record seven weeks to swear in a new representative?
Here is the discharge petition signed by 218 members of Congress.
Here is the full text of HR 581, passed by the ...
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November 18, 2025 • 46 mins
Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein spent nearly a decade making a twelve-hour documentary on the American Revolution. This is what they learned from the thousands of stories and events that resulted in the United States of America. It's a story of world-changing ideas, contradictory figures, myths that do us no good and what it means to be in pursuit of a more perfect union.
You can watch Ken Burns The American Revolution on PBS, PBS.org...
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November 11, 2025 • 27 mins
In sixty years, we have gone from 2 billionaires in the United States to just under 2,000. How on earth did that happen?
Today, Timothy Noah from the New Republic takes us all the way from our framers fearing excessive wealth to the country's first (potential) trillionaire. To learn about their proliferation, their desires, and their outsized effect on American policy, check out his article, How the Billionaires Took Over.
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November 3, 2025 • 31 mins
Off-year elections -- as in, not a presidential or a midterm -- have fairly dismal voter turnout. Yet they matter a great deal. Most of our lives are lived at the local, not the national, level. So why do so many skip their state and local elections?
We spoke with Luis Lozada, the CEO of Democracy Works, to understand why people don't show and why they should.
Democracy Works is a nonpartisan nonprofit dedicated to helping America ...
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October 28, 2025 • 31 mins
The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, has published a Mandate for Leadership since 1981, making policy recommendations to the federal government. The latest edition is part of something much bigger: Project 2025. The newest Mandate is part of a four-pillar project designed to fundamentally change the federal government from the inside. Though President Trump and his team spent his third presidential campaign claiming ...
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October 21, 2025 • 36 mins
This episode is a crossover with our sister NHPR podcast, Outside/In.
What do pastries have to do with environmental justice? Cat butts with the climate crisis? And what US president ate a half-chewed piece of salmon leftover from a bear on reality TV?
Grab a pencil (and maybe a pint?) and get ready for the inaugural Outside/In trivia episode we’re calling “Natural Selection.” We’ve got a game called “Guess That Animal!” We’re test...
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October 16, 2025 • 27 mins
In this episode, we give a brief explanation of what's behind the current government shutdown. The, we explain all the ins and outs of government shutdowns. Have they always been part of our legislative process? How do they happen? And what happens when they happen? Our guest is Charles Tiefer, professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law.
CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast...
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