Political Gabfest

Political Gabfest

Voted “Favorite Political Podcast” by Apple Podcasts listeners. Stephen Colbert says "Everybody should listen to the Slate Political Gabfest." The Gabfest, featuring Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz, is the kind of informal and irreverent discussion Washington journalists have after hours over drinks. Want more Political Gabfest? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Political Gabfest show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/gabfestplus to get access wherever you listen.

Episodes

November 27, 2025 66 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss what happens when the government is untrustworthy as a strong pattern of DOJ lying under oath emerges, why the NYC mayor-elect and the president were so cordial with each other in the Oval Office, and how MAGA world continues to fracture as Marjorie Taylor Greene announces her resignation and the Fuentes/Carlson controversy continues. For this week’s Slate Plus bonu...
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This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss a new oral history of President Trump’s Department of Justice, the complex transactional nationalism of this week’s visit from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman with guest Jake Sullivan, former National Security Advisor and co-host of the new podcast The Long Game, and what is likely to happen now that Trump has signed the bill to release the Justice Department’...
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John Dickerson talks with journalist and author Andrew Ross Sorkin about his new book 1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History and How It Shattered a Nation. Recorded live at the 92nd Street Y in NYC, their conversation explores how a decade of optimism, leverage, and moral hazard culminated in the financial collapse that defined modern capitalism. Sorkin details how figures like banker Charles “Sunshine Charlie” M...
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November 13, 2025 61 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss why Democrats caved to end the government shutdown and what comes next, the affordability crisis with guest and editorial director for New York Times Opinion David Leonhardt, and the importance of this week’s spectacle of competing Epstein document drops. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss the consequential career and historic...
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November 6, 2025 59 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss how Tuesday’s decisive election results give a legitimate boost to Democrats’ prospects as they work toward the midterms, whether the Supreme Court justices will finally draw a line on presidential power and protect Congress’s power of the purse in the consequential tariffs case, and how the Trump administration is using SNAP recipients as pawns in a cruel political ...
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October 30, 2025 79 mins
This week, live from Chicago to celebrate 20 years of the Political Gabfest, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the Trump vs. Chicago showdown and the dynamics between progressive and centrist Democrats with former Chicago Mayor and Obama White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, what threat President Trump poses to the future of American elections and how to push back, and memorable moments from Gabfest history....
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This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss how President Trump reacted to the No Kings protests by embracing his own “cult of the ruler” in particularly dramatic fashion, whether the shutdown will eventually break enough government functions to force more urgency in negotiations, and why Young Republicans are fawning over Hitler in group chats. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and Dav...
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Emily Bazelon talks with Yale law professor John Witt about his new book The Radical Fund: How a Band of Visionaries and a Million Dollars Upended America. They explore the remarkable story of the Garland Fund—a small 1920s foundation that bankrolled early work by A. Philip Randolph, and others who would go on to shape the civil rights and labor movements. Witt traces how the fund connected race and class politics, supported the...
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October 16, 2025 58 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the Gaza ceasefire and prospects for long-term peace with Rob Malley, Middle East policy expert and co-author (with Hussein Agha) of the new book Tomorrow is Yesterday: Life, Death, and the Pursuit of Peace in Israel/Palestine, which side is likely to fold first in the ongoing government shutdown, and who benefits as the Supreme Court hears arguments about whether th...
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October 9, 2025 64 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the extremely consequential new Supreme Court term beginning this week, the facts on the ground and the legal questions at play behind Trump’s escalating deployments of troops to US cities, and the likely legal defeat of state bans on conversion therapy. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss the Treasury Department’s unironic pla...
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October 2, 2025 65 mins
This week, John Dickerson, David Plotz, and guest host Juliette Kayyem discuss the disturbing spectacle of military fealty staged by Hegseth and Trump at Quantico, the possible outcomes of the dramatic government shutdown, and the hybrid war Russia appears to be waging with drones over distressed European cities. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, John, David, and guest host Juliette Kayyem discuss the ugly spectacle of US ...
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September 25, 2025 70 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss how Trump is using the powerful machine of government prosecution to reverse-engineer crimes supposedly committed by enemies, his diatribe against Tylenol at the disastrous press conference on autism, and the echoes of past Red Scares in today’s free speech climate with historian Beverly Gage, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making...
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Emily Bazelon talks with author and Yale professor Judith Resnik about her new book, Impermissible Punishments: How Prison Became a Problem for Democracy. They discuss the history of the prison system’s use of punishments like whipping, how the practice came to an end, and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at gabfest@slate.com. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   ...
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September 18, 2025 66 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the government’s intimidation tactics aimed at chilling free speech after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, why Trump seems intent to provoke armed conflict with Venezuela, and how the president and his Republican allies are upending DC self-governance with guest Michael Schaffer (City Cast DC, Politico). For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and Davi...
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September 11, 2025 62 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss the assassination of Charlie Kirk amid an extremely troubling climate of political violence in America, another Supreme Court order with no majority explanation allowing racial profiling by ICE in LA, and a score-settling excerpt from Kamala Harris’s upcoming memoir 107 Days. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss the astonishing ...
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September 4, 2025 60 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss what the spate of legal defeats for the Trump administration portends as cases wind toward the Supreme Court, the real world effects of RFK Jr. gutting the CDC with guest Dr. Josh Sharfstein, and whether Democrats should compel government shutdown or avoid it now that Congress is back. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss NASA V...
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August 28, 2025 66 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss Trump’s brazen effort to smash Fed independence by wielding allegations of mortgage fraud against Fed governor Lisa Cook, the expanding law enforcement role of the National Guard in DC and other cities, and the inexplicable folly of Trump’s all-out assault on the renewable wind industry. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss this w...
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August 21, 2025 67 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz discuss Trump’s deepening takeover of Washington D.C. as National Guard troops from red states arrive, what if anything was accomplished in the whirlwind of Putin-Trump-Zelensky diplomacy, and this week’s launch of the new liberal publication The Argument with its Editor-in-Chief Jerusalem Demsas. For this week’s Slate Plus bonus episode, Emily, John, and David discuss esca...
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Political Gabfest host Emily Bazelon talks with Jonathan Mahler about his new book, The Gods of New York. They discuss the unraveling of Mayor Ed Koch’s New York City; how the city’s current mayoral race is mirroring the past; and more.   Tweet us your questions @SlateGabfest or email us at gabfest@slate.com. (Messages could be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Learn mo...
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August 14, 2025 57 mins
This week, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and guest host Jamelle Bouie discuss the perils of this week’s Trump-plus-Putin (minus Zelensky) summit in Alaska, how Trump’s claimed crime “emergency” provided pretext for National Guard deployment and takeover of D.C. police, and a new presidential memorandum requiring colleges to share admissions data to “verify” that they are not considering race.  For this week’s Slate Plus bonus e...
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