May is supposed to be the calm before June’s opinion storm in SCOTUS-land, but not in Trump’s America. Melissa, Kate, and Leah kick off the show with the latest news, including Stephen Miller’s habeas suspension fantasies and the president’s blatant disregard of the emoluments clause when it comes to free jumbo jets. Then, the hosts are joined by professor Elora Mukherjee of Columbia Law School to break down last week’s oral arguments in the Court’s blockbuster birthright citizenship case.

Hosts’ favorite things:

• Kate: Second Life: Having a Child in the Digital Age, Amanda Hess; Harvard Paid $27 for a Copy of Magna Carta. Surprise! It’s an Original, Stephen Castle (NYT)
• Leah: My Friends, Fredrik Backman; Senator Sheldon Whitehouse on All Rise News;
• Melissa: Weight Watchers Got One Thing Very Right, Jennifer Rubin (NYT); This Is Big: How the Founder of Weight Watchers Changed the World -- And Me, Marisa Meltzer; Forever (Netflix)

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Order your copy of Leah's book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes

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Drop everything and read! This week, the hosts celebrate the release of Leah’s book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes. Just how did the vibes get so rancid? What is Sam Alito’s…whole deal? And where does Taylor Swift factor in? The answers to these questions (and more!) are in the book. Then, after a rundown of the latest news out of the courts and White House, Leah chats with Amanda Litman, author of the latest book from Crooked Reads, When We're in Charge: The Next Generation's Guide to Leadership.

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

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Is this the term when the Court says “see ya” to the Establishment Clause? Leah, Melissa and Kate consider that question in their recap of this week’s religious charter school case, Oklahoma Charter School Board v. Drummond. Also covered: Advocate Lisa Blatt’s run-in with Neil Gorsuch during oral arguments for a disability rights case, opinions concerning SSI benefits and the Department of Transportation, and the Trump administration’s absurd investigation into the Harvard Law Review.

Hosts’ favorite things:

• Kate: Sinners; Is It Happening Here? by Andrew Marantz (New Yorker)
• Leah: Girl on Girl How: Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves, Sophie Gilbert; The Tide is Turning, Dahlia Lithwick (Slate); Trump & Bukele’s Concentration Camp, Andrea Pitzer (NY Mag); Just Security Litigation Tracker
• Melissa: The Secret History of Home Economics: How Trailblazing Women Harnessed the Power of Home and Changed the Way We Live, Danielle Dreilinger; The Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

Kate and Leah recap oral arguments in two big cases the Supreme Court heard this week. The first is about LGBTQ+ inclusive reading materials in public schools, and the second is about the Affordable Care Act's mechanism for ensuring preventative care. There are also developments in the Alien Enemies Act litigation, and a devastating, if predictable, executive order targeting the Civil Rights Act. Plus, Emily Amick, of Emily In Your Phone, joins to discuss the rise of the creepy conservative push to get women to have more babies.

Hosts' Favorite Things:
Leah:

• SCOTUS conservatives seem eager to increase parents' religious rights in public schools by Chris Geidner
• How Sam Alito Inadvertently Revealed His Own Homophobia From the Bench by Mark Joseph Stern
• Deportation to CECOT: The Constitutional Prohibition on Punishment Without Charge or Trial by Ahilan Arulanantham
• REVEALED: Elon and Trump's Plans to Mint More Mothers by Emily Amick
• These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean

Kate:

• The Trump Victim I Can’t Stop Thinking About by Michelle Goldberg
• We Visited Rumeysa Ozturk in Detention. What We Saw Was a Warning to Us All by Sen. Edward J. Markey, Rep. Jim McGovern, and Rep. Ayanna Pressley

Emily:

• Now comes the ‘womanosphere’: the anti-feminist media telling women to be thin, fertile and Republican by Anna Silman
• Everyone is Lying to You by Jo Piazza
• The Testaments by Margaret Atwood
• The Witch Elm by Tana French

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

Leah, Melissa and Kate join forces to dig through the Trump administration’s latest affronts to the law and the possibility that its officials could be held in criminal contempt. They also react in real time to the Court’s decision to take up the question of birthright citizenship and cheer Harvard’s stand against the administration. Finally, they take a look at what’s in front of SCOTUS this week, including a new opportunity for the conservative majority to use the EPA as a punching bag and its latest foray into the culture wars.

Hosts’ favorite things:

• Melissa: White Potus (SNL); Good Dirt, Charmaine Wilkerson; Hacks (Max); Confessions of a Female Founder (with Reshma Saujani)
• Kate: So You Want to be a Dissident Julia Angwin & Ami Fields-Meyer (New Yorker); Who Is Government? The Untold Story of Public Service, Michael Lewis; Just Security (Substack); Judge Wilkinson’s opinion for the 4th circuit on the Abrego Garcia case; Catalina, Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
• Leah: Never Again Will I Visit Auschwitz: A Graphic Family Memoir of Trauma & Inheritance, Ari Richter; The Vibe Shifts Against The Right, Michelle Goldberg (NYT); Harvard’s new website
• Also mentioned this episode: The Supreme Court threatens to bring “Don’t Say Gay” to every classroom in America, Ian Millhiser (Vox); Five Questions About Domestic Use of the Military, Steve Vladek (One First)

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

This week, the Court weighed in on two cases arising out of the Trump administration’s use of the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport people to El Salvador. Kate, Melissa, and Leah break down both rulings, looking at how SCOTUS is giving leeway to the administration. For the second part of the show, Deborah Archer, professor of law at NYU and president of the ACLU, joins to talk about her new book, Dividing Lines: How Transportation Infrastructure Reinforces Racial Inequality.

Hosts’ favorite things this week:

• Leah: Dividing Lines, Deborah Archer; Why Universities Must Start Litigating—and How (The Nation), David Pozen, Ryan Doerfler, and Samuel Bagenstos; The Case for Suing, Adam Unikowsky
• Kate: Princeton President Chris Eisgruber on The Daily; Who Is Government? The Untold Story of Public Service, Michael Lewis
• Melissa: Up Home: One Girl's Journey, Ruth J. Simmons; The White Lotus (Max)

Vote for Less Radical in the Webby Awards here and here!

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky

Jon Lovett joins Leah and Melissa to talk about what’s at stake in this week’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election and what it was like campaigning for Susan Crawford in Madison and Milwaukee. Then, the ladies run through a busy week of argument recaps, opinions, and legal news, covering the relitigation of the Voting Rights Act, the sunsetting of the administrative state, and that text chain.

Hosts’ favorite things this week:

• Leah: After Dobbs, David Cohen & Carol Jaffe; Mayhem, Lady Gaga; Black Bag, Steven Soderbergh; Wrexford & Sloane mystery series by Andrea Penrose; Lawsuits by Wilmer & Jenner challenging wildly unconstitutional executive orders; Judge Howell’s order rejecting the request for her to recuse in the challenge to the EO targeting the Perkins Coie order
• Melissa: Last week’s episode of Strict Scrutiny; A Season of Light, Julie Iromuanya; The Note, Alafair Burke; Yacht Rock: The Dockumentary (Max); Gwyneth and Meghan on Instagram; New Phone; Houthis? (Christian Schneider on X); Text STOP to opt out of war plans (Leta McCullough Seletsky on Bluesky)

Get tickets for STRICT SCRUTINY LIVE – The Bad Decisions Tour 2025!

• 5/31 – Washington DC
• 6/12 – NYC
• 10/4 – Chicago

Learn more: http://crooked.com/events

Pre-order your copy of Leah's forthcoming book, Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes (out May 13th)

Follow us on Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky