Trump’s American Takeover

Amicus With Dahlia Lithwick | Law, justice, and the courts

Slate Podcasts

News Commentary, Politics, Government, News

4.6 • 3.1K Ratings

🗓️ 1 February 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you’re punch-drunk and disoriented this week, come on in. Donald J Trump’s second administration is materializing at frightening speed and recklessness and it is hard (and stressful) to keep up with it all. Kim Lane Scheppele, the Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Sociology and International affairs at Princeton University, explains that the speed and viciousness of the legal orders in Trump 2.0 are evidence that America switched over to the fast track for autocracy on January 20th, 2025. An expert in the law of autocracy, Scheppele has seen firsthand what happened to constitutional courts and the democratic norms that governed them in Russia and Hungary and she joins Dahlia Lithwick on Amicus this week to explain how Trump’s executive orders on everything from government funding to transgender people in the military reveal a familiar global playbook that has chillingly familiar endpoints. Un-paywalled episodes' description: Want more Amicus? Join Slate Plus to unlock weekly bonus episodes with exclusive legal analysis. Plus, you’ll access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Amicus show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/amicusplus to get access wherever you listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:24.8	dot com and secure your seats today hey everyone it is mary harris host of slates daily news podcast what
0:33.3	next the election has come and gone and now we are in uncharted territory. It can be hard to
0:40.1	know what or who to focus on, which is why we are launching a new series, which we are calling
0:44.3	main character syndrome. Every other Friday, you'll get a bite-sized debrief on the one thing or
0:49.3	person you need to pay attention to that week. And to help us decide what that thing is,
0:54.4	we're going to need the experts,
0:55.9	the hosts of all your other favorite slate podcasts.
0:59.4	From Dahlia Lithwick at Amicus to Anna Sale over at Death, Sex and Money,
1:03.3	twice a month, a new host is going to join me to talk about the main character in their world,
1:08.3	and why even with all the stories flooding the zone,
1:12.0	you cannot afford to ignore them. Our first bonus episode is now live. This week, TVD's Lizzie O'Leary is going to
1:17.5	join me to answer, what is the deal with Deep Seek? Is it really the opening salvo in a new AI war?
1:24.7	But here's the thing. These episodes are only going to be available to Slate Plus
1:29.3	members. If you are not already a subscriber, you can try it out for free by heading over to
1:34.3	the What Next page on Apple Podcasts and clicking Try Free. Or you can visit slate.com forward
1:40.2	slash what next plus to get access wherever you listen. Once you sign up, you will get a new
1:44.7	episode of main character syndrome every other Friday, and you'll know that it's your financial
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