The Josh Marshall Podcast

Marcy Wheeler, the investigative journalist behind the blog Empty Wheel, joins the podcast to dig deeper into the infamous Trump Tower meeting. She also shares one aspect of the Trump-Russia story that people aren't necessarily following closely enough. Image Credit: Getty Images / TPM Illustration Listen

We attempt to pick up the pieces Rudy Giuliani left all over cable news this week. Did Trump's lawyer inadvertently reveal damaging information about his client, or was his revelation of yet another Trump Tower meeting part of his master plan all along? Image Credit: Getty Images / TPM Illustration Listen

Historian Gregory Downs discusses his feature article for TPM — the first in TPM’s ten-part series on voting rights and democracy. He discusses how today’s voter suppression battles date back to the post-Civil War period, how voter suppression tactics were developed not just to target freed slaves in the south... Listen

John Sipher, a former member of the CIA Clandestine Service, helps us figure out what in the world is going on with Trump and Putin. Sipher draws on his decades of experience in the CIA to explain that matters of intelligence and tradecraft are not always black and white. Image... Listen

Campaign data guru Ken Strasma joins the podcast this week to help us understand a key part of the new Mueller indictments: that Russian hackers accessed DNC campaign analytics information in September before the 2016 election. Strasma worked on data operations for John Kerry's campaign in 2004, Barack Obama's 2008... Listen

TPM’s lead reporter on the Russia story, Tierney Sneed, joins us from Washington D.C. to talk through the first of Manafort’s trials, getting underway in Virginia later this month. Manafort’s sneaky attempts to push back the trial start date haven’t worked out quite the way he hoped, despite a judge... Listen

TPM managing editor David Kurtz joins the podcast to discuss how he came to the site and how it's grown over the years. After that, we discuss some of the big upcoming stories on TPM's radar and how we will go about covering them. But before that, we take your... Listen

The New Yorker's Adam Davidson joins us again to discuss the ongoing saga of Michael Cohen, including Cohen's recent sit-down with ABC. Does he understand the situation he's in? Davidson also helps break down the civil suit against the Trump Foundation. But before all that, we take your calls. If... Listen

Today we're talking oversight — specifically, what Congress could investigate under Democratic control. From environmental issues to civil rights lawsuits, TPM's Matt Shuham helps us delve into the issues. Before that, we tackle a bizarre scene described in a recent New York Times report on investigative reporter Ali Watkins' relationship... Listen

The big DOJ Inspector General report is notable for what it omits — evidence of anti-Hillary Clinton bias at the FBI, which appears to have influenced James Comey's actions leading up to the 2016 election. We break down some key questions the IG never addressed in his report on the... Listen

Russia's election meddling wasn't restricted to the U.S. A bombshell report out of the UK over the weekend suggests that Russia also worked to swing the Brexit vote in favor of leaving the EU. We also preview two big stories to keep on your radar this week. Image Credit: TPM... Listen

Retired Gen. Michael Hayden, author of the new book "Assault on Intelligence," discusses efforts Russia made to latch onto controversial narratives in the United States even before Donald Trump was running for President. Remember "Jade Helm"? Or Ebola coming across the southern border? Hayden, who served as NSA director and... Listen

We just learned that President Trump dictated his son's statement about the infamous 2016 Trump Tower meeting, so we decided to take a look back at what else was happening around the time that the story came out in July 2017. It turns out there is a lot of evidence... Listen

New Yorker writer Adam Davidson has covered some of Donald Trump's shadiest deals. In this episode, Davidson walks through the recent global financial history that paved the way for Trump to pursue business with unsavory characters. Image Credit: TPM Illustration / Getty Images Listen

The Middle East thread in the Trump-Russia story was substantially fleshed out this week. This thread comes with a new cast of characters — Elliot Broidy, George Nader, Erik Prince, and Israeli social media strategist Joel Zamel — and raises a new set of questions about the Trump administration’s dealings... Listen

Typically one felony charge would be enough to sink a politician, but Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) has been hit with two. Then suddenly on Monday, the prosecution dismissed one of the charges against him. What's going on in the Show Me State? TPM reporter Allegra Kirkland takes us inside... Listen

A lot has happened on the Michael Cohen front in the past 24 hours, so we brought on author Seth Hettena to help us run through the backstory on President Trump's personal attorney. Hettena’s new book, "Trump/Russia: A Definitive History," digs into the history of Trump's relationship with Cohen and... Listen

For years, Donald Trump boasted of being the "king of debt," and his real estate business operated as such. But then in 2006, the Trump Organization started spending hundreds of millions of dollars in cash. What's behind that sudden about-face? Well, that's when Michael Cohen comes into Trump's orbit. Image... Listen

Trump's new lawyer Rudy Giuliani swings by Sean Hannity's set to blow up the President's legal strategy. What's going on here? We break it down in a special episode to catch up on today's news. Image Credit: TPM Illustration / Getty Images Listen

The widening rift between President Trump and his longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen is becoming more clear, as evidenced by the latest issue of the National Enquirer. We go deeper on the history between Trump and Cohen and where things seem to be going next. Image Credit: TPM Illustration /... Listen

Rep. Ruben Gallego, who represents Arizona's 7th District, talks about Democrats' strategy for the midterm elections. He gives his take on the fissures within the Democratic Party and how voters can get involved in 2018. Image Credit: TPM Illustration / Getty Images Listen

Investigative journalist Ronan Farrow discusses his new book, "War on Peace," which chronicles how the U.S. has whittled down its investment in diplomacy. Farrow also discusses his stories that helped spark the #MeToo movement, for which he recently won a Pulitzer Prize. Image Credit: TPM Illustration/Getty Images Listen

We’re back with an extra episode to fill you in on everything we’ve learned about Michael Cohen since our last episode came out. It turns out a key figure in the story is Michael Cohen’s father in law, who has his own history with the taxi business. We break it... Listen

There's been so much Michael Cohen news over the last week, we thought it was time to round it all up in one place. We take you through Cohen's background and how he ended up in Trump's orbit. Hint: It's about the money. Image Credit: TPM Illustration / Getty Images... Listen

Foreign policy journalist Steve Clemons talks about John Bolton taking over as national security adviser. Clemons was involved in an earlier effort to prevent Bolton from becoming United Nations ambassador under President Bush. Stick around to the end, when Clemons reveals a bizarre story about how he was surreptitiously inducted... Listen

Nell Scovell discusses her new book "Just the Funny Parts," about being a woman in the male-dominated world of comedy. She discusses what it was like to collaborate with Sheryl Sandberg on "Lean In" and reveals that she was behind one of President Obama's most legendary funny moments. Image Credit:... Listen

Legal journalist Jeffrey Toobin discusses the Trump-Russia probe, and how his experience working on a previous independent counsel investigation gives him perspective on the Mueller probe. We also discuss the case against Paul Manafort and his connections to some shady associates. Image Credit: TPM Illustration/Getty Images/Photos by:  Larry Marano/Chip Somodevilla/Alex... Listen

Josh is back from vacation to face the mountain of news that occurred last week. We're learning more about Cambridge Analytica, Trump's top outside lawyer called it quits and Stormy Daniels' much-anticipated '60 Minutes' interview finally aired. All that and more on this week's episode. Image Credit: TPM Illustration/Photo by... Listen

Josh talks to Asha Rangappa, a former FBI special agent and current lecturer at Yale. Josh and Asha talk about counter-intelligence investigations, Paul Manafort's role in the Trump campaign and the Stormy Daniels case. Image Credit: TPM Illustration/Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images Listen

Josh sits down with Stormy Daniels' lawyer, Michael Avenatti, to discuss the physical threats Daniels has allegedly received to stay quiet, Stormy’s former lawyer, the “Trump surrogates” allegedly spreading rumors and threatening her and much more. Image Credit: TPM Illustration/Tom Williams/Win McNamee/Getty Images Listen