When the cats are away...well...you know.
In this special episode, Executive Producer Rebecca Lavoie and Senior Producer Christina Phillips follow up on some recent discussions sparked by our newsletter Extra Credit. How do you have a legitimate discussion with someone who has the facts wrong? And what's going on with all of these different trials involving former President Donald Trump?
Click here to read Nick's essay on responding to someone who's wrong.
Extra Credit: How to argue against disinformation; Trump trials update
Note: This transcript was machine-generated and may contain errors.
Rebecca Lavoie: Christina Phillips.
Christina Phillips: Rebecca Lavoie.
Rebecca Lavoie: You know the expression, when the cat's away, the mice will play.
Christina Phillips: Of course I do.I have two cats.
Rebecca Lavoie: I guess you can say this podcast kind of has cats, too, and they're named Nick and Hannah.
Christina Phillips: I think Nick would resent being called a cat, probably.
Rebecca Lavoie: I mean, he's more like a puppy, but Nick and Hannah, they are not here this week. So I'm Rebecca Lavoie
Christina Phillips: And I'm Christina Phillips.
Rebecca Lavoie: And this is a special edition of Civics 101 where we, the executive and senior producers of the show, normally behind the scenes, are taking over the mics. Christina, what exactly are we doing here today?
Christina Phillips: Well, this is a little bit of a format breaker. As you know, we have a newsletter extra credit.
Rebecca Lavoie: It comes out every other week.
Christina Phillips: Yes. And that newsletter is usually a follow up or a supplement to an episode we released. But this edition of Civics 101, we've decided to flip that.
Rebecca Lavoie: That's right. We're making an episode of the podcast to follow up on some newsletter business, so I'm not going to call this a bonus episode per se, but an extra credit episode. Later in the show, we'll be following up on a newsletter you wrote as a sort of follow up to a recent episode we dropped on presidential pardons. That's sort of what your newsletter was about, because it was about Donald Trump's current trial. So we're going to be talking about all of that, right?
Christina Phillips: And, uh, Trump is involved in a lot of court cases, and they're all pretty confusing. So I'm going to walk you through some of them, not all of them, but some of them where they stand, whether or not they could lead to potential self pardons if that reelection happens and what could happen next?
Rebecca Lavoie: You know, I think I'm one of those people who thinks they understand what's going on with all of this, but probably need someone to explain it to me. So I'm really looking forward to that. But first, there's something I was hoping to do on this show today, if that's okay with you.
Christina Phillips: Yes.
Rebecca Lavoie: So I want to talk about a couple of listener responses. We got to an extra credit newsletter. Our regular host, Nick Capodice sent out a couple of weeks ago.
Christina Phillips: And by the way, this is a good time to remind everyone that they can and should sign up for extra credit. Again, that's our free newsletter at Civics101podcast.org.
Rebecca Lavoie: Yes, and we'll also link to that in our show notes on this very episode. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, we released an episode of the podcast hosted and produced by Nick about Federalist ten. Now that's the Federalist paper written by James Madison. That raises this big concern that Madison had that factions could pose a severe threat to our democracy, which is pretty timely, right? I mean, you could say that.
Christina Phillips: Yeah.
Rebecca Lavoie: So we got a listener email in response to that episode and particular to this bit of it, where Nick and his guest, Jeffrey Rosen, they talk about whether Madison's fears are bearing out right now.
Nick Capodice: So Jeff opened his conversation with me talking about Shays Rebellion. So I had to end it by asking about the modern political climate. Maybe Madison wouldn't call our two parties factions, but what about the far edges of a party? Like, what about the recent example of an armed insurrection on the nation's capitol?
News archive: We had a breach of the Capitol, breach of the Capitol, requesting additional resources on the East side as they've broken into that window and they're trying to kick it in, will not.
News archive: Be kept out of this chamber by thugs, mobs or threats.
Jeff Rosen: Whatever a faction is armed mobs representing a minority of the population that are threatening the rule of law and trying to subvert the Constitution, are it? That's exactly what the Constitution is designed to avoid. By any measure, an armed insurrection against the processes of government is a faction, and Madison would have tried to resist it at all costs.
Christina Phillips: Oh, I remember this is that listener email we talked about on slack all morning. They were angry that we'd said that what happened on January 6th was an armed insurrection, specifically that we'd use that word armed in particular.
Rebecca Lavoie: Right. So this listener asserted that that was just inaccurate. And it is a fact that it was an armed insurrection. There are court documents, photos, there are confessions of people, statements who were charged and convicted, who say that they were armed. There's plenty to back up the fact that there were, in fact, weapons present at the Capitol on January 6th.
Christina Phillips: Sure. And there's lots of misinformation about that out there, too, claiming that there weren't guns or weapons there and that it was simply a very peaceful protest. Again, this is an opportunity to remind listeners, you should check out our episode on misinformation and disinformation to find out how all that works, how these things even sort of gain traction in the first place.
Rebecca Lavoie: Yeah, honestly, that's one of, I think our best civics 101 episodes, one of my all time favorites. So anyway, back to Nick. I think it's fair to be transparent and say that Nick is a thoughtful guy. He is a sensitive guy, and he cares about his job hosting this podcast a lot. Yes, and he could not stop thinking about this email and how to respond to this listener. And I should say, we do respond to just about every email we get here at the podcast. The exceptions are rare. Those are the spam emails, the truly insulting emails that just say things about, like our voices or Nick's music choices or whatever. But really, we respond to just about all of them. And it was super important to Nick to respond to this one. He wanted to do it, but he wanted to do it right.
Christina Phillips: Yeah, I remember him talking through how to approach his response with all of us. He was asking, how about this? How about that? And he sent you a couple of drafts to edit, right?
Rebecca Lavoie: He did. And then he wrote about that whole process of thinking about it in a kind of essay for the extra credit newsletter. So I'll link to that edition of the newsletter in our show notes so that everyone can read it. And this essay, I'll just call it that, because that's what it was, an essay. It was called how should we Respond to Someone Who's Wrong?
Christina Phillips: I love that bold title.
Rebecca Lavoie: Yeah, it was an accurate title. And again, full transparency. I edited it and I approved that title because it was accurate. So anyway, I'm going to read you a couple of excerpts of what Nick wrote in that essay. Today's newsletter is not to drag someone for being wrong. It's about me telling you how I struggled with what to say in response to this listener, which I do every time I'm confronted with someone who's sharing misinformation. My first instinct was to find as many articles as I could, from as many sources as possible, and send them to the writer inner. I then put those news sources into media bias fact check to see where they stood in terms of bias as well as accuracy. So I could assure the writer in her that I was sending them a range of journalism that they could review, maybe even trust. My second instinct, and I'm not proud of this, was just to ignore the complaint altogether. So finally, Nick continues, our EP simply suggested that I respond with proof of the facts. What I didn't do, Nick writes, was what I too often do give in to temptation to become Errol Morris and write a ten page long email with a hundred links, like my dad used to send me when I was in college. I didn't get snarky, and I didn't talk about watching the insurrection happen in real time on my friend's couch.
Christina Phillips: I so like, understand deeply this instinct that Nick has. And yeah. And I can't even tell you how many Google docs I have that are just like very long responses that I've written out and them being like, I can't send that.
Rebecca Lavoie: Email, you have to.
Christina Phillips: Send this. Yeah. And then in typical Nick fashion, he included some advice from the late Carl Sagan. Right?
Rebecca Lavoie: He did. And I don't want to spoil that. I'll just say it has to do with fire breathing dragons. And again, make sure to click the link in the show notes for this episode and read Nick's essay for yourself, because it's it's pretty great.
Christina Phillips: So then what happened?
Rebecca Lavoie: Well, Nick did email the listener back, and while they weren't fully swayed by Nick's response, ultimately they did come to some sort of middle ground, and it was incredibly respectful and civil. And I think, Christina, that we should agree that in 2024, respectful and civil is kind of its own big deal in terms of these kind of conversations.
Christina Phillips: Yeah, I would agree. And I think it's something that we're so hungry for. And when we get it, it's like, yes, okay, this is what we want. Yeah.
Rebecca Lavoie: You know what happened then I.
Christina Phillips: Do, but tell me anyway.
Rebecca Lavoie: So we started to hear from other listeners, a whole bunch of them. We probably got more emails about this newsletter than any newsletter we've ever sent out. And even most podcast episodes we've put out. I want to share a couple of those responses with you because they're pretty awesome. Do you want to hear them?
Christina Phillips: Of course I do.
Rebecca Lavoie: Okay. This one was from Charles Cook. He's a retired US Army command sergeant major and was an armor soldier with 32 years of active duty. He told me he was on tanks and in tanks the entire time he was in the service, which is pretty amazing. And by the way, he wrote some amazing details about what a command sergeant major is and does, and I really encourage everyone to look that up. So Charles talked about his job in the military and then wrote, yes, I have had the opportunity to tell people that they are wrong when they were unaware of the fact it can be consuming or fun, depending on how much personality that person has.
Christina Phillips: I too enjoy telling people when they are wrong. I relate to this.
Rebecca Lavoie: You relate to it being fun?
Christina Phillips: Yeah. Sometimes. Yes. Wow.
Rebecca Lavoie: Okay, well, wait for it because Charles continues. Did you understand that it was your mission to be at location X at time Y to perform task Z? A yes or no question, Charles says the person invariably responds with an excuse that does not contain either the word yes or no. I think Charles is equating that to not containing the facts. Right? So I then restate the question. The person probably figures it out by then, but if not, I will restate the question a second time, indicating that this is the second restating of the question. If I get the excuse, i.e. the things that aren't facts, the third time I stop the person and tell them clearly that I will give them ample opportunity to describe their lack of understanding after the yes or no question receives an answer of yes or no. Sometimes Charles says, this goes on far too long. Those are the interesting ones. When a soldier answers correctly on the first time, I ask for any reasons for the lack of performance. And then seriously, it is learning time. But the ones who cannot answer a yes or no question with a yes or a no, those are the fun ones. I think what Charles is saying here is that when you're talking to somebody who either doesn't know the facts or won't state the facts, or can't admit that they aren't speaking about facts, that the inability to just say yes or no is an indicator of that. And, you know, he kind of enjoys having that conversation because it's just binary for him. Right. And so I just think that's a very interesting way of thinking about this kind of conversation. I'm not sure I would think it's as fun as he does. And you do. But anyway, it's one way to handle it. So I do think we should introduce Charles to Nick. I think they would probably have a very interesting conversation.
Christina Phillips: Yeah for sure. And you said we got a lot of emails, so can I hear another one?
Rebecca Lavoie: Yes, I'll read one more. And I love this one because this is from another amazing listener, Kim Barben. She teaches AP, US Government and Politics and honors an academic, a government and civics at Great Valley High School in Malvern, Pennsylvania. And yes, she uses our show in her classroom.
Christina Phillips: I love that.
Rebecca Lavoie: So Kim's email also included some of her experience and some practical advice for dealing with misinformation and how to argue. She wrote in AP government in my introduction unit, I do three key lessons to set the tone for the year one dissent as an American value and how to respond to dissent. Two media literacy I co-teach this with our school librarian over the course of five days. We cover misinformation and disinformation. What are the types of media biases and how to recognize them? How to check the reputation and accuracy of sources using media bias. Org which we love and all sides, as well as Wikipedia and the impact of extremism polarization due to the echo chambers and biased media. Three civil dialog constitutional conversations using materials from the National Constitution Center and Bill of Rights Institute, I teach my students to focus on constitutional questions and not political questions. The students create their own class norms for how to have discussions in the class and how to dissent respectfully. And then Kim ends with these lessons need to be taught to adults too. So, Christina, what do you think of Kim's advice? Would it work on adults?
Christina Phillips: I mean, I have to hope so. This to me, sounds like a better way to have a discussion than what I learned in school. And teachers, I feel they really make you believe that anything could be possible. They really are the best.
Rebecca Lavoie: They really are. And I think that teenagers sometimes make you feel that way too.
Christina Phillips: Oh yeah. All the time.
Rebecca Lavoie: Christina, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, you're going to help me clear up some of my confusion about a particular topic, something you addressed in a recent newsletter. What is up with these court cases around former President Donald Trump? That's when our extra credit episode returns, after a couple of words from our sponsors. But first, I just want to remind you that while this show does have a couple of ads in our break, they don't come close to covering the cost of the work that Nick and Hannah and Christina and our whole team does each and every day to bring you this podcast week after week. Please consider supporting the show. If you value that work, we will put a link in the show notes. If you want to make a donation to support Civics 101, either a one time gift or a monthly gift, it all matters so, so much and we are so grateful for your help. We'll be right back.
BREAK
Rebecca Lavoie: We're back. And this is a special takeover edition of Civics 101 Extra Credit Edition. I'm executive producer Rebecca LaVoy.
Christina Phillips: And I'm senior producer Christina Phillips.
Rebecca Lavoie: And now we're going to take a bit of a turn. Christina, before the break, we talked about an edition of our extra credit newsletter that our esteemed host Nick Capodice recently sent out, but you also pinned an extra credit. Last week, as a follow-up to the episode, we dropped on pardons and I thought, yeah, so we need to talk more about that. So again, Christina, why are we here?
Christina Phillips: Well we're here because there's so much noise around these cases involving former President Donald Trump that I know I'm starting to lose track of how we ended up here in the first place. And with every new update, it feels like, wait, which one is this again? Why should I care?
Rebecca Lavoie: Yeah, I think at this point, you know, with all these like, news alerts coming in on our phones and headlines going across the TV screens, many people feel this case fatigue or this case confusion around this. And this is a really, really good question.
Christina Phillips: And when I was working on this episode on presidential pardons, the big question for that episode and many episodes that we've done recently, has been, what can a president do with their power and what should they do and who holds them accountable? I think specifically for that episode, it was can a president pardon themselves? Like, do they have the power? Should they use that power? It feels like it's sort of underlining everything that we've talked about recently on the show. Yeah.
Rebecca Lavoie: And after your pardons episode dropped, we got some emails from listeners who were just like, I don't understand why how why what? Yeah, yeah. And it just it's a question that everybody seems to have, like it seems like it should be a simple answer, but it's not necessarily a simple answer. So yeah, it's certainly something that's on everyone's minds.
Christina Phillips: Yeah. So here's what I want to try to do. I want to go through the legal cases that have to do specifically with presidential power and privilege. I want to remind us what laws Trump is accused of violating while in office and where these cases are now. And we're not talking about the defamation, fraud or hush money cases in New York, because those don't directly deal with Trump's time as president. And there's enough there. I think already with the three cases I do want to talk about, and I should say we're taping this on Friday, February 16th. So things may have changed by the time this comes out. I'm taking a line from the NPR politics podcast.
Rebecca Lavoie: That's right. Maybe we should say we're taping this on Friday, February 16th at 3:06 p.m.. Yes.
Christina Phillips: And things may have changed since then.
Rebecca Lavoie: Okay. So we are talking about cases again that could intersect with future pardons or Donald Trump pardoning himself. That's why we've picked these ones, right? Yeah.
Christina Phillips: Or they could have to do with Trump and the election. And if Trump is reelected, it's all about this presidential powers thing and him as president potentially.
Rebecca Lavoie: So can you give me the elevator pitch kind of a summary for, for lack of a better word, dummies for each one of these cases?
Christina Phillips: Yeah. I'm approaching this with the friends episode naming scheme.
Friends clip: Hey, how are you doing?
Christina Phillips: We've got the one with the fake electors. The one with the phone call where Trump asks the Georgia Secretary of State to, quote, find 11,780 votes and the one with the classified documents allegedly stored in a bathroom. All right.
Rebecca Lavoie: Let's start with the one with the fake electors.
Christina Phillips: Okay. This is United States versus Donald J. Trump, aka the election interference case. There is another election interference case, the one in Georgia, which we'll talk about in a minute. This one is specifically centered on that time between November 2020, the election, and January 6th, 2021.
Rebecca Lavoie: What are the charges in this case?
Christina Phillips: So there are four charges conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official government proceeding, conspiracy to deprive people of civil rights, and attempting to obstruct an official proceeding. That would be the certification of the election results in Congress that was interrupted by the January 6th riots. So, in other words, Trump is charged with allegedly pressuring state election officials to change their electoral votes, creating a scheme of fake electors in several states, spreading election conspiracy theories and pressuring his vice president to delay the certification of the election. And this is all against the warnings and advice of his own staff and the Justice Department. There were people who were telling him, you shouldn't do this. This doesn't make sense throughout the whole thing, and that is a really important part of the case.
Rebecca Lavoie: So this is the case that's most closely related to January 6th. Those proceedings were the certification of the electoral votes in Congress on January 6th. And so this is what people think of as like the big one.
Christina Phillips: Yeah. And what stands out to me about this case is that there's a limited window between Election Day and the inauguration, where an outgoing president is supposed to be wrapping things up, preparing for the new administration, etc.. And the indictment lays out pages and pages. Ages of alleged behavior, including phone calls, meetings, emails that are devoted exclusively to the outcome of the election. I can't guess how much time Trump would spend planning for the peaceful transition of power, or on his other remaining duties as president, but this indictment paints a picture of the amount of resources he allegedly used in disputing or altering election results.
Rebecca Lavoie: So what are the potential consequences of all of this?
Christina Phillips: Prison time is on the table, potentially. But also, if Trump becomes a convicted felon, he could be restricted from voting, but he could still run for and be elected president.
Rebecca Lavoie: Where does this case stand now as of this taping?
Christina Phillips: Well, the trial hasn't started yet because Trump has filed a motion to dismiss the case on the grounds that he had presidential immunity during this time. And therefore, even if he did all of this stuff, he could because he was president.
Rebecca Lavoie: So that's the case, that immunity issue that's in front of the Supreme Court right now, right?
Christina Phillips: Yeah. So Trump filed a motion to dismiss this case on those presidential immunity grounds, basically saying this shouldn't even happen. Let's throw it out. The judge said no. He appealed. The higher court said no. He appealed to the Supreme Court. And what he did is he asked them to delay the trial while this appeals process is continuing. And so now we're waiting to see if the Supreme Court will take up this question of presidential immunity, or if they're going to let the decision in the lower court stand. And then if the grounds of presidential immunity are dismissed, he could go to trial. As of right now, the judge in that case canceled the original March 4th start date and has not rescheduled it. So it's essentially on pause.
Rebecca Lavoie: So what's.next?
Christina Phillips: Okay, so next we've got the one where Trump allegedly asked the Georgia secretary of state to, quote, find 11,780 votes.
Rebecca Lavoie: All right. This one I know a little bit about this is a state case rather than a federal case.
Christina Phillips: Yes. And Trump is charged in Fulton County, Georgia, with racketeering under the Rico act. Shout out to our episode on that right with 18 other people for conspiracy to steal the 2020 election. And this is a sprawling case. There's a lot of allegations in here against many different people, including attempts to gain access to secure voting equipment, threatening and coercing state election officials, soliciting election officials to violate their oaths, and impersonating a public officer. And Trump is accused in both overseeing and participating in these alleged schemes. And this case also includes those allegations of fake electors that we saw in the federal case. But I sort of see this as the bigger, more sweeping and comprehensive version of that case.
Rebecca Lavoie: Right. So while I say that people view the other case as the big one, this is the one that I think pundits and people who've really been watching things actually have been saying is the one to watch, the one with potentially the most consequences for the most people.
Christina Phillips: Yeah, the federal case feels like it's it's very specific and targeted towards federal violations. And this one has so much in it.
Rebecca Lavoie: All right. So where does this one stand right now.
Christina Phillips: Well this one is delayed. And if you've been watching the.news. For the past couple of. days, it's because Trump's legal team accused the Fulton County District attorney, Fani Willis, who is leading the prosecution, of having an improper relationship with a special prosecutor who worked on the case. So there have been hearings over the last few days, and a judge could decide to potentially remove her and her office from this case if the judge agrees, which would mean that Fulton County and the state of Georgia would need to appoint another prosecutorial team if they even want to move this thing forward.
Rebecca Lavoie: Yeah, this case was very much born in Fani Willis's office, and I have been watching coverage of those hearings, and it's really been something to see. So if Willis is removed from this case, is it possible this case could just end up going away?
Christina Phillips: Yeah for sure. I mean, the state of Georgia could appoint this new prosecutorial team. They could also decide not to. And that team, even if a new team is put in place, could totally change the course of the the charges, how they investigate. And so I do think it's interesting. This is kind of a pattern with Trump's team throughout many of these cases, including the ones we haven't talked about before, things even go to trial. There have been a number of appeals and motions filed by Trump's team to delay or dismiss, on the grounds that the investigation or the charges have no merit, or there's some problem with the prosecution. And that's sort of similar to what we're seeing with the presidential immunity case we just talked about.
Rebecca Lavoie: Okay, so tell me about the one with the classified documents. Those documents in the bathroom that we've seen those photos of?
Christina Phillips: Yeah. Okay, so this is a federal case charging Trump with 40 criminal counts, including conspiracy to obstruct justice, corruptly concealing a document or record, and concealing a document in a federal investigation, among other things. And all this is related to classified documents and sensitive national security information belonging to the government that Trump allegedly took from the white House to his home at Mar a Lago, where he allegedly stored them in hallways, in the bathroom, on an empty stage. And then the.
Rebecca Lavoie: National Archives tried to get them back, and he allegedly hid some of them and didn't tell the truth about having them, and asked staffers to move them around and lie about having them and all of that. Right?
Christina Phillips: Yeah. And at one point, he also claimed that he had the power to declassify them in his head with his mind. But even so, it remains that even if he had declassified these documents, they still are the property of the United States. They are not his private property. So he, as an individual, a private citizen, could not take them from the office when he left. And many presidents have had classified information turn up in their private homes after they leave office. When they dig into their old file cabinets, they're talking to biographers or ghostwriters. But the allegations here are that Trump went to enormous efforts to hide those documents, to lie, and to stop the federal government from getting them back.
Rebecca Lavoie: I do think that people don't understand that, like even your, you know, your notes from phone calls belong to the American people. When you're the president of the United States, your phone messages do your anything you write down, anything you type, your emails, your. It's really incredible. So what is the potential punishment for this one?
Christina Phillips: Well, some of the charges fall under the Espionage Act and are punishable with prison time. He could still run for president if he's elected. He could potentially try to pardon himself. I think the location is a little confusing. So I do want to clarify that that's a federal case. But the trial would happen in the federal district in Florida, where Mar-A-Lago is located, because that's where the alleged crimes happen.
Rebecca Lavoie: All right. So I have to ask you a question, because I know that some listeners will be wondering it. And it's also been in the news. What about President Joe Biden and his connection to classified documents after he left his office, serving under Obama as vice president? Yeah.
Christina Phillips: So Biden was accused of mishandling classified documents during his vice presidency. There was an investigation, and there was a report released earlier this week from the Justice Department, and that was written by special counsel Robert Hur. And ultimately, he said that there wasn't enough evidence to warrant criminal charges. But it did say some things about Biden's mental capacities and age, and that's been getting a lot of news. It sure.
Rebecca Lavoie: Has. But, you know, these cases aren't exactly the same.
Christina Phillips: Yeah And, um, Robert Hur actually spoke directly to this. I think the big difference here is the obstruction of justice thing. When he was contrasting the two cases, Herr said that Trump, quote, not only refused to return the documents for many months, but he also obstructed justice by enlisting others to destroy evidence and then lie about it. And then Herr says that Biden, quote, turned in classified documents and that he, quote, cooperated with the investigation.
Rebecca Lavoie: All right. So where does this documents case stand?
Christina Phillips: Well, originally it was scheduled to start May of 2024, but the judge in charge, Judge Cannon, recently set a hearing for March 1st to see if it should be pushed out. So it hasn't started yet. It might start in the spring, but it might also get delayed.
Rebecca Lavoie: I see a pattern here, so all three of these cases have not reached the trial stage yet, right?
Christina Phillips: We are still in the pretrial stage, and if Trump is reelected in the fall, there is the possibility that he will try to pardon himself in the two federal cases if he were already convicted. But if the cases are still ongoing, which is probably more likely, and he was elected, he could just have a newly appointed attorney general withdraw the charges and end the cases right then and there. And so I think this is where I kind of want to get on a soapbox for a minute, if you don't mind.
Rebecca Lavoie: Oh, absolutely. Christina, I mean, that's why we're here.
Christina Phillips: Okay. So these cases and the other ones we didn't even talk about have sucked up a lot of oxygen right now, which, as someone who has been watching the hearings and reading the legal documents, I am one of those heavy consumers of this news. And I feel a little torn because it's fascinating. The stakes are high, but we're talking about what a president does in office, and this could have repercussions in the short and the long term for what that office is, what the role of the president is. But it's so abstract when it comes to, like you and me, our lives, what we expect our government to do to serve us. So I would like to encourage people to be a little selfish right now when you're thinking about the election, when you're thinking about voting, I think that we should think more about what we. Need from our president. And if you're not sure, think about what you need from those elected officials that are closer to you, both physically and logistically. What government policies directly affect you and who is responsible for them? What can you do as a voter, as a participant in our democracy, to make the government work for you? I don't want that to get lost in all this coverage with these trials, which oftentimes you read the coverage and you need to read for a few paragraphs before you even sort of understand, you know, what are we doing here? Again, what is the point of this case? So so that's sort of my message to people.
Rebecca Lavoie: Are you saying, Christina, that we can also search for accountability much closer to home when it comes to our democracy?
Christina Phillips: Yes, that is exactly what I'm saying.
Rebecca Lavoie: This episode of Civics 101 was produced by me, Rebecca Lavoie, and senior producer Christina Phillips, and a special nod to host Nick Capodice and Hannah McCarthy for the incredible work they do on this show every week. You might not know this fair listener, but Nick and Hannah. They're not just hosts. They are interviewers, script writers, sound designers, editors, audio mixers. They literally do it all, and they so deserve the vacation that they took. And we are so glad that we had the opportunity to take over because they got some rest.
Christina Phillips: Yes, I'm so happy that they took a vacation.
Rebecca Lavoie: Music in this episode includes tracks by Blue Dot sessions, Chris Zabriskie, Ketsa, and Shaolin Dub. Civics 101 is a production of NHPR - New Hampshire Public Radio.