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COURTHOUSE OF HORROR

Opening Arguments

Release Date: 10/31/2025

We knew the Epstein plea deal was awful. Newly released emails make it EVEN WORSE. show art We knew the Epstein plea deal was awful. Newly released emails make it EVEN WORSE.

Opening Arguments

E18 - Congress required the Department of Justice to release (nearly) everything it had from the investigations into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell by December 19th, so of course they pretended to do that on time on Friday afternoon and then waited until everyone was just about to start heading home for the holidays before actually dumping 30,000 pages of anything resembling actual substance into the record on Tuesday morning. We review and discuss new revelations on how much more time Trump spent on Epstein’s plane than we ever knew, the 30-year-old FBI report that could have changed...

info_outline The 1968 Case That Proves the Charlie Kirk Firings Were Illegal show art The 1968 Case That Proves the Charlie Kirk Firings Were Illegal

Opening Arguments

OA1218 - What happens to your first amendment rights when you work for the government? Do you give it all up when you walk in the door? How do we balance the individual right of the worker to speak, against the government’s need to have a functioning work place? Pickering v Board of Education (1968) sets us up to understand how this all works… and why a teacher criticizing Charlie Kirk on their personal Facebook page probably isn’t a fireable offense. Patrons got exclusive content at the end of this one, only available at ! Can you apply these principles to eight cases that...

info_outline The Federalist Says Trump Should Model Horrifically Racist 1920s Immigration Policies. He Already Is. show art The Federalist Says Trump Should Model Horrifically Racist 1920s Immigration Policies. He Already Is.

Opening Arguments

OA1217 - Well, we recorded a bit late to make sure we caught Trump's "announcement" thingy and it was... nothing. But that's good! Matt also takes us through more travel bans that are going into effect and have been way underreported on. But The Federalist has a piece saying not only is this all great, but Trump should . There is no quiet part anymore. But fortunately, Matt has a fun footnote for us to bring us back up!

info_outline The NYT's Biden border article could have been written by Steve Bannon. It is STUNNINGLY bad. show art The NYT's Biden border article could have been written by Steve Bannon. It is STUNNINGLY bad.

Opening Arguments

We begin with a delightful amuse douche from the lawyer of Colorado election tamperer Tina Peters unconditionally demanding her release from state prison because Donald Trump said so before a deep dive into our main story: an absurdly bad take from the New York Times--in both a lengthy print story and an episode of The Daily podcast--on how Joe Biden’s unwillingness to be a border fascist got a border fascist elected. Matt breaks down the real causes of the uptick in asylum seekers to the U.S. during Biden’s term in office (and its many unreported benefits to the economy and the nation)...

info_outline Solitary Confinement Is Inhumane, Traumatizing, and Unnecessary. So Why Are We Still Doing It To People? show art Solitary Confinement Is Inhumane, Traumatizing, and Unnecessary. So Why Are We Still Doing It To People?

Opening Arguments

OA1216 - We welcome incarcerated journalist and advocate Christopher Blackwell, calling from his home at the Washington Corrections Center. Chris is the co-founder and Executive Director of Look2Justice, a non-profit which empowers and advocates currently and formerly incarcerated people through an “inside-out” organizing model. He is also a writer whose work has appeared in (among other places) The New York Times, the Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and The Nation, and is a co-author of the new book Ending Isolation: The Case Against Solitary Confinement. Chris joins to share his story...

info_outline But Who Will Execute the Executer? The Supreme Court. show art But Who Will Execute the Executer? The Supreme Court.

Opening Arguments

OA1215 - We examine why the potential merger of Warner Brothers Discovery with either Netflix or Paramount would almost be certainly illegal under better circumstances before mourning the imminent loss of the independence of the one government agency which is supposed to stop this kind of thing. What exactly is the Federal Trade Commission, and why was destroying it a top priority for Project 2025? We then take a closer look at this week’s oral arguments in Trump v. Slaughter, in which the Supreme Court’s MAGA majority is poised to turn the FTC and dozens of other independent agencies into...

info_outline Ross Douthat says Trump's Christian Nationalism just needs more Christian in it show art Ross Douthat says Trump's Christian Nationalism just needs more Christian in it

Opening Arguments

VR16 - This week on Vapid Response: it’s the Hat and the Hammer, with the return of both New York Times token religious conservative columnist Ross Doot-hat and Newsweek editor-at-large Josh Hammer. We begin with a savory amuse douche in which a Christian influencer preaches against making policy based on “toxic empathy” before reading  Josh Hammer taking her up on the joke by explaining why the U.S. military has the absolute right to kill anyone Josh Hammer wants dead. Finally, Ross Douthat stops in from whatever planet he has been living on with some advice for the Trump...

info_outline Trump Keeps Racking Up Ls in the Courts show art Trump Keeps Racking Up Ls in the Courts

Opening Arguments

OA1214 - As the end of 2025 approaches, we are finding real cause for hope in how federal courts have been handling the Trump administration’s unprecedented assault on the rule of law. In the first of what will be at least two parts, Matt and Thomas speedrun through just a few of the many wins--both big and small--that we have seen in a wide range of categories. Emily Bazelon, The New York Times (11/16/25) (Alien Enemies Act and related contempt litigation) (9/30/25) (7/2/25)  (2/24/25) blocking IRS from sharing taxpayer information with ICE (11/21/25) blocking...

info_outline Is Trump Playing “Pardon, Marry, Kill” With Narcotraffickers? show art Is Trump Playing “Pardon, Marry, Kill” With Narcotraffickers?

Opening Arguments

OA1213 - Thomas is back for an action-packed Rapid Response Friday! This week: we compare the letter that just earned the former President of Honduras a pardon of his conviction for definitely being involved with narcotrafficking against the Trump administration’s excuses for murder on the high seas of Venezuelans suspected to be involved with narcotrafficking--and if House Speaker Mike Johnson actually has a point in blaming Barack Obama for all of this. Matt then takes a quick look at Steve Bannon’s petition for review of his conviction for contempt of Congress by the Supreme Court and...

info_outline Trump hosts (and dozes through) absolutely unhinged Antifa Round Table show art Trump hosts (and dozes through) absolutely unhinged Antifa Round Table

Opening Arguments

Today on Vapid Response Wednesday: weeks after designating “Antifa” a “domestic terror organization,” the White House hosted a panel of MAGA luminaries to update the President on the not-at-all-made-up threat to the nation posed by a thing which demonstrably does not exist. We begin with a short amuse douche, in which Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn is concerned about the extremely real Portland “Antifa hit list”--a thing which definitely exists exactly as described! Matt then explains why the war on “Antifa” is a threat to all of our civil liberties before we take a seat at...

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More Episodes

OA1203 - Happy Halloween! We take shelter from a year of ghoulish legal news in the COURTHOUSE OF HORROR, a cabinet of macabre legal curiosities including:

  1. “SO I TRADEMARKED AN AXE MURDERER”: The historic Lizzie Borden House takes a whack at a nearby coffee shop

  2. “THE BONE DETECTOR”: Recent patent bar survivor Jenessa Seymour brings us the unbelievable story of the spookiest--and silliest!--lie detector ever registered by the US Patent & Trademark Office

  1. “ATTACK OF THE TORTIOUS CLOWNS”: Can you sue a haunted house for your fright-related injuries? 

  1. “THE GREENBRIER GHOST”: The bizarre tale of how a victim’s testimony from beyond the grave helped to convict her killer in an 1896 West Virginia murder trial

  1. “CANDYMAN 5: SUMMARY JUDGMENT”: In a tasty conclusion to last year’s Halloween footnote on consumers disappointed with the spookiness of their seasonal treats, a Florida federal judge finds as a matter of law that there is no wrong way to make a Reese’s.

Finally, we close on a serious note with Jenessa’s guide to how every registered voter can do their part next week to change the plot of our ongoing American horror story.

  1. Order in Ghost Adventures LLC v. Miss Lizzie’s Coffee, LLC, No. 23-2000 (1st 

Cir.)(Selya, J.)(11/15/2024)

  1. “Federal Judge Known for Polysyllabic Prose Dies at 90,” Trip Gabriel, The New York Times, (3/21/2025)

  2. “Would You Confess Your Criminal Misdeeds to This Skeleton?,” Cara Giaimo, Atlas Obscura (5/16/2017)

  3. “Apparatus for Obtaining Criminal Confessions and Photographically Recording Them,” Patent #1749090, H.A. Shelby (filed 8/10/1927)

  4. “The Greenbrier Ghost Reexamined,” Greenbrier Historical Society, Arabeth Balseko (1/20/2022)

  5. Summary judgment order in Munoz v. Six Flags St. Louis LLC (10/12/2022)(Wallach, J.)

  6. Order granting motion to dismiss in Vidal et al v. The Hershey Company, FLSD No. 24-60831 (9/19/2025)(Damian, J.)

  7. “Your Cheat Sheet To The 2025 General Elections,” Daniel Nichanian, Bolts (10/1/2025)

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