Professor Elizabeth Joh helps an anxious Roman Mars make sense of the maelstrom of news by teaching us all Constitutional Law
As students go back to school, colleges and universities across the country are preparing for the continuation of protests against the Israel-Hamas war—and claims by other students that the protests are violating their own civil rights. Institutions and courts are now weighing the question: whose free speech matters more?
What’s the connection between former President Donald Trump's attacks on the so-called “Deep State" and a tiny silvery fish? The Supreme Court, of course.
In 1960, a man named Lawrence Robinson was sentenced to 90 days in jail for violating a California law that made it illegal to be addicted to narcotics. This summer, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order telling agencies to clear “dangerous” homeless encampments on state land. What links these two situations? The Eighth Amendment.
After an unprecedented several weeks in politics, some on the right are advancing far-fetched arguments to challenge Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, and a federal judge in Florida threw out the classified documents case against former President Donald Trump.
Neither of these are based on established constitutional precedent.
The concept of presidential immunity is not explicitly stated anywhere in the Constitution. That hasn’t stopped the Supreme Court from essentially creating what Justice Sonia Sotomayor called "a law-free zone around the President."
What does this mean for the criminal cases against former President Trump? And what are the implications for the office of the presidency?
Note: this episode was recorded before the assassination attempt on President Trump.
Professor Elizabeth Joh teaches Intro to Constitutional Law and most of the time this is a pretty straight forward job. But when Trump came into office, everything changed. During the four years of the Trump presidency, Professor Joh would check Twitter five minutes before each class to find out what the 45th President had said and how it jibes with 200 years of the judicial branch interpreting and ruling on the Constitution. Acclaimed podcaster Roman Mars (99% Invisible) was so anxious about all the norms and laws being tested in the Trump era that he asked his neighbor, Elizabeth, to explain what was going on in the world from a Constitutional law perspective. Even after Trump left office, there is still so much for Roman to learn. What Roman Mars Can Learn About Con Law is a weekly, fun, casual Con Law 101 class that uses the tumultuous activities of the executive and legislative branches to teach us all about the US Constitution.
All music for the show comes from Doomtree, an independent hip-hop collective and record label based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Elizabeth Joh is a law professor at the University of California, Davis, School of Law, where she teaches constitutional law and criminal procedure (that’s constitutional law, too). She’s written widely on law and emerging technologies, and has provided commentary for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Slate.
Roman Mars is the host and creator of 99% Invisible, a long running podcast about design, architecture, and other sundry topics. The show won the Webby Award for Best Podcast in 2016 and Mars won the Webby Award for Best Host in 2017. Fast Company named him one of the 100 Most Creative People in 2013. He was a TED main stage speaker in 2015. It is currently the most popular TED Talk about design with over 6.5 million views. 99% Invisible was part of the first cohort of podcasts to be archived in the Library of Congress.