Deconstructed with Mehdi Hasan

This week Donald Trump became the first U.S. president to meet with a North Korean head of state, raising the prospect that the repressive dictatorship might finally take steps toward dismantling its nuclear program. But there’s something missing from the conversation: the fact that the United States itself is sitting on the world’s most powerful stockpile of nuclear weapons. Beatrice Fihn, the director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, and William J. Perry, Secretary of Defense under President Clinton, join Mehdi to discuss the nuclear threat closer to home.

Between appointing his daughter and son-in-law to senior White House positions, engaging in business deals with foreign governments, and “encouraging” diplomats and dignitaries to book rooms in his hotels, Donald Trump’s administration is setting new records for executive malfeasance. When corruption is so widespread, so pervasive, so ingrained in the political culture in Washington, D.C. and the executive branch, how do you push back? Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren joins Mehdi Hasan in an exclusive interview to discuss her anti-corruption legislation and how she plans to pull corporate money out of Washington. 

The Trump administration is targeting migrant and refugee children to achieve its policy goal at the border, crack down on immigration, and placate its far right base. More than 700 children have been forcibly separated from both parents at the border and more than 100 of them have been under the age of 4 since last October, according to official figures obtained by the New York Times. Democratic representative Pramila Jayapal, an immigrant herself, joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss the Trump administration’s immigration policies and the unprecedented danger they pose to immigrants and people of color.

Five years ago this week Edward Snowden absconded to Hong Kong with a trove of documents detailing the extent of the U.S. government's global and domestic surveillance programs. Snowden’s leaks helped expose the astonishing reach of the U.S. government's global and, crucially, domestic surveillance programs. More recently we’ve discovered it isn’t just big government that poses a massive threat to our privacy, but also big tech. On this week’s episode of Deconstructed, Edward Snowden joins Mehdi Hasan from Russia to discuss surveillance, tools that can help protect people’s privacy, and the likelihood of a Trump-Putin deal to extradite him.

Two Palestinians join Mehdi Hasan to discuss U.S. coverage of Jerusalem and how to get prominent Democratic politicians to take the Palestinian struggle for freedom seriously. Rula Jebreal was raised in East Jerusalem and is an academic and foreign policy analyst. Linda Sarsour, whose parents immigrated to the U.S. from the Occupied West Bank, is the co-chair of the Women’s March and the former director of the Arab American Association of New York.

The president announced withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal on Tuesday, citing Israeli intel purporting to show that Iran has resumed its nuclear weapons program. Does this move us one step closer to war? Has John Bolton taken the helm of U.S. foreign policy? On this week’s Deconstructed podcast, Tommy Vietor, who served as spokesperson for the U.S. National Security Council under President Obama, breaks down Trump’s latest and scariest political gambit.

Comedian and Hollywood director and producer Judd Apatow joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss the U.S. media’s cozy relationship with politicians. Rather than defending Michelle Wolf as she ridiculed the brazen dishonesty of the President and his equally deceitful staff, journalists at the White House Correspondents Dinner threw her under the bus and stood for the people in the White House who abuse them every day instead. The U.S. media’s friendly relationship with politicians was bad enough under previous administrations, but it’s inexcusable under Donald Trump — a president who, according to James Comey’s memos, jokes in private about having reporters locked up and raped behind bars as a way of getting them to give up their confidential sources. 

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are demonstrating and calling for their right to return to their ancestral lands for the fifth Friday in a row. Israeli forces have been responding with force, killing at least 40 demonstrators and wounding thousands. On episode 6 of Deconstructed, two Israeli activists join Mehdi to speak out against Israel’s human rights abuses of Palestinians. Hagai El Ad is the executive director of B’Tselem and Avner Gvaryahu is a former Israeli paratrooper and current executive director of Breaking the Silence.

Comedian Hasan Minhaj is best known for his work as a correspondent on The Daily Show and his acclaimed stand-up special "Homecoming King." This year he’s slated to host his own talk show on Netflix, and on this week’s podcast he and Mehdi Hasan discuss comedy and free speech in the Trump era. 

The war in Syria has seen seven long years of bloodshed, terror, and foreign interventions. And now, once again, the alleged use of chemical weapons has prompted president Donald Trump to threaten bombing the Assad regime. But on what authority, and with what plan? This week on Deconstructed, Mehdi Hasan speaks to Rep. Barbara Lee, one of the most consistent voices against U.S. military interventions on Capitol Hill. And with former Obama adviser Ilan Goldenberg about whether Trump is following in Obama’s footsteps by going to war without congressional approval.

In her first national interview, Stephon Clark’s fiancée Salena Manni speaks out on his death at the hands of Sacramento police. She calls on President Donald Trump to take action on police violence, and responds to White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who last week called Clark’s death a "local matter." And Professor Ibram X. Kendi of American University joins Mehdi to discuss how America’s history of racist ideas creates the law enforcement environment we see today.

By now you’ve heard about John Bolton’s bluster, warmongering, and disregard for international law. What you probably don’t know is that Trump’s new national security advisor made implicit threats against a diplomat and his children. On this week’s show, Mehdi talks to José  Bustani about that experience with Bolton 16 years ago. He also talks to State Department veteran Thomas Countryman, who served with Bolton and worries that we’re now a step closer to war with both North Korea and Iran.

The Intercept’s Mehdi Hasan sits down with independent senator and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders to discuss why the mainstream press ignores so many of the economic issues that affect the lives of average Americans: poverty, homelessness, and inequality. Fresh off a Facebook town hall with Elizabeth Warren and Michael Moore that was viewed live by nearly two million people, Sanders warns Democrats: “Anyone who thinks Trump cannot win a re-election is just not looking at reality. He can.”

A new podcast from The Intercept that cuts through the political drivel and media misinformation to give you a straight take on one big news story of the week. Hosted by Mehdi Hasan. Coming March 23.