The Brian Lehrer Show

As the Atlantic Festival takes place in NYC, staff writers and panelists Ashley Parker, staff writer at The Atlantic, former Washington Post White House bureau chief, and Adam Serwer, staff writer at The Atlantic, preview their panels and discuss the latest from the White House particularly the events after the the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

On Sunday, the television drama "The Pitt," about emergency room healthcare workers at a hospital in Pittsburgh, cleaned up at the Emmys with several major wins. Listeners who work in the healthcare profession call in to share what the series meant to them and how accurately it depicted post-COVID healthcare.

Meghna Philip, director of the special litigation unit at the Legal Aid Society, talks about its call for the department of investigation to look into all cases of deaths in police custody, after a fifth death occurred this year.

Hilke Schellmann, investigative reporter, assistant professor of journalism at New York University, and author of The Algorithm: How AI Decides Who Gets Hired, Monitored, Promoted, and Fired, And Why We Need To Fight Back (Grand Central Publishing, 2024), talks about AI's expanding role in the job hiring process for both applicants and employers—and its implications.

Elizabeth Kim, Gothamist and WNYC reporter, and Jimmy Vielkind, New York state issues reporter for Gothamist and WNYC and author of the substack "Notes from Jimmy," talk about the latest in the mayor's race, including Gov. Hochul's endorsement of Zohran Mamdani, and a wrinkle in the relationship between comptroller Brad Lander and Zohran Mamdani.

The Trump administration's recent lethal strikes on purported drug boats in Venezuela drew widespread condemnation from experts in international law. Brian Finucane, senior adviser at the International Crisis Group and a non-resident senior fellow at Reiss Center on Law and Security at NYU Law, talks about the strikes and breaks down their legality, plus discusses the implications of that analysis.

Democratic nominee U.S. Representative Mikie Sherrill (D, NJ-11) talks about her campaign for governor and takes calls from NJ voters.

Looking ahead to the 250th anniversary of the U.S., Jill Lepore, professor of American history at Harvard University, staff writer at The New Yorker, and the author of several books, including We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution (Liveright, 2025), digs into the history of the country's founding document and what it means for the country that it is so difficult, but still possible, to change.

David Brand, housing reporter for WNYC and Gothamist, talks about new City Council legislation to require reporting on unfilled supportive housing units, aimed at decreasing the number of empty units (5,000, as of June). "To fill empty apartments for homeless people, NYC will first start tracking them" (Gothamist, Sept 12)

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has issued a report on the state of children's health. Julie Rovner, chief Washington correspondent, KFF Health News and host of the What the Health? podcast, talks about the details of the report and where it fits into the Trump administration's MAHA initiative.

Almost immediately after Charlie Kirk was shot and killed, videos were circulating on social media, and many people saw the gruesome crime without meaning to just by logging on. Adam Clark Estes, senior technology correspondent at Vox, talks about how little content moderation big tech companies are doing these days, how the algorithm fed off people pausing to watch the video, and how content like this may traumatize vast swaths of people.

Jeffery Mays, New York Times reporter covering politics with a focus on New York City Hall, talks about the new worker and vendor protections passed by the City Council, overriding Mayor Adams' vetoes.

A recent Washington Post article explained how most families have a secret language that only they understand, or a "familect" as some lingusts call it. Listeners call in to share the words in their family that only they use, which are often conjured in the minds of small children and then used for years down the road.

Ari Berman, voting rights correspondent for Mother Jones and author of Minority Rule: The Right-Wing Attack on the Will of the People—and the Fight to Resist It (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024), talks about his latest article on the "rapidly escalating" threats to America’s election system, including how the Trump administration is making it harder to vote, the DOJ's civil rights division has dropped cases investigating gerrymandered maps in states such as Arizona, Georgia, and Texas and more.

Three of our favorite segments from the week, in case you missed them. Lawmakers Attempt to Improve the Ticket-Buying Experience (First) | The City's Rat Czar Shares Progress and Challenges (Starts at 23:40) | Helping Monarch Butterflies Thrive in NYC (Starts at 44:44) If you don't subscribe to the Brian Lehrer Show on iTunes, you can do that here.

As the US economy and consumer preferences fluctuate, listeners in the restaurant industry and their customers share how they're adapting to tariffs, slowed job growth, widespread use of GLP-1 medications altering appetites, and other trends.

Zack Beauchamp, senior correspondent at Vox and the author of The Reactionary Spirit: How America's Most Insidious Political Tradition Swept the World (PublicAffairs, 2024), talks about the debate among Democrats over whether to go along with the Republican plan to fund the government or withhold their votes, resulting in a shutdown. => "The Democrats’ shutdown debate is about something much bigger" (Vox, Sept. 10, 2025)

This week, the French government lost a confidence vote in the National Assembly, forcing the prime minister François Bayrou and his cabinet to resign. Sophie Pedder, Paris bureau chief at The Economist, breaks down the latest and what's on the table for President Emmanuel Macron to remedy what's being called a "collapse" of his government.

James Skoufis, New York State Senator (D - 42nd District), talks about his bill that would regulate the live events ticketing industry, plus shares why he agrees with Zohran Mamdani's petition to FIFA to improve consumers' ticket-buying experience for the men's World Cup, which will be in the US next year.

Kelly Drane, research director at Giffords Law Center, Ned Parker, investigative reporter at Thomson Reuters, and McKay Coppins, staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of Romney: A Reckoning (Simon & Schuster, 2023), talk about guns and the state of political violence in America after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at an event on a Utah college campus.