The Aaron Rupar Show

I’m putting the Aaron Rupar Show on indefinite hiatus, and this brief episode explains some of the reasons why. Thank you for listening, and please subscribe to my Public Notice newsletter to follow my work. Cheers! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Melissa Hortman, speaker of the Minnesota House, reflecting on her two decades in the legislature, the state’s Democratic trifecta and this year’s historic legislative session, and much more. Speaker Hortman and I touched upon everything from lessons she took from losing her first two legislative campaigns in resounding fashion to Jesse Ventura's legacy to why Trumpism is such a bad fit for Minnesota Republicans. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Ruth Ben-Ghiat, one of America’s foremost authoritarianism scholars and author of Strongmen and the Lucid Substack. We discuss the factors that contributed to Trump’s rise and MAGA’s parallels to other authoritarian movements, the bizarre GOP primary as a reflection of Trump’s personality cult, the current state of the global struggle been authoritarianism and democracy, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features lawyer and political commentator David Lurie. Topics include a premortem of the DeSantis campaign that David just wrote for Public Notice, the Trump indictments as well as the legal defenses and delaying tactics David expects from Trump's attorneys, why Hunter Biden is actually being treated unfairly by the DOJ, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Justin Higgins, host of the Politics+Media 101 podcast, on his remarkable political biography and the insight it provides into today’s Trumpified GOP. Higgins is a former RNC staffer who did opposition research during the 2016 cycle, but was so turned off by the reality of President Trump that he became a Democrat and ended up working for the Democratic governor of Puerto Rico. We talk about what working for the RNC during Trump’s rise was like, the factors that led to Higgins leaving the GOP, the demise of John Boehner’s speakership and how similar dynamics could take down Kevin McCarthy, why Ron DeSantis’s presidential campaign is floundering, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Liz Dye, who needs no introduction for readers of this newsletter. Liz has done fantastic work here in recent weeks documenting Trump’s mounting legal problems and nonsensical defenses. Now, she joins my podcast to unpack Trump’s January 6-related indictment, including the specific laws he’s accused of breaking, important scenes from Jack Smith’s charging document, the identities and roles of his six co-conspirators, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features comedian Jay Black on his stand-up and the state of political comedy more broadly. Topics include how rising authoritarianism has made joking about politics more challenging, conservatives’ one joke and why Jay is so turned off by it, right-wingers’ difficulty to grasp what censorship is and isn’t, and much more. (“If you start screaming about your diarrhea at a Starbucks and they remove from the Starbucks, you’re not being censored.”) We had a lot of laughs, and I think you will too! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week's edition of the Aaron Rupar Show features Simon Rosenberg, author of the Hopium Chronicles and a longtime Democratic strategist, on the political state of play as we head toward 2024. We discuss the stakes of this election cycle and the importance of MAGA suffering a decisive defeat, Biden's strong record and why Simon isn’t especially worried about it not yet showing up in polling, how Trump's legal problems are an albatross for the whole Republican Party, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features returning guest Juliet Jeske, author of the Decoding Fox News newsletter. We discuss Tucker Carlson’s fading star, Fox News’s new Tucker-free primetime lineup, Ray Epps, Hunter Biden, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Tim Mak, founder and author of The Counteroffensive, discussing what it’s like to do independent human interest journalism from a warzone. We talk about the Ukrainian counteroffensive and what we know about its early progress, how Kyiv residents handle near-nightly missile strikes, the challenges involved in traveling around Ukraine to report these days, what Ukrainians are thinking and saying about US politics, and much more (including, briefly, Ukrainian McDonald’s). Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features regular Public Notice contributor Noah Berlatsky on why he thinks it’s appropriate to describe Trumpism as a fascist movement, how families like his with trans kids are dealing with the GOP’s escalating attacks on the LGBT community, his disagreement with Cenk Uygur about what Biden’s lagging approval ratings mean for 2024, and more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

Public Notice is supported by readers and funded by paid subscribers. To help make this work sustainable, please consider becoming one. This week's episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Nikki McCann Ramírez — politics reporter at Rolling Stone, longtime Fox News watcher for Media Matters, and friend of this newsletter — on how she's detoxing now that she’s no longer watching Tucker Carlson every night, her big picture view on the Trump/DeSantis race, right-wingers threatening to boycott (checks notes) Chick-fil-A, her love of F1 racing, and much more. I really enjoyed our wide-ranging conversation and I think you will too. Check out the audio at the top of this post, or watch the footage below via my YouTube page. New episodes of the show drop each Thursday morning. Next week's will feature Noah Berlatsky, a regular contributor to this newsletter, discussing his work about rising fascism in America. Please share the show with your friends to spread the word. And to support this work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription to Public Notice if you haven’t already. I’ll be back tomorrow with a piece examining the remarkable accomplishments of Minnesota’s Democratic trifecta during the state’s just-completed legislative session. Until then, I hope you like the pod. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

Public Notice is entirely supported by readers and funded by paid subscribers. To support our work, please consider becoming one. This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features returning guest Ron Filipkowski setting the table for the 2024 GOP primary. Hours before Ron DeSantis launched his campaign in sad fashion with a Twitter Space that quickly turned into a technical fiasco, Filipkowski and I discussed why kicking things off in that manner was a strange choice even under the best circumstances. But to my surprise, Filipkowski made a case that DeSantis still has a good chance of beating Trump, and he explained to me how that scenario could unfold. We also talked about the potential the DeSantis/Trump race has to tear apart the Republican Party, Tim Scott’s longshot bid, and much more. Filipkowski is extremely plugged in and doesn’t pull punches, so I hope you’ll enjoy our conversation as much as I did. Listen to it at the top of this post (or wherever you get your podcasts), or watch the footage below via my YouTube page. New episodes drop each Thursday morning. Next week’s guest will be Rolling Stone’s Nikki McCann Ramírez. Please subscribe to my YouTube page and share the show to spread the word. And if you’d like to support my work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription to Public Notice. I’ll be back tomorrow with an explainer on the debt ceiling. Until then, I hope you like the pod. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features tech policy expert Adam Kovacevich, founder and CEO of the Chamber of Progress. We discuss artificial intelligence and how it could impact the 2024 elections, controversies swirling around TikTok, what Elon Musk gets wrong about content moderation, why Adam is a fan of self-driving cars, and much more. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features one of my favorite political scientists — Brian Klaas of University College London, who I interviewed for the very first edition of Public Notice. Klaas explains why grasping the distinction between “the land of normal politics” and “the land of authoritarian politics” is key to understanding Trump. We also discuss the similarities between the contemporary US and other teetering democracies, as well as what Democrats can do to fight back against a Republican Party that’s incapable of shaking Trumpism. Klaas has expertise both in political campaigning and democratic breakdown, so he brings a lot of insight about this fraught moment in American politics. Listen to the audio of our conversation above, or watch the footage below via my YouTube page. New episodes of the show drop each Thursday morning. If you’ve missed any of the previous ones, check out the full archive here. Please subscribe to my YouTube page and share the show to spread the word. And if you’d like to support my work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription to Public Notice. I’ll be back with much more tomorrow about CNN’s disgraceful Trump town hall. Until then, I hope you enjoy the pod. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features one of my favorite guests yet — Oliver Willis, the OG progressive blogger and author of the highly recommended Oliver Willis Explains Substack. We chop it up about how pro wrestling helps explain modern American politics, “old and busted Donald Trump” and his need for a fresh gimmick, why CNN’s Trump town hall is a desperation move that will likely backfire, Dark Brandon’s incredible babyface heat, and much more. Oliver is not only very insightful, but he nearly made me spit out my coffee at a couple different points. Listen to the audio of our conversation above, or watch the footage below via my YouTube page. Next week’s show will feature political scientist and authoritarianism scholar Brian Klaas. If you’ve missed any of the previous nine episodes, you can check out the full archive here. Please subscribe to my YouTube page and share the show to spread the word. And if you’d like to support my work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription to Public Notice. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

This week’s episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features J. Patrick Coolican, editor in chief of the Minnesota Reformer, sharing his insights about Minnesota politics and the blizzard of progressive legislation the state’s new Democratic trifecta is currently shepherding into law. We also discuss the pitiful condition of the Minnesota GOP, which hasn’t won a statewide election in nearly 20 years, and why the party has such a hard time recruiting electable candidates. Did you know I began my career in journalism covering Minnesota politics a decade ago, back when Republicans controlled the legislature and Democrats were seemingly in disarray? We get into that too. It was a fun conversation, so I hope you’ll check it out. Listen to the audio at the top of the post (and also on whatever platform you get your podcasts), or watch us below via my YouTube page. Next week’s episode will feature legendary progressive blogger Oliver Willis. And if you’ve missed any of the previous eight editions, you can check out the full archive here. Please subscribe to my YouTube page and share the show to spread the word. And if you’d like to support my work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription to Public Notice if you haven’t already. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

The April 19 episode of the Aaron Rupar Show features Dan Froomkin, founder of Press Watch. We discussed Trump’s weaponized lying and how media outlets struggle to handle it, the shortcomings of fact checking as a genre of political journalism, why the press should focus more on “why” and less on "what,” reflexively negative Biden coverage, and much more. Audio of the conversation is available at the top of this post, or you can watch the footage below via my YouTube Page. (And please subscribe while you’re there!) Next week’s episode will feature Minnesota political journalist J. Patrick Coolican. If you missed last week’s featuring Kat Abu, check it out here. The full archives are available here. All eight episodes remain timely, so I encourage you to check them out. Please subscribe to the Aaron Rupar Show wherever you get podcasts and share it with your friends. Thanks! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

Episode 7 of the Aaron Rupar Show features Katherine Abughazaleh of Media Matters discussing her viral TikTok videos, Tucker Carlson’s new interview with Donald Trump, Fox News brain poison and what progressives can do to fight back, and much more. Kat is super insightful about all things Fox News, so I hope you enjoy! Check out the audio of our conversation at the top of the post, or watch the footage below. Next week's episode will feature Dan Froomkin of Press Watch. If you haven’t already, please subscribe to the Aaron Rupar Show wherever you get your podcasts, leave positive reviews where you can, and spread the good word about the show. Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe

Episode 6 of the Aaron Rupar Show features independent journalist and Public Notice contributor Thor Benson. Aaron and Thor talk about Thor’s personal interactions with Stormy Daniels and Elon Musk, work Thor has done about artificial intelligence and creeping authoritarianism, and a timely piece you’ll be able to read soon in this newsletter about how other countries have handled the prosecution of former political leaders. Listen to the audio at the top of this post, or watch the footage below. Next week’s podcast will feature Kat Abu of Media Matters on how she became a TikTok sensation, Tucker Carlson, and much more. If you haven’t already, please subscribe to the Aaron Rupar Show wherever you get your podcasts, leave positive reviews where you can, and spread the good word! Get full access to Public Notice at www.publicnotice.co/subscribe