PODCAST · government
Divided Argument
by Will Baude, Dan Epps
An unscheduled, unpredictable Supreme Court podcast. Hosted by Will Baude and Dan Epps. In partnership with SCOTUSblog.
Episodes
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Shoe of Damocles
We're back after a break, and the August interim docket handed us two per curiam standing rulings. In Trump v. California, the Court stayed the injunction against the mail-ballot executive order because the states' injuries were too hypothetical, even as the Postal Service's final rule has…
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A Thriving Atrocities Practice
After following up on Justice Alito's summer interview, the new birthright-citizenship executive orders, and the Court's record-low approval numbers, we devote the episode to Cisco Systems v. Doe, the Falun Gong surveillance case that closes the door Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain left open for new…
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Very Civilized Orangutans
We squeeze in one more episode before Will's vacation, tying the single-season record in the process. The mailbag then demands a reckoning on whether Magneto's powers are really limited to ferrous metals, along with the origins of the S tier and the truth-value of conditional predictions. The…
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Ice by Magneto
We're back — maybe getting a little too scheduled — with one opinion on the docket: West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox, where the Court held that states may limit girls' and women's sports teams to biological sex without violation Equal Protection or Title IX. First, though, Will…
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The Based Direction
We're back from vacation and chipping away at the summer backlog. Before the substance: listeners weigh in on our AI-generated cover art, Claude's new prediction scorecard grades our respective forecasting records, and Justices Kagan and Barrett take the Court's budget request — and some...
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Norway-Sweden Worshippers
We picked two immigration decisions from the same day over the transgender-sports case because — Dan’s protests notwithstanding — that’s where the interesting law is. In Mullin v. Doe the Court lets the administration terminate temporary protected status for Haiti and Syria, holding the statute’s...
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Weird Islands
It's the last opinion day of the term, and the big one landed: Trump v. Barbara, the birthright-citizenship case. We read the majority as the rare easy case and spend most of the episode on why the four dissents each end up somewhere different — and trying to figure out exactly where they…
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Always Already
The big opinions are coming fast and furious as the Term ends. This episode, we take on two related cases from the penultimate opinion drop day: Trump v. Slaughter, which overrules Humphrey's Executor and clears away for-cause protection for the independent agencies, alongside its interim-docket...
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Mechanical / Animal
We're in triage mode as the Court clears its end-of-term backlog. We run through the week's opinion dump before focusing on two cases that look unrelated but turn on the same question: when may a state rewrite background property law to limit a constitutional right? In Wolford v. Lopez, the Court...
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Alcoholic Originalism
The big opinions are starting to drop, and we're doing our best to keep pace. We first discuss Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections, which concerns religious liberty, the scope of Congress's power to create remedies against individuals under the Spending Clause, and whether there's any...
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Even Eve-ier
A deep dive into the latest Supreme Court news, a couple of unusual shadow docket rulings, and a cross-ideological merits decision that raises classic questions about federal power, preemption, and how much weight lower courts should give to context. We open with reporting on leaked internal...
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Backup backup backup backup argument
We recap and reflect on the oral arguments in Trump v. Barbara (the birthright citizenship case) and then analyze the Court's recent decision in Chiles v. Salazar, about the First Amendment limits on Colorado's conversion therapy ban. We also confront the taboo question: Are judicial opinions too...
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Jezebel Shouting
We're live at WashU Law's Admitted Students Day! After catching up on some shadow docket activity, we dig into Olivier v. City of Brandon, the Court's unanimous March 2026 decision by Justice Kagan. A Mississippi street preacher pleads no-contest to violating an amphitheater protest-zone…
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A Subversive Mission
We announce an exciting new partnership with SCOTUSblog and introduce the show to new listeners. We then return to the mysterious origins of the Chief Justice's "no, no, a thousand times no," debate the Court's new policy designed to maintain secrecy, and then take a close look at Galette v. New...
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Cruel and Unusual and Stupid
It's our live show at the University of Chicago! Hosted by the University of Chicago Federalist Society, we discuss this week's big shadow-docket rulings about gender transitions in California Schools (Mirabelli v. Bonta) and redistricting in New York (Malliotakis v. Williams), and also break…
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Betty Boop or Shakespeare
With unpredictable timeliness, we have a quasi-emergency episode on the 170-page tariffs decision, Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump. Come for the in-the-weeds legal analysis, stay for the deep dive into the origins of the phrase "no, no, a thousand times no."
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Ayn Rand Graffiti
We're back for another live show at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, hosted by the Northwestern Federalist Society! We discuss the term's two Second Amendment arguments -- first recapping the oral argument in Wolford v. Lopez, featuring Hawaii's law about getting consent to bear arms on...
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Bok Choy
With shocking and uncharacteristic efficiency, we manage to discuss three merits opinions and one orders list dissent in only 47 minutes. Specifically, we revisit Coney Island Auto Parts Unlimited, Inc. v. Burton (time limits for moving to vacate void judgments) and break down Berk v. Choy (an…
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Lake Shrimp
We didn't get the tariffs decision this week, but we discuss two of the opinions we did get -- Bost v. Illinois Board of Elections, a decision about standing and election law, and Case v. Montana, a rare Fourth Amendment case -- in a remarkably efficient episode (after a brief detour into Grok's...
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The Marshal and the Margarine
We're back with the first episode of the new year, breaking down the interim docket opinion/order in Trump v. Illinois, the national guard case, after first warming up with new Erie scholarship, state criminal jurisdiction over federal officers, and some recent online discourse.
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Non-Cake Physical Object
We're back to break down a month's worth of shadow docket activity -- three recent summary reversals, plus the stay in the Texas gerrymandering case (Abbott v. LULAC). We also discuss the launch of the SCOTUSblog "interim docket blog."
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Counter-Counter-Counter-Designations
Will and Dan record a rare live show in an unusual venue: the Salamander Resort in Middleburg, Virginia, at the annual attorney retreat for trial boutique Wilkinson Stekloff. Dan teaches Will some of the new lingo he's learned from the firm's trial experts before a deep dive into civil procedure....
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Proximity Mines in the Facility
After a predictably unpredictable set of detours through Latin grammar, parenting philosophies, and 90s video games, we catch up on the latest shadow (interim?) docket activity and recap the oral argument in the tariffs cases.
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Crazy Half-Drunk Unreliable Research Assistant
Divided Argument is in its sixth season! Our first episode of the term focuses, of course, on the latest developments on the shadow docket. These include several grants of interim relief to the Trump administration, as well as some dissents from the denial of certiorari. But first, an update on...
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Proust or Plato
For the season finale, we're joined by Yale law professor Justin Driver to talk about his new book, "The Fall of Affirmative Action: Race, the Supreme Court, and the Future of Higher Education." We discuss the conservative cases for and against affirmative action, the post-SFFA world of…
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Byzantine Wall
We extend our record-breaking run with a discussion of the Court's two big recent emergency docket rulings: Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo and NIH v. American Public Health Association.
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Bedrock Con Law 101
We're joined by Michigan law professor Richard Primus to talk about his new book, "The Oldest Constitutional Question: Enumerated and Federal Power." Richard describes one of the the most widespread beliefs about constitutional law -- that the federal government is one of limited, enumerated…
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Originalism Hulk
Continuing our long slog through the end-of-Term opinion dump, it's fraud day! We dig into Kousisis v. United States and Thompson v. United States, two interesting federal criminal law puzzles.
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The Country of the Future
We finally circle back to the two big structural constitutional law cases from the last day of the term. First is Kennedy v. Braidwood Management, which upheld the appointment structure of the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force under the Affordable Care Act. Then is FCC v. Consumers' Research,...
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The Thunder Docket
Acting with unpredictable alacrity and unpredictable brevity, we break down the Supreme Court's recent interim order in Trump v. Boyle, and discuss what it means for the unitary executive, and for the shadow docket. We also debate the best name for the Court's emergency/interim orders docket.
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Snake-Charmer-Specific
Moving with shockingly unpredictable efficiency, we respond to feedback, debate which of us is more composting-friendly, catch up on the emergency docket, and chip away at our end-of-Term backlog by digging into Diamond Alternative Energy v. EPA.
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Didactic and Inculcatory
We look at the final orders list before summer break, and then continue to work through last month's opinions, this time with an extended analysis of two decisions about children and culture wars -- Mahmoud v. Taylor (religious objections to LGBTQ+-inclusive books) and Free Speech Coalition v....
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Schrödinger's Innocence Right
We talk a bit more about Trump v. CASA, revisit the usage of "general," answer some voicemails, and then turn to Gutierrez v. Saenz, a procedural tangle about whether a death row inmate can sue a state prosecutor over access to DNA testing.
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Why Are We Here?
We celebrate the 100th episode of the podcast with a special cross-over episode with Sarah Isgur at Advisory Opinions! Sarah, Will, and Dan break down today's blockbuster decision in Trump v. CASA, forbidding universal injunctions (and not saying much about birthright citizenship).
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Loose Signification
We're joined by a special guest, Harvard Law Professor Stephen Sachs, to talk about Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization. Fuld is last week's big personal jurisdiction case, where the Court upheld federal laws extending jurisdiction to the PLO and PA for antiterrorism lawsuits. The author of...
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Caesar's Face
After some feedback and further thoughts on our Skrmetti episode and a shocking revelation about "LabCorp," we circle back to an earlier June opinion about religious distinctions, Catholic Charities Bureau v. Wisconsin Labor & Industry Review Commission. Dan keeps Will up past his bedtime.
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Low Horse
Without much introductory ado, we interrupt Will's vacation to give you a thorough breakdown of United States v. Skrmetti, the trans health care case that is one of the most-watched cases of the term.
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Truth and Reconciliation
We start out by debating who's responsible for Dan's audio snafus last time before digging into a various odds and ends, such as the Chief Justice's toast at the Supreme Court Historical Society dinner and President Trump's renunciation of Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society. We then try to…
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Delete This. Call Me.
With apologies for Dan's horrendous audio quality: we catch up on the latest emergency-docket happenings and debate whether Trump v. Wilcox is a big deal or small potatoes. We also catch up on listener feedback and, for the first time in a long time, play a couple of messages received on our...
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Gorsuch Genie
We're joined by NYU law professor Rachel Barkow to talk about her new book Justice Abandoned: How the Supreme Court Ignored the Constitution and Enabled Mass Incarceration. Listen to learn about five (or six) Supreme Court cases that arguably ignored the original meaning of the Constitution to...
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Friends with Oprah Winfrey
We're back with another unexpectedly short and timely episode, focusing on last Friday's emergency docket decision in AARP v. Trump. We also spend a few minutes on a few other orders: the administration's partial victory in Noem v. National TPS Alliance and a puzzling mass recusal.
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A Trees Guy in a Forest Court
We reflect on the death of Justice Souter and sort out some loose ends from the last episode. We then dig into the Court's only opinion from Thursday, Barnes v. Felix, which we previewed with friend of the show Orin Kerr back in February at Stanford. Along the way we make a short detour into...
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Moot, Wrong, and Irrelevant
The shadow docket strikes once again! We break down the Court's unusual immigration ruling in AARP v. Trump (no, not that AARP!), and then briefly discuss the much-heralded ERISA case (Cunningham v. Cornell). But first we discuss some blog news, some SCOTUS news, and some SCOTUSblog news.
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Vaxxed and Relaxed
We have another short administrative law episode, analyzing the Supreme Court's decision about e-cigarettes in FDA v. Wages and White Lion. But first we field some listener pushback about facial challenges in administrative law, and discuss the shadow docket ruling, and ensuing fallout, in Noem…
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In Whack ASAP
Thanks to the Harvard Law Review, we recorded a live episode in the famed Austin Hall at Harvard Law School. While we hoped to discuss merits cases, the Court gave us far too much shadow docket activity to break down.
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Sufficiently IKEA-like
We are back with an unexpectedly concise episode focused on last week's "ghost guns" decision, Bondi v. Vanderstok. But first we talk about the calls to reconsider the Court's Confrontation Clause doctrine and also return to the number of votes needed to call for the views of the Solicitor…
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Stunned But Respectful
We announce the new Divided Argument blog! After discussing the blog and some listener feedback, we break down two recent 5-4 decisions -- the shadow docket fight over USAID funding in Department of State v. Aids Vaccine Advocacy Coalition and the Section 1983 exhaustion decision in Williams v....
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Natural Side Effect
Back in the studio after a couple of fun live shows, we discover that the Court has finally given us too much to talk about. We discuss the new Trump Administration's first shadow docket adventure, a number of interesting solo opinions from the orders list, the decline in summary reversals, and…
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Hypothetical Unicorn
Divided Argument is live from the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, hosted by the Northwestern Federalist Society! We discuss whether we are in the middle of a constitutional crisis, the coming demise of Humphrey's Executor, and various shadow docket developments. Then we preview the issues at...
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Double Negatives
Divided Argument is live from Stanford Law School, hosted by the Stanford Constitutional Law Center! We review an unusual summary reversal in a capital habeas case and the latest universal injunction developments, and discuss some of the implications of the change in administration. After that…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
An unscheduled, unpredictable Supreme Court podcast. Hosted by Will Baude and Dan Epps. In partnership with SCOTUSblog.
HOSTED BY
Will Baude, Dan Epps
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Divided Argument have?
Divided Argument currently has 122 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Divided Argument about?
An unscheduled, unpredictable Supreme Court podcast. Hosted by Will Baude and Dan Epps. In partnership with SCOTUSblog.
How often does Divided Argument release new episodes?
Divided Argument publishes regularly with 122 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Divided Argument?
You can listen to Divided Argument on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Divided Argument?
Divided Argument is created and hosted by Will Baude, Dan Epps.
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